A/N: Not infringement intended, not making any money from this. Here you go, hope you enjoy.
I groaned as I hit my alarm clock, waking up early doesn't bother me too much. Last night I stayed up to late last night playing chess with Bella. I got dress fairly quickly and dragged myself downstairs. Maria already had coffee waiting for me.
"Good morning Mister Jasper" She said as put a plate of food in front of me.
"Thank you, Maria. Good Morning, you seem awfully chipper today." I shoveled some eggs in my mouth and washed it down with the black coffee.
"I'm just glad Miss Rose is home, this place needs more women in it." She hummed as she mixed some batter.
I smiled at her as I finished my breakfast. I took my plate to the sink and noticed she was kneading some dough.
"Maria, are you making donuts?" I asked putting my cup in the sink.
"Of course, they are Miss Rose favorites, now you go do your chores." I kissed her cheek as I left the kitchen and headed to the stabled. I feed all the horses and moved some of the hay from the store room into the stable area. Then I went and did the rounds checking the cattle. A calf was born last night; the cowhand said he was doing fine. Already exhausted I headed back to the stable. Ciarra made her begging sound so I went up to the house to get her a couple carrots. Bella and Rose were sitting at the table in pajama eating my donuts.
"These are so delicious Maria, can you teach me how to make them." Bella voice made me smile she was really here. I sat went to fridge and pulled out a couple carrot and stole a donut from Bella plate.
"Sure Miss Bella I would love that." Maria said as she flipped some more dough in the hot oil.
"Where are you going?" Bella said as she swatted my hand away from her plate.
"Ciarra wanted a treat, thought I'd get Astrid one too, want to join me?" She nodded and got up.
"Why does she call me Miss Bella?" She asked leaning against my shoulder. I shrugged and smiled down at her.
"Just something she's always done. Rose hates it to; Maria is more like a grandma to us then a maid." I shrugged; she had a bit of a frown.
"Whats wrong darlin?" I put my arm around her shoulder. She ducked from under it and put herself in front of me making me stop.
"You!" she yelled slightly. "You pushed me away and avoided me like the plague. I come here and you acted like nothing happened. What the Hell, you were my best friend." She was waving her arms around and her pajama top was having problems keeping up. I looked up to the sky to avoid those round orbs bouncing around. "Look at me when I'm talking to you. Tell me what happened." I couldn't tell her yet.
"Bells, you might want to consider a different pajama top from now on. " I tried my hardest to keep eye contact with her, but I could still see a small crescent of pink peeking though the top of her shirt. She looked down and blushed then crossed her arms really fast.
"Oh my god." She gulped out, and then took off running to the house. I adjusted my pants a little and went to the stables.
"This is going to be a long summer." I whispered to Ciarra as I feed her a carrot. She nuzzled her head against mine as I gave her another carrot. "I just don't know what to tell her."
"You could try the truth" a small voice whimpered from the front of the stable. Bella had came back she had on some jeans and a white shirt. I froze and just stared at her trying to hide myself against my dark giant. She was still beautiful even with her hair still crazy from sleep. She must of ran back to the stables she looked out of breath.
"Bella I promise I will one day but not today." I drawled out and looked at the ground. I really need to sweep the excess hay out.
"No you don't get to do that today. Every time you don't want to talk about something you say that and I'm sick of it. I'm not the little girl you had to protect from everything. Just tell me that the hell has been your problem." She growled out as she stomped towards me. Her little fist curled into balls. Her angry was something new to me and it was adorable.
"Tell me now or I'm leaving." She huffed out poking me in the chest with her tiny pointer finger. She still had my ring on, I did a mental fist pump. I had to think of something, the closer to the truth the better. She knew when I was lying. I carefully crafted my half truth and took a deep breath.
"At the Christmas dance I saw how all the guys were looking at you" myself included I added mentally."I know it's just a matter of time before you developed feelings for someone." Hopefully it's me another mental note, glad she's not physic." You're my best friend and I didn't want to lose that" when we broke up my mental voice is an asshole. I looked up and saw a small laugh building in her.
"Jasper Daniel Whitlock that has to be the most stupid thing I have ever heard. You can never lose me." She laughed loudly and wrapped her arms around me. "We're best friends, and nothing can separate us. So quit being mopey and show me my horse." I laughed and took her hand and lead her to Astrid.
"She's not as big as your horse." She quipped as we approached her stall.
"No, Ciarra's size in unusual for a female paint, part of the reason I love her. She is beautiful and powerful like a thunderstorm."
"I think Astrid is prettier." She was just looking at the horse with awe. I handed her the carrot. She shook her head. "She'll bite my hand off." I chuckled and put the carrot in her hand.
"No she won't I promise." I snorted as I pushed her a little closer. "Just hold it out for her, she'll do all the work." I wrapped my hand around hers and reached out towards Astrid. She took the carrot from Bella and she yelped and turned into my chest.
"See nothing to be afraid of, she's a sweetheart." I whispered into her hair. "Want to learn to ride today?"
She turned to look at Astrid and nodded gently.
"Okay well let me get the saddle for you, wait right here." She smiled and put her hand on Astrid mane. I grabbed a saddle and a saddle blanket. Bella watched as I swiftly got her horse ready.
"Are you sure I can do this by myself?" She whispered as I reached for her hand. "You had to help me get on yesterday."
"Astrid is a little smaller and I can still help you if you need it." I replied as she joined my side. "Just reach up and grab the horn of the saddle." A confuse look spread across her face, she bit her lip and looked at me like I could read her mind.
"What's the horn?" She finally remarked when I couldn't read her thoughts.
"Sorry, um this piece right here." I placed my hand on the horn. "But first get your foot ready to step into the stir up." I pointed to it before she could ask. "When you get a good grip on the horn, step into the stir up and pull yourself up." She looked at me like I was insane. "I'm here to catch you and help you."
"Alright, no laughing if I fall okay." I chuckled slightly but I could tell she was nervous.
I held up to fingers and smiled."Scouts honor."
"You weren't in scouts' jackass." She grunted out as she grabbed a hold of the horn and made a weird jump without putting her foot in the stir up. She just landed oddly on both feet. I put my hand on her waist to make sure she was steady on her feet.
"Well that didn't go as planned." She stuttered as she blushed. We tried a couple of times till we heard some walking outside the barn.
"I can't do this. Can't I just ride with you all summer?" She whispered leaning against my shoulder defeated.
"Bells that would be fine, but I still have to work this summer and I think it would hurt papa Jack feelings if you didn't enjoy his gift." I replied as nuzzled the top of her head with my nose.
"So where is my horse?" Emmett bellowed into the stable, startling a few of the horses.
"Emmett shut up you're spooking the horses." Rose yelled as she hit the back of his head.
"I guess you could use Freckles, he should be able handle your weight." Rose said walking by the stables to the old paint quarter horse. He was probably the oldest horse we had and only used him to help train the younger ones.
"You mean, papa Jack didn't get me a horse?" He pouted as he looked to ground.
"He's letting you stay in my sister room this summer, you should be happy he hasn't pulled a shot gun on you." I said as they passed us. Rose smiled and grabbed a couple saddle blankets and some reins and had Emmett grab a saddle.
"Rose you know papa hates it when you ride Rowdy without a saddle." I said to her knowing she'll ignore me.
"Yeah yeah I know." She said as she pulled Freckles out to get him saddled up. Emmett's first few tries were hilarious; I almost started crying from laughing so hard.
"How did you end like that?" I barked out when he landed on his head under the horse with a foot stuck in a stir up.
"This horse has is out for me." he replied as he got his foot lose and fell to the floor. Rose finally showed him how to get up and told him to take it slow. He flailed on top of the horse for a minute before getting settled.
"That was ridiculous, how do you do this every day?" He grunted towards me. I shrugged.
"It's easy when you're not a bear." Rose stated as she trotted Rowdy out of his stall. She grabbed a tuff of his mane and pulled herself up gracefully.
"Really Rose you too?" He whined again as she walked out of the stable with Rowdy. "Go. Um start. Go horsey get the Rose." He looked upset as he tried to figure out how to make Freckle to go.
"Let me help you out man." I said as I walked up to the back of Freckle and slap his buttock. He took off running.
"Asshat" I head Emmett scream as Freckles too off to the field. I knew Rose would catch up to them and settled them down.
"That was uncalled for." Bella said with a serious look in her face and her arms crossed. After a few seconds her frown faulted and she laughed. I smiled and trotted Ciarra out of her stall and brought her near Astrid.
"Come 'ere darling." I drawled out as I pulled her closer to Astrid. "One last try a'ight." My accent made her smile and she nodded. She put on foot in the stir up and grabbed the horn and pulled herself. It was a little awkward but she manages it.
"I did it." She exclaimed as I got on Ciarra with a quick movement. "No one likes a show off."
"Okay just pull her reins gently and push you heels in gently." I said I trotted in front of her. She looked nervous but did as I said. Astrid followed her lead and started to trot behind me, once we were outside the stables I asked Bella what she wanted to do.
"How about you show me the entire ranch?" She said her grip on reins made her knuckles white.
"Well it's about five thousand acres so that could take some time on horseback. Would you like to see the calf that was born last night? I need to go check it out."
"Okay that sounds nice, where do you think my brother and Rose went off too?" I clicked my tongue to make Ciarra go a little faster. Bella mimicked the noise and Astrid picked up the pace.
"Do we really need to know?" I finally answered. After about twenty minutes we arrived at one of the barns set up around the property. There was a small house behind it that one of the cowhands and his family stayed at. I slide off my horse and walked over to Bella, she swung her leg over and waited for me to catch her. I helped her down and walked to the doors of the barn. There was a middle age woman there putting some fresh hay down in a stall.
"Hey Mrs. Hunter, thought I'd come by and check the on our newest addition. " She looked up and smiled.
"You're welcome here anytime Jasper, is this the Bella, Maria told me about?" She said after she hugged me and took Bella hands.
"Yes, Ma'am. Where's James, I thought he was suppose to be helping out at the barn. "I asked, her son was starting to annoy grandfather and me. His mom and dad were the best help we had, but he keeps blowing off jobs, and a few heads of cattle had gone missing when he was on watch.
"Oh Vicky had an emergency and needed him to come right away. I just need to sweep the old hay out and put some new hay in the stalls. It's not a problem." She replied and went back to shoveling the hay into stall.
"Well I'll take care of it, I need to look after the calf, you know how Jack likes to keep an eye on the youngins." I said take the shovel from her. She smiled and walked towards the back of the barn.
"Why don't you join her or try Rose's cell, I'm going to be awhile."
"I could help you." she replied too quickly. I shook my head.
"Darlin this is pretty tough work, it's not like raking leaves. I want you to have fun not work." I tried shooing her towards the back. She shook her head and took the shovel from me.
"Okay here you'll need these." I handed her some gloves and put mine on. "We need to throw this hay down for the cows to sleep on. So try to keep it in one even area." I let her keep the shovel and picked up an armful of hay from the wheel barrel. We empty the barrel and I picked it up and moved it to the next stall.
"Now we have scoop the old hay out. It's going to smell bad. Sorry." She bent forward and got a shovelful of the old moist hay. She started coughing and gagging making her dropped the shovel.
"Told you so." I said picking up the shovel and began putting the stuff in the barrel.
"I still wasn't expecting that. That's a really bad smell." She said leaning against the stall watching me as I scooped all the hay into a barrel. I picked up that one and asked her follow me to the compost pile.
"What do you do with the old hay?" She asked as I empted the barrel unto the pile.
She followed me out to the storage area and I grabbed a bale of hay and threw it next to the barrel. I put the knife out and cut the wires so I could put the loose hay in a barrel. We did this routine for the next for about an hour till we were done. She was covered in a thin layer of sweat making her shirt stick to her. The dampness made it a little sheer and I had to force my eyes to the ground again to avoid ogling her.
"Why don't we go check out that calf before we head back to the house." I said as I took her hand and lead her to the back.
"How can you do this everyday, in this heat. I'm melting" she whined as pulled her shirt away from her body.
I smiled at her and tried not to ogle the flesh she was exposing as she fanned her shirt out.
We got to the stall and was still there putting some feed in the the bucket for the calf and the heifer.
"Thank you Jasper you didn't have to do that. How about I go get you two some lemonade, you like you could use it?" She smiled and left us with the calf and heifer.
"He's so tiny, how is he already walking?" She asked as she crouched down to look at the calf.
"They are born walking. They'll stay in here for the rest of the day but they'll take them out tomorrow. They cows don't normally stay here, this is just for the heifers and calf and when we're breeding." I explained to her. She smiled and stood up and leaned against me. I wrapped my arms around her and we just stood there in silence till we heard Mrs. Hunter return.
"Here you two go. I'm sorry again Jasper, I'll talk to James when he gets back." She said looking at the ground.
"Mrs. Hunter, you and your husband are doing a great job here. We appreciate everything you do, but if ranching isn't something James wants to do then maybe he should look elsewhere for employment." I hated to talk to her like this, she was older than me and has been nothing but nice to me.
"I think you're right, he doesn't love it like we do. Ranching is in our blood, but James seems to hate it. We'll talk about it tonight." She said she put her hand on my shoulder and went back to the house. After we finished our lemonade we took the horses back to the stables.
"I'm so tired and its only noon." She whined as we took the saddles to the rack. "I'm going back to bed." She leaning against a post. I smiled at her and picked her up to place her on the fence. I stood in front of giggled and wrapped her arms around my neck and her long legs around my waist.
"Allons-y" She cried out as I walked back to house with her on my back. We made it back to the house and I deposited her on the porch swing.
"Stay there, I'll be right back." She smiled and nodded her head. I raced inside, Maria had some sandwhiches made for us and some tea set out. I grabbed the stuff and went back to Bella. She was propped up on the side of the swing with her legs stretched across the length of it. She picked up her legs and put them back on top of mine. We ate in silence when we were down I put everything on the floor.
"You must have muscles of steel if you do this kind of stuff everyday." She moaned lowering the pillow she was propped against. I started rubbing her calves and she moaned loudly. The sound went straight to the little major, making him stand up and salute her.
"I guess, just get use to it, I still refuse to do the manure part of it." I replied trying to distract myself from the soft moans coming from her as I kept kneading her calves. I moved up slightly to the top of her thighs. A lower louder moan came out of her. I stopped I had to those noises were killing me. I moved my hand to the part of her arm I could reach and started rubbing them. She made contented mewing noise.
"You're putting me to sleep." She murmured as she closed her eyes. I was tempted to lean forward and kiss her eyelids. I smiled gently and kept rubbing her arms.
"Then go to sleep. I have some more work to do and some emails to check." Her eyes fluttered open.
"Outside, on the porch?" She asked looking at me like I was nuts.
"Why not, it's in the shade and there a nice breeze. You'd probably be more comfortable out here anyways. " I replied brushing my hand across her eyes forcing them to close. I started rubbing her calves again she moaned and nestle herself into the swing. I kept rubbing until I heard her breath even out. Then I went inside to finish the emails.
The next few weeks went on like this. She would get up early with me and make the rounds with me and help clean the stables. Then she would spend the afternoon with Rose and Emmett. Sometimes I would join them ad we'd go swimming. The evening she's spend playing chess with papa and visting with Maria. Each night I would go to sleep wishing I could wrap my arms around her all night. Maybe a few nights I had to take matter I my own hands. Then I would feel bad about it and chastise myself mentally for having such perverted thoughts about her. She deserved better than me jacking off to the image of her in that tiny pajama top. It was nearing the fourth of July and papa said I should take a few days off. I thought about it and agreed .
"Hey son, did you check your email today?" My grandfather asked as I came in from the stables.
"Not yet, anything interesting, I'm going to take the next few days off." I said I settled into the desk chair.
"Well the Plummer farm near Lake Texhoma wants us to bring a Bull out there for studding." He said with the mischievous smile that Rose had inherited.
"Think they could wait a few days, I really want to spend the forth with Bella." I said as I opened the email.
"Well I was think you could take the bull up there and stay at the lake house we have there." He replied as he sat down on my bed.
"It's not really a house as much as a living room with a bathroom." I replied, it was his idea I take some time off what was he playing at. "Besides it's on the other side of the state line."
"Well I put a trailer down there, it's a new three bedroom double wide. Thought I could use a retirement home." I laughed at that. Papa would never spend more than a week away from here.
"I was thinking that you, Bella, Rose and that bear of a man she brought could go and enjoy the holiday there. I have a boat out there too so you can go out on the lake." He got up and smiled at me again.
"Okay. I'll email them back and let them know." I said as I typed out the email. Rose knocked on my door then let herself in.
"So papa said we were going to Lake Texhoma. Is it true?" She asked excitedly. I nodded as I sent the email
"You are my favorite brother." She squealed before she ran out of my room. I rolled my eyes and finished my work.
A/N: Sorry for the delay. Thank you for reading and all the kind reviews. Thank you babygirl2829259 for all the reviews they made my dreary Saturday happier. Hope you enjoyed this chapter.