Brody inched along at a snail’s pace so the tired critter didn’t have to do anything but a slow walk. It had been a long day already but Brody would have to wash the bull down, then feed and water him before he could go to the house and stand under a cold shower himself. But he was glad for the time alone so he could collect his thoughts and give himself a severe lecture about Lila.
The business of sorting things out was a lot easier said than done. It was impossible to shake that picture of her big brown eyes going soft when they were so close together in the café. He jumped and hit the gas when his phone vibrated in his hip pocket. He quickly removed his foot from the pedal and gently tapped the brakes to stop. Checking the side mirror, he could see that Sundance was all right.
He worked the phone out of his dirty jeans pocket, checked the ID, and tossed it onto the seat. After five rings it stopped but only for a few seconds before starting again. He slapped the steering wheel and answered the damn phone. If he didn’t, she’d try a half dozen times and then she’d call Kasey to get into the ranch truck to check on him.
Turning the ranch over to him hadn’t meant that she’d let go of the reins completely—not by a long shot.
“Hello, Granny.”
“Where are you now?”
“I’m taking Sundance to the barn to clean him up,” Brody answered.
“Why didn’t you tell me Lila Harris was back in town?” she demanded. “I heard you’ve been at the café flirtin’ with her.”
Brody rolled his blue eyes toward the sky and then quickly blinked when the bright sun nearly blinded him. “I was not flirting. I was just making conversation. With all I’ve got on my plate, when would I have time to flirt with anyone? I barely have time to sleep.”
“That girl is a bad influence, Brody. I hope that café sells real quick and she goes back to whatever rock she crawled out from under. You’d do well to stay away from her,” Hope said.
“Doin’ a little judgin’ there, are you, Granny? Reckon you’d better go to church twice this next week.”
“No, simply statin’ facts.” Her tone raised an octave or two. “And don’t you sass me.”
“Did your gossip sources tell you that she’s a teacher now and she’s only here for the summer?” Brody asked.
Hope’s quick intake of breath told him that she was not pleased. “Are you takin’ up for the likes of her? I thought you’d turned out to be a better man than that.”
“I’m statin’ facts. And I’m almost to the barn with this critter, so I’d better say good-bye. See you at supper?”
“Yes, you will and we will talk more about this, so don’t think the conversation is over.”
Without a good-bye, the phone went dark and he tossed it back onto the seat. He parked the truck in front of the horse barn and got out. When he tugged on the rope to get Sundance started toward the barn doors, the bull balked. He yanked again and Sundance promptly sat down, threw back his head, and glared at him.
“So you don’t want to stay in the barn. I wouldn’t either. It’s hotter in there than it is out here,” Brody said. “How about we put you in the corral for a couple or three days until you get over nearly going into a full-fledged stroke?”
Sundance lowered his massive head and took a step. Brody got back in the truck and moved around the barn to the attached corral. This time when he undid the rope, Sundance followed him like a puppy on a leash into the corral.
“I’ll get the water hose goin’ and get you cleaned off and cooled down. Then we’ll fill the tank and bust open a bale of hay for you,” Brody said as he shut the gate and locked it. He whipped off his cowboy hat, pulled out a bandana, and wiped the sweat from his brow. When he’d finished, he settled his hat toward the back of his head and stuffed the bandana back in his hip pocket.
Normally, old Sundance had a little mean streak in him but that day he didn’t even flinch when Brody hosed him down. “It don’t take much of that wallowin’ in the mud to wear a guy out, does it? You never knew Lila Harris before she left, but she’s a force like you are. Full of spit and vinegar, and God help anyone who ever gets in her way. But underneath all that bluster, she’s got a soft heart of the purest gold. I was such a fool not to stick up for her and tell everyone in town to go straight to hell. I damn sure should have kept my word the last night she was in town, Sundance.” He dropped the hose into the watering trough to fill it.
He stared at the water for a long time, lost in the thoughts of what he’d do if he could have a second chance with Lila. Finally he shook his head and exhaled loudly. No use wishin’ for what couldn’t happen. Nowadays he flat out didn’t have time for women—not even Lila. He had a ranch to run and too many people who depended on him for any kind of romance.
While the trough filled, Brody went inside the barn and hefted a bag of feed onto his shoulders. Carrying it out to the corral, he shook his head toward Sundance. “You got it easy, old guy. You just breed the cows and then forget them. But me, I’ve never been able to get Lila out of my mind. Her coming back to Happy is most likely my punishment for being a cocky little shit who didn’t know the best thing in the world when she was standing right in front of him.”
He dumped the feed while Sundance drank his fill of water. The bull snorted and moved to the feed trough.
“That’s all you got to say? Some therapist you are,” Brody said as he looped the hose into a circle and hung it on the rack on the back side of the barn. “You think about what I told you and next time I come out here I expect more than a snotty old snort.”
“Got him in the barn?” Jace yelled from the porch.
Brody was too tired to hop over the fence, so he went through the gate. “He sat flat down and refused to move. Evidently he didn’t like the idea of the barn, so I put him in the corral, washed him down, and fed him. I hope one of those beers is for me.”
Jace held out a can, but Brody got sidetracked when Kasey’s two older kids, five-year-old Rustin and three-year-old Emma, ran across the yard to wrap their arms around his legs. Rustin was all Dawson with his dark hair and blue eyes, but Emma was the image of her red-haired mother, down to the spunky attitude.
“Uncle Brody, where have you been? Uncle Jace got here a long time ago.” Emma was small for her age and her deep, gravelly voice sure did not match her looks and size.
He picked her up and swung her around. “That crazy Sundance got stuck in a mud hole and we had to get him out.”
She squirmed. “Put me down. You stink. Did you get in the muddle puddle with Sundance?”
“Yes, I did.” He set her on the lawn and she ran off in pursuit of a big yellow butterfly. So much like her mother, Emma had stolen his heart from the first time he’d held her in his arms. Someday he wanted two or three daughters and that many sons—when he found a woman to share his life with.
Rustin tilted his head back and stared into Brody’s face. “Someday, I’m going to be a cowboy like you and Uncle Jace and I’m going to stink too.”
Brody ruffled the little boy’s dark hair and smiled. “Don’t get into too big of a hurry, buddy. Be a little kid as long as you can. This adult stuff isn’t easy.”
“Okay, Uncle Brody, but when I’m a cowboy, I’m going to be good help.” He took off toward the jungle gym in the corner of the yard.
Brody sat down on the top step and took the beer from Jace’s hand. “Look at those kids. All that energy at the end of the day makes me jealous.”
“We were like that when we were their age.” Jace finished off his beer and crumpled the can in one hand. “Guess our next job is to fix the fence near the springs so Sundance can’t get out. Wonder why he don’t wade in the water there?”
“It would freeze his balls off.” Brody tipped up the can and swallowed several times before he set it back down.
“Just a heads-up that Granny is in the house with Kasey, and she’s not happy,” Jace said flatly.
“I got a phone call, so I’m not surprised. Who’d have thought that Lila comin’ back to Happy would cause this much crap?” Brody held a mouthful of the icy liquid a couple of seconds before he swallowed.
Jace went on. “Granny is on the warpath. She says it’s my job to keep you away from the café and Lila. That a leopard does not change its spots and Lila is going to lead you straight to hell.”
Brody grabbed the can and finished off the last two swallows of beer. “What makes Granny think you or anyone else can keep me away from Lila or that she’s going to hell?”
Jace’s gray eyes twinkled. “She’ll get over it. To tell the truth, for some fun like we all had in high school, I’d go with you, not try to keep you away from her. We could always depend on her to come up with something crazy.”
The door swung open and Kasey stepped out on the porch with her third child, Silas, slung on her hip. She slipped between them and set Silas on the lawn. The little blond-haired fellow toddled out to the yard and promptly fell on his butt. Brody was instantly on his feet and hurried over to help him.
“Steady now, Silas,” Brody said. “You ain’t quite ready to run just yet. One step at a time.”
Silas gave him a big grin and toddled off in the direction of the other kids. Brody slumped down on the step, resting his back against a porch post. “He sure does look like Adam.”
“I know.” Kasey choked up.
Brody patted her on the shoulder. “Sorry.”
“Hey,” she said, “we can’t stop talking about him. Memories are all I have, even if they do make me sad. Silas is like Adam and I love that.”
A little bit of anger still ate at Brody when he thought about Adam being killed during a military mission. There were evil people in the world who deserved to die—Adam didn’t. He’d had a wife and two kids and Kasey had been pregnant with Silas. Sometimes fate was a bitch.
“So I hear Lila is back in town.” She suddenly stood up. “Emma Grace, don’t you dare hit your brother with that stick.”
“He hit me,” Emma said.
“Did not!” Rustin declared. “I was just spinnin’ around and she got in the way.”
“Then you stop spinnin’ around.” Kasey sighed as she sat back down. “Heads-up, Brody. Granny is making biscuits and cussin’. I’m supposed to watch you like a hawk circling the sky lookin’ for breakfast—her exact words. She says Mama is goin’ to pitch a hissy if you get involved with that girl again.” Most Dawson women were tall and thin, but Kasey was short and curvy and the only one in the family in three generations with curly red hair.
“Again?” Brody asked.
“Hey, the whole family knew you were sneakin’ around with her when y’all were in high school but they thought you’d get over it,” Kasey said.
“I can’t believe they didn’t say anything.” Brody shook his head slowly in disbelief.
“Mama figured if she said anything you’d set your heels like Daddy did.”
Jace opened another beer. “And back then everyone figured you’d go to college and find someone else, that it was just a passing thing.”
“We’ll never know what it was.” Brody frowned. “I’ve got to get a shower before supper.”
“Well, I’m supposed to watch you so…”
Silas stumbled and fell again. Brody was on his feet the moment the little guy’s hands hit the grass. “Easy, cowboy.” He picked the toddler up and righted him. The moment he let go, Silas raised his hands in an attempt to catch a bright orange butterfly.
Brody returned to the porch and eased down on the porch step. “Does that mean you’re going to stand outside the bathroom door while I shower, sis?”
“Hell no! But get ready for some opposition—not from me. God knows I liked Lila. I admired her. But Granny and Mama?” Kasey wiped her brow in a dramatic gesture.
“Later tonight, I’ll get out the binoculars and follow him, Kasey. We can take turns and write down in a little book all about where he’s been. Let’s see—seven-thirty p.m., went to check on Sundance. Eight-thirty p.m., came back to the house and had a beer,” Jace teased.
Brody shot a dirty look toward him. “You going to the Silver Spur with me to keep me out of trouble? Because that’s where I’m going after supper, and if Lila happens to be there, I intend to dance with her,” Brody said.
Kasey raised her hand. “I’d go with you if they’d let me bring three kids with me. I heard that you stopped in at the café and talked to her. Is she still as pretty as she was in high school?”
“Oh yeah,” Brody sighed.
“Well, you’d better not let Granny see you with that look on your face at just the mention of her name,” Kasey said.
“Granny, nothing. Wait until Mama hears that Lila is in town.” Jace rolled his eyes.
“Sweet Lord! I remember those nights when you didn’t come home until thirty seconds before curfew. Mama would rant and rave about you probably being somewhere with Lila Harris,” Kasey said.
“He probably was and I was most likely with him.” Jace grinned.
Brody ran a hand down his face. “This is worse than being in junior high all over again.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” Kasey said. “I feel your pain, brother. I’ll run interference for you as often as I can. Sometimes life throws stuff at us that’s pretty damn hard to endure.”
Brody patted her on the shoulder. She’d been strong at Adam’s funeral, but day after day without him had to be lonely as hell. “I’m going to take a shower soon as I can force my old bones to stand up.”
“Old my butt,” Kasey laughed. “You’ve got a long way to go before you can claim senior citizen’s rights. Back to the Lila thing. You’ll have to suffer the wrath of Mama and Granny if you don’t stay away from the café. They’re in cahoots to get you and Jace both married and settled, and believe me Lila Harris is not in the picture they’re painting for either of you. They want a sweet little ranchin’ woman who will pop a kid out once a year and who attends church at least twice a week and it wouldn’t hurt if she had wings and a shiny halo.”
Jace’s gray eyes popped wide open. “Hey, now! That’s not even funny. I’m not ready for a wife or kids. Right now I just want to be your kids’ favorite uncle. Thinkin’ of marriage gives me hives,” Jace said. “Granny ain’t out kickin’ the bushes for a wife for me, is she?”
“She was actin’ strange,” Kasey answered.
“How so?” Jace asked.
“Well, first she was cussin’ about Lila. Then next thing I knew, she was askin’ about Henry Thomas.”
“Really? Why?” Brody rushed out to remove a handful of petunia blossoms from Silas’s hand. “They might be pretty, buddy, but they’d taste awful.” He turned him around and showed him a blue jay in the tree. “If you can catch that bird, you can eat every bit of him.”
“Brody!” Kasey fussed.
“Well, he can.” Brody grinned. “Now what about Henry?”
“Granny got a faraway look on her face and next thing I know she’s wipin’ away tears on her apron tail. Then she went back to cussin’ about Lila was the cause of every bad thing that ever happened in Happy. Hell’s bells! I think she even blamed her for all the businesses on Main Street closing down,” she said.
“It was a tough time everywhere, but none of it was Lila’s fault,” Jace said seriously. “We lost Gramps and Daddy. Henry disappeared and Lila left town. In her mind, it’s all rolled into one big ball. Blaming Lila for all of it would be easy.”
“Seems like Lila’s coming back to town sure stirred up a lot of old memories,” Brody said.
“I can’t imagine why Henry’s disappearance was such a big deal. He told his sister he was leaving. His mama had died, so he wasn’t needed on the ranch next door. I guess it’s the not knowing where he went or what happened to him that worries the gossipin’ folks.” Kasey lowered her voice. “And we all know that Granny and her church buddies keep the rumor mill going.”
“Oh, yes, we do and the gossip vines have been about to dry up lately. This should make them happy. Maybe you ought to flirt with Lila just to give ’em something to talk about.” Jace nudged Brody in the ribs with his elbow.
Brody put a hand on his shoulder and shoved him. “Why don’t you help me out and do something crazy so they’ll have something to talk about?”
“Wouldn’t take the spotlight off you for anything.” Jace popped him on the shoulder in a friendly brotherly slap. “Hey, Kasey, what’s for supper? If our old-man brother will go take his shower, we might get to eat before it gets cold.”
“Barbecued chicken and rice. I made two chocolate pies for dessert and it’ll be ready in”—Kasey checked her watch—“fifteen minutes.”
Brody’s head bobbed once. “That’ll give me enough time for a fast shower. Emma told me that I stink.”
“She’s an outspoken one. Reminds me of another little red-haired girl named Kasey,” Jace said.
His sister’s and brother’s voices faded as Brody headed inside. When he and his siblings had all moved into the house a couple of months before, Kasey took the south wing for her and the children and Jace and Brody each chose a room on the north side. Granny Hope still had a bedroom in that side of the house, but she’d moved her furniture out to the house that the foreman had vacated when he moved away. Located about a quarter mile behind the house, it was where she spent a lot of her time these days.
Brody stripped out of his clothes in his bedroom and padded barefoot to the bathroom. Letting the cool water beat down on his back, he remembered a time when he and Lila had sat under the falls at Hope Springs. The water had flowed down on her dark hair, plastering it to her naked back, and they’d made wild, passionate teenage love right there in the cold water.
He sighed and put away the memories, and after he’d dried off, he remembered to splash on a little cologne so that Emma would be happy with him. He dressed in fresh jeans and a snowy white T-shirt and made it to the table just as Kasey and Jace put the last of the food out.
Slinging an arm around his grandmother’s shoulders, he leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. “I hope you made plenty of biscuits. Ain’t none better than yours.”
“Not even Molly’s down at the Happy Café?” She walked away from him.
“Can’t compare.” He smiled. Usually a hug, a kiss, and a compliment worked, but the frown on her face said that it was going to take a while for her to cool down.
“You smell good now,” Emma said.
“Well, thank you.” Brody dropped a kiss on her red curls. “I wouldn’t want to be all stinky when I read to you tonight.”
Emma sighed dramatically. “It’s not your turn. It’s Uncle Jace’s turn to read me the bedtime story.”
Good Lord, had he lost his touch with all the female population?
“And mine tomorrow night,” Kasey laughed. “Looks like you got all cleaned up for nothing.”
“If I can’t read to the princess, then I’ll read to the boys,” Brody said.
“No, it’s my turn to do that.” Hope set the hot biscuits on the table and motioned for them all to take their places.
Brody slid into the chair to Hope’s right. “Then I’ll just go on to the Silver Spur.”
“You can say grace, Brody,” Hope declared as she sat down at the head seat. Sure, she’d given the running of the ranch over to Brody and Jace but there were some things she didn’t relinquish and the head chair was one of them.
Jace thanked God for the food, family, and life and then said, “Amen.”
“I like it when Uncle Brody says the blessin’.” Rustin handed his plate to his mother. “He don’t have to talk forever like Uncle Jace.”
“Your uncle Brody needs to talk to Jesus more and get God’s opinion on women and bars,” Hope fussed. “I’m not callin’ names but he knows exactly who I’m referring to. When it comes time for him to settle down, he needs a good churchgoin’ woman who knows how to run a ranch and can cook and—”
“And has angel wings and a halo?” Brody quickly finished for her.
Her green eyes squinted into slits and her mouth puckered so tight that it brought on a new set of wrinkles. “Someday I’m going to enjoy saying that I told you so. Don’t come runnin’ to me whinin’ like a baby when you make the wrong choice, because I ain’t goin’ to feel a bit sorry for you. Are you goin’ out with him, Jace?”
Jace put a chicken leg and a thigh on his plate and passed the platter to Brody. “No, ma’am. I got other plans tonight but they don’t have anything to do with one of them angel women, Granny.”
“I like angels,” Emma said.
“I like cowboys. If cowboys go to bars, then I want to go.” Rustin bit into a biscuit.
“Me too.” Emma nodded. “Can I wear my boots, Mama?”
“Girls can’t go to bars, right, Granny?” Rustin frowned at his sister.
Kasey shook a finger toward the kids. “Neither of you is going to a bar. When you’re thirty, you can go with your uncle Brody to the Silver Spur and not before. Now hand me your plate, Emma.”
“Thirty?” Brody asked.
Kasey’s finger turned toward him. “When you have a daughter, you can decide when your little girl can go to a honky-tonk.”
“Forty,” Jace said quickly. “And only then if I go with her.”
“Amen!” Brody agreed.
“Well, you’d better get to lookin’ for someone who can live with your sorry asses because if your daughter is forty, then y’all will be sixty-eight and seventy. And that’s sayin’ you can find a woman in the next year.” Hope slathered a biscuit with butter and laid it on the side of her plate.
“Granny said a bad word,” Rustin singsonged.
“And when you’re twenty-one you can say that word.” Kasey finished helping him with his plate. “For now, you concentrate on eating a good supper and then you can have chocolate pie.”
“And ice cream?” Emma asked.
“If you promise to never set foot in a nasty old bar,” Hope said with another sidelong glance toward Brody.
“Okay.” Emma grinned.
“I’ll just have pie if that’s the way it is,” Brody said. “Or maybe I’ll go by the café before it closes and have a banana split.”
“I can buy that place and burn it down to keep you out of it,” Hope said. “Don’t test me, Brody Dawson. Besides, you’ve got a work load too heavy to be gallivantin’ to town every day.”
“Oh, Granny, we all know that inside that tough exterior is a heart full of love and sweetness.” Brody reached over and laid a hand on her shoulder. “We all love you.”
“To the moon and back,” Emma said quickly.
“I love you the purplest.” Rustin nodded.
“What?” Jace asked.
“It’s a book that I read to him last week about a mother who loves her kids in colors,” Brody explained. “I think we all love Granny Hope the purplest.”
“Oh, hush, all of you.” Hope smiled. “Eat your supper before it gets cold.”