“Dinner is served, ma’am,” the cook said from the doorway leading into the dining room.
Everyone set their glasses on the bar and migrated that way with Austin bringing up the rear. Light from the cut glass prisms on the chandelier made the crystal water glasses and the wine glasses sparkle. Steam rose from bowls of spiced tomato soup and the waiters stood ready to refill glasses when they were emptied.
Grandfather sat at the head of the table with Grandmother on his right and Barbara on his left. Clydia had the other end of the table with Joan on her right and Austin on her left, which put Austin across the table from her mother.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve all set down to dinner together. This is nice.” Clydia smiled.
Everyone raised a glass and said, “Hear, hear!”
Austin picked up her knife and carefully buttered a bread stick, bit off a piece, and remembered the delicious stuff that Rye served with steaks.
Grandmother looked at Austin. “You look exhausted, my dear. By the summer’s end you’ll be ready for an asylum.”
“I like it in Terral. It’s peaceful. You should all fly into Dallas for a weekend and drive up there to see for yourself,” Austin said.
“No thank you. I don’t have that kind of time. I’m stretching it by promising to fly up here a couple of times a month to spend time with the family,” Clydia said seriously.
“What in the devil is that?” Barbara blurted out.
“What?” Joan looked around quickly and then realized her sister wasn’t staring at her but at Austin.
Barbara pointed. “That horrible mark on your neck. Good God, that’s so low class it’s…” she stammered.
“It’s a hickey,” Austin said.
Grandmother slapped her hand over her mouth but it didn’t keep the gasp from being heard all the way around the table.
The cook giggled.
Clydia shot her a look that froze her laughter in midair. Austin wondered how a person could make noise stop once it was out in the air. She might just get to be a judge with that kind of power.
“So you really have been down there in that hovel sleeping with the neighbor?” Barbara said.
“Didn’t sleep with him when I got this hickey. Got a Charlie horse in my leg before we could have sex. I started flailing around trying to get untangled from his long legs and arms and knocked him off the bed. He bumped his head on the nightstand and it bled. It was just too damn funny to have sex after that. So I got the hickey without getting screwed.”
“Good God! You…” Barbara was speechless after three words.
Grandfather held up a hand and said, “Tell us more about this fellow. Other than making a mark on your neck, what does he do?”
“He’s a rancher and owns rodeo bulls. He lives across the street from my property and I like him a lot. His name is Rye O’Donnell.”
“He lives in a trailer house,” Barbara said petulantly.
“Yes, he does. And he’s got a tattoo of barbed wire around his arm, too.”
“You are sure you didn’t have…” Grandmother couldn’t make herself say the word.
“Not when I got the hickey. Don’t ask me about later on or about last night.” Austin grinned.
“What are you saying?” Joan asked. She wasn’t smiling.
Grandfather was.
Grandmother had taken her hand from her mouth and her eyes were big as saucers.
The two waiters’ jaws were clamped so tight they couldn’t smile for fear Aunt Clydia’s glare would melt them into a pile of ashes right there on the white carpet.
“I’m saying that tomorrow morning I’m going to my office and packing up my stuff in a box. Derk can have the promotion. I’m going to move to Terral and raise watermelons. I hate getting in the car and coming to Tulsa. I want to stay down there among all that clutter and drive a tractor every day or else mow the lawn or visit with Molly and Greta on Friday after I make my weekly trip to the bank. I don’t want to be here. I don’t give a shit about the job I’ve been doing. I just want to go home.”
“This is your home. It’s where you were born and lived your whole life,” Joan said.
“But Terral is where my heart is.”
“You let that man talk you into this, didn’t you?” Barbara said.
“Rye doesn’t even know I made this decision. He isn’t expecting me until Thursday. I didn’t even know I was going to make it until a few hours ago. The closer I got to Tulsa this week the more I wanted to turn the car around and go home and make sure my watermelons are growing right and that Molly and Greta haven’t died while I was gone.”
A smile turned up the corners of Barbara’s mouth. “You are making a very foolish decision, but when it falls in a heap around your ears, you can always come home and run the dealership for me. If you go through with this crazy notion I will not give you the business but I will hire you as manager. At least you’ll have a job when you get tired of living in squalor.”
“If GM goes belly-up after all this bailout shit, I’ll return the favor. You can come to Terral and help me make watermelon wine.”
Barbara’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You’re even talking like those rednecks.”
“Thank you.”
Clydia held up a palm. “Enough! Austin, you have played the shock value card enough for one night.”
Austin laid her napkin beside her plate. “I have packing to do, so I’m leaving. Y’all enjoy the dinner and please don’t let me ruin anything else. I’ll call you tomorrow when I get home, Mother.”
She marched out of the house with her head held high but her temper had gone far beyond the boiling point. How dare they treat her like a child when they’d treated her like an adult since the day she was born!
On the drive home her phone rang. Dreading another fight with her mother, she almost didn’t answer it. On the fourth ring, she checked the ID to find that it was her boss, and her first thought was that her mother wasted no time! He offered her a three-month sabbatical to think things over before she absolutely made it final.
“Thank you but I want a clean break. I want to move to Terral without thinking about coming back to Tulsa.”
“I want you to be happy, Austin. Derk can step right into your office and the promotion. I’d rather leave knowing you were taking care of my job, but he’s capable.”
“Thank you. I’ll be in and clean out my office tomorrow morning then.”
She pulled into her garage and said good-bye. When she opened the door into her apartment she flopped down on the sofa and stared at the ceiling for a long, long time. Was she being too rash? Was her mother right? Would she grow to hate the town, the people, and the hard work? Was she severing the ties too completely? Should she take the sabbatical and give it some time?
When no answers came floating down from the crystal light fixture in the recessed ceiling, she threw her hand over her eyes. Granny’s face appeared as if it were on the other side of a dense fog.
Good decision. Don’t worry about tomorrow. It will take care of itself. Be happy today.
Granny’s face faded and the misty gray fog disappeared, then Rye materialized. He didn’t say a word but the expression on his face said it all. In the background Gemma was dancing around like a sugared up six-year-old after a day at the rattlesnake festival. Colleen had folded her hands over her chest and was shaking her head back and forth. Dewar and Raylen were both patting Rye on the shoulder.
Austin moved her hand and her eyes sprung open. “Guess Colleen and Mother will have to learn the hard way. If this works between me and Rye, that’s great. If it doesn’t, I’m still going to grow watermelons and make wine. He’s not the reason I’m leaving. He’s just the icing on the cake. But hey, I can eat cake without icing too.”
Her cell phone rang and she dug around in her purse until she had it in her hand and answered on the third ring without looking at Caller ID.
“Hey, girl,” Gemma said. “Are you busy? I’d like to run so
mething by you.”
“Not a bit. What’s on your mind?”
“It’s about the rodeo this weekend. There’s a post-rodeo concert with Tracy Lawrence. I’m scheduled to ride Saturday night. I know you don’t get home until Thursday night and I’ve got appointments on Friday so I can’t leave until Friday afternoon. Want to go with me? You can room with me and Colleen or else I’ll call down and make arrangements to add a room to our block for the summer.”
“I’d love to go but I think I’d rather have a room of my own. No offense but…”
“None taken. Colleen is a great person. She’ll see the light. It just takes her awhile.”
“How’d you get to be so smart?” Austin asked.
“They saved the best ’til last. I promise we’ll get you home in time to drive back to Tulsa on Sunday.”
Austin grinned. She wasn’t telling Gemma before she told Rye.
“That will be great,” she said.
Chapter 17
Rye fidgeted while he waited. Austin was coming home to Terral for good. She’d even left her car behind in Tulsa and flown to Dallas. He’d arrived an hour early and looked through the shops. He bought a long stemmed red rose wrapped in crinkly clear paper and tied with a bright red ribbon. Then he found a seat as close as he could get to her gate and waited. Time crept by so slowly that he wondered if the clocks had stopped, but every so often the boards with arrival and departure times would shift. Finally, her flight number and time fell into place and the line after said that it would be right on time.
Ten more minutes and her plane should be setting down. He picked up a six-month-old magazine but nothing in it held his attention for more than five seconds. Fifteen minutes passed before he saw a stream of people coming up the corridor. She wasn’t among the first ones and he feared she’d changed her mind. When she’d called the night before she was excited about the plans but she’d had time to sleep on it; time for her mother and aunts to convince her not to make such a foolhardy change in her life.
He caught a flash of a tall woman with dark hair and there she was, waving at him with one hand, dragging a small suitcase on wheels with the other. He stood up and waved back and everyone in the Dallas/Fort Worth airport disappeared. She covered the distance in long strides and walked into his open arms.
He swung her around in circles and kissed every inch of her face. He set her down and kissed her long and passionately, then picked her up and swung around three more times. When he set her down he gathered her into his arms and kissed her again, this time longer and more lingering and with more heat.
“I can’t believe you came home for good. I’m so happy I could jump up and down like a little kid at Christmas,” he whispered in her ear as he hugged her tightly to his chest.
“I missed you too!” She laid her head over his heart and heard the steady rhythm. That was Rye. Steady. Dependable. Truthful and still sexy as hell!
He tipped up her chin with his fist and kissed her again and then handed her the rose. “Welcome home.”
“Wow! Kisses and a rose and you… what a homecoming!”
“That’s just the beginning of the story. Let’s go to baggage claim and get your things.”
“No need. Got it all right here.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“There’s still three months on my apartment lease so I just brought a few things. Later, I’ll have it all packed and put into storage closer to Terral.”
He looped her arm through his and picked up the handle of the suitcase. “Then let’s go home, Austin Lanier. Have I told you in the last ten minutes that you are beautiful?”
“No, but flattery gets sex in the bathtub or on the counter. Hey, we haven’t christened the kitchen table yet.” She smiled. She wore the jeans and lace blouse from the Red Barn and had topped it off with a suede vest that tied in the front that she’d picked up when she and her mother had shopped.
“Anytime you want to give it a try, I’m game, but remember that table is at least fifty years old.” He hugged her tighter to his side.
“But what a way to kill it, right?” She giggled.
“Hungry?” He changed the subject.
“For you or food?”
“Either one can be arranged.”
He’d found a short-term parking spot close to the entrance of the terminal, so he draped an arm around her shoulders and led her outside to his truck. He opened the door and helped her inside then rounded the tail end and settled into his seat. He’d barely slammed it shut before she flipped the console unit up and wiggled her way into his lap, her long legs straddling him like he was a saddle.
“I want an appetizer of you and then food.” She kissed him long and hard, unbuttoning his shirt the whole time, feeling his rock hard muscles and abs. “I’m not ever leaving again.”
“Promise.”
“Oh, yeah! Now let’s go find some fast food and go home.”
“It’s not fast food but we could get a beer at Chili’s Bar and Grill.” He sunk his face into her hair and inhaled deeply.
“Sounds wonderful. I want a beer in a bottle and chips and picante and when I’m done with fajitas I want one of those chocolate cake things that is absolutely sinful.”
He grinned and kissed her so long that she was panting when he broke away. “Whew!” She fanned her face with her hand. “Gotta stop or else figure out a way to have sex in the airport parking lot.”
She shifted back into her seat.
He couldn’t wipe the grin off his face. She’d said home more than once so she must mean it! No more counting the hours until she got back from Tulsa. No more phone calls that left him pacing the floor with hot desire.
“How about you, Rye O’Donnell? You wanted my farm. Are you glad that I’m not selling or disappointed that you won’t ever get that land now?” She strapped in her seat belt.
Oh, honey, there’s more than one way to get that land. But I’m not nearly as interested in three square miles of dirt as I am in you, he thought.
He said, “I’m not a bit disappointed.”
Her phone rang at the same time he started the engine and she fished it out of her purse, checked to see who it was, and answered, “Hello, Mother. I’m on the ground and Rye and I are heading toward a Chili’s for supper.”
“Good. When you get tired of playing farmer down there in the hinterlands, call me. I’ve hired a decorator to redo an office for you at the dealership,” Barbara said.
“Don’t spend too much money,” Austin said.
“There’s the doorbell. James and I are having dinner with some friends.”
“Have fun.” Austin flipped the phone shut and put it back in her purse.
“Spend too much money on what?” Rye asked.
“An office in the dealership. It’s her hope that I’ll hate this place by the time we bring in a watermelon crop and will need a job so she’s creating a managerial position in the dealership for me. Since I used poor judgment and left a gravy job in the oil company, I am no longer deemed responsible enough to own Lanier Chevrolet but I won’t be allowed to live in a cardboard box out by the Goodwill store. I told her that if the car business went belly-up I’d give her a job.”
She’d left an apartment full of her things and a mother with an office waiting. Things weren’t nearly as simple as he’d hoped they might be but, hey, the watermelon crop wasn’t in and if she came home to him, then she might stay home with him if he gave her plenty of reason.
“What are you grinning about?” she asked.
“Your mother on a tractor? I’ve never seen her but somehow I don’t think high-heeled shoes and a fancy suit would last long out there in the watermelon fields.”
She giggled. “She wouldn’t be caught at a dog fight in overalls, much less covered in sweat and dirt. And riding on a tractor? That is a funny vision.”
“I’m glad you are home, Austin. I can’t begin to tell you how much I miss you when you are gone. I feel like I’ve known you forever
,” he said.
She’d wondered after the first few times that she talked to him why she was so drawn to their conversations on the phone. Why she felt so energized and happy when she talked to him. Ten years and she’d never met the man who’d been such a big part of her grandmother’s life. Then she met him in the café. Was that fate and if it was, why?
Hell’s bells, I betcha Granny fixed that too! She’s been having a grand old time making sure the timing was right for us. That’s why she didn’t want her ashes scattered until Easter—so I’d be here for the first of the planting. And that’s why she doesn’t want us to have sex at his house. She wants us to settle into the place across the road. Sly old girl, aren’t you?
“You look pretty serious over there. Regrets?” Rye asked.
“No regrets.”
“Cháchara?” He chuckled.
“I’ve got lots of time to take care of the rest of the junk. Tomorrow I will call a company for one of those roll-off Dumpsters. When it arrives the scoop shovel can take care of the cháchara.”
“Set up a couple of tables out in the yard and put all the junk you don’t want on them. Put a sign that says ‘free’ in great big letters on it and you’ll be surprised how little of it gets into the Dumpster.”
“Is that where Granny got so much junk? Did she go to free sales?”
“She loved garage sales and the Red Barn. My grandmother is the same way. I’ll take you to her house sometime. It looks just like Granny Lanier’s.”
“You are kidding me.”
“No, I’m not. They’ve both got their own quirks but they are a lot alike. Like planting the first seeds of each row by hand.”
“Yes, she did have her ways and she was superstitious as hell.”
“So is Grandma,” Rye said.
“We made good time getting out of the airport traffic. We shouldn’t even have to wait for a table.”
“Good because I’m really hungry. Mother says I’ll be calling Omar the tentmaker to design my clothes if I stay in Terral.”
Love Drunk Cowboy Page 27
