Hairdresser's Honey (Culpepper Cowboys Book 14) Read online

  Hairdresser’s Honey

  Merry Farmer

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  HAIRDRESSER’S HONEY

  Copyright ©2016 by Merry Farmer

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Cover design by Erin Dameron-Hill (the miracle-worker)

  ASIN: B01MYNOOHW

  Paperbacks:

  ISBN-13: 978-1540478832

  ISBN-10: 1540478831

  Click here for a complete list of other works by Merry Farmer.

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  Created with Vellum

  1

  “So then Andy actually had the nerve to admit that he was getting paid for each day that Evan didn’t come forward to claim the Kissie Lips fortune.”

  “No way!” Denise Bonneville exclaimed, keeping her eyes on the road as she drove. Everything about her friend, Elvie O’Donnell-soon-to-be-Lipinski’s story shocked her, but also made her laugh.

  “Yeah, and he had the nerve to think I would still want to marry him,” Elvie went on. She snorted. “Why would I want a hot dog when I can have a juicy steak?”

  “I suppose it depends on how big the hot dog is,” Denise joked.

  The two of them bubbled with laughter. Elvie doubled over as much as her seatbelt would let her. Denise beamed from ear-to-ear, half because of the joke, but half because one of the nicest, most popular women in town counted her as a friend. Sure, she wasn’t in high school anymore and shouldn’t be thinking of people as popular and unpopular, but not only had she never been able to shake the specter of high school, her fifteen-year class reunion was in a matter of days. It had been a massive relief when Elvie had asked her for a ride out to the Mountain View Spa for a pre-wedding overnight stay with Evan.

  “Oh! Oh!” Elvie suddenly sat straighter, flapping her hands as she giggled. “And then, once Andy actually got the probate paperwork filed and turned everything over to Evan last week, he actually had the nerve to ask if Evan would hire him to be a financial advisor for the company.”

  “You’re kidding!” Denise gaped, peeking sideways at Elvie for a moment. It wasn’t like anyone else was on the roads so far away from Culpepper proper. And since the roads were all pretty much straight and flat, she could have taken her hands off the wheels, rested back in her seat, and driven with her knees if she had to.

  “Not kidding.” Elvie shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Evan said no, of course. His great-aunt had a whole team of financial advisors and business advisors and every kind of advisor you could want. Andy was also holding back on that.”

  “How could he get away with that?”

  “I don’t know,” Elvie sighed. “Here, this whole time, Evan has been so worried that the Kissie Lips business will be too much for him to handle, that he won’t know what he’s doing, but his great-aunt built all of that help into the company, knowing Evan would have a steep learning curve. All he really has to do is listen to what the advisors and CEO of the company have to say, and he can be involved as much or as little as he wants.”

  “So what’s he going to do?”

  “He started out thinking that he wanted to do nothing, just continue working for the Culpeppers. But now he thinks he wants to buy some land of his own. Not a lot, mind you. Just enough to build a house, keep some horses, and maybe ease into the cattle business.”

  “That’s so sweet.” Denise grinned, happy that her friend was getting the life she deserved.

  That happiness melted into a sad sigh. Elvie was the kind of person who got a happy ending. She, on the other hand, was not. She wasn’t pretty, like Elvie or Nancy O’Donnell or any of the women the Culpepper boys had married. She wasn’t well-liked either. That was her own fault, if she was being honest. Well, it was the fault of high school Denise. High school Denise had been a real bitch, bullying the people she thought were nerdy, forming nasty cliques with other popular girls, and sucking up to the football players…in every way.

  “Hey, what’s that sudden gloomy face all about?” Elvie asked.

  Denise sighed. “Oh, nothing. I’m just thinking about my class reunion.”

  “Yeah, that all happens a couple days after the wedding,” Elvie answered with a voice infused with cheer, probably in an effort to boost Denise’s spirits, which was sweet. “Arch’s class has their reunion this year. I’m so glad I don’t have one.”

  “I wish I didn’t have one either,” Denise sent her a quick look before turning off of the main highway and onto the road that led to the spa. “High school wasn’t exactly the best time of my life.”

  Elvie hummed and nodded. “At least you’ve made a substantial change in who you are,” she said softly, with respect that Denise wasn’t sure she deserved. “I wouldn’t have picked you to be my bridesmaid if I didn’t genuinely think you were a great person.”

  That put a smile on Denise’s face and brought a few tears to her eyes. “Thanks so much, Elvie. I still can’t believe we’re friends after…” There was no point denying the truth. “After how mean I was.”

  Elvie shrugged. “Hey. We all have bad days.”

  “My bad day lasted for about fifteen years,” Denise snorted.

  “But those days are behind you. That’s all that matters,” Elvie insisted as Denise pulled into a parking space in front of the spa. “And if your old classmates don’t appreciate that, then they aren’t worth knowing.”

  “I suppose so.” Denise did her best to think positively. “And as crappy as high school and everything afterwards was, I got Destiny out of the deal.”

  She smiled with pride, heart filling with love, at the thought of her daughter. Destiny had meant the world to her, even if her father was a gigantic, neglectful, ex-boyfriend jerk who had knocked her up senior year then dumped her to run off to college. As hard as it was, there were times when she was glad Wes hadn’t stuck around, hadn’t shown much interest in Destiny.

  Okay, so that wasn’t very fair to Destiny. Every girl deserved a father. But as much as her daughter pined for a father figure, she didn’t really know what she was yearning for when she wished her real daddy would swoop back into town and make her life better, like some fairytale. If anything, Wes was the troll who lived under the bridge.

  And he would be in town for the reunion.

  “Hey, it’ll be okay.” Elvie assured her, squeezin
g her arm like a true friend. “And if it isn’t, you can always ditch your reunion and come hang out with us.”

  “You and Evan will be on your honeymoon, won’t you?”

  “We decided to delay leaving for a few days so that we can help out with Culpepper’s homecoming events.”

  Denise let out a breath, shaking her head. “You are the nicest person I’ve ever known, Elvie. I have no idea how we’re actually friends.”

  Elvie laughed, opening her car door and stepping out. “Hey, you’re the one who drove me all the way out here into the middle of nowhere so I could meet up with my future hubby to be slathered in mud together.”

  “Have fun with that.” Denise laughed, waving as Elvie got out of the car. Evan was already waiting for her on the sidewalk in front of the spa. Elvie skipped into his arms and threw her arms around him in a big hug. Evan—manly hunk of awesomeness that he was—hugged her back and planted a kiss on her lips that made Denise ache with sentimentality and regret.

  No one would ever kiss her like that. She’d spent too long being too horrible to everyone. And she was all bloated and chubby. She wasn’t the super-cool cheerleader dating the captain of the football team anymore—she was the loser who barely managed to graduate and faded into obscurity after being shunned by everyone else. Girls who had made the mistakes she had didn’t get the chance to have a happily ever after.

  But she had Destiny. As she pulled out of the spa and headed back to the highway, that thought made her smile. She had her beautiful, bright, hard-working daughter. And sure, Destiny had turned into a total teenager lately, getting moody, stomping around the house slamming doors, and giggling on the phone with her girlfriends, but Denise wouldn’t trade her for the world. So help her, if Wes complained about his daughter in any way during this stupid reunion week or if he broke Destiny’s heart by ignoring her, Denise would cut the man’s balls off with an old pair of her haircutting shears.

  Images of all the ways she would destroy Wes if he hurt her little girl kept Denise smiling as she merged onto the highway and headed home. That smile didn’t stay on her face for long, though. She hadn’t gone more than two miles before her old Ford started to cough and sputter.

  “Uh oh.”

  The car started to slow. She stepped on the gas, but that only made ugly, black smoke spill out the tailpipe. The car continued to slow.

  “Oh no.”

  She put on her hazard lights and turned off onto the shoulder. The check engine light blared to life on the dashboard. Denise attempted to swallow her panic. She knew nothing about cars, nothing about fixing them. It was a long walk back to the exit with the spa, and there wasn’t a gas station there anyhow. It was an even longer walk to the next exit, and the weather had turned cold lately.

  She cut the engine, zipped up her parka, popped the hood, and got out of the car to see what was wrong. But in spite of the smoke that had come out of the tailpipe, even after she’d lifted the hood, she didn’t have a clue. She could have been staring at hieroglyphics for all she knew. Worse still, when she pulled her phone out of her pocket, the battery had died.

  “Shoot.” She lowered her shoulders, bit her lip, and looked around. There was nothing but vast, open, Wyoming ranchland as far as she could see, and the cows wouldn’t have a phone charger. She was well and truly stuck.

  “Yes, ma, I packed all my valuables in the car. I didn’t send them ahead with the moving company.” Hero Yamaguchi chuckled and shook his head as he drove down the lonely, Wyoming highway.

  “You can never be too careful,” his mom replied over the car’s speakerphone. “My friend, Gladys, from work said that when her son was moving, the movers stole half his electronics and the antique watch his grandfather had given him.”

  “Then it’s a good thing Sofu didn’t give me any watches.”

  “Don’t be smart with me, young man.” Even through speakerphone, Hero could imagine his mom shaking her finger at him. She might be third-generation American, but she still had a hefty bit of Japanese mother in her. “I’m just looking out for your best interests. I can’t believe you’ve moved so far away.”

  “Ma, Haskell, Wyoming isn’t that far from Minneapolis,” Hero insisted. “And besides, Paradise Space Flight is a peach of a job. I’ll get to design space ships. How many of my U of M grad fellows can say that?”

  “You and your space ships.” He could practically hear his mom’s eyes roll. “How come you couldn’t do something more practical, like designing airplanes or working for the defense industry?”

  “Hey, at least I became an engineer, like you and Pop wanted me to,” Hero laughed. Like it or not, his parents fit the Asian stereotype of wanting their kid to go into some kind of high-achieving field. And like the American he was, he’d figured out a way to meet their expectations while fueling his own interests. “You should be happy that I turned out so normal, unlike Sue.” His sister, Sukima, or Sue as she’d always been called, had “ruined” her parents plans for her by going to culinary school and becoming one of the most renowned chefs in Minneapolis. Hero couldn’t have been prouder of her.

  “I’m just looking out for your best interests, honey.” His mom finished this discussion the way she finished every discussion they had.

  Hero laughed, shaking his head. “I know, Ma. And I promise you that I’ll make a name for myself in the aerospace world. I’m not just joining up with PSF to nerd out and build models of the Starship Enterprise, you know. I was hired for a team that is designing a ship that can supply the International Space Station.” And take space tourists up into orbit at ten thousand dollars a pop, but his mom didn’t need to know that. At least he was getting to dream big and design things that most people would never think were possible.

  “I know, Hero, and Pop and I are proud of you.” Affection took over from scolding in his mom’s voice. “You always were a good boy.”

  “Thanks, Ma.”

  In fact, he took the compliment with a grain of salt. He always had been a good boy. A little too good. In school, he’d been the weird kid who paid attention to everything the teacher said, never got into trouble, and offered to clean the chalkboard before going out for recess. In high school, he’d been the hopeless nerd who was more interested in studying and playing strategy games with his guy friends than going to parties and experimenting with girls. The girls all liked him anyhow—much to the frustration of his even nerdier friends, who couldn’t have talked to a girl right if their lives depended on it—but he was more the “safe” guy, not the one they wanted to make out with behind the bleachers. In college, he hadn’t bothered joining a fraternity, opting for extra classes so he could graduate early and move on to earn his master’s in Systems Engineering.

  He hadn’t had a bad run of things, but he hadn’t exactly had a lot of fun either. He’d definitely never been spontaneous. Until now. Now here he was, driving through cow country on the way to a start-up space flight company spearheaded by an eccentric billionaire way out in the middle of absolutely nowhere. It was just the kind of adventure he figured he’d been lacking in his life.

  “Are you still there, Hero?” his mother snapped through speakerphone.

  “Yeah, Ma.”

  “Are you paying attention to the road?”

  Hero chuckled. “Of course, Ma, although there’s not a lot to pay attention to out here.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He shrugged and looked out the windows. “It’s really flat in Wyoming.”

  “I thought there were mountains everywhere.”

  “There were back around Laramie, but this is the Continental Divide. It’s high prairie. Basically, it’s sort of the desert. There aren’t thick trees everywhere, like there are at home. Lots of scrubby bushes and rocky ground. There’s enough for the cattle to eat—and Ma, there are cattle everywhere out there—cattle and windmills—but other than that, it’s really—”

  He stopped mid-sentence. Ahead, on the side of the road, a car was broken dow
n. He slowed on instinct, and his brow flew up at the sight of a woman with a shock of pink in her hair standing helplessly by the side of the car. She was still half a mile ahead or so, but Hero could see she needed help. He flicked on his turn signal and slowed onto the shoulder.

  “What?” his mom demanded. “What’s going on? Why did you stop talking? Is it a bear? Or a coyote? I hear there are bears and coyotes in Wyoming.”

  “No, Ma, it’s a woman.”

  His mom gasped. “That’s even worse!”

  Hero laughed. “No, it looks like her car has broken down. I’m pulling over to help her.”

  “You can’t just go helping any stray woman by the side of the road. What if she’s a murderer? What if she’s a prostitute? What if…what if she’s a Libertarian?”

  Hero laughed harder. “I’ll call you when I’m back on the road, Ma.”

  He ended the call before his mom could verbally pound him over the head even more. He didn’t need the distraction. He pulled his car to a stop right behind the old Ford with its hood open. The woman with pink in her hair had noticed him and stood anxiously by the side of her car, eyes wide. Hero chuckled. All that worry. Whoever she was, she would probably get along great with his mom.

  Well, he wanted an adventure. Helping someone was always an adventure. And something about the woman made him smile. She looked lost. She looked like she needed…a Hero. He cut his engine and got out of the car.

  2

  “Oh no, oh no, oh no,” Denise chanted under her breath as the black sedan pulled onto the shoulder behind her. She chewed her lip and wrung her hands, searching in all directions for some sort of help, any sort of help. There was nothing but cattle and the occasional semi zipping past on the highway.

  The black sedan stopped and the engine went off. Crap, crap, crap, she thought. No one in Wyoming drove a car like that. It was too sleek, too shiny. It was a city car. Whoever it was definitely wasn’t from around here. She could tell a man was driving. He leaned over to the passenger seat for a moment. With her luck, he was probably some sort of gangster. He was probably a drug dealer running heroin across the high prairie. He was probably reaching for a gun.