LOVE OF A RODEO MAN (MODERN DAY COWBOYS) Read Free Page B

noting the way her skin shone from its recent scrubbing and the fact that her thick hair was beginning to dry in wispy little curls over her ears. He passed close by, and he could smell the harsh green soap they’d always used in the barn shower, along with a warm and subtly sweet scent, like wild grass in hot sunshine, that must be Sara’s own. He breathed it in, feeling as if he’d discovered an intimate secret about her.
    Sara made her way slowly across the wide expanse of graveled yard over to where the rambling wood-framed farmhouse with its flaking coat of white paint squatted in a circle of lawn. She hesitated several moments before she made her uncertain way to the screen door at the side of the house where the kitchen must be, judging from the delicious smell of baking biscuits wafting into the heavy evening air.
    She was puzzling over Mitch’s comment about his mother. Why should having Sara arrive for dinner unexpectedly be good for Mrs. Carter? What was wrong with her in the first place that she might need such therapy?
    Feeling a lot less than confident and wishing fervently she hadn’t let Mitch bulldoze her into this, she smoothed a hand over her still-wet hair and finally knocked softly on the screen door.

Chapter Two
 
    “Goodness, come right in dear. Mitch said...it’s Sara, isn’t it? Sara, eh...?”
    “Sara Wingate, Mrs. Carter. I do hope I’m not putting you to a whole lot of bother. I told Mitch...”
    “It’s a pleasure to have you, Sara. And please call me Ruth, won’t you?” Nervously wiping her floury hands on her faded apron, Ruth Carter nodded and smiled, motioning her guest into the large, cheery kitchen.
    “Sit down, I’ll pour you some lemonade. I just have to...” Ruth’s voice trailed off as she hurriedly rescued a pan of biscuits from the oven of the large, modern electric range. The entire kitchen was well equipped, old and new blending in charming proportions: heavy old oak cup- boards fitted with gleaming stainless-steel sinks, a micro-wave resting beside an antique wooden bread box, an old coffee grinder on a shelf above a food processor.
    Sara watched Ruth Carter curiously as the older woman moved around the kitchen. Ruth seemed about Sara’s own mother’s age, perhaps a few years past fifty, but the two women were very different. Jennie Wingate-Hoffman was attractive, vi gorous, meticulously groomed, full of fast quips and bubbly good humor.
    In contrast, Ruth’s hair was combed and careless ly pinned back from her face, not styled, with wide streaks of white weaving through what must have once been a pure golden wheat color. Her delicate and pretty features were devoid of makeup, and around her eyes and mouth were deep lines, grooved into the mushroom-pale skin. She looked as if she’d recently been ill, and her smile, warm and sweet and rather shy, still seemed somehow forced, as if she weren’t in the habit of using it. Her clothes, too, looked as if they’d been donned for covering and little else. The cotton housedress was as faded as the apron, and it hung on her too-slender frame as if it might have been purchased for a much larger woman.
    “Lemonade, heavens, I’d forget my own head these days...” Ruth poured a tall, icy glass for Sara and then, after a distracted glance around the kitchen, a smaller one for herself. With an unconscious sigh, she slumped into a chair at the circular table, across from her guest.
    “Supper’s nearly ready. I hope Mitch thinks to call his father up from the cattle barn. Wilson bought a new steer today and he’s down there admiring it. Sometimes I envy men.” Ruth’s voice was both weary and querulous.
    Sara didn’t have a clue what the proper response should be to a remark like that, and she be gan to feel slightly uncomfortable. “Could I please use your phone, Ruth?” she asked after a few moments had passed in silence. “I left my cell in the truck.” It was a relief to get up and dial the number and hear