I follow the dirt track, taking the left fork as instructed by Lizzie, and pull up outside a large white farmhouse nestled amongst some trees. Cash’s giant truck sits parked alongside a few other pickups in the dirt lot. I can just see a stable off in the distance, about a football field away, and a barn out back. It’s the most perfect setting to live a life.
Are you lonely up here?
Walking up the front steps, bag and coffee in hand, I ring the doorbell.
I hear it ring through the house and I wait. I don’t hear any noise or dogs from the other side of the door. I give a light tap. Still nothing.
I’m about to give up, sad my plan failed, when I hear a noise around the side of the house. Walking around the back, I see a man, short and stocky, in an outfit that matches what I generally see Cash wearing, hat, boots, tight jeans. He’s carrying some sort of mechanical implements.
Seeing me standing there, my food in hand, he startles, dropping one or two things through his loaded hands.
“Shit,” he mumbles.
I put my things down, carefully, and jog over. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” I tell him, kneeling to pick things up and try to find a place to put them so they won’t fall again.
“S’kay. You didn’t scare me. I just wasn’t expecting to see a woman standing there. You got a delivery or something?”
“I was just looking for Cash. I rang the bell…” I trail off as he watches me.
Nodding once, he eyes me suspiciously. “Cash?” He thinks for a second before deciding on something. “He’s up at the stables.” He inclines his head in the direction of the building I saw earlier.
“Great, thanks!” I give him a giant smile which seems to relax his face a little before he goes back about his business.
Trudging across the land toward his barn, I realize it’s further than I thought. I’m huffing a little before I reach the doorway, but I can hear voices, or at least, a voice, inside as I approach.
“Daisy, I tell ya what, I’m the biggest idiot God put in Montana.” Silence.
“Don’t look at me like that. I barely even remember texting her in the middle of the night, but my confessions are right there—in black and white. I’m an ass.”
I peek around the corner and see him talking to his dun mare. He rubs her down with a brush, making small circles across her haunches, his hand laying lightly on her shoulder while he tells her all his problems. It instantly makes me feel like I need to comfort him for his nighttime commentary.
I giggle at his words, and he spins around so fast he loses his footing and lands against the wall of the stall, sliding down to sit on his butt, a stunned look on his face.
“I brought breakfast.” I hold up the bag and the coffee. He sits in the hay and blinks at me a few times before a huge grin spreads across his face. “It seems scaring the men on this ranch is my plan for the day.” I let out a self-deprecating laugh.
I see the open curiosity on his face and decide to relieve him of it. I wave a hand in the general direction of the house. “I went up to the house first, but you weren’t there, obviously,” I grin at his position on the ground, “and ran into some man coming out of the shed. I startled him too; he dropped his tools.”
“Sonny. I’ll hear about ‘random women just showing up at the ranch’ from him later,” he adds with a chuckle.
“Doesn’t happen often?” I ask, exposing my own curiosity.
“Not usually. I mean…there’ve been women at the ranch, but never uninvited.”
I’m immediately concerned I’ve made a huge misstep in this plan. “Oh, I didn’t realize. I can go?” I ask, wincing a little in embarrassment.
“Hell no, woman,” he says, panic in his voice as he hauls himself up off the ground. “Best thing that’s happened to me is you showing up to my barn. Put your stuff down on the table and come meet Daisy.”
Wandering over to her, now empty-handed, he gives me a peppermint from his pocket. “It’s her favorite.”
I hold it out in my open palm and her giant mouth gobbles it up, making me laugh. She brings her face close to mine at the sound, her hot hay-breath blowing on my hair. I run a hand up her huge snout and she presses against it. Her skin is warm and her fur is so soft.
“She’s beautiful, Cash.”
“I think she agrees about you,” he tells me, wrapping his arms around my middle as he lays his head on my shoulder from behind. I inhale a deep breath, relishing the man at myback, warm and comfortable. His musky scent matches the barn, earthy and grounded. “I’ve never seen her examine someone so closely.” He squeezes me once before letting go. “I’m just going to fill her water, and we can walk back up to the house.”
Carrying the bag, and sipping the coffee, we walk the trail back to the house.
“This is Lizzie’s coffee,” he remarks and makes a big show of moaning.
