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You’re kidding. Why?
Cherry worked as a college counselor, and she had busy times and not-busy times. The first week of June wasn’t terribly chaotic in that she had to deal with students, but the counseling department did a lot of registration and setting up for fall semester over the summer. Not only that, but Cherry was well-known for disappearing in the middle of a conversation simply because she had the attention span of a goldfish.
I don’t know, Clarissa said.I just saw him and Daddy go into the barn from the stable.
With horror, she realized why. Her fingers flew over the screen, but she hadn’t finished her text before Cherry’s came in.
Is he going to hire him? He put up a new job last week, didn’t he?
Clarissa jammed her thumb against the backspace arrow to delete her message, which had said the same thing.Yes, she sent instead.How can he hire him? Do you think he’s forgotten that we used to date?
In typical Cherry fashion, she didn’t answer. Clarissa should be glad she’d gotten as many responses as she had. Cherry’s super-hot boss had probably walked by, and her sister had been trying to get a date for six months now.
Clarissa didn’t have the heart to tell her it wasn’t going to happen. She certainly didn’t have any wiggle room to speak of when it came to relationships. After she’d dated Spencer, she’d poured herself into her culinary training and returned to the farm. He’d still been at Hope Eternal Ranch, but Clarissa knew how to revolve around the sun that was Spencer Rust without coming into contact with him.
She’d perfected it for the past eight years, in fact.
Now, though, it seemed as though he’d thrown his heavenly body out of orbit and was careening toward her.
She looked up from her phone when Cherry still didn’t respond and kicked herself into action. She couldn’t stand here and text her sister about Spencer. She had work to do, and then she needed to close up the shoppe and get on home.
Her résumé needed to be updated, as she’d need it to apply to any job in San Antonio, including the one that had just come open at Overlook. The restaurant sat on the top floor of a prestigious hotel that overlooked the river that wound right through the city.
Clarissa had been there once, to visit Leslie, over a year ago. That trip usually stayed buried deep in her gray matter, because her boyfriend at the time—another dark, dreamy, delicious cowboy named Russ Hatchell—had broken up with her on the drive home. All the romanticism of the sunset through floor-to-ceiling windows, and perfectly seared scallops, and the huge brownie sundae they’d shared with a single spoon had been soiled in less than five minutes.
Another of those gashes on her heart belonged to Russ, because Clarissa had genuinely loved him, and she’d thought they’d be married by now.
Sometimes life didn’t understand her fantasies, and she’d almost stopped dreaming.
In the realm of men, she had. She held no more wondrous plans for her Cowboy in Shining Belt Buckle, who’d come rescue her from a life of dairy cows and crotchety brothers.
As far as her cooking career, Clarissa still held out some hope that she’d find somewhere where she could use her hard-fought-for and expensively-obtained baking skills. “And it’s not your family’s dairy farm in Nowhere, Texas,” she muttered to herself, focusing on the clipboard in her hand.
Sweet Water Falls wasn’t really Nowhere, and she criticized herself for being unfair. She was just ready for a change. Any change.Please, she prayed, the way her mama had always taught her.Something has to change, or I’m going to lose my mind.
As she’d done a thousand times before, she checked the refrigeration units and made checkmarks on her clipboard. She checked the fridge in the small kitchen attached to the shop and went through the ingredients there. She looked at the schedule for ice cream flavors, checked the levels in the big cardboard containers in the freezer case out front, and turned toward the menu board, which she hand-lettered every time there was a change.
She’d taken a few design classes as part of her unfinished business major, and she did like expressing her creativity on the menu board and in her recipes. She turned away from the black chalkboard with flowery writing as the tinkling bell on the door sounded. She put a smile on her face, because if there was one thing Clarissa knew, it was that the customer was always right.
They didn’t care if it was closing time, or if she’d just lost a boyfriend, or that yet another chef hadn’t returned her inquisition for a job at their restaurant.
“Evening,” she drawled before she could turn to see who it was. “Oh, hey, Daddy.”
The smile faltered as her dad stepped aside and Spencer Rust himself filled the doorway. Those dark eyes had not changed, and they devoured her as easily as they ever had.
“Evenin’, Clarissa,” he said, touching the brim of that stunning cowboy hat. “What’s the flavor of the day?”
Dark, dreamy cowboy, she thought. With her stupid heart tap dancing now, she turned toward the menu board, which she’d just been studying. She’d seen the flavor of the day, but her mind had blanked with one look from Spencer, and all she could hear was the racket her pulse made in her ears.
“Looks like it’s Rocky Road,” she said.
She probably needed to see a cardiologist. All they’d have to do to replicate her issues was flash a picture of Spencer onto the wall.Oh, yes, they’d say.This requires surgery. Complete heart transplant.
She turned back to Spencer, and he hadn’t taken his eyes from her. “Sounds amazing,” he said, and Clarissa found herself agreeing with him.
Wait. She didn’t agree with Spencer Rust, and the argumentative side of her almost said the ice cream would certainly be disgusting. Then she remembered she’d made it.
“Waffle cone?” she asked, and it sounded like she’d gargled with one. Perhaps she needed to see an ear, nose, and throat specialist. She’d just have a dozen procedures done to eliminate her husky voice, the tightness in her jaw, and the way her stomach swooped at the very idea of Spencer getting close to her again.
