The Rancher Next Door

“Does it matter?” He was beginning to look a little annoyed. “I can vouch for ’em. They’re good.”

Rebecca slid one out from under the cover of plastic wrap. They smelled delicious, too. “I’m just curious.” She bit into the confection, and found it rich and buttery and full of crispy rice cereal, oatmeal and coconut.

“I made ’em.”

It took all her concentration to swallow. “You?” she sputtered, amazed.

Trevor shrugged. “My brothers and I all know how to cook. Even Kyle and Kurt.”

“The younger two,” Rebecca said, remembering.

“They’re only seventeen and eighteen but they can grill a mean steak, scramble eggs. Throw together a salad. All the basics.”

Maybe doctoring the food hadn’t been such a good idea. She could have cooked normally and he likely would have been disappointed. Now, well, it was obvious what she had done….

“Anyway, I hope you like oatmeal and coconut….”

Like ’em? She was addicted to both. Even more annoying, it looked as though he was a better cook than she was, if the cookies were any indication.

“Can I help?”

Rebecca shook her head. Gestured for him to have a seat at the trestle table. She’d put herself at one end, him clear at the other. Four places and a vase of primroses stood between them. Aware the lettuce was beginning to wilt over the heavy application of buttermilk ranch dressing she’d layered it with a good half hour before, she set the wooden salad bowl on the table and went to the oven to get the casserole.

“I never knew you wanted to ranch,” Trevor remarked.

Rebecca set two steaming plates on the table and sat down opposite him. “That’s because I never confided my ambition to anyone but Miss Mim. She used to help me find books at the library.”

“But you didn’t study agriculture in college.”

Deciding to start with her salad, Rebecca twirled a soggy piece of lettuce on her fork. “That’s because I couldn’t see myself breeding cattle or horses, or heaven forbid, pigs! I can’t say chickens appealed to me much, either.”

Trevor dug into his first course with an enthusiasm that made her wince. “So instead you took the job with that tour company and headed overseas.”

That had been due more to a quarrel with her sister Susie and her father, over their outright betrayal of her in a romantic matter, than anything else. But Rebecca wasn’t about to get into that. Especially since her relationship had never really been the same with her sister Susie, or her father, since.

Rebecca shrugged. “I’d always longed for adventure. The job provided that, and more.” Plus, since she’d always been working and traveling and hadn’t had to pay apartment rent, she’d been able to bank nearly her entire salary.

“I still don’t see how you got from there to breeding alpacas.” Trevor finished his salad, and took a big bite of Tex-Mex chicken casserole.

It was all Rebecca could do not to gag herself as Trevor swallowed and followed his first bite of the main course with a gentlemanly sip of water.

She continued to play with her salad. “One of the European tours went to an alpaca ranch. I fell in love with the animals almost the moment I saw them, and when I found out how valuable their wool is—it’s the finest in the world—I knew I’d found my calling.”

“Sounds like you’ve given this some thought.” Trevor got up and walked over to the gift basket. He came back with a bottle of Annie’s Homemade Ketchup, with the familiar blue-and white-gingham label. He sat down and poured a liberal dose over the entrée.

“More than you could ever know,” Rebecca replied.

He studied her while he ate. He didn’t need sips of water now.

Rebecca on the other hand had all she could do not to gag on the mixture of incompatible herbs that she had added to the casserole.

Which served her right, she figured, for having done such an immature and bratty thing to begin with. She knew better than to treat a guest—even a self-invited one—this way.

“It’s okay to be nervous about a new business venture,” Trevor said eventually.

Finished with the meager portion she had put on his plate, he helped himself to some more, added ketchup, and—to her complete astonishment—dug right in.

“What makes you think I’m nervous?” Rebecca groused, not about to deal with one more naysayer in her life.

Her parents’ worries, combined with her three siblings’ unvoiced skepticism, had been more than enough.

Not that anyone had bothered to listen to the entirety of her plan. No, she usually lost them when they heard about the second loan she’d taken against the first, and the balloon payment due two weeks after closing.

Oblivious to the calculated financial risks she was taking, Trevor regarded her with a gentleness she didn’t expect.

“You have the same look in your eyes that I had in mine when I closed on Wind Creek.”

Rebecca couldn’t figure out whether he was being straight with her or not. What he’d said did not sound like the Trevor McCabe she knew. “You. Mr. Big Shot Cattleman. Were nervous.”

“Oh, yeah,” Trevor replied. “As was my brother Teddy when he started up The Silverado.” Trevor finished his second helping, and went for a third. “It’s the same thing everybody feels when they buy their first car or home or pet, or accept a job. That what-have-I-gotten-myself-into-now panic. Buyer’s remorse, some call it.”

Rebecca added ketchup to her dinner, too, and found the condiment delicious and the casserole beneath just as unpalatable.

She toyed with the food on her plate, suddenly glad he’d brought this up. She needed some encouragement. “When does the panicky feeling pass?” she asked him.

“As soon as you get going.” He flashed her a sexy smile. “Which is why it’s probably good you’re going to pick up the start of your herd tomorrow. Once you get busy caring for your alpacas, you won’t have time to think.”

Not thinking sounded good.

Rebecca started to relax.

Trevor smiled at her.

Too late, she saw the unexpected had happened…they were becoming more than neighbors…they were becoming friends.

“YOU DIDN’T TELL ME you had a puppy,” Trevor remarked a few minutes later as they cleaned up the dishes.

“I don’t.”

“Then you’ve got a visitor.”

Rebecca followed his glance to the bank of kitchen windows overlooking the backyard. Sure enough, a chocolate- brown Labrador retriever was alternately nosing the ground and trotting briskly toward the house. When he reached the stoop, he let out a sound that was half bark, half whine. “Oh my goodness. He barely looks old enough to be away from his mama.”

Trevor caught the puppy before he could dart past Rebecca, into the house. He lifted the squirming Labrador to chest level. “It’s a she. And I’d guess, from the size of her, that she’s about nine, ten weeks old, which means she probably just left her mama and the rest of her litter.”

Interesting. “Does she have tags?”

“Nope.” Trevor looked. “Just a collar.”