Chapter 5

She was surprised that she'd even fallen asleep, let alone awakened refreshed after what felt like the best night's rest she had in long while. Or ever.

The incredibly comfortable memory foam mattress she slept on must've had something to do with that. Then again, she hadn't slept in a real bed for what seemed an eternity, and then there was the fact that she'd suffered no less than two fainting episodes in the past twenty-four hours.

Clearly, her body needed some serious rejuvenation.

Whatever it was, she felt energized when she awakened early the next morning. After she dressed in a dark blue Trixie circle skirt dress with yellow and white Waterlilies, and after strapping simple strap sandals on her feet, she exited her room early in search of the kitchen.

She donned the apron she had used the day before and went straight to work. She began preparing a hearty breakfast for the Barrington men, understanding they had big appetites. She didn't know how much time she had since she'd forgotten to ask what time they had breakfast, but she was certain that four in the morning was sufficiently early to get breakfast cooked and table-ready.

By six o'clock, she had the large kitchen table decked and breakfast cooked. Six o'clock was what she aimed for and it was what she got. With slender hands clasped to her as she smiled, admiring her hard work and feeling elated about it, something dawned on her, making her smile fade and a frown appear on her brow. Something was missing. Then her sapphire eyes lit and she snapped her fingers before she began searching the many cabinets until she found a tall thin glass.

Taking it, she studied it for a moment and then sighed. "It'll have to do."

She quickly set the glass down and rushed out the back door and onto the back verandah. She'd seen a small patch of ground in the back with beautiful bluebonnet flowers. She plucked a few before she returned to the kitchen and set her small bouquet in the tall glass, added some water, and then set it in the center of the table.

"Magnifique!" she said softly in French—her second language.

"Who you tryin' to impress?"

She turned her head and looked over her shoulder, seeing Elena with crossed arms leaning in the doorway to the laundry room. The exotic beauty was dressed in a denim dress with drop shoulders and a decently long skirt ... if she bothered to button the last three buttons from the hem up, that is. She didn't.

"Good morning, Elena."

The other woman shrugged. "So again, who you wanna impress?"

"No one."

"Yea?" She pushed from the doorframe and sauntered into the kitchen as she arched an eyebrow at, what she believed to be, the uppity Louisianan. "Flowers? You're from Louisiana, right?"

"Yes."

"Who're you puttin' bluebonnets on the table for if it ain't to impress the Barrington men? You know those are the State's official flower, don't you?"

"No, I didn't. I just thought they were pretty and they're the only flowers around."

Elena gave the raven-haired beauty a wry smile and a wink. "Sure," she said. "You wanna impress the Barrington men, aw'right, bein' that they're proud Texans. Or," she said slyly, "you just want to impress one o' them?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't you?" Elena said, clearly not believing her. Then she looked at the basket of buttermilk biscuits and took herself one before she plucked a piece off and popped it into her mouth, chewing as she smiled at the other woman. "You think you're gonna lasso the wildest steed in the Barrington stables with your pretty face and lady-like manners?"

Isabella frowned, confused. "What?"

"You heard me."

"I heard the words," she shook her head with a frown, "but I don't understand your meaning. What are you trying to say?" Then her sapphire-blue eyes went cool. "Do you honestly think I'm here to find me a husband?"

Elena smiled as she chewed on another piece of buttermilk biscuit. "Plenty of gals prettier than you tried and failed to lasso that wild blond mustang," and then she leaned a little closer, "and frankly, you ain't got it in you. You're too..." she let her gaze drop before she slowly grazed the other woman's length until their eyes met again, "genteel." She smiled. "He don't like his women that way. It's boring. That's what he told me once."

"Only once?" Isabella asked with cool, arched eyebrows. "How disappointing it must've been for you."

"Oh, he wanted more," she continued with her gossip session as she poured herself a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice, "but he and I are a lot alike." She swept coy eyes at the other woman. "We like our lovers wild and we like variety. We're not the marryin' kind, know what I mean? It's like with Angie."

"Who?"

"Junior's ex-fiancée," she said before she had a sip of the orange juice, removed the glass from her lips, and popped eyebrows. "Fresh squeezed. This is good."

"Thank you."

"But a waste of time and effort on a bunch of rough and tumble cowpokes like the Barringtons." Then she smiled at the other woman. "Anyway, Jacob just takes what he wants. You have eyes, so I know you can see that he can have his pick of the gals. Why do you think he ain't married yet already bein' twenty-nine, nearly thirty? That's because we think the same. Why buy the cow when we can get the milk for free?"

Isabella briefly frowned on hearing that idiom. "Anyway," she began, "twenty-nine isn't exactly too old. I know plenty of men who are much older and aren't yet married." Then she arched an eyebrow. "Take Mister John. He's Mister Jacob's older brother and he isn't married yet."

"Pff!" Elena scoffed. "He would'a been had circumstances been different."

Isabella looked curiously at the other woman, but she appeared to only want to talk about Jacob Barrington.

"And sure, Jake'll act like a gentleman and all that ... until he gets what he wants. Then he tosses you aside like nuthin' and moves on to the next willing filly."

"Well," Isabella shrugged. "He's an unmarried man and he'll do what unmarried men do. I wouldn't hold that against him."

Elena didn't like that response, so she upped the ante. "Yea, but would you be that flippant if you knew he'd done it with John Junior's fiancée?"

Isabella arched a surprised eyebrow, not because of the gossip Elena was doing, but because she was surprised the woman knew what the word "flippant" meant.

"Yep," Elena continued, oblivious to the other woman's thoughts, "he took her right from under his own brother's nose and the girl was sent away pregnant with his baby and all. Junior didn't want her anymore and Jacob never did to begin with."

"You're giving Mister Jacob more credit than he's due. He can't "take" what can't be given. In other words, the young woman isn't blameless in this, Elena. She was the one who was engaged, and if she allowed herself to be seduced by the brother of her fiancée, then she created her own problems."

Elena listened with a thoughtful look. Then she quirked her head. "You know what?"

"What?"

"You remind me of Angie. Yea. She was a lot like you. Genteel." Then her green eyes turned to stone. "Weak. And he don't care for weak women. None of the Barrington men do."

Isabella arched an eyebrow. "It's a good thing I'm not interested in any of them, isn't it? Being that I'm supposedly weak and all."

"What's wrong, Izzy?" She smiled when she saw the other woman stiffen when she heard that silly nickname. "Did he send you away from his quarters last night cuz he didn't want you? Was that why you were cryin' like a little baby, bawling your little eyes out when you rushed to your room and locked the door?"

Isabella's sapphire blue eyes turned to stone as she glared at the other woman. To hear that name, that horrible nickname that Charles used on her coming from the other woman's mouth made her soul freeze to sub-zero and it made her deaf to anything else the woman had said.

"My name is Isabella or Miss Beau-Boucher, Elena. But don't you ever address me with Izzy again," she said with enough venom that it briefly knocked the other woman off her pedestal. "Is that understood?"

Elena slowly frowned as she stared into the coldest blue eyes she's ever seen—and that's saying something. All the Barringtons had blue eyes and they could freeze fire with a single angry. But there was something about this woman that made her icy glares far more menacing. She began to doubt the wisdom of asserting her authority over this Louisiana woman. Maybe she was a Bayou witch? She heard about those. Maybe this Isabella Beau-Boucher was one, and if she wasn't careful she'd have a hex put on her.

"Yea. Sure, Isabella." Then she watched as the other woman nodded and turned before she got the second batch of cooled biscuits from the counter and brought it to the table. Curious rather than antagonistic now, she eyed the Louisianan and cautiously asked, "Are you a witch? Like one o' them Bayou witches?"

"Only when I'm vexed."

"You're not gonna put a hex on me, are you?" Elena asked, narrowing her eyes.

Isabella couldn't believe what she was hearing and seeing! Was the woman serious? Witches don't exist, but apparently someone had forgotten to let Elena know. Just when she was about to open her mouth to tell her not to be so silly, another voice chimed in.

"What's this talk about hexin' and stuff?" John Barrington said as he entered the kitchen, followed by his three sons. By the look of them, they appeared to have been up for some time.

So much for rising early.

She immediately turned her face away as she proceeded to add the cooled biscuits to the rest in the large basket on the table. Elena turned to the foursome entering and smiled the brightest smile she could muster.

"Nuthin', John. We were just havin' some girl-talk." Then she smiled at each and every one of the handsome Barrington boys and put a sassy hand on her hip. "Howdy, boys."

"Good morning, Mr. Barrington," Isabella greeted politely.

"And it sure is," John Barrington said as he looked hungrily at the cooked breakfast in front of him. "Good mornin', Isabella. Elena."

"Mornin', Elena," Junior said with a smile.

She smiled and batted her eyes, but then his gaze roamed over to the other woman, and her smile faded before she snapped hard eyes toward Isabella who'd just finished putting the rest of the biscuits in the bread basket on the table.

"Mornin', Isabella," he said.

She lifted her head and smiled politely. "Good morning, Mister John."

"Mornin', Isabella," James said with red cheeks.

She smiled and nodded. "Good morning, Mister James." Then she looked away, feeling Jacob's eyes on her as he stepped around the table to take his seat. "Good morning, Mister Jacob."

"Mornin', Bella."

She gave him a polite smile but he was already teasing his younger brother as the men took their seats.

"My, my, my," John Barrington said, astonished. "But you ladies have been busier than a stumped-tail bull in fly season this mornin'. Everythin' sure looks good. Me and my boys just don't know where to start," he said as he already reached for the big skillet with hash browns.

"Elena?" Isabella said, and the other woman looked at her. "Will you pour the orange juice while I get the coffee?" She didn't wait for an answer and proceeded to get the coffee, leaving Elena with no choice than to do as she said.

As the Barringtons made good of her cooking and talked amongst themselves, she smiled as she poured their coffee and set the coffee pot on its base on the hotplate behind Jacob. She accepted their compliments with polite poise and didn't mind that they believed that Elena had anything to do with the food they "wished they could have at, ruminate, and have at again". She did, however, learn that they'd been up and about since three thirty that morning, a full half hour earlier than she had awakened. It was most likely their sounds that had stirred her awake although she couldn't be certain.

Although John Barrington kept telling her to take it easy, she kept telling him she needed something to do. Everyone at the Barrington Ranch pulled their own weight—with, perhaps, Elena as the exception—and she didn't want to just sit around. However, she promised she'd take it easy.

After the brothers had their fill and thanked the two ladies for a wonderful breakfast, they left the house to get back to work. With the handsome Barrington brothers gone, Elena had no desire to stick around and she exited the kitchen as well, leaving the clean-up to the new woman.

John Barrington stayed behind for a last oversized white cup of "Arbuckle"—which was just plain coffee.

"This is excellent, Isabella. It's better'n my youngest boy's Arbuckle." Then he pulled an envelope out of his inner pocket and set it on the table. "That there is wages for a full day. In cash. It'll help tie you over till next payday this Friday," he said.