One Lucky Cowboy (14 page)

   "What would you say about me?" she asked.

   "No fair. I asked first."

   She held out her hand. "Give me your palm."

   He laid his hand in hers. The warmth went all the way to his toes and curled around his heart.

   "Oh great moon, please shine upon this man's hand and tell me his past and future so that he will be a happy little boy," she intoned. Actually she was amazed that she could utter a word with his big hand searing hers. She wondered what it would be like to crawl between the sheets with him, both of them naked as the day they'd come into the world. They'd probably set the sheets on fire so quickly the fire department wouldn't find anything but ashes.

   He jerked his hand away. "I'm not a little boy. I'm a thirty-year-old man."

   "Okay, then I will tell your fortune from what I've learned about you in the few short weeks I've been here. Oh, great moon, please don't bother shining on this man. He's not a little boy and I can't fool him into believing a lie; I'll have to tell the truth," she said.

   "Enough shenanigans already," he growled.

   "Okay then, seriously, here goes. You are kind and considerate—except with me, of course, but then I'm a con artist you have befriended in hopes that I won't steal your ranch or rustle your prize cows. So I don't matter. That's why you argue and fight with me on every issue, including my calling upon the great moon since I don't have a crystal ball."

   A smile tickled the corners of his mouth but he didn't let it materialize. Jane thinking he was kind and considerate was even better than Elaine calling him eye candy.

   "Do you think I'll ever marry? I mean, I am thirty and that's evidently past the prime bull age."

   She stuck out her lip in a pout. "Did the big old blond bimbo say something ugly? Of course you'll marry. Some woman will come along that loves ranching as much as you do, who loves Granny even more than you do, and she'll make you a fine wife."

   Her heart turned to stone at the thought of him with another woman. Why in the hell did she care if he married or not? She couldn't imagine being married to such an egotistical, set-in-his-ways, chauvinistic man.

   "Thank you," he said seriously. "Children?"

   "What about them?"

   "What's your take on my relationship with kids?"

   "You love them. They gather around you like ducks on a pond at the family get-togethers. I'd say you'll be a good father, but you'd best be gettin' on with the job. If you're going to have a big family, you got to remember you won't be eye candy much longer. Pretty soon all your blond curls will fall out and you'll be bald. Your arms will get too short and you'll have to purchase reading glasses. Your prostate will—"

   "Whoa! Your predictions are getting too personal," he said.

   "My turn," she said.

   "For what?"

   "The same thing. You have to tell either my past or future. Since you haven't done too good a job on the past, maybe you'd better stick to the future."

   "Oh, I can do the past. You are the child of a gypsy couple who never stayed in one place more than a month. You are self-educated and on one hand, you'd love roots, but on the other, there's that wandering gypsy blood that keeps drawing you to the next bus station. The future is easy. You'll drift out of here and find another place to light until the itch begins and then you'll do the same thing, because the wanderlust is greater than the desire for roots."

   "You got it," she said.

   "Which, of course, means I didn't come anywhere near it."

   "I wouldn't burst your bubble."

   "Oh, yes you would. You'd just love to prove me wrong," he grumbled.

   Ellen and Nellie joined them on the deck before she could think of a quick comeback. Ellen wore a flowing cotton lounging robe with big roses splashed around the full circle hem. Nellie had on pink seersucker pajamas. Both wore towels turban-style around their heads and carried daiquiris.

   "Want a drink? We'll share. We just didn't want to waste a single drop of these. You ought to marry this girl, Slade. She makes the best daiquiris this side of Cuba," Ellen said.

   "I'll pass on both," Slade said.

   "It's the powdered sugar. Just a teaspoon per recipe to sweeten it up—and I'm glad he passed on both. I'd hate to have to break his heart," Jane said.

"Hmmphh," he snorted.

   "You could do worse. Almost did with that Kristy. How was the Elaine trial?" Nellie asked.

   "Are you the jury?" he asked.

   "Could be. Jane can be the judge. We'll be the jury. Was she all clingy, telling you how handsome you are? Did she try to talk you into coming inside for one more drink at the house? Did she assure you that she was on the pill so you didn't need protection?" Ellen asked.

   "Sounds more like you are the prosecutor," he said.

   "You going to answer?"

   "Your honor, I'll answer one of the questions," Jane played along. "She told him he was eye candy."

   Ellen guffawed. She didn't giggle or chuckle or even laugh. She actually snorted daiquiri out her nose and stomped her bare foot on the wood deck until it looked as if she might start tap dancing.

   "Good God, am I that ugly?" he asked.

   Nellie joined in the laughter. "No, she's that stupid."

   "Why?"

   "I bet she talked about herself all night, didn't she? One little compliment and the rest of the evening was all about her," Ellen said.

   "We need to start a school to teach women how to catch a man," Nellie said.

   "I'm so sure you'd have a line of women beating a path to your door," Slade said.

   "He didn't have a good time, Nellie. That's why he's out here crying the blues to Jane. Bless her heart, she's a sweetheart to listen to him. What he needs to do is beg her to make him a drink, count his losses, and forget the woman. Did you tell her you'd call her?" Ellen asked.

"I did not," he said.

   Nellie pulled a five dollar bill from her pajama pocket and handed it to her sister. "How did you know? You only saw her at the dance for a little while."

   "I can spot one a mile away," Ellen said.

   "What?" Jane asked.

   "A conniving bitch," Ellen answered.

   "Hey, now that doesn't say much for my taste," Slade said.

   "Exactly," Nellie said.

   "But we didn't come out here to talk about you. Although I'm glad you learned something with Kristy and didn't let this conniving bitch take up three months of your time. You are over thirty and it's time for you to settle down," Ellen said.

   "We came out here to tell you that I'm going to Amarillo with Ellen tomorrow morning. Myra and Jeannie are going, too. Jeannie is driving and we're all staying in Ellen's apartment. We're going to shop and party at the senior club she knows about, and we're going to hit a casino on the way. We'll call every night so you won't worry," Nellie said.

   "You can't leave during the busy season," Slade said.

   "Oh, but I can. Jane is familiar with the kitchen. If you get in a bind, she can saddle up and ride with you. She can go to the grocery store on Monday, pick up whatever she needs to do the cooking for the week, and—"

   Jane's mouth dropped wide open. "You're going to trust me with keys to the truck?"

   "Of course, you haven't robbed me blind yet. I don't expect you'll steal my truck while I'm gone—not that you'd be getting such a good deal if you did. The old bucket of bolts is fifteen years old and not worth enough for it to be a felony if you did run off with it."

   "Thank you," Jane said.

   "She can't keep up with the cooking," Slade said.

   Jane pointed a finger at him. "Don't you underesti mate me."

   "Don't come begging me to peel potatoes," he said.

   "I wouldn't think of it. I'd buy instant before I asked you to pick up a paring knife," she said.

   "I can smell instant and I hate them. Don't you dare serve instant potatoes while Granny is gone." He glared at her.

   Ellen and Nellie slipped back into the house and left them to their arguing. They high-fived each other just before going into their bedrooms.

   "The menu is my business. You take care of the ranch and leave the cooking to someone who knows how to do it," she said.

   He folded his arms over his chest. The woman was a fighter, most definitely not a lover. Lord, she'd probably tell him how to make love to her and then tell him he did it wrong if he ever did get close enough to kiss her without getting his lower lip bit clean off.

   "If Granny is gone then you are working for me. If you even bring instant potatoes in this house, I will fire your ass," he said.

   "And the rest of me?"

   "What are you talking about?"

   "The rest of me. If you fire my ass, then it can't work here. Can my hands work or my brain or any other part of my anatomy?" she asked.

   He threw up his hands with a one-word utterance, "Women!"

   "Can't live with us and it's against the law to drown us," she said with only a slight shudder.

   "I'm running for Congress and changing the law," he declared on his way into the house.

   She sat there awhile longer feeling quite pleased with the evening's bickering. It had been fun and she'd found out even more about Slade Luckadeau. She got misty-eyed again at Nellie trusting her with her home, the job of cooking alone, and her truck. She'd been on the Double L less than a month and for the older woman to put that much faith in her was touching enough to bring tears to her eyes.

Slade's bedroom window looked out onto the deck so he pulled the curtain back slightly and watched Jane. She wiped at her eye at one time. Did something in her past make her sad? There was so much he didn't know and suddenly he was interested. Not enough to get involved with her, for heaven's sake, but his curiosity was piqued.

   At first he'd only thought about her in terms of getting rid of her, but Granny trusted her and Slade was slowly changing his mind. Either she was truly on the up and up, or she was the best damn con artist in the world.

   Finally she stretched like a lazy cat on a summer after noon, did a couple of toe touches and in a few moments he heard her padding barefoot past his door. He listened to the shower running and imagined her wrapped up in a towel, sneaking back across the hallway to her room.

   He still couldn't believe his grandmother was leaving the ranch in the middle of the summer. It wasn't like her at all to delegate authority. The kitchen had always been hers and some of the time she laid claim to the hay barn or a new baby calf. Either she'd been bitten by the crazy bug and needed to see a psychiatrist, or else she knew something about Jane she wasn't telling.

   He sat straight up in bed and held his head. Everything had been insane since Jane came into their lives. The peace was gone with the arguments. The routine was askew with her in the kitchen. Kristy had broken up with him. He wasn't willing to give Elaine a second chance. Lord, if only he could catch a lucky break now and then—but he never had and probably never would.

   "She knows something," he said aloud. "Granny knows something and she's not sharing. She knows who Jane Day really is and I don't think Jane is even aware that she does. That's the only way she'd put so much faith in the girl. What in the hell is she hiding?"

SATURDAY WENT FAIRLY SMOOTHLY. NEITHER SLADE nor Jane really thought Nellie would leave with the ladies, but she did. Every time Jane heard a noise that morning, she thought Nellie had changed her mind and come back to the ranch. Slade was so busy making hay that he scarcely had time to think about the issue and figured that Nellie would be there at dinnertime. She was playing a trick to see how he'd take it and simply gone off shopping with her friends. He'd come close to giving half his kingdom, known as the Double L Ranch, to discover what she knew about Jane.

   Jane made lasagna and hot rolls, a corn salad, and cinnamon rolls for dessert. Keep it simple, she kept telling herself. No fried chicken and mashed potatoes would be served that week. Pot meals or casseroles so one person could handle it in the kitchen. After the dinner mess was cleaned up and put away, she did laundry, folded towels, put away linens, and ran the vacuum.

   Just after five o'clock she stepped out onto the deck for a breath of fresh air and noticed the black clouds gathering in the southwest. Lightning split the sky in long, crooked streaks. No thunder followed, so the storm was still miles away. The house phone rang and she trotted back to the den to catch it, thinking it would probably be Nellie telling her that she'd won enough to buy a third world country or at least dinner at Cracker Barrel at the casino.

"Hello," she said.

   "Hey, there's a storm brewing. Marty says the weatherman on the television at his house says it's coming our way. We still got the small square bales on the ground. We can use every hand we can get to put it in the barn before the rain hits. You mind driving a truck?" Slade asked.

   "You got anyone else who can see over the dashboard that can drive?" she asked.

   "I won't beg," he said coldly.

   "I'm not asking you to beg. I can handle a set of hay hooks as good as you can, so if you can get someone's kid to drive, I'll help load. Where are you?"

   "Not far. I've got a pickup ready to unload. Meet me in the barn where the kittens are."

   "I need gloves."

   "Granny's are on a hook inside the back door, right beside her hat. You might want to wear that, too."