When a Cowboy Loves a Woman (Creedence Horse Rescue #2) - Jennie Marts Page 0,6
Mandy’s class.”
“She looks like she has her hands full.”
“Yeah, she married her high school sweetheart, a big douche nugget who left her and the girls last year to run off with the rodeo queen from the Colorado State Fair. Poor girl had no idea what she was getting herself into.”
“That’ll be nine seventy-five,” the teenage cashier told them as she passed two shakes out the drive-through window. Brody handed her a ten-dollar bill. Elle took a shake and passed Brody her debit card. She raised her voice to the cashier as Brody passed over the card. “Please use that to pay for the meals of the car behind us.”
The teenager raised her eyebrows as she took the card and passed out the bag of fries. “You sure? They ordered a lot of food.”
Elle nodded. “Yes, I’m quite sure.”
Brody handed the fries to Elle, then poked straws into their shakes. “That’s nice of you. I didn’t realize you knew Kimmie.”
“I don’t. But it looks like she could use a kind gesture.”
Brody took the debit card and receipt, and passed them to Elle before pulling out of the drive-through and onto the road. “Do you do that often?”
Elle was shaking a packet of salt onto her fries. “What? Use too much salt?”
He laughed. “No, pay for other people’s meals?”
Elle shrugged. “I don’t know. I help when I can, I guess. I got a bunch of money from Ryan’s life insurance, which feels weird, because I’d rather eat ramen noodles every day and live in my car if it meant I could have him back. But it somehow feels better if I can spend some of it to help other people.”
“Hmm,” he said, narrowing his eyes again. “Bryn told me someone paid off her entire account at the grocery store last week. She asked if I knew anything about it, hinting around that she’d really like to thank the person who did it, but I told her it wasn’t me. Was it you?”
Elle kept her gaze trained on her freshly salted fries. “I’m sure I wouldn’t know anything about that.”
“Yeah, I bet not,” he said with a laugh, then nodded to the bag of food. “Toss some of that salt on my fries, would ya?”
She sprinkled salt on his fries, then passed him the carton, thankful for the distraction and that he was willing to let the awkward conversation go. The whole point of helping someone anonymously was to stay anonymous. And she knew Bryn used her account to buy pet food and groceries to feed the friends who stopped in to help volunteer with the horses. The few hundred dollars she’d paid off on the account wasn’t a big deal to her, but she knew it would help Bryn, who survived on her waitress salary and would still give the shirt off her back if someone were in need of it.
Elle settled into her seat, and they passed the ten-minute drive in comfortable silence, munching on fries and sipping their shakes.
“Is that a deer?” Brody asked, squinting into the headlights as he turned into Bryn’s driveway and slowed the truck.
“No, that’s Shamus,” Elle responded, recognizing the mini-horse Bryn had recently rescued. “But what the heck is he doing out of the corral?”
“And why is he hanging around with that ornery goat? Otis is bound to get them into trouble.”
The horse stood in the middle of the driveway, grazing on a small patch of grass and eyeing the truck. As they got closer, Elle spotted the black-and-white goat, a dandelion hanging from his lip, standing behind Shamus. She laughed as she watched the unlikely pair trot off together toward the barn. “They probably heard we stopped at McDonald’s and were hoping to steal a fry.”
“I’ll go put them back in the corral after we get you inside.” Brody cautiously drove down the final part of the driveway and stopped in front of the two-story farmhouse. “I just realized we probably should have waited to eat. Bryn’s most likely set out enough food to feed an army. And you know she won’t be happy until she convinces you to eat something.”
“You’re right,” Elle said, gazing at the yellow house with the big wraparound porch. Something in her settled as she took in the soft glow of light shining through the windows, and she could almost smell the scents of cinnamon and vanilla that hung in the air of the farmhouse kitchen. “Knowing Bryn, she probably whipped up a Three-Alarm Kitchen-Fire Casserole while she waited