Train Me Daddy

“Yeah, promises, promises! That’s all city slickers are good for.”

“When we get home, I’m going to make you sorry for calling me a city slicker,” I say as I catch up with her.

We ride side by side for what feels like an hour but is probably a forth that long when Olivia pulls Autumn to a full stop.

“What?”

She nods her head toward the fence row. “It’s a good thing we have the rule about riding the line after changing a herd to a new pasture. There’s a break in the wire just ahead.”

“Damn, you have good eyes.”

“Come on let’s fix it.”

“Uh . . . I forgot to bring the wire stretcher. I didn’t know we were going to be riding the fence line.”

“Don’t worry; it’ll be okay,” Olivia says reaching back and pulling a pair of fence stretchers out of Autumn’s saddle bag. She waves them at me.

“Yeah, you are a barrel of laughs,” I say shaking my head.

“A cowboy is always prepared . . .”

“Don’t start with me, Olivia, or I’ll rub your pretty little nose in a cow patty. And then we can call you Cow Patty, the cowgirl,” I say and start laughing so hard I almost fall out of the saddle.

“God, I wish you would fall off your horse so I can get a shot of it with my cell phone. It would look good on a Facebook page . . . CEO trying to cowboy.”

“What say we call a truce and fix the fence.”

I ignore her as she tries to bribe me about posting it on Facebook. Not that I care, it’s not as if I go on there that much.

“Yeah, spoken like a wise CEO,” Olivia says as she climbs off Autumn.

As I put on my gloves, I glance up at the sun that is threatening to suck all the moisture out of my body. “Suddenly, I remember why I moved to Houston,” I’m wiping my forehead with the back of my arm.

The sun’s pouring down on my face and burning me. I should have put sun lotion on before I came out here, because I burn easily.

“Why because you’re not a good cowboy?”

She raises and eyebrow and I know that she’s really pushing me to the limit.

“No, because…”

I can’t even think of a comeback. She’s got me there, I’ll make he

r pay for it much later, when I spend the night with her in the cottage or maybe before that, when we get back to the barn.

Chapter 12

Olivia

I smile to myself when we finally meet up with Dan. Isaac’s trying to put on a good show, but I know his butt must be hurting something awful. Not once has he complained.

“How did it go? Find any breaks in the fence?” Dan asks as he approaches Isaac.

“Yeah, two. We fixed them. And you?”

“None,” Dan says as he rides past us. “Time to head back to the ranch,” he calls over his shoulder.

Isaac looks over at me. “Do you think he knew the breaks in the fence were on the left side?”