The Rancher's Rescue

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“Fluffing a pillow.” Ethan smashed the pillow again with his fist.

“That’s a beating.” Grace yanked the pillow away from Ethan and patted the stuffing back into place. Her hands gentle as if she did this every day.

“What does it matter?” Ethan fell face forward across the queen bed. “This is what beds are for. There’s no pretty required.” He could think of a few other things beds were good for, like holding Grace all night.

Fortunately, Grace and Katie chose that moment to pummel his back with pillows, pummeling his wayward thoughts away, and he grunted into the mattress.

Grace put her pillow back against the headboard. “How many more rooms do you have to do?”

“Too many. Who builds a lodge with so many rooms anyway?” Ethan turned his head and grinned at Katie. “Rooms four through seven are haunted and need to be closed indefinitely.”

Katie smacked him with her pillow again. “Not happening.”

“Come on,” Grace said. “We’ll teach you how to do pretty.”

He thought Grace looked pretty with the moonlight streaming in from the window framing her from behind. “I don’t want to learn.”

“This won’t leave a scar. I promise.” She gripped his hand and pulled, trying to tug him off the bed.

Ethan rolled over, but kept his hand inside hers. “Tomorrow I’m doing all manly tasks. Nothing that requires pretty.”

“Fine with me.” Katie tossed her pillow on the bed. “Now get up, so we can get this done and finally call it a night.”

With having called time on the pillow fights, the three of them finished the other guest rooms quickly. As he said good-night to Grace at her car, he thought she looked almost exhausted. Was he asking too much of her to try to make sense of Big E’s accounts?

Ethan stretched out across the queen bed in Cabin Six after a midnight snack, and considered all the repairs that were needed in his cabin alone. The to-do list seemed to double every night. But Grace had offered a reprieve and made the evening less toilsome. Less lonely. And he’d learned to do pretty.

He’d learned more than that too. He now knew Grace’s favorite color: purple, thanks to an argument between Katie and Grace about whether the shower curtain in one of the suites was lavender or lilac.

He’d learned Grace’s favorite flower: sunflower. This came out after Katie and Grace agreed the large guest room in the Western Wing needed some decoration and that several different flowers should be painted as a border along the walls.

And her favorite time of the day: the witching hour, when magic happens. That, she’d let slip, when he’d walked her to her car. She’d pointed out a shooting star, smiled and closed her eyes as if making a wish.

Not that he intended to do anything with his new information about Grace. Or to even repeat the getting-to-know-Grace-better evening.

She worked for the Blackwells. Nothing more.

After all, he’d returned home to help his brother with the ranch, not discover if there was something more between him and Grace.

CHAPTER FIVE (#u3d93a91c-32c9-5ce0-803c-f0d195523a1b)

GRACE SWISHED WATER around her mouth and spit it out into the bathroom sink in Brewster’s warehouse. She’d avoided the newly renovated bathroom in the main store ever since her morning sickness had extended into days and evenings. Unfortunately, as her nausea didn’t seem to be lessening, her stomach seemed to be expanding every hour. Thankfully she had a jacket with her yesterday to conceal her growing tummy from Ethan. Nothing managed to conceal her nausea though.

Ten minutes into the ATV ride at the Blackwell ranch last night, she’d decided the horse might’ve been the better option. Ethan had driven the four-wheeler like he was on an off-roading race course and trying to catch the leader. Grace had spent most of the ride trying to catch her breath and calm her stomach.

She’d thought her note at the hotel had ended any discussion of their one night together like an exclamation point ended a sentence. She’d lost that battle when Ethan had teased about eating the snake.

She touched her stomach.

Of course, their discussion was far from over. Far from complete.

But she’d never dare expect more from Ethan Blackwell than one night. One memorable night. She’d always been the friend. The confidante. But not the girlfriend. She’d been “like the sister” that a guy had never had so often that her family tree should’ve fallen over by the time she’d graduated from college. There wasn’t a variation on the we-make-better-friends line that she hadn’t heard.

Once she’d moved home from college, she’d shelved relationships and dating with her statistics books. Until Ethan. She’d stepped into that hotel room with Ethan with her eyes open and her head clear. It was only ever supposed to be one night.

She touched her stomach.

Yet, Ethan had made her feel anything but plain last night when they’d been teasing each other and laughing for most of the night. She’d been anything but quiet around him ever since he’d come back to Falcon Creek. He also hadn’t scoffed at her business ideas or suggested she rethink her goals. He’d even complimented her skills.

Nothing that made her heart trip over, of course.

Her heart had stopped tripping in middle school when Trevor Dixon chose her younger sister, Nicole Marie, over Grace for the holiday dance. Her sister had tried to persuade Trevor to take Grace. But he’d moved on to Dana Brantley by lunch. And Grace had moved into Brewster’s, making herself a permanent and indispensable fixture in the store. She had her family, the store and her show horses. That had been enough.

Until recently. But now she had a baby to concentrate on. A baby to love.

Her name echoed over the store’s loudspeaker. Grace splashed her cheeks with cold water and yanked open the door, but pulled back to keep from running into her sister.

Sarah Ashley handed her several paper towels, but remained in Grace’s path, her gaze skimming over Grace’s face.

“Thanks.” Grace wiped the paper towel across her damp forehead. “Something I ate at breakfast didn’t agree with me.”

“That’s been happening frequently.” Sarah Ashley arched one perfectly groomed eyebrow.

“Maybe I need to make better breakfast choices.” Her heart definitely needed to make better choices, like not to get involved in the first place. Otherwise she’d only have herself to blame if she let Ethan break it. She was even more ill this morning than she’d thought if she was considering hearts and Ethan in the same sentence.