Mossy Glenn Ranch 3 -Saddles and Memories (11 page)

“Call Carlos,” Rocky corrected. Salt glanced at her and she grinned. “We have to go to town to pick up a feed order that just came in.”

“Both of you?” Ramsey asked doubtfully.

Rocky turned and looked at him. “You got your job to do, we got ours. There’s no need for you to be poking about in what we’re doing.”

Ramsey turned away and Salt felt a frisson of unease, but he couldn’t pinpoint any reason for him to suspect Ramsey was less than he claimed to be.

Except that he seems to know about ranch work in a third-party kinda way, like someone told him what he’d be doing instead of him actually ever having done it.

“You just want to go back to the diner,” Salt teased Rocky a short while later. “You’re the one having raunchy on-the-job fantasies.”

Rocky started the truck up as she laughed. “Oh, now, there ain’t nothing raunchy about them! I would never think about treating my lady with anything less than the utmost respect and gentleness.”

Salt just about chuckled himself silly. It took him a couple of attempts at getting a good breath before he could speak while Rocky glowered at him. “Sorry, but you know, Ms Jen looks like a lady, all prim and proper, and it’s been my experience with men, granted, that prissy and perfect hides a tiger in the sack. The tighter they’re wound, the fiercer they come uncoiled for ya.”

Rocky waggled her eyebrows. “Ohhhh, then I am so gonna work on encouraging her to take a walk on the wild side.”

“You can’t convert someone—” Salt stopped. Rocky knew it, and it wasn’t like she was going to force herself on the pretty waitress.

“She might be curious,” Rocky told him while she drove them down the bumpy dirt road towards the main house and road. “Lots of people are, especially when they start getting older and wonder what they’ve missed.”

Salt tried not to look shocked at that. He knew people were curious, but was Rocky saying she was willing to be used? Salt had to ask. “You’d let her mess around with you and use you?”

Rocky shrugged, but Salt didn’t miss the pinched look that settled over her profile. “Why not? I keep wanting to jump right into serious with every woman I date. Might as well try something different. You can’t bitch at me about it, either. You told me all you ever had was casual sex. It’s my turn to give it a shot.”

“Didn’t realise it was a tag-team event,” Salt groused, but he let it go. Rocky was an adult and who knew, maybe a casual fling would be good for her.

Except when they got to the diner, Salt could tell by the longing in Rocky’s gaze that she was already infatuated with the waitress, Jen. There were, he was certain, emotions involved on Rocky’s part, at least. He’d better start preparing for the coming letdown and misery she was probably going to experience.

They grabbed a seat at a table in the back of the diner—one right by the people Jen was waiting on. Rocky shot her a timid look as they sat. Jen nodded and returned a polite smile that she probably used on all customers.

Salt didn’t like the whole timid bit. Rocky wasn’t like that—she was gregarious, loud and obnoxious but fun and good-hearted. “Just be yourself,” he mumbled softly. “Otherwise she might think you tricked her later on, if…well, if you two, you know.”

Jen glanced at him and Salt winced. He’d been pretty damn quiet and didn’t think she could have heard him, but she
was
a mom and his own sure had had super-hearing abilities. It went with the whole eyes on the back of the head thing as far as he was concerned. Moms were about as omnipotent as a human being could be.

“I’ll be right with you,” Jen said before heading over to the counter. Salt watched her pluck up two menus before he spoke again.

“Maybe you need to relax a little,” he suggested.

Rocky rolled her eyes. “Being myself ain’t got me nothing but a string of broken hearts. I’m not risking that kind of pain again.”

“You seem to have gotten over Shelly quick enough. Are you sure you loved her?” Salt thought a broken heart should take months to recover from, not that he was any expert. It still seemed a good idea to get Rocky to thinking about the strength of her feelings for Shelly.

Rocky opened her mouth and closed it again before covering her eyes with her hands. “Oh, hell. Maybe not. I don’t even miss her. Didn’t bother me at all to talk to her and tell her she wasn’t getting another dime from me last payday.” She peeked at him from between her fingers. “Maybe I’m in love with the idea of being in love. That’s bordering on too deep a thought for me, but it’d explain why all my ex-girlfriends don’t seem such a loss to me now.”

“Surely you’re being modest. An intelligent person would be cognisant of their issues, and it seems like you are aware of yours.”

Salt jerked his head around and saw Jen standing beside their table at the same time Rocky did. Rocky dropped her hands to the table top as her face flamed scarlet. “I—I—it wasn’t—I didn’t—”

Hell’s bells, he’d never seen Rocky so flustered! Salt couldn’t bear to see her stumbling over her own words. “Rocky was just being modest. She’s a smart gal.”

Jen and Rocky both looked at him. Salt held up both hands. “Oh, come on, now. When did gal become politically incorrect?”

Jen brought her pen to her bottom lip and nibbled on it for a second before responding. “I suppose it hasn’t.”

“He didn’t say I was smart
for a
gal,” Rocky said as she nodded.

Salt huffed and held out a hand for a menu. “I’m not stupid. My mama would have skinned me alive if I’d ever even had a misogynistic thought.”

Jen’s smile seemed a lot more genuine when she turned it on him. “Ah, your mama and I raised our sons the same way.”

Salt almost reached back and rubbed his backside at that. He’d had a wooden spoon put to his butt more than once as a kid when he’d screwed up. Didn’t seem like abuse to him, either. If his mama hadn’t kept him in line, there was no telling what all kind of trouble he’d have got into.

“You both work at the Mossy Glenn?” Jen asked.

Salt decided Rocky could do the talking. Rocky glanced at him then at Jen. “Yes. Salt and I have been there since the first hires. It’s a great place to work.”

“I imagine it is,” Jen agreed before tapping her lip with the pen a few more times. She seemed to be working up to something.

“Everyone’s real friendly, and it ain’t like there’s wild parties going on,” Rocky continued, speaking a little faster than normal. “The ranch is doing well, too. Carlos was able to hire a few new hands about a month ago.”

Jen took the order pad out of her pocket and went to tapping that with the pen instead. “Oh, okay. So I suppose there’s no need for even a part-time hand out there?”

Rocky gulped, her eyes going round. Salt decided to bail her out again. “Well, ma’am, that depends on the bosses and whoever’s applying. Would that be you who is interested?”

Jen waved him off. “No, of course not. I’m not—” She darted an apologetic look towards Rocky, and Salt knew then she’d definitely heard him a few minutes ago. Rocky averted her eyes and turned away. “I’m not sure I’d fit in there, but I suspect my son might.”

“You suspect?” Salt felt his eyebrows climbing up his forehead.

Jen glanced around and so did Salt. The people beside them had left at some point and they seemed to be relatively alone with her.

Jen still leaned close as she spoke. “Barney hasn’t ever told me he’s interested in anyone, not women or men, but I suspect… I suspect he’s afraid to tell me. I might have went on about wanting grandchildren years back before…” She shrugged.

Salt canted his head at her. “Being gay don’t mean there can’t be children and grandchildren for you.”

“I was ignorant.” Jen tucked a strand of brown hair behind her ear. “I went on about him marrying the right girl and all that, without thinking about how he’d never so much as dated a girl before. He always followed around Fred’s boy.”

“Freddie Jr.” Salt knew all about that kid. He’d been badly abused by his daddy, and it might have broken something in him. Either that or the kid had been a pyromaniac psycho long before he’d almost killed people a few months ago.

Jen tapped that order pad again. “Yes, him. This whole community let that boy down.”

There was no arguing with that, at least not to Salt. Freddie Jr’s abuse hadn’t been a secret according to what Salt had heard.

“Anyway. I was just wondering if there was anything he could do there. He’s working two part-time jobs as it is right now, but…” Jen blushed and scribbled something on that pad. “Times are really hard.”

“They are,” Salt agreed. Rocky murmured her assent as well. “Let me talk to Carlos, and I’ll see what he says.” He didn’t think there was any room—financially at least—for another ranch hand, but he could be wrong. Salt didn’t have shit to do with the books, so for all he knew, the Mossy G could be dragging in the big money. Of course, how that would happen without them selling off any stock was beyond him.

“Thank you.” Jen beamed at him.

Rocky cleared her throat. Jen looked at her. “If Barney is straight as an arrow, the Mossy Glenn probably won’t appeal to him.”

“Let me or Rocky talk to Carlos first.” Salt held out a hand to Jen. “I’m Salt, by the way, and that’s Rocky.”

Rocky shook Jen’s hand next and Salt bit back a grimace at the way Rocky let her palm linger against Jen’s. Rocky surely was setting herself up for disappointment.

“Here’s my cell number,” Rocky offered, rattling off the numbers. “Give me until tomorrow evening to talk to the boss. Then you can call or text me. This way you don’t have to give out your number to someone you don’t know.”

Jen quirked an eyebrow at her. “Like you just did?”

Rocky spluttered then muttered something about being able to take care of herself.

“I assure you, so can I.”

Damn, Jen sounded a bit miffed. Salt was just starving.

“Any chance I can get a burger and fries along with a glass of tea?” he interjected in the hopes of preventing any bickering. It sure looked like Rocky was about to insert her foot into her mouth again.

“Of course you can. I’m sorry, I’m being a horrible waitress.” That fake smile was back as Jen put the tip of her pen to the pad. “How do you want your burger?”

Twenty minutes later, Salt and Rocky were outside sweating under the sun’s rays. “That was maybe the most uncomfortable lunch ever, Rocky.”

Rocky groaned. “My God, I know! I just had to make it sound like I thought Jen was some fragile flower. Ugh.”

“Apologising might help.”

Rocky shook her head. “You don’t get it. Every time I tried to speak to Jen and tell her I was sorry, my throat damn near closed up on me! I’ve never been so nervous around a woman I was interested in before.” Rocky paused and pursed her lips. “Of course, I’m usually in bed with a woman within a couple of hours of meeting her, too. Jen’s different.”

Salt prayed for more patience. “She’s straight, Rocky. You heard her in there when we thought she wanted a job at the ranch. You need to look elsewhere for someone to date.”

The stubborn look on Rocky’s face told him it was a lost cause. They didn’t speak again until that evening after supper.

“I’m not mad at you,” Rocky said as she pulled him aside. “I was just thinking about what you said, is all. I can’t help but feel there’s more to Jen than what you’re seeing. And she didn’t say she wasn’t a lesbian, or bi. She said she wasn’t sure she’d fit in. That’s not a no.”

Salt couldn’t hold back a sigh. “It’s not a yes, either, Rocky. Chances are she just wants a job for her son and she’s not willing to jeopardise that by saying she’s straight. Or he’s straight, I don’t even know at this point.”

Rocky bobbed her head. “That’s right, you don’t, so let me deal with it. I appreciate you being concerned, but I’m a big gal. I won’t blame you if Jen shatters my heart into a million pieces.”

“Melodramatic much?” he asked as he winked at her.

Rocky made shooing motions with her hands. “Duh. Now go talk to your boyfriend and have dirty text sex. You should just call him, you know. I’m going to chat with Carlos.”

“We don’t text sex, or sext, or have phone sex at all,” Salt grumbled. “We’re friends, not just fuck buddies.” And it felt so good to say so even if he wasn’t sure Andy felt the same way.

“You have fun with that.” Rocky patted his arm and left.

* * * *

Texas was hot, miserable, muggy and the plant life looked to be dying off due to the almost constant state of drought the place was in. Andy knew there were prettier parts of Texas, but the area South of San Antonio was in bad shape. As hot as it was, he’d bet the water would evaporate right out of his bottle if he uncapped it outside.

After a sweat-soaked day—Andy hadn’t ever sweated like he had making his sales calls today—Andy cranked up the AC in his hotel room and contemplated supper. No way was he going outside again. Even if the hotel caught on fire, he’d probably be cooler standing in the flames.

His phone chimed with his favourite tone and the exhaustion that had been settling over him vanished. Salt was done working for the day, too, it seemed.

Andy took his cell out and set it on the small table by the window. He made himself wait until he’d taken off his boots, socks, shirt and pants before checking the message. Getting cooled off was a priority above all else, even the one thing that made his days joyful.

Once he was stripped down, Andy checked the message and grinned. Salt started off with a lead-in about the lunch from hell. “Of course I want to know what happened, goofball.” Andy typed those exact words in. Less than a minute later, he frowned at the reply. Did he want to talk to Salt instead of text?

Would that be breaking some non-relationship rule? “Are there non-relationship rules?” There was probably some
Idiot’s Guide
book for those.

There’d been things he’d like to have shared with Salt over the past weeks, but texting them had been too tedious. He had a great story to tell about the rancher he’d just called on, too. One involving tarantulas and Andy acting like a terrified child. Damn, but he hated spiders.

Instead of texting Salt back and telling him to go ahead and call, Andy dialled Salt’s number himself. Salt had taken the first step towards changing things between them, and Andy was willing to match him.