Hot Cowboy Nights (Lucky Penny Ranch #2)(47)

“Oh, no, never. This baby will need a sister to help her name her kittens and to confide in when she likes a boy.” Allie grinned.



Rich aromas of chocolate mixed with barbecue met Toby when he entered the house through the back door that evening. Big black clouds hovered down in the southwest, but the sky didn’t have that eerie quiet feeling that preceded a tornado. He felt good about the day’s work. Perhaps clearing land wasn’t as exciting as his days on the rodeo circuit, but he loved seeing the results. With the cash he’d earned in those four years of chasing the rodeo around the country he’d been able to buy the High Roller ranch down in Muenster. It had been nothing but weeds, cow tongue cactus, and mesquite, but he’d put a lot of hard work into it and now it was a prosperous ranch that had brought in enough money to more than pay for his third of the Lucky Penny.

“Please tell me that is your famous pulled-pork barbecue.” He clamped a hand on Blake’s shoulder. “And do I smell chocolate cake? Lord, I think even this old scar on my face is aching tonight. I feel like I’m looking eighty in the eye rather than thirty.”

“Twenty-seven is not close to looking thirty in the eye, but I do not doubt for one minute that you have aches and pains from your rodeo days,” Blake said. “It’s time for you to settle down.”

“Not yet, brother. Maybe after I’m thirty, but definitely not now. This damn celibacy thing is teaching me right quick that I was born to raise hell not kids,” Toby said. “I do smell chocolate, right?” He changed the subject.

“It’s Mama’s sheet cake recipe,” Allie said. “We’ll eat it warm with a scoop of ice cream on top for dessert.”

“Now this is the life. Comin’ back to good home-cooked food after a day out there clearing land and listenin’ to country music with old Blue perched up there in the seat with me. How’s the roofin’ business, Allie?” Toby went to the sink and washed his hands. “I’ll set the table. My mouth is watering just thinking about pulled pork sandwiches and fried potatoes.”

“You see fried potatoes?” Blake asked.

“Please tell me you’ve got them in the oven keeping warm.”

“Cake is in the oven, but the potatoes are in the microwave,” Allie said. “And to answer your question, those boys have got the roof on the store. Deke is a slave driver. He swears we’ll have Lizzy’s back room done by Thursday at quittin’ time so the kids can have a three-day weekend to waste their money.”

“I remember those days very well,” Toby said. “We couldn’t wait to get old enough to take our money to the bar, could we, Blake?”

“I’m glad I’m past that time in my life.” Blake brushed a kiss across Allie’s lips as he carried the potatoes to the table.

Toby beat down the streak of jealousy. It wasn’t the first time in his life that Toby had been jealous of his older brother, Blake. But it had been a long time since the green-eyed monster had hit him as hard as it did that evening.

Can’t have your cake and eat it, too.

“What’s on your mind?” Blake touched him on the shoulder.

“Arguing with myself,” Toby answered honestly.

“You know what Jerry Clower said about that. When you start arguing with what you know is right, you’re about to mess up real bad. What’s the problem?”

“Something I have to work out for myself.”

Blake pulled out a chair for Allie. “Been where you are. It’s miserable. Don’t want to go back there. Let’s have some supper. Things always look better with a full stomach.”

“You got that right and I’m starving,” Toby said with a nod, avoiding what he couldn’t come to terms with…not yet.



Roast, simmered all day with potatoes and carrots in the slow cooker, was one of Lizzy’s favorite meals. Katy had also made one of her famous sheet cakes for dessert to top off the meal. When they sat down to eat, Lizzy’s urge to bare her soul to her mother was almost more than she could stand. But how did a daughter describe how hot those sexy nights were without burning herself up in embarrassment?

“Janie and Trudy and I are planning a little trip this next weekend,” Katy said. “We’re going to fly out of Dallas on Friday night to Las Vegas and we’ll come home Sunday evening. Sharlene is going to mind the store for me on Saturday.”

“Good for you.”

“It still feels strange, going places. Even up to Wichita Falls to the movies with Janie and Trudy. Your dad and I were tied down to the businesses all our lives, and then after he died, your grandmother needed us. I would have done things different if I had them to do over again. We would have taken vacations with you girls even if it was only short ones to the beach,” Katy said.

“We had lots of vacations, Mama. Don’t tell me your mind is slipping like Granny’s. They may have only lasted a day, but Sunday was family day. Remember all those summer days we spent at the lake on Sunday afternoons or how about Christmas when we all went together to stomp around in the mesquite looking for the right tree to drag home? We had fifty-two of those days a year. Do you realize that’s more than a six-week vacation if you stacked them all up together?”

Katy brushed away a tear. “Thank you, Lizzy.”