Her cell phone rang as she smeared butter on her pancake. She recognized the ringtone as the one she’d assigned to her grandmother and jumped up so fast that her chair flipped over backwards. She didn’t even take the time to set it upright but dived for her purse, which was still on the credenza.
They called it a credenza but it was really the bottom half of an old washstand that had belonged to Grand’s grandmother. The bow that held the towel had long since broken off and probably burned in the fireplace, but the rest of the burled oak washstand was still as sturdy as the day it was made. She fished the phone from her purse and hiked a hip on the edge of the credenza as she answered it.
“Hello, Grand,” she said breathlessly.
“Well, you did make it home,” her grandmother said through a buzz of steady static. “Looks like the blizzard is messing with the lines. Just wanted to be sure you were safe.”
“Grand, what have you done?”
Grand giggled. “I told you I’d sell when I felt like the time and the buyer were right. Well, Creed Riley walked up on the porch and I knew it was time. I could feel it in my bones, and it was even an omen that his name starts with a C. He agreed to keep the Rockin’ C brand, so that was another good sign. I gave him a good deal and he took it. Live with it or move out here with me.”
Sage shouted into the phone, “To Pennsylvania in the mountains! No thank you!”
“I love it. Wasn’t sure I would, but it’s beautiful. And me and Essie are doing just fine in this big old barn of a house she’s got. I’m going to take care of the two old milk cows and we’ve got this little fruit stand out in front of the house where we’ll sell stuff in the summertime. And the neighbors stop in every day to buy what milk we want to sell.”
“All that will wear off before long,” Sage told her.
“I don’t think so. I knew when I looked into Creed’s eyes that he was the one. My sense never fails me. And Essie needs me. She’s getting feeble, Sage. You are cutting in and out so bad that I’m hanging up now…”
The phone went dead in her hands before she could say good-bye.
Sage redialed but got the no service message again. She picked up the landline and got nothing. It was going to be a long day.
Chapter 2
Sage painted when she was sad. She painted when she was happy. She painted when she was nervous, and she painted when she was antsy, like she was that morning.
Her supplies had been stored in the bunkhouse when she finished the last canvas and headed to Denver and Cheyenne to the two showings. There weren’t many days in a year when she couldn’t paint outside. Sometimes spring rains kept her inside, but that wasn’t every single day. And bitter cold didn’t last long in the wintertime, but the way the snow kept falling, it looked like it might go on until eternity.
She finished the pancakes, drank two more cups of coffee, and started toward her bedroom to haul her heavy coveralls out of the closet. She could stoke up a fire in the bunkhouse and do her painting there. She weighed the consequences. If she escaped to the bunkhouse, Creed would think he had run her off. This was her house, not his. Or she could ignore him and show him exactly who the boss of the Rockin’ C was.
She might have to share space with him, but that did not mean she had to talk to him. Knowing his name was enough, and she’d have been quite happy not even to know that much. She could have referred to him as “hey, you” or simply “cowboy” for three weeks.
“What are you doing the rest of the day?” he asked.
She turned around in the middle of the living room. “I’m going to get my supplies out of the bunkhouse, take a shower, and then paint until the light fades so much I can’t see. And FYI, cowboy, I do not like people to talk to me while I’m painting.”
“In cold water?”
Was he stupid or what? An idiot knew you didn’t paint in water.
He grinned. “Are you going to take a shower in cold water?”
Dammit! Why couldn’t he have one of those big toothy grins that turned a woman off? Oh, no! Grand had to leave her with a cowboy who had a smile so sexy that it lit up the whole universe.
“The hot water tank runs on propane. Grand thinks a total electric house is a joke. The trick to having a hot shower is to keep the generator that runs the well pump filled with gas. That means twice a day, and I like hot water enough to do it myself if you don’t want to.”
If anyone had told her two days ago that she’d be explaining the workings of her home to a complete stranger, she would have thought they were crazy. Never in her wildest dreams did she think Grand would ever go this far in selling the ranch. But it happened and it hurt to admit it, but his green eyes were mesmerizing, his pancakes were good, he was good to the dog, and when he grinned her heart got a hitch in the beating process. She’d bet dollars to cow patties that if there were kids around they’d flock to him like flies on the kitchen table in the summertime. That must have been what Grand saw in him when he appeared on the porch.
Grand might have enough clout with God to get Him to send the storm to the canyon so Sage would have no choice but to spend days and days with the cowboy, but Ada Presley had met her match. Sage had three whole weeks to fire up her temper and work on her arguments.
“What are you going to do with yourself all day long?” she asked.
“Read until chore time and then afterwards read until bedtime.”
“What are you reading?”
“I got a whole pile of books in my bedroom.”
That is Grand’s bedroom. Like I said before, don’t get too comfortable, Creed Riley.
He stacked the breakfast dishes on the cabinet. “They’ll wait until after lunch and then we’ll run a sink full to do dishes.”
“We?” she asked.
“I understand you don’t cook. Some women don’t. But darlin’, you can damn sure help with the dishes. If you don’t know how to do that, I will teach you.”
“Don’t you get all high-handed with me, cowboy.”
He held up his palms and took a deep breath.
“Hey, what do you say that we start over? Hello, Sage Presley. I am Creed Riley. Your grandmother, Ada Presley, is selling me this house. She told me you’d pitch a fit and I realize it’s a shock to you, but I will buy it. I can cook. I can take care of a ranch. Looks like we are stuck together in this house for a few days. What do you say we make the best of it?”
“Don’t look like we have much choice. I will try to be civil.”
A mistletoe cowboy and a dog so ugly that its face would stop an eight-day clock—her world had turned totally upside down.