A Cowboy Under the Mistletoe (6 page)

Ally yawned and stretched. “You're up.”

Hank took the puppies and placed them at Duchess's side, one by one, and made sure they all latched on. “I'm used to staying up all night to nurse sick animals.”

Ally shrugged and began preparing another bottle of puppy formula. “Financial analysts pull all-nighters, too.”

Hank didn't doubt that she gave her all to whatever she
did. Tenacity was something he and Ally seemed to have in common. However, he still thought she needed a break. He closed the distance between them, wishing he could kiss her again. He put his hands over hers, stilling the movements of her fingers. “Seriously, I can handle all the dogs for the next two hours if you want to catch a little shut-eye.”

Ally pulled away. “I can't hit the sheets just yet. Gracie is due for another feeding.” Her kissable lips assumed a stubborn pout.

Hank pushed away the forbidden image her sweet, soft lips had evoked.

With effort, he concentrated on the problem at hand. “Gracie?”

Reluctant pleasure tugged at the corners of her mouth. “I thought she should have a name, other than ‘the littlest one.'”

Their eyes met. Once again, Hank felt a mutual purpose, a bond. The same sort of connection he figured parents of a newborn baby felt. But then she lowered her gaze, and it was gone. He studied the newborn pup's velvety golden coat and scrunched up face. “Gracie is good. It suits her.”

“You're not going to argue with me?” Ally joked, only half-humorously. “Tell me that I shouldn't name a pup I'm only going to have to give away?” She snapped her mouth shut, as if worried she'd reveal even more of her runaway emotions.

Hank shrugged. “I figure you probably already know that. Besides,” he said slowly, “Gracie is the runt of the litter.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” she demanded, narrowing her eyes.

“Someone willing to pay top dollar for a show quality
retriever may not want anything less than perfection. Cute as Gracie is, her size could be a deterrent.”

Ally fumed. “Not to me!”

No kidding.
Her intense reaction worried him a bit. Ally was becoming personally involved in the situation and was bound to get her heart broken if and when Duchess's owner showed up to claim the litter and their mama. She almost would have been better off if she had continued to loathe the canine species as much as she had when Duchess first showed up.

The sound of a truck motor in the driveway broke the silence. Ally wrinkled her nose and continued cradling the puppy like a newborn baby. “Are you expecting anyone?”

Hank shook his head. “You?”

She furrowed her brow. “At dawn?”

A knock sounded on the back door, and Hank went to open it.

His father was standing there, foil-covered plate in hand.

Hank figured he knew what this was about.

The blessing was, Ally didn't. And if he could help it, she would never have any idea.

“Might as well get it over with,” Hank told his father short minutes later. As the sun rose over the horizon, the two of them emerged from Hank's pickup truck and strode toward the back. Hank opened the tailgate so they could get at the supplemental feed for his herd, and shot his father a knowing glance. “'Cause I know you didn't come here just to say hello to Ally, see the new pups and help me tend my cattle.”

“You're right.” Shane hefted a big bale of hay and carried it into the mesquite-edged pasture where the hundred cattle had weathered the cold and rain the night before. “I did want to talk to you in private.”

Hank cut the twine and separated the feed, scattering it about so the steers could get at it easily. “What about?”

The two of them got back in the truck and drove a little farther on before stopping and doing the same thing again.

“The word in town is that Corporate Farms is wooing Ally,” Shane stated.

Hank shrugged. “She's talking to a Realtor about listing the property, too.”

His dad lifted a silver brow. “I thought
you
had a deal with her.”

I thought so, too.
Which was what he got for letting the
arrangement be as convenient as Ally had needed it to be, when he had volunteered to watch over the property for her last summer, in the wake of her dad's death.

Hank went over to check the water supply. Ice had formed around the edges of the trough, so he broke it up with a hoe. “She agreed to let me run cattle here and live in the house, in exchange for my help tending to the ranch.” At the time it had seemed the perfect solution for both of them.

Shane studied the property with a horse rancher's keen gaze. “She knew you were interested in buying it?”

“Eventually.”
When I had the money.
“Yes.” Hank carried another bundle of feed across the rain-soaked ground. “She also figured—rightly so—that I couldn't afford it yet.”

Shane followed with another bundle. “I wish you had talked to me before you struck that deal,” he said with regret.

Hank's irritation increased. Tired of weathering his father's meddling in his affairs, he squared off with him. “We both know what would have happened if I had!”

“You'd be better off now,” his dad countered, his disapproval as evident as his need to help.

“I'd be
better off
if you and the rest of the family stopped trying to coddle me!” Acting as if he were some damned invalid, instead of a decorated ex-marine embarking on the next chapter of his life.

His father grimaced like the take-charge man he was. “We're not doing that,” he argued.

Like hell they weren't! “You've done nothing but that since Jo-anne's death,” Hank countered.

Shane's jaw set. “You fell apart.”

Hank turned his gaze away from the mounting concern
in his dad's eyes. “And I've long since put myself back together again.”

Shane sighed. Tried again. “The point is, son—”

“The point is,” he interrupted curtly, lifting a staying hand, “we shouldn't be having this conversation. Not now. Not ever.”

 

A
LLY WAS UPSTAIRS IN
the sewing room when Hank and Shane returned.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to know something had happened while they were gone. The two men appeared to be barely speaking as they parted company. Which was a surprise. Ally had thought the McCabes were a close-knit family through and through. Yet as Hank stood watching his father's pickup disappear from view, he looked as tense and bereft as she had usually felt when dealing with her own parents.

Not that it was any of her business, she reminded herself sternly, returning to the cutting table.

Seconds later, she heard him come in.

Footsteps sounded in the hall. The door to his bedroom closed.

Fifteen minutes later, Hank emerged, looking freshly showered and cleanly shaven. He paused in the doorway of the sewing room. A smile quirked his lips when he glanced at the puppies snuggled together in the warming bed, with Duchess lying on the floor next to it.

An eyebrow lifted in silent inquiry.

Self-consciously, Ally explained, “I needed to do work up here, and I didn't think I should leave them unattended so soon.”

Hank nodded, a knowing light in his midnight-blue eyes.

“By the way, the candy cane shaped coffeecake your
mother sent over was absolutely delicious.” The festive gift had sported a flaky golden bread, cranberry-cherry filling and cream cheese frosting.

Hank folded his arms and propped one shoulder against the frame. “I'll tell her you said so.” He nodded at the sophisticated ivory fabric she was measuring. “What are you doing here?”

Ally picked up the shears and began to cut. “Making new drapes for the downstairs windows, to dress up the space.”

He came closer, in a drift of sandalwood and leather cologne. “You know how to do that?”

Her gaze flicked over his nice-fitting jeans and navy corduroy shirt, then rose in a guilty rush. “My mother taught me how to sew when I was eight. I helped her make custom slipcovers and draperies.” And she needed to stop remembering what it had been like to be held in his arms, kissing him passionately.

Hank hooked his thumbs in the belt loops on either side of his fly. “I didn't realize she had a business.”

Ally swallowed around the sudden parched feeling of her throat. “They needed the income she brought in to buy more land.”

His gaze roved her face, settling briefly on her mouth. A prickling, skittering awareness sifted through her. “And put you through college?” he added, almost as an afterthought.

Ally tensed and marked off another length. “I did that myself.”

Hank did a double take. “Seriously?”

Ally picked up her shears once again. She bent her head, concentrating on her cutting. “They didn't want me to leave Laramie County. They would have preferred I stay on the ranch and build a life here.”

He came closer. “But you went anyway.”

She sighed. “Like I said, I was determined to do things my own way.” She pushed the bad memories aside and turned her attention back to him. “And speaking of parents…what's going on with you and your dad?”

A muscle in his jaw flexed. “What do you mean?”

Ally eyed him pointedly. “I saw the two of you come back. Neither of you looked particularly happy.”

Hank shrugged and averted his gaze.

“Does the discord have something to do with the ranch?”

His expression darkened. “Why would you think that?”

“I'm not sure.” It was her turn to lift her shoulders. “I just do.”

Silence fell. Hank looked as if he was about to say something, but didn't. The quiet continued, fraught with tension.

Aware this wasn't the first time she'd been summarily cut out of a situation—her parents had done it all the time—Ally turned her attention back to her task and cut along the last line she had marked.

Her feelings were hurt, but she wasn't sure why—it shouldn't matter if Hank confided in her or not. She cleared her throat, and added with as much indolence as she could manage, “Anyway, if that's all…”

“Actually—” Hank's frown deepened “—it's not. I've got something I need to do in Laramie.”

Could he be more vague?

Could she be more nosy?

Honestly! What was wrong with her today? Just because she and Hank had bonded a little over the birth of the litter, and exchanged one way-too-hot kiss, that was no reason to think they were involved in each other's lives. Because
they weren't now, and definitely wouldn't be once the ranch was sold!

“Can you watch over Duchess and the pups a little while longer?”

Trying to hide her disappointment at his sudden remoteness, Ally nodded. “Sure.”

And that, it seemed, was that.

 

“T
HERE'S NO WAY WE
can give you a mortgage on Mesquite Ridge without at least ten percent down,” the president of Laramie Bank told Hank an hour later. “And given the fact we're talking about a two and a half million dollar loan…” Terence Hall ran a hand over his close-trimmed beard.

Hank had already run the numbers. “I need two hundred and fifty thousand, cash.”

Terence rocked back in his chair. “Plus an application fee, closing costs. Money for the survey, inspection and title search. And a real estate sales commission if she lists with a broker, as she currently plans to do.”

The situation was getting worse by the minute, Hank thought, as he listened to the Christmas music playing in the lobby of the bank. Only there was no Santa Claus here. Only Ally Garrett, and Graham Penderson from Corporate Farms, who could easily become this year's Grinch, by stealing the property out from under him.

Aware that his holiday spirit was fading as fast as his problems mounted, Hank decided to be straight with the most influential banker in the county. The word in the agricultural community was that if Terence couldn't make it happen, no one could. “I've got only forty thousand saved.”

Terence rapped his pen on his desk. “Maybe you could convince Ms. Garrett to do some sort of land contract or lease-purchase agreement.”

Hank's hand tightened on the brim of his Stetson. “I doubt it. Besides, even then I'd have only a hundred eighty days max—to come up with the rest of the cash, or forfeit everything I've already put in.”

On just the assumption this would work out as I hoped.

“Perhaps if you sell your herd…”

“I'd be all hat and no cattle, with no cash to replace 'em.”

“Sometimes there are sources for cash that aren't readily thought of.”

Hank knew where this was heading. He'd already had one argument today with his dad. He wasn't going to have another, with a banker. He lifted a palm and stood, not about to go down that road now. “Thanks for your time,” he said curtly. “I'll let you know if anything changes.”

Terence followed him to the door. “Maybe you should have another talk with Ms. Garrett,” he suggested hopefully.

As it happened, Hank planned to do just that.

 

T
HE ONLY PROBLEM WAS,
when Hank got back to the ranch, a big Cadillac with a Corporate Farms logo was sitting in the driveway.

Frowning, he got out of his truck and walked inside.

Ally was standing next to a ladder in the living room, a spritz bottle in one hand, a putty knife in another. In worn jeans, an old Rice University T-shirt and sneakers, with her hair drawn into a clip, she looked younger—and more vulnerable than ever—as Graham Penderson harangued her.

“It's a good offer. Better than you'd get if you went the traditional sale route.”

Snorting, Ally sent Graham a narrowed-eyed glance.
“That's ten percent less than the asking price suggested by Premier Realty.”

You go, girl,
Hank thought, pleased to see her standing up to the pushy acquisition agent.

Penderson turned his back on Hank and continued his pitch in a you'd-be-crazy-not-to-accept-this-deal tone. “We subtracted out the real estate commission and other costs. You'd still get the same amount, only without all the hassle and expense of—if you'll forgive my candor—renovating this dog of a house.”

It was also, Hank thought, the home in which Ally had grown up.

Not a smart move, criticizing it.

He looked over at her.

Ally's face remained calm, her emotions—whatever they were—camouflaged. She climbed back down the ladder and wordlessly accepted the written offer Graham Penderson was holding out. With a forced smile, she walked over and put the papers on the scarred rolltop desk. “I'll take that into consideration,” she stated cooly.

Graham Penderson did not seem to know when to quit. “If you sell to us,” he continued, “you won't have to worry about updating anything on the property, since we intend to tear down all existing buildings, including the ranch house and barns, and build something much more utilitarian.”

Ally blinked.

She hadn't been expecting that.

“That seems like a waste,” Hank interjected, in an effort to buy Ally time to pull her thoughts together.

The agent swung around to him. “It's good business,” he countered matter-of-factly. He turned back to Ally. “The offer is good for forty-eight hours,” he said impatiently, holding his Resistol at his side.

“So you said.” Ally ignored the question in Hank's eyes
and gestured toward the door. “Now if you'll excuse me, Mr. Penderson, I have work to do.”

The smart move, Hank noted, would have been to take the hint. The agent did no such thing.

“Not if you sell to Corporate Farms. Then, all you have to do is sign on the dotted line, take the money and run.”

Clearly unimpressed, Ally stared down the CF representative. “So you
also
said.”

Penderson stepped even closer. “I'd hate to see you lose out on what has to be the answer to your prayers.”

Ally remained grimly silent. Hank figured this was his cue, and walked toward the agent. “I believe the lady asked you to leave.”

Penderson turned. Whatever he was about to say was lost as Hank clapped a firm hand on the small man's shoulder, physically propelling him across the living room, through the dingy foyer and all the way to his car. Hank waited until Penderson drove off, then went back inside. Ally was back on the ladder, spritzing a piece of the loose horse-and-hound wallpaper. If she resented his macho interference, she wasn't showing it.

“You okay?” he asked gently.

Ally set the spray bottle on the platform at the top of the stepladder. Stubbornly pressing her lips together, she eased the putty knife beneath the paper. “Why wouldn't I be?” The wallpaper made a ripping sound as it separated from the ancient drywall.