AllFreeNovel
Share Us
As Hannah sat and played with blocks in the high chair that Janet had retrieved from her car, she knew she didn’t have time to start a new meal from scratch. Although Zach was in his room where he’d been enclosed since he’d gotten home from school, Janet had heard the back door slam a moment before and knew the boy’s father was washing up in the mudroom.
And that obviously meant he’d want supper any moment now. A sick feeling of dread congealed under her breastbone. She’d never told him about her lack of experience in the kitchen, she’d been too afraid he’d rescind his job offer.
Lunch had been easy. Sandwiches she could do.
Real food was different. She’d never gotten the hang of it and simply hadn’t had enough practice. She knew that someday she’d be able to master the art of cooking, but unfortunately, this wasn’t the day.
Maybe it would be okay. Maybe the casserole would taste okay even though it looked … yucky. But she didn’t know—she hadn’t tasted it. She wasn’t afraid exactly, but the smells coming from the stove for the last half hour had killed her appetite to the point where she hadn’t been able to take a single bite.
And now, she saw Zach coming from one direction of the house just as his father came from the other.
Her moment of reckoning was upon her.
She took a deep breath and attempted to pretend that her casserole was going to be delicious.
****
Jeff forced another forkful and couldn’t contain the grimace as he swallowed. Chasing the bite with a long swallow of iced tea, he glanced across at Zach and was proud to see that his boy was handling the situation like a trouper. His son had swallowed a bite as well, but now, having gotten over the shock, the kid was shoveling the stuff in his mouth so fast it would make your head spin.
Of course, Janet was standing at the counter behind Zach and couldn’t see his son’s expression. It was obvious to Jeff that Zach was trying to put the unpleasant encounter behind him as quickly as possible.
It was a good plan but one that wouldn’t work for Jeff as the girl at the counter continued to take surreptitious looks in his direction as if gauging his reaction to the meal.
Yeah, her casserole sucked but he didn’t seem to be as much of an ass as he’d previously thought because he plastered a neutral expression on his face as he took one excruciating bite after the next.
He couldn’t actually bring himself to compliment her endeavor, but he refused to allow the painful experience to reflect on his face.
As he took his fourth steady bite and swallowed, a tiny hint of relief showed on her expression and then she turned away to begin washing a pot.
After the sixth bite, Jeff admitted the dish was edible, but it had no flavor and the consistency of the rice made it barely palatable.
But it was supper and he hadn’t had to cook it. So that was one point in her favor. He forced another swallow as he watched the sway of her backside as she attacked the dirty pot as if it were a mortal enemy she was determined to best.
The repetitive motion of her hips almost hypnotized him as he continued to ignore what he was consuming as he focused his attention on her. As he continued to watch her, a craving need developed that was hard to ignore, to say the least.
As he studied her with an impatience he couldn’t explain, he heard the sound of Zach’s chair scraping against the floor as his son stood and left the room as quickly as humanly possible.
The noise brought Jeff out of his stupor. The fact that the girl was able to damn near mesmerize him should have been another point in her favor, but it wasn’t. To his way of thinking, the magnetic force coming from her direction wasn’t an attribute, it was a disadvantage, and he damn well needed to get his cock to understand that.
****
The next evening, Jeff ate a meal that was no more palatable than the previous night’s supper had been. He could tell that it was supposed to be some kind of pasta dish, because the mush on his plate had apparently been noodles at one time.
Again, his son ate as quickly as possible before mumbling an excuse and fleeing the room.
Janet loaded the dishwasher while the baby played with Cheerios as she sat in her high chair. Jeff looked between the two of them and slowly asked, “Have you already eaten?”
She turned toward him as her face noticeably paled. “Yes.”
“You ate this?” he asked without expression as he motioned to his plate, very aware that it mattered little to his libido that the girl wasn’t a damn bit accomplished in the kitchen.
She licked her lips with obvious agitation as she nodded with a silent answer.
The agitation she was feeling was telling to him. She knew she couldn’t cook, but she was too worried about her job to admit it.
He let it go and focused on the reason behind his question. “Why aren’t you eating with us?”
Her hands noticeably trembled as she ran them down the sides of her thighs before finding stability on the countertop. “I try to eat earlier, when I feed Hannah.”
Okay, he could believe that. But he could also believe that she didn’t want to sit next to him because—she was what—scared of him? She avoided his eyes; she moved away from him when he walked into a room she occupied. Her body subtly trembled when she was aware of his presence, and her reaction to him was enough to make his skin tighten and his muscles cord.
As he fought down his growing erection, he knew the situation wasn’t sustainable. In the two full days she’d been here, his arousal was only building, and that irritated the shit out of him. He had an impressionable son, and the last thing he needed was a housekeeper who fucked him up so badly that his boy was sure to notice sooner or later.
She wasn’t the kind of help he needed at all. He needed someone almost invisible to him, someone who did the laundry and cleaned the house but was indistinguishable to him in any other way. Yes, that’s exactly what he needed. He needed a clean house and clean laundry, not a housekeeper who screwed with his insides so badly he almost couldn’t notice anything else.
And later that evening as he walked through to his shower, although he tried to focus on his full belly and the clean clothes stacked on his bureau, all he really noticed was the new, feminine scent that lingered everywhere—in his room, in his bathroom—and goddammit, in his sheets as he tried unsuccessfully to find any sleep.
****
At midnight after another bottle, Janet laid Hannah down in the pseudo baby bed that she’d rigged in her room. Simply a drawer from the bureau, Janet had removed it from the piece and lined it with a blanket, making a perfect miniature bed.
From experience, she knew how many hours of sleep she’d be able to get—if she could fall asleep at all. Her nerves were keyed up, as they had been since she’d arrived and taken her first step onto the Bar M Ranch.
Everything about this place was perfect, everything, that is, except the rancher himself. The location, far off the beaten path, was so far away from California that Janet felt safe from any threat her in-laws might try to make, although she didn’t really expect any. Undoubtedly they’d offered her the money out of a sense of responsibility toward their grandchild. But Janet knew they’d never really wanted Hannah to begin with—their distaste toward their son had been obvious when Lance had been alive, and as far as Janet could tell, it came from Lance’s unwillingness to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a doctor. The fact that their son had majored in Theatre had been nothing less than an atrocity to them.
As Janet walked across plush carpet on bare feet and looked out the window at the night sky, she felt another huge relief: This area of Texas was only about four hours away from Shreveport, Louisiana and her mother, not halfway across the country like California.
Although her father had abandoned them when she’d been a small child, Janet still ached for her mother and home, especially since she’d given birth. Eliminating much of the distance between them had been Janet’s goal when she’d set off in search of a job
, and in particular, a way to earn money while keeping Hannah with her. The trip from California hadn’t produced any results, but granted, she hadn’t tried very hard until she’d left New Mexico and entered Texas.
Yes, the Bar M Ranch was perfect for her needs, in fact, it was spectacular beyond belief. When she’d left the small town of Redwood Falls in search of the McIntyre ranch, she hadn’t realized what it meant when the miles of split railed, barbed wire fencing had abruptly turned into black aluminum fencing, every post thereafter containing richly embellished detail.
At the time, she’d realized the property she was passing through had given way to a new owner—but she hadn’t realized that the miles of black fencing belonged to the Bar M until that same fencing led her straight to the arresting and dramatic entrance, where the sign proclaimed she was entering the Bar M Ranch.
From the fencing itself, she knew that the ranch was situated on miles and miles of acreage. How the hell many acres did Jeff McIntyre own? She hadn’t expected the man to be so affluent; Mr. Rigsby had given her no indication the man he was describing was rich.
After she’d driven through the bricked entrance, she’d still had to drive several miles on a private, heavily terraced road. The land on either side had been dotted with big black cows, undoubtedly being bred for profit, and the sheer number of them lumbering and feeding on the verdant green land had made her stomach seize with unease.
She’d driven past an array of outbuildings as well, barns and shelters, corrals with horses. Parking areas dotted the property here and there, with so many spaces that she’d known that Jeff McIntyre had a vast number of employees who worked the property and the herd.
But what had made her the queasiest were the working oil wells that dotted the vast ranchland. Not standing still and listless like so many she’d seen on the drive, these particular wells moved to and fro with a slow synchronization that seemed to underline the fact that there was oil beneath the ground here, and lots of it.
She bit down her unease as she turned and made her way back to sit in the chair next to where Hannah lay sleeping.
