S toney tore the plastic off his best dress shirt, checking it over real quick before he tugged on his dress boots.
“Oh, you’re wearing your fancy ostriches, Daddy. I love those.”
“Thank you, son. You all set up for the evening? Geoff’s going to be in the kitchen if you need anything, okay?”
“Uh-huh. When is Uncle Ford coming home?” Quartz looked so hopeful that he couldn’t say the truth, which was he didn’t know.
Ford had left a couple of messages, and then there’d been a text with “clear me half an hour Monday pls for a mtg.”
A meeting.
You didn’t meet with a lover who you had had a spat with, did you? You had wild make-up sex. You had a fistfight. You had a beer.
Meetings were for business partners.
Stoney fully intended to make things difficult as he could—through fucking or fighting or both—for Ford to take them back to meeting-together types.
“He’s really busy, son, but I know he’s wanting to see you soon.”
“I miss him. I made him a cherry picker.” Quartz was being so brave, his almost ten-year-old face set in determined lines. “Hetty said to text her if I needed her.”
“Well, you save that for after Geoff and me, huh? She’s with Angie in the barn.”
“Okay, Daddy.” Quartz nodded. “I have lots of episodes of Elementary to watch.”
“My little detective. Wish me luck, son?” He undid his buckle, tucked himself in, and buckled back up.
“You’ll be fine, Daddy. You’re a cowboy.”
“I am that, bud.” He kissed Quartz on top of the head. “Okay. I’m off and running.”
“Good ride!”
He nodded and headed out, straight into the kitchen, which looked like it was exploding with the sheer number of appetizers. “How goes it, man?”
Geoff glanced sideways at him, sauce smeared on one cheek. “I need a pair of hands. Do you think Doc or Doogie would come help?”
“You got it. The waitstaff are here and set up?”
“No.” Geoff’s mouth tensed. “The roads are a problem, boss.”
“Okay, I’m on it.” He stepped out the door and into screaming hell going on in the courtyard.
“Why the fuck hasn’t this road been cleared?” Andy roared, and Miranda screeched back.
“Don’t you scream at me, you asshole!”
“Enough,” he snapped. “Mira, talk to me.”
Andy opened his mouth, and Stoney just raised his hand, palm out. “No. Mira, now.”
“The highway is clear, but from the main gate is impassable if you don’t have chains. I tried to get it dealt with, but no one was available, boss.”
“Ford wants—” Andy started, and Stoney shook his head.
“No, sir. I’m the boss. It’s what I want, and right this second I want Tanner to run down and pick up all the waitstaff and get their asses up here. Next I need to talk to Angie about hitching up Barney and Fred, and Hetty needs to hitch Sally and Big Mike. Andy, you hire folks to deal with parking?” His brain was going a million miles a minute. Okay. They’d haul the folks up in the old sleighs, six at a time. Andy’s parking people could get the cars lined up down at the main gate.
He turned on his heel, popping the kitchen door open. “Geoff! I need thermoses of hot cocoa in an hour! Quartz, honey, I need you to get your boots on and come help find all them fuzzy blankets that we put away last year.”
“Yes, sir!” Quartz pounded down the hall to get his boots, and Geoff jumped to get pots of milk warming.
Tanner came when he texted and grabbed the keys to the big truck with the camper shell. “Back in fifteen with the waitstaff.”
“Good deal. Then you’ll need to saddle up for me. I’m going to play cowboy tonight for the guests.”
“Anything else?” Tanner asked.
“Send Doogie up to help Geoff.”
“You got it.” Tanner disappeared just as Quartz came back.
“I’m ready, Daddy.”
“Good deal. You ’member where all them blankets are?” At Quartz’s nod, he smiled. “I want you to grab them and bring them to the utility barn, okay? We’re running both the four- and the two-man bobsleighs, and there needs to be covers. You do it right and there’s a twenty-dollar bill for you, deal?”
“Woo!” Quartz bundled up, and Stoney texted Doc to keep an eye on his kid.
“Do I get twenties too?” Geoff murmured.
“Shit, man, you get a Christmas bonus and a promise that I’ll order in pizza for Christmas dinner.” He had to tease. He’d cooked for Geoff once.
Just once.
“I’ll get Quartz to make the pizza.” Geoff’s face twisted in a frown. “Have you heard from Ford?”
Conscious of Andy watching him, Stoney shut that shit down. “No. He had court through Monday.”
“Damn.”
“Yeah. He hates that he’s missing this. Still, we have to make it work. I’ll have Andy bring the thermoses down.”
Andy gaped, and Stoney just ignored it. Everyone had to pitch in. He had to make sure the ladies used the fancy harnesses and to promise Hetty that he’d give Angie two weeks off over the holidays for her help. There was no one else he’d trust more to carry these folks up and down the mountain.
“Let’s give these ski bunnies a night they’ll never forget, y’all. I’m off to the barn. Geoff, no ‘magic’ in the coffee you’ll do for anyone driving a sleigh.”
“Got it. No Irish whiskey.”
“Good man. Yeehaw, y’all. Let’s make this the party of the season. We’ll get Western on their asses.”
Stoney would show them all how a Texan cowboy ran things, for once and for all.