At the mention of family, Whitney finished filling glasses with ice and tea. She refused to think about St. Louis and the family she’d left behind years ago. Regrets of that magnitude hurt too much.

Sophia patted her leg. “Mama. Mama.”

“What, baby?” At two and a half, the girls loved to jabber, mostly to each other, but if they wanted something, the words came through loud and clear. At least, to her mama ears.

“You got da boo-boo. You weg is bweedin.’”

Whitney glanced at the spot where Sophia’s finger rested. Her legs and arms had taken a beating from the gravel and briars, but she’d had no time to deal with the dirt in her hair or the wounds. Both babies had been awake and wailing when she’d gotten back to the house. “I’m okay.”

“I get da bandaid.” Sophia toddled off toward the still-empty bathroom, and Olivia, after a squinting squat to stare at her mother’s knees, followed.

“You should go and take care of that.” The cowboy stood directly inside the kitchen door, gray hat in hand. Every time she looked at him, she got a funny, wobbly feeling inside. He seemed like a nice man, cordial and easy in his skin, so that he calmed her jittery nerves. Plus, he’d rounded up the stupid horse. And she had to admit, talking to an adult was a welcome change.

If she was honest, and she had no reason to be anything else at this point, she didn’t know what to do now that she was here on the ranch. Nate Caldwell was clearly a cowboy with lots and lots of experience in raising animals. Though she didn’t want to be dependent on anyone ever again, asking advice wasn’t being dependent. Was it?

He had experience. She needed the help. He lived nearby. Would he?

She handed him a glass of fresh amber tea. “I guess I look pretty rough.”

One side of his mouth tilted. “Wrangling a mighty steed like that one is hard work.”

Whitney studied his rugged face. Was he teasing? She’d forgotten how to joke with a man, and flirting was out of the question. “It is to me.”

Most of Sally’s animals were small, but to her, they might as well be ten feet tall and weigh a ton. She’d lived her life in the suburbs, not in the country. Dogs and cats, even hamsters, she understood, but not farm animals. Especially strange little creatures like these. Sure, she’d gone to summer camp and sort of learned to ride a horse—a big one—but she’d never been responsible for their care.

She had to learn and she had to learn fast. Failure was not an option.

She shoved a stack of paperwork off the table and onto a chair. The eat-in country kitchen wasn’t big, and the cowboy seemed to take up a lot of room.

“Sit down if you’d like, Nate, and drink your tea. I’ll be back in a minute after I wipe off some of this dirt and blood and check on the twins.”

After firmly shutting the girls out of the bathroom where they’d been unrolling the toilet tissue as they jabbered, Whitney returned to the kitchen with a cleaner face and a handful of Band-Aids. Yes, she’d hurried. Not because she was attracted to the cowboy, but because he was in her house, and she wanted to be a good neighbor, especially considering the favor she needed.

She plopped the Band-Aids on the counter, opened several, and decorated her knees and shins.

“Snoopy?” The cowboy saluted her kneecaps with a half-empty tea glass and a wry expression. He had not, she noticed, moved from his spot by the kitchen door.

She had that effect on people, she supposed. They’d remain standing, so they could run away faster.

“Cures all boo-boos, even the imaginary ones.”

Raising one arm like a chicken wing and twisting her head sharply to the side, Whitney attempted to assess the elbow damage.

“You’ll never reach that.” A very wide hand appeared in her peripheral vision and gently took hold of her elbow. “Let me help.”

His voice was baritone warm and really close to her ear. Every cell in Whitney’s body went on high alert at his surprisingly tender touch. As he gently dabbed the bloodied spot with a damp paper towel, her pulse gave a funny stutter.

She raised her eyes to watch him. The cowboy’s focus was on her injury, so she could stare her fill. And stare she did.

Brown-lashed eyes lifted. “Got any antibiotic ointment?”

Whitney quickly glanced down, pretending she hadn’t been admiring his rugged face, the strong jaw, the firm lips, and the way he smelled of cotton shirt and clean air. A man’s man. A woman’s man, too. “No.”

She sounded breathless. How ridiculous. She, who knew better, was already fighting an attraction to the first man she’d met. Men had been her downfall since she was sixteen. Would she never learn?

While she wrestled with all sorts of crazy emotions, Nate Caldwell cleaned and bandaged both her elbows like a pro.

When she found a sensible thought, she said, “Are you a doctor or something?”

Those firm lips curved. “Or something.”

He released his hold and stepped back. “Snoopy’s got you covered, but you probably should pick up some antibiotic cream for those scratches. Some are pretty deep.”

“Sure. Thanks.” She reached for her tea and swigged as she melted into a chair and searched for something to say besides, you smell good.

“Your ranch is the next one over, right? The one with the big cross timbers?”

He spun one of Sally’s four chairs around and sat, tea glass dangling over the chair back. “Yes, ma’am. The cross timbers is the entrance to the main house where we live.”

“You and your wife?”

“No wife. Not anymore. She left a few years back.” Nate stared into his tea glass, expression serious. The divorce had hurt him. “My brother Ace and me live on the ranch now, but there’s four of us kids. Brother Wyatt’s in the military. Emily lives in her own place on the ranch. She’s a social worker, not a rancher.”

“Just one sister?” Caldwell’s place, from what little she’d seen in her efforts to find her way around, was enormous, and several homes dotted the landscape.

Nate started to say something else but shook his head and swigged the tea instead.

Whitney was curious about the reaction, but she didn’t push. There were plenty of things she didn’t want to discuss either.

The twins toddled in, and Olivia plopped a clean diaper in Nate’s lap. “I wet.”

“Olivia!” Whitney jumped up and swung her daughter into her arms. With an embarrassed grimace, she took the diaper from Nate. “Excuse me while I change her.”

He set his glass on the table and started to rise. “I should go anyway.”

Panic struck her. “No! I mean, please don’t go yet. I want to ask you something.”

Hoping she’d convinced him to wait, Whitney rushed down the narrow hallway to the room she’d designated as nursery. For now, she had their one, single crib set up, an onerous task that had seemed simple, but finding all those bolts and screws had taken forever. The rest of the room would wait. She’d sold most of her remaining items to get here. Not that she’d had much left. Thankfully, the girls still preferred to sleep together anyway.

When she returned to the cheery red kitchen, she found Sophia sitting at Nate’s feet, rubbing the dust off his boots with her sock. She was barefooted again.

Whitney relocated both girls to the play drawer, a bottom cabinet she’d filled with harmless plastic toys, lids, and spoons. They loved to remove each item. Unfortunately, they’d yet to learn how to put them back.

“You’ve got your hands full.”

“Twins are time-intensive.”

“Do you have anyone to help with them?”

“If you mean the girls’ father, no. We’re not together.” The stab of betrayal didn’t hurt as much as it once had. “He left when they were born.”

Whitney didn’t know why she’d told him such a personal thing.

Nate frowned in disapproval. She liked him for that.

“Must have been rough on you, alone with two newborns.”

The lost job, the eviction notices, the shelter smell of human bodies and bleach flashed through her memory.

He had no idea how hard, and she didn’t want anyone to know.

“More than I care to remember.” She pulled a length of hair over her shoulder and settled a tender gaze on her babies. “But they’re worth everything.”

“What about your mom and dad? I’d think grandparents would be crazy over twins.”

That awful feeling of failure rose in her throat. Like a clutched hand cutting off her air supply, the string of failed relationships choked her. From her parents and grandparents to a myriad of ex-boyfriends. Failures, all. Her fault. She’d been the rebel who knew everything and didn’t need anyone, especially her parents. How foolish she’d been.

Something was fundamentally wrong with a woman no one could love for long.

“No family.” No family that wanted her, anyway.

She’d phoned her parents once when she was pregnant. Mom had hung upon her. She wouldn’t make that mistake again.

Tears burned at the back of her eyelids. She would not cry, not in front of this stranger, no matter how pleasant he was and how easy to talk to. She gulped a bracing swig of tea.

“I guess I brought up a bad subject. None of my business.” He plunked the glass down again and rose. “It was good meeting you, neighbor. If I can help you in anyway, give me a call.”

Whitney rose too, pulse hammering against her collarbone. “About that. Help, I mean.”

He tilted his head, curious. “Yes?”

She didn’t want to ask. She wanted to succeed on her own. Sally had. But Sally was born and raised with ranch animals.

She swallowed the last ounce of pride she’d been clinging to. “I can’t lose this ranch.”

He looked at her as if she made no sense. Which she didn’t.

“What I’m saying is this, Nate. Sally left the ranch to me on the condition that I live in the house and successfully run the place for at least a year. When that year is over, I’m free to sell or do whatever.”

His nostrils flared as if she’d said something distasteful. “A year’s not that long.”

“If I don’t take proper care of the ranch, I lose it. If the animals get sick and die, I’m out. If they run away and get lost, like Clive wants to do, everything goes to Ronnie Flood.” She stepped closer, ashamed of her desperation but praying like mad that she could convince him. “I’d like you to teach me about ranching. I’ll pay you.”

And do my best to ignore the tingling effect you have my skin.

Nate blinked, thunderstruck. “Me? Teach you?”

She nodded. Olivia and Sophia must have felt her anxiety because they toddled to her side and clung to her legs. Sophia started to whine. Reflexively, Whitney stroked the top of her silken hair.

“You live nearby. You could stop in whenever you have time, maybe first thing in the morning before you start your day.”

“My day starts at five. Sometimes earlier.”

“Whenever, then. I’ll make it work.” She was pleading now. “Come over whenever you have time. I don’t even know what to feed them. Or how much. What if I make them flounder?”

His lips, those firm appealing lips, quivered. “You mean, founder?”

“See? I don’t know enough to keep them alive for a whole year, and I have to. I can’t lose this property. I can’t.”

But he was already shaking his head. “The Triple C is a huge enterprise. It keeps us all working dawn to dusk to take care of what we have and to generate a profit.”

Sophia sniffled. Whitney wanted to do the same. Instead, she straightened her shoulders and nodded. “I understand. I’m sorry to impose.”

Nate shifted on his boots, decidedly uncomfortable. She’d put him in a lousy spot. “I guess I could ask around for you, if you’d like, help you find a hired hand.”

“You’d do that?”

“I could try, but I have to tell you, most cowboys think Sally’s miniatures are a cute little hobby, not a livelihood.”

Whitney didn’t know if the ranch was profitable or not. Not yet. But Sally had made a go of the place. “So, you’re saying no self-respecting cowboy will work for me.”

He winced, obviously sorry to be the bearer of bad news. “Like I said, ma’am, I’ll ask around. Thank you for the tea.”

Failure, once again. She couldn’t even pay a man to hang around her.

Nate didn’t like feeling guilty. Lord knew, he’d felt that way often enough. But Whitney and her twins slapped a load on his back, and he carried it around all the rest of the day.

Late that evening as he parked inside the garage of the sprawling family ranch house, a two-story dormer, he considered what it would be like to have no family and to be the new kid in town the way Whitney was. He couldn’t imagine. He’d always had the Triple C, plenty of family, and good friends all over Calypso County.

He felt sorry for her, but she’d irked him too. All that mattered to her was surviving the year. After that, she’d sell Sally’s ranch for a nice profit and head back to wherever she’d come from. Probably a big city with lots of shopping malls.

He knew city girls when he met them. Especially when he married them. And why on earth was he thinking about marriage or his ex-wife in the same flash of brain wave as his new neighbor? But he knew why. She was pretty, personable, and too alone. She and those babies poked at the protective side of him. The one that had wanted family and kids.

Nate shook his head and muttered under his breath. The redhead was on his mind too much. Calypso was just a stop on her way to somewhere better.

Inside the house, the smell of spicy enchiladas greeted him, and Nate put his new neighbor out of his thoughts. He tossed his hat onto the hook in the mud room and shucked cow filthy boots. Connie Galindo, cook, housekeeper and surrogate mom, would chase him with a broom if he tracked manure on her floors.

Dad had built the sprawling structure thirty years ago, leaving the old original homestead to the ranch hands in order to accommodate four kids and extended family. Then Mom died, and a part of Dad died with her. Life went on, and Dad threw himself into work and kids, but till the day he graduated to heaven, Clint Caldwell never stopped mourning his bride.

Clint and Cori Caldwell, the Triple C.

Nate missed his parents with a yearning that never quite stopped. Working this ranch was his way of honoring them.

He entered the dining room and found Ace already seated at the table scooping enchiladas from the platter. The rectangular table for eight was emptier than usual tonight. Even Gilbert, the foreman who never missed a meal, was absent. Tonight, only Nate and Ace occupied the long, wooden expanse. Didn’t seem right. A house this big needed family in it. But neither he nor Ace seemed inclined to make that happen.

Occasionally, Emily popped in for dinner, but she had her own house on the property, a home she’d once planned to fill with kids. Her dreams had died twice and since then, she’d focused on her work with someone else’s children. Like her brothers, Emily had pulled the short straw in the love department.

“I started without you,” Ace said without apology. “No lunch break. Already blessed the food.”

Nate nodded as he took his place and began to eat, he on one side and Ace on the other. Ace was officially in charge of the Triple C, but Nate was the oldest. By birthright, he could have taken the head of the table. He never had. Neither would Ace. Dad belonged there.

“Cobbler for dessert.”

Above his piled-high plate, Nate looked at his brother. Ace was the kind of cowboy women considered a heart throb—tall, lean, and loose-hipped. He had a smirky grin, plenty of wavy chestnut hair, and deep brown eyes that reminded Nate of those twin babies. The ones he didn’t want to think about.

“Smelled it when I came through the kitchen.”

He wondered what the redhead would think of Ace, but that idea made him restless. Ace was a heartbreaker. From the looks of her with those twins, Whitney didn’t need that kind of complication.

Still, if the two lookers hooked up, he’d have no reason to think about her and her crazy offer. Imagine! Wanting to hire him to teach her about toy animals. He’d have been insulted if he didn’t have a soft spot for anything four-legged.

He shoved a cheesy, spicy bite into his mouth, mulling, seeing the hope in Whitney’s eyes fade away. Blue. Hers had been blue though the twins’ were brown. Blue and troubled.

A man ought not to have such a powerful conscience.

Ace put down his fork and reached for the sour cream, but his gaze rested on Nate. “You’re kinda quiet tonight. Got something on your mind?”

“I’m hungry.”

“You’re always hungry, but you usually talk while you’re filling your belly. What’s up? Trouble on the south range?”

Nate had spent most of his afternoon along the southern boundaries of the property with two day hands sorting cows. No trouble there. The trouble was in his heart.

“Saw five new calves. Two heifers and three bulls.”

“That’s good.” Ace reached for a second helping. “Gilbert said someone’s moving into the old Rogers’s place. Did you notice anything when you drove by?”

Unless he rode horseback across a few thousand acres, Nate had to drive past the Rogers Ranch to reach the south side gate. Every single time.

“Yeah, I noticed.” He really didn’t want to talk about Whitney. Not until he had his head wrapped around his uncharacteristic thoughts. Attraction, that’s what he felt, and he didn’t want it. “Where is Gilbert anyway? He came to the house before I did.”

Ace shrugged. “He’ll show up when he smells supper.”

As if they’d conjured him, Gilbert Tiger, a tall, wiry Seminole Indian, tromped in from the front of the house. “Nate knows about the new neighbors,” he said. “He stopped by and wrangled a wild stallion. Tell him, Nate.”

Gilbert snickered, and Nate shot him a sour look. The Seminole, their dad’s army buddy, had lived on the Triple C before any of the siblings had been born. He was family of the heart.

“One of Sally’s horses was loose. I rounded him up for her.”

Gilbert pulled out a chair and sat down, suddenly more interested in the new neighbor than the meal he’d yet to eat. “Did you get her name?”

A slideshow of cinnamon hair and lightly tanned skin played behind his eyeballs. He recalled that moment when he’d bandaged her elbow. Her soft skin had him thinking crazy thoughts. Thoughts about holding her, about making promises, about keeping her and those twins safe and secure. “Whitney Brookes. She’s got no help.”

He didn’t know why he’d added the last. But how could she make it on her own with two toddlers to look after and a ranch full of animals she knew nothing about.

“No one?” Gilbert helped himself to enchiladas and beans.

“No.” Nate made a face. “She asked me to work for her.”

Ace laughed. “I can see that now. Nate Caldwell milking three-foot-tall cows and branding itty bitty calves the size of house cats. Whoopee! Ride ‘em, cowboy.”

“My thoughts exactly.” At the time, those had been his thoughts, along with uncharacteristic thoughts about the pretty mama and her twins. But all afternoon her request had weighed on him like a two-thousand-pound black angus. “I feel kind of sorry for her, though.”

“Why? She bought a ranch. It’s up to her to know what to do with it.”

“I don’t think it’s that simple. She didn’t buy the ranch. She inherited it.” And she was desperate to keep it. Desperate, a bad place to be.

Ace screwed up his face in thought. “I didn’t know Sally had kin except for that weasel, Ronnie something.”

“Ronnie Flood.” Weasel extraordinaire. “Whitney says she didn’t even know Sally. Something about her great grandma and Sally being double cousins and best friends. No heirs, so she picked someone connected to her childhood friend.”

“Not surprised. Sally always walked to her own drum beat.” Ace shoved a forkful in his mouth and talked around it. “This Whitney, is she old? Young? Pretty?”

Nate huffed. Leave it to Ace to want to know those details. “Near our age, I guess. Thirties.” He left the pretty part alone.

Connie swirled in from the kitchen toting that tantalizing peach cobbler on a pile of potholders. Her white Nikes made hushed sounds on the rock tile.

“You gonna love this cobbler, boys,” she said in the accent Nate found both beautiful and comforting. “Fresh peaches from south Texas where we know how to grow ‘em. Paco brought ‘em in his truck, all himself, to the farmer market in Calypso.”

The two brothers pushed their plates aside in their eagerness for the cobbler.

Did Whitney like peach cobbler?

Nate frowned at the aberrant thought. What was wrong with him today?

“Is there ice cream to go on top?” Ace asked.

“Sí. You think I make cobbler with no ice cream in the freezer?” Connie pretended insult but laughed, pleased at the men’s eagerness.

That was Connie. Taking care of the Caldwells was what she loved. After Mom died, Clint Caldwell had been desperate for someone to help care for four young, grieving kids so he could work the ranch. Connie, with her thick Mexican accent and soft hands, had filled the bill. According to his father, she’d simply appeared at the front door one day, took baby Emily into her arms and the three boys under her wing, and never left.

Nate didn’t know what any of them would have become without her. She’d loved them, taught them manners and Spanish, and shown them who Jesus was in the earthly spirit of one small Latina. He suspected she loved Clint Caldwell as much as she loved his kids, but if Dad had known, he’d never let on.

Dishes clinked as the pie was passed around, and Connie offered up a carton of vanilla ice cream and a scoop. Then, as she did every night when “her boys” were settled, she took up her place at the table next to Nate and helped herself to the meal she’d cooked.

“I heard you talk about this new woman at Sally’s ranch. Does she have a man?”

Nate didn’t consider the ex much of a man. A real man wouldn’t walk out on his woman and newborns.

While he pondered how much of Whitney’s business to share, the ice cream melted down the sides of his cobbler. He dipped a fork into the decadence and white and peach swirled together.

“Has two little girls, twins. Just babies toddling around. Other than them, she’s on her own.”

There was the problem burning his insides more than the half cup of picante he’d doused onto the enchiladas. Whitney and her twins were all alone. She’d done her best to appear competent and determined after her tumble in the dirt, but her vulnerability had shown through.

“Alone? With two babies?” Connie’s voice was pure sympathy and tenderness. “Is she from around here? She got people in Calypso?”

“No. I asked.”

“Then, it is our Christian duty to be good neighbors. I will go tomorrow and introduce myself. Sí. I will take cobbler and ice cream. Emily should go too. They can be friends.”

“Emily can’t.” Gilbert pointed a fork. “Court all day tomorrow in Clay City for her foster kid cases.”

“You then.” She jabbed a brown finger at Ace. “You busy tomorrow?”

Ace held up both hands. “Rotating pastures.”

She turned calf eyes on Nate.

Sweet, fruity cobbler slid over his tongue and down the hatch to sizzle against the hot sauce.

No, no, not him. He held up both hands. “Promised Scott Donley a load of horse hay. After that, I gotta finish separating bulls and heifers on the south side.”

“Bueno. That’s close to Sally’s ranch. We’ll go and have a nice chat and invite her to church. Then you go to pasture.”

Connie beamed as if she knew he’d love the idea. He didn’t. He had work to do, even if he’d exaggerated a little when he’d told Whitney he was too busy. A rancher could always carve out a little time here and there. If he wanted to. And Nate didn’t.

The little mama and her babies bothered him. Made him think about things best left alone.

But the woman legitimately needed a ranch hand, and he could probably find someone for her. Doing that didn’t feel right either.

She’d asked him. But he couldn’t. Wouldn’t. He didn’t need the complication of another woman in his life. A woman already planning her escape and she hadn’t even been here a week! Not him. No way. The sweet mama would have to find some other lonesome cowboy.

Guilt pinched him. Was he being selfish?

Sally had left her in a mess. Her ex had left her in a mess. Nate knew about being left, about waking up in the dark to wonder why, and praying to understand God’s plan even though he never had.

“Okay, Nate?” Connie’s warm voice pushed into his dark thoughts.

Like everyone else, he’d hit some hard times, but he had a good life here on the Triple C. Maybe he was in a rut, and maybe he got lonely for female companionship sometimes, but so what? Life wasn’t meant to be all fun and games. He knew his limitations, and he knew heartache. And he didn’t want to go there anymore. No matter how appealing his new neighbor might be.

Connie patted his arm. “No greater commandment than to love our neighbors. It is God’s will, Nate.”

He knew Connie meant the agape God kind of love, not romance, but even hearing the word love in reference to the new neighbor made his insides jumpy.

He gestured with his fork. “Take Gilbert.”

Connie waved the idea away. “Gilbert goes to the bull sale tomorrow. The woman knows you already. This will make it easier for her. We must show every kindness. This will honor our friend, Sally, and please God.”

“Stop arguing with her, brother.” Ace grinned at him. “She said you’re going, and you know you will.”

The cobbler settled like a brick in Nate’s stomach. Ace was right. Connie was right too. Tomorrow he’d see the redhead again.

But he was not going to be the hired hand on that make-believe ranch for a woman as attractive as Whitney Brookes. No. He was not.