Free Cattleman's Courtship by Carolyne Aarsen

expensive furniture filling her aunt and uncle’s home. The money, which was no problem for Aunt Lori and Uncle Alan, couldn’t replicate the homey comfort of this worn but clean kitchen.
    This could have been mine, she thought, the idea lacerating her hard-won composure.
    Cara pressed her lips together and marshaled her defenses. Over. Past.
    She pulled a wooden chair back from the table, dropped into it and pulled out a pad of paper from the briefcase she had taken along.
    And then, almost against her will, she glanced in Nicholas’s direction.
    He wore an old shirt, his sleeves rolled up as he measured coffee grounds into a coffee press. While she watched he rinsed a cloth and wiped the already clean counters. He poured boiling water into the press, set out cups, found a plate in the cupboard and a bag of cookies and put that out, as well.
    She tried to imagine her uncle working as efficiently in her aunt’s kitchen. The picture didn’t gel.
    Lorne and Trista were huddled together, whispering and giggling like a couple of teenagers, their previous tiff obviously forgotten. Cara cleared her throat to get their attention. “So how many people will be coming?” she asked.
    Trista pulled away from Lorne, then bent over, pulling a folder out of a bag she had taken along. “We’re keeping it small. Just family and close friends.”
    “And how many is that?” Cara asked. As Nicholas set her mug in front of her, she noticed he had put cream in it. Just enough to give it a faint caramel color. He remembered, she thought, the idea giving her heart a silly lift.
    Old acquaintances. That’s all.
    “Not sure,” Lorne said.
    “Let’s see your list?” Cara asked. Trista handed her a paper from the folder.
    “We don’t really have time to send things out in the regular mail,” Trista said, “so I thought we could e-mail whoever has an e-mail address and phone the people who don’t.”
    “So how many people would that be?” Nicholas asked as he sat in an empty chair beside Cara. She caught the scent of his cologne and the faintest hint of hay and straw from the barn, and she noticed the silvery line of a scar along his forearm that she didn’t remember being there before.
    An accident at work? Or at the ranch?
    Focus, you silly girl.
    “About sixty, we guessed?” Lorne said.

    “I’d like to ask some girls from work,” Trista said.
    Lorne frowned. “I thought we were keeping the wedding small.”
    “Well, yeah, but I’ve worked with them for the past four years—”
    “Then I should ask some friends from my work, too,” Lorne put in.
    “Of course,” Trista said.
    “So that makes it, what, eighty now?” Cara wrote the number down at the top of page one.
    “Only if my brothers don’t bring escorts,” Lorne added.
    Cara couldn’t help a quick glance at Nicholas, who was rolling his eyes.
    “Let’s get a firm list down now. Trista, you send out the e-mails as soon as possible and give people a week to reply,” Cara said, feeling like a schoolteacher. “Then we’ll follow up with the people we haven’t heard from. In the meantime we need to think about the meal.”
    “Nicholas suggested we have a barbecue,” Lorne said. “Do it ourselves. Get the relatives to all bring something—like a bit of a potluck.”
    Cara stifled a groan and chanced a look at Nicholas. “Did you suggest that?”
    Nicholas shrugged, looking a bit baffled himself. “I did, when we were talking about only thirty people.”
    Cara imagined herself, in her bridesmaid dress, whipping up a taco salad between the ceremony and dinner. “I think if we can get someone else to do the meal, we should definitely look at that.” She made another quick note.
    An hour and a half later they had a list of people who would be attending, a tentative plan for the service and a rough concept of how Trista wanted the yard decorated and set up.
    “So, is that good enough for now?” Lorne asked, shifting in his chair.
    “What about the