ma’am, and I’d rather not.” He tugged the brim of his hat lower. “At this point, by her standards, I’m rich and she might think she could cash in.”
“I’d like to see her try!”
Geena’s protectiveness made him smile. It also made him glad he’d told her. “Thanks for that.”
“Maybe you should give me her name in case she has the nerve to contact you through me.”
“Mindy’s her first name, but no telling what her last name is now. It could have changed six times since then.”
“If anybody named Mindy comes looking for you, I’ll let you know.” She gazed at him. “And I had the audacity to whine about my childhood.”
“Money doesn’t make everything okay. You had it tough, too. Don’t forget that I ended up with Rosie and Herb, plus all my brothers. The way I look at it, my birth mom did me a favor. She went looking for a better life, and thanks to her I found one.”
“I suppose, in a way, she did the right thing. She wasn’t a positive influence.”
“Except she was the reason I got into acting. Whenever the school put on a play, I was the first to stick my hand in the air. It was my favorite escape, a chance to pretend I was someone else.”
“But when you came here, you didn’t give it up. That much I do know about you from your résumé. You were in a ton of high school productions.”
“By then I was hooked. If I could make an audience laugh or cry, or even get mad, I was thrilled. Now I’ll have to go to my own movies to get that buzz.”
“Or take a shot at live theater.”
“Maybe.”
She stood on tiptoe and brushed a kiss over his cheek. “Thank you for trusting me with your story. It won’t go anywhere.”
Pushing back his hat, he took her by the shoulders and gave her a quick, fiery kiss. Then he noticed that her glasses were fogged and began to laugh. “I see what you mean about steaming things up. Let me help.” He gently took them off and pulled a bandanna out of his back pocket. “I hope I end up doing this a lot.” He cleaned the lenses and carefully slid the glasses back into place. “In fact, I’d kiss you again right now, but it’s almost time for breakfast.”
“Can I have a rain check?”
“Lady, you can have anything you want from me.”
She could have anything she wanted from Matt. Geena wished she believed it, but she knew his comment didn’t extend to whatever she had in mind for his goodwill campaign. He’d made it clear that his foster-kid story was off the table. Now that he’d told her the details, she understood why.
As she tucked into what was possibly the best breakfast she’d ever eaten, she reviewed the situation. Before hearing that his mother had abandoned him, she’d hoped he’d consent to a heartwarming article or video interview about how Rosie, Herb, his foster brothers and this ranch had shaped his life. She’d discovered that trying to refute bad publicity never worked, but replacing it with good news almost always did.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t use the Thunder Mountain angle. Once she opened that door, celebrity gossip magazines would dig for the story behind the story. An enterprising reporter might find his mother. Or his mother would contact him. Since he didn’t want that, they’d have to take a different approach.
She had no idea what that would be, but the conversation at the breakfast table had shifted from the weather to what everyone planned to do after breakfast. That was her cue to propose the cleaning plan. She glanced across at Matt, who gave her a subtle nod.
Somehow, in the midst of taking seats at the round table, they’d ended up on opposite sides. Herb and Rosie sat on her right and Lexi and Cade were on her left. She focused on Rosie and went into her spiel.
Rosie listened politely as she sipped her coffee. At the end of the speech she put down her mug. “That’s a wonderful offer, but here’s the deal. I didn’t expect either of you to be here during this time, so we have it covered. Matt needs a break and you probably have calls to make. I doubt your business has come to a screeching halt because you flew to Wyoming.”
“No, but I’ll check in with my office before we start. If I have issues to handle I might have to retract my offer, but nothing was critical when I talked with my assistant yesterday. And I really do want to help.”
“I can see that.” Rosie beamed at her. “But you and Matt are both excused from cleaning duty.”
Matt looked at Geena, his lifted eyebrows clearly saying I told you so.
But she wasn’t giving up. “You didn’t expect us, but here we are, consuming food and taking up space. I’m sure I speak for Matt when I say that we’d feel a whole lot better about our unplanned visit if you’d let us do something for the cause. It won’t be a chore for either of us to scrub down a cabin or two. If we hop right on it, maybe we can finish up all four this morning.”
“Whoa, there, Geena, ma’am.” Cade took off his hat and settled it more securely on his head. “Back up the bus. You gotta leave something for the rest of us. My lady purely loves watching me operate a vacuum cleaner.”
Lexi sighed dramatically. “I’ll admit it. Nothing’s sexier than a man running a vacuum.” She fanned herself. “Oh, baby.”
“I’d never want to deprive you of that.” Geena focused on Lexi, figuring she’d understand the situation even if Rosie balked. “Can we split the job, two cabins for you guys and two for us?”
“Sure, why not?”
“I like it.” Matt lifted his coffee mug in Rosie’s direction. “Over to you, Mom, but I hope you’ll throw in the towel. And the mop and the broom while you’re at it.”
“Matthew Edward.” Rosie frowned at him. “Young women who come to visit Thunder Mountain are welcome to help out a little bit because that’s being mannerly. But they’re not supposed to wash windows and mop floors.”
“Oooh, she said your whole name, bro.” Cade rolled his eyes. “Either she’s touched or annoyed. It could go either way.”
“I’m both.” Rosie pulled a tissue from her pocket. “But mostly I’m touched.” She dabbed at her eyes and gave them all a teary smile. “When I listen to the four of you arguing for the privilege of cleaning the cabins, it gets to me.”
“I’ll just bet it does,” Cade said. “You’re probably remembering all the years we tried to argue our way out of doing it.”
Rosie laughed and dabbed her eyes some more. “Yes, you certainly did. Very creatively, too.”
Cade looked over at Matt. “We were rotten, you know?”
“I know. We should have been more grateful, more willing to—”
“Now, hang on,” Herb said. “We’re talking about normal boys, here, right?” He put an arm around Rosie. “We would have worried if you’d all gone about your chores with a smile on your face and a song in your heart.”
Cade chuckled. “Yeah, that would have been kind of sickening.”
“I loved it all,” Rosie said. “The arguing, the pranks, the roughhousing. The handpicked bouquets.” She winked at Cade.
“Who knew that was poison ivy?”
Herb shook his head and sighed. “Everybody but you, son.”
“So many great memories.” Rosie looked at Matt. “I’ll never forget when you had the lead in Oklahoma!”
“Yeah,