How to Marry a Cowboy (Cowboys & Brides) by Carolyn Brown Read Free Book Online Page B

people.
    That was one hell of a lot of trust.
    She could almost hear her mother saying, “It’s all in the eyes. They are the windows to the soul, and if you are honest, you’ll see the person through his eyes.”
    She wished she’d done that when she fell for Nicky. Looking back, there had always been a veil over his eyes that never lifted. And no matter how hard she tried to be what he wanted, she couldn’t fix the problems that he had with control and anger that were worse than a drug addiction. Mason’s eyes were warm and she could not only see but feel the love and worry in them when he looked at the little girls.
    “Well?” Lily asked.
    “Of course we can start tomorrow,” Annie Rose said.
    “Oh, Djali!” Gabby stomped her foot.
    The goat was rooting around inside the still-open garbage bag. When he raised his head, there was pink cake icing on his beard and a piece of paper dangling from his mouth.
    “Jeb!” Lily squealed and dashed off to the side of the pool where Jeb was kneeling to drink the chlorine water. “You can’t have that. It will make you sick.” She tugged at his ribbon leash and it broke. The momentum caused her to fall into the pool, and the goat took off toward the jungle gym, bleating like someone was trying to kill him.
    Mason chuckled, then he laughed, then he guffawed so loud that it bounced off the clear blue sky and echoed off the far reaches of the state of Texas. Annie Rose’s dad had laughed like that and she always loved hearing it, but this man sure wasn’t her father. No, sir! He was a gorgeous cowboy who wore his jeans just right and had lips that begged to be kissed and a body that… dear God in heaven, he couldn’t even laugh without sending her thoughts spiraling into places they had no place going. He probably had a girlfriend or maybe even a fiancée, and even if he didn’t, she was the nanny and that was all.
    “It’s not funny, Daddy!” Lily swam to the far end of the pool.
    “Yes, it is funny. Let’s get those pesky critters out in the calf pen, and then we’ll move Annie Rose into the nanny apartment.”
    “Which is where?” Annie Rose asked.
    “Last door on the left off the foyer. It’s yours as long as you want it.”
    Annie Rose smiled. “If I like the job at the end of the month and if the girls still like me after tonight and you still want me to stay, we’ll shake on a new deal then. I don’t want you to offer something you’ll regret later.”
    “If you last a month, it will be a miracle.”
    “So do we get to keep the goats in our room, Daddy?”
    “Ask Annie Rose about goats in the house. She’s the new Nanny-Mama,” Mason said, shaking his head and still chuckling quietly.
    “And it’s Mama-Nanny. Mama comes first,” Gabby said.
    “How far is it from their bedrooms to my apartment?” she asked.
    “Down the stairs and across the foyer,” he answered.
    “Your dad says there are a couple of old playpens up in the attic that he will bring down for you. Jeb will go in one beside your bed, Lily, and Djali goes in one beside your bed, Gabby. If you bring them in the house for the night, they are your responsibility. You have to take care of them and then clean out the playpens tomorrow morning before breakfast. Understood? Your father is not going to clean the messy playpens, and neither am I. You still want them in the house?”
    Gabby tilted her chin up a notch. “A nanny’s job…”
    Annie Rose laid a finger on her lips. “A mama’s job is to teach her children responsibility. They can stay in the pen with the calves or you can babysit them all night and clean the pens tomorrow morning. Those are your options, and you have to get a bucket of soapy water and clean the dust and spiderwebs off the playpens first if you want to use them.”
    Annie Rose had turned into her mother. Elizabeth Boudreau’s spirit had been resurrected inside her the minute that she took on the job of taking care of those little girls.
    “But