Lucy bowed up to him. “Junior, you don’t tell me what to do.”
“Of course I don’t, darlin’. You think the same thing. You just ain’t figured it out yet but you will by the time we get in the warm house.”
Stella watched them go, surprised that her mother didn’t attempt to send Rance with Junior while she gave Stella a good tongue lashing. She rubbed her eyes and it dawned on her that it was Junior’s doing. For that, she just might accept the man.
“Good mornin’,” Rance said.
“Same to you.”
Several awkward moments passed. She untangled herself from him, hung the blanket up and slipped her feet into a pair of his boots. He wiggled the kinks from his back and combed his thick black hair back with his fingers.
“Why didn’t you wake me up?” She asked.
“Same reason you didn’t wake me up. We were both sleeping. You going to insist I make an honest woman out of you?”
“You going to insist I make an honest man out of you?”
“Aren’t you glad it’s modern day and not a hundred years ago? Lucy would have been carrying a shot gun and a preacher would have been right behind her.” Rance grinned.
She folded her arms over her chest and glared at him.
“Do you always wake up like an old bear?”
“I’m not cranky. I’m mad.”
“This early. What set you off?”
“You did. I want you to do something to make me hate you.”
“What?”
“I’m mad because I really don’t want to fall for you and I have and I don’t want to tell you that, but I am, and I’m so angry I could just spit.”
He cocked an eyebrow at her. “What do you want to do with all this anger? Shovel out the stalls? Make Christmas dinner?”
“I’m very grateful for all you are doing and have done for my family, Rance, but when the electricity comes back on, I don’t want to see you for a whole week. I want to get my head back on straight. This spinning around is about to drive me crazy. I want to be rational and adult.”
“Okay. What about lunch when I bring all the men over to your place to eat? You going to hide from me? How are we going to manage that?”
“I’ll go to my room and Maggie and Lauren can do the serving.”
“If you need a week then you can have it. It’s a deal. On one condition. My grandparents on my Mother’s side of the family have a New Year’s Eve barn party at their ranch near Dallas every year. I’ll give you your week if you’ll go with me to the party.”
She was stunned. She figured he’d tell her to drop dead on the spot.
“Deal,” she stuck out her hand.
He shook her hand, then pulled her to his chest, tilted her head back and kissed her long and hard with enough heat to melt all the ice in Murray County, Oklahoma.
“Merry Christmas, Stella. Now let’s go up to the house. I’m starving.”
Chapter Thirteen
Rance told Stella to dress western instead of formal so she took a straight denim skirt trimmed along the hem with rhinestones and embroidery and matching jacket from the closet, along with a western cut lace blouse in a poinsettia red from the closet. Once dressed, she brushed her hair, letting it fall in natural curls to her shoulders. She tilted her head back and struck a pose like Marilyn on that famous poster. No, she’d never, ever pass for Miss Monroe. Not by a long stretch of anyone’s imagination. Not even if they were near sighted to the point of blindness. But she’d fiddled with her dress long enough. The time had come to sink or swim and she’d worried enough for one week so she picked up her western hat and set it on top of her head, being careful not to mess up her hair. Just as she swung open the hotel door, Rance held up his hand to knock, and they were face to face.
He took her hands in his. “My, my, don’t you look like a rodeo queen?”
“You don’t look so shabby yourself.” She started at the toes of his shiny black, eel dress boots and let her eyes slowly travel up the perfect crease in his starched denim jeans to a belt buckle with a bull rider on it. She felt a slight blush coloring her face as she blinked and went on up the pearl snaps on his pale gray shirt to his freshly shaven chin.
“Just like old James Dean himself,” he said.
“Elvis,” she argued. “James Dean’s hair was lighter and he didn’t swagger.”
“I don’t swagger,” he drawled.
She smiled up at him and laced her arm through his. “I’ll be the judge of that. Look out world, here we come.”
The barn had been swept spotlessly clean and tables for four were set up with white tablecloths and centerpieces of fresh flowers and candles. A bandstand and portable hardwood dance floor were off to one side, and a whole row of tables, set up in a U shape, were covered with food. Caterers in white western shirts and black Wranglers fussed with everything from Mexican finger food to grilled steaks. There was an ice sculpture of a quarter horse on one table and one of an Angus bull on another. The whole atmosphere overwhelmed Stella so much she wanted to run back to the house, gather up her belongings and chase right back across the Red River.
The band had just finished setting up and the lead singer leaned into the microphone. “Rance Harper and his lady friend have arrived. We’ve got to warm up so this song’s for you.”
Rance gently took the hat from the top of her blond curls, drew her close to his chest and with one hand in hers and the other holding her hat at the small of her back, he nodded to the band. The first strains of “The Dance,” by Garth Brooks started and she looked deeply into his blue eyes.
“Our song.” He said softly.
She laid her head on his chest, listening to the steady beating of his heart as the singer told a story in song. Stella wished time would stand still and they could have the barn, the band and all those beautiful tables to themselves for the whole evening.
Rance had fallen in love with Stella. It was as simple as that. Like was fine and he’d enjoyed it. As she so aptly said that day, friendship was important in a relationship. But somewhere in all this, he’d added love to like. He could see down the lane into the future and someday he and Stella Brannon Harper were going to sit on the front porch of his ranch and watch their grandchildren, possibly even great grandchildren romp across the yard with the newest batch of puppies or kittens.
They’d not laid eyes on each other for a whole week and he’d thought of little else but her. During that time he realized he wanted one of those lifetime things she talked about. And more importantly, that C word wasn’t one bit scary if he could have it with Stella.
When the dance ended, several people clapped heartily from inside the door.
A lady whistled through her teeth and yelled across the floor. “Time to share. You’ve had her to yourself all these weeks, and we intend to butt in.” The short, slightly overweight woman crossed the barn with a parade behind her.
Rance began making introductions. “My friend, Cindy. She’s married to my best friend from college, Grady. This is Stella Brannon, the woman you’ve all heard me talk about. This is my mother, Vivien, and this is J.T. and Imogene Grayson, my grandparents.”
“Pleased to meet you all,” Stella said.
Vivien shook her hand. “Rance, you failed to mention that she was a tall blond.”
“What has that got to do with anything?” Rance asked his mother.
“Not one thing. Oh, excuse us please, there’s the senator we wanted to talk to this evening. Rance, there’s a bit of gossip I need to share with you later. Stella, it’s delightful to meet you finally. Save me an hour later or tomorrow to really visit. The people are arriving now and goodness knows we can’t have anything private at an affair like this. Maybe we can have breakfast together along with Rance’s mother? She’s been beside herself all week just thinking about this party and you being here with Rance.”
Cindy batted her eyelashes. “So why didn’t you mention it?”
“What?” Rance pretended innocence.
“
That she was tall, beautiful and blond?” Cindy said.
Rance slipped an arm around Stella and pulled her close. “Didn’t want the joshing.”
“Something like ‘if I ever look at a tall blond again, shoot me and put me out of my misery’,” Cindy teased.
For a moment Cindy made Stella nervous, then she realized the woman wasn’t rude, just blunt.
“I’ve said that same line, only it concerned a tall dark haired, dark eyed handsome man. But sometimes fate sure has a strange sense of humor doesn’t it?” Stella said.
“You bet it does,” Cindy said. “Now come on over here, and claim a table with me and my husband. He’ll be along soon. He’s even more vain than I am and always late to everything, but he’ll get all that red hair to lay just perfect and then he’ll join us. Rance get us something to drink.”
She led the way to a table in a corner and motioned for Stella to sit. Rance headed toward the bar. Stella watched him.
“Are you as much in love with him as he is with you?” Cindy asked when he was out of hearing distance.
“I don’t know about love, but I think we’re definitely in like,” Stella smiled.
“You look like those old pictures of Marilyn Monroe when you smile like that,” Cindy said.
“You’ve been talking to Rance.” Stella said with a snort.
He set a glass of wine in front of each of them. “What did I tell her?”
“He didn’t tell me anything,” Cindy said. “I didn’t know if you were going to be a short, dumpy redhead or a tall brunette. All he kept saying was that we’d think you were beautiful.”
“My head is swelling and I feel a blush coming on,” Stella laughed.
Before Cindy could say a word and before Rance could sit down, a lady slid in next to him. She wrapped one arm around his neck and pulled his mouth down for a kiss. “Well, hello, sweetheart. Long time, no see.”
“Speak of the devil.” Cindy said aloud.
Rance pushed her away. “What in the world are you doing here, Julie?”
Stella looked up at the gorgeous woman, dressed in black silk slacks and a matching, flowing jacket over a lace camisole which gave sneak peeks at a skimpy black bra and the skin on her midriff. Her hair was done up in a twist, held fast with a clip of sparkling diamonds shaped like an S, with a few straight wisps escaping on her neck.
“I’m here with the senator over there. The one your grandparents are talking to so intently about boring politics. How have you been since you crossed the Red River into Oklahoma? Lonesome for me?”
“Not hardly,” Rance said.
Julie turned an icy stare toward Stella. “And who’s this, Cindy? Another one of Grady’s friends you’re fixin’ good old Rance up with?”
Stella looked up right into Julie’s big brown eyes. “I’m Stella Brannon. And I’m not anybody’s relative. I’m here with Rance.”
“Well, pleased to meet you Stella. Be careful. He’s known to love ’em and leave ’em.”
“The pleasure is all mine. I’ve heard so much about you,” Stella said coldly.
“I’m sure you have, darlin’,” Julie said.
She dismissed Stella with a disgusted look and turned back toward Rance. “I’ll talk to you later. Oh, and by the way, I’m here with my new husband, that senator right over there talking to your mother.”
“Congratulations. I hope you are both happy,” Rance said.
“He’ll do. The tabloids love it,” she said and with the wave of a hand went back to hug up close to the gray haired senator.
“Sorry.” Rance whispered to Stella.
“What for? She’s just spoiling for a cat fight. Forget it. Would it be asking too much of you, since you’re the host here and need to mingle with your guests, if you would dance the next three dances with me? And would you ask the band to make them all good slow two steppers?”
His eyes lit up and he led her out onto the dance floor. “You bet. I figured you’d be spittin’ mad, not asking for dances.”
She just smiled up at him, wrapped both arms around his neck and pressed her body close to his.
He looped his arms around her waist and pulled her tightly into his chest. “Why did you want three dances?”
“One dance would have shown her that she is obviously not in the picture any more. Two would have let her know I’m definitely with you, and three, well, just let it suffice to say, she’ll know I’m damn sure not somebody’s country relative being pawned off on you,” Stella said.
“Is this one of those woman things I wouldn’t understand?”
Stella laid her head his shoulder. “I’m afraid so. She’ll stick to the old senator like glue the rest of the evening, trying to make you jealous. Trust me.”
When the three songs ended, he took her hand and led her back to the table, meandering among the people along the way. There were so many she’d never be able to keep names and faces together, but that would come in time. Maybe by next year, she would have been around them all enough to call them by their first names.
Now where did that come from? It came from the bottom of my heart. I’ve fallen completely in love with this man, and some things are worth fighting for, and if Julie thinks she’s still got a claim, she’s deaf, dumb and stone blind. Because Rance is mine, and even if I have to wait for him to wake up and realize it, I will.
After the midnight count down and a kiss that rocked Stella’s heart and soul, the people thinned out and the food tables looked like they’d been run over by a semi. Rance and Cindy’s husband, Grady, were talking to the band members as they packed up their instruments.
Cindy sighed loudly, “I always hate to see the end. Oh, there will be a few hangers on for another hour or so, but when the band leaves, it’s really over, you know.”
“It’s been a wonderful evening,” Stella said. “I can’t remember the last time I danced until my feet actually hurt, but they do.”
“Rance is really in love with you,” Cindy said.
“Oh?”
“Don’t look so surprised. We’ve known for weeks, and now that we’ve met you we don’t even mind,” Cindy told her. “I really am too blunt. Everyone tells me that but I never change. If tact was money, I’d be a pauper.”
Stella laughed. “I think you and I might get along just fine. I don’t mind you speaking your mind, Cindy. I’d much rather someone tell me what they’re thinking even if I don’t like it, than wait until I’m comfortable and then spring a surprise on me.”
“Amen to that, sister,” Cindy nodded. “Now tell me what is happening between you two?”
Stella evaded the issue. “Oh, I think we need a lot more dances.”
“I’m going to the ladies room. If I don’t get rid of half a bottle of white wine and a couple of mixed drinks, I’m going to float away,” Cindy laughed.
Stella stood up. “I’ll go with you.”
“Bad part of drinking a little too much is that it makes me sleep too sound and Grady says I sound like I’m sawing logs.”
“Well, if I snore, I’m sure Rance has already heard it. Bless his heart, he took my family in to his home when the ice storm knocked out the electricity in our area. We all slept in the living room together except for one night when we fell asleep in a horse stable, but that’s a long story for another time.”
“He told Grady about that ice storm. If I ever lost electricity they’d have to dig a grave and put me in it. I couldn’t live without a curling iron.” Cindy stopped in her tracks right in front of Stella. “Uh-oh,” she muttered.
In the shadows of a corner right beside the bathroom door, Julie was plastered to Rance with her arms tightly around his neck. “Come on, honey. I drove my own car since the senator had to leave early. Just one more night for old time’s sake.”
Cindy and Stella froze in place. Cindy had the sudden urge to wade into the middle of Rance and his ex-wife, with fists flailing and cursing loud enough to wake the dead. Just when the idiot had found someone like
Stella he let that two-bit hussy turn his head.
Stella smiled and waited.
Rance growled. “Julie, take your hands off me. I’m not interested. Go on home and stop making a fool of yourself. What we had died a long time ago.”
“What we had darlin’ was pure physical attraction and that never dies. I’ll wait in my car until the lights go out in the house and then I’ll slip in your room. Your new honey won’t ever even know, and what a body doesn’t know, sure can’t hurt them.” Her words slurred slightly and she wasn’t nearly as graceful as she’d been earlier in the evening.
Stella still waited.
“I want you to go home and I don’t ever want to see you on the Bar H again. Get your arms from around me, or . . .”
“Or what, Rancey,” Julie moved one hand slowly down his chest to his belt buckle.
That’s when Stella moved.
Stella picked the woman’s hand and dropped it like it was a dead mouse. “Hello, Julie, I think you’re messing with property which does not belong to you anymore. I do believe it would be best if you go now before you do something you’ll regret when you sober up. The senator would be disappointed if he knew what you were doing.”
“Like I said, Rancey, some things never, ever die.” Julie stomped away, but before she’d gotten far she turned around and narrowed her eyes at Stella. “Just remember every time he takes a business trip that I might be waiting. We were first loves and honey, they never die. And the senator doesn’t control what I do.”
A cold, chill started at the base of Stella’s neck and inched its way slowly all the way down to her toe nails. Déjà vu. Her mind told her she should turn and run as far away as possible, but her heart said she loved him, and love was trust.
Rance put his arms around her waist. “I’m so sorry. I cannot believe she just said that. I promise I’m over her, Stella. I promise.”
Cindy stepped up. “Well, I hope to hell you are! She’s led you around by the nose forever, even after the divorce, and we’re all sick and tired of it. Stella is the best thing that’s happened to you in a long time. The woman is a witch, Stella. Just consider the source. Now I’m going to find Grady. You two better hash this out right now.”
To Commit Page 16
