Dirty Sweet Cowboy

“Ignore who?” Hawk says as he walks into the kitchen. He’s wearing a jacket over top of a tank top, like he rolled out of bed and just ran out of the house. His boots aren’t tied, and the button of his jeans is undone. He looks rumpled and sexy and I have to look at his feet so I can maintain some of my anger .

“The reporter you told to come here without consulting any of us first,” I say, looking at my juice .

“What? I told you she was coming,” he answers defensively .

“You didn’t say for a month, Hawk. And you didn’t tell anyone she would be staying here,” Anna snaps at him .

“Where else would she stay? How is she going to cover the reno if she’s not on the property ?”

I cross over to stand next to Anna so I can soak up a little of her sassiness. “Hawk, there are already going to be builders, landscapers, and contractors everywhere. It’s going to be loud and chaotic. And you want to add someone to the mix who is going to be all up in our business, twenty-four seven, for a month? Do you have any idea how intrusive it is going to be for them, for us, to have a reporter taking photos and asking questions the entire time? And is she just covering the build? Did we set any boundaries? She’s not going to be asking us personal questions, is she ?”

Hawk throws up his hands. “Jesus. How much time did you two have to coordinate this attack ?”

Anna throws a dish towel at him. “This isn’t about attacking you, Hawk. It’s about doing what is best for the family while this insanity is going on. And Parrish is right. Some boundaries need to be set with this reporter straight away. She doesn’t get to ask about the family. She doesn’t get to ask about Matt. And I’m sure Parrish will agree with me when I say, no photos of Gracie .”

“Oh, god. No. No photos of my daughter,” I agree. I hadn’t even considered that and now I’m panicked just thinking about it .

“Fine!” Hawk shouts. “I’ll email her with some ground rules. Jeez. You two got bossy while I was away .”

“A lot happens in ten years,” Anna snipes as she jumps from the counter with her coffee. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. I have a few meetings scheduled with some horses. I’m going to go get dressed, and get to my very important job mucking out the stables .”

Anna walks out of the kitchen, leaving Hawk and me alone, staring at each other awkwardly. I don’t feel like dealing with it, so I try to double-time toward the dining room where I can work in peace. But Hawk takes hold of my arm and stops me .

“Parrish, hold on a second. Can we talk ?”

I shake him off. “No, thank you. I have a lot of paperwork to get done and I need to go over these estimates from the concrete guys. Then I have to go over to my home, and clear everything I need for Gracie and me out so this reporter can move in there for a month, displacing us. I really don’t have time to talk .”

Hawk looks at me in shock, like he doesn’t know what to say, so I just keep walking into the dining room, uninterested in hearing anything he has to say. I’m exhausted already, and the day hasn’t even really started .

How am I going to survive the month ?

Hawk

O nce again, I feel like a jerk after what happened with Parrish yesterday, but it didn’t even occur to me that anyone would have a problem with the reporter being here. Which is probably a huge part of my problem. I’m so used to thinking only about myself, that when the time for me to consider anyone else’s feelings, I tend to… flake out. I seem to forget that other people have feelings, and that they are often at odds with my own. It doesn’t help that Parrish hasn’t given me the opportunity to apologize. Instead, she spent the last twenty-four hours avoiding me .

To be fair, it’s been a hectic twenty-four hours. The entire family had to pitch in to move Parrish and Gracie’s stuff over from the carriage house, and it took a lot of collective effort to glare at me the whole time. I’ve spent a lot of time telling my mother, and Anna, how sorry I am to have added to the chaos, but Parrish won’t even look at me. They spent their first night in the house last night, and I could hear Anna in there were them, basically having a slumber party, while I lay in my bed, staring at the ceiling, again .

Today, I am watching as lumber guys start felling the trees on the side of the ranch where the new stables will be, then stack them to use as the wood in the structure. I’ve planned the whole project to be as sustainable as possible, and that starts with an almost zero-waste system, from repurposing the trees to using only vintage, reclaimed brick. The first tree has just fallen when my cell phone rings .

“Yeah?” I yell into it, distracted by the workers and trying to shout over the noise of the chainsaws .

“Hawk? This is Simone, the writer from Modern Architecture ? I’m at the gate leading on to the ranch, but the car that brought me from Helena seems to think he may not be able to make it down the gravel road. Is there any way someone can come fetch me?” She sounds English, and prissy. I’m trying not to be annoyed that I have to leave the build site to drive to the entrance just to pick her up. But the last thing I want to do is piss her off when she just got here .

“Of course, Simone. I’ll be there in a minute.” I hang up and yell to the tree guys, “I’ll be back in a minute! If anything goes wrong, call me!” Then I walk back to the main house and get in my rental truck to drive to the front gate. It takes me five minutes, since it’s a solid mile of gravel road, and if I speed, my father will have my ass. As I pull up over the hill, Simone comes into focus, and I am pretty sure my eyes bug out .

She is almost six feet tall, and lithe. She’s wearing a meticulously-planned outfit that hugs every curve of her body, and her long, wavy brown hair has been styled and curled to perfection. Even from a distance, I can see her huge expensive sunglasses sitting atop high cheekbones. She looks like a model, or an actress .

She looks like someone I would pursue relentlessly, if we were in Los Angeles .

I turn off the truck and jump out, trying to keep my cool and not act like a fool. “Simone ?”

She holds out a perfectly-manicured hand and shakes mine gently. “Indeed. And you’re Hawk, I presume ?”

“I am. Let’s get your luggage,” I say as I look around her to the luxury sedan, which never had any hope of making it down the pothole-filled gravel drive .

Simone lifts her sunglasses off, and her thickly-lined brown eyes stare at me pitifully as she blinks slowly, her huge lashes hitting her cheeks. “Do you mind grabbing it for me? It’s quite heavy and I’ve had such a long trip .”

I have to force a smile, reminding myself that this is what LA women are like, and that she’s a reporter here to write a story about the ranch. I don’t want to give her something negative to say right out of the gate… literally .