Page 14 of Baker
Two younger siblings looked at the youngest. Ford nodded. “Yeah, okay, we can do a year, right, Bella?”
Bella seemed a little disappointed but covered it quickly. “That sounds wonderful. A year. Yes, a year here making dresses sounds just amazing.”
Granny took Bella’s hand and gave it a squeeze. Then she leveled her sight on me. “Well, Baker, what do you say? That seems like a fair deal all around.”
I sat back to assess them all. Personally, I was happiest when it was just me and my horse. I’d always been like my mother in that regard. Withdrawn, prone to solo jobs, which was why ranching suited me. Most times, it was just me and the cattle. Beefers didn’t say much or ask where you were going or how come you drink so damn much. I had not been a social drunk. That old George Thorogood song about drinking alone could have been written about me.
“You all plan on staying here while during this year of probation?” I asked and got nods around the table. Great. Just great.
“?Course they are! We’re not going to make your brothers and their family take rooms at the Bastian Grange Motel. This house was built for lots of cowboys and kids!” Granny told me. And when I say told, I do mean told. Oh sure, I could argue and spit and kick rocks, but in the end, she was the matriarch. And while the ranch was now legally mine—well, a quarter of it was—Granny ruled the roost, especially when it came to household shit. And this here was big household shit. “Maybe you all shoulddraw up some sort of agreement, just between yourselves, about this here probation period. Guess you could even get it read over by Milton if you wanted, but I think a paper signed by all four of you is legal enough.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” Dodge said and got agreements from Ford and Linc.
“I’m happy to sign a rental agreement for the springhouse boutique. Oh!” Bella said as her eyes went round. “That is a darling name, don’t you all think?”
Chatter filled the kitchen. I folded my arms over my chest and listened to the noise. Then, because Granny was already discussing dress patterns with Bella while Linc and Ford talked goats—goats for the love of God—Dodge gave me a questioning look.
It all seemed to be a lot. Did I want four strangers in the only home I had ever known? Nope. All my solitary instincts were on high alert. Nothing would have made me happier than waving goodbye to all of them. Well, maybe not Bella. She was nice and seemed kind in a way that you rarely saw anymore. But the others? Yep, later, dudes. But—and this was a huge but—they had money to invest. And this ranch was cash poor. Hell, it was poor in almost every way a property could be poor. Did they all have silly ideas about boutiques, goats, and hot tubs in line cabins? Yes. Yes, they did. Yet, and here came another but, could those ideas bring back Bastian Acres Ranch? Maybe? I didn’t know. Was I willing to chance it and them for a year? What did I actually have to lose other than fried eggs, my bed, and all that coveted alone time?
With a sigh, I nodded, just once, and took the last egg before Lincoln could pounce on it like a hungry weasel.
“None of you are taking my bedroom,” I announced and shoved the whole egg into my mouth to emphasize my point.They might be taking over my ranch and my house, but they werenottaking the last fried egg or my damn bed.
A man had to havesomelimits.
6
Chapter Six
Seven days later, my limits had been reached.
Which was why I was out on Prissy, alone, checking the fencing. Was it a job that needed to be done today? Probably not. The new cattle wouldn’t be arriving for some time, but if I didn’t get out of the house and away from myhalf-brothers, I was going to start saying things that I couldn’t take back. One of the lessons I have learned at meetings as well as in life was that things said in anger, or when shitfaced, had a tendency to never really die.
Heated words kind of lingered in the heart or house like a ghost, showing up out of nowhere to make your life less than pleasant. My ex-wife could attest to my rambling mouth when I was hammered. Just another reason among many—gay sex with a rodeo cowboy was probably the largest nail in that marital coffin—but nasty words hurt. And while I wasn’t head over heels for my siblings yet, they were now legally co-owners of the ranch. Also, they were sinking cash into Bastian Acres at an alarming rate. New beefers? Yep, in a few weeks, courtesy ofthat moolah from my half-brothers. Big red and black Herefords were due to be delivered. Twenty. Nineteen heifers and a proven bull.
Oh, and goats.
“Goats,” I mumbled to Prissy as we rode along the fencing that ran west, then cut over to touch the corner of a swollen creek. Prissy flicked an ear and stopped atop a knoll to watch a ring-necked pheasant take to wing. “It’s a bird. They don’t eat horses.” She snorted a few times. Once she was sure the bird was not coming back to attack her, she began walking again. “So goats. They said we should diversify. Goats are hot and cool. Less methane in the air. You ever round up goats?”
The horse was not commenting. She didn’t need to. I knew she had never seen a goat in her life. I’d not had much interaction with them, to be honest. There was a goat barn on the fairgrounds filled with kids and caprines with them funny eyes. Ford had been put in charge of the goats when they arrived since it was his idea to bring them in. Not that he knew the front end of a goat from the back, obviously, but he seemed okay with the idea. He and Linc were clearing out an old storage barn for the big boar goats we’d located not all that far from here.
Granny had taken Bella under her wing and into her junk room. The hum of that old Singer could be heard way into the night as dresses and pants and frilly tops were created. Bella was helping Granny with the household chores. They got on well and Bella seemed content to help cook and sew and chatter with us when we all returned to the homestead for meals.
Dodge seemed to be the organized one, so he stepped in to create a paper for us to sign, a probationary outline, that said one year from now we would reconvene to discuss whether they wished to stay or leave. He also was really good at bookkeeping, so I begrudgingly handed him the password to my bookkeeping program. His exhalation upon opening it was huge. I tried, Itruly did, but I was more a shove the receipts into a folder and forget about them for a year kind of man. He got things sorted over a few days with a lot of muttering. I could do it, but I was shit with numbers in rows and he seemed pretty sharp. Guess you had to be to run a successful dental practice. His son had a month of school yet, private school if you could imagine, and then he would be coming to the ranch. Granny, of course, was beside herself with all the hubbub. I tended to drift off when it got too loud. Cards at night were a thing now. With dismal internet, streaming movies was touchy so cards seemed to be the game of choice to while away the time before bed. This morning over breakfast, after Bella had done Granny’s hair, a rather heated discussion broke out about which breakfast sausage was superior. Seriously, the three of them went back and forth about pork meat while I was trying to eat my damn oatmeal in peace.
When I left, they were still bickering about the amount of sage in one brand. Granny gave me a smile as I exited stage left, eager to be out of the din and on the back of a horse.
Only fifty-one weeks to go. I could do this. They’d settle in soon, I hoped. Shaking off the buzz of lingering annoyance, we headed to the left, riding along the barbed wire fence line until it hit a small stand of ancient eastern redbuds. Prissy began to curl her upper lip. I leaned up a bit to see if I could see what she was smelling. Tucked in among the short trees was a small pop-up tent. I caught sight of a huge lens glinting in the morning sun and felt a small spark of anticipation, knowing that Hanley was close.
“We know him,” I whispered, patting the horse before giving her a tap on the sides. She went forward but wasn’t keen about it. “Just a smelly dude with a camera.”
“I heard that,” Hanley called, easing out from behind the 35mm set up on a tripod. He looked good. Whiskery with overgrown hair, but man, did it look fine on him. I slid from thesaddle, letting the reins fall. Prissy lowered her head to munch on the short green grass. “I’ll have you know I washed up in that creek back there last night.”
I ambled closer, refusing to dwell on the mental image of a naked Hanley in a wild creek. My dick twitched.
“Thought you were out here to take pictures of animals, not lonely cowpokes.” I walked up and offered him my hand. He shook firmly and waved at his little camping area tucked under the redbuds. The trill of a male bluebird floated over us as his fingers held mine. I was reluctant to let go, but someone had to make the call.
“I’m here to take pictures of nature’s glory and a man as handsome as you surely qualifies.”
