Chapter 9
“Don’t look so grumpy, Cory.” Sunny shot him a bright smile. “This is fun!”
This wasn’t even close to what Corbin would consider fun. He’d planned on letting his sore butt heal before he got back on a horse. All it had taken was one of Sunny’s puppy dog looks to have him bouncing along on the back of Homer with his teeth jarring and his still-sore butt aching.
He was a complete sucker.
And not just for Sunny.
Mimi bossed him around like he was a wet-behind-the-ears kid. Just this morning, she had gotten after him for holding Tay too much. So now the kitten was wandering around the ranch and getting into things she had no business getting into.
Then there was Darla Holiday. The woman had completely won him over with her baking. She had figured out he had a sweet tooth and was constantly bringing him cookies, brownies, and pies he couldn’t resist.
The only one who hadn’t turned him into putty in their hands was Hank. But with the way the older man had taken Sunny under his wing, Corbin didn’t dislike him as much as he used to.
Then there was Belle. What had he been thinking to offer her his trailer? But it had been impossible not to when she had looked like a little lost lamb that couldn’t find its way back to the flock.
Except she wasn’t a little lost lamb. She was a full-grown woman. A woman who had kept him up for the last two nights with thoughts of her sleeping in his trailer. Had she slept in his bed? Had she rested that mane of ebony curls on his pillow? Tucked those long legs under his sheets? Had she showered in the tiny shower? Lathered her hands with his soap and run them over her curvy hips and perfect breasts?
And if those thoughts weren’t bad enough, he couldn’t stop thinking about the kisses they’d shared on their date.
Belle might be the tentative twin, but she wasn’t a tentative kisser. On the front porch, she’d kissed him with hot slides of her lips and demanding thrusts of her tongue until he had been so hard he’d worried about climaxing in his jeans. The other night, he’d wanted to feel those lips again. When she’d released that breathy little sigh and closed her eyes, he’d been seconds from giving into the temptation.
Thankfully, he came to his senses and left.
Now he just wished he could get her to leave his mind.
“Did you hear about Jesse and Liberty going to Houston?” Sunny cut into his thoughts.
He adjusted his butt in the saddle. “No. What are they doing in Houston?”
“I guess Liberty has some events there this weekend and needs Jesse to help her.”
“Why isn’t Belle helping her?”
“According to Jesse, Belle decided to take some time off. Now Liberty is stuck doing all the events on her own. She’s having Cloe and Sweetie help her with the Memorial Day picnic this weekend, while she and Jesse are in Houston doing a wedding and anniversary.” She laughed. “I can’t shake the image of our rodeo cowboy big brother fluffing a bride’s veil before she walks down the aisle.”
Corbin didn’t laugh. He was too focused on Belle suddenly taking time off from work. He knew she’d been upset the other night. Any fool could have seen that. But he figured she’d be over it by now and she and Liberty would have worked things out.
Obviously not.
“Is Belle okay?” he asked.
“Jesse doesn’t think so. I guess she moved out of Cloe’s house and is staying in some hotel.”
“And they let her?”
Sunny glanced over at him. “She’s an adult woman, Cory. She gets to make the choice where she wants to live.” Her eyes narrowed. “And why are you worried about Belle, anyway? I thought you didn’t like her.”
It was a good question. He wished he had a good answer. Before he could make one up, Sunny glanced over his shoulder and her eyes widened. “Oh, no!” Without any warning, she urged her horse into a gallop.
Homer, being the follower that he was, took off after her, with Corbin hanging on for dear life and praying he wouldn’t fall off and break his neck. Once Homer slowed, Corbin saw what had caused Sunny’s concern. A longhorn steer had gotten stuck in an overgrown mesquite tree. Sunny never could ignore an animal in distress. As soon as she reached the tree, she jumped off her horse. Which scared Corbin to death.
“No, Sunny!” he yelled as he dismounted and pulled out his phone. “I’ll call Hank.”
“We can’t wait for Hank. Look how scared he is.”
He didn’t look scared to Corbin. He looked pissed off. The animal was twisting his head back and forth, his sharp horns poking out of the branches like twin daggers.
“I mean it, Sunny,” Corbin said. “Get back on your horse. I’ll handle this.”
“You don’t know anything about cattle.”
“Neither do you. Now get back on your horse. I’ll free him. Please, Sunny.” Please was the one word that worked the best with his sister. Probably because he only used it when he was about to have a heart attack.
“Fine. But don’t you dare get gored. You might be an annoying big brother, but I’ve gotten used to you.”
Once Sunny was safely on her horse, Corbin tied Homer’s reins to a mesquite branch and moved closer to the struggling steer. “Easy there, big fella. I’m here to help.” The animal rolled his eyes at him and continued to tug at his extremely sharp-looking horns entangled in the gnarled branches of the tree. “Bring me your rope, Sunny.”
Sunny moved her horse up next to him and handed him her rope. It took some doing to get the rope tied around the thick branch that was holding the steer. Especially when trying to avoid thrashing horns. Once Corbin felt like it was secure enough, he tossed the other end to Sunny.
“Wrap that around your saddle horn and see if you can break that branch off.”
She nodded and wrapped the rope around the saddle horn before she clicked her tongue and the horse started backing up. It didn’t take much to break off the branch and free the steer. Corbin got ready to jump out of the way in case the cow charged. But the steer merely shook his head and then continued eating the grass beneath the tree as if he hadn’t just gotten stuck in it.
“We did it!” Sunny crowed. “We’re ranchers!”
“More like two greenhorns who just got lucky,” he said, but Corbin couldn’t help grinning the entire ride home. When they got back to the ranch, Hank stepped out of the barn to help Sunny dismount and she couldn’t wait to tell him all about their rescue.
“You should have seen him, Hank. Cory didn’t even blink. He just walked straight toward that big bull and freed him.”
“It wasn’t a bull, Sunny,” Corbin corrected. “It was a steer.” Hank looked at him with surprise and Corbin couldn’t help wondering if he’d made a mistake. “A steer has been castrated, right?”
Hank studied him intently. “That’s right. And you got that steer out?”
“Yes, sir.” The sir just popped out. Annoyed, he added, “It’s my steer, after all.” He started unsaddling Homer. A thump on the back startled him and he glanced up to see Hank standing there.
“Good job.”
Once Corbin finished unsaddling Homer and made sure he was groomed and had water, he headed to the house to get some work done. The Wi-Fi company had sent a guy out the day before so Corbin had a lot of catching up to do. But once in his office with Tay cuddled on his lap, he couldn’t seem to stay focused. His mind kept wandering to Belle being all alone in a dreary hotel room.
After trying to read through a contract for the sixth time without retaining any of the words, he finally gave up and went in search of Mimi. He found her out front in her flower garden.
“Sounds like you had an exciting afternoon,” she said as soon as she glanced up and saw him standing on the porch. Tay wiggled to get down. When he set her on the porch, she leapt down the steps and weaved her way through the flowers to greet the old woman. Mimi laughed and took off one gardening glove to pet the kitten.
Corbin sat down on the top step. “Sunny exaggerates my abilities.”
Mimi shot him a glance from under the wide brim of her hat. “I doubt that. You seem pretty capable, Cory. And it wasn’t Sunny who told me. It was Hank.”
Again, he felt annoyed. He’d done nothing to endear himself to the Holidays. In fact, he’d done just the opposite. So why were they being so nice to him? No doubt, they were only sucking up so he’d allow them to stay longer. Well, it wasn’t happening. When the month was up, they were gone. So they didn’t need to waste their hospitality on him.
Especially when there was someone in their family who needed it more.
“Belle is pretty upset about Jesse and Liberty getting married,” he said.
Mimi didn’t look surprised by the sudden change of subject. She tugged on her glove and went back to pulling weeds. “I think that was pretty apparent the other night when they made the announcement. And it makes sense. Belle and Liberty aren’t just sisters. They’re twins. They’ve spent their entire lives sharing everything. Marriage is something they can’t share. It has to be hard for Belle.”
“I think that’s putting it mildly. I guess you’ve heard about her taking time off from her business.”
“I heard.” She chuckled. “Liberty is fit to be tied.”
Her amusement surprised him. “You think it’s funny? Because the emotional state your granddaughter was in the other night wasn’t funny.”
Mimi stopped weeding and looked at him. “I heard about you helping out Belle by offering her your trailer to stay in. Seems you keep coming to her rescue. Are you interested in my granddaughter, Cory?”
His annoyance shot to anger. “Not hardly. At least not in the way you’re intimating. But I’m not going to ignore someone who is going through a tough time like you and your family seem to be doing. Belle obviously needs your support right now and you’re here weeding your garden, Miss Darla is inside baking cookies, Hank is doing Lord knows what, and Liberty’s off in Houston. No one seems to give a damn about Belle being alone in some seedy hotel.”
He thought Mimi would be offended by his outburst, but if her smile was any indication, she was delighted. “It certainly seems like you give a damn. And you’re wrong. I do care about Belle being upset and so does the rest of the family.”
“Then why haven’t you talked her into staying with one of her sisters . . . or here?”
Her eyes widened. “You’d allow her to stay here?”
“Since the place is already overrun with Holidays, one more wouldn’t make a difference.” He pointed a finger at her. “But only until the end of June. No Holiday is staying longer than that.”
She smiled. “Of course not. Unfortunately, I don’t think Belle would agree to that. Nor does she want to stay with her sisters. And I get it. She needs time to figure out who she is and what she wants. She needs to learn how to stand on her own two feet.”
“I don’t doubt Belle needs some space to figure out who she is, but she also needs support.” He knew from experience that life lessons were brutal and if you didn’t have someone to love and support you, it was hard to get through the bad times. He didn’t know what he would have done without Sunny.
“I agree. But there’s a difference between support and smothering.” She nodded at Tay, who was lying on her back batting at a drooping flower. “Take that kitten for example. If you don’t let her get used to the ranch and figure out how to avoid the dangers, she’ll never learn. There will come a point when she doesn’t want to. She’ll just sit in her cat contraption all day staring out the window and not realizing how much fun she could be having.” She hesitated. “The same goes for Sunny.”
“Believe me, Sunny will never miss out on having fun.”
Mimi laughed. “True, but she relies on you more than you think. And while it’s good to have a safety net to fall back on, you also need to learn how to rely on yourself. That’s what Belle is learning now. She’s learning to trust herself and her decisions. The last thing she needs is another family member coming to her rescue and making decisions for her.” She sent him a pointed look. “But a friend’s support wouldn’t be a bad thing.”
It took him a moment to figure out what she was saying. He held up his hands. “Oh, no. Belle and I aren’t friends. Far from it.”
“Really? Because you being worried about her says differently.” Before he could continue to argue the point, she glanced at her flowers. “Would you look at my poor babies?” She lifted the bloom Tay had been swatting at and shook her head. “They’re getting all wilted in this heat.” She glanced at Corbin. “Could you do me a big favor? I’m all out of fertilizer. Could you pick some up for me at the hardware store? It doesn’t have to be right now. Just whenever you go to town.” She sent him a pleading look. “Although the sooner the better.”
Corbin hadn’t planned on going into town. He had work to do. He glanced at the sun edging lower in the sky. Although it looked like he’d already wasted most of the day. He might as well start fresh tomorrow morning.
“Fine. I’ll go into town.” He got to his feet and went to pick up Tay, but then he remembered Mimi’s words and stopped. “I guess Tay can stay here—but if anything happens to her, it’s on you.”
Mimi smiled. “I’ll guard her with my life.” She went back to weeding. “And while you’re in town, you might want to stop by your trailer. Belle is a sweetheart, but she’s always been a little absentminded. I wouldn’t be surprised if she forgot to lock up.”
Belle had never acted absentminded to him, but Corbin figured Mimi knew her granddaughter better than he did. Besides, he had left one of his favorite western shirts at the trailer and needed to pick it up.
But before he stopped off at the hardware store and his trailer, he drove an extra twenty minutes out of town to the closest hotel. He knew he had no business doing it, but damned if he could stop himself. Nor could he stop himself from being worried when the front desk guy informed him that Belle wasn’t registered there.
He called three other hotels in the vicinity and she wasn’t at any of them. Which made him wonder if maybe she’d decided to stay with one of her sisters, after all. Since he certainly wasn’t about to call every Holiday sister to find out, he decided to let it go.
Belle Holiday wasn’t his concern.
At least that’s what he tried to tell himself. But if that were the case, then why was he flooded with relief when he got to his trailer and discovered her car sitting in front?
He got out of his truck and headed inside expecting to find Belle looking as sad and lost as she had the other night. But that wasn’t what he found. Instead, he found her sprawled out on the couch wearing his favorite western shirt surrounded by a pile of snacks and looking as happy as a pig in mud. Her smile brightened when she saw him and she held up the bag in her hand.
“Hey, Corbin! Flamin’ Cheeto?”