What stuck in his brain was “if I stay in Terral.” She must have a few doubts hiding in the shadows of her subconscious to say that, but he would erase them if it took every damn bit of the energy he had left in his body.
“Granny was tall and thin and never watched a thing she ate. A couple of years ago the doctor told her that her cholesterol was slightly elevated and if she’d be careful she might never have to take medicine for it. Know what her response was?”
Austin nodded. “I will eat what I want and die when I’m supposed to.”
He parked the truck and unfastened his seat belt. Turning toward Austin, he ran the back of his hand down her jawline. “I wouldn’t care if Omar did make your clothes.”
Her nose wrinkled in disbelief and she said, “Really?”
“Really.” He leaned in and brushed a soft kiss across her lips. “You’d be beautiful in a burlap bag tied up in the middle with a piece of frayed out rope.”
“I already told you that flattery will get you anything you want, including a bump on the head or bathtub sex.” She quickly unfastened her seat belt and opened the door. She met him in front of the truck and he laced his fingers in hers.
They devoured the first basket of tortilla chips and went through two bowls of salsa before their meal arrived. She was on her second beer when she realized he was still nursing his first one and raised an eyebrow.
He read her expression and held up the mug. “I’m driving. One is my limit. You don’t have a limit.”
“I love this stuff. Never drank it, so it’s not an acquired taste. Must be a dormant gene that’s surfacing.”
“You never drank beer? Not even in college?”
She shook her head. “I always had a martini and my limit was one.”
“When did you have your first one?”
“At your house. My dad loved a good cold beer, but Momma said she wouldn’t kiss him with beer on his breath, so he didn’t drink them often. Guess that’s my dormant gene. Did Granny like beer?”
“Honey, your granny loved beer. Coors was her favorite. That and Jack Daniels, neat. Two fingers.”
“That I knew. It’s pretty damn good, too. I had one yesterday just to see. Granny told me that it was sipping whiskey, not the kind that you throw back down your throat like they did in the old western movies.”
Rye stuffed a flour tortilla with grilled beef, peppers, and onions, added a bit of guacamole and a spoonful of salsa. “She’s right. It is sippin’ whiskey. It’s meant to be savored, not tossed back. Kind of like sex with you,” he teased.
“Then that must be the reason I like it so well!”
***
They talked all the way home just like two old friends but when he parked in the front yard, friendship stopped and something far deeper began. The kisses started at the pickup door with a slow brush across Austin’s lips. They intensified so much with each step that by the time they reached the porch a step at a time, she was panting, he was breathing hard, and red-hot desire could have been written in the stars overhead.
She was pressed against the wall but didn’t break the kiss to reach around behind her, open the front door, and walk backwards into the house. She kicked the door shut with her boot heel and unfastened his plaid western shirt starting at the top and working her way down through three buttons before sinking her hands into all those muscles and groaning.
He slipped his hands under her blouse and whispered, “I love touching you.”
Her lips found his again in the darkness.
He didn’t tell her that he liked a woman her size, that tiny women scared the bejesus out of him. She didn’t tell him that she had never been so turned on in her life or that she didn’t care if she got another leg cramp. She peeled his shirt from his broad shoulders and tossed it at the sofa. “Sit down and let me get those boots off.”
He pulled her down to the sofa with him and removed her blouse and bra before he let her remove his boots. She sat on him backwards, put one hand under the heel of the boot and one on the toe and had them both off in seconds.
“You’re pretty damn good at that.”
“I’m learning,” she said.
His fingertips danced up and down her bare back, sneaking around the sides for quick touches of the sides of her bare breasts and loving the way she gasped. The past was gone and he wanted to be a big part of her future.
She stood up and led him down the short hallway to her grandmother’s bedroom, fell back on the full-sized bed, and dragged him down with her.
He didn’t know when her boots had been left behind but when he pulled her jeans down over her hips they were already gone. Moonlight flickering through lace curtains on the window made her red toenails sparkle. He kissed each one individually, taking time to make her moan before making his way back up to her lips.
“Don’t make me wait. I’ve thought about this moment all day. I was scared to death that the plane would have to land somewhere between Tulsa and Dallas and I wouldn’t be able to do this.” She ran her hands over his body, and felt tension and desire bottled up there as much as she felt it in her own body.
“Yes, ma’am, but I do not intend to hurry. I’ve thought of nothing else all day too.” His breath was warm against her already-hot skin.
He started a rhythm that produced shivers, purring noises, and long, sensual kisses. Keeping things from going too fast was the hardest job he’d ever done but he made it last until she finally dug her nails into his back and pleaded. After which he rolled to one side and drew her close to his side.
They slept until midnight in the soft glow of moonlight and that special light reserved for cowboys and the women who brand them. She awoke first to find his strong leg thrown over her body, one arm under her and the other over her, her breasts pressed into his chest and his face buried in the crook of her neck.
That uncanny feeling that tells a person when someone is staring at them awoke him. He opened his eyes slowly and hugged her tighter.
“Round two?” He kissed her neck right where the hickey still shined.
“Too tired. Time for you to go home. We’ve both got a big week ahead of us and rodeo on the weekend.”
“Wake me early and I’ll make breakfast,” he mumbled.
“Rye, I’m going to live in this town for the rest of my life. You are going home.”
“Okay! Okay!” He rolled off the bed and grabbed his jeans.
She pulled the sheet up under her arms and stood toe to toe with him. “Don’t get huffy.”
He hugged her close to his bare chest and kissed her on the forehead. “I’ll see you tomorrow and I’m not huffy.”
“I’ll cook supper, so plan to eat here.”
“And go home before daylight?”
“Probably before dark.”
He groaned. “I know I’ve said it a lot but you really are killing me, Austin Lanier.”
Chapter 18
Tuesday night Kent and Rye spent until past dark working on a new loading chute for the rodeo bulls and getting them into the corral. He called Austin in the middle of the afternoon to tell her they wouldn’t be finished by suppertime. She answered the phone from the seat of a tractor and told him she and the guys were plowing weeds that day. She was about to call him to say that she wouldn’t have time to cook but they could grab a basket of fish at the Peach Orchard. By the day’s end they were both too tired to do anything but talk on the phone ten minutes before they fell asleep.
Wednesday night Austin worked until after ten o’clock, the last two hours by the light of the tractor headlights. Felix said it was important to get the whole crop fed and sprayed if they wanted to make some real money at harvest. Austin didn’t have a high paying office job anymore and she didn’t want to touch the savings accounts Verline had left for her. She wanted to prove to her mother that she could make a watermelon farm work from day one and to show her granny that she hadn’t put her trust in a quitter. Rye called at eleven from the motel in Mesquite.
“I wanted a kiss before I left but you were nowhere in sight,” he said.
“Me too, but I must’ve been at the end of the row on a tractor. I’ll see you Friday night. Gemma called this afternoon and said she had another room put on the block for the season so I can go any weekend I want to.”
“You could have stayed in my room.”
“Yes, I could and I might. But…”
“I know,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“So do you go every week this early?”
“No, just this time when I bring down the stock. After this, only weekends. Kent takes care of the place for me while I’m gone. When I’m in Oklahoma I pay a groundkeeper to feed and take care of the bulls.”
“I see.” She yawned. “Your house looks vacant and I miss you!”
“Now you know how I felt when you were in Tulsa. I miss you too. Are you already in bed?”
“Yes, I am. You?”
“Oh, yeah. What are you wearing?”
“You won’t laugh at me?”
“Promise.”
“Absolutely nothing.”
“You are killing me graveyard dead.”
“Well, you sleep in the raw. I decided to try it and it’s wonderful.”
He chuckled. “When you get down here, darlin’, I’ll show you how wonderful it is. Now, go to sleep. Dream of me.”
“Good night, Rye.” She didn’t tell him that every time she shut her eyes she dreamed of him.
Thursday night she went to bed at ten and was asleep when her head hit the pillow. At midnight she awoke to every hair on her neck standing straight up. She rolled over to look out the window on the other side of the bed and found Rye lying next to her, propped up on an elbow. “I missed you so bad that I drove home for the night. I’ll go back tomorrow morning. I just want to spend the night beside you.”
“Oh, Rye! That’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever said.”
He grinned and his eyes twinkled in the moonlight. He gathered her in his arms and snuggled against her back. “I’m not here for sex tonight, darlin’. I just want to hold you until morning and wake up with you in my arms. Don’t tell me to go home.”
“To hell with what people think. Hold me.” She snuggled deeper into his arms and shut her eyes. She awoke the next morning to the smell of coffee and bacon, and to the noise of rattling pots and pans. She smiled and slung her legs out of bed.
Life was truly good!
He left right after breakfast and enough kisses to keep her until she could make it to the motel and rodeo that night. She drove the new truck into Nocona to the feed store to fill the order for more fertilizer and spray. Next spring she was putting a couple of feeder steers and some hogs back in the lots east of the house and maybe even getting a few of those baby chickens to grow up into fryers. She got back in time for Felix to mix up the right amounts for the tanks and check the spraying apparatus to make sure the filters were working properly. Then it was lunchtime so she wolfed down two sandwiches, half a bag of corn chips, and the rest of a container of guacamole dip. She did the payroll and headed to the bank.
When she walked into the drugstore Molly waved from the first table at the back of the place. “Hey, girl, we wondered if we’d see you today. We’re havin’ a dip of each kind. What do you want?”
“Yes,” she nodded.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, whatever you said.”
Greta told the waitress and scanned Austin from head to toe. “Good lookin’ tan you got there. Better be sure to use lots of that sunscreen shit. You don’t want to grow up and have as many wrinkles as me and Molly got. We didn’t have that sunscreen stuff when we was your age or we might still look like movie stars. Oma Fay said that you came home for good. Darlin’, do you have any idea how hot the summer is down here out there on a tractor or bringing in a crop? This ain’t play. It’s real work.”
“I thought you wanted me to come home.”
Molly nodded so hard all three of her chins wiggled. “We do, but we don’t want you to get Rye’s hopes all up and then leave him high and dry. Farmin’ ain’t pretty shoes in an air-conditioned office. It’s dirty work.”
“I know how hot it’s getting and how dirty it is. But it will get cooler come winter and I can wash the dirt off at night.”
“Good. Now tell us about Rye. Is he any good in bed?” Greta asked slyly.
Austin smiled. “I still don’t kiss and tell. Right now he’s in Mesquite at the rodeo where he’ll be every single weekend until August. We both work so hard all week that we don’t have time to see each other and then weekends he’s at the rodeo so there’s not much to tell.”
“So go to the rodeo. Dance a little, both vertically and horizontally.” Molly winked.
She giggled. “You two make me laugh. Last time I did a dance like that I got into big trouble.”
“Tell us,” Molly said.
“Only if you don’t tell Oma Fay.”
Molly crossed her heart and held up two fingers.
“Okay then, I had a big hickey when I went home for Mother’s Day and Mother spotted it. I thought she was going to pass out right there under the crystal chandelier. She told me it was low class.”
Greta giggled. “It is but hell, it’s damn sure fun gettin’ them, ain’t it?”
“Except when you get a cramp in your leg and have to get up and jump around like a one-legged chicken at a coyote convention. And when you kick your partner out of the bed and he hits his head on the nightstand and makes a bump and it bleeds.”
Greta put her spoon down and slapped the table so hard the salt and pepper shakers rattled. She laughed until her wrinkles were flooded worse than the Red River in the springtime.
“Did that really happen?” Molly got the hiccups.
“It did and you can’t tell.”
“Oh, Greta, we’ve got secrets. Now when Oma Fay calls with something really big we can say that we know something we can’t tell because it’s a secret that Austin trusted us with. And she’ll think we know they went to bed and we ain’t tellin’. Ain’t life wonderful? We’re so damn glad you moved back to Terral that we could…” She paused.
Greta finished for her, “That we could piss in our boots and call it lemonade.”
Austin got the giggles at that. “Okay, girls, I’ve got to get this finished. I’ve still got to iron my jeans and Gemma is picking me up at five to go to the rodeo. Think I ought to see if I can get this hickey renewed?”
“Good God, don’t ask us a stupid-ass question like that, girl,” Molly said. “You know the answer before you even ask.”
***
Gemma knew all the back road shortcuts to get to the Resistol Arena in record time. It reminded Austin of getting around in Tulsa where she knew which streets to avoid, which ones had more red lights, and what parking lots to use as a detour to get from her apartment to the oil corporation building in the center of Tulsa.
Gemma made a right-hand turn on Rodeo Drive, a left one into the Hampton Inn parking lot, and hooked a spot not far from the front doors.
“Impressive,” Austin said.
“I’ve been doing this since I was sixteen. Daddy let me drive down here in the summer to get my big city training. Passed my driving test the first time out, which is better than most Ringgold kids do. We have no red lights, few stop signs, and very few curbs in Ringgold so it’s not easy to get any training. We all start driving when we can see over the pickup steering wheel, but passing the test is another thing.” Gemma got out of the truck, opened the back door, and removed her suitcase.
“Are you really riding tonight?” Austin pulled her suitcase from the other side of the backseat of the truck.
“Yes, I am and I get to ride in the opening ceremonies. You’ll like that. It’s quite a production.”
Austin looked for Rye when they rolled their suitcases into the Hampton. He’d said that he’d be busy with the stock and couldn’t see her until after the ceremonies but
she’d hoped he would surprise her.
It didn’t happen.
“We’re going to have to rush more than I like. Momma’s waiting to leave until we get here so she can show you the ropes this first night. It won’t take me twenty minutes to get into my finery for the opening ceremonies. I’ll take my riding britches with me and change in the restroom.” She led the way to the front desk where room keys waited.
“Call Momma’s cell phone when you get ready. I’m not going to wait on you since I’ve got to find Daddy and make sure my horse is ready for the ceremonies.”
“Horse?” Austin managed to sneak in a word.
“He brought my horse this week. He’ll bring her back home on Sunday since this is the only week I ride in the opening ceremonies and there ain’t no way I’d leave her down here all summer. She’d get fat and lazy. See you after I ride. Keep your fingers crossed. I really want to win tonight.”
“Why?”
“I need the points for the championship rides,” she said. “Here are our rooms. Mine is next down the hall and Momma’s is right beside that.”
“Okay, then I’ll see you later.” Austin was suddenly nervous. She was out of her element completely.
Business, she knew.
Watermelons, she was learning.
Rodeo? It was a foreign language.
She opened the suitcase in her room, hung her clothes in the closet, used the bathroom, hoped her nervous bladder didn’t act up right in the middle of Gemma’s ride, refreshed her makeup, brushed her hair, and then called Maddie.
“Hi, kiddo. It don’t take you long to get ready. I’ll be in the hallway by the time you open your door.”
Austin picked up her purse and found Maddie already in the hall with a smile on her face. She wore a bright pink satin trimmed shirt, snug fitting jeans with a silver laced belt set off with a rhinestone buckle, and pink boots.
“You ready? We’ll walk over to the arena. Cash is already there. He’s a clown tonight. Can’t wait for you to see him in his cut-off overalls. The man never did have much meat on his legs and now that he’s past fifty, they are even skinnier. He makes a real good clown.”
Austin followed half a step behind Maddie. “What does a clown do?”
Love Drunk Cowboy Page 28