Love Drunk Cowboy

chapter 2

Austin inhaled deeply before she opened the front door into the small white frame house and went inside. She hadn’t been there since her grandmother died back in the fall. There had been no need. The tumor wasn’t something they could surgically remove. She’d opted for no treatments and taken her last six months with no chemo. They’d talked every Thursday night and she’d visited Austin twice, both times in Dallas when Austin had trips there.

She’d decided early on how she wanted things done. No funeral. Cremation. No fuss and no need to come to Terral. Pearlita would keep the ashes until Easter. She died on a Thursday and Rye had called. They’d talked every week since then and that had filled the space when she normally talked to Granny. Except Austin thought she was talking to a much, much older man all those months.

The windows had been opened and cool spring breezes pushed the lace curtains out away from the window in the living room. The house had been built the first year Verline and Oscar got married back in 1947 and reflected the simplicity of the times. The living room took up the first quarter of the house with a bar separating it from the kitchen. A short hallway to the left had doors that opened into a small bathroom and two equal sized bedrooms. The washer and dryer were in the garage off the kitchen. It had been years since there was enough room out there to park a car. Now it housed the overflow of Verline’s love for pure old junk.

Austin turned around slowly and took in every nook and cranny filled with stuff. Getting through it all would take every waking hour for the next two weeks. Maybe she should have taken her mother’s offer to come and help her. Barbara would have gone through the place like a whirlwind and in two days it would have all been relegated to the trash bin. Austin wanted to take her time and make decisions about what to keep and what to toss.

“Granny was a junkie of the purest kind,” she mumbled.

Granny’s business desk was in the corner of the living room, back behind the recliner that faced the small television set. A letter bearing her name rested on top of a business checkbook, lying in plain sight on top of an antique desk. The oak chair squeaked when she sat down as if it realized the wrong woman was using it. She recognized the spidery handwriting on the letter as her grandmother’s and held the letter to her chest before she opened it and read,

Hi honey,

If you are reading this then my ashes are floating down the Red River and I’m already sliding down a rainbow or chasing raindrops. I’m writing this today because I know the time is nearing. Don’t know how, but it is, and I don’t want you to cry for me, Austin. Just pick up the reins and run this old ranch like it was the love of your life and it’ll give back to you a hundredfold. The lawyer will come soon and you’ll see just how prosperous good old hard work will make you. But in case you need to take care of business before he gets here, the checkbook will tell you what I pay the hired hands. Felix will tell you how we do business. Rye will help you with anything he can. He’s a damn fine young man and he’s been good to me. Do whatever you want with the farm and the house. I’d love it if I could see what you decide, but I trust you to do what’s best for you. Remember I love you and the times we shared were the highlights of my life… Granny

Austin wept until she got the hiccups. She finally got it under control enough to look through the checkbook, find the amount owed each hired hand from the previous summer, and write out six checks, but when she signed the last one she swallowed hard past the lump still in her throat. Verline Lanier had lived in this little house, less than half the size of Austin’s Tulsa apartment, for the majority of her life. She’d lived in Terral all eighty-three years. Could Austin really sell a lifetime to strangers looking for a good deal at an auction?

“They wouldn’t even realize how many hours Granny spent sitting in this creaky old oak chair or why there’s a chunk out of the corner of the desk.”

Austin rubbed her upper arm at the memory of the summer when she was running through the house and stubbed her toe on a throw rug. It sent her flying into the desk, knocking out a chunk of wood and putting a gash in her arm that required five stitches at the Nocona hospital emergency room. Granny hadn’t even told Barbara and Eddie about it until it was time to send her home. The scar was barely visible, nothing more than a tiny white line that showed up when she had time to get a tan. Barbara had said her daughter would never go to that godforsaken place again and Eddie had said it wasn’t any big deal. Barbara had asked him what he was going to do the next time when it scarred Austin’s face.

Austin’s father had said that they’d hire a damn good plastic surgeon if that ever happened. She didn’t even know what a plastic surgeon was and wondered that day why a doctor would ever work on plastic people.

She went from the desk to the kitchen. The sink was on the right-hand side with a window above it looking out over acres and acres of freshly plowed earth. Cabinets running the length of the west wall with the bar made an L-shaped leg. The refrigerator was on the east wall: one of those old rounded top things that Granny said was irreplaceable because it didn’t circulate air like the new ones, therefore it didn’t circulate odors. Trash can to the right of the refrigerator. Granny said that way the icebox, as she always called it, hid the ugly thing from anyone sitting in the living room. A sugar bowl, salt and pepper shakers, and a bottle of pepper vinegar was arranged in the middle of a chrome-legged table with a red top. Four red padded chairs were pushed up under the table. A ceiling fan above the table was turning, slowly stirring the breeze from the windows into the kitchen.

Red and white checkered curtains hung on the window above the sink with matching ones on the back door window that led out into the garage. Austin stared at that window for a long time, trying to figure out if they’d built the garage years after they’d put up the house, since the door had a window. Probably so, since Granny would have needed a place to store her extra stuff after a few years of marriage. She’d always had a penchant for keeping every single thing that came through the front door.

She started a pot of coffee and opened the refrigerator to find it filled with crates and crates of eggs. She counted twelve with two dozen eggs in each one. That was twenty-four dozen eggs. Why on earth would there be more than two hundred eggs in the refrigerator?

“Easter!” she moaned.

Granny always ordered eggs for the hunt. She’d gotten them from Martin’s Grocery down past the school. It was the only one in town other than the Mini-Mart, a convenience store that also sold gas and diesel.

“What am I going to do with all these eggs? And why are they here? Granny’s been gone six months. Surely she didn’t order them before she died. I’ll call Pearlita and see if she knows who will take them off my hands tomorrow, but right now I’ve got to go to the bank as soon as my hired hands get in here and sign the checks.” She talked to herself as she listened to the gurgling sounds of the ancient percolator.

Her grandmother had hated the newfangled drip machines and had said that they were the beginning of the ruination of decent coffee. Give her a good percolator and plenty of strong dark roast coffee to go in it and they could take all the fancy machines at Walmart and bury them in the nearest landfill or cram them up their asses. She didn’t care which just so long as they didn’t expect her to use one of the gadgets.

A gentle knock on the door brought her back to the present. She motioned for Felix and the other men to come inside. They lined up right inside the door, hats in hands, and waited. She brought the checks over to them and handed Felix the ink pen. He went to the bar and laid his check down, signed the back, and left it lying. The rest of the men followed his example just like they did every Friday.

“Would you all like a cup of coffee? Will the bank know the right place to send the money?” Austin asked.

“We are fine and Miz Verline always took care of it for us so I hope they know what to do,” Felix said.

“Okay. I want you guys to know that I’m not sure what I’m going to do with the place but I appreciate you staying on until I get it figured out. I gave you each a ten dollar raise. Do you want that brought to you or sent home?”

“Please bring it back to us. Our families will be looking for a set amount. We will take care of the rest and thank you,” Felix said, then fired off rapid Spanish to the others.

“¡Este padre!” A wide grin split Lobo’s face.

“He says that’s awesome.” Rye walked right in without knocking. “I forgot to tell you about the eggs I put in the fridge this morning. The grocery store called yesterday and said they were there. Granny had ordered them six months ago so I picked ’em up and stored them in her fridge. Didn’t have room in mine. We’ll color them tomorrow. I’ll be here early. What time do you get up?”

Felix headed toward the door. “Lots of cháchara.” He motioned at all the knickknacks sitting everywhere on every single flat surface in the room.

“What?” Austin asked.

“Cháchara. Junk.” He waved again at it all.

“You got that right.” She smiled. “I’m going to the bank now. I’ll be back as soon as possible.”

“Si. We can take the pickup to town for food when you get back, yes?”

“Did Granny let you do that?”

He nodded and wiped his eyes. “Yes. Once a week on Friday night we go to town and buy food.”

“Then that’s fine.”

“We thank you, Miz Austin,” Felix said.

“How long have you been working here?”

“Forty years. My father was here before me. Estefan and Lobo are my nephews.”

“Then you knew her well.”

He nodded and said on his way out the door, “Miz Lanier was a great lady even if she did like the cháchara.”

“Are you ready?” Rye asked.

She picked up the checks. “What makes you think I’m going to dye Easter eggs tomorrow? I’ve got enough to do without that on my plate too. You can come and get them in the morning and do them yourself, but not before ten.”

Rye didn’t argue but held the door open for her. Her heel sunk into the dirt when she stepped off the porch and he quickly slipped an arm around her waist to keep her from falling. She looked up with those big round blue eyes and he had to stop himself from kissing her right there. It was a crazy feeling: If the woman was drugs, he’d be addicted the first time his lips met hers.

“That was almost a disaster. I guess high heels aren’t any good on a watermelon farm, are they?” She blushed.

“Guess not.” He grinned.

But if they make you fall into my arms, then by all means wear them every single day. I’ll take a chance on the addiction.

He drove back into town, past the cemetery, the watermelon shed, the grain elevator, the school that had had a much needed face-lift, the Baptist church on the left, the community center beyond that with the old boarded-up Methodist church on the next corner, and then the funeral home. On the right was the Church of Christ and the grocery store, then a building that Granny said the Watermelon Jubilee crew had bought to rent out for special occasions like birthday parties and baby showers, and then the Mini-Mart on the left facing Highway 81, with a fire station, a car fixing place, the telephone company, and a café in between. When he reached the highway he turned right and pointed the car to the north.

“It hasn’t changed a lot since I was a kid,” she said.

“People move in and move out. Population stays about the same.”

“Didn’t there used to be a grocery store on the other side of the street? Somewhere about where the fire company is now?”

“That’s right. When I was a kid, my folks brought us over the bridge to the Fourth of July festival. Terral always had the best fireworks show in this area and there was a store there that still sold penny candy and put it in a little brown paper bag.”

If he didn’t look at her, he felt like they were back on familiar ground. Talking about things like they did on Thursday nights but one glance and poof! Every intelligent thought slipped right through his mind and he wanted to touch, taste, and feel. All of which would most likely bring about one reaction and that was a solid slap on the jaw.

“I was here one time for that. We sat in lawn chairs up by the Methodist church and I got all sticky eating cotton candy,” she said.

She looked out the side window at the cattle, the fields of alfalfa, and the barbed wire fence. It was easier if she couldn’t see him; then he was the same man she’d pictured to go with the voice on the phone. An elderly gentleman who was kind enough to oversee her grandmother’s place across the road. How in the hell had she not realized from his deep Texas drawl and his laughter that he wasn’t seventy years old?

He was tempted to drive slower so he could keep her beside him longer but the nine-mile trip to Ryan went fast even at the speed limit. He turned left at the flashing light, made a U-turn at the end of the street, and parked beside the bank. “Here we are. If you’ll wait at the drugstore over there on the corner across the street, I’ll pick you up there when I get my feed and tractor oil.”

He opened his door but she shook her head. “Don’t get out, Rye. I’m able to open a door and shut it all by myself. I’ll get my business done and then wait for you at the drugstore. Do they still have a soda fountain?”

He nodded. “Probably in the same place at the back of the store as it was last time you were here.” He was disappointed. He’d wanted to help her out of the truck so that he could touch her again. Maybe it had been like a flash in the pan: instant, fiery heat that burnt itself out in a few minutes.

The heat in the pickup came close to blowing the windows out, so it was not a flash in the pan, he thought as she slid out the door.

“Then that’s where I’ll be.” She slammed the door shut and walked across the sidewalk into the bank.

He watched her until she was inside the bank and slapped the steering wheel. If he’d parked a half a block away he could have watched that cute little fanny a helluva lot longer.

The lady who waited on her knew exactly what Verline did on Friday with the checks and the transaction went smoothly. She put a twenty and a ten dollar bill in each of six bank envelopes and handed them to Austin.

“We all sure do miss Verline. We always looked forward to seeing her on Friday afternoon. She was an institution in this county and a pillar down in Terral. You going to sell the farm or run it?”

“I’ll probably hang on to it until the end of the season so the hired hands won’t be without work.”

“You are a good woman. I see a lot of Verline in you.”

“Me? Granny always said I looked exactly like my mother.”

“Not in your looks as much as your actions. You move like Verline. She was tall like you and you have her smile.”

“Well, thank you. I take that as a compliment.”

“It’s meant as one,” the teller said.

The drugstore hadn’t changed a bit since the last time she’d been in it and that had been at least fifteen years before. She’d gone there for ice cream with her grandmother the last time she came for a visit. That would have been when she was fifteen. After her sixteenth birthday, her mother and father decided that she would work summers at the dealership. She missed Terral the first year but soon her life was so busy that the years slipped by quickly. She always managed a couple of days at Christmas and maybe two or three scattered quick visits throughout the year, but never a long visit again.

She went inside to find that it had changed very little. The pharmacy part of the store was still at the back on the right-hand side with the soda fountain on the left and a few scattered tables and chairs. A couple of elderly ladies were sitting at one table and waved at her.

“You’d be Verline’s granddaughter, I bet,” one said loudly.

Austin nodded.

“Come on back here and let us buy you some ice cream. We used to meet with her on Fridays right here.”

“I’m Austin Lanier and you are?”

“I’d be Molly and this here is Greta.” The one with the bluer hair pushed a chair back. “What kind are you eating?”

Austin sat down. “Chocolate and a cup of coffee for afterwards. She talked about you two when we visited on the phone.”

Greta held up two fingers. “We sure do miss Verline. We looked forward to our ice cream Fridays with her. She’d tell us stories about the watermelon farm, what all you’d said on Thursday night when you called, and then we’d bitch and moan about our families.”

The lady set a cup with two enormous scoops of chocolate ice cream in front of Austin and patted her on the shoulder. “I loved your granny. She was an independent old gal.”

Austin picked up her spoon. “She did things her way right up to the end. And we did what she wanted even though I’d have liked a real funeral.”

“It’s best to do what she wanted. That way there’ll be no regrets. I’m making a pot of coffee now. I’ll bring out three cups when it’s finished.”

“Verline did do things her way,” Greta said.

Austin changed the subject. “I’m going to have to run an extra hour tonight to get all these calories off my thighs.”

“Ah, honey, you got Verline’s genes. That woman wouldn’t fatten up if she ate six pounds of bacon and a gallon of ice cream a day. She was slim her whole life.” Molly giggled. “Y’all ain’t built for fat cells. But I am. I got a right good relationship goin’ with my fat cells. They’re happy as sailors in a whorehouse when they hear me orderin’ ice cream and I’m happy to keep them that way.”

Austin giggled. “Tell me stories about Granny, since you knew her so well.”

“Honey, we could make your hair stand straight up like them punk rockers on the television set but we made a pact with her long ago that what got discussed in the drugstore stayed in the drugstore. We growed up down in Terral with her and Pearlita. Pearlita married and she and her husband built a motel over at Henrietta because he worked on the railroad part time. Them two never did have no kids but Pearlita took a big shine to one of his nieces who was named after her. You know Pearl. She used to come up to visit when Verline got you in the summertime for those weeks. Then me and Molly, we moved to Ryan when we married, so that kept all four of us pretty close together. We know too many secrets to tell anything much in one Friday afternoon but if you was willin’ to meet us here about two o’clock every Friday, we might forget that we promised we wouldn’t tell secrets,” Greta said.

Austin raised an eyebrow. “Y’all wouldn’t be tryin’ to keep me in Jefferson County, would you?”

Both of them nodded emphatically. “Verline said once you come back and got a taste of farmin’, you’d stay. We’re just hopin’ to make sure you get a good taste.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s what Verline wanted. She always wanted Eddie to love the farm like she did. You know your grandpa wasn’t worth a damn on the farm. He was smart as a tack when it comes to investin’ money but it was Verline who liked farmin’. He wanted to move into a house in town when he got that job for that company that took care of other people’s money up in Waurika, but she wouldn’t have no part of it,” Molly said.

So that’s where Dad got his business savvy and his distaste for farming, she thought.

“She said that she made the money and he took care of it. Then he died and she kept doin’ what she liked and bringin’ in the crops,” Greta said.

No wonder she and Mother didn’t get along. They are just alike.

“You met your neighbor, Rye O’Donnell, yet?” Molly asked.

Greta fanned her face with the back of her hand. “Now that’s a man with a future. Let me tell you, if I was fifty years younger I’d done already have him corralled up in the hay loft and you wouldn’t have a sinner’s chance in heaven of takin’ him away from me.”

“Ah, Greta, you never would’ve had a chance with him. He’s like Mark Chestnut sings about.”

Austin cocked her head to one side. “What is it that Mark sings about?”

Greta’s eyes lit up. “He talks about something bein’ hotter than two rats in heat inside an old wool sock. That’s the effect all of those O’Donnell boys have on the women.” She lowered her voice and her chin and looked up over her wire-rimmed glasses. “Personally, I always thought Rye was the prettiest one of the lot.”

“That’s pretty hot. There’s more of the O’Donnells?”

Greta nodded.

***

Rye whistled all the way to the feed store and told the man there to load twenty gallons of tractor oil in the back of his truck.

“What’s got you in such a good mood today? You break down and buy a new tractor or what?”

“Nothing.” Rye grinned.

“Boy, it’s either a new tractor or a new woman. Ain’t nothin’ else can put a look like that on a man’s face. So is it a John Deere or what’s her name?” the old fellow asked.

Rye’s face lit up even brighter just thinking her name and visualizing her big blue eyes and the way his hands felt when he kept her from falling.

“Might as well spit it out, son. You sure didn’t look like that the last time you came in here all serious. Matter of fact, I ain’t never seen such a spring in your step.”

“I just met her. Don’t want to jinx it by talkin’ about it.”

“I knew it was a woman. A new John Deere might put that look on my face but I’m forty years older ’n you. I’ll tell Randy to load up that oil and you’d best get on home to her. Don’t be lettin’ her out of your sights now,” he said as he walked back through the store and told his son how much tractor oil to put in the bed of Rye’s truck.

Rye signed a ticket and started whistling again before he made it to the feed store door. Damn, she was pretty in that suit, but he bet she’d look like a rodeo queen all dolled up in jeans and a pair of boots. Or a model from Victoria’s Secret in a cute little sky blue silk nightgown with those skinny straps and her dark hair set loose to fall down to her shoulders.

That last visual was set firmly in his mind as he drove past the drugstore, made a right-hand turn, and was three miles down the road toward Terral before he remembered that she was waiting for him at the drugstore. He whipped the truck around in the middle of the road, stomped the gas pedal, and was driving eighty miles an hour when he looked up and saw the flashing lights right behind him. He stomped the brakes, came to a sliding stop in the parking lot of the tiny used car business not two blocks from the drugstore, and slapped the steering wheel.

“Shit! Shit! Shit!” He pushed the button and his window rolled down.

“License and registration, please,” the officer said.

Rye pulled out his wallet and opened the console to find the papers. He handed both to the highway patrolman and waited.

“Mister O’Donnell, do you have any idea how fast you were driving?”

“Yes, sir, I do. It was stupid but I was supposed to pick up my…” Damnation and hellfire, what do I call her? My friend? The woman in the sexy silk nightgown in my dreams?

“Yes?” the patrolman asked.

“I brought a lady friend to town and I forgot her and left her at the drugstore. When I realized what I’d done I was hurrying back to get her,” Rye explained. Even in his ears it sounded stupid.

“I’ll be right back.” The patrolman carried his license and registration back to the black and white car with the lights still flashing.

Rye tapped his foot. He set his jaw and ground his teeth. He rolled his eyes.

Austin was going to be furious that he’d forgotten her. She’d never go anywhere with him again. Granny Lanier would haunt him forever.

“And shit! I forgot to buy feed too,” he mumbled when he looked over his shoulder and saw the oil but no sacks of grain in the back of the truck.

The patrolman took his own good time returning and even when he was beside the truck, he held the papers in his hands for a full minute before passing them back to Rye. “Mister O’Donnell, I ran your license and you haven’t had a ticket in the last three years. Since you were distracted and there were no other cars on the road, I’ve written you a warning, but the next time you’re doing eighty down this road, I will write you a ticket. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir, and thank you,” Rye said.

“Go on and get that woman. You’re probably going to be in more trouble with her than a speeding ticket would be anyway.” The gray-haired fellow chuckled and walked back to his car.

Rye tossed everything over into the passenger’s seat, looked both ways, and pulled back out on the highway. He drove very slowly to the flashing red light, made a left, and parked right in front of the drugstore. He quickly put the registration in the console and his license back in his wallet. When he got out that silly grin plastered itself right back on his face!

“Well, I do declare, speak of the devil and he shall appear,” Greta said when Rye walked into the drugstore. “And ain’t he pretty?”

“Shhhh. You’ll embarrass Austin,” Molly said.

“Hello, ladies, warm day, ain’t it?” Rye said.

“Afternoon, Rye. What brings you to town? And yes, it’s a warm day but it’s goin’ to get really hot here real soon.” Greta pushed her ice cream dish back. “Summertime, it gets hotter than Lucifer’s tail feathers, Austin. By then you’ll be wearin’ Verline’s old overalls and they’ll feel right good especially if you roll up the legs up above your knees.”

“What makes you so happy today? Warm weather?” Molly eyed Rye.

The tips of his ears turned red and he felt the heat, but he couldn’t think of an answer.

Greta looked at Molly.

Molly winked at Greta.

Austin could figure out what was going on between the three of them, so she spoke up. “I know about southern Oklahoma in July.”

And this other heat that gets me from the inside out every time I’m in Rye’s company is something that overalls won’t fix.

“Well, if you stay on, anything under a hundred degrees from the end of July to the end of September means we done got us a cold snap,” Greta said.

Molly slapped Greta’s arm. “Don’t be scarin’ her away.”

Greta grinned. “Don’t drink the water then. If you ever do, you’ll be doomed forever.”

“Why’s that?” Austin asked.

“Tell her, Rye,” Molly said.

“It’s magic. If you drink the water in Terral, you won’t ever be happy anyplace else.”

“I drank it when I was a kid and it didn’t affect me. I even took baths in it.” Austin smiled up at him, careful to blink when she looked down so her eyes wouldn’t fixate three inches below his belt buckle.

“You ready?” Rye asked.

“I am. Felix and the guys will be waiting to go to the store. Next week I’ll buy the ice cream.” Austin stood up.

Rye escorted her to the front of the store with his hand on the small of her back. After the shock in the café and the jolt when he caught her when she stumbled, he wasn’t a bit surprised that his palm felt like it was on fire. Or that the only way he wanted to move it was further down to cup one cheek or up around her shoulders to hug her close to his side so that he could feel more of her body next to his.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Greta whispered loudly. “She didn’t say he’d brought her to town.”

“Shhh,” Molly said. “They’ll hear you.”

“You are right on time. We’d just finished our ice cream,” Austin said.

Rye’s grin got bigger.

The DJ was rattling on about it being Good Friday when she got into the truck. The Friday before Easter; the day she was to toss her granny’s ashes into the Red River. Why on earth had Verline wanted it done that way and in that manner?

She looked around at the town, a little bigger than Terral but not much. Her mother said the first time her father, Eddie, brought her to Ryan she thought all the history books in the world were wrong. The world was not round. It was flat and when they left Ryan they drove off the edge, landed in hell, made a left-hand turn at the Welcome to Terral sign, and drove another two miles out to the place where he grew up. Barbara said that she felt like she’d landed right smack in the middle of a Hee Haw set that day.

“I need to run back by the feed store,” Rye said. He didn’t dare go home without the grain or Kent would never let him live it down.

“Okay,” she said. “Must’ve taken awhile at the tag agency?”

“You know how those things go,” he mumbled. No way was he telling her that he hadn’t even gone to the tag agency. He still had two weeks before deadline on the pickup tag so he’d take care of that another day.

Her cell phone rang when they were backing out. “That’s my mother. How far is it to the feed store? I can tell her to call back.”

“No need. It’s not two minutes from here. You can visit while I run inside and take care of things,” he said.

“Hello,” she said.

“Is it over? Are you okay?” Barbara asked.

“It is and I am. I’ve got a six-man payroll that I’m taking care of today. Tomorrow I meet with the lawyer and start packing.”

“I don’t envy you that job. Verline never threw out a thing. You’ll probably come across school papers that your dad colored when he was in kindergarten down there. God, I hate that place.”

“Well, stay in Tulsa, and I’ll take care of it.”

“That house is as old as God. I swear it is and she wouldn’t move up here even when she got sick. I offered to take care of her, hire the best nurses, send her to a specialist, and have the tumor removed, but she’d have no part of it.”

“I know, Mother. Granny did things her own way right up to and including the funeral.”

“Well, if it overwhelms you, I’m just a phone call away.”

“Thank you and I’ll remember that. I may just pack it all up and put it in a storage unit, then go through a box or two a month until it’s all done. That way I won’t have to make decisions right now.”

“You were always organized. Gotta run. It’s payroll day here too.”

“’Bye, Mother.”

“That was quick.” Rye backed the truck up to the feed store so loading would be easier.

“She just wanted to be sure everything went as planned. I told her that it had.”

As planned, he thought. Not one blessed thing has gone as planned today. From the time I hid behind the willow tree and watched you dump those ashes into the river, my whole life would make Katrina look like a summer rainstorm.

“I’ll be right out,” he said and disappeared down the side of the truck into the store.

The two big glasses of iced tea at the café and the cup of coffee she’d had at the farm plus the two cups she’d had after her ice cream while she talked to Greta and Molly hit bottom and she needed to find a bathroom. She opened the door, slung her long legs out, and walked inside where Rye was signing a ticket on the counter.

“Do you have a restroom I could use?” she asked.

An elderly man looked up at her. “Yes, ma’am. Right back down that aisle and to the left.”

His eyes widened and he looked back at Rye, a silly grin on his face. “Is that what made you forget to buy your grain?”

Rye nodded.

“Well, son, I reckon you done good to remember what your name was when you signed the tickets. I ain’t sure I could if I had that a waitin’ on me.”

Rye chuckled.

“John Deere don’t make nothin’ that looks like that. You better keep her in your sights real good or some other old cowboy will boot scoot her right out from under you,” he teased.

“Yes, sir,” Rye said.

By the time she was finished and had walked back to the front of the store, the feed was loaded and Rye was leaning on the side of the truck waiting for her. She and the older gentleman exchanged waves as she left.

“You need anything else before we go home?” he asked.

Home? That sounded strange. Terral wasn’t home.

“Not a thing,” she said.

The wind kicked up a minor dirt storm right outside of Terral and by the time they reached the farm it had blown enough red dirt around that her cute little Corvette looked like it had gone through the Great Depression dust bowl days. She jumped out of the truck and headed into the house as fast as she could in three-inch spike heeled shoes.

Rye was right behind her. “We’ve got to get the windows down or there’ll be dust in everything. That stuff can get into the smallest cracks. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of them. I know which ones I opened to air the place out for you.” The minute he was in the house he was chasing from one room to the other slamming down windows.

“I wondered if they’d been up all week.” She brushed a coating of something resembling rust-colored baby powder from the front of her black suit.

“House smelled all musty when I came over this morning. It’s been shut up for six months, and other than me comin’ by last week when the guys came from Mexico, no one’s been inside,” he said as he shut the final window in the living room. “Didn’t think about a dirt storm.”

“Well, shhh… crap! My suitcases are in the back of my car. Do you think the dust got in them?”

He held out his hand. “Give me your keys and I’ll go bring them in for you.”

She fished around in her purse until she located them and put them in his hand.

He had to control his breathing when her fingertips touched his palm. Dammit! He was thirty-two years old, not sixteen. He’d been in love. He’d had girlfriends and serious relationships. What was it about Austin Lanier that built a fire in his gut?

Austin removed the envelopes from her purse and laid them on the bar. Then she went to the window and watched his fine looking rear end as he hurried to her car in the dust storm. If he’d walked into her oil company a dozen women would have hog-tied him and carried him off to the nearest broom closet. That brought on a jealous streak that wiped the grin off her face and replaced it with a frown. Sure they’d talked lots of times but she’d only met the man that day. She had no right to be jealous. Maybe he had a girlfriend, a fiancée, or maybe he was just being nice to her because he’d loved her granny like his own grandmother.

He set her suitcases inside the door and shut it behind him, went to the thermostat on the wall, and adjusted it to blow cool air. “It’s too warm with the windows down. We usually have to use the air-conditioner a few hours about this time of year. I still got feed to unload so I’ll be going. Oh, I put the dye for the eggs up on the refrigerator in case you want to do some tonight. But I bet you are too tired to mess with them, aren’t you?”

“I told you I’m not dying eggs. Not tonight or tomorrow.”

“See you later,” he said.

She opened her mouth to argue more but he was gone before she could get a word out. Mumbling all the way about Easter eggs, she hauled her suitcase down the short hallway to her old bedroom. Nothing had changed. It still had a twin-sized bed pushed up against the east wall, a dresser on the west wall, and a fluffy pink rug between the two. A picture of Eddie when he graduated from Terral High School was framed and took center stage on the dresser. One of him and her mother on their wedding day was on the left and Austin’s senior picture on the right. More than a dozen smaller ones were scattered around them. Pictures of Austin at a ballet recital. She picked it up and frowned. She must have been ten because that was the last year she took dancing lessons. The next one she picked up was one of her with her mother and father at her college graduation.

She put the picture back and threw her suitcase up on the bed. In half an hour it was unpacked, her clothes hung up, underpants and pajamas in the one empty dresser drawer, and she was removing her dusty suit jacket that would definitely need a trip to the dry cleaners when she got back to Tulsa.

She heard someone knock on the kitchen door and then Felix yelled her name. She kicked off her shoes and padded barefoot through the living room.

“Hello, come on in. I was in the back of the house. Here’s your money.” She picked up the envelopes on her way to where he stood just inside the door and handed them to him.

“Could I get pickup keys too?”

She unhooked the keys from a rack at the end of the bar.

“Not those. That is Miz Lanier’s fancy new truck keys. The ones on the other side with the red keychain is the old work truck.”

She replaced the keys and picked the other set off the rack. “Where is this new truck?”

“She keeps it in the shed behind the house. The old work truck is parked in the backyard. It is so old the weather and dust storms don’t do much damage.”

“Why don’t you just keep those keys while you are here? That way, if you need something from town you can go get it.”

“Thank you.” Felix grinned.

***

She really meant to take a quick bath in the big claw-footed tub but when she sunk down in the warm water, she groaned and leaned her head back on a rolled towel. She’d forgotten how well her body fit in the tub and just how deep it was. She shut her eyes and a picture of Rye appeared instantly. She snapped them open so fast she swore she could hear the pop.

She was not going to think about that man even if he was the best eye candy she’d seen in months. She lazed in the water until it went cold, contemplated letting part of the water out and refilling it with hot, but didn’t. She stepped out and wrapped a big white towel around her body. She dried her hair, brushed her teeth, dressed in a pair of soft knit pajamas, and opened the door to her grandmother’s bedroom but couldn’t make herself go inside. She had at least five hours before bedtime and she could get a lot done in that time but she was mentally exhausted. She couldn’t face packing a single box or going through even one dresser drawer that day. All she wanted to do was curl up in an easy chair and shut her eyes. On Thursday she’d call the old man, Rye, like she always did and they’d have their usual conversation. But a quick reality check told her that nothing was normal and wouldn’t be again. Granny was gone. She wasn’t coming back. Rye wasn’t an old man. He was a helluva sexy cowboy.

Tomorrow after the lawyer came and went she’d get serious about the business of packing up Granny’s things. She’d done enough for one day. She went to the living room, turned on the television, channel surfed until she found reruns of NCIS, and settled into the worn recliner where her grandmother had always sat.

***

Kent left at five thirty but Rye worked until dark with Austin on his mind all evening. He finally got the tractor in running order and drove his old work truck back to his house. When he removed his shirt and tossed it at the dirty clothes hamper he realized he hadn’t changed clothes after he’d driven Austin to Ryan. His favorite Sunday shirt now had big round ugly oil stains all over the front. He looked down at his jeans and groaned. They’d come from the cleaners just last week and hadn’t even been worn until that day. Now they had grass stains on the knees, oil on the hip pockets where he’d wiped his hands, and a nice two-inch tear down the thigh.

His best boots had weathered a dust storm, waded through a feed lot and the pasture, as well as kicked the tractor wheel more than once. It would take a week to get them back to the shine they’d had that morning when he put them on to go to the cafe.

“What was I thinking?” he said.

He went to the window in the kitchen and looked out across the road at the little white house. The blue light flickering from the living room said that Austin had the television on. What was she watching? Did she like old movies like he did? What would it be like to share his oversized recliner and a bottle of cold beer with her while they watched a movie?

He stood there for a full ten minutes before he went to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. He pulled out a container of leftover lasagna, put it in a pan and slid it into the oven, turned the knobs, and headed for the shower.

It took awhile to get all the oil and dirt from under his fingernails and three shampoos before the water ran clear out of his hair. When he finished he wrapped a towel around his waist and padded back to his bedroom in the far left corner of the house. He pulled the blinds up and looked at the house across the road again. She was still watching television. Had she fallen asleep?

“It’s only eight thirty,” he said. If he dressed in a hurry would it be too late to run over there with the lasagna? There was plenty for two and she probably hadn’t had anything since ice cream in the middle of the afternoon.

He grabbed a fresh pair of jeans from the closet and tossed the towel in the corner. He pulled a knit shirt over his head and took off for the bathroom to see if he needed to shave again. The plague of having dark hair was that a man’s beard was also dark and either he looked scruffy or he shaved every day… twice if he wanted to impress a lady.

He had his nose right up next to the mirror when he got a snoot full of smoke. “The lasagna!” he yelled and rushed into the kitchen.

When he opened the oven a blast of black smoke billowed out and up his nose. He hurriedly turned on the exhaust fan above the stove and opened the kitchen window. So much for taking a late supper across the road. He pulled the smoking pan from the oven and carried it to the deck off the living room where he put it on the picnic table and left the sliding doors open.

He sat down in a lounge chair and put his head in his hands. He’d had more bad luck since he’d met Austin than he’d ever had in his life and still he could hardly keep from inventing an excuse to cross that road to see her again.