Her valentine cowboy, p.1
Her Valentine Cowboy, page 1
Roque’s smile was long gone. Now he looked as if she’d slapped him.
“You don’t believe me,” he said. “You think I won’t follow through. You think I don’t have it in me to do what I say.”
“What else can I think, Roque? I’m thankful for everything you’ve done here, but you’ve generated so much new business that I can’t do all the work by myself anymore. I had a hard enough time doing it to begin with.”
“I’ll still come,” he said.
“What for?” she asked.
Roque held his hands out. “For you!”
She sighed. “Let’s just be realistic. This is the end of our arrangement. It was always month to month, subject to being ended at any time by either party. That’s in our contract.”
“You’re not just a contract to me, Susana!”
Dear Reader,
There’s more to being a cowboy than putting on boots and a Stetson, and more to being a Texan than where you lay your head at night. As John Steinbeck once said, Texas is a state of mind. It’s big and diverse, with ten distinct ecoregions, at least five different accents, and a cuisine that includes kolaches and barbecue, Tex-Mex and gumbo, chili and chicken-fried steak. Its cultural heritage draws on too many influences to count. It’s a place that calls out strong emotion and deep loyalty—whether you’re a multigenerational native Texan like Susana or a newcomer like Roque, who got here as quick as he could.
Texas has scope. There’s room here to dream big, to find friendship, community, meaningful work and love. So pull up a chair and enjoy Susana and Roque’s story.
Happy reading!
Kit
PS: The chicken noodle soup and chili supper is a real thing, hosted every February by the friendly folks of the Vsetin Czech Moravian Brethren Church, and if you’re handy to the Hallettsville area, I encourage you to check it out. (See what I did there?)
Her Valentine Cowboy
Kit Hawthorne
Kit Hawthorne makes her home in south-central Texas on her husband’s ancestral farm, where seven generations of his family have lived, worked and loved. When not writing, she can be found reading, drawing, sewing, quilting, reupholstering furniture, playing Irish penny whistle, refinishing old wood, cooking huge amounts of food for the pressure canner, or wrangling various dogs, cats, goats and people.
Books by Kit Hawthorne
Truly Texas
Snowbound with the Rancher
Hill Country Promise
The Texan’s Secret Son
Coming Home to Texas
Hill Country Secret
Visit the Author Profile page at Harlequin.com for more titles.
To all the horse people in my life. You know who you are. Your knowledge, devotion and capacity for hard work inspire me.
Acknowledgments
Many thanks to everyone who answered my questions about horses, tractors, dozers and the rest—my sister Teri James Gillaspie; my daughter Grace; my husband, Greg; fellow authors Nellie Krauss and Janalyn Knight; and local horsewoman and leatherworker Janine Hunt. Thanks also to the members of the Vsetin Czech Moravian Brethren Church, especially pastor’s wife Vernell Labaj, who cheerfully and tirelessly answered my many questions about Czexan culture and cuisine and never made me feel like a pest. As always, thanks to my critique partners: Mary Johnson, Cheryl Crouch, David Martin, Janalyn Knight, Willa Blair, Nellie Krauss and Ani Jacob. Special thanks to my reader Monika in New England, who encouraged me to follow up on the taco-kolache place mentioned in some of my earlier books. Thanks also to my editor, Johanna Raisanen, who always makes my books better.
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
EPILOGUE
EXCERPT FROM A MERRY LITTLE CHRISTMAS BY AMIE DENMAN
CHAPTER ONE
ROQUE FIDALGO LAY flat on his back on the full-size mattress that made up the sleeping quarters of his live-in horse trailer. The mattress was shoehorned in over the trailer’s gooseneck hitch, which put the ceiling about a foot and a half away from his face. Tiny curtainless windows ran down the narrow strips of wall on two sides, but there was nothing to see through the dirty glass except the rusted corrugated metal of the old barn that the trailer was parked inside.
Sometimes in the mornings, if Roque didn’t hop right out of bed the minute his alarm went off and start filling Cisco’s feed bucket with grain, Cisco would saunter over into the barn and eyeball him through one of the windows. If that didn’t work, he’d lean his thousand pounds or so of horseflesh against the side of the trailer and rock it back and forth until Roque finally rolled out of bed.
But Cisco hadn’t done that this morning. Maybe he was standing hock-deep in snow out in his sorry excuse for a pasture, too downhearted to even care. Or staring across the road at the huddled buildings of the frozen Texas town, wondering how his life had come to this and what was the point of it all.
Roque eased his body out of his sleeping area, down the ladder and onto the nine square feet of floor space, trying not to bump into the little drop-down table where he kept his electric kettle and French press, but bumping into it anyway. A minifridge and microwave were stacked in the corner between the table and the door. That was the kitchen. There wasn’t any stove. As far as food went, if it couldn’t be nuked, reconstituted, eaten straight from the package or bought ready-made, Roque didn’t eat it.
He could hear the whine of the faucet he’d left streaming into the rust-stained bathroom sink on the other side of the pleated folding door. At least his pipes hadn’t frozen.
Lately Roque had been making a lot of these at least statements to himself. At least he had his health. At least his truck still ran. At least his bank balance was somewhat above zero. At least he had his horse. He held on to these things like handholds on the side of a cliff.
He rolled his left shoulder a few times, trying to ease the deep ache out of the deltoid and pectoral muscles. Over a year since he’d been hurt, and he still wasn’t back to a hundred percent. A couple of 9-millimeter bullets could do that to a guy.
He picked up his jeans from the floor and pulled them on, leaning his hip against the ladder for balance, then stepped into his cowboy boots. His entire living space was smaller than most modern closets—and as a frame carpenter who’d built his share of closets, Roque ought to know. It was all right as a place to crash and keep his clothes, but as a place to hang out for hours on end with nothing to do but think about his life, it sucked.
He’d been snowbound for the past four days, and stir-crazy didn’t even begin to cover it. Power outages had kept the light and heat off more often than not, but he’d wasted precious phone juice watching action movies until the Internet went out completely on the third day, after which he’d just stared at the fake wood grain on the warped ceiling panels, and thought.
And thought.
And thought.
An insulated coffee mug stood on the little triangular corner space above the microwave, next to a tower of empty Styrofoam cup-o-noodle containers and a pair of spurs. Roque picked up the mug and drained the last of yesterday’s coffee. It was ice-cold and tasted like diesel fuel.
The cold air outside his trailer door hit him like a slap in the face. There were two trailers parked inside the metal barn—one for living in, and one for hauling Cisco around. The live-in one was of eighties’ vintage, solid steel and ridiculously heavy to tow by today’s standards. The other, the one Granddad had left him in his will, was newer and lighter, but didn’t have living quarters.
The barn’s big sliding door stayed open so Cisco could come and go as he pleased. Most mornings, he was ready and waiting at the back of the live-in trailer, where Roque kept the feed, but not today. Roque opened the loading door and filled the bucket without Cisco whuffling in his ear or nudging him in the back to hurry him along.
He walked out into the pasture—really just a one-acre lot on the edge of town, roughly fenced with scrounged materials.
“Cisco!” he called. “Come and get your breakfast, buddy!”
The gray morning swallowed up the sound of his voice. No answering neigh came back to him, no clop of hooves headed his way.
He walked out past the old slab foundation of the house that had been started decades ago and then abandoned. The edges were all grown up with dried weed stalks and brushy tree limbs tall and thick enough to hide a horse.
He came around the edge, then stopped in his tracks.
The wooden fence post on the corner of the lot had split near the ground, and the wire fencing on either side of it lay flat.
He turned, slowly scanning the lot. Cisco wasn’t there.
A wave of nausea rose in his throat. He heard his breath going in and out fast, and saw it ma
king a cloud of fog in front of his face. He shut his eyes and took a deep breath.
“Okay, okay,” he muttered. He had to get his head right and figure this thing out.
He opened his eyes. To the north and east of him lay the downtown area of Limestone Springs. Southward were mostly big residential lots like this one, anywhere from one to ten acres in size, but with actual houses on them, not bare slab foundations like on this one. Westward, the land opened up into ranches and farms along Highway 281. The roads were empty now, as they had been for most of the past four days, but that didn’t mean Cisco hadn’t been hit by an out-of-control vehicle. He could be lying in a bar ditch right now, or on the side of the road, hurt and cold and alone.
Roque walked over to the flattened section of fence. Cisco’s tracks were clearly marked in the snow, leading west. But there was no trace of him now.
Roque thought fast. Should he track Cisco on foot, or take the truck? The roads were still slick, with no salt or sand to provide traction, but at least there weren’t any other motorists to crash into him. Yeah, he’d take the truck so he could follow Cisco’s tracks while they were still clear. The main thing was to find the horse quickly, before he got hurt. Once Roque did that—he refused to think in terms of if—he could find a way to secure him and then come back with his hauling trailer to bring him home.
He hurried back to his living quarters to get his keys, then grabbed a lead rope and halter out of the hauling trailer. Within a few minutes, he was on his way.
The icy roads were eerily empty beneath a chilly gray sky. Swags of snow-topped green garland hung on the front fencing of a neighboring pasture, with jaunty red bows on the posts in between. Somehow the cheery decor made the desolation worse. The whole town looked blank and cold, like a movie set after the filming was done and the actors and film crew had all gone home.
It was the day after Christmas, about three weeks shy of a year since Roque had first driven the eighteen hundred miles or so from Jersey City to Limestone Springs, with nothing but a pickup truck and a headful of dreams, ready to claim his inheritance and become a cowboy. In the months since, he’d had more setbacks than victories, but that hadn’t fazed him. He hadn’t expected it to be easy, and he liked a challenge—the harder, the better. Being told he couldn’t do something only made him want to prove that he could.
That was the attitude that had kept him going the past eleven months. His step-cousin Dirk, his family back in New Jersey and everyone who’d ever given him the stink eye in the feed store—he’d show them all. He had his horse and saddle, his muscles and skills, and the thing inside him that wouldn’t quit.
But that was before he’d spent four days trapped in his dismal tin can of a home—over Christmas, no less—with nothing to distract him from the fact that he was alone and underemployed, in a community that didn’t want him, with a dwindling bank balance and no prospects for improvement.
And now...
Now even his horse was gone.
He swallowed hard. He loved that big bay horse like a brother. The words of Granddad’s last message to him, words of hope in those dark days in that hospital room over a year ago, came drifting up like smoke from a doused fire. I’m sorry I can’t do more for you. I hope it’s enough for a fresh start. As if he’d had a glimpse into the future, and known that a fresh start was exactly what Roque would need. Losing Cisco meant losing that chance, and letting Granddad down.
It felt like a sign. Maybe it was time for Roque to cut his losses. Dirk had made a standing offer to buy back Cisco and the trailer if ever he decided to give up and go home. Maybe Roque ought to take him up on it—for Cisco’s sake, if not for his own.
He shook his head hard. No! This was his chance to make something of his life, given to him by the one person who’d still believed in him. He couldn’t throw that away.
He had to get Cisco back.
CHAPTER TWO
SUSANA VRBA STARED at the fifty-two buckets stacked in uneven towers on the snowy ground just outside the feed barn. Four days of freezing temperatures, intermittent electricity and isolation had worn her out. She’d been feeding horses, goats, llamas and donkeys, morning and night, all by herself except for Pirko, whose contribution amounted to nothing more than companionship and moral support.
Pirko sat on her haunches at Susana’s side, eyeing the buckets with an intelligent gaze. The medium-small dog had a spaniel-like head, with a round forehead and curly floppy ears, and the shape of a border collie, with a trim little waist, light feathering at her legs and a plumy tail. She didn’t have the thick border collie undercoat, though, and Susana could see her shivering with cold. Pirko could have stayed inside the relative warmth of the house if she’d wanted, but any time there was work to be done on the place, she was right there in the thick of it.
The weather was supposed to moderate today, but in the meantime, Susana had another feeding to get through, and staring at the buckets wasn’t going to get it done.
She picked up a stack of buckets in her gloved hands and opened the doors to the feed barn.
She called it a barn, but it was really just a glorified shed, neatly organized and crammed to full capacity. One wall held a saddle rack and bridle hooks; she referred to that part as the tack room.
The air was marginally warmer in here, with a wholesome oaty scent that always made her think of sunshine. Grit, grit went the fine layer of feed crumbles beneath the soles of her work boots as she carried the buckets to the feed bins—big metal trash cans with their lids bungee-corded on to keep rodents out. Above the bins, rough wooden shelving held plastic containers full of wormers, syringes, antibiotics, gauzes and other medical supplies. Up in the loft—really just the highest, deepest shelf—some worn horse blankets formed a lounging area for three cats that were just coming awake, blinking in the thin wintry sunlight. They earned their keep by hunting rodents and snakes, but they weren’t too tough for a cuddle.
Susana opened the bins and started scooping. One held regular sweet feed for the horses who were on a maintenance diet; the other held senior feed for those who needed extra calories. Some of the horses got hoof supplement or some other addition to their feed; she color-coded their buckets to keep track. She had the whole thing charted out with a posted list of all the animals’ feeding requirements, along with a map of who was penned where and what they all looked like. She didn’t really need the chart—she had all the information in her head—but she liked having things documented. And theoretically, if anyone ever fed in her place, they’d need clear written instructions.
Not that she was planning to kick up her heels and go on vacation anytime in the foreseeable future, much less allow herself a sick day. She’d fed every morning and evening for well over two years now. Whenever anyone in her big extended family got married or buried, she had to leave the gathering in time to make it home for evening feeding; whenever she was sleep-deprived or feverish or had a sore throat, she sucked it up and fed anyway. She’d have to be seriously incapacitated to miss a feeding, and just thinking about the possibility of such a thing gave her a panicky, fluttery feeling inside, because what would happen then? She really ought to get a replacement trained up just in case something happened to her, but she didn’t have the time or energy to spare to find or train one. It was impossible to move ahead when she was barely hanging on.
She carried the filled buckets to the bed of the feed truck, grabbed some more empties and headed back to the barn.
Two of the cats had jumped down from the loft. Haystack, a longhaired orange tabby, was already munching spilled horse feed from the floor. Chauncy, black-and-white with tuxedo markings, stretched luxuriously, then abruptly froze, snapped to attention as if he’d seen a ghost, and darted outside. Pirko chased him as a matter of form, at a speed just fast enough to look like an earnest effort without any possibility of actually catching him. She came back quickly when Susana told her to.
The third cat, a calico called Ermentrude, was still lolling around in the loft.
“You’ve got the right idea, Ermentrude,” Susana said. “Stay in your warm bed for as long as you can.”
