Dax nodded. “It’s no surprise that I second Jackson.”
One down, five more Traubs to go, and Jackson could see by the stubborn expressions on his relatives’ faces that they needed some more persuading.
He pulled out the most powerful weapon he could think of—one that wouldn’t necessarily affect DJ, but one that would strike true at the hearts of his brothers and sister.
“Dad would’ve wanted us to stand up for family,” he said, believing it with all his soul. Although he had been just a kid when his real father had died, Jackson had always lived under the impression that his dad had been noble—that he had been perfect in a lot of ways.
He would have held his children to a high, all-for-one, one-for-all standard, and Jackson had spent a lot of time trying to live up to that. And oftentimes failing.
The rest of the Traubs merely stared at Jackson, as if they couldn’t believe their brother had dared bring up their father’s name in this.
Dillon blew out a breath, as if it would calm down the rest of the room, too. Then he said, “None of us were really old enough to know what Dad would’ve wanted, Jackson. Furthermore, I doubt he would’ve wanted any kind of war, under almost any circumstances.”
Jackson held his tongue. It could be that Dillon was right, but Jackson didn’t want to admit that—it would have meant that he didn’t know much about his father at all.
Rose finally said, “Why don’t we ask the person who’s most affected by this?” she said. “DJ? What do you think?”
Slowly, DJ rose from his chair, his body so tense that Jackson thought he might break apart any second.
“I think,” he said, “that when a man is being attacked, he doesn’t go forward unarmed. But—” he added “—he doesn’t provoke the other side, either. There have got to be ways to counter LipSmackin’ Ribs that don’t include extreme measures.”
Jackson realized that he had fisted his hands on the table, and he loosened them, suddenly remembering his deal with Laila.
No more kicking butt. More…sweetness…instead.
Or not so much that as subtlety.
As the idea permeated him, he realized that this was probably what his real dad would have truly wanted—that honor wasn’t necessarily brought about by the use of fists.
Jackson just wished he knew for certain.
That same day, Laila couldn’t seem to sit at her desk for more than a few minutes at a time.
She just couldn’t get her mind off last night’s date.
And Jackson.
She could really strangle him. One minute, he was wooing her by candlelight in the Gallatin Room, and the next they were in his truck cab, with that soft country song playing and him smelling so good and inching closer to her…
Close enough that she couldn’t have said no to him about anything.
But she had lucked out in that area, she guessed. Again, he had been the one to back off what would surely have been a compromising situation in her parking lot, had any of her neighbors passed by and seen beyond the steamed-up windows. Once again, Laila had been ready for a whole lot more from Jackson than she had gotten.
How weird was it that he was actually somewhat of a gentleman when she—the supposed lady—was hardly acting genteel? Of course, she was sure that this whole act of his was designed to string her along and drive her so crazy that she would hop all over him when he finally decided to stop toying with her, but she rather liked being reeled in like this.
Or was this actually his way of chasing her?
For the next fifteen minutes, she did her best to work, and when she saw Mike Trudeau in the lobby, chatting with some of the tellers who didn’t have customers at the moment, she finally recognized a chance to be productive.
If there was one thing that Jackson had given her, it was that piece of advice about kicking butt.
She smoothed down her forties-style pantsuit and tried not to think about yet another instance when her boss would shoot her ideas down or give her that look that said she was nothing more than someone who should have pursued an MRS degree in college.
Mike Trudeau had wandered over to Dana’s desk, and as Laila’s best friend adjusted her glasses and smiled at her boss, Laila sucked it up, stood from her chair and went out her door.
Kick butt, she kept hearing Jackson say.
She approached Dana’s desk just in time for her friend to push a recalcitrant strand of taboo purple hair back into her conservative ’do before the boss noticed.
“Morning, Miss Cates,” Dana said, tongue in cheek.
Mike Trudeau turned around, all grandpalike in his cable-knit sweater. “Hello, there, Laila. Happy Wednesday.”
It was actually Tuesday, but Laila didn’t correct him. “Morning.”
“I was just telling Dana that I’m off on a trip.”
Dana picked up a pencil, absently winding it through her fingers. “A hunting jaunt for Papa Banker,” she said to Laila.
“I should’ve guessed.” Laila put on her best, most persuasive professional smile and aimed it at her boss.
Kick butt!
“Mike,” she said, “is now a good time to touch base with you before you leave?”
“Well…”
Again, it was Jackson’s Texas round-’em-up voice she heard saying, Don’t let him off the hook…?.
Unwilling to accept no for an answer, she began walking to her boss’s office. When she glanced behind her, just to see if this was working, she saw that he was surprised.
And the look Dana had on her face?
Happy as all get-out. She might as well have been pumping her fist in the air because if Laila had told Dana once about her frustrations at the bank, she had told her a million times.
She made herself right at home in his office, taking a seat, crossing one leg over the other, as polite as possible while he walked inside and waited by his desk.
Not giving him a chance to lead the conversation, she started in. “Did you have a chance to read my latest proposal?”
“I…”
She would take that as a negative.
Then she did something she never thought she would do in her life—she launched right into the nitty-gritty of her idea, selling it as she had never sold anything before.
In fact, she might have even been channeling Jackson Traub and his silver tongue.
When she was done talking about the benefits of loaning more money to the community’s small businesses and homeowners, Mike Trudeau was watching her, a tiny smile pulling up the corners of his mouth.
“Why, Laila,” he said, “I didn’t know you had it in you.”
“These ideas? I’ve laid them out for you more than once, Mike.”
He chuckled, and she could tell he was recognizing that he had been called out.
“I like this,” he said. “Go-gettedness. Now I saw enough in you to recognize that you could run a bank, but you’ve got a lot more going on, don’t you?”
A lot more. More than a face. More than the surface.
She couldn’t help but glow at that.
As her boss finally sat down and started to run some numbers with her, she didn’t stop glowing. It didn’t even diminish when she got back to her office, where, for the first time in her career, she leaned back in her chair, kicked up her heels and rested her fashionable boots on the desk.
What now, though?
Even though it was a quarter to five, she didn’t want to call it a day and go home. Lord Vader, swimming around in his fishbowl, wouldn’t care much about her big victory today.
She thought about asking Dana to go out and celebrate, but then she remembered that her friend was going out tonight with her on-again-off-again boyfriend, a traveling salesman who was in town for a couple of days.
What about her other friends, though?
Laila went through her mental address book, only to realize that just about everyone she used to have girls’-nights-out with were married with children.
That twan
g of yearning blasted through Laila again as she thought of babies…and Cade telling her that maybe they could get married before it was too late.
Here she was, sitting around, not knowing who she could share her good news with. Wishing she knew Jackson well enough to just call him up and say, “Hey—want to hang out? Want to be my friend?”
Friend, indeed. He was nothing of the sort. He wasn’t the kind of guy who would genuinely care about all her long-range plans and successes.
Puzzled that she would even want this from him, she put her feet on the floor. She knew who she could depend on, always and forever. Her family.
Wasn’t it time to finally sit down and talk to Abby?
Laila opened up a desk drawer, took her cell phone out of her purse and called her youngest sister.
Abby answered on the fourth ring. “Hello?”
“Hey.”
Her sister detected Laila’s upbeat mood right away. “What’s going on? Did you win some kind of lottery?”
Laila sighed, wanting so badly to get to the bottom of Abby’s remarks. “No jackpots, just a good day at work.”
“Glad to hear it.”
“And I want to have some fun, too. Celebrate a minor victory with my boss. You want to go to the Hitching Post with me? My treat.”
Abby’s hesitation made Laila think that her sister knew there was an ulterior motive here.
“Abby,” Laila said. “Come on. It’ll be fun. When’s the last time I got to spend quality time with my sis?”
“It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Laila was smiling. “So what do you say?”
It didn’t take long for Abby to respond, and that had to be a positive sign. “Sounds good.”
“All right. I’m going to head there straight from work.”
“Great. And Laila?”
“Yes?”
Abby seemed to rethink whatever she had been about to say. Or maybe she just wanted to say it when they were together.
“Nothing. I’ll see you soon, okay?”
They signed off, and Laila closed her phone, more confused than ever about what she had done to her little sister to merit the standoffish treatment.
And what she could do to make whatever it was better.
Chapter Seven
“Jackson,” said Rose as they left Traub Oil’s office building, “you’d better not be following me.”
“Aw, Rose…” He was always one to take the opportunity to razz his little sis. “You know I live for dogging you during one of your dates. The minute I heard you’d be going out, I knew I’d have to sit across the room from you at the Hitching Post and make threatening faces to whoever it is you’re meeting in such secrecy.”
Not true. He just had a mighty yen for those burgers the Hitching Post sold and wanted to take one home. After the last meeting with the family, he had assured them that he was building up to talking to the manager at the Post one of these nights when he was in, making the case for DJ’s ribs. Jackson was sure that, as a good customer and persuader in general, he might hold some sway.
Rose rolled her blue eyes just before Jackson fell behind her. With her red hair and fresh complexion, she looked much younger than thirty. For some reason, the girl had a real tough time finding the right man, and since coming to Thunder Canyon, she had become determined to discover her Mr. Perfect.
Jackson knew her mission had something to do with how the rest of his siblings seemed to be falling, one by one, to the big bad force known as love, but what was the point?
He pulled on his coat, although this evening wasn’t quite as chilly as last night. “Don’t worry, Rose, I’ll be out of the Hitching Post before you have your date eating from your delicate hand.”
“Oh, I’m sure he won’t be that simple to win over. Besides, we only agreed to meet for drinks, so this isn’t a full-blown date. I’m not sure he’s ready for that yet.”
“Who?”
“Cade Pritchett.”
As Rose went on her merry way ahead of him, Jackson stopped in his tracks.
Pritchett?
Not only was it a surprise that Rose was meeting with the man, but what would happen when Jackson saw him at the Hitching Post? This would be the first time he would be encountering his rival for Laila’s affections since he had “saved” her that one night when Cade had been having that intense conversation with her.
But since Pritchett was going out with another woman—Jackson’s sister, to boot—did that mean he was over Laila?
Now Jackson wasn’t just wondering if there would be any hard feelings between him and Cade—he was also wondering whether the man was going to end up breaking his little sister’s heart if he was still interested in Laila.
Those were definitely good enough reasons in and of themselves to still go to the bar and grill. Yet there was also something else pushing Jackson to continue on his way there.
If his real father was looking down on him at this very moment, he might be proud not only of how Jackson was coming to terms with handling the rib war, but that he wanted to smooth things over with Cade—and he would do it while looking out for Rose as well.
Shoving his hands into his pockets, he let his sister walk alone, trailing far enough behind her so that she would have time to settle into her date at the tavern.
When he walked into the bar area, the place was bustling with activity—waitresses fulfilling Happy Hour orders, townsfolk huddled over the bar tables, the sound of utensils and the low murmur of the jukebox.
Rose and Cade were already at a small table. When she spied Jackson, she narrowed her eyes in a “You never listen, anyway” manner, then gave an accepting wave.
Cade turned around to see who she was greeting, stiffening his spine once he saw it was Jackson.
A decent man would go right on over to say hi, to let Cade know that there was no reason to nurse any hard feelings because of the situation with Laila. More importantly, though, a decent man would let Pritchett know that he was being watched, just in case he was merely stringing Rose along.
This one’s for you, Dad, Jackson thought, sauntering over to their table.
Rose greeted him first. “This is why I love small towns—no privacy whatsoever.”
Jackson extended his hand to her date. “Cade.”
He accepted the handshake. “Traub.”
Although Pritchett offered nothing more than that, he nodded at Jackson, and Jackson got the feeling that Cade just wanted this awkwardness between them to be over and done with.
Did that mean Pritchett didn’t mind that Jackson had gone out with Laila a time or two? Had he decided to move on?
Jackson sent a gauging look to Rose, who was clearly ready to resume the date.
“Have fun, you two,” Jackson said, tipping his hat. “Not too much fun, though.”
“Scram,” Rose said, grinning.
Jackson chuckled, glad to see that Cade was wearing something of a grin, too.
He retreated to the bar, where there was only one space open, between an elderly cowpoke and a middle-aged man who had his back to Jackson while he drank wine with a woman Jackson guessed to be his wife.
Unfortunately, the seat was within earshot of Rose and Cade’s table.
But neither of them seemed to notice Jackson with their backs to the bar, a distance between them that was roomy enough to scream FIRST DATE while being intimate enough to let everyone know that they were together.
After asking the bartender if the manager was in tonight—he wasn’t—Jackson gave his burger order and, while he waited, he caught Rose’s voice.
Maybe his attention was even snagged because of one word she uttered in particular.
“You know he’s been seeing Laila,” Rose said in her usual straightforward manner. “Don’t you?”
Laila. Her name echoed in Jackson, reverberating, chiseling away at him in ways he had never suspected could happen.
Pritchett hesitated, as if he’d been caught off bala
nce. But if he had hoped Rose wouldn’t address the elephant in the room, he was dating the wrong girl.
“I’m aware that they’ve been going out with each other,” Pritchett said, somewhat carefully.
“Are you still aiming to marry her?”
Jackson was riveted.
“Now, Rose…” Pritchett said.
“It doesn’t mean you can’t have a drink with a girl, as you’re doing now. I’m only getting a sense of what’s what, Cade. You can’t blame me for not wanting to waste my time.” She paused. “I’m not naive enough to think that you wouldn’t still have some feelings for Laila, even if she turned you down.”
Jackson almost felt what Pritchett must be feeling in his gut—a well-aimed punch from a well-meaning woman.
“I’m here to have fun,” Pritchett finally said. “That’s what you want, too, right?”
“I’m all for it. But I’m not about to embark on a date with a man whose gaze is always on the nearest doorway.”
Pritchett must have had that quiet, thoughtful look on his face that Jackson had seen before, because Rose added, “Do you still have your sights set on Laila, even if you’re here with me?”
When Cade didn’t answer directly, Jackson’s hackles went up—not only for his sister, but because he had earlier misjudged Pritchett. Clearly, he still carried a torch for Laila.
“Rose,” he said, “the truth is that I’m a realist. And I know Laila doesn’t love me, but I want to marry and have a family. I figure a good case of ‘like’ may be better than a passionate relationship that’s doomed to burn out.”
“So you’re just marking time until she comes around?”
“I wish you hadn’t started this conversation.”
“Better now than later.”
Pritchett sighed. “The bottom line is that Laila’s got a lot of common sense, and she’ll get back in touch with it. No one wants to get old by themselves.”
Jackson could almost picture Rose’s stunned expression as Pritchett continued.
“Everyone gets tired of being alone.”
Another beat passed before Rose answered. “Not that tired.”
“Well, I’m to that point, and I’ve been dating Laila a good long time. If I didn’t have to start over with someone else, I’d be satisfied. I don’t want to wait the amount of time it takes to see if I’m compatible with a woman when I already know that’s how it already is with Laila.”
The Hard-to-Get Cowboy Page 9
