Heaven, Texas (8 page)

They pulled to a stop in front of a row of mission style condominiums. Cheryl Lynn leaned closer and whispered something in Bobby Tom's ear.

He scratched the side of his neck. “I don't know, honey. That might be kind of embarrassing with Gracie lookin' on, but if you don't mind, I guess it's all right with me.”

This was too much, even for Cheryl Lynn, and the beauty queen reluctantly agreed that they should call it a night. Gracie watched as he popped her umbrella and held it over her head while he escorted her to the door. In her opinion, Bobby Tom was showing good sense in dumping Cheryl Lynn, although she couldn't imagine why he'd agreed to go out with her in the first place. The beauty queen was opinionated, self-centered, and considerably less intelligent than the source of those crab legs she'd ordered for dinner. Even so, Bobby Tom had treated her as if she were a paragon of womanhood. He was the perfect gentleman with everybody but her.

At the doorway to the condo, she saw that Cheryl Lynn had wound herself around him like a snake around the Tree of Knowledge. Not that he seemed to mind. She pushed her hips against his as if they'd been there before. Although Gracie considered herself a mild-tempered person, quick to make allowances and slow to anger, the longer he took with his good-night kiss, the more she could feel her indignation growing. Did he have to do major oral surgery on every woman he met? He had so many female scalps hanging from his belt he could walk around without his pants and nobody would know he was naked. Instead of wasting time coming up with a new diet pill, the pharmaceutical companies in this country would better serve the female population by producing an antidote to Bobby Tom Denton.

Her anger simmered as she watched Miss Bluebonnet Rodeo Saddle Queen attempt to climb his legs, and by the time he returned to the car, she had worked herself into a stew. “We're going right to the emergency room so you can get a tetanus shot!” she snapped.

Bobby Tom lifted one eyebrow. “I take it you didn't like Cheryl Lynn.”

“She spent more time looking around to make sure everybody noticed who she was with than she did looking at you. And she didn't have to order the most expensive items on the menu just because you're rich.” Gracie was building up a good head of steam as she combined four days worth of frustration into one outburst. “You didn't even like her; that's what made it even more disgusting. You could not stand that woman, Bobby Tom Denton, and don't you try to deny it because I can see right through you. I've been able to see through you from the beginning. You've got more lines than a fisherman. All that malarkey about the CIA and Uzis. And I'll tell you another thing. I, for one, don't happen to believe a word about these alleged paternity suits.”

He looked slightly amazed. “You don't.”

“No, I do not. You're full of balderdash!”

“Balderdash?” The corner of his mouth kicked up. “You're in Texas now, honey. Down here we just call it plain old—”

“I know what you call it!”

“You sure are in a grouchy mood tonight. I'll tell you what. Just to cheer you up, how about if I let you get me out of bed at six o'clock tomorrow morning? We'll drive straight to Telarosa. We should be there for lunch.”

She stared at him. “You're kidding.”

“I'm not such a sorry excuse for a human being that I'd kid you about something so near and dear to your heart.”

“You promise we'll go straight there? No side trips to see an ostrich ranch or visit your first grade teacher?”

“I said we would, didn't I?”

Her crankiness evaporated. “Yes. All right. Yes, that sounds wonderful.”

She settled back in the seat certain of one thing. If they made it to Telarosa tomorrow, it would be because Bobby Tom had decided he wanted to be there, not because of what she wanted.

He turned back to her. “Just out of curiosity, how come you don't believe me about those paternity suits? They're pretty much a matter of public record.”

She had spoken impulsively, but as she thought over what she had said, she became convinced that this was simply another example of Bobby Tom stretching the truth. “I can imagine you doing many nefarious things, especially involving women, but I can't imagine you abandoning your own child.”

He glanced over at her and the corners of his mouth formed an almost imperceptible smile. It broadened as he returned his attention to the highway.

“Well?” She regarded him curiously.

“You really want to know?”

“If it's the truth instead of one of those tall tales you spin for the rest of the world.”

He tipped the brim of his Stetson forward a fraction of an inch. “A long time ago a lady friend slapped me with a paternity suit. Even though I was pretty certain the baby wasn't mine, I had all the blood work done. Sure enough, her old boyfriend was the guilty party, but since he was a born-again sonovabitch, I decided to help her out a little.”

“You gave her money.” Gracie had watched Bobby Tom in action long enough to understand how he worked.

“Why should an innocent kid suffer just because his old man is a jerk?” He shrugged. “After that, word got out that I was an easy mark.”

“And more paternity suits came along?”

He nodded.

“Let me make a guess. Instead of fighting them, you made settlements.”

“Just a couple of small trust funds to take care of essentials,” he replied defensively. “Hell, I've got more money than I can spend, and they all signed papers admitting I wasn't the father. What's the harm?”

“No harm, I suppose. But it's not really fair. You shouldn't have to pick up the bill for other people's mistakes.”

“Neither should little kids.”

She wondered if he was thinking of the tragedy of his own childhood, but his expression was unreadable, so she couldn't tell.

He pushed the buttons of his car phone and propped the receiver to his ear. “Bruno, I didn't wake you up, did I? That's good. Say, I don't have Steve Cray's number. You mind giving him a call and telling him to fly the Baron down to Telarosa tomorrow.” He pulled into the left lane. “All right. Yeah, I thought I'd do some flying when I'm not working. Thanks, Bruno.”

He replaced the phone and began to hum “Luckenbach, Texas.”

Gracie struggled to speak evenly. “The Baron?”

“A classy little turbo-charged twin. I keep it at an airstrip 'bout half an hour from my house in Chicago.”

“You're telling me that you fly?”

“I didn't mention that to you?”

“No,” she said unsteadily. “You didn't.”

He scratched the side of his head. “Shoot, I must have had my pilot's license—let's see.  .  . I guess it's going on nine years now.”

She clenched her teeth. “You own your own plane.”

“Sweet little thing.”

“And a pilot's license?”

“Sure do.”

“Then why did we have to
drive
to Telarosa?”

He looked wounded. “I just had it in my mind, is all.” She dropped her head into her hands and tried to conjure up a picture of him staked out naked in the desert with vultures eating his maggoty flesh and ants crawling in his eye sockets. Unfortunately, she couldn't make the image gruesome enough. Once again, he had done exactly what he wanted without regard for anyone else.

“Those women don't know how lucky they are,” she muttered.

“What women are you talking about?”

“All of them who were fortunate enough to
fail
your football quiz.”

He chuckled, lit up a cigar, and launched into the chorus of “Luckenbach, Texas.”

They headed southwest out of Dallas, driving through rolling pastureland dotted with grazing cattle and shady pecan orchards. As the land grew hillier and rockier, she began to see frequent signs for dude ranches as well as glimpsing some of the local wildlife: quail, jackrabbits, and wild turkey. Telarosa, Bobby Tom informed her, sat on the fringes of the Texas Hill Country, a hundred miles from nowhere. Because of its relative isolation, it had missed the prosperity of towns like Kerrville and Fredericksburg.

In her conversation with Willow that morning, her employer had ordered her to bring Bobby Tom directly to the Lather spread, a small horse ranch located several miles east of the city limits, where they would be doing much of the shooting, so Gracie wouldn't actually see the town until that evening. Since he seemed to know the location Willow had described, Gracie refrained from reading the directions aloud.

They turned off the winding highway onto a narrow asphalt road. “Gracie, this movie we're making.  .  . Maybe you'd better tell me a little something about it.”

“Like what?” She wanted to look her best when they got there, and she reached into her purse for a comb. She had put on her navy suit that morning so she'd look professional.

“Well, the plot for one thing.”

Gracie's hands stilled. “Are you telling me you didn't read the script?”

“I never got around to it.”

She closed her purse and studied him. Why would a seemingly intelligent man like Bobby Tom accept a part in a movie without having read the script? Was he that undisciplined? She knew he wasn't very enthusiastic about the project, but even so, she would, have thought he'd take some interest. There must be a reason, but what could it possibly—

At that moment she was overcome by a horrible suspicion, one that made her feel almost ill. Impulsively, she reached out and curled her hand around his upper arm.

“You can't read, can you, Bobby Tom?”

His head shot around, eyes flashing with indignation. “Of course I can read. I did graduate from a major university, you know.”

Gracie understood that colleges gave their star football players a great deal of latitude when it came to academics, and she was still suspicious. “In what field of study?”

“Playground management.”

“I knew it!” Her heart filled with sympathy. “You don't have to lie to me. You know you can trust me not to tell anyone. We can work on improving your reading together. No one would ever have to know that—” She broke off as she saw the gleam in his eyes. Belatedly, she remembered his laptop computer, and she gritted her teeth. “You're teasing me.”

He grinned. “Sweetheart, you've got to stop stereotyping people. Just because I was a football player doesn't mean I didn't learn the alphabet. I managed to struggle through U.T. with a respectable grade point average and earn myself a degree in economics. Although I'm usually too embarrassed to admit it, I happened to be an NCAA Top Six scholar athlete.”

“Why didn't you say so in the first place?”

“You're the one who decided I couldn't read.”

“What else was I supposed to think? No one in his right mind would sign a movie contract without reading the script first. Even I read the script, and I'm not even in it.”

“It's an action adventure movie, right? I'm supposed to be the good guy, which means there'll also be a bad guy, a beautiful woman, and a tot of car chases. Now that we don't have the Russians to kick around, the bad guy'll either be a terrorist or a drug runner.”

“A Mexican drug lord.”

He gave her an I-told-you-so nod. “There'll be a bunch of fights, all kinds of blood, gore, and cussing, most of it gratuitous, but still protected by the First Amendment. I'll be running around looking manly, and the heroine, movies being what they are, will prob'ly be running around naked and screaming. Am I pretty much on target so far?”

He was right on target, but she didn't want to encourage his slipshod study habits by saying so. “You're missing the point. You should have read the script so you could understand the character you're playing.”

“Gracie, sweetheart, I'm not an actor. I wouldn't have the slightest idea how to be anybody but myself.”

“Well, in this case, you're going to be a drunken ex-football player named Jed Slade.”

“Nobody's named Jed Slade.”

“You are, and you're living on a run down Texas horse ranch you bought from the brother of the heroine, who's a woman named Samantha Murdock. I presume you know that Natalie Brooks is playing the part of Samantha. The people at Windmill feel quite lucky to have signed her.” As Bobby Tom nodded, she went on. “You don't know who Samantha is, though, when she picks you up in a bar and seduces you.”

“She seduces me?”

“Just like in real life, Bobby Tom, so that part shouldn't give you any trouble.”

“Sarcasm just doesn't suit you, sweetheart.”

“Unbeknownst to you, Samantha drugs you when she gets you back to your house.”

“Before or after we do the wild thing?”

Once again, she ignored him. “You pass out, but you have the constitution of an ox, and you wake up in time to see her tearing up the floorboards in your house. The two of you have a big fight. Normally, you could easily overpower her, but she has a gun and you're groggy from the drugs. There's a struggle. Eventually, you start strangling her so you can take the gun away and force the truth out of her.”

“I am not strangling a woman!”

He looked so outraged that she laughed. “In the process, you discover that she's the sister of the man you bought the ranch from, and that he was running drugs for a wealthy Mexican kingpin.”

“Let me guess. Samantha's brother decided to hold out on the kingpin, who had him iced, but not before the brother hid a wad of cash from one of his drug runs under the floorboards of the house.”

“That's where the heroine thinks it's hidden, but it's not there.”

“The kingpin, in the meantime, decides to kidnap the heroine because he thinks she knows where the money is stashed. Old Jake Slade—”

“Jed Slade.” She corrected him.

“Old Jed, being a gentleman in addition to being a drunk, naturally has to protect her.”

“He's falling in love with her,” she explained.

“Which makes for lots of excuses to keep her naked.”

“I believe you also have a nude scene.”

“Not in a million years.”

T
he Lanier ranch had known better days. A cluster of wooden buildings with peeling paint sat on a flat section of land that stretched back from the banks of the South Llano River. Chickens scratched in the dirt beneath an old oak in the front yard. Next to the barn, a windmill with a broken blade turned listlessly in the July heat. Only the well-fed horses in the corral looked prosperous.

The equipment trucks and trailers being used by the film company sat close to the highway, and Bobby Tom parked the Thunderbird next to a dusty gray van. As they both got out of the car, Gracie spotted Willow standing in a coil of cables near a portable generator, where she was talking with a thin, studious-looking man holding a clipboard. Crew members worked near the corral, adjusting large lights set on sturdy tripods.

Willow looked up as Bobby Tom, nearly two weeks late, strolled toward her. He was resplendent in black slacks, coral shirt, and diamond-patterned gray silk vest topped by a charcoal Stetson with a snakeskin band. Gracie waited with a good deal of relish for her sharp-tongued employer to light into him.

“Bobby Tom.”

Willow spoke his name as if it were a sonnet. Her lips curved in a soft smile and her eyes lit up with dreamy pleasure. Her sharp edges seemed to melt away, and as she walked forward, she extended her arms to grasp his hands.

Gracie felt as if she were choking. All the verbal lambastings she had endured came rushing back to her. Bobby Tom was getting a hero's welcome when he was the one responsible for the trouble!

She couldn't stand watching Willow drool on him. As she turned away, her eyes fell on the Thunderbird. Dust streaked its shiny red finish and the windshield was splattered with bug gore, but it was still the most beautiful car she'd ever seen. As frustrating as the past four days had been, they had also been magical. Bobby Tom and his red Thunderbird had transported her into a new and exciting world. Despite the conflicts and arguments, this had been the best time of her life.

She walked over to the catering wagon to fetch a cup of coffee while she waited for Willow to finished worshiping at Bobby Tom's feet. An exotic-looking, dark-haired woman with long silver earrings stood behind the counter. She had heavily made-up eyes, olive skin, and bare tan arms with silver bangles at her wrists.

“You want a donut to go with that?”

“No, thanks. I'm not too hungry.” Gracie filled a Styrofoam coffee cup at an urn.

“I'm Connie Cameron. I saw you driving in with Bobby Tom.” She took in the navy blue suit in a way that made Gracie realize she had once again dressed wrong. “Have you known him for long?”

The woman's manner was less than friendly, and Gracie decided it was better to clear up any misunderstanding right at the beginning. “Only a few days. I'm one of the production assistants. I escorted him here from Chicago.”

“Nice work if you can get it.” Connie's gaze was carnivorous as she watched Bobby Tom in the distance. “I spent some of the best times of my life with Bobby Tom Denton. He sure does know how to make a woman feel one hundred percent female.”

Gracie didn't know how to answer that, so she smiled and carried her coffee over to one of the folding tables. As she took a chair, she forced herself to put Bobby Tom out of her mind and still thinking about her new responsibilities instead. Since production assistants were at the bottom of the totem pole, she could end up working with the prop people, typing crew sheets, running errands, or performing any of a dozen other jobs. As she saw Willow approach, she hoped her boss hadn't decided to send her back to L A to work in the office. She wasn't nearly ready for this adventure to end, and the thought of never seeing Bobby Tom again gave her a sharp pang  .  .  .

Willow Craig was in her late thirties, a woman with the lean and hungry look of an obsessive dieter. She bristled with frantic energy, chain-smoked Marlboros, and could be curt to the point of rudeness, but Gracie still admired her tremendously. She began to stand to greet her, but Willow gestured her back into her chair and .sat down next to her.

“We need to talk, Gracie.”

The brusqueness in her tone made Gracie uneasy. “All right. I'm anxious to hear about my new duties.”

“That's one of the things I want to discuss.” She pulled a pack of Marlboros from the pocket of her peach jumpsuit. “You know that I'm not happy with the way you did this job.”

“I'm sorry. I did my best, but—”

“It's performance, not excuses, that count in this business. Your failure to get our star here on time has been extremely costly.”

Gracie bit back all the explanations that were bubbling to her lips and said, simply, “I realize that.”

“I know he can be difficult, but I hired you because I thought that you could handle difficult people.” For the first time, her voice lost its edge and she regarded Gracie with a trace of sympathy. “I'm partially to blame. I knew you lacked experience in the business, but I hired you anyway. I'm sorry, Gracie, but now I'm going to have to let you go.”

Gracie could feel the blood, draining from her head. “Let me go?” she whispered. “No.”

“I like you, Gracie, and, God knows, you saved my life when Dad was dying at Shady Acres and I was so distraught. But I didn't get where I am today by being sentimental. We're on a tight budget, and there's no room for dead weight. The fact is, you were given a job to do, and you couldn't handle it.” “Her voice softened as she stood up. “I'm sorry it didn't work out for you. If you'll stop by the office at the hotel, you can pick up your check.”

With that, Willow walked away.

The hot sun beat down on. Gracie's head. She wanted to turn her face into it and let it burn her up so that she wouldn't have to face what she feared the most. She had been fired.

In the distance Bobby Tom emerged from one of the trailers followed by a young woman with a tape measure draped around her neck. She laughed at something he said, and he gave her an answering smile so charged with intimacy that Gracie could almost see the girl falling in love. She wanted to yell at her, to warn her it was the same smile he gave tollbooth operators.

Tires squeaed and a silver Lexus peeled into the compound. The driver had barely brought the vehicle to a stop before the door flew open and an elegantly dressed blond-haired woman jumped out. Once again Bobby Tom's face lit up with a lady-killer grin. He ran toward the woman and pulled her into his arms.

Sick at heart, Grade turned away. She stumbled blindly through a quagmire of cables, not paying attention to where she was going, knowing only that she had to be alone. On the other side of the equipment trucks, she saw a shed that rested at a crazy angle next to the hull of a rusted car. Slipping behind the weather-beaten structure, she sagged down in a patch of shade and leaned against the rough wood.

As she buried her head in her hands, she felt all her dreams slip away and despair gripped her. Why had she tried to reach so far above herself? When would she learn to accept her limitations? She was a homely woman from a small town, not some wild-eyed adventuress who could take on the world. Her chest felt as if it were squeezed by a giant fist, but she couldn't let herself cry. If she did, she would never be able to stop. The days of her life stretched in front of her like one of the endless highways they had traveled. She had hoped for so much and ended up with so little.

She had no idea how long she sat there before the squawk of a bullhorn cut through her misery. Her navy suit was much too heavy for the hot July afternoon, and her skin was sticking to her blouse. Rising, she glanced without any real interest at her watch and saw that a little over an hour had passed. She had to get into Telarosa to pick up her paycheck. Nothing could make her stay here any longer, not even her suitcase locked away in Bobby Tom's trunk. She'd make an arrangement with someone in the office to pick it up for her.

She remembered having seen a road sign indicating that Telarosa was only three miles to the west. Certainly she could walk that far and spare herself the indignity of having to beg a ride from someone at Windmill. They could have her job, she told herself, but they weren't taking the few shreds of pride she had left. Squaring her shoulders, she made her way across the field to the road and began to walk along the dusty shoulder.

Barely fifteen minutes passed before she, realized that she had seriously underestimated her stamina. The strain of the last few days, the sleepless nights she'd spent worrying, the meals she'd only picked at, had left her exhausted, and her black pumps weren't designed for walking any distance. A pickup flew by, and she lifted her arm to protect her eyes against the dust. Less than three miles, she told herself. That wasn't far at all.

The sun beat down on her head, and the sky was bleached to the color of bone. Even the weeds along the side of the road looked parched and brittle. She peeled off her damp suit coat and carried it over her arm. Off to her right she caught glimpses of the river, but it was too far away to provide any relief from the heat. She stumbled, but quickly righted herself. As she glanced above her, she hoped the dark birds circling overhead weren't vultures.

Forcing herself to ignore both her growing thirst and the blister her pumps had rubbed on her heel, she tried to decide what to do. Her financial nest egg was pitifully small. Although her mother had urged her to take a larger share of the profits from the sale of the nursing home, Gracie had refused because she wanted to make certain her mother had plenty to live on. Now she regretted not setting aside a little more. She would have to return to New Grundy immediately.

She winced as her ankle turned on the uneven surface but she kept moving. Her throat felt like a tube of cotton, and she was dripping with perspiration. She heard a car coming from behind her and automatically lifted her arm to shield her eyes from the dust.

The car, a silver Lexus, pulled to a stop beside her, and the passenger window slid down. “Would you like a ride?”

Gracie recognized the driver as the blonde she'd seen throwing herself at Bobby Tom several hours earlier. The woman was older than she'd realized, probably in her early forties. She looked rich and sophisticated, as if she drank bottled water between tennis games at the country club and slept with a good looking ex-wide receiver when her husband was out of town. Gracie didn't want to face another encounter with one of Bobby Tom's women, but she was too hot and tired to refuse.

“Thank you.” As she opened the door and settled into the cool gray interior, she was enveloped by the scent of expensive perfume and the lilting music of Vivaldi.

With the exception of a wide wedding band, the woman's hands were free of jewelry, but pea-sized diamond studs glittered in her earlobes. She wore her frosted blond hair in the soft, side-parted pageboy favored by wealthy women, and a belt of hammered gold links loosely cinched the waist of a gracefully cut oyster white sheath. She was slender and lovely, and the faint web of lines fanning out from the corners of her eyes only seemed to make her look more sophisticated. Gracie had never felt dowdier.

The woman at the wheel touched her finger to the button that raised the window. “Are you going into Telarosa, Miss—?”

“Snow. Yes, I am. But, please, call me Gracie.”

“All right.” Her smile was friendly, but Gracie sensed a certain reserve. The wide gold cuff on her right wrist glimmered in the sunlight as she turned down the volume on the radio.

She knew the woman must be curious about why she had been walking along the highway, and she appreciated the fact that she wasn't being pressed for explanations. On the other hand, her personal unhappiness was no excuse to be rude.

“Thank you for picking me up. The walk was a bit longer than I'd thought.”

“Where would you like me to drop you?” Her accent was distinctly Southern, but it carried more of a lilt than a twang. If she hadn't personally witnessed her rescuer throwing herself at Bobby Tom, Gracie would have believed this woman represented everything gracious and civilized.

“I'm going to the Cattleman's Hotel, if that's not too far out of your way.”

“Not at all. I assume you're with the film company.”

“I was.” She swallowed hard, but she wasn't quite able to hold the words back. “I've been fired.”

Several long moments passed. “I'm sorry.”

Gracie didn't want pity, so she spoke briskly. “So am I. I'd hoped it would work out.”

“Would you like to talk about it?”

Her rescuer managed to sound both sympathetic and respectful, and Gracie could feel herself responding. Since she was very much in need of a confidante, she decided that, if she didn't reveal too much, it would be all right to talk about it.

“I was a production assistant for Windmill Studios,” she said carefully.

“That sounds interesting.”

“It's not a very prestigious job, but I'd wanted to make some changes in my life, and I felt lucky to get it. I had hoped to learn the business and work my way up.” Her lips tightened. “Unfortunately, I got tangled up with a self-centered, irresponsible, egotistical, womanizing
bounder,
and I lost everything.”

The woman's head whipped to the side, and she regarded Gracie with dismay. “Oh, dear. What did Bobby Tom do this time?”

Gracie stared at her across the interior of the car. She was so startled that long seconds ticked by before she found her voice.

“How did you know who I was talking about?”

The woman arched one smooth brow. “I've had lots of experience. Believe me, it wasn't hard to figure out.”

Gracie regarded her curiously.

“I'm sorry. I haven't introduced myself, have I? I'm Suzy Denton.”

Gracie tried to sort it out. Could this woman be his sister? Even as the notion flickered through her mind, she remembered the wedding band on her finger. A married sister wouldn't have the same last name.

Her stomach plummeted. That lying snake! And after all his talk about football quizzes.

Fighting dizziness, she said, “Bobby Tom didn't tell me he was married.”

Suzy gazed at her with kind eyes. “I'm not his wife, dear. I'm his mother.”

“His
mother?”
Gracie couldn't believe it. Suzy Denton looked much too young to be his mother. And much too respectable. “But you're not a—” She cut herself off in midsentence as she realized what she'd almost let slip out.

Suzy's wedding ring clicked against the steering wheel as she gave it a hard smack. “I'm going to kill him! He's been telling that hooker story again, hasn't he?”