Ice Cold Lemonade
modern billy x farmers daughter reader
When your dad hires a charming new ranchhand, it’s not your fault he won’t stop looking at his bosses daughter. But it is your fault for looking right back.
part 1 of Ice Cold Lemonade
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We are so back
Levi jeans. a taupe, sleeveless shirt. cowboy boots tucked under said levi's and scuffed from well-use. a navy hat smushing his hair to his slightly-sweaty forehead, but letting the dark locks at his nape curl.
Not to mention blue eyes that keep on finding their way over to you.
It's been a week since your dad hired him. You hardly even know his name, your dad just calls him Kid. Makes sense, seeing as the rest of the hands are pushing forty. Maybe he's a kid in comparison. But looking at him now, sipping the glass of lemonade you fetched yourself from the kitchen, he was all man.
He looks back up at you from where he's mending the wire fence to the cattle pen. You divert your eyes.
The heat was almost oppressive, you had the perfect excuse to wear the tiniest jean shorts you could find in your drawers and the flowiest white camisole. On the other hand, there wasn't a single excuse to be sitting out on the porch when you could practically get 3rd degree burns by touching the wood railing. Who cares? Wasn't like the Kid was gonna come up and ask you what you were doing, besides watching him bust his ass.
It's hardly your fault the man a good handful of yards away makes hard labor look good. Even from here you can see his large arms, skin tanned from working outside. His hat shades his eyes, but from the quick glimpses you've caught of him from behind your father's back, they're blue like the sky above. His broad shoulders raise and flex as he reaches for a nail to hammer the barbed wire into the fence post.
Maybe it's your fault for paying such close attention, actually.
He hadn't dared approach you. Your father's anger was a force to be reckoned with, he was smart enough to get that. You wish he was just a little bit dumber, little bit ballsier (you could clearly tell he had them, you thought to yourself with a grin, you hadn't spared his belt any glances). Though you'd just drop dead seeing him saunter up to you, all shoulders and chest and--
The lemonade glass meets the wooden side table with a clink, the rocking chair you were seated in is on a pendulum as you stand. You can hear Angharrad clawing at the screen door, she must've been getting antsy. You throw the new ranchhand a long look over your shoulder. Just as you move to step inside, he lifts his face, shaded eyes meeting yours.
You blow the air out your cheeks, looking back at a whining Angharrad. Jesus.
You rifle through the dish at the entrance table for a hair tie, pushing the keys to your father’s pickup and some loose change around the ceramic. Catching your own eye in the mirror, you put your hair into a high ponytail. Having hair on your neck in this head was a death wish, but more than that, you were careful to make sure it looked nice. You’ve never cared much about your appearance on the property before— but you guess that was before there was a new hire to try and impress.
Angharrad pushes her head into the side of your knee, her nails clicking on the hardwood as she pads twixt the screen door, and you. You tighten your ponytail, words coming out in a sigh, “I hear ya, baby, I hear ya,” You shake your head, watching the dog (a Great Pyrenees, a cattle dog bought by your father to work on the farm— though she spent more time on your heels than herding cattle,) bound outside the moment you open the door.
And right to the new ranch hand.
Who is leaning against the railing of the porch from the other side, his face twixt the wood posts, reaching through to scratch twixt Angharrad’s ears.
An easy smile rests on his face, his eyes creasing with it, and though it’s probably directed to your dog, his expression doesn’t falter one bit when he meets your stare.
Holy shit.
First words out his mouth don’t register in your brain. You shake your head a little, lifting your brows, feeling dumber than ever. “What?”
“I said, s’a cute dog.” The new hire chuckles, giving you a toothier smile. God, is he handsome. And his voice— it’s masculine and accented and now you just gotta keep him talking.
A smile parts your lips, too, one that you hope looks more shy than stupid. You settle back into your rocking chair, crossing your legs. “Thanks. She clearly thinks you’re cute too.”
Well, doesn’t that one make you proud. You work another laugh out of the Kid, he shakes his head and adjusts his hat on his dark curls. Now, you can get a serious look at his eyes. And it’s suddenly real difficult to tear yourself away from the brilliant azure of them. “M’ Billy,” he winds a hand around a post of the railing, the muscles of his arm shifting under his sweaty skin. Billy.
You give him your own name in exchange, and his brows lift. He dodges Angharrad’s sniffing snout— she really is head over heels for Billy— to call out, “Pretty name. It fits for a pretty girl, y’know.”
A laugh, clear as a bell, sends your head tipping back a little. You had to give it to him, he was charming as all hell. You peer at him over your glass of lemonade, shaking your head just a bit again. Billy’s eyes dart quickly over you, not long enough to make you uncomfortable, but he isn’t exactly hiding it.
“D’ya know who my dad is?” You grin at the way his lips turn downward in a dramatic, so what? expression. He nods.
“M’boss.” A shit eating grin cracks across his face.
“Your boss.” You agree. You watch him take off his hat, wiping his brow with the back of his hand as he walks to the stairs of the porch. Walking straight to you.
Now your stomach really does get fluttery— here was this handsome, no, gorgeous man, broad and even larger than you expected him to be this close up, looming over you and pointing to the half-full pitcher of cool lemonade.
“I don’t guess a sweet girl like you’d spare a glass of lemonade for a tired, workin’ man?” The grin on Billy’s face was just as clear in his words, the joke eased off his tongue with a natural charm that he clearly had in droves. You nod, that’s all you can get out, standing to your feet.
“I’ll grab you a cup,” you mutter, ducking away from him and hurrying inside, pushed by nerves. Weren’t you barely just gawking at this man from across the property, and here he was, calling you pretty, saying you were sweet?
Well, if you’d looked over your shoulder, you’d see an only slightly confused, and extremely enamored cowboy. When you returned back outside, Billy was sitting in the other chair, on the other side of the coffee table— his hat was in his lap, he was trying to ruffle some life into his hat-hair. Waiting ever so patiently for his boss’s pretty daughter, even reaching to scratch your dog’s ear again.
When you crossed over to him and began pouring him a cup, you could feel his eyes on you. It wasn’t uncomfortable, not at all predatory— by the time you met his eyes, handed him the glass, there was a certain twinkle in his eyes. Charming, but not over the top. Not pushy.
Your hand grazed Billy’s for a moment longer than necessary, he drawled a low, “Thanks, miss.” You fell back into your chair, huffing through your nose as you watched him down the lemonade. It really was hot out here, you couldn’t blame him. New Mexican summers were no joke. And he was doing manual labor under the sun on top of it— though you didn’t feel entirely bad, he looked damn good doing it.
“I ain’t my dad, you can call me by name.” You jest, earning you another grin. You watch him rock back and forth on the chair, one leg pushing himself, his fingers fiddling with his belt— you shouldn’t be looking down there!
Billy hums and repeats your name in correction. It seems like he just sat down, but here he is, pushing himself to his feet and standing in front of you. He pushes his hat back on, you get a glimpse of his large arms, his defined biceps— maybe the heat is what’s making you feel dizzy.
“You ain’t got a guy, d’ya?” Straight to the point. Your eyes dart back down— damnit— to see he’s hooked his thumbs over his leather belt. When you meet his stare again, there’s that devilish smile. You shake your head no to his question. “Makes sense. If y’did, I don’t think he’d take kindly t’how y’been starin’ at me.”
The easy way it falls from his lips— you’re practically clutching your pearls. “I have not been—“
“Oh, yes you have, miss,” Billy interjects with a warm, rumbling laugh, his brows lifting in good fun. Clearly he found it funny more than anything. You find yourself a bit distracted by the crease of his eyes when he grins, the sun-kissed pink to his tan cheeks. His broad shoulders, revealed by his sleeveless shirt. Maybe you get a little ballsy, faced with all this in front of you.
“So what if I have?” You retort, the flirting filling you with a strange, overpowering yellow, from head to toe— a kind of excitement that you didn’t feel often, not from any guy. “You work for me, y’know.”
“Thought you said you wasn’t your dad, sugar.”
You stare at eachother a long, long few moments. You’re huffing, beat. He’s shifting his weight, putting forward a boot on the porch, glancing you over again. The gumption on this man was gonna send you up the wall, all-right.
It takes a while for you to find your words, and they come out in an astonished laugh. “Get back to work!” you half-jokingly shoo him off even though you want nothing more than for him to stay, sit back down, keep your jaw dropping, keep your chin tipping back with laughter.
“Cruel, cruel woman,” he mutters without any bite, his eyes falling to Angharrad spread out at your feet. He only smiles at his own joke when you giggle. And Billy turns, shakes his head at you, looks over his shoulder atleast twenty times, waves once and curses himself twice, even though he wants the exact same.
If you’d want him to risk his job to sit and tell you the worst jokes he has, drink up your lemonade, drink up the sight of you— he would. In a heartbeat, honest, he would, even just from that quick interaction. Even if your father came after him with a shotgun and ran him off this ranch, he has half the mind to slither right back in and sit at your steps. It’ll get to that point, all-right.
You’re gonna get this boy into so, so much trouble.
