The Other Side Of Paradise. Laurie Paige
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a dollar above minimum wage. Next summer she would head south and join the steeple circuit again. If Attila was well enough. If she could accumulate enough to pay for food, gas and fees. As usual, she’d sleep in the truck.
She handled her finances through an online bank. One thousand dollars stood between her and destitution at the present. Ah, well, she’d faced leaner times. After paying for the dun, she’d been down to counting pennies and collecting soda cans for recycling to stave off poverty, while she continued to work the race circuit in California for the rest of the season.
Shaking her head impatiently, she shoved the thoughts to the back of her mind and hurried to the lodge to see what she was supposed to do next. She hoped it was mending fences or something equally solitary.
“Can you change beds?” was the question that greeted her as soon as she walked in the door.
“Uh, as in change rooms?” she asked.
Jonah shook his head. “Change the sheets and make up the beds in the guest rooms. They’ll also need dusting and checking for any lost items. Empty the waste-baskets, too.”
“Sure.”
Upstairs, she stripped the six beds, gathered the used towels and started the washing machine she’d discovered in a laundry/storage room yesterday while searching for the bathroom. Next to the laundry was a room with a large, tiled shower. A powder room with a toilet and sink was on the other side of that. Each bedroom also had its own sink, which was convenient for the occupants.
Linens and towels were stored in a cabinet in the laundry room, which also held a vacuum cleaner and cleaning supplies. While the sheets were washing, she made up the beds with fresh ones, then cleaned and checked each room as instructed. By the time the second load of sheets was spinning out, she had the rooms finished.
She cleaned the shower and powder room, then vacuumed the hall runner. Finally she folded and stored the clean linens, then put fresh towels in all the rooms.
Noting the empty vases on the reading tables, she dashed outside and picked long stalks of dried grass beside the stable, plus a few graceful branches from a hemlock and a juniper. These she made into interesting arrangements in the vases in each guest room, then used the leftover pieces in her room.
“Very nice,” a deep voice said from the doorway.
Startled, she jerked around. Her boss stood there, his expression thoughtful. She tried not to sound defensive as she explained, “I placed some grass and evergreens in all the guest rooms.”
“Yeah, I saw them. Good idea.”
She relaxed, unable to figure out what it was about him that made her nervous. Other than his ability to move around the place without a sound. And to probe her mind with a glance and a few observant questions.
“What’s next?” she asked.
“Roundup. Keith and Janis are driving part of the herd this way. We’ll meet them and bring the cattle here. The seed cows stay for the winter. The rest go to the stock sales or are delivered to those we have contracts with.”
She detected a note of displeasure in his manner, but hadn’t a clue to what bothered him. “Uh, who takes care of the campers? And the store?”
He shrugged. “We use the honor system. It seems to work okay most of the time.”
“I can probably handle the herd—”
“You don’t know where it is.”
“I’m good at directions.”
He studied her long enough to start the qualms to churning. He didn’t have a lot of faith in her abilities. She met his gaze dead-on, determined to show him she could hold her own against any male wrangler.
“Do you always argue with the boss?” he demanded.
She’d asked for that one. “Not always.” She kept her tone neutral.
“Just most of the time,” he muttered, then he smiled. “The rooms look nice. It’s time for lunch. We’ll eat, then hit the trail.”
“I’ll need a mount.”
“You’ll need two for the country we’ll be traveling. The horses should be rested enough to leave around one o’clock.”
She nodded as a trill of excitement pinged around inside her like an echo in a box canyon. Actually she’d only herded animals a few times in her youth and at the rodeos where she’d usually helped with the bucking broncos.
No need to tell him that. Cattle were just critters. She could handle critters.
Jonah closed the safe and spun the cylinders. He’d bought the relic at his cousin’s shop last year. Wells Fargo was still visible in faded gold letters on the front. It suited the resort’s needs perfectly.
He liked things that fit in, that made sense in the grand scheme of life as he saw it. He was pretty sure the new wrangler didn’t fit any mold.
As a former orphan, she might not appreciate the intimacy of long winter days snowed in, just the two of them at the lodge when hunting season ended. You could get to know a person extremely well in those circumstances.
However, Keith and his family did come over if the weather got too bad to stay at their place. That added some diversity to the winter nights. After the new year began, the snowmobile and winter hiking crowd would show up.
She might not like that, either, he admitted. He’d already deduced that she preferred being around animals more than people. Interesting. In his experience, women loved any excuse to go to town and gossip with friends.
He wondered if she was running from something…or someone. Zack Dalton was the assistant sheriff. He could ask the lawman to check out her credentials.
A smile tweaked the seriousness of his thoughts. One thing—the lady could cook. On a lot of ranches that would be enough to keep her at all costs.
He headed outside and spotted her at the fence. She had two cowponies saddled and two on leads. The rain gear and food packets he’d prepared after lunch were already tied behind the saddles or on the spare mounts.
“You’re efficient,” he commented.
“One learns to be.”
“In the orphanage?”
“At the rodeo. You have to move things along for the shows. Broncos and bulls aren’t always cooperative.”
Her smile was brief, but intriguing as it hinted at memories of her past. He refrained from questions.
“Your horses are very well trained,” she finished.
“Most of them are retired cutting horses. Our neighbors, the Daltons raise and train some of the best. Keith and I buy the ones that are getting a bit long in the tooth.”
“An old-age home for horses,” she murmured. “I like that.” She patted her mount’s neck.
He noted she had her gloves on, but no chaps. “You’ll need chaps to get through some of the brush. There’re extra pairs in the tack room.”
She nodded and hurried to the stable. The tack room took up a space the size of a stall at one end. She returned in less than two minutes, the leather chaps outlining her body.
Watch it, he warned his libido as she swung up into the saddle, her lithe, slender body moving with sensuous ease. She was the hired hand and way, way off-limits to anything that might come to mind.
He glanced at the lofty mountain peaks surrounding the ranch. At present, there were only a couple of lingering ridges of last year’s snow on the highest peak. The first snow of the current season hadn’t fallen yet, but when it did, they could be snowed in for days at the lodge.
The question on his mind wasn’t whether she could take it, but whether he could.
Startled,