Have Cowboy, Need Cupid (9 page)

“Suzanne just spent the day with Rafe McAllister on his ranch.” Rebecca paused dramatically, letting the sentence sink in. “He’s teaching her to ride and showing her around his property.”

“I bet that’s not all he’s going to show you,” Mimi said.

“I have a feeling you’ve met your man,” Hannah added.

“I might as well get things ready in the bridal shop to start planning another Hartwell wedding,” Alison said.

Suzanne shook her head in denial. “We barely know each other. I’m not sure we even like each other.”

“Uh-huh,” Mimi said. “I didn’t think Seth was for me at first.”

“I didn’t think Thomas liked me either,” Rebecca said.

“And Jake thought I might be involved with an illegal car theft ring,” Hannah added.

“Brady thought we weren’t meant to be together,” Alison said.

But that was different, Suzanne thought. And they wouldn’t think about marriage if they knew the truth about why she was spending time with Rafe.

And what about James?

As if her sister had read Suzanne’s mind, Rebecca gestured toward the sapphire ring. “Have you answered James’s proposal yet?”

Suzanne shook her head. “I-I’m not sure what to say to him.”

Rebecca gave her a sympathetic look. “Do you love him, Suzanne?”

Suzanne pressed a finger to her temple where a headache was beginning to pulse. Did she love James? She wasn’t exactly sure how she felt about him. He certainly didn’t send her senses into a dizzying spin like the sight of Rafe….

Chapter Eight

Rafe spent a miserable, sleepless night stewing over the ranch’s problems. His morning didn’t fare much better. He’d risen at dawn to do three hours of work before he drove his mother into town to the doctor. Thankfully, Hannah Hartwell Tippins had consulted with his mother’s rheumatologist so she could treat his mother without a trip to Atlanta each time she needed follow-up treatment. Of course, there were the occasional times when she needed more extensive tests and they had to make the long trek to the city, but for now her condition had stabilized, meaning her medication was working. Her spirits seemed high, too, especially since that visit with Suzanne.

But why had Hannah given him an odd look when he’d left? As if she knew some kind of secret about him that she thought funny.

He must have imagined it, he thought, as he hurried into the grocery store to fill his mother’s prescription. He’d left her at the bookstore to browse through the magazines and books, knowing she needed to pick out a few new paperbacks to entertain her while she rested. Dropping the prescription off at the pharmacist’s window, he gathered some pain-killers, ointment, cotton balls, milk and bread, tossed in a box of her favorite bubble bath along with some fresh strawberries, then headed to the pharmacist window. But as he rounded the corner near the baby aisle, he nearly crashed into Mimi Hartwell Broadhurst, carrying a pink bundle.

“Hi, Rafe.”

“Hi.” He didn’t realize Mimi even knew his name.

“I hear you’re giving Suzanne riding lessons.”

“Yeah.”

Mimi grinned, jiggling her daughter up and down on her shoulder. “She told us what a good time she had at your ranch yesterday.”

“She did?”

“Yes. You’re really sweet to teach her to ride.”

Sweet? No one had ever accused him of that before.

“She’s a good athlete,” Mimi said. “I bet she takes to the saddle pretty easily.”

He nodded. She had been a natural. Those long legs and all…. “I’m only doing it so she’ll change her mind about supporting that mall project,” he said, not knowing why he felt the need to clarify his actions, but Mimi was looking at him oddly, her eyes twinkling just as Hannah’s had.

“Oh, right.” Mimi winked at him, then walked away, laughing.

What was it with women? First his mother pushing him toward Suzanne, now Mimi Hartwell grinning like he had ulterior motives in giving a riding lesson. Even Hannah, who seemed like the practical sort, had behaved oddly.

What exactly had Suzanne said about him?

“W
HAT DID HE SAY
about me?” Suzanne asked, studying Rafe’s sexy backside as he exited the store.

Mimi grinned. “Just that he was only giving you riding lessons to convince you not to support that mall project. Of course, you know the old saying, ‘Me thinks he doth protest too much.’”

“I’m sure he meant what he said,” Suzanne said. “For some reason I don’t think he likes me.”

“What’s not to like?” Mimi said, wide-eyed. “He’s a man and you’re a positively scrumptious woman. He’d be crazy not to be attracted to you. I don’t know why you didn’t go over and just talk to him. I never thought of you as being shy, Suzanne.”

“It’s not that,” Suzanne said. “But I don’t want him to think I’m stalking him.” She adjusted her purse on her shoulder. “Besides, I’m buying ingredients to make a cake, and I didn’t want him to see me with this recipe book.”

“I didn’t know you could cook.”

Another tiny tidbit she’d sort of fudged yesterday. “I can’t. At least not much. But yesterday I told Rafe’s mother about this wonderful chocolate cake, and somehow she got the impression that I baked it myself. I guess I forgot to mention that it was our third housekeeper, Mrs. Atkinson, that actually cooked the darn thing.”

Mimi’s mouth twitched. “Uh-huh. You wanted to impress Rafe’s mother?”

“I…I guess so.” Although she had no idea why impressing Mrs. McAllister had seemed important, but it had at the time, so she simply hadn’t corrected her assumption. Now, she’d dug herself into a hole. But it wasn’t like it was a big lie, really, and what could it hurt to make a sweet, sick woman a cake? Rafe’s mother had been so cordial yesterday, so full of Southern hospitality. Besides, Suzanne needed to learn to cook sometime, so why not practice her culinary skills while she had a few days to relax in Sugar Hill? How hard could it be to make a cake? All she had to do was follow the directions.

“Well, keep me posted,” Mimi said. “We’ll see you at the next town meeting.”

Suzanne nodded and raced through the store to gather the ingredients listed in the recipe, battling nerves. She could handle major mergers and acquisitions, entertain the wealthiest entrepreneurs and close million-dollar deals. Baking a cake should be easy. After all, she’d certainly
served
plenty of cake at receptions before.

She read the ingredients. What exactly was cake flour? Perplexed, she scoured the shelves and discovered more varieties and name brands than she could ever have imagined. Wheat flour, white flour, self-rising flour, all-purpose flour. What in heaven’s name was the difference between them and which one was she supposed to buy?

A frown pulled at her mouth. And what in the world was a sifter?

H
IS NERVES STRUNG TIGHT
, Rafe strode into the bank. Though Slim Wallace had turned down his loan, he hoped he’d cut him some slack on the second mortgage payment. A few minutes later he paced across Wallace’s office, his hands jammed in his pockets to keep from pounding the man’s snotty face into the stack of papers on his desk marked Past Due—all bills of Rafe’s, thanks to his irresponsible father.

“Look, Wallace, it’s barely turning spring. Just give me a few more weeks, and I’ll have part of the money. I have some beef cattle I’m about ready to sell—”

“I’ve heard it all before,” Wallace said. “From your father and now you.” Wallace stood, hands planted on his desk. “Listen, Rafe, I feel for you, I honestly do. But you’re in way over your head. You’re so far past due that I’m not going to have a choice soon. I’ll have to collect or foreclose.”

God, no.

Sweat beaded on Rafe’s forehead. “You can’t do that, Slim. This land has been in my family for generations. It would kill my mother to have to leave her home.”

Wallace sighed, twisting a cigar end with his fingers. “Maybe you should tell her the truth. She might be stronger than you think.”

“No.” He fisted his hands by his side. “Don’t you tell her, either. She hasn’t been in the best of health, and I don’t want to add to it by heaping more stress on her.”

“Think about selling part of your land to Landon, then. He’s been after it for years.”

“He’s part of the reason my father got in so much trouble.”

“Well, your only other option is to sell to that developer.”

Anger mounted in Rafe’s chest. “I won’t let the Lazy M become another shopping mall.”

“Then consider Landon,” Wallace said, sounding weary. “At least he’ll keep the property for ranching. Maybe he can even hire you to help run it.”

Work as a hired hand on his own ranch? Nausea cramped Rafe’s stomach. They had reached an impasse. “Just don’t do anything yet.”

“A week,” Wallace said. “That’s all I can give you.”

Rafe scowled, his heart pounding, and stalked out of the office. One week wasn’t nearly long enough to solve all his problems.

S
UZANNE CASHED HER CHECK
at the teller’s window, then turned abruptly, in a hurry to get back to Rebecca’s apartment and bake the cake before she went to the Lazy M, but she suddenly slammed into a hard masculine body. Two strong hands caught and steadied her, and she glanced up to see Rafe McAllister, all six-three of him staring down at her with laser-sharp, dark eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

“No, I should have been watching where I was going,” she said, shaken by the intense look of anger in his eyes. Anger and some other emotion, something much more disturbing. He was really upset about something. Had he found out who she was working for?

Then Slim Wallace stepped out of his office with a folder clenched in his hand, looking equally troubled, the mutinous stares that rippled between the two men explaining everything. They had just had some kind of meeting that hadn’t gone very well. She’d dealt with enough men in the aftermath of a deal turned sour that she recognized the signs.

Rafe still had his hands wrapped around her arms, his expression stony. “Are you okay?”

She nodded dumbly, slowly extracting herself. “I guess we were both in a hurry.”

A clipped nod was his only response.

Had Wallace warned Rafe he was going to lose his ranch?

A man’s land is his pride. Without that, he has nothing.
Rafe’s words echoed in her head, followed by his mother’s.

That tree is where Frank and I got married. And those tulips remind me of my mother. She loved tulips.

Sympathy welled up inside Suzanne. She didn’t know the name of her own mother’s favorite flower. Or where she and her father had married. Rafe had all those memories of his land. He woke up and looked out at the mountains where his ancestors had lived and breathed and worked for generations. How would he feel if his home was suddenly taken from him?

She couldn’t imagine, because she hadn’t lived in the same house her entire life, the way he had. She woke up to an empty apartment overlooking a crowded parking lot where people fought for parking spaces like rabid beasts. Her place was only miles away from her father’s, but they rarely saw each other. When they did, business usually brought them together.

“I need to get going,” he said in a gruff voice.

“So do I.” She raised her chin a notch, uncomfortable with her own emotions.

He started past her, and her temper surfaced at his dismissal. “What time do I need to come by the ranch today?”

He turned around and glared at her, so hard that her insides quivered.

“Or have you changed your mind?”

She saw the indecision in his eyes. Rafe didn’t want to want her to come, yet he did. And he still thought he’d sway her to his side.

“Five o’clock. I’ve got a ton of stuff to do first.”

“Five is fine. I have work to do, too.” Like learn how to bake a cake.

“Good, I’ll see you then.”

“All right.”

“Oh, and, Suzanne, you might want to wear some regular boots this time.”

Irritation crawled through her. He was actually criticizing her clothes. No one had ever said Suzanne Hartwell didn’t know how to dress. “Don’t worry, cowboy. You won’t be disappointed in what I plan to wear.”

His eyes shot up, and she realized how suggestive her comment had sounded. But the sudden spark of desire in his eyes that replaced the troubled look was so much nicer she didn’t care; she’d have to pick out something that would rattle him even more.

After all, it wasn’t fair for her to be the only one wrestling with this crazy desire.

R
AFE PARKED IN FRONT
of the Hotspot, still contemplating Suzanne’s parting remark. What did the woman plan to wear to his ranch? Something soft and seductive?

To ride in? Not likely.

Still, he indulged his imagination, conjuring images of her dark exotic hair spread across bare shoulders, a low top veeing down to reveal enough cleavage to tempt a man to want to see more, and jeans that rode low enough on her hips to let him glimpse her bare flat belly.

Scrubbing his hand through his hair, he fought the images, reminding himself she was off-limits. A definite danger to his lonely libido.

And a distraction from problems that seemed almost insurmountable.

Shaking off the images of Suzanne, he slammed the truck door and strode into the bookstore to pick up his mother. She was standing at the register talking to Rebecca Hartwell Emerson.

“Thanks for stopping in, Mrs. McAllister,” Rebecca said. “I hope you enjoy those books.”

“Oh, I will, dear,” Rafe’s mother said. “And thanks for the chat. It’s lovely to see you again. Marriage certainly agrees with you.”

Rebecca blushed. “I’m enjoying it.”

“I keep telling Rafe that he needs to find himself a bride. Don’t you think so?”

“Mother,” Rafe cut in, “Shouldn’t we be going?”

“He’s so ornery these days.” She offered Rebecca a knowing smile as if the entire female population had some secret he didn’t know about, as if all the Hartwell women had decided to conspire against him. “A good woman would change his disposition all right.”

Rebecca simply smiled at him, and he tipped his Stetson in a polite gesture, then ushered his mother toward the door, wishing for once she could move that walker a little bit faster. He wasn’t normally a man to blush, but all this matchmaking talk was downright embarrassing.

“What time is Suzanne coming over?” his mother asked when they’d settled into the car.

“Five o’clock. I told her to wait until I got some work done first.” He heaved a sigh and hit the gas. “I don’t have time to baby-sit her all day. I’ve got much more important things to do. Like run the ranch.”

“Then maybe you should get Bud to give her riding lessons.”

He clenched the steering wheel tighter. “No, that’s all right. I…the insurance might not cover him.”

His mother pursed her lips as if fighting a smile and turned to stare out the window. But the twinkle in her eye suggested her matchmaking plan wasn’t over.

Maybe he should relay Suzanne’s opinion about the new development, that if it was up to her, the ranch he and his mother loved would be replaced by a damn mall.

He took another look at the syrupy smile on her face, and, remembering how pale she’d looked before, opted to remain silent. His mother liked Suzanne, and he couldn’t stand to disappoint her.

He’d have to deal with Suzanne Hartwell himself.