Texas #4_Texas Christmas by RJ Scott

music.
    “Washing up dishes isn’t in your job description, you know,” Riley said.
    She turned to face him with a smile on her face. “Dishes are therapeutic. Anyway, the twins are quiet and I finished a book, what else could I do?”
    “Start another book?” Riley answered. He leaned on the sink next to her and peered out the kitchen window to see if he could spot Jack and Max. They were in the far end of the paddock, and he could see that Hatty was moving slightly faster than a walk with Jack quickening his pace to keep by her side.
    “Max loves horses,” Riley commented. “Jack has this idea of opening the ranch up to have other kids here for the horses.”
    “That’s an awesome idea,” Eden agreed. She leaned next to Riley and nudged his arm. “All you need now is to open up a mini oil exploration center for kids, and you’ll be set as a working ranch.”
    Riley huffed. “Ha freaking ha.”
    “You could even build a miniature oil platform,” Carol offered with a sideways smile.
    “And everyone could wear those adorable yellow hats.” Eden was clearly getting into this.
    “And every hour on the hour you could have the oil erupting, only it isn’t oil, it’s chocolate,” Carol added.
    Riley shook his head. “Not going to happen, ladies. I will not create a chocolate oil well just so the two of you can stand under it and drink the stuff.”
    “Damn,” Eden said teasingly without heat, “he saw right through us.”
    Carol laughed. “Damn is right. Speaking of chocolate, I have coffee brewing and made cookies yesterday when you were out.”
    “Where?” Riley said immediately. “I didn’t see any cookies.” He had told Jack he could smell cookies and had hunted for them in all the obvious hiding places. Riley admitted to anyone that he had developed a cookies-baked-by-Carol addiction in just the short week she’d been here.
    “I put them in the cookie jar,” Carol said.
    “But you never put them in the jar because you said…” He trailed off when he realized what he said. Bashfully, he bowed his head and tried to hold back the laugh.
    “I put them in there because I knew you’ve found all my other hiding places. Plain sight is always a good place.”
    Riley pretended to sulk for at least two minutes, until Carol took pity and sent him to his office with a plate of cookies and a coffee. He had reports to file that needed to be done by five pm, which meant Jack had time to spend with Max.
    Unbidden, his own words rose up to bite him in the ass. Max loved horses, and that was his and Jack’s thing. What did Riley have to give to him? A chocolate oil well was not on his list of options. Maybe they could do something with Thomas. Get a layout or something. As soon as he’d filed his reports, he opened Google and searched for Thomas the Tank Engine.
    There were sets for every age, babies, toddlers, Hayley’s age, then it skipped until there were die-cast Thomases that belonged in a collection somewhere. Max was five in November, should he buy the toddler stuff? The Thomas Max loved was plastic and sturdy, and that was part of the baby collection. Decision made, Riley placed one of everything into his basket and added loads of the plastic track. He had the idea in his head that he could find a flat space somewhere and maybe build a layout. They could probably add it to Max’s bedroom.
    He paid for the basket and immediately rang William, their builder who had heard it all.
    “Can we get an extension to Max’s room over the good room for a sensory room and train layout?” Riley asked immediately.
    William went quiet for a little while. “I can fit that in,” he said. “I have a space in January.”
    Riley swallowed. The poor guy had already fitted getting things done for the twins then Carol and Max at a fast pace.
    “Any chance of having it done by November?”
    “November?”
    “The second.”
    “The second of November.”
    Riley could go elsewhere, but he liked William, and best