Her Kind of Cowboy (Tying the Knot in Texas #2) - Dylann Crush Page 0,1
wedding in southeast Texas. With penguins.
“And all I have to do is take care of the penguins for a couple months?” Alex confirmed.
“You’ll be solely in charge of their welfare and training. Mr. Munyon is donating a generous amount to the Houston Marine Life Aquarium. Their current permanent penguin habitat is in need of repair. While the penguins are off display we’ll have a subset of the herd—”
“It’s a waddle,” Alex interrupted.
“A waddle?”
“A waddle or a colony. Unless they’re out on the water. Then a group of penguins is called a raft.”
“How interesting. As I was saying, we’ll have most of the waddle stay on-site at the aquarium. But we’ll separate a few and put them in your care. By the time the wedding is over, they’ll all be reunited in the new penguin habitat.”
“I see.” But Alex didn’t see at all. “And where will the penguins I’ll be in charge of be living during this time?”
“That’s a loose end we need to tie up. Are you interested in the position? Mr. Munyon would like to move on it right away.”
“If I take this on, I need to be near Swynton. That’s where my family lives.”
“That’s fine. Mr. Munyon’s stipulations require an address within a one-hundred-mile radius of Houston. If you find somewhere acceptable near your hometown where they can have the wedding and house the penguins, it would be a win-win. Can you let me know your answer within the next day or two?”
Alex drummed his fingers against the arm of his chair. “Let me think about it. Send over the details and I’ll take a look.”
“Fantastic. I’ll have my assistant e-mail over the particulars. Mr. Munyon is a generous man. If you do a good job, he might be able to offer you something more permanent.”
“I’ll be in touch.” Alex disconnected the call and spun his chair around to look out the window. A blanket of white covered the flat terrain. He’d been working in the cold long enough. If all went well he could give Charlene a hand with Gramps, cash in on the too-good-to-be-true offer he’d just received, then move onto something more lucrative. With a little bit of time left while the satellite was still hooked up for outgoing calls, he punched in his sister’s number.
She answered after the first ring. “You’d better not be calling unless you’re telling me what time to pick you up from the airport.”
“Always good to talk to you too, Sis.”
“I’m serious. Did you see my e-mail? Gramps has really done it this time. The nursing home threatened to kick him out.”
Alex scoffed. “He’s been kicked out of other places at least a half dozen times before. Just deliver a batch of your killer cookies to the office and they’ll find a way to forget about it.”
“Not this time. I even put in a call to the state director and he said Gramps has taken things too far. He’s got one more strike, and then they’ll ban him for good.”
“What did he do?” Alex had seen a series of e-mails come through from Char last night, but after spending eight hours working outside in subzero temps, all he’d wanted to do was sit in the lounge with a tumbler of whiskey.
“You didn’t read my e-mails, did you?” Her frustration trickled through the phone line and wrapped tight around his chest.
“I’m sorry. It was a long day, and—”
“They’re all long days for you. And how is that? You’ve got no one but yourself to worry about down there. Meanwhile I’m trying to manage two jobs, an absent husband, four kids, and a man who refuses to grow up.”
Alex raked a hand through his hair. “Isn’t there another home nearby? Maybe somewhere we haven’t tried yet?”
“Not that I know of. Either he’s been kicked out or they’ve heard about him and won’t take him.” She groaned. “What are we going to do?”
That was the million-dollar question. Their grandfather had outlived his wife and kids. With no one left to look after him but Alex and his sister, Gramps was wreaking havoc all over the county. It wasn’t fair for Char to have to deal with him on her own, not on top of everything else she had going on.
“I’ll see what I can do, okay?”
“That’s what you always say. I know you’d rather cut off an arm than come home, and I don’t blame you, but . . .”