Chapter 22

22

Poor man. He was getting more and more frustrated. Dylan cleared away dinner dishes and washed them like a good little housekeeper. Although she wasn’t certain housekeepers were supposed to actually eat dinner with their employers every night; now that she thought about it. She did now, whenever she wasn’t working at the inn or diner during dinner, anyway. Fletcher insisted she eat with him so he didn’t have to eat alone, and they talked. About everything, it seemed.

Well, mostly she talked and he listened. He wasn’t exactly chatty cowboy or anything. But tonight, he had kind of just grunted at her and settled on the couch with the receipts of doom in front of him.

It was a task she had been suspecting he was dreading—and putting off—all week, since the dance. She had mostly kept distance between them, but she was living in the man’s house—some closeness was rather avoidable.

She kept cleaning. Listening to the melodious sounds of Fletcher getting crankier and crankier. The man did cranky so well. So, so well.

And she understood his frustration. He was juggling a lot. Not only was he dealing with the everyday aspects of running his business, and that was exactly what his ranch was, but there were tax implications to this expansion he was creating with the W-Deane Ranch. And she could tell from what he was muttering that he was struggling.

Poor man. He did work harder than any three men she had ever met combined. He might get under her skin with his constant crankiness, and the fire in his eyes when he looked at her now, but the man worked hard. Making this experiment work for his ranch and for Mr. Deane out of Texas was incredibly important to Cowboy Fletchie.

He had dreams wrapped up in this ranch. And he was willing to put in the blood, sweat, and tears to make it work.

And that man loved baked goods.

It took her about twenty minutes to have a cake mixed together and in the oven. The man seriously liked baked goods.

Then she turned to him.

She was going to have to make him her project, Dylan decided. She could easily see the way his face was all tight and his shoulders tensed. Someone had to take care of him, and wasn’t she basically a Fletcher-keeper right now? “Can I help?”

“I don’t think anyone can. I don’t know if this is a business deduction, a write-off, or just something stupid in an alien language.” He had receipts in front of him. His hair stuck up all over his head in strawberry-blond antennae everywhere. Her fingers kind of itched to touch that hair. See if it was as soft as it looked. “I should pay someone to do this, but hell, I’m not sure I have the money for that.”

“I can help.” Dylan sank onto the couch. He was sitting on the floor, his coffee table—which had jumped right out of the 1980s but could eventually be refinished into something modern when she had time—littered with receipts and notes. And a good old-fashioned ledger book just waiting to be filled in.

Dylan pushed up her sleeves, physically and metaphorically. The man needed help. She had the skills to do it. Besides, he was her sister’s future-brother-in-law, didn’t she have a moral obligation to make sure he didn’t expire from trauma induced by deductions? “I majored in business, you know. I’m little, but I can probably come in surprisingly handy here.”

“You really do need to finish your degree someday, you know. Just to have. Wish I had taken a few business classes. Maybe this stuff would have made more sense now.” He looked at her, those blue eyes of his so beautiful. Why had she not noticed how beautiful he was before she’d made her bet? Kind of walked right into this trap, hadn’t she? “If you can figure out this mess, I will give you my firstborn child.”

An image of a little strawberry-blond baby with a cranky face and stubborn attitude flashed into her head. Cute, but…she’d bet any baby this man fathered would be pure stubborn trouble, through and through. It would take a really strong woman to raise this man’s babies, no denying that. “I will pass on your firstborn, thank you, adorable though that Fletcherling would undoubtedly be. However, I will help you tonight. Let’s get started.”

It took her two hours to straighten out what he had into a system. “I will set up something for you on the computer. If you pick a day and enter everything just once a month, it won’t be so traumatic. In fact, if you put them in the same place when they come in, I will handle entering them once a week.”

Now that she had a system, she did not want a rogue Tyler man to mess it up again.

“Not part of your job description.” He leaned back. Until his head rested on the couch. Right next to her leg. “But I appreciate this. I know I need a system, it just got away from me.”

Of course, it had; he worked his butt off. One Tyler man could not do it alone.

“I’m expanding my job description. I am no longer a housekeeper, only. I think I may be a Fletcher-keeper now. The cake should be cool by now.” She’d taken a break an hour ago and mixed up some buttercream icing. “It’s Dorie’s favorite recipe. I came up with it when she was little, for her birthday. And just tweaked it until it was the way I wanted it. I think you deserve cake.”

“You are a better cook than even Meyra.”

“Shhh. Do not say so. That is Talley blaspheme. And I’m not better than Meyra. I just do okay. Plenty of practice. I started when I was nine or so. I just had to stand on a chair. Mom was going through a tough time, and Dorie was only three or four. Devvie and Dahlia would play with her while I made dinner. Easy stuff, like hot dogs and french fries. Dad was working late hours at the time, and, well, we needed to eat.”

“He left you at home, in charge of your sisters, at nine ?”

“I was pretty resourceful, you know. And Mom was there, in case of an emergency, she just…struggled. Her anxiety would come and go, depending on…life, really. Some days she functioned perfectly fine, others she just didn’t. Most of the time, she was okay, though.”

“And that put you taking care of things you had no business taking care of when she wasn’t.” He turned toward her. Then his hands were around her waist. And he was just there. Right in her space. “I am sorry. Your parents should have done better for you girls. All eight of you beautiful monsters.”

“I’m trying to accept what happened, honestly. My parents do love us. I have never doubted that. Until…recently. But they really do.”

“Your father is a controlling asshole.”

“No denying that, but Devvie believes it stems from fear. And I agree with her. He is terrified something will happen to one of us. Our childhood wasn’t all bad, you know.”

“I don’t like your father. I probably never will. Finding Dusty out there in the snow kind of cemented that.”

“I can understand that.” Dylan wiggled. Just a little. Strong male hands tightened on her thighs. “You’re, uh, getting a bit touchy.”

“I don’t care. Do you?” His eyes flared. Got darker. There was that give-me-the-cookies look on his face again. “You smell really good.”

“I smell like chocolate cake and vanilla.” Her hand came up. His chest was just right there. It was hard not to want to touch him. So she just…did. He was just such a beautifully built man. And he was funny and hardworking, and she’d seen him be kind and helpful—to others.

He still thought Dylan was the devil. Hard to forget that part. He’d practically run from her like a scalded cat all week, ever since the dance. Dylans were scary creatures, after all.

But he was right there, looking at her the way other men looked at Darcey or Dixie. The way Ben definitely looked at Dusty. No guy had ever looked at Dylan that way. Not really.

Talk about terrifying. Utterly terrifying. Her entire body was tingling here. “Just…what are you doing?”

“An experiment.” His hand came up. Cupped her cheek. He felt so warm again. Scorching, really. “Your skin is incredibly soft. I’ve wondered. It looks like it would be. You are paler than your sisters. More like Marin, really. Pale cream everywhere that tempts a man to touch, to taste...”

He almost sounded like he was saying it only to himself. Dylan just looked at him. She wasn’t the least bit sure what she should do now. What she even wanted to do now.

She jumped when her phone rang. Clear across the living room. Way over in the kitchen. She hopped to her feet and booked it across the room.

Staying that close to Fletcher was probably not a good idea.

She was going to remember that.