Summertime on the Ranch by Carolyn Brown (leveled readers txt) 📗

only way to be,” she said. “And speaking of that, I’m tellin’ you right now, this is some damn fine wine, and it’s hittin’ me harder than whiskey usually does.”

“This must be Austin’s good stuff. Did you get it from the top shelf?” he asked.

“Yes, I did. I wanted to bring the best,” she answered.

He removed the pan of cookies and slid the second batch into the oven. “Like ’em warm?”

“Honey, I like ’em hot,” she said, giggling.

“Let’s take them to the living room.” He lifted twenty cookies off the pan with a spatula and put them onto a plate. “You carry the wine, and I’ll bring this.”

“Don’t you dare drop them on the floor,” Becca cautioned. “I’ve looked forward to warm cookies and cold wine all day.”

“If I do, we’ll just sit down on the floor and eat them. You don’t have to worry. My floors are just that clean,” he told her.

“Did you see that episode of Friends when Joey and Rachel and Chandler eat cheesecake off the floor? This reminds me of that night, only they were stone-cold sober.” She picked up the wine and took short steps all the way to the living room where she set the glasses on the coffee table and then sank down into the sofa.

“And we are not.” Dalton sat down beside her and draped an arm around her shoulders. “I’m not sure if it’s the wine or if I’m slap happy because you’re here. After almost six months of wanting this to happen, now it is, and I could be drunk on that and not the wine.”

“You are a charmer for sure.” Becca reached for a cookie, took a bite, and then sipped the wine. “Very good together. Do we really have to wait until tomorrow night to get into our vodka melon?”

“It takes at least twelve hours for it to infuse, but if you want to have it earlier, you are welcome to spend the night,” he told her.

Before she could answer, someone knocked on the door and then came right in without being invited. Becca hoped like hell it wasn’t his mother or his grandmother. Either of them seeing her half-lit would not bode well.

“Well, well, well? So, it’s true. You’re not pregnant. If you were, you wouldn’t be drinking wine.” Lacy stopped inside the door and popped her hands on her hips.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Dalton asked.

“I came to tell you that you were having twins, only not by the same mama, but I guess you’ll only be getting one little dark-haired baby in about seven months.” She pointed down at her flat belly.

“Oh, no!” he said loudly. “If you’re pregnant, it’s not mine. I haven’t been with you since before Christmas.”

“Are you sure?” She raised both eyebrows. “Run along home, Becca McKay. He lives by the cowboy code, and he’ll marry me because it’s the right thing to do.”

“She’s lying,” Dalton whispered. “She’s trying to cause trouble. I swear to God, I haven’t been with her since right after Thanksgiving.”

Becca shook off his arm and stood up. “You clean up this mess before you text or call me again.”

“You’re too drunk to drive,” he said.

“I don’t plan on getting behind the wheel. I’ll sleep it off in the watermelon shed,” she told him as she went to the kitchen, picked up her purse, and headed toward the door. “Forget about me going with you to deliver the rodeo animals tomorrow.”

“I’ll swear on a Bible, take a DNA test, whatever it takes, Becca. Trust me,” he said.

With tears running down her cheeks, she staggered down the lane and across the dirt road. She was almost to the watermelon shed when she heard a vehicle. Her hands knotted into fists. If it was Lacy, she might drown the bitch in a five-gallon bucket of watermelon juice and swear to God that she had nothing to do with it. The truck came to a stop and Dalton got out and tried to take her hands in his, but she wasn’t having any of it. She might be able to forget the past and her dreams, but evidently his wild oats were going to follow him around forever.

“I’m so sorry, but I mean it. If she is pregnant, it’s not my baby,” he said.

“We both need to sober up before we talk,” she said. “Go home, Dalton. You shouldn’t even be behind the wheel.”

“Can I call you tomorrow?” he asked.

“I suppose,” she nodded, “but not until you get back from Texas.”

Chapter 7

Greta came through the door like a Category 5 tornado. “Get your drunk arse up and go get in the car. You’re comin’ home with me right now, girl. There ain’t no way you are sleeping in a lawn chair all night.”

“I’m not drunk. I’m barely buzzed, and I’m perfectly fine sleeping right here,” Becca argued.

Greta pointed toward the door. The expression on her face said that she wasn’t about to repeat herself and she wasn’t taking no for an answer. Becca slowly got to her feet and stumbled that way. She didn’t have the energy to fight with her grandmother, especially when the odds were against her. Not once in all of her twenty-eight years had she won an argument with her grandmother.

When they were in the car and on the way home, Greta glanced over at her and said, “What in the hell happened?”

“Nothing,” Becca growled. “And I’m going home with you, so you win.”

“Don’t you sass me, Rebecca McKay,” Greta told her. “I told you that spending time with that cowboy would prove if you should be with him or not, one way or the other. Evidently, it’s not.”

“Yep,” Becca agreed.

“If he can’t trust you, then you don’t have a foundation to build on anyway, so it’s best to end it before it even gets started,” Greta said as she parked in front of her house.

“Yep,” Becca said a second time. “Whoa! Wait a minute. Him trust me? Evidently, he called you