Cowboy for Hire. Marie Ferrarella

around him as if they were morons—until they proved otherwise. She did the exact opposite.

      Employees—and potential employees—had her respect until they did something to lose it.

      “The deed that my company purchased a little less than three weeks ago,” she replied, then waited for the next question.

      “Deeds are for ranches,” Nathan McHale, Murphy’s’ most steadfast and longest-attending patron said into his beer, “not hunks of this town.”

      Connie shifted her stool to get a better look at the man. “I’m afraid you’re wrong there, Mr—?” She left the name open, waiting for the man to fill it in for her.

      Nathan paused to take a long sip from his glass, as if that would enable him to remember the answer to the newcomer’s question. Swallowing, he looked up, a somewhat silly smile on his wide, round face.

      “McHale.”

      “Don’t worry about him, missy. Ol’ Nathan’s used to being wrong. The second he steps into his house, his wife starts telling him he’s wrong,” Alan Dunn, one of the older men at the far end of the bar chuckled.

      Nathan seemed to take no offense. Instead, what he did take was another longer, more fortifying drink from his glass, this time managing to drain it. Putting the glass down on the bar, he pushed it over toward the bartender—the younger of the two behind the bar.

      Connie noticed that the latter eyed his customer for a moment, as if deciding whether or not to cut the man off yet. She knew that she definitely would—and was rather surprised when the bartender decided not to.

      For all his girth and folds, McHale looked like a child at Christmas, his eyes lighting up and a wreath of smiles taking over his rounded face. He gave the bartender who had refilled his glass a little salute as well as widening his appreciative smile.

      Using both hands, he drew the glass to him, careful not to spill a single drop. Then, just before he took his first sip of his new drink, McHale raised it ever so slightly in a symbolic toast to the newcomer. “You were saying?”

      “I was saying—” Connie picked up the thread of her conversation where it had temporarily stopped “—that my construction company has purchased the deed for a section of the town’s land.”

      “You here to see if the town wants to buy it back?” Brett asked, curious.

      There’d been complaints from time to time that there was nowhere to stay if anyone was stranded in Forever overnight. But things always got sorted out for the best. The sheriff enjoyed telling people that was how he and his wife, Olivia, had first gotten together. On her way to track down her runaway sister, Olivia’d had no intentions of staying in Forever. Her car had had other ideas. She’d wound up relying on the hospitality of the town’s resident wise woman and diner owner, Miss Joan.

      “No,” Connie replied patiently, “I’m here to build a hotel.”

      “A hotel?” It was someone else’s turn to question the wisdom of that. Obviously, more than one person found this to be an odd undertaking. “What for?” the person asked.

      “For people to stay in, you nitwit,” the man sitting on the next stool informed him, coupling the sentence with a jab in the ribs.

      “What people?” a third man asked. “Everyone around here’s got a home.”

      Connie was ready for that, as well. She’d read up on Forever before ever setting out to see it. She knew her father wouldn’t have given her an easy project. That had never been his way.

      “Well, if there’s a hotel here,” she said, addressing her answer to the entire bar, “it might encourage people to come to Forever.”

      “Why would we want people to come here?” the man who’d asked her the question queried again. “We got all the people we know what to do with now.”

      Several other voices melded together, agreeing with him.

      Connie was far from put off, but before she could say anything, the good-looking man she’d seen this afternoon beat her to it.

      “She’s talking about the town growing, Clyde,” Finn pointed out. “You know, progress.”

      Connie fairly beamed at the bartender, relieved that at least someone understood what she was trying to convey. “Exactly,” she cried.

      “Hell, progress is highly overrated,” Clyde declared sourly. He downed his shot of whiskey, waited for it to settle in, then said, “I like this town just fine the way it is. Peaceful,” he pronounced with a nod of his bald head.

      This was not the time or the place to become embroiled in a hard sell. The land officially now belonged to her father’s company, thanks to some negotiations she had not been privy to. That meant that the decision as to what to do or not do with it was not up to the people lining the bar.

      Be that as it may, she was still going to need them, or at least some of them, to help with the hotel’s construction. That meant she couldn’t afford to alienate any of them. Besides the fact that local labor was always less expensive than bringing construction workers in, hiring locals always built goodwill. There wasn’t a town or city in the country that hadn’t felt the bite of cutbacks and didn’t welcome an opportunity to obtain gainful employment, even on a temporary basis.

      This was not the first project she was associated with, although it was the first that she was allowed to helm on her own. She already knew she was going to need a few skilled workers, like someone who could handle the backhoe, and those people would be flown in. But as for the rest of it, the brawn and grunt part, those positions she hoped she would be able to fill with people from in and around the town. The one thing she knew she could count on was that extra money was always welcomed.

      Connie raised her voice, addressing Clyde. “I promise not to disturb the peace.” For good measure, she elaborately crossed her heart. “I came here to offer you jobs. I need manpower to help me make this hotel a reality.”

      This time it was Kyle Masterson who spoke up. He hired out to some of the local ranchers, but he had never been afraid of hard work. “What kind of money we talking about?”

      She made eye contact with the big man. “Good money,” she responded in all seriousness.

      “How much?” Brett asked, trying to pin her down not for himself, but for the men who frequented Murphy’s, men he knew were struggling with hard times and bills that were stamped past due.

      “Depends on the level of skills you bring to the job,” she replied honestly. “That’ll be decided on an individual basis.”

      “Who’s gonna do the deciding?” another man at the bar asked.

      The question came from behind her. Connie turned to face whoever had spoken up. They were going to find out sooner or later, might as well be sooner, she thought. “I am.”

      “Big decisions,” the man responded with a laugh. He eyed her in clear amusement. She obviously looked like a slip of a thing in comparison to the men she was addressing. “You sure you’re up to it, honey?”

      Connie had never had any slack cut for her. Her father had made sure that she was treated like a crew member no matter what job she was doing. The fact that she was willing to—and did—work hard had not failed to impress the men, even if it seemed to have no effect whatsoever on her father.

      Connie looked the man asking the question directly in the eye and said with no hesitation, “I am. Are you?”

      Her answer generated laughter from the other men around the bar.

      “She’s got you there, Roy. Looks like you better make nice if you want to earn a little extra for your pocket,” the man next to him advised.

      “It’ll be more than just a little extra,” Connie was quick to correct. “And if you work hard and get this project in on time