Page 19 of Caleb’s Cause (Broken Wheel Ranch #12)

“Morning,” a woman said as she smiled at Katherine. “I’m Naomi. I’m the manager of Broken.”

“Oh, so you tell us what needs to be done, and assign jobs to us?”

“I used to, but they have everything under control that I just basically sit in my office and do paperwork all day.”

Katherine wrinkled her nose and shuddered. “I hated those days. I was better at putting out fires than the paperwork. Don’t get me wrong, I did it, but I preferred the busyness of dealing with problems.”

“Yeah, I hear you, but I like to think that with me doing the paperwork for Broken, then that’s one less iron out of Erin’s fire.”

“Okay, I understand. What will I be doing here?”

“First, you’ll follow the ladies and listen to them. Have you ever ridden a horse before.”

“No.”

“Okay, I’m not being mean, but you need to work your way up to riding.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that you’re going to muck out the stalls.

Not by yourself, you can help the others.

Then you’ll have to learn the different types of tack.

” Naomi held up her hand to stop Katherine from speaking.

“Trust me, you’re going to want to keep your eyes and ears wide open when you are told about the horses.

One thing I will not tolerate is any mistreatment of my animals.

Whether through negligence, or stupidity, that won’t be allowed here. ”

“I understand.”

“Good, now, you can follow Marcia around this morning.” Naomi pointed to the only woman left standing there, and Katherine had a quick flash of what Caleb had mentioned that morning about the other woman, and watched as she walked away.

If she hadn’t been looking for it, she never would have noticed the subtle stiffness of her movements.

She followed the other woman, and had to shake her head several times to try to grasp what was being said.

For some reason, her brain couldn’t connect with the physical activity she was doing, so though she listened, and didn’t complain, she did the work, but it felt like she was only going through the motions.

There was no emotional connection to what she was doing.

Hours later, Katherine entered the break room, but before she could do anything, she heard someone call her name and she turned to see Caleb standing there.

“Here.”

“What’s this?”

“Your lunch. I forgot to tell you to pack one this morning. I’ve been running around all day to get my business off the ground, and when I got hungry, I picked this up for you.”

Katherine took the bag, looked inside, then at him with a grin. “What kind?” she asked of the sub she saw there.

“Roast beef, lettuce, and tomato. I know there are condiments in the refrigerator here, and I left the onions off. I didn’t know whether you liked them or not.”

“I do, but that’s okay. Did you have cheese put on it?”

“No,” Caleb said with a shake of his head. “I didn’t know what kind you liked, so I left it off.”

“That’s okay, I don’t really like cheese in the first place.

” She did that cute thing with her nose and Caleb couldn’t take his eyes off her.

Her next actions shocked the shit out of him as she rushed forward, stood on tiptoes, and kissed his cheek.

By the time it registered, she was entering the break room.

He stood there staring after her when he stumbled forward.

With a scowl, he whipped around and grinned when he saw his uncle standing there.

Neither said anything, and Caleb nodded then turned on his heel and left to go back to what he had been doing.

In the breakroom, Katherine washed her hands, then settled down to eat her lunch.

She sat at a table with several others and at one point she looked up and frowned.

She used her foot to nudge Ryan’s beneath the table and when he whipped his head up to scowl at her, she only used her head to indicate that he should look at Pru, who sat next to him, but she had been staring into space with a completely blank look on her face.

Ryan nodded to Katherine, then slowly turned his head to look at Pru.

“Prudora?”

When Katherine started to say something, Marcia, who sat beside her gently laid her hand on her forearm and shook her head at her. She leaned in to whisper. “We’ll explain later, but that’s one of Pru’s challenges. She gets like this. Let Ryan handle it.”

“Okay,” Katherine agreed as she continued to eat, but didn’t take her eyes off the couple across from her.

“Prudora?” Ryan asked again, then reached over and began rubbing her back. It took a few minutes for Pru to shake her head and her expression cleared that she was back with them.

“Holy shit, Ryan!” Pru called out, causing everyone in the room to look at her in concern.

“What is it, Prudora? You were a million miles away, can you talk about that?”

“Holy shit, Ryan!” she repeated, then turned to him fully and Katherine saw utter shock on her face.

“What is it, Prudora?” Ryan’s tone never changed, he was cool, calm, and collected.

“We’re getting married!” Katherine saw the look of pure love come across Ryan’s face and looked at Marcia and the others to see them grin.

“We are.”

“But, but, but…”

“But what?”

“I don’t have a dress! We need flowers! What about the cake? The food? What will we do?”

Before Ryan could speak, Opal spoke into the panic, she too had a calm voice.

“We’re handling that, remember Pru? We’re going to have our regular BBQ, you and Ryan already went to town and ordered the cake from Kora’s bakery, and we’re all going to Colorado Springs on Saturday to get your outfit.

” She turned to Katherine to explain, “It’s in two weeks.

The only outside people that were invited are Pru’s parents, Caleb, and his father.

All the other guests work for Erin’s Way, Broken, or New Double. ”

“Ah, an intimate family affair?”

“Yes,” Ryan said, and looked back at Pru. “We’ve got this. Caleb is already here, Larry, his Dad should be here by the end of next week, and your parents will arrive the Thursday before the wedding.”

“But, but, but…” Pru stuttered and looked confused.

She finally shook her head, as if to clear it, sighed heavily, then looked around the table.

When she spotted Katherine, she sighed again.

“I have TBI and spaz out at times. I know Ryan and I are getting married, I know that things are planned, but when I have my spaz moments, I forget about all the planning we’ve already done.

” She shook her head and looked at Ryan.

Again, the love she showed him made Katherine’s heart hurt.

“What else do you need to do? Is there anything I can do to help?” She looked around the table, and it was Opal that answered with a laugh.

“How good are you at organizing?”

“I like to think I’m great at it, why?”

“It’s just that we have everything written down, and all in one place, but it’s all on several pieces of paper, so that when we look for something, we end up going down a rabbit hole as we go through them.”

“I’ll help,” Katherine said in excitement as she sat up and forward in her seat.

“To protect you, I won’t tell you where I worked, but at my job I did all the organizing, assigning jobs, making sure they were completed, and put out small fires all day.

” She looked around the table and laughed.

“I was like Naomi, but in an office building.”

“I don’t want to put you out,” Ryan said.

“You won’t be, I volunteered. Please. What I’m about to say is not mean, I do not want anyone to think that I’m ungrateful for a job while I’m here, but I went through the motions this morning, but I couldn’t connect to the work.

” She shrugged and looked around the table.

“I know the work is important, but I’m just not an outdoor person, nor an animal person.

I never had any dogs or cats growing up, hell, I never even had a goldfish.

I can remember that from an early age I would always organize papers.

” She laughed and shook her head at a distant memory.

“What?” Ryan asked in confusion.

“I think I was six or seven when I sat Mom down once and handed her a folder.”

“What was in it?” Pru asked.

“All the junk mail we had received over the past month. I opened it all, and organized it by categories. I felt so proud of myself, and Mom was good enough to sit there and listen to me, then she had to explain to me what junk mail was. I was so pissed that I did something I’m not very proud of.

I did it for three solid months. When Mom found out she laughed.

I mean she laughed so hard I thought she was going to either pass out from lack of oxygen, or pee her pants. ”

“What on earth did you do?” Opal asked.

Katherine looked around the table with a grin. “Do you know those little postcards that come in magazines?”

“The ones that always fall out and we throw away? What about them?”

“Well, you don’t have to fill them out with any information when you mail them back.

If they have postage paid on them, then that means the company has to pay that postage when they receive the card or whenever.

I only heard that it was free for us, but they had to pay.

For the next three months after learning what junk mail was, because I really thought I was helping Mom with organizing the bills, I stopped by a newsstand on my way home from school.

If I remember correctly, it was the newsstand person that told me about the postage on those cards.

The two of us would send them back.” She took a sip of her drink, and looked at the others with a grin.

“I put them in the mailbox, he would just gather the cards during the day, and I’d stop by on my way home to pick them up.

There was no blow-back, I didn’t do anything wrong, but he and I would keep a tally of them.

If I remember correctly, in that three-month period I sent over a million postcards. ”