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Will followed the directions on the screen in his pickup truck, his heart beating louder than the radio played. He couldn’t believe Gretchen hadn’t been at the candy shop, nor that his nerves hadn’t given out yet.
Short Tail sat about twenty-five minutes past her sweet shop, and he wondered how she lived this far from work.
“She doesn’t,” he told himself as he peered out his side window. “She said her father lived out here.” She hadn’t divulged where she lived. Rightly so, as Will had gone into grump-mode and demanded her employee get Gretchen on the line.
Even when Jon had said she was spending the morning with family after the first phone call hadn’t been picked up, Will had insisted. He wanted to sleep tonight, goldarn it, and until he apologized to the gorgeous Gretchen Bellows, he couldn’t.
The map on his screen got replaced with Daddy’s name and picture as a phone call from his father came in. Will reached to tap theconnecticon as he turned onto the street Gretchen had given him.
“Hey, Daddy,” he said, one thousand percent distracted. She was here, on this street, at one of these houses.
“You left in the middle of milking?” Daddy barked into the truck.
Will blinked, focusing on the situation at hand. He shouldn’t have answered this call. “Uh, yes, sir,” he said. “Travis said he’d cover for me.”
“Travis is currently covered from head to toe in manure,” Daddy said sourly. “Where are you? This better be somethin’ like you needin’ an epi-pen or something.”
Will didn’t point out that Daddy had used the word “something” twice in one sentence. His mind screamed at him to say that of course he’d been stung by a wasp. The biggest, nastiest, most poisonous wasp in the whole world, so he’d jumped behind the wheel of his truck and driven to the pharmacy…alone.
His conscience wouldn’t let him do it. “Not exactly,” he said. “Daddy, listen, I’ll be back in two shakes, okay? I just needed to do something.”
“What?”
Apologize to a womanran through his mind, and Will let it come on out of his mouth.
Daddy made a grunt or a scoff, or maybe he was just breathing out. No matter what, Will had stunned him. He’d also done something Will thought impossible. He’d calmed his father’s bark for long enough for the man to think before he spoke.
“All right,” he said with resignation in his tone. “But make it snappy, son. We have work going on out here.”
“I’m aware,” Will snapped back. He wanted snappy? Will could give Daddy snappy.
“Son.”
“I’ll be back in a half-hour,” Will said, already reaching to disconnect the call. He wasn’t sure if he did or Daddy did first, but there were no goodbyes. The GPS map roared back to life, and Will squinted at it.
“Shoulda told Daddy I needed glasses,” he muttered to himself. “That wouldn’t’ve been a lie.” He got the truck moving again, finding the quaint and quiet farmhouse just two more down the lane.
He turned down the driveway, easily spotting a dark minivan that must be Gretchen’s. At the same time, she totally didn’t seem like a minivan type of woman. She didn’t have kids—at least that he knew of.
The grass grew in between the tire tracks in the driveway, and a huge oak tree stood guard in the front yard. Off to the side and on the way around to the back to Will’s left sat a willow, and he could take a moment and breathe here.
If he didn’t get out of the truck soon, he wouldn’t, and Will unbuckled his belt and slid from the truck. Only the whispers of wind and the sound of a tractor growling in the distance met his ears, and this place reminded him so much of his family farm.
He did love working the family operation. Of course he did. He’d never wanted for anything different, the way Clarissa had. She’d gone off to culinary school, and then she’d tried to get a job in the city at a fancy restaurant.
Cherry had done the same, graduating in educational counseling, and she worked at a college in San Antonio now. Will knew the most about that, and while no one in the family had asked in a long while, being on the cruise together had brought up some renewed questions about how Cherry could stay away when Mama was so sick.
Will kept his mouth shut. He’d learned that was the best way to survive in the Cooper family. At least when it came to personal things, he didn’t say much. If there was a problem with a cowboy or cowgirl, he could yell with the best of them. But matters of the heart? He shut right down.
Which was probably why his pulse banged against his ribs, begging him to get back in the truck and get on home. No one came out onto the porch or down the front steps to greet him, and the house had no sidewalk leading up to it. It had to be about a hundred years old, but it seemed to be smiling at him as he made his way across the lawn. Someone obviously took care of the yard, as the lawn wasn’t overgrown, and the trees had neat and clean beds around their trunks. The house had been painted recently, in Will’s estimation, and he could appreciate someone taking care of their property.
He’d just put his foot on the first step to go knock on the door when he heard a voice. “…fine, Daddy,” the woman said.
Will froze. Gretchen.
“I don’t mind doing the yard work. I’ll just check out the front and then come do those weeds in the back.” She came bustling around the corner, her eyes sweeping the street and then the driveway. She froze, her hands halfway into a pair of gardening gloves.
