there was a certain unconcerned confidence in his actions that was very appealing. This was not a man that would be caught dead cowering on the roof of his car.
Another animal lumbered through to the paddock it had come from and casually wandered off to eat some grass. Thirty others still surrounded her.
This was going to take some time.
Ellie relaxed on her unconventional perch and channelled her inner Alex—her easygoing baby sister—scratching around for the positives in the moment. Actually, the Texan sun was pleasant once the drama of the past couple of hours had passed and once someone else was taking responsibility for the cows. And there were worse ways to pass the time than watching a good-looking man build up a sweat.
‘Sure you don’t want to come down here and help now that you’ve seen how docile they are?’ the man in question called.
Docile? They’d nearly trampled her earlier. Sort of. Getting friendly with the wildlife was not the reason she drove all this way to Texas.
Not that she’d really thought through any part of this visit.
Two days ago she’d burst out of the building her family owned, fresh from the devil of all showdowns with her mother in which she’d hurled words like hypocrite and liar at the woman who’d given her life. In about as much emotional pain as she could ever remember being.
Two hours and a lot of hastily dropped gratuities later, she was on the I-78 in a little white rental heading south.
Destination: Texas.
‘Very sure, thank you, Sheriff. You were clearly born for this.’
He seemed to stiffen but it was only momentary. If she got lucky, country cowboys—even ones in uniform—had dulled sarcasm receptors.
‘So…Jess just got married?’ she called to fill the suddenly awkward silence. Back home there was seldom any silence long enough to become awkward.
‘Yep.’ He slapped another rump and sent a cow forward. ‘You said you know the Calhouns?’
I think I am one. Wouldn’t that put a tilt in his hat and a heap more lines in his good ol’ Texan brow.
‘I… Yes. Sort of.’
He did as good a job of the head tilt as his giant dog. ‘Didn’t realise knowing someone or not was a matter of degrees.’
It really was poor on her part that two straight days on the road and she hadn’t really thought about how she was going to answer these kinds of questions. But she hadn’t worked the top parties of New York only to fall apart the moment a stranger asked a few pointed questions.
She pulled herself together. ‘I’m expected, but I’m…early.’ Cough. A couple of months early. ‘I wasn’t aware of Jessica’s plans.’
They fell to silence again. Then he busied himself with more cows. They were starting to move more easily now that their volume had reduced on this side of the wire, inversely proportional to the effort the sheriff was putting in. His movements were slowing and his breath came faster. But every move spoke of strength and resilience.
‘Your timing is off,’ he puffed between heaving cows. ‘Holt’s away, too, right now and Meg’s away at college. Nate’s still on tour.’
Her chest squeezed. Two brothers and two sisters? Just like that, her family doubled. But she struggled to hide the impact his simple words had. ‘Tour? Rock star or military?’
He slowly turned and stared right at her as if she’d insulted him. ‘Military.’
Clipped and deep. Maybe she had offended him? His accent was there but nowhere near as pronounced as the young cowboy she’d met out at the Calhoun ranch who told her in his thick drawl that Jess wasn’t home. Least that’s what she’d thought he’d said. She wasn’t fluent in deep Texan.
The animals seemed to realise there were now many more of them inside the field than outside it and they began to drift back through the fence to the safety of their numbers. It wasn’t quick, but it was movement. And it was in the right direction.
The sheriff whistled and his dog immediately came back to his side. They both stood, panting, by her rental’s tailpipe and watched the dawdling migration.
‘He’s well trained,’ Ellie commented from her position above the sheriff’s shoulder, searching for something to say.
‘It was part of our deal,’ he answered cryptically. Then he turned and thrust his hand up towards her. ‘County Sheriff Jerry Jackson.’
Ellie made herself ignore how many cow rumps that hand had been slapping only moments before. They weren’t vermin, just…living suede. His fingers were warm as they pressed into hers, his shake firm but not crippling. She tried hard not to stiffen.
‘Jed,’ he modified.
‘Sheriff.’ She smiled and nodded as though she was in a top-class restaurant and not perched on the back of a car surrounded by rogue livestock.
‘And you are…?’
Trying not to tell you, she realised, not entirely sure why. For the first time it dawned on her that she’d be a nobody here. Not a socialite. Not a performer. Not a Patterson.
No responsibilities. No expectations.
Opportunity rolled out before her bright and shiny and warmed her from the inside. But then she remembered she’d never be able to escape who she was—even if she wasn’t in fact who she’d thought she was for the past thirty years.
‘Ellie.’ She almost said Eleanor, the name she was known by in Manhattan, but at the last moment she used the name Alex called her. ‘Ellie Patterson.’
‘Where are you staying, Ellie?’
His body language was relaxed and he had the ultimate vouch pinned high on his chest—a big silver star. There was no reason in the world that she should be bristling at his courteous questions and yet…she was.
‘Are you just making conversation or is that professional interest?’
His polite smile died before it formed fully. He turned up to face her front-on. ‘The Calhouns are friends of mine and you’re a friend of theirs…’ Though the speculation in his voice told her he really wasn’t convinced of that yet. ‘It would be wrong of me to send you on your way without extending you some country courtesy in their place.’
It was credible. This was Texas, after all. But trusting had never come easy to her. And neither had admitting she wasn’t fully on top of everything. In New York, that was just assumed.
She was Eleanor.
And she’d assumed she’d be welcomed with open arms at the Calhoun ranch. ‘I’m sure I’ll find a place in town…’
‘Ordinarily I’d agree with you,’ he said. ‘But the Tri-County Chamber of Commerce is having their annual convention in town this week so our motel and bed and breakfasts are pretty maxed out. You might have a bit of trouble.’
Embarrassed heat flooded up her back. Accommodation was a pretty basic thing to overlook. She called on her fundraising persona—the one that had served her so well in the ballrooms of New York—and brushed his warning off. ‘I’m sure I’ll find something.’
‘You could try Nan’s Bunk’n’Grill back on I-38, but it’s a fair haul from here.’ He paused, maybe regretting his hospitality in the face of her bland expression. ‘Or the Alamo, right here in town, can accommodate a single. It’s vacant right now but that could change any time.’
Having someone organise her didn’t sit well, particularly since she’d failed abysmally to organise herself. If she had to, she’d drive all the way to Austin to avoid having to accept the condescension of strangers.
‘Thanks for the concern, Sheriff, but