“I would too. I will plead with Gerald,” Tracy said jokingly but was serious as well. With a glance around the corrals, stables, and store, she saw everyone but Cash.
“I think Gerald will let you do what you want. I hope you’ll ask him to send me along.”
“Of course I will, Jacob,” Tracy said. “We work well together.”
Jacob added, “Just don’t let Gerald find out Cash has a crush on you.”
“Cash doesn’t have a crush on me,” Tracy said maybe a little too quickly.
“Okay, sure. And you don’t have one on him, either,” Jacob teased her and in a quiet voice added, “If we do get to come back, I hope we don’t get stuck with Donna again.”
“I have to agree with you about Donna,” Tracy said softly. “Since you have your camera, come with me to the cabin. I’ll get my laptop and we can talk about what I’ve written so far. We can also pull up your photos and discuss which ones go best with the story.”
“Yes, I was just thinking the same thing.”
Tracy caught up with Kellie and Cristen before leaving the café and giving them her phone number and urged them to text or call if she could be of any further help to them. Then back at her cabin, she and Jacob sat in the rocking chairs on the porch while working on matching sections of her article with his photographs. Having made a great deal of progress, they had just smacked hands in a high five when the chow bell clanged to announce lunch.
“I promised to let Cash have a look at the story and photos before I submit them,” Tracy said a lot more casually than she felt. “I hope he approves.”
With a nod, Jacob said, “Speak of the devil.”
“Where?” Tracy asked as her heart suddenly pounded.
Jacob indicated the stables and Tracy turned her head. Cash and Sam walked into the sunshine and stopped near the stage to speak with Beau. Kellie left the dining area with a thermos and paper cups in one hand and a large, insulated lunch bag in the other. Reaching the men, she handed the lunch bag to Cash and the cups and thermos to her husband. Giving Sam a kiss, she made her way back to the kitchen. Jeff exited the barn with Ed and Larry following him, and they gathered around Cash as he spoke to them.
“Time to eat again!” Donna said way too loudly, bursting out of the cabin. Her clothes and hair were somewhat disheveled, but she seemed oblivious. “Well, well, I see all the gorgeous cowboys gathered in one big group. I’ll go say hello.”
“Donna, it looks like they’re in a meeting with Cash,” Tracy said. She couldn’t imagine interrupting Cash and his crew.
“I think it looks like they’re ripe for picking,” Donna said.
“Aren’t they all spoken for?” Jacob asked.
“Cash and Jeff aren’t,” Donna snapped, despite having said Cash wasn’t interested and Jeff was too young. With a shrug, she stumbled off the porch. Spewing a curse at tripping, she jiggled her way toward the men and stables. “Hi boys!”
“Donna is an embarrassment,” Jacob muttered.
“I wish she wouldn’t make a pest of herself.”
Tracy wondered if she, too, had made a pest of herself with Cash. Cash had caught sight of Donna coming for them. From her rocking chair, Tracy raised a hand in the air and wiggled her fingers in a wave at Cash. But he had returned his attention to his crew and with a couple of gestures and a nod appeared to finish his instructions to them. The men split up, with Cash and Sam heading to thehouse and the wranglers veering off in several different directions. Donna found herself left alone in the dust.
“I don’t think he noticed you wave,” Jacob said, causing Tracy to slowly lower her hand to her lap. “He was too busy putting distance between himself and Donna.”
Or between himself and me, Tracy thought as Cash vanished from view.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Never had a woman ditched Cash until Tracy Dalton.
He didn’t know which was worse: a woman clinging to him as he rolled out of her bed or rolling over in his own bed and finding Tracy gone.
Finding Tracy gone.
He had only himself to blame. He’d broken his steadfast rules of not letting a woman spend the night and not using a condom. What the hell had he been thinking? Whatever thinking he’d done wasn’t with his brain. Somehow bringing her into his private world had backfired.
The sex with Tracy, no—making love to Tracy, had been so incredible he’d almost convinced himself it was a dream. Maybe she’d never been in his bed at all, just in his fantasy. But as he had sat up on the side of his bed he’d noticed a spot of blood, her innocence surrendered to him, on his white sheet. It was the only tangible proof she’d actually spent the night with him. Part of the night.
“My own damn fault,” Cash muttered to himself as he set the lunch bag on the kitchen table. Leaving Jeff in charge of the guests, he and Sam had a Zoom meeting in a few minutes regarding the possible purchase of some horses, thus he’d asked Kellie to pack lunches for them.
