Page 1 of Gourd Enough To Eat
CHAPTER ONE
ELIJAH
Istared at the pink glitter monstrosity of a van that marred the Lone Grizzly Mountain the Off-Duty Rescue Ranch sat on with my mouth open, catching flies. Hands that ached with hours of work wrangling a new horse that just wouldn’t stay put forgot to hurt as I decoded the nude oversized animal decal one side.
AGrin and Bear Itslogan decorated the front. I gazed at the pun, the naked bear—ha, the bare bear—all I could see. The eyesore obscured everything I loved about the ranch and the landscape, right up until a blonde bombshell of a girl hopped out of the driver’s side. She was also covered in glitter and pink, fluffy stuff as she skipped around the front to chat with Ash, who ran the place.
He gave her a hug, his arms fitting around her where she had curves in all the right places. More than a few, actually. Hell, I didn’t know jeans could look like that.
“She could rival you for a pun, gourd boy.” Anson, one of the ranch’s other workers, slapped my shoulder then cuffed at my face in play. “Fuck, man. You’re drooling.”
I jerked back with an oath. “Keep your hands to yourself," I grumbled.
Part of me wanted to watch her all day. The other part kind of admired her balls to stick a bear that big all over the front of her display—even if her display was a glitter van that looked like a pink version of the Mystery Machine, circa two thousand and one.
I swiped the back of my hand across my mouth just to check. He was right, dammit. That irked me worse than before. I turned my back on the glitter bomb and the girl who made a mess in the yard adjacent to the house, focusing on the rescue in front of us. “We have work to do,” I snapped, succeeding only in frightening the creature, and probably Anson too, from the look on the man’s face.
He turned away from the calamity in the making before me, grumbling like I had before. The sparkly new shiny thing in the yard might look like the best new distraction to come in from town, but I knew better.
Nothing good came from something so pretty. Anson could take my word for it, though right now he didn’t seem inclined to ask, and I sure as hell wasn’t about to offer my philosophy on life.
Today’s newly arrived rescue horse, Daisy Duke, nuzzled my hand affectionately.
“Wanna feed, pretty girl?” I murmured, running my hand over her nose with extreme care, all too aware of the trust she put in me, offering me that first touch. Deep scars cut into her stunning chestnut coat around her head where she’d been trapped into a halter for an extended period by a previous owner who thought they were doing the right thing but…
Yeah, well. Sometimes owners did the wrong thing even when they thought they were doing the right thing. I was just glad that my job didn’t involve talking to said owners. I figuredmy words would be too harsh for that end of a really blunt stick. Dusty, the local vet, lanced a pocket in her cheek earlier that looked like it was just swelling, and nothing worse. I’d stayed with her the entire time and she sort of semi imprinted onto me afterwards as her carer.
After the military shit I’d been through in the desert over the past few years, being kind to someone rather than too harsh felt…oddly good. Maybe the rescue in this case wasn’t DD after all.
“You gonna day dream about your gourds all day? Maybe you get enough time with all your curves there, huh?” Anson didn’t know when to give up.
I rolled my lips inward as Miss Daisy D gave me a fixed look that saiddon’t murder him in my paddock, please.
“Never, ma’am,” I muttered.
“D’you just call the horse,ma’am?” Ash Rhodes, the man who ran the Off-Duty Rescue Ranch, clapped a hand across my shoulder blades.
I stiffened. Daisy sent me a commiserating look.
“Is there a problem with how I address a beautiful lady?” I stroked Daisy’s nose. She whickered in response, nuzzling me gently.
“She’s taken to you,” Ash mused. “I know a girl who did that once. You want to look after this one for me?”
I stroked Daisy’s nose while something uncertain coiled too tight in my gut, something that might shatter at a moment’s notice.
Something akin to trust, unfounded.
“You know I can’t be here most nights if she needs me,” I said carefully. “And I care in the afternoons. Not that I’m not grateful. It’s just that—” I paused, knowing his eyes were upon me. Knowing I couldn’t screw up this chance at a slice of peace, of somethingmorethan the drifter life that had taken me fromone ranch to the next, following the seasons for the last few years. This was the first place I'd had a glimpse of what home might feel like again in a long time and I’d do almost anything not to jeopardise that.
Plus, I had a sense of purpose here. A sense of something more than just place.
“You like the part of you that you’ve found here. And in town. I know that,” Ash said, so easily. Much more so than I'd be able to say for myself. That rankled, but I held my silence and let the other, slightly older man finish. “I’m glad you’re here with us, Elijah Campise. Both Off duty and Forest Grove wouldn’t be the same without you.”
I ground my teeth, unsure why his acceptance, when I couldn't do the same for myself, bothered me so much. “Appreciate it.” I kept on stroking Daisy's nose long after Ash walked away, humming softly to her, unsure who was comforting who.
When I finished up with Daisy, had her settled for the afternoon, the yard stood empty, covered in long shadows, the glitter bus with its bare bear nowhere in sight.
And that meant it was time to get some real work done.
