by Amy Andrews
Kill her now.
So a shoe conversation was just what Viv needed and she almost kissed Jess as her and Stephen approached. Stephen was Reuben’s first cousin who been hilariously funny throughout the meal—although his mother, who was Gaylene’s sister, hadn’t thought so—and Jess was his wife. They were about the same age as Reuben.
The old rancher gave a half laugh and shook his head pityingly at Reuben. “Shoes.” He gave a dramatic shudder. “Run away while you have the chance, son.”
Considering Reuben was taking advantage of them having their backs to a wall by planting his hand firmly on her ass, Viv didn’t think he’d be too inclined to go anywhere. “I don’t mind shoes,” Reuben said with a wry smile and squeezed her ass.
Oh yeah he liked shoes. He liked checking out her butt when she stepped into them and he especially liked it when she left them on, and rode him like a cowgirl.
“I bet you don’t,” the older man said with a hoot and departed.
“Are they…Louboutins?” Jess asked, gazing down at Viv’s black suede shoes with the exquisite stitch detailing and distinctive cherry-red soles.
“Yes, they are.”
They fit Viv’s feet like gloves and felt as if they were made from angel wings despite the three-inch heels. Viv was paid well and with the company taking care of most of her living expenses, she had a lot of disposable income. Which she spent on shoes.
The other woman sighed and poked her husband in his slight pot belly. “Why don’t you ever buy me shoes like that?”
“You never ask me,” he complained. “You want ’em, babe, you got ’em.” He glanced at Viv and asked, “How much do a pair of those go for?”
“Eight hundred dollars,” she said as Stephen took a swig of his beer.
He choked mid swallow and spluttered and Jess slapped him on the back a couple of times. “Maybe next year,” he told her when he’d recovered.
“It’s okay, babe…I didn’t marry you for your riches.”
“Yeah…” He waggled his brows at his wife. “I know you just married me because I’m good in bed.” And he gave her a smacker of a kiss.
Reuben rolled his eyes. “God…you two are grossing out not only me and your children but everyone else’s as well.”
“Dude,” Stephen said completely unabashed, “that’s one of the true joys of fatherhood.”
Viv laughed at the pained faces on several children then back at the couple in front of them, their arms around each other’s waist in an easy kind of affection that spoke of happiness and longevity and history. And damn if her chest didn’t ache a little watching their love for each other on obvious display.
“Anyway…enough of shoes,” Stephen dismissed as he turned his attention to Viv. “What I want to know is has this guy—” He poked Reuben in the chest with the hand that was holding his beer. “Told you that he lost—”
“Stephen.” Reuben’s voice was low with warning but also tinged with an exasperated kind of affection that told Viv he and Stephen enjoyed some smack talk. “Don’t you dare.”
Stephen was unperturbed as he continued with a grin. “His virginity in my parents’ barn?”
Viv tried not to laugh as Reuben sighed and shook his head and Jess did laugh. Stephen’s mother, however, was not impressed. “Stephen,” she scolded. “There are children around!”
But Stephen just laughed some more and Reuben shook his head. “I can’t believe you just told her that.”
To be honest, Viv couldn’t either but it was still funny as hell. She had the feeling Reuben’s cousin had pulled this one on him before and, in fact, enjoyed doing it at the most embarrassing time and Reuben had just become resigned.
“And how was that?” Viv asked as she looked at him, still trying to suppress her smile.
“Best ten seconds of his life,” Stephen joked.
“Bite me. It was at least twenty.” Which caused both Stephen and Jess to crack up.
Viv laughed, too, as she glanced at Reuben for an answer to her question. “It was scratchy.”
“Scratchy?”
“Hay loft. Country kid hazard.”
“Ah…”
Yeah, she wouldn’t know about that. But hell if she didn’t want to find out. Hell if she didn’t want to grab him by the hand and find the nearest hay loft and have her wicked way with him in her Louboutins.
For damn sure she’d make it last more than twenty seconds.
His gray-green eyes went all dark and intense as if he was reading her mind, his nostrils flared and his hand on her ass tightened. Viv’s nipples went hard as nickels. But then Jess changed the subject, asking Reuben how he was settling into the new office and he pulled his eyes off her.
Viv’s nipples, however, were going to need a longer recovery period.
As she listened absently to the cousin chatter her gaze wandered around the room. Spying Gaylene heading into the kitchen, Viv excused herself. She wanted to get the milk put on for the hot chocolates anyway and, if Gaylene was ducking in to start the cleanup, then Viv could give a hand with that as well.
When she finally reached the kitchen after being stopped twice by assorted relatives of Reuben’s, keen to tell her some childhood story about him, Gaylene’s hands were immersed in sudsy water in the sink.
“Hey,” Viv said, hovering in the doorway.
Gaylene looked over her shoulder clearly startled and there was a split second of something that looked like…anxiety?…before the smile slipped in place. “Oh hey. I’ve just put a huge pot of milk on for the hot chocolate stirrers you brought. Thank you so much for them—it was very kind of you.”
Viv shrugged. “My momma taught me never to go to anyone’s house empty-handed.”
The other woman laughed and it was nice to hear. “They’re popular in Marietta. Everyone is raving about them even if they don’t want to admit it too loudly.”
Viv smiled to herself as Gaylene’s face contorted into a mask of oops-shouldn’t-have-said-that. Like she’d revealed a state secret. “It’s fine, I know they’re popular because we can barely keep up with the demand. Can I—” She tipped her chin at the pile of dishes at her elbow. “Give you a hand with that?”
“Absolutely not.” Gaylene shook her head. “You’re our guest. Go back to Reuben and relax.”
But Viv was determined not to be fobbed off as she crossed the space and grabbed a dish towel from the clean stack on the bench beside the sink. “It’s no problem.” She smiled. “Many hands make light work and all that.”
Gaylene graciously acquiesced and the two women stood side by side at the sink making small talk about the weather and the lunch and the cousins and Viv was beginning to wonder if she’d got the whole thing wrong when she mentioned something about going to Missouri in the new year and Gaylene went all quiet.
“So…you’ll be moving on?”
Ah…so, here was the crux of it. Viv nodded slowly. “Yes. End of April.”
“I see. And, what about Reuben?”
There was no malice or bitterness in her voice but there was a whole lot of what sounded like mama bear protectiveness. “Reuben knows. He’s fine with it.”
Gaylene gave a soft snort, leaving Viv in little doubt what she thought about her son’s attitude to Viv’s departure as she attacked the turkey-roasting pan with gusto, scratching at all the baked-on bits with the tines of a fork.
“He’s moving on also,” Viv pointed out. Technically it was Reuben who was leaving first—not her.
“Reuben’s going to Bozeman. It’s a thirty-minute drive.” Gaylene looked at her reproachfully for a beat or two before returning her attention to her chore. “You’re going three states away.”
Viv reached for the big serving platter draining in the rack and slowly dried it as she stared out the window at the backyard, choosing her words carefully. She could see a love seat on the porch and, through the bare, gnarled branches of a tree, she could see the white peak of Copper Mountain in the distance.
She opened her mouth to tell his mother that everything would be okay, that Reuben would be fine but Gaylene got in first blurting out, “I don’t want him to get hurt. He’s just left a long-term relationship.”
Viv nodded, treading carefully as she spoke. “I don’t think he was that…” Ugh. How could she tell Reuben’s mother that her son hadn’t been that cut up about the romantic relationship between him and Clem ending? He certainly hadn’t given it a second thought when he’d let her pick him up in Bozeman.
“I’m pretty sure that was quite amicable,” Viv said, tentatively, trying to feel her way delicately through the situation.
Gaylene sighed. “I know. Trina—that’s Clem’s mom—and I kept hoping but they never seemed interested in moving things along.” She smiled at Viv. “It feels like I’m the only sixty-five-year-old woman in Marietta who isn’t a grandma.”
Viv smiled back. She supposed that was another by-product of the infertility that had impacted Gaylene’s marriage—one child later in life reduced grandchildren odds.
“Clementine seems happy,” Viv said. “And, not to be too conceited or anything but…so does Reuben.”
“Yeah.” Gaylene looked back at the pan she was still scrubbing. “For now. And then you’ll leave and then what?”
“He’ll be fine, Gaylene.” Viv said it gently because it was sweet of her to worry about her son getting hurt. Even if said son was thirty years old. Viv supposed a mother never wanted to see their kid hurt. “He knows what he’s doing. We both know what we’re doing.”
Another one of those soft snorts Viv was already coming to recognize as Reuben’s mom’s way of saying bullshit without having to curse out loud. “I can’t talk for you, Viv, because we’re not that well acquainted but I am acquainted with my son and trust me, he only thinks he knows.”
Viv was pretty sure Reuben knew his own mind on just about everything, including this, but she was curious as to why his mother was so adamant. “What makes you say that?”
“Because.” She looked up from the sink straight into Viv’s eyes. “You’re different. He was with Clem for three years and he never looked at her the way he looks at you. I’ve never seen him look at any woman like he looks at you.”
A big old thunk in the center of Viv’s chest rattled her rib cage. Was Gaylene saying what Viv thought she was saying? Her hands stilled on the dish towel. “He doesn’t…love me if that’s what you’re thinking.”
Gaylene gave Viv a sad little smile. “Oh, honey, of course he does. He just doesn’t know it yet.”
“No, I—” Viv frowned. That was ridiculous. They’d known each other for a month. They’d set parameters. He’d sworn on his deputy badge.
This wasn’t at all like that guy at her first shop who had fallen for her so quickly. Reuben wasn’t following her around or showering her with gifts. He wasn’t sending her flowers or writing her notes and leaving them under her windshield. He wasn’t calling a dozen times a day and clogging up her voicemail.
“He’s not,” she insisted.
“Okay.” Gaylene held up her hands in surrender. They were red from the hot water.
“Just answer me one thing, okay?”
Viv resumed drying the object in her hands. “Okay.”
“Do you have to leave? In six months. What happens if you decide you’d found a store you wanted to stay at?”
“Oh.” Viv blinked. The question seemed…preposterous. Of course she didn’t have to do anything but…she’d never even considered the question Gaylene had just put to her because she’d never not wanted to leave.
She’d never even thought about not leaving anywhere she’d been temporarily located. Because moving on meant she was free—not stuck. It was the metaphorical dropping off of the key and getting in the car and going on to the next place.
She loved going on to the next place. She loved the challenge of a new store, a new city or town, a new bunch of faces. Viv loved seeing parts of the country she’d only ever dreamed about as a kid and she got a huge kick out of exploring the places in which she’d lived. She loved finding all the best boutiques and the funkiest craft markets and the interesting little lanes and alleys where antique shops and hole-in the-wall pizza places were often found.
She loved finding the best gelato. And the nicest park. And the most interesting gallery or museum.
Or the best lake to skate on…
“That’s not my job though,” Viv said slowly because she wasn’t sure Gaylene had understood when she’d been explaining it over the turkey at lunch. “I’m the new store manager. I have to move around. To all the new stores.”
“Right.” Gaylene nodded in a thanks-I-got-that kinda way. “But…what if you changed your job?” It was her turn to talk slowly so Viv got what she was saying. “I know Marietta gave you a hard time when you first arrived and I can only apologize again for—”
Viv interrupted with the wave of a hand brushing the apology away impatiently. She’d moved past her rocky start with Marietta and rushed headlong into the utterly charmed phase of her habitation. “It’s fine.”
“Okay.” Gaylene nodded again. “Anyway…I thought I’d put it out there because I know you said that you yearned to travel as a kid but I’m not sure you’ve ever thought that it’s okay not to at some point. That you could…you know…stop. If you really wanted. And stay somewhere. Stay in Marietta. And, I’m not even saying this for you to be with Reuben and not break his heart but just because I thought maybe you needed to hear that it was okay to want to settle somewhere at some stage.” She shrugged. “Just something for you to consider over the next few months.”
“Right.” Viv blinked again as Gaylene turned her attention back to the turkey dish, which was scrubbed so clean now Viv was pretty sure Gaylene could see her face in it.
To say her brain was blown was an understatement. Not at what Gaylene had said because Viv couldn’t go there but that she’d said it at all.
Viv was trying to summon some kind of outrage or affront at this level of motherly interference because that was far easier than concentrating on the content of the conversation, but there was a part of her that actually felt a little…flattered, that Gaylene cared. Sure…her main reasons for initiating this conversation had been selfish. Had been about Reuben. But she’d been so earnest in her statements about wanting Viv to consider that it was okay to stay it was hard to be miffed.
Even while trying to look out for her son, Gaylene was also trying to look out for her. Which was really rather sweet.
“Umm…everything okay in here?”
Viv had been so caught up in this head-exploding conversation, she hadn’t even heard Reuben approach. Gaylene looked up from the sink, catching Viv’s gaze for a beat or two. It seemed to say ball’s in your court before she looked over her shoulder at her son.
“Hey, honey,” Gaylene said.
“Mom? You’re not telling Viv that story about when I won the under-eight line-dance championships at Grey’s are you?”
Picking up on the humorous tone in his voice and forcing herself to mimic it, Viv quirked an eyebrow at Gaylene and said, “He line dances?”
Gaylene gave a nod, meeting Viv’s eye again, their gazes holding. “He’s the full package,” she said with a sad kind of smile before returning her attention to Reuben. “You’ve arrived just in time to help Viv with the hot chocolates.”
“Did someone say, hot chocolate?” Viv watched as Stephen trooped in behind, Reuben. “I’m starving.”
“Dude, you just ate a twelve-course meal. How could you possibly be hungry?” Reuben shook his head at his cousin then poked him in his pot belly. “And you’re getting a spare tire.”
Unconcerned, Stephen patted his stomach. “I’ll have you know this is a dad bod and women find it irresistible.” Then he pulled up his shirt and pinched the fat around his belly button to make a mouth, which he pointed at Reuben and said, “Feed me. Feed me.”
Viv laughed as Reuben winced. “How did
you lose your virginity at all?”
“I took pity on him,” Jess said, also appearing. “Now put that thing away, dufus.” She kissed her husband on the cheek. “Go and help your aunt with the rest of the dishes while we get these drinks poured.”
And, just like that, the awkwardness that had permeated the air prior to Reuben’s entry evaporated and the kitchen was full of noise and laughter and conversation and Viv breathed a little easier.
*
She didn’t say anything to Reuben about the conversation with his mother as they made their way home about four in the afternoon. It had been a lovely day, her belly was full and the two glasses of red wine she’d had before she’d left had set up a nice buzz. She didn’t want to talk about the issues his mother had raised at the kitchen sink. Hell, she didn’t even want to think about them.
Not least because Gaylene was wrong.
Viv didn’t blame her for looking out for Reuben and she had no doubt that, as his mother, she probably did have a fairly good handle on his thoughts and patterns of behavior but, in this instance, she’d definitely got the wrong end of the stick.
Oh, honey, of course he does. He just doesn’t know it yet.
Nope—Reuben didn’t love her. They were just…having fun. Enjoying each other’s company. In fact, there was almost a fatalistic feel to their relationship, both of them knowing they only had a certain amount of time together and determined to make the most of it without screwing it up with anything serious.
There was a lot of sex and laughing about sex and other things like chatting into the night about their jobs and Reuben telling tales about growing up in Marietta and her recounting stories about the goings-on in her family’s motel. There was eating popcorn and chocolate and drinking good red wine while watching Netflix in bed or in front of the fire and making each other watch first eps of TV shows they hadn’t seen yet and agreeing that The Lord of the Rings movie franchise was better than the Harry Potter franchise and arguing about whether Die Hard movies could be classified as Christmas movies.