Page 41 of The Rough Rider

And it was late.

How the hell had she slept in this late? She hadn’t slept in this late since...ever.

It was 10:00 a.m.

She was a farm girl. She didn’t do that lie-in-bed-for-half-the-day stuff.

She got dressed quickly, pulling on her blue jeans and grimacing when she realized they were a little bit tight.

And then she went downstairs, and stopped.

The house was a mess. There was a layer of dust over...most things.

It had a hollow, unused feeling. And then she went into the kitchen. And that table was still covered with papers. And everything was just...

The space of a man who wasn’t really inhabiting his house.

It was the weirdest thing.

And he hadn’t fixed it up for her.

Why should he? She didn’t really know the answer to that. Especially because she had said she wanted to be in charge of all of this.

But she also wanted to work the ranch. And she suddenly felt overwhelmed by all the things that she wanted to do. They would have to make a room for the baby.

You’re getting ten steps ahead of yourself.

She huffed. First things first. She needed some coffee. That little bit that she was allowed to have today.

The coffeepot was cold. Whatever had been in it was long gone. It didn’t even look like there had been any made in it today.

She opened the top and saw that there was an old filter full of grounds in it and grimaced. She dumped out the remainder in the carafe and went hunting around for beans. It took forever to find them. The little bag of grounds was halfway rolled shut. She got the pot of coffee going, and then proceeded to hunt around for some breakfast.

She opened up the fridge.

There was...beer. And the half-and-half she’d used here the other day. The corners of the carton opening were ragged, the half-and-half nearly gone. There was no milk. There was an onion. She had no idea the hell why.

So there was nothing to eat.Fabulous.

What kind of farmer—rancher—didn’t even have eggs in his fridge?

She opened up the freezer and laughed. There was toaster strudel in there. And pizza. And ice cream. And the man obviously ate entirely out of his freezer. She took out a toaster strudel and the little packet of icing. Stuck it in the toaster. She wasn’t going to be a beggar or a chooser. And this was just fine.

But she was going to have to go get some supplies. Maybe she would just go back to Sullivan’s Point and get some things there. She would be able to see her sisters.

Of course, they might be waiting for details on her wedding night.

Since she hadnottold them that Gus had outright said he didn’t want her. Because her pride wouldn’t allow it.

She huffed. Again. She was feeling very huffy and it was his fault. Because the house was a mess.

What she ultimately decided on as she crunched the toaster pastry and drank the coffee with the scanty cream was that she would go down to the ranch. Work for a while, and then she would co-opt Gus and make him shop with her. They could go to a grocery store, and choose some things that he liked. And maybe they could go out to dinner. That seemed like a nice thing to do.

Yeah. Happy couple time.

That’s not weird at all. And completely unlike what you said you were going to do.

Yeah. That. Completely unlike that. Weren’t they supposed to be like roommates? But he wanted her to cook for him, so she had to know what he wanted. She finished eating, dumped the rest of the coffee out, because the grounds were old and it was all disappointing anyway, and she was going to fix that.

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