Hot Cowboy Nights (Lucky Penny Ranch #2)(31)

Lizzy hated mice with a passion. A spider, she could handle. A snake, she could kill with a hoe or a pistol. But a damn mouse was only slightly smaller than a full-grown gorilla and it roared like a lion.

Keeping her eyes closed tightly, she pulled her pants up, zipped and buttoned them, and then fastened her belt. Maybe the mouse would be gone now.

One eyelid barely opened and she held her breath, almighty glad that she’d at least finished her business before having her soul scared from her body. Her heart pumped double time as she scanned the floor from potty to door and saw nothing. Then a movement in her peripheral vision snapped the one open eye shut again. She’d seen enough to know the creature was black and furry and it had a tail. Should she yell at Toby to come save her?

Hell, no, don’t do that. He thinks you’re tough as nails. Don’t ruin that by letting him know you are afraid of a little old mouse.

If she stepped down really fast and grabbed the door handle, she could be out of the tiny bathroom in no more than three seconds.

But what if I step on it and it gets mouse on my boots? What then? These are my favorite work boots and if there are mouse guts on the sole, I’ll have to throw them away.

If she reached forward she could open the door, bail off the potty in one long jump, and then slam the door shut. That was the plan until she heard a squeaking noise to her left and she opened both eyes before she thought.

“What the hell?” She eased down off the potty. A black and white cat with three little yellow kittens pawing at her belly was curled up tightly in the corner of the bathroom behind a small cabinet. “Where did you come from? We must have left the door open when we ran to the cellar. Are you wild?” She gingerly touched the cat on the head and she started to purr.

“Lizzy, are you all right in there?” Allie knocked.

“Shhh!” She put a finger to her lips and eased the door open. “Come and see what came lookin’ for refuge from the storm.”

Allie put the lid down on the potty and sat down. “Can I pet her?”

Lizzy nodded. “She’s friendly.”

Lizzy had been offered cats from every rancher in the county to keep the mice away from the feed sacks. She always refused, telling them that she’d buried too many cats as a child to want to go through the pain of losing one as an adult. The real reason was that she hated any form of rodents, from field mice to rats, and cats often left dead ones as presents. In Lizzy’s books, dead ones were just about as wicked as live ones. But this little family needed her and that made a difference.

“What’s going on in there?” Katy peeked in.

“Lizzy has a cat and what looks like three, no four, kittens. There’s a little black head down there under that fat yellow one,” Allie said. “Either the tornado dropped it or it came looking for a safe place to get out of the storm.”

Toby’s blue eyes showed up over the top of Katy’s head.

“Most feed stores have at least one cat.”

“I never wanted one but I think I’ll keep this family,” Lizzy said.

“Good for you, sister. Now, Blake, either take me home or take me to Nadine’s café. I’m starving.”

“Home it is. Nadine won’t have any electricity. At least we can rustle up food at our house,” Blake said.

Lizzy left her new family of cats and stepped out of the bathroom. “Give me time to open a can of food for my new mama cat and fix up a litter pan and I’ll be right with y’all. No electricity means I can’t do a bit of business here right now. I’m going home with you, Allie, if there’s food involved.”

“Me, too,” Katy said. “What are you cooking, Blake?”

“There’s a pot of chili ready to be heated up. Allie has been craving it for a week so I made a big batch.” He slipped his arm around Allie’s waist. “And Allie made a cherry cobbler this morning.”

“When we get done, I’ll get up on that roof and stretch some plastic over that leak until the insurance adjustor comes. Then we’ll fix it for you,” Allie said.

Deke shook his head. “You will not be getting up on any roof. Not until after this baby is born. I’ll take care of it for Lizzy. Won’t take but an hour at the most.”

“I’m pregnant, not dead,” Allie protested.

“And let’s keep you that way,” Blake said.





Chapter Nine



The electricity came back on in town at two o’clock that afternoon. It was hard to believe that not three hours before, a tornado had ripped through Throckmorton County, leaving trees uprooted, barn roofs gone, sheet metal wrapped around trees. The mesquite trees looked like a bunch of pranksters had toilet-papered half the county, but in reality it was wet shredded paper from businesses on south of Throckmorton that had gotten hit harder than Dry Creek.

“I’ve never seen mesquite look like that,” Lizzy said as Deke drove them all back to town. “All the leaves have been stripped off the limbs and replaced with paper. It’s kind of eerie.”

“I saw it once or twice down around Muenster,” Toby said.

He’d had more than two hours to think about that comment he’d been about to make in the cellar and had changed his mind about voicing it. The hatch had opened at the exact right moment to keep him from saying anything more. Granny Dawson used to say that sometimes fate stepped in to help us out when we’re about to make a big, big mistake.