Page 17

“I understand you met my boys in town this morning,” Miss Dulcie said with that same gentle smile.

“Your boys?”

She chuckled lightly. “Clint and Remington and Westin and the others.” She reached up and rubbed her chin. “I call them my boys because they’re the closest I have to family now.”

“I did. They got me out of a difficult situation.”

“Do you mind if I ask what that situation was?”

Lea lowered her head, brushing a loose string of hair behind her ear. “Well, it’s kind of shameful, to be honest. You see, I was involved with a man who couldn’t take no for an answer. When our relationship ended, he wouldn’t let me go.” She blushed, feeling a little conceited in speaking those words, but she didn’t know how else to put the situation without telling a complete lie. “He caught up with me outside that diner, and tried to pull me out of the car. Your boys came to my rescue.”

Miss Dulcie smiled. “That sounds like something my boys would do.”

“They were a godsend. I don’t know what might have happened if they hadn’t gotten involved.”

“And now you’re stranded here?”

“I am. He took my car with all my things in it, including my phone and wallet. And we’re heading into the weekend, so the banks and everything are closed. But I’m hoping that I can make arrangements on Monday to be on my way again.”

Miss Dulcie’s alert eyes moved over Lea again. “Well, you’re welcome to stay as long as you need to. All I ask is that you not interfere in the daily business of the ranch.”

“Yes, ma’am. Of course.”

“This is a working ranch and it takes a lot to run it. We have more than seventy employees during the winter and double that in the spring and summer. Clint is my foreman. He runs the day-to-day operations. His team is the backbone of Golden Sphinx.”

Lea nodded. “I’m sure they are.”

“Ranching becomes more and more about business every passing year. You almost have to have a business degree to run it.” Miss Dulcie sighed. “When Asa started the ranch forty years ago, it was an old boys’ club. If you knew the right people, if you played in the right circles, it didn’t matter if you knew the first thing about business. You were in.” She smiled, memories floating over her expression like clouds on a lazy summer afternoon that Lea could clearly see. “My Asa… he was quite the cattleman!”

“Is that your husband?”

“Yes,” Miss Dulcie said with a hint of the girl she once was lacing the simple word. “He was a good man, my Asa. Strong and hardworking. Never turned his back on a neighbor in need. And he ran this place like it was his child, with kid gloves when warranted, and with a whip when it was needed.” Again, she sighed, clearly filled with affection for a man who’d been a great influence in her life. “We were married thirty years, Asa and me. Worked our way through difficult times, and good times. We fought for this place side by side. It’s his legacy, and I am determined to make sure it remains a good legacy.”

“Seems to me he was a lucky man to have a woman like you on his side.”

Miss Dulcie smiled widely. “And he knew it, too.” She giggled, again a hint of the girl she once was coming through. “They don’t make ’em like Asa much anymore. Cowboys are becoming a dying breed.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Miss Dulcie leaned over and patted Lea’s knee. “I like you. You’re a smart girl.”

“Thank you.”

Clint came back into the room then, his baseball cap in his hands. “Ma’am? The cook says dinner is ready.”

“Come, join me,” Miss Dulcie said, standing and holding her hand out to Lea. “Georgia is one of the best cooks in the whole Southwest!”

“I’d be honored,” Lea said, shooting Clint a questioning look. He lowered his head slightly, his expression consistently dark and brooding. Lea was beginning to wonder if the man ever smiled.

And she wondered how she’d gone from being dragged out of her car by her hair to sitting down to a meal with a fine, delicate lady like Miss Dulcie. This day was threatening to give her whiplash!

***

“Ice cream in twenty-degree weather!”

Rena laughed at her own words, running her tongue delicately over the vanilla ice cream on her waffle cone. Westin walked close beside her, their arms touching from time to time as they made their way to a little bench in front of the drugstore in downtown Milsap.

“Are you home for good now?” he asked as he sampled his own vanilla ice cream.