Page 20 of Second Chance With a Cowboy

“What is all that for?” she asked as Dodge walked up with a circular saw and another handful of boards.

“Hey Leni,” Dodge said, his shit-eatin’ grin telling her he already knew where his brother had spent the night.

Chevy gestured to the stairs leading up to the front porch. “Those steps are treacherous enough as it is without trying to manage them in crutches like Lorna’s going to be doing, so I thought Dodge and I could build her a couple of railings. One for each side.”

“Um…wow…that would be a really nice surprise for her.” Had she mentioned the night before the trouble they’d had trying to navigate the stairs with Lorna’s broken ankle? Or had Chevy just noticed the need and come up with a solution?

“That’s not the only surprise I have for her,” he said, grinning like a kid who had just been given the new toy they’d been wanting.

Leni stared at him as he backtracked to the truck and pulled a blue knee-scooter from the bed.

He carried it back across the yard and set it down in front of her like it was a prize he was awarding. “Check this out. It’s going to make her life so much easier than trying to manage a set of crutches.”

“Where in the world did you get a knee-scooter already this morning?” she asked, not able to keep the incredulity out of her voice.

“One of the gals in the knitting club had one from when she got a knee replacement last year,” he explained. “You have to give it back, but she was happy to loan it to Lorna to use. It even has a basket.” He tapped the pink and white basket attached to the front of the scooter. “Her name is Betty.”

She raised an eyebrow. “The knee-scooter has a name?”

“Oh yeah. Betty the Balance Buddy. And from what I hear, she’d got a personality too. But if you’re good to her, she’ll be good to you.”

Leni let out a laugh. “I’ll let Lorna know.” Then her mouth went dry as he slung a tool belt around his lean hips and dropped a hammer into the ring on its side.

What was it about a man in a tool belt?

Holy hot handy cowboy.

Dodge had already pulled out a tape measure and was marking up two by fours with a pencil and a framing square. He looked up at her with a sheepish grin. “Guess we owe you an apology for the coffee gag we pulled on you and Chev. We just thought it would be a funny way for Chevy to find out you were still in town. We didn’t mean any harm. Sorry if we upset you.”

She sighed. “No harm done. And in retrospect, it was kind of funny to have Chevy rolling up to the counter and trying to order a…what was it…a purple unicorn volcano.”

Dodge laughed. “That one was mine.”

“Yeah, you guys were hilarious,” Chevy told him, with a playful shove to the shoulder.

Leni laughed along with them. It felt good to be around the guys she’d practically grown up with again.

Dodge held a board up to the side of the steps, marked it, then tucked the pencil behind his ear. He wore a baseball cap over his blond hair instead of a cowboy hat, and she could still see the boy she remembered—the one who used to find a shady spot on the farm and read for hours—in his features. It made perfect sense that a total bookworm like him would end up with a librarian.

She’d only seen him and Maisie together a few times, but they seemed totally in love and like a really great fit for each other. Lorna told her that Maisie had been in love with Dodge since the tenth grade—and why wouldn’t she be—the guy had always been sweet and was crazy good-looking.

Allthe Lassiter men were.

Including the one who kept sneaking glances at her and flashing her grins that made her pulse race like a car in the Daytona 500.

Stop looking at him.

Leni turned her attention back to the brother she didn’t used to be in love with and was glad that Dodge had found someone who made him happy. But she wasn’t so sure about the way he was fitting two of the boards together.

She eyed him skeptically. “Do you have any actual plans drawn up? Could I see the specs for these railings?”

Chevy laughed. “This isn’t rocket science, Len. But don’t worry. You know Duke’s been teaching us how to properly build things since we were all ten years old.”

“And we’ve all spent summers working in construction,” Dodge added.

“We can manage two stair railings,” Chevy assured her. “And I promise we’ll do it right.”

Her phone buzzed, saving her from offering any unwanted advice on their building skills, and she pulled it from her pocket to see her sister was calling.

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