Bootscootin' Blahniks

by D. D. Scott

  Jack wasn’t smiling today. His lips were set in a taught line. He sucked-in his stomach, puffing out his perfect pecs. This was the last place he wanted to be, Zayne thought, watching Jack posture as he closed the short space between them.

  “I’d shake your hand, but mine are full,” Zayne said, nodding toward the cell packs. “What brings you two by again?”

  “So you’re really serious about the contest this year?” Jack asked, his voice’s forced ease betrayed by his intensely dark eyes.

  “Yep. Sure am.” Zayne adjusted the packs in his arms, hoping for a brief visit from his competitors. The trays, still heavy from last night’s watering, were about to buckle in his arms. “Why are you asking again? Did we not make ourselves clear on that point yesterday?”

  Scuffing his boot on the ground, the only son Harry Baudlin produced, gnawed on a piece of straw in his mouth. A habit Zayne had taken-up too, but just about the only one he shared with his old man. Hell. Kent McDonald should have been buried that way.

  Jack moved the straw around his mouth with his tongue, chewing on his question. “You were perfectly clear. But after we left, we all got to talking. You haven’t been in the business for what, Zayne…ten plus years?”

  “Something like that,” Zayne answered, not sure where this conversation was headed but curious enough to continue. “But why would that worry you? Hell, with me at the helm, I’d think your farm would already be celebrating a win.”

  Jack laughed. But Santos didn’t, choosing instead to stare at the ground, drawing the heel of his boot against a jagged piece of crushed rock as if he was reluctantly standing guard, dutifully waiting to follow his mentor’s lead. Santos’s seriousness tempered by his concerned look seemed to offer Jack the loyal support of a friend. A devotion Zayne admired despite the trouble the man’s silence predisposed. Something was brewing at the Baudlin farms.

  “Well, you’re not far off there,” Jack said, cloaking the awkward silence. “Dad sure is whoopin’ it up knowing you’re his competition.”

  Yeah. He would be, Zayne thought. But why was Jack singling out his father as the only poor sport in the bunch? The Jack Baudlin Zayne had grown up with would have been bellying up to the winner’s circle right along with his dad. All Baudlins were in love with their tomatoes and knew their farm produced the best in the county. And Baudlin men stayed true to the family line, regardless of truth or what act would better serve justice.

  “Dad swears he’ll be Nashville’s tomato king forever.” Jack tossed the limp piece of straw to the ground, mashing it into the dirt with his boot. “His only real competition was your father. So, yeah, he’s feeling confident.”

  “Good for him. Just don’t let him get too confident.” Zayne shifted his weight, antsy to move the trays off his cramping arms. “I’m planning to win.”

  “I’ll tell him that,” Jack said with a sly grin.

  Although Zayne would have liked to dig deeper into Jack’s apparent angst at the promise of a tomato showdown, he had work to do before the heat of the day gave way to sundown. “If you’ll both excuse me, I’ve got to get these trays out.”

  “Here. Let me help you.” Jack took two trays.

  Santos took two more. “Hardening time?”

  “That it is. Thanks. Cody should be back soon to catch the rest.” Zayne set off for the shade behind the tractor barn with Jack and Santos following close behind him. “So things working out for you farming for your dad?”

  Jack edged ahead of Zayne and Santos, effortlessly maneuvering the trays. “You bet. Farming. Tomatoes. Family. That’s my life.”

  Santos quickened his strides, securing his place next to Jack, leaving Zayne faltering alone. But Zayne needed the extra time to digest Harry Baudlin’s hell-bent drive to win the competition.

  Jack slowed down so Santos could match his gait then hollered over his shoulder to Zayne. “But I’ll never have the insane devotion to the farm that Dad does. There’s more to life than tomatoes.”

  Zayne fell back further, not remembering it taking this long or this much effort to get from the greenhouse to the tractor barn. His stomach tightened in raw acknowledgment. He faced more of a battle than he’d prepared for by entering the contest. Dancing and tomato growing required different muscle groups. The reality of his incompetence sickened him, while at the same time producing an unshakeable will to beat the odds.

  A fleeting glance passed between Jack and Santos. Or was Zayne imagining it? With the early May heat, greenhouse gases and manual labor overload, hard telling what was real and what was a mirage messing with his mind.

  “Jack’s dad will do anything to prove he’s the king,” Santos said, shaking his head almost as if he were in a disturbed daze.

  Despite his stoic detachment, Zayne sensed Santos had a sharp edge grinding underneath his composed surface. His muscles twitched under his skin, giving Zayne the push to needle both him and Jack for specifics. “What do you mean by anything?”

  Santos brushed Jack’s shoulder with his hand as if attempting to sooth his friend’s unrest.

  No, Zayne thought, he wasn’t imagining a bigger connection between the two men. There was something more going on there than work. But Zayne sure as hell didn’t have the time or right to ask. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to know how well they were connected, although he definitely needed more on their cryptic behavior regarding Jack’s dad’s intentions.

  “Just be prepared for a hell of a competition.” Jack set the trays in the shaded grass behind the barn. “Dad’s devoted to his growing operation. So are Santos and I. I’m sure your dad told you the stories. My old man’s not always the best sport during the game.”

  Zayne hadn’t talked tomatoes with Jack even when they were boys. ‘Course, he’d never been direct competition. His father was their threat. Only now had Zayne filled those boots.

  And boy he sure didn’t like the implications of foul play being levied. Jesus. He wished his dad were here. He’d know what to make of this. Did the Baudlins play fair? Or would they do whatever it took to win?

  Maybe his dad had despised Harry Baudlin for a valid reason. Zayne had thought the riff between the two was petty jealousy, perhaps Harry’s obvious fondness for Zayne’s mom. Now he wondered if his dad had a sounder basis for his fierce despise of all things Baudlin.

  “Thanks for the warning.” Zayne put his tray next to the others, wishing he’d spent more time with his dad, picking up pieces of the man’s knowledge.

  He turned toward Jack and Santos, wanting to question them further about Harry’s sportsmanship, but they were already returning to their truck.

  What was Jack trying to tell him? And why were both he and Santos all but speaking in codes? Even though Jack had never been the in-your-face guy his father was, he hadn’t been a man who played games. He’d always played straight. Well, maybe that wasn’t exactly true regarding Santos. But where business was concerned, Jack, unlike his father, had no history of walking as the crow flies.

  Did he?

  Reaching the driveway, Jack turned back toward Zayne. “Make sure you get those trays off the ground. They need to drain.”

  “I planned on it,” Zayne said. Once you told me to, he thought.

  Zayne rubbed his ears, shaking out the roars of confusion assaulting him.

  He used to think only the advertising world was full of anomalies. Not anymore. The man who stood to inherit Baudlin Farms just tipped off his competitor on possible foul play. Plus, offered advice on product development.

  Jack had just saved Zayne’s ass. Forgetting the trays needed proper drainage while they hardened Zayne hadn’t bothered getting the benches out of the barn to hold the trays off the ground. Hell. He would have drowned the shit out of the start-ups, leaving him with nothing but moldy muck-ups for planting.

  Once Jack’s truck was out of sight, Zayne went to the barn to dig out the benches, praying Cody would get his ass back to the farm to help.

  Shit. Now Zayne didn’t
have time to look for the missing card. He had too many of his own fuck-ups to avoid to worry about his dad’s.

  Chapter Twelve

  7:17 p.m. So much for a dinner companion, Roxy thought. Kat had been in the Sunset Grill powder room for over twenty minutes.

  Roxy tapped the tip of her home-manicured nail against her wine glass. Her hands may no longer be Elizabeth Arden quality like her mother’s, but they still passed for high maintenance. She’d paid attention to the extravagantly tipped technicians she’d employed every Friday in Manhattan. She may be frugal for the first time in her life, but she was still fashionable.

  She’d give Kat three more minutes. If she didn’t return to the table by 7:22, Roxy was going in. Her annoyance had turned to concern. Her stomach was a free-for-all of nervous twitter that something awful could be wrong with Kat. If she were remotely responsible for a mishap resulting in Kat’s injury, Roxy could never face Zayne. Worse, she couldn’t handle the guilt caused by her inaction.

  Kat had fluttered around Raeve all day, ooh-ing and ah-ing and making notes. The woman never sat down, finding one design after another to occupy her curiosity and feed her enthusiasm. Not used to overt excitement regarding her talent, Roxy couldn’t decide how to handle the positive reinforcement or the woman behind it. But she was inclined to consider the attention favorably.

  Roxy poured herself another glass of Pinot Grigio. One glass hadn’t taken the unique edge out of the day she’d had. She’d started damn near getting run over by a chicken feed truck and ended befriending a co-worker. Not that she was dismissing the horror of the former, but the latter was much scarier.

  Surprised at the positive slant she’d given Kat’s first day, Roxy sipped her wine and tried to sort through her discombobulated emotions.

  Zayne’s mom may have missed her calling by trading in her fashion sense for The Neon Cowboy. She had a flare for design and most definitely knew what to wear to flatter her body type. Not that much wouldn’t look good on her well-maintained body. At fifty-something, her curves were still in the right places. And she’d proudly boasted, while trying on a pair of Raeve’s jeans, she’d kept her figure without injecting-into or sucking-out any ominous substances. No wonder Roxy liked her so much and, at the same time, had nothing but disdain for her own mother the Cosmetic Surgery Queen.

  Roxy swirled the wine around her glass, placing her conflicting feelings in the vortex of the soft white centrifuge.

  Exhilarated by Kat’s talent, ideas were taking form as to how she could best apply her new assistant’s strengths. Every creative wire wound through her buzzed with possibility. Too overwhelmed though to accept Kat’s encouragement and support of her designs, Roxy’s blocked artist short-circuited.

  Was there anything Kat couldn’t do? The only role she didn’t fit was the image of a farmer’s wife. But by making her thirty-year marriage to Zayne’s dad work, she’d also booted that contradiction in the ass. Although Roxy had been convinced she’d find several failing points when Zayne had set-up her and his mom as co-workers, the woman just didn’t possess any qualities Roxy couldn’t tolerate.

  With her Bulgari gliding past the three-minute mark, Roxy removed the linen napkin from her lap, brushing off the stray fibers inconveniently stuck to her skirt. She scooted to the outside of the booth. Just as her bandaged, Ugg-booted foot hit the aisle, Kat rushed toward their table as if she was running from paparazzi.

  “So sorry for the delay, Dear.” Kat sashayed into her side of the booth in a frenzied huff. “I ran into a few of the girls from the Belle Meade Preservation Society and filled them in about your fabulous fall line. We really should consider doing the fashion show for their autumn gala. I wanted to say yes as soon as they asked, but remembered it was your decision, not mine.”

  Kat patted her napkin to her forehead, dabbing at the dampness glistening on her skin in the restaurant’s soft lighting. She pulled the neck of her shirt away from her chest, using the spun silk as a fan against her faltered breathing. Even the woven lavender fibers flapping against her neck didn’t add color to her pale face.

  “We’ll discuss the autumn gala later. Are you all right? It’s certainly not warm in here. In fact, if it weren’t for the wine, I’d be frozen stiff. But you’re clammy and damn near hyperventilating.” Roxy leaned across the table, encouraging Kat, by up-close-and-personal scrutiny, to spill whatever condition she was desperately, unsuccessfully trying to hide.

  “I’ll be fine.” Kat emptied the last of the Pinot Grigio into her glass and smoothed the tablecloth with her salon-perfect hands. She focused her attention on the wine’s canary yellow bottle instead of her dinner companion.

  Roxy knew the look. She’d worn it herself in the man-eating, Manhattan socialite circles her family swam in. Should I confide? Or shouldn’t I? I’ve held it in this long. Why feed the sharks? I’ll get through this obstacle alone. Like I always do.

  If she’d pegged Kat correctly, Roxy thought, the only difference was that Kat wouldn’t make an appointment with a therapist. ‘Course, Roxy wouldn’t have either, come to think of it, if she’d had the power back then to live according to her own mind. Therapists were her father’s idea, not hers. She, like Kat, would prefer to release and catch her own life rafts.

  “Okay. I’ll be blunt,” Roxy said, shoring up for the storm approaching. She pressed her back firm against their booth’s leather-padded bench. Pulling back her shoulders, chest uplifted, she prepared to drag Kat out of her secret cocoon. “From what I’ve seen, you’ve got an illness you’re denying because (a) you don’t want to worry Zayne and (b)…”

  Roxy paused to recompose her hit, thinking she’d probably be safer spouting off to Tony Soprano.

  “Well, go ahead know-it-all,” Kat encouraged her.

  Faced with Kat’s melancholy resignation instead of the sharp scolding she’d expected, Roxy softened her edge. “Or (b), you’re in denial.”

  There. She’d said her piece.

  She knew she’d forced the woman into a corner on a personal topic she had no business approaching. But what choice did she have? Kat needed help whether she wanted it or not. How could she be foolish and refuse?

  Roxy pumped herself up for the hailstorm brewing in Kat’s eyes. Each deep breath Roxy stole from the thick air weighing heavy on her conscience, she decided the woman across from her may not be near as acceptable to have around when she’d been challenged. Kat McDonald wasn’t wearing melancholy well at all. Piss and vinegar was a much better look for her.

  Maybe if Roxy had befriended her first, Kat could have accepted Roxy’s brevity. But the two of them had barely made it past acquaintance level. Lousy timing perhaps, Roxy thought. But she’d never claimed to have patience. It wasn’t a virtue in the Vaughn genes.

  “All right, Roxy. You win.” Kat re-pressed the table linens with her hands, applying enough pressure her knuckles turned from red to white. “I’ve got to talk to someone about this who won’t share it with the Belle Meade set. You’ll do. You haven’t made any friends to gossip with, and I would imagine your upbringing taught you the value of appearances.”

  Roxy wanted to respond to the friendless upbringing part but Kat’s fierce hazel eyes held her motionless. Eyes a shade lighter than her son’s but with the same passionate fire.

  “This goes no further than you and I. Got it?” Kat’s eyes narrowed, commanding Roxy’s promise.

  “Fine. But I don’t think that’s fair to Zayne.” Roxy crossed her arms, attempting to suffocate the fear filling her lungs. She forced herself to exhale in short, punchy intervals.

  “You haven’t as yet endeared yourself to my son or me to concern yourself with his welfare,” Kat said without hesitation. “Not that I might not approve of you…eventually. My critique’s still out.”

  “Fair enough.” Roxy heard herself respond with casual confidence, although she couldn’t force the muscles knotting in her chest to lighten-up.

  She had to give Kat credit for making her own de
als. The woman was tough on multiple levels. That she’d chosen to let Roxy into her field of influence seemed like an accomplishment Roxy could build on. To have a savvy person like Kat believe in her designs and confide in her personally felt foreign but good. Unwanted when Zayne had originally forced it on her. Oddly okay, now that it had happened. Damn, she was overdue for a stint on a therapist’s couch even though she probably didn’t really need one.

  Kat took a less-than-graceful-sized sip from her wine glass.

  “Wine’s good for me,” she said, polishing off what was left. “Okay. I’ve got a small glitch in my health. Actually…it’s my heart.”

  Roxy folded then refolded her napkin, consciously forbidding her hands to shake. “So how big is this glitch?”

  “The doctors are still working on that. I have an appointment a week from Wednesday with a specialist. I’ll know more then.”

  “Would you like me to go with you?” Roxy wasn’t sure what part of her that came from, but it felt right.

  “Yes. That would be nice. Thank you.” Kat reached for the check in an unassuming manner as if she’d been discussing the weather rather than her dire health.

  “I can get that.” Roxy got her bag off the floor underneath the table, rummaging through it for cash.

  “No. It’s on me.” Kat slipped her American Express into the pocket at the top of the waiter’s portfolio. “But when I come into Raeve tomorrow, I’d love a coffee and a brown-bagged breakfast like you had this morning.”

  “You got it,” Roxy promised, thrilled with receiving the amount much easier on her budget.

  “While we eat, we can go over all my ideas for Raeve as well as the details you’ll need to know for the autumn gala.” Kat’s innocent smile didn’t come close to covering up her smug win.