Chapter Eight
Liz looked between the two men, Tanner striding away to the barns and Jake turning toward the house.
Well, now. It was one thing to have Jake own the place silently for the moment, but to have the accounts and responsibility for pay taken from Tanner? Ouch.
Liz fell into step beside Jake, watching him fiddle with his phone and earbuds, serious thoughts clouding his face.
“How’s it going?” she asked, to break the mood that had settled over him, and he looked over at her, then back at the path ahead of them.
“Well, apparently all my stuff arrived in town, and I have to go get it, Rosy is deathly afraid of me, your brother thinks I’m useless, I have the finances of this place to get sorted out, and I am going stir-crazy with no coffee shops and people.”
“So, it’s goin’ well, then,” she drawled, wanting to pull him out of the spiral he seemed to be sinking into.
He laughed, and she liked the crinkles that appeared at the corner of his eyes, the way he relaxed his shoulders. She laughed, too, and he stopped on the path, turning to her.
“Yeah, pity party of one over here. I’m just not quite sure what to make of all this yet. I’m worried, tired, restless, and I don’t do well without the city noise. It’s so quiet here, sleeping is—”
“You’ll get used to it. Weaning season is soon. Trust me, you’ll wish for the quiet of the city after two days of cows bawling.”
“You don’t say,” he replied, raising an eyebrow. “Noisy, huh?”
“Oh god, yes. It took me a couple of seasons to really get used to it when Mom and I first got here. You don’t remember any of this, at all?
” she asked, suddenly wanting to know. He had a tie to here, and she wanted him to remember it, make some good memories, so that maybe he would visit once they got it all sorted out and he went back to his life.
“No. My first memories are of concrete, the local park with the broken seesaw, and our third-floor walk-up apartment,” he replied.
He certainly was interesting, his life so different from theirs, growing up in a place she couldn’t even imagine, or want to be in.
But he seemed to be adaptable, and she hoped it meant he would like it here.
It had hit her last night, listening to him talk to Brady and her mother, that she was warming to the idea of him being here for the near future.
He was fun, easy to talk to, which was reminding her how much she enjoyed talking that wasn’t just pleasantries.
She wanted to discuss things. Debate, or if not that, at least feel like the conversation was worth something.
Brady really seemed to like him, her mother was looking brighter since he had arrived, and the food was certainly better too. Rosy was a good cook, but her food was bland and carb heavy. She cooked to Brett’s tastes, which had been simple.
Liz also decided she liked looking at Jake.
He was easy to watch, fluid and controlled with his movements, both in the kitchen and walking beside her now.
There was a power and stillness in him that a lot of men hadn’t harnessed at his age that was really sexy.
Whether it was to control himself, or was just his way, she didn’t know yet.
“I was three when Mom left here with me. I saw a picture of me once, I think it was winter, and I was standing on the front veranda of the house here, I assume. I’m in some terrible one-piece toddler snowsuit, with a massive beanie on, clutching a bear.
It’s the only picture of me that mom took before we were in New York. ”
“Toque,” she said, grateful for the small admission of his past from him. His voice was light, so she went with it.
“What?” he asked.
“Toque. If you’re going to live in Canada for a while, you need to learn the terminology. What you folks call a beanie, up here us locals call it a toque.”
“Ridiculous,” he muttered, humor in his voice, and they continued walking. “Anyway, no, I have no memory of this place, and my mother would never talk about it other than to tell me it was hell on earth.”
“Is it?” Liz asked, immediately regretting asking such a personal question. She wanted him to say no. She wanted him to say he really liked it here.
“I’ll get back to you on that,” he replied. “But I can say I’m enjoying the fresh air.”
“Well—” she said, and they both stopped in the middle of the driveway at the main house. Liz looked down at her feet, and Jake cleared his throat.
“Yeah. I think I shouldn’t keep Tanner waiting, should I?”
“Okay, then. Good talking to you Jake,” she said.
He turned, walking backward, and waved at her, a smile on his face that made her stop short.
He was completely disarming when he was happy, and her heart skipped a beat.
It didn’t hurt that all his muscles were popping out from his run, and his hair was falling over one eye.
He combed it back as she pulled her lower lip into her teeth.
Men around here did not look like that. Mind you, men around here wouldn’t be caught dead in shorts that showed off their perfectly toned thighs like that either.
“Hey. Why don’t you and I go into town to get my things later today? You have time?”
“Okay,” she said quickly, a funny feeling of elation hitting her square in the stomach. “I’ll hook up my two-horse trailer and come get you. Around one?”
“It’s a date,” he replied, spun, and jogged the rest of the way up the driveway to the house.
Liz let out a breath and looked up to the sky, willing her heart to stop flailing against her chest. A date.
“Well, you wanted to get to know him, girl. Here you go,” she said to herself, and made her way back to the stable.
* * *
Liz honked the horn outside the office, and when no one appeared, killed the engine to the truck and hopped out. They must be ears-deep in the books. She’d said one o’clock, and it was around a quarter past now.
West men, it seemed, were, to a one, not good at timekeeping.
Walking down the hallway between the main cattle barn and the office, she caught voices having some sort of an argument. One deep and even, and one frustrated. Shit. She should have known better than to leave Tanner alone with Jake. Hopefully they hadn’t started throwing punches.
She poked her head into the office. Jake, in well-fitting jeans, a crisp short-sleeved polo, and his hair a complete mess, was on one side of the room looking through Brett’s old ledger. Tanner was on the other, arms crossed, in a pair of oil-stained brown coveralls and beat-up muck boots.
They looked so different it took her a moment to reconcile that the two of them were in the same room. But they were, because the glares Tanner was throwing at Jake were deadly.
“Hey—” she started, but was cut off when Jake ran his finger across the ledger and shook his head.
“So Bobby makes more than Kevin, but both of them make less than Harry or Rowan? Trevor makes more than Liz—”
Tanner interrupted Jake. “Look, this isn’t a fancy restaurant.
These boys are hired for their know-how and their muscle.
Hours are long. Bobby, he’s newer than Kevin, but has a diploma from the Ag college.
So, yeah, he makes more than Kev. Harry, he’s our head cattleman, and Rowan is his son.
They’re the best when it comes to our beef lines.
I trust ’em, so I pay ’em more. Liz runs the stables, and Trevor gets a cut of the lesson program fees on top of his salary. ”
“It’s so arbitrary, I mean—” Jake said, flipping through more pages. “And how is it this isn’t in accounting software?”
“Dad hated computers. We haven’t switched it over yet,” Tanner snapped.
“Lizzie,” he muttered, glancing up at her. He looked beyond frustrated at having to explain everything to Jake, justifying what he paid the staff. Which included her.
She waved back silently and leaned against Brady’s desk, waiting for Jake to notice she was there. He was so deep into that ledger, she was sure he was going to inhale the ink. He was taking a lot of interest in something he really didn’t need to concern himself with.
She’d seen that book so many times, the spiky ink in whatever color pen Brett could find inching across the page, the years marked, the names scratched in over and over.
They’d been on Brett for a couple of years about learning to use a computer for all of it, but he’d always refused.
Old dog, new trick. Liz usually stayed up late right before tax time reading off numbers while Tanner plunked them in, single finger typing across an Excel spreadsheet.
Tanner was only mildly better at using a computer than his father.
It could be funny, as Tanner would get frustrated, swearing at the screen as if that would help.
Jake made a noise, pursing his lips. “These boys don’t make much, comparatively. How on earth do they make ends meet?”
“Doesn’t cost much to live out here. Those who live in the bunkhouse behind Liz’s place, rent comes out of their pay,” Tanner growled. “Enough. I’m through justifying numbers to you. The bank should have set up the paperwork for you to do when you go to town with Bobby later.”
“Actually, I’m taking him in,” Liz said, and Jake turned his head.
Seeing her, his eyes sparkled with amusement.
She shook her head at him, trying not to laugh as she realized he was maybe enjoying goading her brother over the numbers.
Those two, under the hood, were two peas in a pod.
Payback for Tanner insinuating Jake was useless earlier, likely.
Tanner made a frustrated noise, and Liz looked over at him.
“Tan?”
“Where’s Bobby?” he snapped.
“Brady needs him this afternoon,” she lied. “I gotta get some senior feed, salt blocks, and maybe that set of hoof nippers you ordered is in. Might as well get Jake’s stuff while we’re at it and I can drop him at the bank after. Trev is working the horses we need to today, so I have the time.”
Tanner shook his head and flicked his eyes to Jake, who had shut the ledger and put it on Brett’s desk.
They hadn’t gotten around to moving his things out of there yet, and Jake picked up a lumpy piece of iron, polished to a sheen.
He turned it in his hand, studying it, then set it down.
He ran his hands over the funny block-letter nameplate that was half buried under cattle magazines and pulled it out.
It spelled out dad and each blocky, carved letter was painted a garish color of blue.
“Who made this?” he asked, flourishing it. “It’s cute.”
“Brady did,” Liz offered, when Tanner didn’t answer. “Apparently got blue Tremclad all over the front porch painting in the letters. Made it in shop class.”
Jake set it back down, letting out a breath and dusting his hands off. “You’re ready for me?”
She nodded, noticing Tanner was studiously avoiding them, his hands working the muscles on the back of his neck as he looked over some papers on his desk. “I’ll meet you in the truck, Jake. Need to talk to Tanner.”
Jake ducked out without another word.
“Having fun yet?” she asked gently, as Tanner swiveled his eyes up to her.
“He was trying to make me lose my cool. I know it,” he groaned, and sagged into his chair. “Why does he fucking care what I pay my men?”
“Because they’re his men right now, and for once, you have a fresh set of eyes on the books. Someone who knows how to run a business.” Liz chastised him.
Tanner sometimes didn’t realize how much of a dog in a manger he was.
Jake might be temporary, but perhaps he could inject some fresh thinking into some of the business practices Tanner was happy to keep status quo from Brett’s way of doing things.
How many times in the past had he and Brady complained that their father needed to modernize?
Yet when push came to shove, Tanner would stick to tried and true instead of innovating.
She loved him for his loyalty, but it also drove her mad when she wanted to do something new in the stables and would get turned down by both father and son. Maybe that would change now.
“He doesn’t know the first thing about ranching,” Tanner replied.
“Maybe, but he’s managed people. Bobby deserves a raise. You won’t keep him long unless you do. He’ll find a big cash-crop outfit to hop to, one where he can use that brain of his for something other than sitting on a tractor and punching cattle when you’re short a rider.”
“Don’t you start in on me too. I’ve had a long enough day as it is,” Tanner said peevishly, rubbing at his eyes and groaning. “This place is out of control already.”
“It’s been three days, Tan,” Liz snorted. “It’s not. You’re the one who feels adrift because you can’t control absolutely everything right now.”
“It’s our money, Lizzie. Without it, this place don’t run,” he threw back at her.
“I know,” she replied. “It’s temporary. Jake knows how important something like payroll is.”
Tanner groaned and sat up. “Yeah. All right. Pick up a roll of fence wire while you’re at it. Twelve-inch fixed knot. We’re low and we’re due to fix the front fence on the north hayfields.”
Liz nodded curtly. In-control-foreman Tanner was back, and conversation was over. She left him in the office to stew and gratefully stepped into the sunlight. Jake was slouched against her truck, hands in his jeans pockets, sunglasses on. He’d finger-combed his hair, and her mouth went dry.
Holy hell, that looked good leaning up against her truck.
“Boss man chew you out too?” he asked as she walked over.
She laughed and shook her head as she hefted herself into the truck. She grabbed her sunglasses and shoved them on, grinning as he much less gracefully flopped up into his seat and slammed his door.
“Ready, City Boy?” she joked, and turned the key.
“Don’t you start in on me too,” Jake groaned, but smiled when she put the truck in gear and they rolled out.