Page 71 of The Cowboy Who Worked Late

“Sure is,” Trevor boomed, and Daddy threw him a glare too. To her surprise, her brother laughed.

“Come on, Daddy,” he said. “Who do you think is gonna take over Lone Star if Angel doesn’t start having kids?”

She pulled in a breath, which sent a chunk of scrambled egg down her throat. She started to cough and wheeze and gasp, and Trevor laughed even harder. “I’ve got no prospects,” he said through his chuckles. “I haven’t dated anybody since my accident. If Angel doesn’t get married and have kids, it’s going to be the end of this place.”

Angel cleared her airway by taking a big drink of orange juice. She glanced from Trevor to Daddy. “Henry and I haven’t talked about kids or marriage or anything like that yet,” she said. “It’s been two months.”

“Daddy met Momma and married her within two months,” Trevor said dryly.

“It was four months,” Daddy drawled, and that set Angel giggling too.

She managed another couple of bites of breakfast before everyone sobered and she looked at her father again. “What are you going to do?”

“I’d like to talk to Henry,” he said.

“Daddy, less than a week ago, you told me he was your top choice for captain.” She cocked one eyebrow and took another drink of juice.

“Yeah, well, that’s before I knew he was kissing my daughter,” he said.

“That doesn’t impact his work at all,” Angel said. “It only makes him more loyal to us.” She hated using Henry as a business asset, but Daddy could at least understand that. He nodded and said, “I’m still going to talk to him.”

“Fine,” Angel said. “I’ll text him and tell him that you’d like to meet with him.”

“I have the man’s number,” Daddy said slowly. “I’ll text him myself.”

Angel wanted to lunge for his phone and throw it against the wall to break it. “Daddy,” she said with as much courage and patience as she could. “I really like this man, and I have very little opportunity to meet men off the ranch.”

“Everyone should know,” Daddy said.

“And they will,” Angel said. “But you’re not going to tell them. That’s something that Henry and I get to decide.” She threw another glance to Trevor, though she didn’t know what her brother could do to help her.

“When the new employee manual comes,” she said, seizing onto the idea. “I’ll tell everyone. There is no longer a no-dating rule at Lone Star, and that Henry and I are together.”

“When’s that going to be?” Daddy drawled.

“Another month,” she said. “It’s going to be fine.”

He didn’t say anything else, and breakfast concluded in stony silence—clearly waiting another month was not fine with Daddy.

Daddy helped Trevor stand, and they left with Trevor saying plenty of non-verbal things with his eyes. The moment the frontdoor swung closed, Angel whipped out her phone and texted Henry.

Daddy wants to meet with you. He was not happy. I think I managed to delay him from telling anyone or making an announcement or embarrassing us until the employee handbook comes out.

Oh, boy, Henry sent back.I’m real sorry, Angel. I didn’t mean for that to happen.

Angel sighed. She honestly wasn’t sure what she wanted to have happen.Maybe it’s okay, she typed out.Maybe now that he knows, we don’t have to be so secretive. Maybe we can just start hanging out and holding hands and everyone will get the hint.

Henry called, and instead of saying hello, he said, “No, that’s not gonna work for me.”

“Not gonna work for you?” she repeated, throwing his attitude right back at him.

“Angel, we’re not just going to start pretending like we just started dating and hope other people catch on,” he said. “This requires an announcement—either from you, or Trevor, or Justin, or Shad, or your dad…but I think it should come fromus. Us,together.”

Angel heard the power in his voice. She heard how passionately he felt about this. And she had to say she didn’t disagree. So she said, “Okay…but I’m not ready.”

“That’s fine,” he drawled. “I did want to ask you if you’d come to my graduation in a few weeks.”

Angel once again hesitated, but Henry seemed to have none of that inside him.

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