Page 9 of Road to a Cowboy

“Fine,” Cal acknowledged. “Before Monday.”

Austin opened the door wider to let Cal through and gave Barbara a mock salute. “A pleasure as always, Barbara.” As he stepped outside, closing the door behind him, he muttered, “Don’t let the flying monkeys get you,” under his breath.

Cal shot him another look, though there was a hint of laughter in his eyes. “Can’t help yourself, can you?”

“Hey.” Austin pulled him to a stop next to his SUV. The laughter was still in Cal’s gray eyes, but behind it lurked old wounds. “I’m sorry about what I said earlier. I didn’t mean to hurt you or?—”

Cal cut him off with a wave of his hand. “It’s fine, Aus. I just wish...” He trailed off, his gaze straying somewhere to Austin’s right. His brows pinched together and he let out a long breath. “Well, I wish a lot of things.”

“Not that your mom and I will get along, right? Because I have to say?—”

“That it’s a pipe dream?” Cal said with a little laugh. “I’m well aware.” He sobered fast. “I’m sorry she’s still so awful to you.”

“Meh. I can handle your mother.” And would handle her every day on Cal’s behalf if only Cal would let him. “Now let’s get back to the market so I can send Marco home for the day.”

Chapter Three

Cal’s workday normally started somewhere around sunrise and ended after sunset. There was no such thing as a typical forty-hour work week in ranching, and Cal liked it that way. Ranching was often unpredictable, but Cal was nothing if not a problem-solver.

Though when ranch hands came to him to solve a problem he shouldn’t have to solve, it tended to put a crimp in his daily to-do list.

“He’s not pulling his weight.”

“Oh, fuck you. I do twice the amount of work you do.”

“Pfft. In your dreams maybe. Every time I see you, you’re slacking off.”

“You see me twice a day. While I’m on break. I’m legally allowed those.”

Biting back a sigh, Cal held up a hand, shutting both men up.

The day was miserable as hell: cold, wet, and gray. He stood outside the horse barn in a patch of mud that was becoming soupier by the minute. Rain dripped off the brim of his hat, and considering he’d been putting out one fire after another all morning, he wasn’t in the mood for petty squabbles that could be resolved without him.

Being foreman wasn’t all get-your-hands-dirty ranch work. It was people management too.

Cal turned to the first man. Kid, really, at barely twenty-one. “Ewan, Orson’s right—he is legally entitled to breaks.”

“But—”

“And Orson, Ewan’s right,” Cal continued, wiping the smirk off Orson’s face. “You do tend to slack off when you think I’m not looking.”

“But—”

“There’s a fallen tree in the northeast field that came down during last night’s storm. I need you both to get rid of it.”

They looked at him, each other, him again.

“Together?” Ewan asked.

Cal raised an eyebrow and added a trace of steel to his voice. “That a problem?”

“Nope.”

“No, sir.”

“Good. Take one of the trucks. You’ll need it.”

They slunk off, shoulders hunched against the rain, already arguing about who would drive.

---