How to Marry a Cowboy (Cowboys & Brides) by Carolyn Brown

pool? I would sure love to stretch out my legs in a recliner lawn chair while I have coffee. Is it all right if they do the dishes after I go back to work, Annie Rose?”
    “There’s no hurry. We all get a break at noon, no matter if we’re hauling hay or baking. I’ll put your cake on paper plates and you can pour your tea into plastic cups. Be careful and don’t spill it,” Annie Rose said.
    Mason settled into the chair and Annie Rose pulled up another one beside him. The girls were ten feet away at the patio table.
    “They are fast learners,” she said.
    “You are amazing. I’ll pay you double if you’ll sign a year’s contract.” Where in the hell had those words come from? He couldn’t hire a woman like Annie Rose for a year. He couldn’t bear the guilt that being in the same room with her brought about. He held his breath as he waited for her answer.
    “One month at a time,” she said.
    ***
    The rooms were usually a cross between a dump ground and what happens when a tornado hits a toy store when Mason went in to kiss the girls good night. That night everything was in its place and Gabby was propped up against the headboard on pillows with a book in her hands.
    “I’m reading this book that I got for my birthday yesterday and Mama-Nanny says that it was in her library and that I should read it. We get to read thirty minutes before we have lights-out now, and we’re on the honor system. At nine thirty, we have to put the marker in our book. See?” She held up a piece of paper with stickers plastered on it. “Me and Lily made one this afternoon. Mama-Nanny showed us how to make it and she taught us how to use measuring cups and cook and she says she trusts us to turn off our own lights at nine thirty.”
    Without having to pick his way across the floor to avoid stepping on a Barbie, an electronic device, or a hair bow, he quickly crossed the room and sat down on the edge of her bed. “So you think maybe you’ll keep your mean old nanny?”
    Gabby sighed. “We would fire her if she was a nanny, but since she’s a mama ”—she emphasized the word—“we are going to keep her. We had so much fun today, Daddy.”
    “I thought you had to do chores,” he said.
    “Well, we thought chores were work. We didn’t know they were fun.” Gabby yawned. “I’m glad Djali is in his own bed tonight. I really didn’t like all that carryin’ on last night.”
    Mason kissed her on the forehead. “So today was a good day?”
    “The best ever.” Gabby smiled.
    “I’m glad to hear that.”
    Lily looked up from her book when she heard him coming through the connecting bathroom between her and Gabby’s room. “Daddy, come and smell my sheets. They smell like springtime. Mama-Nanny says that we can hang them on the line every Monday if it’s not raining.”
    Mason crossed another clean floor and stuck his nose in Lily’s pillow, inhaling deeply. “They do smell nice. What are you reading?”
    “It’s called Winner Bakes All , and it’s about a little girl my age who likes to be a tomboy, but she likes to cook too. Mama-Nanny says when I read it all, me and Gabby can make cupcakes and put our own decorations on them and we’ll have them for dessert when you come home at noon.”
    “Then you had a good day and you like this idea of turning off television and games so you can read before you go to sleep?” Mason asked.
    Lily twisted her mouth to one side. “Well, I didn’t think I was going to like it one bit, but Mama-Nanny says that if we know where our things are all the time that it makes everything work better.”
    “So we’re not going to fire her?” Mason asked.
    “Hell, no! I mean heck, no! Mamas are better than nannies, so me and Gabby were right all along,” Lily answered.
    Mason kissed Lily on the forehead. Two calm girls who didn’t want thirty more minutes of Nick-at-Nite or thirty more minutes of games on their tablets—no one could tell him that miracles didn’t exist in