Cole drove a staple in with one powerful smack of his hammer then turned to squint at Joe. After a long count of ten, Cole turned back to the post, pinched another staple between his fingers, and centered it over the next wire.
“Haircut wouldn’t hurt,” he said, and gave the staple a mighty whack.
Chapter 20
Violet’s left boob vibrated, startling her so she nearly stabbed herself in the foot with a pitchfork. She propped the fork against the side of the stall she was mucking out and fished the phone out of her breast pocket.
“I have got to know what happened at practice last night,” Melanie declared. “Whatever y’all did, it’s got Hank goggle-eyed and afraid to make a peep, which is damned inconvenient the one time I actually want him to talk.”
“Joe tried to pinch his head off,” Violet said, pressing a hand into her lower back and arching to stretch out the kinks. “Promised to finish the job if Hank blabbed.”
She’d surprised herself by sleeping like a rock once she’d finally gone to bed at just after midnight, having deduced that Joe wasn’t going to come knocking on her door. Damn him. Just once could the man do what she expected?
“Anyone who can put the fear of God into my lunkhead brother is a friend of mine. I can’t believe I have to leave on this asinine business trip tomorrow morning and won’t be back before Joe leaves.”
Violet imagined introducing Melanie to Joe, counted at least five ways she could end up humiliated beyond words, and decided she was in favor of the business trip. “He wants to court me.”
“To…what?”
“That’s what I said. And then he got all huffy, like I insulted his manly pride.”
“So you’re going to let him?”
“Might as well.” Violet shivered a little at the prospect of being the target of Joe’s formidable concentration. “By the time he leaves, no one will care what Hank has to say. And imagine what it will do for my reputation, being wooed by the great Joe Cassidy who, from all reports, does not chase girls. He just stands back and lets them come to him. If nothing else, it oughta be entertaining. I’d be amazed if he ever courted anything but trouble his whole life.”
And it was also amazing how little that bothered Violet today. Once she’d decided to take Lily’s advice to heart, she felt like a whole new person. No more fretting and fussing at herself. No pretending Joe wasn’t exactly what she wanted, and possibly more. Just the fizz and pop of anticipation, like champagne trickling through her veins. Ten whole days before Joe left. Two weekends. Nine nights. And he’d wasted one of them already.
Melanie huffed out a disgruntled sigh. “I’m gonna miss it all, as usual. Remind me again why I haven’t let some sugar daddy sweep me off my feet so I can quit this damn job?”
“Because we are modern, independent women who don’t need a man to support us.”
“Been there, done that, getting pretty damn sick of it,” Melanie said. “I wanna see how the spoiled half lives.”
Violet laughed, because everybody knew how much Melanie loved her job. As an events coordinator for the fairgrounds in Amarillo, she helped plan everything from rock concerts to rodeos to monster truck rallies. Violet soothed her by promising to report any and all juicy details at the earliest possible moment. As she hung up, she heard a roar. The chore pickup, unmistakable thanks to a muffler that’d died a painful death when her dad hit a dry wash a few years back.
She set her pitchfork aside, walked to the barn door, and leaned a shoulder against the frame while she waited for the pickup to cough and die in front of the shop. Both men climbed out, Katie right on Cole’s heels. Joe caught sight of Violet, raised a hand in greeting, and walked toward her, leaving Cole to unload the tools.
“If I’d known barn cleaning was an option, I wouldn’t have offered to go fencing.” Joe held up his arm so she could see the angry red scratch on his wrist. “I usually don’t need a tetanus shot when I’m done shoveling manure.”
Violet winced. “I can run you to the walk-in clinic in Dumas.”
“Just kidding. I had one in June. Took a horn in the chops at Prineville.” He touched a crescent-shaped scar on his jaw, then glanced over her shoulder at the pile of manure she’d scooped out of the stall. “Need a hand?”
Violet hesitated. She couldn’t help feeling like this new, considerate version of Joe was some kind of joke he was playing on her, and any minute he’d nail her with one of those mocking smiles.
“I have to talk to Cole,” she said.
Joe blocked her path with an arm across the door. He tilted his face into the crook of her neck and inhaled deeply, stirring the hair on her nape. “Oranges. My second favorite.”
The champagne bubbles burst en masse at the play of his breath on her skin, a wave of pure sensation rolling through her body and short-circuiting her brain.
Joe dropped his arm, motioning for her to pass, a knowing glint in his eyes. “Take as long as you want. I’ll be down here knee-deep in shit, as usual.”
Violet nodded, struck mute. She walked slowly over to the shop, sorting out the neurons he’d scrambled. Focus, Violet. She couldn’t just blunder into this conversation with Cole. The subject was beyond touchy. His head was buried under the raised hood of the chore pickup. He glanced over at the sound of her footsteps in the gravel and looked down again without a word.
“You found the hole in the fence?” she asked.
He pulled the dipstick free, squinted at it, then wiped it clean with the old sock he used as a rag. “Same place as always. First low spot past the gate.”
“Figures.” She folded her arms and leaned them on the pickup, watching Cole thread the dipstick back into the skinny metal tube. “I can’t stop thinking about the McCloud stock. They’ve got some real buckers.”
“Yep.” Cole walked into the shop to fetch oil, leaving Violet hanging. When he returned, he said nothing—just stuck a funnel in the truck’s filler tube and started to pour from a silver can.
“Like I was saying,” she continued. “McCloud’s got some good stuff.”
“That we can’t afford.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, too.” Couldn’t stop thinking about it, since Joe had planted the idea in her brain. “We do have some assets we could liquidate. At least one very valuable asset.”
Cole made no visible attempt to follow her to the obvious conclusion. He was gonna force her to come right out and say it.
“What I mean is…would you ever consider selling Dirt Eater?”
“No.”
Yeah. That’s what she figured. She blew out a sigh. “I knew better than to ask. It’s just…well, sometimes I feel like we aren’t doing him justice. Putting him on the stage he deserves. If he spends most of his life at our rodeos, he’ll never get the kind of recognition he could.”
“If we sell him, he’ll get recognized under some other contractor’s name,” Cole said flatly.
And that was the deal breaker. If Dirt Eater was going to get famous, it had to be as a Jacobs Livestock bull, or it didn’t count. They’d be selling the dream. The only living piece Cole had left of his father.
“I’m sorry. You’re right. I shouldn’t have said anything. The McCloud thing got me going, and I was already feeling restless. Wishful, you know?”
If he had any inkling, he hid it well. Cole set the oil can aside, pulled out the dipstick again to examine it, then shoved it back into place, satisfied. Violet jerked her arms back just before he slammed the hood.
He finally looked her in the eye, his brow puckered. “Is this one of those change of life things?”
“Excuse me?”
“They say women get kinda crazy when they go through that stuff.”
Violet had never realized a person could feel their own eyes bug out. “Change of life is menopause, Cole. That’s in your fifties.”
“
Oh.” He tilted his head, thoughtful, as if filing that tidbit away for future reference. “Maybe it’s a midlife crisis.”
“I am not having a crisis!” But an aneurism was a possibility. The arteries in her brain had to be bulging.
“Well, what would you call it?” Cole asked, so damn obtuse she wanted to smack him.
“Suffocation! There hasn’t been a breath of fresh air around this place in years!”
He sucked in a noisy lungful, then let it out in a blast that stirred the dust on the hood of the pickup. “Seems fine to me.”
He strolled back into the shop to put the oil can away. Violet started after him, then stopped short. Better stay out of there. It’d be too tempting to grab a wrench and try to pound some sense into that thick skull. She flexed and relaxed her fists, breathing deep, trying to clear the red haze from her eyes. Honest to freaking God. Men! And people wondered why she didn’t want another one in her life.
A flash of sky blue in the driveway yanked her attention away from Cole. Her fury ebbed, replaced by puzzlement. She squinted, then let out a low whistle, tinged with envy. She’d always wanted a Mustang—back before she worried about things like safety ratings and juice-repellant seats—and this one looked like it had just rolled off the lot. Must be a tourist, lost and looking for quickest route to Amarillo. As she started toward the car, Joe poked his head out of the barn, then set the pitchfork aside and came striding up the driveway.
The driver stepped out as Violet approached. The first thing she noticed was his shoes—canvas loafers that looked like they were made for lounging on the deck of a yacht. Definitely a tourist. She started to smirk, but then she got a load of the rest as he unwound from the low-slung car. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Blond. Wow. His short-sleeved sports shirt was the color of ripe cantaloupe, worn loose over perfectly creased golfer’s shorts, the blue stripe in the plaid the exact same shade as his car.
He looked like a guy who’d color coordinate. He also looked familiar. Weird, given that Violet didn’t know many male model types and definitely wouldn’t have forgotten this one. He posed—one hand propped on the open car door, the other on his hip—surveying the yard and buildings before turning his attention to Violet with an orthodontist-perfect smile. Suddenly, it clicked. “Oh! Hi, you’re—”
Joe’s voice cut between them. “What the fuck are you doing here, Wyatt?”
* * *
Joe should’ve realized something was up. Wyatt hadn’t called since Tuesday night and it wasn’t like him to butt out.
Wyatt answered his question with a lazy shrug. “I was in the neighborhood.”
“You’re supposed to be in Omaha tonight. Since when is Nebraska next door to here?”
“I had that fundraiser in Tucson last night, remember? I practically had to fly right over, so I figured I might as well stop.” Wyatt focused on Violet, so charming Joe wanted to knock out a few of his perfect teeth. “Nice to see you again.”
“Uh…yeah. I mean, yes. Likewise.” She was blushing. And stammering, for Christ’s sake. Joe had never made her stammer.
“What do you want?” Joe snapped.
Wyatt lifted the hand draped over the car door, revealing a manila envelope dangling between his fingers. “If you can’t make time for me, I’ll come to you.”
Contracts. Hell. Wyatt was not going to back off until Joe considered every rodeo in the country that wasn’t produced by Dick Browning.
Joe ignored the envelope and sneered at the Mustang, instead. “Why can’t you rent a normal car?”
“Unlike you, I prefer to enjoy the ride,” Wyatt said, wrinkling his nose.
“My Jeep gets me where I need to go.” And it had been paid off for years.
“So does this, and it actually has a sound system and functional air conditioning.”
Violet tapped a finger against her chin, adding up the evidence. “Tucson to Amarillo to Omaha? You’re not flying commercial.”
“I have my own plane. Just a little twin engine Cessna.” As offhandedly as if owning and piloting a plane were a matter of convenience, like having a smartphone. Wyatt pushed the door shut on the Mustang. “I hope I didn’t show up at a bad time?”
“Always,” Joe said.
Violet’s gaze slid down the driveway to the road, then back again. “Delon’s flying to Omaha today, too. He’ll be bringing Beni home any time now.”
And she would clearly be a whole lot happier if Joe made himself scarce so they could avoid a replay of that cozy scene at the barbecue shack. He’d just drag Wyatt over to the bunkhouse…
Too late.
Delon’s car turned in off the highway. Why did Joe have a sinking feeling that this was exactly as Wyatt had planned it? The silver Taurus pulled to a stop behind Wyatt’s rental. Nothing flashy for Delon. He drove with the same attitude as he rode—safety first. The wheels had barely stopped rolling when the back door swung open and Beni leapt out.
“Mommy! That car is so cool! Who does it—” He skidded to a stop when he saw Wyatt, his eyes going big. “Is that your car?”
“Just for today.”
“Can I have a ride?”
“Sure.”
“With the top down?”
“Naturally.” Wyatt held out a hand. “You probably don’t remember me. I’m Wyatt.”
Beni accepted the handshake, vibrating with excitement. “You’re the best bullfighter in the whole world. My mommy says so.”
“That’s real nice of her,” Wyatt drawled, tossing a triumphant grin toward Joe.
“My mommy is always nice,” Beni said, serious now. “Except when I don’t listen. Or when she scrubs my ears and makes me dress up for church.” He leaned closer to Wyatt and lowered his voice. “Did your mommy make you wear those clothes?”
“Beni!” Violet exclaimed.
Joe busted out laughing.
Delon stepped out of the car, ignoring Joe and working up a polite smile for Wyatt. “What brings you down here?”
“Joe and I have some business, so I popped in on my way to Omaha,” Wyatt said.
“You’re working the rodeo up there?”
“Heading north soon as I’m done here. Need a lift?” Wyatt asked.
“No. Thanks. I’m flying out of Amarillo with a couple of other guys.” Delon shifted and shot Violet a glance. Pretty obvious he wanted to get her alone. To grill her about Joe? Remind her that she’d have an impressionable child watching her every move? And Joe’s. Beni circled the Mustang, running his fingers over the sleek curve of the hood. A pained look flashed over Wyatt’s face, but he didn’t say a word. If it had been his own car, he would’ve pitched a fit.
Wyatt focused his vote for me smile on Delon. “If you can wait until after the bull riding, I’ll buy you a beer tonight. I assume you’ll stick around for the barrel racing since Stacie Lyn is up tonight. Unless the two of you have other plans…”
Violet’s chin jerked up like a coyote catching a whiff of blood.
“We don’t…I mean, we’re not…” Delon stammered.
Wyatt faked an embarrassed wince. “Sorry. After I saw you together at Greeley and then again at Casper, I just assumed…”
“Funny, you never mentioned her,” Violet drawled, her mouth twitching with the beginnings of a smirk.
Delon’s face went a shade darker as he sidled toward his car. “I, ah, should get going. I’ll pick Beni up next Wednesday morning, okay? We’ll see you at the rodeo Saturday night.”
“Fine.” Violet gave him a bright, toothy smile. “Have a great time.”
As the car door slammed behind him, Beni frowned at his mother. “You didn’t tell him good luck.”
She snorted. “I’m guessing he’ll get plenty lucky anyway.”
“Whaddaya mean—”
“Hey, Beni,” Wyatt said. “Give me five minutes to talk to Joe, then
you and I can go for that ride, okay?”
Beni pumped a fist. “Awesome!”
Joe spun around and made a beeline for the bunkhouse. Wyatt sauntered in behind him, looking pleased with himself. The instant the door closed Joe turned on him.
“What the hell was that?” he demanded.
“You were worried Delon would give Violet a hard time about you, so I took care of it. The last subject he wants to bring up now is anybody’s sex life.” Wyatt paused to study a black-and-white photo that hung by the door, a Jacobs bucking horse in action from back in the seventies.
“Do you get some kind of sick thrill from screwing with people?”
Wyatt moved on the next framed picture, this one in faded color. “Didn’t seem to bother Violet.”
His nonchalance only stoked Joe’s temper. “So, what? You were bored, so you dropped by to see what you could stir up here?”
“No.” When he turned, Wyatt’s expression was flat and hard. “Lyle is gone.”
Joe’s whirling thoughts caught like tumbleweeds piling up against a fence. “What do you mean, gone?”
“His wife gave him an ultimatum. Her and rehab, or Browning Rodeo. He chose her.”
Joe stepped back, felt for the arm of the couch with one hand, and sank down onto it. “How do you know?”
“Helen called. She was worried.” Wyatt folded his arms, all stern and disapproving. “The woman fusses over you like you’re one of her own and you can’t take five minutes to let her know where you are?”
“I didn’t think of it.” Guilt clenched a knotty fist in Joe’s gut. He usually kept Helen up-to-date on his schedule so she knew when to lay an extra place at the table. “She could’ve called me.”
Reckless in Texas Page 16
