Jesse

by Reina Torres

  Sure, easy for that moment, but then what would happen next?

  He was still wondering when she looked up at him, barely visible in the moonlight.

  “Jesse, are you… okay with this?”

  He was missing something. This. This?

  What exactly was-

  “Me, helping your father?” She looked away for a moment, letting out a breath. “I didn’t plan on it. I mean, I mentioned the idea after he was talking about how crazy the books were making him, but I think I should have talked to you first.”

  “You don’t have to ask me before you get a job. I think you’re my father’s new favorite person in the whole wide world.” He had to rethink that. “Well, except for my mother. She’s always at the top.”

  “I can tell,” her voice had softened. “They’re so sweet together.”

  “My mother’s sweet. My father, he’s something else.” He said the words with a smile because it was true and he said the words with the kind of love that happened between a father and the son he was stuck with. “Still, I wouldn’t stop you from helping my father. It’s going to help us all.”

  She looked up at him. “That’s what I want to do, Jesse. I want to help.”

  He shrugged. “Then there’s no problem.”

  He could tell she wasn’t convinced, felt the way she hesitated and wanted to touch the side of her face to sooth her nerves. This… whatever he couldn’t let happen between them… just might turn him inside out.

  “Don’t think for a moment that my father was joking about throwing you a parade when you get things organized for him.” He turned his head and looked at her. “Feeling overwhelmed?”

  Her shoulders shook and he hoped it was from laughter. “How did you know?”

  “I would say it’s because of my father, but I know that you’ve been going through a lot of changes lately.”

  He knew she was laughing when she tipped her face up toward the sky and he could see her face in the moonlight.

  “I like the way you talk, Jesse.” She sighed and reached out a hand toward him but lowered it just as quickly. “You make things seem… possible. Like I have a chance to make this work.”

  “Don’t doubt that,” he looked at her, wanting to make things easier for her, “I bet you could do whatever you set your mind to.”

  “Really?” Her smile lit him up from the inside. “You do?”

  “Sure.” He leaned a little closer, finding it impossible not to. “I’ve seen my dad make grown men back away with a look, but you had him all but ready to adopt you on the spot.”

  That got her laughing and before he could start up himself, she put her hand on his chest and gave him a little nudge.

  “You’d hate to have me for a sister. I’d hog the bathroom.”

  Images of that in his head made him feel like he walked into a brick wall. Yeah, she was right, he didn’t want her for a sister, but not for that reason. He was pretty sure that sharing space with Etta Bradford wouldn’t be a chore. Not in the least.

  Even at that moment, having her close enough to smell her hair and see the shadows of her eyelashes on her cheeks made him only want to get closer.

  Much closer.

  Did she have to smell like sunshine?

  When had his arms felt so empty?

  “Well,” he cleared his throat and managed to step away with some of his nerves intact, “I should get you back to the motel. Unless you want me to take you somewhere else?”

  Some of the laughter in her eyes dimmed and she shook her head. “No… No. I don’t need to go anywhere else.”

  Before he could take her hand, she stepped up into the truck and sat down. He managed to pull himself together enough to hand her the buckle for her seatbelt and watched as she buckled it in.

  When he didn’t move, she turned to look at him. “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah.” He swallowed and he felt his ears clear from a temporary fog. “Yeah, everything’s okay.”

  Jesse closed the door and walked around the front of the truck, looking in through the windshield at her as he went. He finally pulled his gaze away when he reached for his door.

  Everything was okay.

  The problem was that he couldn’t seem to stop himself from wanting it to be better.

  And wanting Etta to be a part of it.

  They managed to carry on a conversation while he drove her back to town. It was barely twenty minutes away, but when the conversation dragged, he couldn’t help but feel as though the drive had lengthened itself, making his nerves tense.

  Etta would answer if he asked a question but her answers were shorter, her words piecemealed out. He knew he’d started it, letting his thoughts push and pull him in different directions when they’d stood beside his truck.

  But it was better this way, he told himself. She was going to work for his father and that meant she might be around for awhile.

  He didn’t want to ruin that by acting on his instincts. He’d seen the pain that his brother’s girlfriend had gone through when they got news that he wasn’t coming back from Vietnam. He’d seen how it tore up Alice’s life and stole her smile.

  His attraction to Etta felt good.

  It felt right.

  But he’d heard his brother say the same things about Alice.

  And he still felt the hole in his heart that Frank’s death had drilled through his chest.

  There was no way he could stand to see pain on Etta’s face that he caused. He wanted to see her smile and laugh and getting involved with him might take that away.

  He couldn’t take care of her the way she deserved when he was sure he didn’t have enough inside of him to share with another person and expand the small circle that kept him going.

  And Etta didn’t need him hurting her heart and adding that pain to what her father had done.

  When they pulled into the parking lot, he could see more cars in the parking lot. Wardrobe and casting had sent some people ahead. They were still looking for extras and bit players and needed people in place for costumes. He shook his head as he slowed his truck through the lot. He’d need to spend more time working now that he had more to do than his already-full plate demanded of him.

  “Wow,” Etta shifted beside him and looked out of the passenger window, “looks like a bunch of people checked in today.”

  “We’re expecting a couple of big trucks coming in tomorrow with costumes and some props that we don’t have on hand. It’s going to be busy.”

  “Yeah,” her voice was softer, more like a sigh than an answer.

  He pulled up behind her car and nodded. It wasn’t right in front of her door, but it was in the light and he was happy that she’d taken his advice.

  “Did you set a start date with my father?”

  Her hand hovered over the seatbelt buckle before she released the clasp and guided it back into its housing. “Uh, yeah. Tomorrow.”

  He turned in his seat and looked at her with his mind already working for a solution.

  “I’ve got some work to do with Randy tomorrow, but if you tell me what time you need to get to the ranch, I’ll pick you up.”

  He saw her hesitate and listened to Jon Denver’s soothing voice on the radio until she turned to him and gave him a hopeful smile that about killed him. “He said I can start anytime in the morning. If you’re busy, I can take my own car.”

  “Do you remember how to get to the ranch?”

  Jesse saw the realization dawn on her face a moment later when she winced. “No.”

  “Then I’ll pick you up at… eight o’clock?”

  “Sure, sure,” she picked up her purse and held it in her lap, “that’s great. But tomorrow, I’ll pay more attention to the drive and then you won’t have to pick me up. I don’t… want to make you work any harder than you already are, Jesse.”

  “Picking you up isn’t work.”

  Her smile startled him. So much like sunshine, he felt blinded and warm all over. “That’s so sweet.”
>
  She reached for her seatbelt and he touched her hand.

  “I’m going to get your door.” He had to turn away to hide from the joy on her face. Something so simple…

  He was out of the truck and jogging around the front of the truck a heartbeat later, trying to tell his runaway heart to relax. Calm down!

  Yeah, like that was going to work.

  Still, he had to try.

  He opened her door and tried to paste a simple smile on his face, but he couldn’t manage any more than the truth. Etta made him happy. Just looking at her made his heart beat fast and his lungs fill full with air.

  She was going to be the end of him.

  Starting with his piece of mind.

  He knew he was supposed to help her down and walk her to her door, but he couldn’t seem to make himself move.

  Nor could he keep himself quiet.

  He wanted to tell her everything he had inside of him and like an idiot, he started talking.

  “I had a brother.”

  “Oh?” She tilted her head to the side, her eyes softer than they had been moments ago.

  “Yeah. An older brother, Frank.” He felt a need to touch her, reaching out a hand, he smoothed away an errant wrinkle on her sleeve. “He was always supposed to be the one running things at the ranch. It was always his dream.”

  She caught his hand between hers and her arm and smoothed her thumb over the back of his hand. “Not yours?”

  Just a simple question.

  One he didn’t really have an answer to.

  Until now.

  The smile that touched his lips was almost childlike in nature. All those years…

  “I’d always thought of it as his. My father would bring us down to watch rehearsals for the film crews and he’d always say, ‘This will always be yours someday,’ but I never thought he was talking about me. He’d always look at Frank when he said it.”

  He turned his hand under hers and shamelessly enjoyed the way her thumb kept sweeping over his skin… his palm now. He was hoping she wouldn’t notice for a while.

  “But that all changed when Frank joined up and headed to Vietnam. Big plans of… whatever, he never really said, but he wanted a bigger paycheck than the ranch could offer at that point. He was in love and wanted to marry. The money he was making, he was going to put it all on a ring and a house.”

  Etta took his hand in both of hers. “And that’s why he’s not here anymore? Something happened to him over there?”

  Jesse swallowed hard, surprised at how easily the tears sprang up even now when he was sure that he’d cried them all out.

  Just the thought of it. Of him.

  Of everything that had happened since.

  “He was there one day. And then he wasn’t.” He felt as if her hands were warming his with just her gentle touch. “By the time they came to give us the official notice, we all just knew. Some of the other families said it felt like the wind just fell out of our sails. Well, the Suttons are a contrary lot sometimes. My mother put it best into words, she said it felt like we’d all lost big chunks of our hearts and we’d been walking around bleeding.”

  Etta squeezed his hand. “And even when you knew why it was happening, probably even when you had him back home, it just felt like it kept right on bleeding.”

  He nodded. It was a damn good description of how lost he’d felt.

  “I felt like that when my mom died. She was always the one who I could talk to. She was the one who gave me comfort. And confidence. When she was gone I felt like the world just stopped spinning.

  “I couldn’t understand how people around me kept… doing all the things they did. Didn’t they understand what was missing from the world?”

  “Exactly. And this is the first big project we’ve had since Frank… since he left us. To say that it’s important to us doesn’t do it justice, but I want this too. I want to make this whole film the start of something new for us. For my family. When this is all done, this isn’t just going to be my dream, Etta. It’s going to be something concrete. That we’re going to build on.”

  A car swung into the parking lot and headlights swept across Jesse’s face, making him step back from the truck. Even though the car didn’t come all the way down to the end of the row, the sudden interruption changed everything.

  Jesse held out his hand and helped Etta down to the ground and he didn’t let go, even when they got to her door. He wasn’t sure what to say. Or if he should say anything after all the talking he’d just done.

  Still, he managed to open his mouth and say something intelligent. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “I’ll see you in the morning.” She used her key and unlocked the door, but didn’t go right inside. “Jesse?” She turned back around, smiling at him.

  He liked the smile on her face. He liked it a lot. “Yeah?”

  “You know, I was kidding about the brother thing. You don’t have to watch out for me. Or see me to my door.”

  “I like looking out for you.”

  Shrugging, she stepped inside and almost had the door closed when he opened his mouth again, maybe hoping to stick his foot all the way in this time. “Etta?”

  She opened the door a little bit more. “Yes?”

  “I’m not your brother.”

  She was gone a moment later, leaving him standing there, confused.

  He shouldn’t have said anything else.

  He should have left well enough alone, but what he should do and what he wanted were starting to get jumbled up and his resolve to keep her at arm’s length from his heart had taken a serious hit.

  A door opened on the other side of the parking lot, closer to the office, and he turned his head instinctually in that direction. He thought it would probably be one of the crew members who was working on the show. Only a couple of rooms were occupied by other folks. A man stepped out of the room and pulled a woman in for a kiss.

  Jesse pulled himself up into the cab and was about to shut the door when he caught sight of the man in the mirror on the side of the truck. Randy Calhoun.

  Randy, who was working on buttoning his shirt.

  Randy, who looked up and caught him looking.

  There was barely any shock on Randy’s face. That Hollywood handsome grin that spread like an oil slick as Randy shrugged and winked as he stepped off into the shadows of the parking lot.

  Jesse cursed under his breath and pulled the door closed. He focused his gaze through the windshield and fought down his frustration with the wannabe cowboy.

  “Just great.”

  He put the truck in drive and headed home hoping he could put the memory out of his mind before morning.

  Chapter Six

  ETTA

  When Jesse’s truck turned off the road and into the parking lot at the Sagebrush Motel, Etta was ready to go. She stepped away from the wall and walked between her car and the red Datsun beside it, she was stunned when she saw Jesse’s mom through the windshield.

  Opening the passenger door, Etta looked up at Caroline Sutton. “Hey there!”

  “Good morning, Etta. Sorry for the change in plans but Mr. Calhoun wanted to get an early start on his training today. I hope you don’t mind that I came to get you.”

  “Mind?” She couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m glad you came.”

  Of the Suttons, Caroline was the one who put her most at ease. Holt’s energetic personality had left her breathless as if she ran for hours and hours and never seemed to quite catch up.

  Jesse’s quiet demeanor should have made him the easiest of the Suttons to be around, but the attraction she felt for him… the way she craved his presence made her feel more unsettled around him than anyone else.

  It was no surprise how easy it was for Etta to spend time with Caroline. It wasn’t just that Caroline was the steady, rock-solid center of her family, she had a sweet personality and gentle demeanor that reminded Etta of her mother.

  Before she’d stumbled onto the Sutton family, Etta was
starting to forget her mother. Thinking of the sweet, gentle soul that had given her life, it was harder and harder to remember her face without looking at a picture of her and at home those had been few and far between.

  Lately, she’d only been able to remember the feeling of having her mother near. A warmth. A happy thought. An aching longing for a reassuring hug, or a hand brushing her hair back from her face.

  Caroline’s warmth and her gentle personality felt so familiar in that way that Etta was happy to spend as much time with her as she could.

  “I’ve been telling Jesse that I’m happy to drive myself, but he keeps telling me he’s afraid I’m going to get lost either on the way to the ranch or on the way back.”

  “Lost?” Caroline’s laughter was magical. “I don’t see how that would happen. You’ve been back and forth with him.”

  “Exactly!” Etta turned toward the driver’s side of the truck and hiked her left knee up onto the bench seat. “Maybe you can tell him to let me drive my car?”

  When Caroline hesitated, Etta’s smile started to fall.

  “Oh no, not you too!”

  “I have no doubts about you, Etta, but if Jesse wants to pick you up and drop you off, I don’t see a problem with that. He’s just watching out for you.”

  “I don’t see what harm I could come to on a,” she looked down at her watch, “twenty-minute drive.”

  Caroline spared Etta a glance before she focused her gaze back out onto the road ahead. “I learned a long time ago that when a Sutton man worries, there’s a good reason to let them worry.”

  “What good is that?”

  “It’s in their bones, dear. They worry and they watch out. It can be a touch ‘caveman’ but it shows they care.”

  Etta sagged against the back of the bench seat. “Well, I could do with a little less worry from Jesse. Every time I get a break I try to go down to the set and look around, but it’s like he has this… this way of knowing when I’m headed down there and he… he stops me.”

  Caroline’s brow furrowed. Etta could see it in the rear-view mirror. “Does he say why?”

  Etta replayed the last time it happened in her head. “No, not really. He just says that there’s a lot of machinery and tools and he’s worried about me stepping in… stepping on something?” She shrugged. “He says he’ll go with me so he can introduce me around, but he keeps putting that off too.”