by Anna Jeffrey
“I fed those jackasses, too,” he said in his clipped way of speaking. “One of them tried to bite me.”
His grouchiness no longer struck dread into her. She was now interpreting it as a sort of cynical sense of humor. She thought she saw his eyes crinkle at the corners. He was teasing her again. “Come on, now. Don’t falsely accuse my little donkeys. Their names are Joe and Jill. They don’t bite.”
“Oh, yeah? I never met a jackass that didn’t bite.” He pushed himself off her pickup door and stood there with his hands jammed against his belt. “I’ve got the steaks thawed out and ready to cook.”
“Listen, I know I got here late. I’ll just get these eggs washed and—”
“No hurry. Do what you have to.” He turned and strode up the stone pathway toward the front door, obviously perfectly confident that she would follow him rather than just fire up her pickup and drive away. That was another of his traits that lured her. That unabashed self-confidence.
He might have said “no hurry,” but she had sensed impatience oozing from his every pore. Still unable to believe she was really doing this, she went back to her pile of clothing. She hurriedly put on her dress clothes again, covered them with clean coveralls and finished handling the eggs in record time.
She had left her purse in the pickup, and inside it was a hairbrush. She climbed into the driver’s seat and dug it out, along with a tube of Frosted Peach lipstick. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a drop of cologne with her. She ran the brush through her shoulder-length do and tried to improve her appearance in front of the visor mirror. In the dim glow from the overhead light, she could scarcely see the mark between her brows, though she was sure the concealer she had applied early this morning had melted away. She let out a breath of resignation. There was nothing she could do about it now.
Before leaving the pickup, she glanced at the brown paper sack of apples sitting on the passenger seat. She had bought them from one of her Lubbock customers for her mom and herself to share. She decided to offer the dozen apples to her host as a gift of appreciation. She doubted he would spend much time in a grocery store, so fresh fruit seemed like a good thing.
Ever the peacemaker, trying to get along, her cantankerous side groused.
“There’s nothing wrong with a kind gesture,” she mumbled.
She dragged the apples from the pickup and carried them with her, rehearsing as she went something clever to say when she gave them to him. She felt as giddy as a schoolgirl on prom night.
She entered the house without knocking, placed her purse on the dining table and headed for the kitchen with the sack of apples. She was barely inside the door when his scent reached her nose. Soap and water and something outdoorsy. His being all dressed up and looking like a movie star was tantalizing enough, but smelling manly and sexy was almost too much for her starved libido. Especially when she looked like a tired old shoe, and felt worse. And she sure wasn’t wearing perfume. She tried to identify his fragrance but couldn’t. It was ridiculous that she couldn’t. She sold fragrances, for crying out loud.
He looked up from fussing with the steaks—two big T-bones lying on a large platter. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey, yourself,” she replied, suddenly self-conscious. She had been in this kitchen countless times, knew where everything in it was stored, but tonight in the sphere of his dominating presence, she felt awkward and out of place. “Uh…remember that smart-aleck remark you made to me yesterday about apples?” She set the brown paper sack on the counter. “Here you go. Fresh from the orchards in Washington State. They just got them in at one of the markets I went to in Lubbock. There used to be a dozen, but I ate one on the way home.”
He stopped, wiped his hands on a towel and came over. He peered into the sack, then back at her and grinned. Now, he was close enough for her to see his square jaws shining from a fresh shave. He did have the most arresting face. Not pretty, but lean-jawed and rugged. The force of his masculinity came at her like a barrage of pin pricks.
“Apples and snakes,” he said. “This might be prophetic.” He chuckled in a way that implied intimacy, as if they knew each other well and shared some secret joke.
Redirecting her attention, she saw a bottle of red wine on the counter, the cork already pulled, sitting beside a bowl of salad. The salad looked to be torn lettuce and tomatoes sliced into thin, neat wedges. She could smell potatoes baking in the oven. His being able to cook steaks was to be expected. Every man she had ever known, especially the studly types, thought he could cook meat on a grill, but a crisp, neat salad and baked potatoes surprised her. “Look at all of this,” she said. “I thought you were kidding about being a cook.”
One side of his mouth tipped into that crooked grin she had first thought was a smirk. “Babe, making a salad and throwing a potato in the oven isn’t exactly cooking. You hungry?”
“Yeah, I am. I mostly got along on Diet Pepsi and protein bars today.”
“And one of my apples?” He grinned, then added, “That fizzy shit’s bad for you, you know. You shouldn’t drink too much of it.”
And wasn’t he bossy? “Hm. I’ll try to remember that.”
“I’ve got something for you, too,” he said, and left the kitchen.
He came back carrying a manila file folder and handed it to her. Having no clue what could be inside, she opened it cautiously…and found an eight-by-ten color photograph of Dulce. It was a stunning shot of the white hen on top of one of the chicken houses, her neck feathers tufted as if she had posed just for Dalton’s camera. “Oh. My. Gosh. It’s Dulce. What a wonderful picture. How did you ever get her to look like this?”
She looked up at him and could almost see his chest swelled. He winked. “Photography’s my business, remember? Look at the others.”
She shuffled through several more photos—another of Dulce, one of Joe and Jill, their heads together and looking like twins staring at the camera; one of a cluster of several of her hens, all in various and striking colors and looking as if they were in a heated gossip session.
“This is so nice of you. I’ve had these chickens for over two years and I’ve never taken their pictures.”
“I would’ve fixed them up with mattes, but I didn’t have the stuff to do it,” he said.
“That’s okay.” She shuffled through the pictures again. “I’m sure I’ve got frames somewhere. I can put this one of Dulce on my desk in my office.” She looked up at him again and couldn’t keep from smiling like a witless fool. “Thank you. Thank you so much.” She turned to leave the kitchen. “I’m going to put them with my purse, okay?”
“Sure. I’ll make us a drink.”
When she returned, a half-gallon jug of Jack Daniel’s and a fifth of tequila sat beside the wine. Also, two double-shot glasses, the saltshaker and several limes. Uh-oh. “Good grief, are we having a party?”
He picked up the tequila bottle and unscrewed the cap. “You could say that.”
“What are we celebrating?”
He leveled a look into her eyes and smiled. “That’s up to you.”
Was he flirting? In spite of herself, she reacted with a giggle. “Me? I hope you aren’t trying to ply me with liquor so—”
“Un-huh. I know what you’re gonna say. I never ply. I just think we’d get along better if you weren’t so uptight. And if we got along better, who knows what—”
She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. “I wasn’t aware I’m uptight.”
He gave another one of those low, intimate chuckles. “See there? What’d I tell you? Darlin’, you’re the most uptight woman I’ve been around in a long time.”
Who wouldn’t be after the way you’ve behaved? she thought.
He reached up and brushed her hair behind her ear, and his touch sent a tingle all the way to her toes. She stared into his eyes, eyes that no longer seemed so angry, but dark with mystery as much as color. Now she knew what it was about his eyes that hypnotized her. They were intuitive; he could read her mind. The
ir gazes held, and for a fleeting second, her insides felt as bare as her outside had been in the egg-washing room.
Was he really trying to seduce her? Was that the game they had been playing all along, from the day of his arrival? Maybe it wasn’t such a far-fetched notion. Since she had mused over how it would be, maybe he had thought about it, too. A little thrill zipped through her, setting off a drumbeat in her heart. A very long time had passed since she had let herself so much as think about intimacy with a man. “It’s my nature to worry.”
His face was close enough for her to feel his breath on her lips and breathe in his scent. His fingers cupped her neck and his thumb gently massaged. She closed her eyes and relished the strength in his hand.
“You know, there’s a cure for all of that tension,” he said, his raspy voice soft and smoky sounding.
She mentally shook herself. Oh, God. This was going way too fast. “Huh. What is it, Valium?” She looked up at him and saw that lopsided grin.
“That’s not exactly what I had in mind,” he said softly.
That funny little ripple squiggled through her belly again. Devil. She drew in a deep breath and stepped back, away from his hand. When he was like this, it would be so easy to just go along with whatever game he was playing. But then, as she almost had talked herself into believing that, instantly he ceased to be Don Juan, as if he was offended that she stepped out of his reach.
“I didn’t know what you might like to drink,” he said. “I didn’t have time to drive clear to Kingdom Come to buy booze. I can’t believe this county’s still dry. This is the twenty-first century, for chrissake. In LA, I buy liquor in the grocery store. On sale.”
He picked up the half-full bottle of tequila and looked at the label. “I found all of this in the cupboard. Must be Lane’s. Unless she started lately, my mom doesn’t drink much.”
His last remarks and his touch had left Joanna feeling so unsettled she could scarcely think, but she didn’t want to look like an unsophisticated ninny. Rather than confess she didn’t drink much, either, she said, “I’ll have what you’re having.”
He poured the two shot glasses full to the brims with tequila, pulled a knife from the knife block, sliced a lime in two and handed half to her. She watched as he licked his thumb knuckle, sprinkled it with salt, then threw back a shot of tequila. He licked the salt off his thumb, and followed with sucking the juice from the lime and a growling noise.
Though she didn’t drink tequila unless it was surrounded by a margarita, she knew many, women as well as men, who drank it just as he had demonstrated. She followed suit. The undiluted liquor slid down her throat and hit her empty stomach with a thud. Her whole body involuntarily shuddered. She gasped and grimaced at the kick, slamming the shot glass back onto the counter with a thunk. She quickly licked the salt off her knuckle and sucked on a lime half. “Oh, my God,” she croaked.
He grinned and picked up the tequila bottle, holding it poised above her shot glass. “The second one will go down easier.”
She was certain her eyes were crossed as she blinked away moisture. “Okay.” I guess.
He poured another shot for her, then one for himself. After she quaffed the second, the alcohol’s warmth began to spread through her system and she felt more relaxed than she had in days. In fact, she believed she liked drinking tequila in this fashion better than she had thought she would. But she had to be careful. Two large drinks of tequila were more liquor than she had consumed at one time since New Year’s Eve nine months ago.
“That ought to get me through grilling these steaks.” He picked up the plate of meat. “Let’s go outside.”
He stopped off at the refrigerator and pulled out a couple of longnecks. He stuffed one in her hands and gave her a wink. Then he proceeded through the back door.
Holy cow. It couldn’t be wise to drink beer on top of tequila. And she sure should be cautious about letting down her guard.
Still, she followed him.
Chapter 17
On the patio, the portable grill usually stored against the wall beside the back door had been rolled out to the middle of the huge limestone-paved square. The CD player that had a home in the kitchen now sat on the windowsill broadcasting Willie Nelson. Plates and silverware had already been placed on the cast-iron, glass-topped table that was tucked just under the patio’s partial roof. Joanna was growing more impressed by the minute. Dalton’s hosting skills were better than hers.
She spotted a slab of plywood leaning against the wall of the house, a long rattlesnake skin stretched and tacked to it. The skin was at least four feet long and a foot wide. “Is that it?”
“Yep. Big sucker,” he answered, fussing with the grill. “If he had struck you, it could’ve been bad. You want the rattles? I put them on the windowsill.” He tilted his head in the direction of the window.
She walked over for a closer look at the cluster of rattles, grateful again that he had been with her for last evening’s visit to the chicken yard. A shiver passed up her spine as the sound of the rattle echoed in her ear and a visual came to her of the hateful thing writhing on the ground. It was frightening even after Dalton had whacked it. She swallowed another drink of beer. “I was so upset, I forgot to say thanks for saving me.”
“Anytime, babe.” She turned and saw him grinning and holding a steak with a pair of tongs. For the first time she noticed he had near-perfect teeth. Before she could say more, he plopped the steaks onto the grate, generating a smoky sizzle. “How do you like your steak?”
“Um, medium.”
As the aroma of charbroiling meat filled the air, her mouth began to water. The lack of real food all day and the alcohol were starting to make her feel loose jointed and ever-more congenial. She sank to a seat at the table and swallowed another swig of beer.
The crickets’ serenade had begun with a rhythmic thrum. At the corner of the house, the bare branches of a giant sycamore tree clattered in a westerly breeze. Wind was almost as constant in Hatlow as time itself. In summer the tree’s canopy shaded the patio and its leaves rustled softly, and Joanna thought of the summer afternoons and evenings she had sat here in the shade with Clova, drinking iced tea, listening to country music on the radio and talking on into the evening. She wondered how many more times they would do that, if Clova would ever be completely well again, or if by this time next year, Farmers Bank would own the Lazy P. “I went by the hospital and saw your mom.”
“And how was Mom this evening?”
“Better, I think. That was nice of you to send her roses. I can’t recall her ever receiving roses from anyone.”
“No big deal,” he replied. “The least a man could do for his mother, right?”
The words came out in a flat tone, devoid of emotion, but she saw a subtle tic in his jaw muscle. She still remembered how confounded he had been yesterday after the ER doctor had told them Clova was too sick not to be admitted to the hospital. Joanna was convinced he cared more than he wanted anyone to know.
She watched his throat muscles as he tipped up the beer bottle and guzzled a long swallow of beer, reminded again of his blatant masculinity. Then she thought of something that, in her own mind, was exceedingly more important than a bouquet of flowers. “And you paid the taxes.”
He gave her a look. “Somebody had to.”
His critical opinion was glaringly evident in his tone and his expression. To avoid those eyes, she glanced down and picked at the label on the beer bottle, choosing her words carefully. “If you hadn’t been willing to do it, I don’t know what might have happened. Our bank isn’t like it used to be. It really isn’t our bank anymore. The people who run it don’t have much understanding or sympathy for the needs of the people in agriculture.”
There. She had revealed she knew of the ranch’s deep problems. She waited for a sarcastic comeback.
“I suppose you could say I’ve got a vested interest,” he said instead. “I don’t want to see my mother homeless, and Lane’s in no shape for
an ass-kicking. Of course, the key to avoid being strung up by your thumbs by a bunch of blood-sucking bankers is not to get in hock to them in the first place.”
Joanna tilted her head to the side and suppressed a sigh of resignation. From what she saw going on around her every day, it seemed that you couldn’t be in the business of farming or ranching without borrowing, at least not in Wacker County. Even if Lane hadn’t been off on whatever trip he had been on for the last couple of years, Clova would still have had to get operating funds from somewhere. All of the ranchers and farmers Joanna knew owed money, either to the credit union or to Farmers Bank. Another thought followed that one: And Suzy Martinez made sure she kept the Joanna’s Salon & Supplies patrons aware of who and how much every time she came in to have her hair done.
“That’s easier said than done,” Joanna said. “Maybe you aren’t aware of what an iffy business ranching has become nowadays. It’s a struggle for even the big operations.” She swallowed another drink of beer. “Clova mentioned the cattle sale. Are you going to be around to get the cows to the sale?”
“I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about it.” He clamped tongs onto the edge of a steak, lifted it and peeked at the underside. “I haven’t been on a horse in a helluva long time, but I guess I could saddle up that gray nag in the pasture and round ’em up and move ’em out.” He chuckled at his attempt at levity. He dropped the tongs onto the empty plate and crossed his arms over his chest. His eyes met hers again. “If I don’t, are you gonna take care of it?”
Her palm automatically flew to her chest. “Me? Well, no.”
“Guess that settles it, then.” He glanced at his watch. “Those potatoes must be ready.”
