Adrienne deWolfe - [Wild Texas Nights 03] by Texas Wildcat Read Free Book Online

due?
    Fortunately, Cord's front door squealed open, sparing Zack from Bailey's impending wrath.
    "Well, it's about damned time you showed up, Rawlins," Hank Rotterdam growled, plunking his Stetson down on his thinning blond hair. "I've been waiting on you for nigh on an hour. You're lucky your Aunt Lally bakes a pecan pie like a dream. If she weren't so consarned full of opinions, I'd have to marry her. Now. You want to sell me a hunting hound, or don't you?"
    Zack bit back an oath. He'd forgotten all about his appointment with Rotterdam. "Where's Cord?"
    "How should I know? You've got more damned relations on this ranch than I can keep count of. That sister-in-law of yours tried to strike a deal with me, though." Hank snorted. "Thinks she's a regular sharper, the way she kept haggling over the price. So I told Miss Fancy to go do business with her soup kettle. I'd wait for a man to get home."
    Zack glanced into the hallway beyond Hank's hulking frame. If he was speaking even a modicum of truth, Hank was lucky Fancy wasn't standing behind him with a shotgun, or at least a pot of boiling soup to dump over his head.
    "Simmer down, Rotterdam. You'll get your pick of the litter just as I promised. But it's going to take another three weeks before those pups are weaned."
    Hank's color rose, and he lowered his head as if to butt horns. "My grandson's birthday's in two days."
    "Yeah? Well, if you don't like the arrangement, go see Rob Cole. I hear his bitch whelped six weeks ago."
    "What would my Jeremy want with some stinking collie? He's chasing coons, son, not sheep."
    "Glad to hear it, Hank," Bailey interjected dryly. "For a while there I was beginning to think troublemaking ran in your bloodline."
    Hank started, then peered over Zack's shoulder. "Well now, lookie who's here." Hank's anger blew away as quickly as it had come, and he gave Bailey a horsey grin. "Have you sheepherders come begging for mercy already? Shoot. We ain't even decided on the contest's events yet."
    To her credit, Bailey handled Hank's ogling of her chest with more than passing aplomb. Zack, however, wanted to punch out the old skirt-chaser's lights—a confusing feeling that he attributed to the disrespect Hank had shown Aunt Lally and Fancy.
    "Don't go betting the ranch just yet, Hank," Bailey said. "We sheepherders have a couple ideas of our own about how that contest should be run. I expect there's going to be a contract drawn up whenever you boys quit stalling and agree to meet with us Woolgrowers."
    "Stalling?" Hank darted a speculative look at Zack. The corners of his mouth twitched. "Don't tell me you've been holding out on the little lamb lady, Zack. That there's a rodeo planning meeting you called for tomorrow night, ain't it?"
    Bailey sucked in her breath, and Zack felt absurdly guilty. Damn Hank anyway, it wasn't as if he'd been the one who'd neglected to invite Bailey. The sheepherders had been responsible for alerting their own kind.
    "Nice try, Rawlins." Bailey folded her arms, and Zack felt the temperature between them drop a few degrees. "Did you think you could keep the Woolgrowers' board from participating?"
    "Now, hold on a minute, Bailey. President Eldridge and Vice President Cole were contacted in plenty of time to get the word out to their planning committee—"
    "What planning committee?"
    "Sounds to me like someone's been keeping secrets from you, hon," Hank drawled, his sympathy about as genuine as fool's gold. "Seems a shame your Rawlins neighbors can't be straight with you after the hardships you've had to face all by your lonesome these days.
    "Now, I'm not as versed in cattlemen's business as I used to be, since a certain young whippersnapper filled my presidential boots, but I recollect hearing something about a group of volunteers coming together about sevenish tomorrow night at the Reedstrom Hotel to discuss that rodeo idea you've been peddling."
    "Oh?" Pint-sized as she was, Bailey could be powerfully intimidating when that