Page 20 of 11 Cowboys

“But people can’t be shaped?”

“Exactly. People are their own shapes. There are toomany shapes in this house already. It’s like trying to work out the centerpiece of a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle first. How can we find one person to fit us all?”

“I don’t know,” I say.

“Exactly.” Corbin surveys the kitchen, rubbing his hands on a cloth hanging from his pocket. “You ever made chocolate brownies before?”

I tap my temple. “Leave it to me. I have an embedded recipe that will bring you to your knees.”

He grins, warmth lighting up his whole face and crinkling his cheeks. “Now there’s something I’m looking forward to experiencing.”

***

An hour later, three trays of gooey chocolate brownies emerge from the oven to cool on racks. The air is scented with warm cocoa and sugar, and I have sweat trickling down the small of my back. Even with Corbin acting as a capable and willing sous chef, I’m exhausted, and I was only responsible for delivering dessert.

Levi sticks his head around the door, inhaling with the enthusiasm of a bloodhound. “Please tell me it’s ready.”

“It is.” Corbin finishes slicing the bread as Levi yells that dinner is ready, and suddenly, the kitchen is a bustling hive of activity.

Plates are passed. Bread is distributed. Kids climb into chairs and silverware clatters like percussion. The cowboys file in like a slow-moving tide with broad shoulders, deep voices, laughing and creating the hum of family. There are no instructions or orders. People fall into their roles, ladling out huge bowls of heart soup and carrying them to the table. The kids are served first, warned to blow on their spoons, or eat cornbread or crusty bread with lashings of butter first.

McCartney urges me to sit, and he supplies me with twice as much food as I would usually eat, but somehow, the portion looks just right. This has been one hungry day.

Corbin is the last to approach the impossibly long table, surveying it something akin to pride.

“Sit,” Conway tells him. “We’re good.”

He takes his place between Hannah and Caleb, watching Matty with fatherly concern as he pulls his bread into chunks, dropping it like spongy boats into his broth.

“Everyone, thank Grace,” he says. “For helping prepare this meal.”

“Thank you, Grace,” everyone says, and I blush like a tomato.

“I didn’t do much.”

“Wait till you find out what she made for dessert.” The kids stare at the counters, eyes wide and excited. “We might decide to never let her leave.”

Conway sits at the head of the long wooden table like it was built around him, with his spine straight and shoulders wide. He eats like a man who sees nourishment as just another job to get done.

But that doesn’t mean he isn’t watching.

His gaze never lingers anywhere for long, glancing quickly at the kids, at the men. Atme. Measuring. Weighing. Guarding.

His face gives nothing away. It’s handsome, in a less pretty and obvious way than Levi’s. His features are hard-edged and lived-in. The faint silver at his temples does something dangerous to my insides; the scar just above his right eyebrow is half-faded and a mystery I’d like to solve. Bar fight? Errant animal? Something less impressive?

His shirt sleeves are rolled up, his forearms corded and tanned, veins rising like topography beneath his skin, and when he lifts his glass to take a sip of water, I watch the flex of his wrist, the way his thumb traces the rim afterward like he’s still thinking.

Like he neverstopsthinking.

I should be eating. I should be listening to the men swapping jokes and the kids arguing about who gets the last roll. But I’m stuck on the man at the head of the table who seems to hold up the ceiling with sheer presence alone. And that thumb tracing the glass. I bet he could do magic thingswith it.

He still hasn’t looked at me.

And yet, I know he’s aware of every breath I take.

We eat shoulder to shoulder, savoring Corbin’s efforts, exchanging stories, jokes, and ladles of second helpings. At one point, Levi grins at me and says, “Don’t get used to the light work, city girl. Day two’s coming for you.”

“And it won’t be gentle,” Cody adds from the end of the table with a wicked smirk.