A Texas Family

by Linda Warren

  “Are you under arrest?” the boy asked, buckling his seat belt.

  “No, son, this is Jena Brooks, and I’m taking her to her car at my office.” Carson answered before she could.

  “Ah, shucks, nothing fun happens around here,” the boy complained.

  “Jena, the kid who craves fun is my son, Trey, and the blonde cutie is—”

  “I’m Claire—” the little girl jumped right in “—and I’m four years old. My best friend is Chloe. We’re the same age and everything.”

  “Dad, Mr. Walt is taking Kelsey fishing this week and she asked me to go. I said yes. I can go, right?”

  “Don’t you think you should’ve asked me first?”

  “Ah, Dad, it’s Kelsey and Mr. Walt. They’re like family.”

  “We’ll talk about this at home.”

  “Ah, shucks.”

  Jena wasn’t given a chance to get a word in edgeways, and she could see the easy rapport Carson had with his kids.

  “Chloe and Kelsey are Ethan James’s kids.” Carson drew her into the conversation.

  “You were friends way back when,” she said.

  “Yes. And now our kids are friends.”

  How nice that must be to be a part of a long-lasting friendship, like an extended family. She had only her mother and her sister. And a baby she may never see.

  As Carson pulled up to his office, his phone jangled. He reached for it on his belt. “Okay, Harry, I’ll be right there.”

  “The Baxter brothers are fighting at the Rusty Spur,” he said to her. “Do you mind watching my kids just for a minute? It won’t take long. Here’s the key to the office.”

  “But...”

  Carson didn’t hear the but. He quickly got his children out of the car. “You can take them to the convenience store. They can have a drink and a cookie or candy. Tell Ella to put it on my bill. I’ve got to go. Thanks.”

  “But...”

  He backed out and roared off down the highway while she was still stammering. She stared at the two kids who were staring up at her. Now this was a fine mess. She was going to walk into the Willow Creek convenience store, the busiest place in town, with Carson Corbett’s kids. That should set a few tongues wagging. But she was up to the task.

  “Who are you?” Trey asked.

  How did she explain this? She spied the café across the highway. “Do you know Hilary?”

  “Yeah. She makes good sundaes and she always puts two cherries on mine. She’s cool.”

  “I’m her sister. I’m visiting.”

  “Oh.”

  “I’m thirsty,” Claire said. “I want an ICEE.”

  “Dad said you can’t have any more of those,” Trey told her. “It makes your head hurt and then you cry. You like pink lemonade and a chocolate chip cookie.”

  “Yeah.”

  That settled, Jena took Claire’s hand and they walked the twenty or so feet to the store. Trey spoke to several people and they stared at her, but no one said anything. Jena opened the door and they trailed in. That old familiar scent assailed her—freshly popped popcorn. Some things in life just never changed.

  Trey headed for the coolers at the back. “I’m getting a Big Red.”

  Jena looked down at Claire. “You still want a lemonade?”

  Claire twisted in her sandals and stared at her with big green eyes. “Yes, please.”

  Ella was waiting on a customer and then she turned and saw Jena. Her mouth fell open in shock. “Jena, my girl.”

  Back then Ella had always been nice, always trying to help her.

  “Hi, Ella.”

  “Girl, it’s so good to see you.” Ella ran around the counter and hugged her—one of her big motherly squeezes. She had to be in her fifties now but still looked the same as she did the day Jena had left. A little overweight, sometimes cranky, but blessed with a loving personality that benefited everyone in Willow Creek. She had one flaw, though; she loved to gossip. “Are you home for a visit?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hon, you’re a sight for sore eyes. I thought I’d never see you again.”

  “I live in Dallas now. I work for an attorney.”

  “Good for you.” Ella leaned in and whispered, “Did you bring your kid?”

  Jena froze, not expecting that question so abruptly. She licked her suddenly dry lips. “No.” It wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t exactly the truth. It was all she had at the moment, though. As much as she liked Ella, she knew whatever she said would spread through the town quicker than Jena could bat her eyelashes. There would be a lot of questions about her pregnancy, but she wasn’t willing to answer them. Not to protect Asa, but to guard the privacy of her child.

  “Oh, hon, I don’t know why you had to leave town so quickly. Nobody blamed you for what happened to Jared.”

  “I want a lemonade, please,” Claire said, and Ella hurried to serve her customers.

  “Coming up,” Ella said. She reached for a disposable cup, filled it with ice and lemonade from the pink machine, as all the kids called it. After placing a plastic lid on top, she inserted a straw. “I thought of you so often and it breaks my heart to know what you’ve been through.”

  Jena saw Trey coming from the back. “Could you bring me a diet Dr Pepper, please?”

  “Okay.” He swung back to the coolers.

  Jena didn’t want him to hear Ella’s gossip.

  Ella handed Jena the lemonade and she gave it to Claire, who immediately sucked thirstily on the straw.

  “Slowly,” Jena advised. “Or you’ll get a brain freeze.”

  “Hon,” Ella whispered, “what are you doing with Carson’s kids?”

  Jena tensed, but she didn’t let it show. “I had some things to discuss with him and he got a call so...”

  “Get all you can out of ’em, hon. We all believed it was Jared’s baby. No one listened to that idiot Roland. Though the Corbetts have fallen on hard times like the rest of us.”

  No one had ever said to her they knew her baby was Jared’s and it was cruel of Ella to mention it now. She bit her tongue to keep from saying anything. It would only create gossip. And it would do no good to tell her it wasn’t about money. It was about something much more important and Ella would be the last person she’d tell.

  A woman walked up to the counter with a Coke and chips. Ella immediately turned to her. “Hey, Stacey, look, Jena’s back.”

  Jena looked at the girl she’d gone to high school with. Her brown hair was pulled back into a ponytail, her face devoid of makeup, and she’d put on at least twenty pounds. Stacey had been one of the popular girls and she never had much to say to Jena and Jena didn’t have much to say to her now.

  Stacey shouted over her shoulder. “Charla, come here. Jena’s back.”

  A very pregnant strawberry blonde waddled forward. Charla was also one of the popular girls, but she’d always been nice to Jena.

  “My goodness,” Charla said, eyeing Jena from head to toe. “You look gorgeous.”

  “Thank you” was all Jena could say.

  Charla placed a hand on her stomach. “My third one. I feel like a blimp.”

  “You look great.”

  Trey came back with the drinks. “Chocolate chip cookies for everyone?” she asked, trying to get out of the store before they started asking questions.

  Trey nodded and Jena made the order. She reached in her purse for her wallet and paid for everything. No way was she putting it on Carson’s account. She wasn’t sure why that bothered her, but it did. It was important to pay her own way.

  “It was nice seeing everyone.” She put her wallet in her purse and hurried to the door.

  Holding it open for the kids, she heard Stacey whisper, “What’s Carson thinking leaving his kids with her? Her
father killed his brother.”

  “Stacey!” That was Charla.

  “Where’s her kid?” Stacey asked Ella.

  “I don’t know,” Ella whispered back. “She wouldn’t say.”

  “Wonder who it looks like.”

  “Stacey, she can hear you,” Charla said under her breath.

  Jena didn’t wait to hear any more. The gossip didn’t destroy her composure like it used to, but it made her aware that Willow Creek had changed very little. And it made her more eager to continue investigating with Carson. Lamar Brooks wasn’t a killer. She firmly believed that now. Soon everyone would know.

  In seconds they were walking to Carson’s office with their snacks.

  Ella poked her head out the door. “If you need a job, just call me, Jena.”

  “Thanks.” Like when hell has an early frost.

  “Do you need a job?” Trey asked.

  “No, but I worked there as a teenager.”

  “That must have been cool. You could eat anything you wanted.”

  “I had to pay for it.” And she’d had to budget wisely.

  She unlocked the door and they went inside. Trey sat in his father’s chair, and Jena pulled a chair to the desk for Claire. She sat across from them sipping on her drink. Glancing at her watch, she realized Carson had been gone more than thirty minutes. What was taking so long?

  The kids finished their cookies in record time. “What do we do now?” Trey asked.

  Evidently she was supposed to entertain them. Claire sucked on the straw of her drink, and, as Jena watched, Claire’s ponytail came undone and her hair fell all around her.

  “Oh, no,” Claire wailed. “Daddy never does it right.”

  So much for Carson’s claim he had the ponytail mastered.

  “Well, Claire, at least it didn’t happen until we were out of school this time.” Trey laughed.

  Claire brushed the hair from her eyes. “Ponytail bands are in Daddy’s car.”

  Jena picked up her purse. “Let’s see what I have.” She dug around and found her brush. “I can brush it, and I bet your dad has some rubber bands here somewhere.”

  “Can you do hair?” Claire asked excitedly.

  “I can try.”

  “Oh, boy.” She stood on her knees in the chair.

  Jena walked around the desk and started brushing Claire’s hair. It was long, thick and had a slight curl to it. The girlish highlights were to die for, and she’d seen women in Dallas pay a fortune in an attempt to duplicate them.

  “Trey, see if you can find a rubber band in your dad’s desk.”

  Claire twisted her head to look at Jena. “Can you make a French braid?”

  Trey laid his head on the desk and groaned. “Not again.” He lifted his head. “Dad said you had to stop fussing about your hair. You’re driving us crazy.”

  Claire stuck out her tongue at him.

  “I’m going to tell Dad,” Trey warned.

  “You’re a tattletale,” Claire shot back.

  “No arguing,” Jena said. “Did you find a rubber band, Trey?”

  “Yes,” he replied.

  “Please make a French braid,” Claire begged.

  “Okay. Let’s see if I can remember how.” She brushed the long blond hair into her right hand and then gathered the hair from the top into three sections, letting the rest hang loose. As she crisscrossed the strands, she took hair from the right and then from the left and added it into the braid. She gripped it tightly so it wouldn’t be loose and continued all the way down. Trey handed her a rubber band and she tied the end. She looked at her handiwork and smiled. She remembered.

  “What does it look like?” Claire asked.

  She looked around for a mirror but there wasn’t one. “I’ll get my compact from my purse so you can see.”

  Claire touched the braid with her hand. “I got to see. I got to see.”

  Jena opened the compact and held it so Claire could take a peep. “Oh, wow. Wait till I show Daddy.”

  “Thank God that’s settled.” Trey sank back into the chair. “Now what do we do?”

  Jena glanced at her watch. What was taking Carson so long? How did she entertain two kids? She had never been around children that much, but surely she could come up with something.

  “I left my stuff in my backpack,” Trey said. “I can’t play with my Nintendo DS.”

  “Let’s play a game the old-fashioned way,” she suggested.

  “Like what?”

  Since Claire was walking around looking at herself in the compact, Jena took her seat and grabbed a couple of pieces of paper from the desk. “Ticktacktoe. Have you ever played it?”

  “Sure. It’s with x’s and o’s?”

  “Yes.” She drew the grid of four lines and nine spaces. “Wanna play?”

  Trey scrunched up his face. “That’s for little kids.”

  “Okay, smarty-pants, let’s see if you can beat me.”

  “You’re on.”

  They played for a few minutes, and Jena could see Trey was very smart. He focused, paid attention and beat her more than once.

  Out of the blue, he said, “Our grandpa is sick.”

  Jena’s breath caught in her throat and she didn’t respond.

  “He’s had a stroke, and Claire and I help him with his exercises,” Trey went on.

  “Yeah.” Claire put down the compact. “His hands shake and I kiss them to make them better. I love Grandpa.”

  Those were words Jared had never said about his father, but it was clear his grandchildren adored him. Maybe Asa had changed in the past nine years. Believing that, though, might take an act of God because when it came to Asa there was no forgiveness in her soul.

  Claire grew bored and crawled into her lap, wanting to play, too. The little girl felt comfortable in her arms, and she wondered, not for the first time, what her child would have looked like. She often envisioned a brown-eyed girl with Jared’s blondish hair, but she could never make out the features. She just always had a sense her child was a girl.

  “Claire, you don’t know how to play,” Trey complained. “Look at your hair again. Jena and I were playing.”

  “Let’s be nice,” Jena said, even though Claire was scribbling on the grid.

  “She’s making a mess.” Trey laughed in spite of himself.

  Jena laughed, too.

  The door opened and Carson stood there staring at them with a strange expression on his face, as if he was seeing her for the first time. The childish giggles faded away and all she was aware of was the warmth in Carson’s eyes.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “DADDY. DADDY!” Claire jumped out of Jena’s lap and ran to Carson. “Look at me. Jena did my hair. Am I pretty?”

  Carson picked up his daughter, hardly able to tear his eyes away from Jena. She looked so comfortable with his kids—as if she belonged there, which was the craziest thought he’d ever had.

  “Absolutely. You’re my pretty girl.” He kissed her soft cheek.

  “The ponytail bombed again, Dad,” Trey quipped.

  Claire turned her palms upward. “Again, Daddy.”

  Carson saw the teasing light in Jena’s eyes and felt a kick to his heart. He set Claire on her feet. “Trey, take your sister and get in the car. Aunt Fran has already called.”

  Trey bounced out of his seat. “I bet Grandpa’s worried about us.”

  “Yeah.”

  The kids trailed out the door but suddenly stopped. “Thanks, Jena.” Trey waved.

  “Thanks for doing my hair,” Claire called.

  Carson looked at Jena. “I’m sorry I was so late, but I couldn’t call because I don’t have your number. And Hilary didn’t answer her cell.” He pulled out his phone
. “What is it?”

  They exchanged numbers quickly, and Jena asked, “Did you have a problem with the Baxter boys?”

  “They were drunk and fighting over that piece of land their parents left them.”

  “I wasn’t aware the Baxters had passed away.”

  “Mrs. Baxter passed away about five years ago, and Mr. Baxter followed about six months later. They left the house and ten acres to Carl. Roy has a mobile home on the site, and they left him fifteen acres. Since Carl got the house, Roy feels he received more, and when they’re drinking it’s always brought up. This makes the third time this month I’ve had to deal with this. Today they were drunker than usual and started cursing at me. I called the sheriff’s office and waited for a deputy to pick them up. I only had one pair of handcuffs, so I had to sit it out until the deputy arrived.”

  She got up and slipped the strap of her purse over her shoulder. “It’s okay.”

  He thought how graceful her movements were—she kind of had the appeal of a young Jackie O, especially the stoic no-one-will-break-me expression.

  “Though it was a little awkward walking into the convenience store with your kids. The community will be alive with gossip by tomorrow morning.”

  “Sorry. I hadn’t thought of that.”

  Her eyes met his. “I would say don’t do that to me again, but I stopped caring a long time ago about what people think of me.”

  He could see that she had. Nothing and no one was ever going to shake her confidence in herself again.

  “What do you want to do with the leftover drinks?”

  He was completely lost in thoughts of her, and her question went over his head for a brief second. “Oh...I’ll pour the remains down the sink in the bathroom.” He picked up half of a Big Red and half of a lemonade and marched into the bathroom off his office. After emptying the contents, he threw the bottle and cup in the trash. Turning, he stopped short.

  Jena stood in the doorway, a breath away. Her dark eyes were warm, inviting, pulling his senses into an almost forgotten dance. A delicate fragrance that had tempted him earlier clouded his judgment, and the urge to touch her gnawed at his willpower.