Colin kept his intuitional sense on Dana, whose cheeks had pinked up as everyone dove into the delicious food after Mary gave a short, sincere prayer of thanks. Louise brought in two baskets of sourdough biscuits, which made the men even more appreciative. The vegan eaters bypassed them on the first pass. But he, Chase, and Logan didn’t.
There wasn’t much talking, just eating. Dana ate heartily, finishing everything that was on her plate. He offered her the basket, two biscuits left. She smiled and daintily took one. After slathering it with butter, Dana closed her eyes, savoring it.
The tendrils of her hair, mussed from the day’s work, but also cleaned in a shower, made her look almost fragile to Colin. He didn’t know why he thought of her in that way. Today, she’d hauled ass and worked as hard as he had. She was very athletic. But then she worked on a farm, and was in top shape. Her face was a tad red from being out in the sun all day, he noted, mostly her nose. She needed to have a hat and he mentally made a note to bring one of his with him tomorrow morning so she wouldn’t get sunburned. Tomorrow was going to be a super-busy day outside on the Wildflower Ranch, that was for sure.
“Is Louise not the best cook around?” Mary prodded Dana, noting her plate was clean.
“She is a wonderful cook, Mary,” she answered, patting her stomach.
“Nothin’ like home cooking.” She wiggled her fork at Dana’s plate. “Louise uses food from the surrounding ranches and farms that we have contracts with. Any food that passes our lips here at the ranch, is non-GMO, organic, and tastes like the food I grew up on in the past!”
“I can tell it’s homegrown,” Dana said. “And I’m happy that I’ve signed a contract with you, too.”
“Well, that will come in time.” Mary smiled. “Is Colin being a good helper to you out at your ranch?”
Dana turned and looked at Colin. As usual, his expression was unreadable. “I couldn’t have done it without him”—she looked over at Chase—“or you allowing him to come and help me out.”
Chase nodded. “No one works harder than Colin.”
“I do like a coffee break sometimes,” Colin replied, giving them a partial grin.
Everyone at the table laughed and hooted.
Colin saw Dana’s reaction and didn’t want her targeted because this group, who knew each other so well, might appear to be like a pack of wolves to her. “Dana and I brought thermoses and we had a couple of breaks today.”
“So?” Chase goaded. “You think you’ll stay and help her out?”
“Sure,” he murmured. “She’s easier to work for than you, boss.”
More good-natured chuckling and guffawing followed.
“Hey, Dana, you’ll get used to this cosmic family of ours,” Mary said consolingly. “They like to razz the daylight outta each other.”
“Well,” Cari said, “just the boys do that.” She gave Dana a warm look. “We girls don’t do that kind of roughhousing and horseplay.”
“Good to hear,” Dana said.
“Nah,” Mary said, “we usually get together—Cari, Lea, and me—and we have farm-grown herbal tea, it’s organic, and some delicious dessert that Louise makes for us here at the ranch. We expect you to come to our weekly gabfests, too, if you’d like?”
“I’d love to do that,” Dana said.
Colin saw her green eyes widen with happiness and it tugged at his heart, a sensation of desire for her. Again.
There was no evading that some part of him was fully drawn to her. Why now? He had been okay with being alone. As Chase had accurately pinpointed, he worked best alone. A woman in his life? The way he was? Broken into pieces even he couldn’t control? No woman in her right mind would want someone like him. He knew how stressed he was daily, fighting to keep the monsters at bay, trying to seem normal, trying not to project onto others or get triggered by a silly situation that didn’t invite an explosive reaction on his part.
Gently, Colin tucked away his yearning because he saw so much possibility with Dana in his life. No. He couldn’t hurt her like that and he knew he would. Somehow, he was going to have to move to being her support, her teacher, and helping her to bring her dream to reality. That gave him a good feeling. He wasn’t totally worthless, after all.
* * *
April 18
The scudding gray clouds signaled an end to a swift-moving front that had hit the valley with rain yesterday. Dana looked forward to the concrete platform that would be created this afternoon for the double-wide mobile home.
The sun was peeking out here and there, warming her against the gusty breezes that came and went against her green winter nylon coat. She was glad to have the hood over her head to protect her neck from that late morning windchill.
Her gaze moved to Colin, who was dressed for the weather as well, a heavy denim jacket over his hoodie as he toiled to get everything into place for the cement mixers that would be coming in after lunch. He worked tirelessly and she didn’t know how he did it, exhausted just looking at the energy he consistently gave to her ranch the last day and a half. He worked as if it were his own place.
Pulling on her heavy sheep’s-wool-lined gloves, she went back into the dilapidated cabin. Yesterday, Colin had an outfit bring out a huge PODS metal container, where all their refuse could be put and later on hauled to the dump outside of town. There was a lot of debris inside the cabin and she looked around, wistful, because she’d wanted to save it because of its history. Reaching out, she ran her gloved fingers down the dark brown wood that had been roughened with age, across the white plaster, now yellowed, many parts of it having fallen out between the hand-hewn logs from so long ago. And where it had fallen out, cold air whistled in.
Getting down on her hands and knees, pulling a big bucket next to her, she took a whisk broom and dustpan, beginning to sweep up the debris. Her nostalgia continued as she wondered where the family had slept. Down at one end was a huge river boulder fireplace, handmade, rising up the wall, through the roof. How long had it taken them to build it? She imagined, looking at it, that perhaps it could be saved.
“How’s it going?”
Snapping her head up, gasping, she hadn’t heard Colin enter the cabin. “You scared me!”
“Sorry,” he said, wiping his brow with the back of his arm. “Old habit from my military days.” Giving her a close look, he asked, “Are you okay? You look pale.”
Shrugging, she quickly swept up the debris and put it in the can next to where she knelt. “Just an old reaction,” she muttered, shaking her head, unhappy.
He didn’t say anything, his brows dropping for a moment as he watched her move down the floor, sweeping up the chunks of fallen plaster. “I’ll try not to do that again. I’ll make some noise beforehand so you know I’m coming in,” he offered quietly, seeing the darkness come to her eyes.
She sat back on her heels, pointing to the fireplace. “What do you think of it, Colin? It’s really beautiful and it looks like the smooth, rounded stones are from the creek in back of this cabin.”
He ambled down to it, leaning over, checking it here and there. “Yes, those must have come out of this creek. Did you know, the glacier from ten thousand years ago came through here and dropped tons of rocks around the valley?”