Page 25 of Ace of Spades (Hidden Creek Ranch #1)
HAILEY
“I’m just saying, I still think we oughta throw the tourists on some steers. Gotta give them the real ranch experience, ya know?”
“We’ve gone over this, Chance. We’re not letting the tourists get on the steers, it would be too much legal paperwork and it’s too risky. We want them to leave with great memories, not broken bones,” Beau tells him, looking exasperated by his friend.
“We can just have them sign waivers,” Chance argues, shoving a piece of bacon in his mouth.
“No.”
“You’re no fun,” Chance huffs.
“On to more important things,” Rafe exhales, ignoring Beau and Chance as they bicker back and forth. “Wes—you want to tell them or should I?”
“Go for it,” Weston tells him from across the table.
“Tell us what?” Chelsea asks, the rest of us looking around the table at each other in question.
“Well,” Rafe stands, tapping his coffee mug with a fork to get everyone’s attention down the length of the farmhouse table. “I heard back from the inspector late last night. Ladies and gentlemen, the guest bunkhouses of Hidden Creek Ranch are officially up and running!”
A round of applause erupts down the table, everybody hooting and hollering at the great news.
“Hell yeah! So does that mean we can start advertising the retreat?” Allie—one of the female ranch hands—asks.
“Most definitely. Chelsea and Debbie ran to town two weeks ago to pick out and order all of the furnishings and decor, and Chelsea has been working on guest experience packages. We’ve got a few more details to bang out, but other than that, we’re pretty much set to go.”
The room buzzes with excitement, conversations breaking out around the room.
“And that brings me to the second thing,” Rafe continues, his commanding voice carrying through the space and quieting all of the whispers. “As of today, Hidden Creek Ranch officially has a social media manager.”
Rafe’s eyes find mine, a smile stretching across his face.
“That is, if she accepts the position.”
All eyes follow his, landing on me as my cheeks flush .
“Me?”
“Yes, you—ya dingbat,” Chance beams. “Who else?”
Everybody looks at me expectantly, my eyes darting between my friends as they all watch me intently, waiting for a response.
“Yes—yes, of course!” I finally manage to spit out, the corners of my mouth pulling into a wide grin.
Another round of animation engulfs the room, a few of the ranch hands congratulating me as the girls all come to offer me hugs. I chance a glance at Weston to find him already watching me, his green eyes twinkling in amusement.
“Well, it’s settled then. How fast do you think you can get a website up and running?” Rafe asks, sitting back down as the hands all get back to their conversations as breakfast wraps up.
“I can have it done by the time we leave for the rodeo this weekend,” I tell him, excitement bubbling through me as ideas race across my mind of all of the things I want to incorporate.
“That fast? Well alright then, I can’t wait to see it.
I’ll give Don at the home goods store a call to see if all of the furniture has come in yet, if it’s ready to be picked up you could run to town with Debbie to pick everything up when she gets back tomorrow.
You’ll have a lot more content to shoot once the rooms are set up. ”
“Of course, that sounds perfect,” I tell him.
“She had asked me to come to town with her anyway to help her pick out a gift for her daughter’s birthday.
Which reminds me—I was going to ask what you guys thought about maybe finding a way to get Cheyenne down here for a weekend that we don’t have a rodeo?
I was talking with Debbie the other day and it sounds like she really misses her, I think it would be such a great surprise! ”
An awkward silence blankets the group, something passing between all of them that makes me think I was missing some piece of information.
“Cheyenne won’t come to the ranch,” Rafe finally speaks, his tone suddenly icy. “It’s a nice thought, but you would be wasting your time.”
With that, he gets up from the table, carries his plate to the sink, and makes his way out the doors.
I look around the group expectantly, waiting for someone to explain what just happened. Rhonda clears her throat, following Rafe’s lead and making her way to the sink to begin loading the dishwasher as the rest of the group picks at their food wordlessly.
“We don’t—um, we don’t really bring up Cheyenne when Rafe is around,” Chance finally speaks up.
“Why?”
Chance looks to his remaining friends for help, Dakota taking one for the team.
“Let’s just say that they have a past. I don’t think any of us really know the full story, other than the fact that Cheyenne is the one who convinced her mom to take Rafe in when she found out that he was essentially homeless when they were in high school together.
I don’t really know what happened between them, but obviously something did, because he hasn’t been the same since she up and left right after high school.
He won’t tell us anything so we just put two and two together, but long story short, he just sorta shuts down whenever her name comes up. ”
“Oh,” I say. “Good to know.”
“Don’t take it personally,” Chance says. “He’ll get over it, just give him a minute is all. ”
“Well, I’d better get to work on this website anyway,” I tell them. “Do you guys want to help me start filming some content for the socials after lunch? I figure we could get some stuff filmed during the daytime so I can get some posts up this afternoon,” I ask the girls.
“Definitely!” Chelsea says. “I was going to get some laundry done once we finish breakfast, but after that, I’m free as a bird. Just let me know what you need.”
“That’s perfect, it’ll give me enough time for a quick morning practice, and then I’ll wash off and shoot you a text when I’m done. We can meet over at the bunkhouses,” I tell her.
“Aw man, I wish I could, but I promised my mom that I’d stop by and see her today,” Dakota says. “She actually has a day off for once so I told her that I’d take her out to lunch.”
“No worries at all,” I tell her.
“She wouldn’t have to work two jobs if she just moved into the ranch,” Weston mumbles from his place at the table.
“Just out of curiosity—and I don’t mean to pry, but why doesn’t she want to move into the ranch? There’s an open cottage near the front of the property, isn’t there?” I ask, hoping that I wasn’t stepping out of line by asking.
Dakota and Weston exchange a glance.
“She’s just set in her ways,” Dakota finally says. “Trust me, we’ve both tried to convince her numerous times, but she doesn’t like the idea of anybody having to take care of her. Kinda like somebody else I know,” she comments, her eyes narrowing at Weston.
“The ranch isn’t doing too well financially just yet, since we’re still paying off all of the startup costs on top of paying all of the staff.
She says she doesn’t want me wasting any more of my money on her, even though I’ve tried to tell her that we could find her a job, so it wouldn’t be like we’re just handing it to her.
She knows how big of a risk the investment into the guest ranch has been for us and she insists on refusing a single penny from us,” Weston adds.
“Oh,” I say. “There’s really no convincing her?”
“I don’t think so,” Dakota admits.
“I don’t know if she’ll be able to hold out for too much longer, considering how downhill everything is going at the trailer park. The rent and fees keep increasing, and meanwhile, the conditions have gotten worse every time I go over there,” Weston says.
A pang of guilt hits me in the chest.
“I’m sorry,” I tell them truthfully. “About my dad.”
“Don’t apologize, you aren’t him,” Dakota tells me, reaching across the table to grab my hand. I give her a sad smile, the excitement from earlier dying down inside of me at the realization that I would have to talk to my dad eventually.
Weston doesn’t say anything, finishing off the food on his plate as the rest of the room continues to clear out, heading to their daily duties.
“I’d better go get the horses saddled, I want to get a quick practice in with all three of them before it gets too hot. Tell your mom I said hey, I’d love to come up there with you next time to see her,” I tell Dakota, sparing a glance at Weston before standing from the table.
“She would love that!”
“It’s a promise, then,” I smile.
“Say less, I’m in,” Chance exclaims, pulling his shirt off over his head.
“Come on, babe. Please?” Chelsea asks her boyfriend, giving him the best puppy dog eyes I’ve ever seen.
“Fine,” Beau relents, following Chance’s lead and unbuttoning his shirt. “But I’m cashing in when we get to bed tonight, you best remember that.”
“Remind me again what this is for?” Rafe asks, removing his work gloves and setting them down on the bale of hay to his right.
Chelsea and I had managed to track the guys down at the barn while they were in the middle of moving the hay bales in order to make room for the new guest ranch stuff.
“We’ve got tons of serious content already, so we figured we could switch it up and try to do something fun.
Besides, the bunkhouses aren’t furnished yet, so there are only so many clips we can get until they’re ready to be photographed.
I’m telling you, a shot of you four moving bales shirtless would catch so much attention, I promise.
I want to expand our target audience,” I tell him.
“And who exactly is the target audience for this?”
“Bachelorette parties, girl’s trips,” I say.
“Divorce parties, twenty-first birthday parties, sorority retreats,” Chelsea adds. “Come on, this would be the perfect place for any of those. We just gotta show the ladies the potential! ”
“So you want to turn our retreat into party central? That’s not exactly what we had in mind,” Rafe says, rubbing the back of his nape as he looks over at the other guys.