Now that she was older, she appreciated her aunt even more. Misty’s parents had died on Christmas morning when Misty was just twelve. She’d been consumed with grief when Aunt Cami had taken her home. Her aunt had been a single parent on a teacher’s limited salary, but she’d raised Misty and helped her through college. In all those years, they’d never celebrated Christmas. Neither wanted to remember or relive that terrible Christmas that had changed their lives forever. And Misty had lost or intentionally stuffed away most of her cherished memories so she could go forward in life and not live in the past. Instead of Christmas, Aunt Cami and Misty had given each other gifts and goodies on Winter Solstice.
Misty had always been cautious after losing her parents, so Aunt Camilla had encouraged her to experience more of life. Now Cindi Lou was doing the same thing. Maybe they were both right.
She glanced sideways at Trey. The big, handsome, shirtless cowboy firefighter sat there in her front seat, filling the air with enough testosterone to make a gal feel giddy. He was certainly full of life. But she needed answers, not a hunky guy. There were lots of ways to make small talk to learn important facts. Weather and locale were good ways to start.
She’d like to trust Trey, but trust wasn’t something she could afford in Wildcat Bluff County. Fire had destroyed a Texas Timber Christmas tree farm before the harvest. Another fire on an adjacent tree farm had been caught and extinguished before too much damage was done. Heat and drought could be a factor, but arson was the main consideration. Fortunately, the Christmas cutting and hauling season was over, but that still left other Texas Timber tree farms in various stages of growth.
Normally, she didn’t get calls or referrals during the holidays, but Texas Timber had been insistent that they needed a troubleshooter in Wildcat Bluff County now. She’d get a bonus if she could find the culprit or figure out what was causing the fires by Christmas. She wanted to be away from the holiday madness in Dallas anyway, so she took the job.
Only she sure hadn’t counted on a cowboy firefighter upping her own internal heat. She quickly turned the AC higher.
“Think you may never get cool again?”
Not with him so close. But she didn’t say that. “Temperature on my gauge reads eighty-nine outside. Will winter ever get here?”
“Heat lets up at night.”
“I wonder if the B&B lures many people into the warm spring right now.”
“It’s a good way to ease sore muscles.” He chuckled, a low, intimate sound. “Lots of ways to get those. Some better than others.”
“I’d just like some sweater weather.” She decided his voice ought to be outlawed as unfair to the state of a woman’s thoughts. She could almost feel vibrations from his deep, resonant voice twining deeper inside her mind.
“With this weather, it doesn’t seem much like the holidays, does it?”
“Not hardly.”
“On the plus side, I bet Ruby’d want us to use the spring after we saved the town with our heroics.” He leaned toward her. “What do you say? Beer and barbeque later out at the pool?”
“It’s a tempting offer.” She kept her eyes steady on the road, not about to give in to the impulse to ogle him again. “But I haven’t even checked in yet and—”
“I’ll bring the fixings over after the sun goes down.”
“But—”
“Least I can do after your help today.”
Obviously he wasn’t a man to take no lightly, or any other way. She didn’t want to make any waves, at least not yet. Plus, he had to be a font of information. She’d just take advantage of that fact.
“I don’t know much about this area of Texas.” She had in mind what her Aunt Cami had taught her and what she’d researched online for updated facts before she left Dallas, but a local’s viewpoint was bound to be different and more beneficial.
“You want me to be your tour guide?”
“Please, would you?”
“Sure thing. We get enough tourists around here that we’ve all got our spiel down pretty good.”
“Perfect.”
“This highway was once Wildcat Trail. It leads to Wildcat Bluff, where the town looks out over the Red River Valley. The Bluff was originally founded as a ferry terminus so folks could cross the Red River between Texas and Indian Territory, or Oklahoma now. Delaware Bend and Preston Bend were wild ferry towns, too, but they got flooded to make Lake Texoma.”
“That’s a huge, popular lake. Too bad towns had to be lost to create it.”
“They were already pretty much ghost towns.”
“Wildcat Bluff got lucky, didn’t it?”
“We’ve got more than luck going for us.” He gestured toward the front window with a pointed finger. “Wildcat Bluff County is special. We’re situated in the Cross Timbers.”
“I’ve heard the Timbers are mostly gone.”
“Not here. We’ve got thousands of acres we’ve been riding herd on since the eighteen hundreds.”
“Your family?” She was learning more than he realized he was telling her. He was proud of this land and the fact that they’d saved this section of the Cross Timbers. She admired him and those who’d had the foresight to save a unique land. Aunt Cami would’ve loved knowing about this, too.
“Several clans. Plus, newcomers.”
“I don’t see the Cross Timbers.”
“Over there.” He pointed again. “We’re driving up the north-south corridor of prairie. Up here it’s about ten miles wide. Other places it can be as narrow as three miles or as wide as thirty miles. It’s bordered on both sides by dense trees and shrubs.”
“I see the line on the east side. What is all that growth?”