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“Did you tell him you’d just come from Australia?” Luke asked, driving with one hand while he polished off the blondie with the other.
“I did.”
“Did he go all ‘G’day’ and ‘Down Under’ on you, dialing up that fake charm? Honestly, he acts like he thinks we’ve never seen an Aussie before.”
Luke was a fine one to talk about being an overbearing flirt. Before the rodeo accident that ended his bull-riding career, Tess would have clocked Luke in as possessing more ego than both Pine brothers combined. “I think he’s married. Did you know that?”
That seemed to surprise her brother. “I didn’t. Wouldn’t surprise me, though—the ladies seem to go for him, and he must pull in a pretty paycheck. I haven’t seen her. Now that I think of it, I barely see him.”
“And yet you’re sure he goes all Aussie on everyone.” This was a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Or at least, it would have been before—for the old Luke. She was rather impressed with the person her twin brother was becoming lately. Luke—formerly a confirmed and rowdy bachelor who couldn’t imagine any life outside of the razzle-dazzle of the rodeo circuit—had settled comfortably back in their hometown and was getting married to his high school sweetheart. This was not only good news, but offered Tess a convenient excuse to come home from halfway around the world.
“Have you ever met an Aussie before Cooper Pine?”
Luke grunted. “’Course I have. A few were on the bull riders tour. Dated a few sheilas, too.”
Tess knew enough Aussie slang to find the term for females ridiculous in Luke’s Texan drawl. “More than a few, I imagine. All of that being over now, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Because Ruby knows how to make you pay if you get too friendly with any of those Pineys who might be lining up near home.”
“Ugh, what an awful thought. Not Ruby—but a bunch of screaming fan girls scaring the herd. No one wants him and his crazy brother to put up a Buy Your Show Tickets Here billboard.” Luke pulled onto the road that led up toward the Blue Thorn Ranch. The familiar scenery began the slow, peaceful seep into Tess’s soul. The house with its sprawling front porch. The barn. The green of the pastures with the ever-growing herd of bison silhouetted against the blue of the sky. Home. For now or for good? I’m still too hurt to know that yet.
“Still, anyone’s got to be an improvement over Larkey, right?” The ranch’s former owner had caused serious trouble for their oldest brother, Gunner Jr., as the Bucktons had fought to keep the Blue Thorn Ranch from the clutches of a shady land developer awhile back.
“You’d think,” Luke replied. “Can’t say as I’m sure yet. For a brother act like the Pines, we’ve only seen Cooper. Hunter hasn’t shown up yet—so I’m taking that as a good sign.” Hunter was the dominant brother of the pair, if the advertising was to be believed.
Of course, the advertising also made both brothers look very single and available. They presented themselves as rugged bachelors, which made the information about Cooper’s “little lady” a surprise. Was the omission privacy or just careful marketing?
“He seems nice enough.”
Luke glared. “You been here, what—all of an hour? And you’ve decided our closemouthed new neighbor is ‘nice enough’?”
Tess put the snarky remark down to soon-to-be-groom stress and hauled herself out of the pickup to take in the glorious sunshine that only the Blue Thorn Ranch could offer. For better or worse, she was home.
* * *
Cooper placed the bakery bag down on the kitchen counter. “Glenno,” he called to the longtime employee who had managed his house no matter where he lived, “what time is it in Alice Springs?”
“Seven tomorrow morning,” came Glenno’s voice from inside the pantry. The kitchen of this place was large but outdated. Cooper made a mental note to himself that he was going to have to push out the back wall to make a dining room big enough for his plans.
Plans he’d have to reveal sooner or later. He could do it now, while his brother Hunter was back home taping a special Outback segment before their next set of Pine Method tour dates. Sure, it’d be the coward’s way out to tell Hunter his plans while the man was halfway around the world, but he’d chickened out all the other times Hunter had been close by. He knew he needed to get it over with...but Sophie’s birthday was tomorrow and he had no desire to spoil the celebration by igniting that particular bomb today. Or was he just making excuses for himself again?
“Hunter’s up,” Glenno said as he came out of the pantry with a bag of onions, “if that’s what you’re thinking.” The man had always been so much more than just a cook or house manager—he was a wise part of the family. He was also the only other person who knew Cooper’s plan. For the hundredth time since renting the ranch, Cooper wondered how long it should stay that way.
“He called half an hour ago,” Glenno added. He smiled as if that were a trivial detail, as if the strain between Hunter and Cooper was simply a ripple on a much larger pond. For a man continually dragged around the world in the wake of his famous employer, Glenno was the happiest man Cooper knew. “At home in his own skin everywhere,” Hunter used to say.
The call wasn’t a trivial detail, because his brother was never known to be an early riser. The early hour either meant Hunter was losing his famous immunity to jet lag, or he was itching to share some new business plan for the Pine Brothers’ franchise. Given Hunter’s nonstop drive, it wasn’t hard to guess which.
Cooper shared neither his brother’s drive, nor his travel immunity. He’d skipped this latest jaunt back Down Under on the half-truthful premise of wanting a between-season break, but it was really more than that. He needed time to think about how to dismount the constant media carousel that had been his life for the past few years.
How do you tell your brother you still want to be brothers but not part of the Pine Brothers?
You don’t. Or, at least, you drag your feet on doing so. Heaps. “Why didn’t Hunter call my cell?”
“He did,” Glenno answered wearily. “Only, since it was sitting on your desk, it wasn’t much help.”
Despite owing much of his success to the technology that allowed the media to promote him around the clock, Cooper hated cell phones. If he had his way, he’d never carry one. He hated how the thing took up all the space in his pocket and assumed he’d pay it nonstop attention. There was a time a man could be alone with his thoughts in the world, not feel compelled to type them continuously into cyberspace with itty-bitty keys or even just pictures of keys.
Hunter, of course, owned a smartphone, two tablets and one of those new watch gizmos to boot. The man had been known to post videos of his lunch to social media. Even if Hunter was in the remotest quarter of the Outback, he was never off the grid and never off the stage.
Cooper ignored Glenno’s long-suffering look, pointing instead to the white paper bag. “A new recipe for you to figure out. But save one for Sophie to have tomorrow—those things are delicious.” Glenno, aside from being a great cook, was also somewhat of a gastronomic sleuth, forever attempting to recreate sauces, dishes and foods he found in restaurants or shops. If Glenno’s track record could be trusted, Cooper and Sophie could have an unending supply of Lolly-like blondies whenever they wanted them by the end of the week, if not for tomorrow’s birthday.
Then, casually, Cooper added, “I met another of our neighbors today.”
Glenno began inspecting one of the blondies with a scientific squint. “More Bucktons?”
“Yes. At least this one’s pretty.”
Glenno smirked. “So not Luke or Gunner.” He broke off a corner of the treat and tasted it. After a moment’s savoring, he gave an approving nod. “Very good. Who’d you meet?”
“Tess. I’d heard Luke had a twin, but I always assumed it was another bloke. This sister just blew into town—from Adelaide, believe it or not. Why didn’t anyone tell me one of the Bucktons was there lately?”
Glenno broke off another piece. “Because they don’t talk to you. Because you don’t talk to them. Because they’re afraid this ranch is about to become another stop on the tour and you don’t tell them otherwise.” He set the confection down. “You can’t start if you don’t start.”
Another Glenno-ism. The man had an unending collection of wise sayings that didn’t quite make sense. Hunter called him the Aussie Yogi Berra—something Glenno took as a compliment. “I just have to find a way to tell Hunter first. Word might spread, and I don’t want him to hear it from anyone but me.”
Glenno took a piece of the blondie, sniffed it then squished it between his fingers, testing the texture. “You keep waiting for the perfect time to tell your brother unwelcome news. The longer you wait, the worse the news gets.”
“Not if I tell him the right way.” But Cooper knew his voice lacked conviction. They’d had this conversation a dozen times already.
Glenno shook his head. “Even if you tell him the perfect way.” He looked at Cooper. “You want to do this thing, dontcha?”
From the moment his plan arrived in his head, seemingly straight from God Himself, Cooper had never wanted to do anything more than the plan he was waiting to launch right now. “Of course.”
“And you know Hunter won’t approve.”
“I think that’s pretty much certain, don’t you?”
Glenno nodded once. “Two facts that won’t change no matter how much time you let them sit. But the sooner you tell him, the sooner you two can start working past this. He is your brother, mate. Give him some credit for wanting you to be happy—once he has a chance to get used to the idea.”
Cooper poured himself a cup of coffee. “Credit? Remember what’s going on here. I’m breaking up the act. Hunter’s going to take that like a stab in the heart. He won’t just say ‘goodonya’ and move on like it’s just a minor ding. I’m denting—maybe even sinking—the Pine Brothers’ brand. The unforgivable sin. I doubt he’ll ever speak to me again after I tell him.”
“And yet you keep saying you’re tired of Hunter deciding your future.”
“Daddy! You’re back!” Cooper heard the welcome sound of his very nearly six-year-old daughter coming down the hallway toward the kitchen. “I need your help.” He turned to see Sophie’s face scrunched up beneath two wild peaks of strawberry-blond curls. “I can’t do it. You hafta.” She leaned her crutches up against the kitchen counter and slid onto the seat next to him, catching sight of the white bag as she did. “What’s in there?”
Break out early birthday blondies? Or make another sad attempt at Daddy pigtails? It wasn’t a hard decision. “Special six-year-old birthday goodies that were supposed to be for tomorrow. But they can arrive a day early for anyone having pigtail troubles.”
She grinned up at her father. “That’s me.”
“They’re called blondies, and a lady in town said they were her absolute favorite. I knew right then I needed some for my little lady on her birthday.” Glenno produced a plate, and Cooper slid one of the goodies onto it and in front of Sophie. “I’ve barely mastered the ponytail, sunshine, and now you want two?”
“And braids.”
Cooper laughed. “I’m pretty sure braids are beyond me.”
“Oh, Daddy,” Sophie said after a hearty “Mmm” to go with her first bite of the confection, “nothin’s too hard for you. Not even French braids.”
Cooper looked at Glenno. “What’s a French braid?”
Glenno smirked. “Harder than a regular braid, I expect.”
Sophie unleashed her hair from the uneven tangles and placed the glittery holders on the counter in front of Cooper. “I want to wear pigtails on my birthday tomorrow. Can’t you try? Please?”
Cooper had watched his fair share of how-to videos just to master the ponytail—an irony not lost on a horse trainer. Still, all those curls atop a wiggly five-year-old, combined with the challenge of maneuvering those impossibly tiny elastics, made two pigtails feel nearly impossible. Still, this was Sophie. How could he say no?
“I’ll look it up tonight and we’ll give it a whirl tomorrow.” He thought about Tess Buckton, the pretty neighbor he’d just met. She had long hair. Maybe he could override his “keep to yourself” rule in the name of birthday hair.
Then he remembered Luke Buckton’s none-too-neighborly glare as he’d left the bakery.
Maybe not.
Chapter Two (#uc92f9a23-bffc-57bf-a886-3c9a261c7cb3)
The next morning, Tess pulled a Blue Thorn Ranch truck up to the main house after being buzzed in at the Larkey ranch. She’d have to stop calling it that if Cooper stayed. It had been the Larkey ranch—often said with a derisive sneer for the wily, backstabbing former owner—for her whole life. Well, lots of things were changing around here. The loss of Larkey as a neighbor could only fall into the positive column as far as she was concerned.
She adjusted the basket on her arm and rang the doorbell on the big, beautiful old home. A startling squeal—a distinctly little-girl sound—came from inside the house. Could it be that Cooper Pine’s little lady really was little? The thought surprised her as Cooper’s face peered through the door’s small upper window before he pulled the door open. “Well, hello there.”
“You said it was somebody’s birthday. Blondies—even Lolly’s—aren’t enough for a birthday in my book. So I brought over some Buckton brownies.” She held out the basket. “Welcome to the neighborhood.”
“Well,” Cooper said, looking genuinely surprised, “look here. Buckton birthday brownies.”
From behind him came the smiling face of a young girl—eyes as green as her father’s, but with a wild tousle of strawberry-blond curls rather than Cooper’s darker hair. Definitely Cooper Pine’s daughter. Was she the birthday girl? Or was it her mother, whom Tess thought was probably back somewhere in the house—maybe in the kitchen, munching down a blondie?
Then came an odd clicking sound as a pair of Canadian crutches came into view, flanking the ruffles of a frilly party dress. Tess told herself not to stare as the ruffled skirt ended in only one white cowboy boot.
Cooper was clearly accustomed to smoothing over such moments for his daughter. “Sophie, this is the lady who told me about Lolly’s blondies.”
Sophie’s eyes grew wide. “They were super yummy!”
Tess felt a smile spread easily to her face. “I know. They’re among my favorites. But another of my favorites is my grandmother’s brownies, and she insisted I bring some over when she learned there was a birthday girl in the house today.”
“I’m six now,” pronounced Sophie with regal emphasis. So the birthday was hers. “That means I go to first grade in the fall.” She shifted on the crutches to show off her solitary boot. “Do you like ’em? They’re my birthday present.”
There was something brave and bittersweet in how the child referred to her single boot as a pair. Tess liked her immediately, feeling guilty for her momentary stumble. “Mighty nice,” she said. “I’ve always felt white boots were extra special. Never had white ones myself—you must be extra special.”
She’d called a little boy in Adelaide “extra special”—a little boy she’d never get to buy birthday presents for now—and the words sat bittersweet on her tongue.
Sophie, oblivious to Tess’s memories, somehow executed a twirl on the crutches. It flounced her ruffled skirt out in girly splendor. “Thanks. Daddy says so all the time.”
Still no mention of a “Mommy.” And this “Daddy” was not the Cooper Pine of the Pine Method empire or the man with the gleaming toothy smile from the television show. His off-camera persona was quieter, calmer, less imposing, but still in full possession of the charisma she imagined made him a star. And probably won him the heart of some strawberry-blonde who had given him this beautiful daughter. So where was the mother? The noise and chatter at their doorstep would have sent most women Tess knew out to see what was going on.
“Good for Dad,” she said. “I don’t mean to interrupt if you’ve got a party planned.”
“Can you braid?” the little girl asked.
“Huh?”
Sophie tugged on her curls. “Braid. Hair.”
Cooper shrugged. “I’m kind of out of my league here, and someone wants birthday braids.”
But wouldn’t her mother...? Oh, Tess thought with a momentary shock of understanding, remembering being a little girl herself with no mother to fix her hair anymore. Apparently this precious child was Cooper’s one and only little lady, after all.
Tess stared down at those sweet eyes. “Birthday brownies and braids, that’s me.”
“Well, then,” said Cooper as he gestured her inside, “come on in. As a matter of fact, your timing is downright great. Glenno will want to know if we got the blondies right, and you’re just the taste-tester we need.”
“You’re right!” Sophie cheered, suddenly taking off down the hallway in a tumbling three-legged canter that Tess had to admire. “Glenno! Glenno!” Her cries echoed as she disappeared to another part of the house.
“Our cook, among other things,” Cooper explained as he relieved Tess of the basket. “I call Glenno our culinary lyrebird. Likes to figure out other people’s recipes and imitate them. I gave him one of the blondies yesterday.” He looked down at the basket. “Um...these aren’t a secret family recipe, are they?”
Tess felt a little knot pull at her stomach. “As a matter of fact...”
Cooper pulled open a door on a hallway credenza and slipped the basket in. “I’ll hide ’em for now. Later, Sophie and I will dig in on the sly.” He tapped the door shut with his cowboy boot. “No point baiting Glenno’s curiosity.”
Tess heard the click-click-clop of Sophie’s boot and crutches long before the girl popped up from around a corner down the hall. “Are you coming yet? Glenno thinks he got it on the first try.”
Tess threw a sideways glance to her “host.”
“I doubt Lolly will be happy to hear that.”
The resulting grin did belong on a charming television star. “I won’t tell if you don’t.”
* * *
By the time Cooper led his short-order hairstylist to the kitchen, Sophie was seated on one of four stools in front of a kitchen island, her crutches dispatched to a nearby corner. She spun on the stool’s swivel seat, her leg swinging in anticipation.
“I’ve got a niece not too far from your age at Blue Thorn, you know,” said Tess. “You’d like Audie.”
A friend? Cooper pondered the possibility. His travel schedule hadn’t afforded Sophie many chances to make friends—one of many things he was set to change—and one just across the road would be a blessing. All Sophie really needed was one soul her age who would see past the crutches to the treasure that was his darling daughter.
“Miss Tess,” Sophie said in an amusingly formal tone, “this is Glenno. He’s kinda everything.”
“G’day to you.” Cooper watched Glenno chuckle at the “job description” as he extended a hand in greeting. “From the Buckton place, eh?”
Cooper had heard bits and pieces of the past tension between the former owner of this property and the Buckton family. Sophie neither knew nor cared about such neighbor relations. She simply grabbed the plate from one end of the counter and pulled it toward the middle open stool. “Taste ’em.”
