Page 93 of Grit
He squinted. “I think around a dozen.”
Melissa nodded. “Sounds about right. Check with me next week on timing. I’ll try to take a look over the weekend and see if my numbers are the same as yours.”
“Sounds good.” He drew on his cigarette. “Got a friend in Utah that’s due to have a litter of dogs in the next month. Been thinking about getting a female, training her up to work, and maybe breeding her to Dex. Maybe even doing a litter a year if it works out. Nothing big. Just raising good, strong working dogs. I can train ’em to work with the horses and the cattle. Sell ’em when they’re old enough. Would you be okay with that?”
“With you breeding dogs on the ranch? Little tiny, cute border collie puppies? You’re already on track to be Abby’s favorite person, Stu. You don’t have to work so hard.”
His face creased into a grin. “So you’re saying you wouldn’t mind a few balls of yappy fluff running around the place?”
Melissa threw up her hands. “We got cows, horses, barn cats, chickens, goats. Hell, my mom was talking about getting ducks last week. Dogs are hardly the craziest thing going on around here. I’m only surprised no one has brought a llama home yet.”
“Give it time. They’re great with sheep, you know.” Stu nodded and tipped his hat before he nudged his horse Magnum down the hill.
“No sheep, Stu!”
“Sure thing, Miz Rhodes.”
“I’m serious. No sheep!”
Melissa followed him down the trail, wondering if she had time to eat anything before she headed over to pick Abby up from school.
She glanced at her watch. Two forty-five.
Nope.
Here’s hoping Cary hadn’t eaten all the granola bars in her purse.
She droppedAbby off with not a single word to her father-in-law, made it back to Oakville, and dropped by the bunkhouse just as Brian and his crew were finishing up.
Brian waved a set of keys as she brought her truck to a stop. Melissa opened the truck door.
“Perfect timing.” He tossed her the keys. “We just finished cleaning up.”
When she’d left, the outside of the bunkhouse was patchy, newly primed stucco over the old adobe bricks. Now it was a tidy cream-colored building with green trim around the red-tiled roof and windows. The porch had been shored up and painted the same green.
“Brian, it looks fantastic.”
“I’m really pleased with it.” He grinned. “It’s not often you get to work on old buildings like this, so it was pretty cool. I’m glad you called me for it. I was thinking I wouldn’t have time, but Cary…”
“Cary what?”
Brian smiled. “Anyway, my guys have had fun.”
Hmmmm. Interesting. “And the structure is all looking solid?”
He nodded. “These old adobes last forever as long as they don’t get water damage, and the roof on this one only had like… one leak, maybe? We replaced the tile—that was really old—and the subroofing. You’ve already seen the bathroom. The trim is all cleaned up and the floors are refinished. Stay off them for a couple of days and you’re golden.”
She shook his hand. “I’m excited about this.”
“It’s a sweet spot. You gonna rent it out?”
She nodded. “Gonna set it up as a vacation rental. Grab some park traffic.”
“Cool.” He crossed his arms and looked around. “You know, I was just fixing up an old barn the other day to be a wedding venue. The setup out here is pretty close, only you’ve got the whole citrus grove too. If you built some kind of bigger deck under the trees there with a pavilion or something along those lines, I bet you could do something similar out here. You get a lot of wildflowers spring and early summer?”
She cocked her head. “Tons. All along the creek. I hadn’t thought about it.”
“I’d start thinking about it if I were you. I wouldn’t have time to start right away—we’re busy through the rest of the fall. But I could give you an estimate on what I’m seeing for a deck and pavilion.”
