Daisies in the Canyon

by Brown, Carolyn

  “And let Rusty think we can’t function without him on the place?” Bonnie asked.

  “Okay, okay, we’re already wet anyway,” Shiloh groaned.

  “And the lightning hasn’t struck us yet, so that makes us lucky,” Abby said.

  Shiloh pointed a long slender finger at Abby. “You can shut up. You said this wouldn’t take long and it’s already past dinnertime. I’m tired. I’m wet. I’m hungry and I’m cold. And besides that my leg is cut open, so don’t you say anything or else lightning is liable to flash out of the sky and set my hair on fire.”

  “Fate is a hormonal bitch on steroids. And honey, it was me that said it wouldn’t take long, not Abby.” Bonnie laughed.

  “Bonnie is a prophet with that saying about fate. Get her one of them gold chest plates and a fez with a tassel on it,” Shiloh said.

  “You did a good job, Bonnie. I wouldn’t have had any idea how to fix that fence. Does Rusty carry tools in the four-wheeler all the time?” Abby asked.

  “I doubt it, but most ranchers keep tools in their truck. When Shiloh got stuck, I grabbed the tools and shoved them into the four-wheeler’s saddlebag,” Bonnie answered. “We’re standing here in the rain, ladies, when we could be talkin’ in front of a nice fire. Mount up and let’s go.”

  Abby threw a leg over the four-wheeler and Shiloh climbed on behind her. Bonnie led the way back to the truck and looked at the situation. She might have experience with fixing a fence but Abby had gotten more trucks out of sandpits than she could count. Surely getting one up out of a mud puddle couldn’t be a bit more difficult; however, she wasn’t saying a word. Shiloh looked like she was about to cry or throw a hissy, and she was the mildest-tempered one of the three. Abby had learned long ago that the quiet ones were deadly when they’d had enough.

  “Bonnie, can you go back to the house and either get some chain or one of those boards the cows broke on the fence?” she asked.

  “Sure thing,” Bonnie said. “Hey, Shiloh, crawl up here behind me. You can go on and get cleaned up. This only takes two people, anyway.”

  Shiloh did not argue. She moved from one vehicle to the other and they left Abby standing in the rain. She quickly crawled inside the truck and slammed the door.

  Abby pushed her blonde hair from her face and envied Shiloh that warm dry robe. In minutes she heard the roar of the four-wheeler coming back and thought about the fact they would have three vehicles and two drivers when they got the truck back on the road.

  “Shit fire!” She shook her fist at the sky when she was out of the truck.

  “What now?” Bonnie asked.

  “Two drivers. Three vehicles.”

  “We can’t get no wetter. Shiloh looked like she was about to blow a gasket, though, so I thought she’d best go on to the house.”

  “Who died and made you boss?” Abby asked.

  “Ezra died and right now we are all three the bosses. You got a problem with that?” Bonnie asked.

  Abby smiled and then chuckled. That turned into laughter that floated out across the canyon through the driving rain. “This is what that old fart wanted.”

  “Have you gone crazy? Did lightning strike you while I was gone?” Bonnie asked.

  “No, can’t you see it? Ezra wanted us to get into a situation where we disagreed and fought so we’d leave one by one and Rusty could have the ranch.”

  “Bullshit! This is my ranch,” Bonnie said.

  “It’s our ranch right now. We needed Shiloh, but if you thought she’d wimp out and leave, then you did the right thing. We can manage and Ezra loses.”

  A smile covered Bonnie’s face. “Then let’s get to it and go home while he turns over again in his grave.”

  “We’ll have to drive the truck and one four-wheeler back to the barn and both ride back through the muddy fields.”

  “We’re tough.” Bonnie smiled.

  A length of fence, ragged on both ends, stretched out across on the handlebars in front of Bonnie. Abby grabbed the board.

  Bonnie yelled over noise of the storm. “Got another problem in the yard. A Lucky Seven bull has parked his fat ass on the porch. He’s lying there like he owns the house and all that’s in it. Reminds me of those fancy places that has a big concrete lion out by the fence.”

  “Well, dammit!” Abby said. “We’ll have to keep him penned up to be sure he doesn’t breed any of our cows.”

  “How are we going to do that? All three of us together can’t budge him off the porch. It’s like he’s found a refuge, I tell you.”

  “I’ve got an idea if we can get this truck to moving. We’ll use the truck to block the part of the yard fence where the cattle broke the wood down and came through. It doesn’t have to fill all the hole, just enough that the bull can’t get out.”

  “The dogs are having a fit, but he’s ignoring them,” Bonnie reported. “Shiloh let them in the house. She’s going to wipe them down and get them warmed up by the fire.”

  Abby nodded. “Okay, you get in the truck. When I give you the signal, back it out slowly.”

  Bonnie nodded.

  Abby shoved the board into the wet earth and gave Bonnie the thumbs-up sign. The tire spun a couple of times and then it caught and jerked backward with so much force that the board went flying. Abby fell backward again and more mud splattered all over her.

  Bonnie applied the brakes and Abby waved at her to take the truck on to the ranch and block the hole in the fence with it. She didn’t even try to wipe her face clean but climbed on the four-wheeler and followed Bonnie, who must be pretty damned good at parallel parking because she maneuvered that truck right into the hole. Abby would bet there was less than six inches of space on either end.

  When she finished, Bonnie trotted out and settled in behind Abby. In twenty minutes both four-wheelers were parked back in the barn. They looked like shit, but then they’d been run through mud and manure and dodged lightning bolts. If Rusty didn’t like it, he could damn sure wash them down all by himself.

  They jogged through the cold rain to the house and the minute they were inside they started undressing, throwing coats and socks in a pile together. Shiloh had put another log on the fire so they were greeted with a toasty-warm and, more importantly, dry house.

  “Does the leg need stitches?” Bonnie asked Shiloh.

  “I’m accident-prone, so I carry a first-aid kit with me. I just cleaned it and bandaged it,” Shiloh answered. She’d put her cute little pajama top back on, but now she wore plaid boxer shorts with it and the scratch on her leg had been covered with gauze and tape.

  “You go first,” Abby told Bonnie when they were inside. “I’ll get dried off, throw the jackets and socks in the washer, and change into dry clothes. Then I’ll start some dinner. Hamburgers all right with everyone?”

  Bonnie padded down the hall in her bare feet. With no makeup and her hair hanging in strings, she looked young enough to be carded at any bar. The only thing old about her was her eyes, and they left no doubt that her life had been the roughest one of the three.

  Abby loaded the washer, started it, and headed down the hall to her room, where she stripped naked and dried off. She grabbed a pair of flannel pajama pants from the dresser drawer along with underpants, a bra, and an oversized T-shirt. She dressed in record time and carried a pair of socks to the living room, where she flopped down in Ezra’s chair. Clean, dry clothing had never felt so soft or good.

  “So, hamburgers?” she asked Shiloh.

  “I’m so hungry, I’ll take a knife and carve a chunk out of that son of a bitch on the porch if we don’t have enough hamburger thawed out,” Shiloh said.

  Abby couldn’t hold back the laughter. She wiped at her eyes and said between hiccups, “I can’t believe that just came out of your mouth. I can see Bonnie doing that, but not you.”

  “Oh, sister, you’ve got a lot to l
earn about me. I’m tough as nails on the inside even if I’m not brave enough to sit in that chair,” Shiloh said.

  The conviction in her voice told Abby that she could definitely be a force to be reckoned with even if she hadn’t helped get the vehicles out of the muddy fields.

  “We can have ice cream sundaes for dessert and you can make cookies later for our nighttime snacks,” Shiloh said.

  “Thank you. I’ll put the burgers in the skillet, so I can make the cookies while they’re cooking. We can eat them warm with the ice cream.” Abby left the chair and padded to the kitchen in her socks.

  She peeled an onion, sliced it thin, and laid it on one side of a plate while the burger patties cooked. Then she chopped lettuce and sliced a tomato. When she finished that job she took the pickles, mayonnaise, mustard, and ketchup from the refrigerator and set everything on the cabinet. Her stomach growled loudly and she looked at the clock. Two thirty! That meant they had to go back out into the weather in two hours and feed the cows again. And they’d have to use her truck since the work truck was now serving as a barricade.

  The cookies were in the oven. The hamburger patties were about done and everything else was ready, so Abby went to the living room and leaned on the back of the sofa. The blaze in the fireplace licked at the logs, consuming them to make heat. Was that what love did? Those flames would fade and die like Ezra’s love for his three wives?

  Bonnie came out of the bathroom decked out in mismatched pajama pants and a shirt. She took one look at the chair and, after sucking in a long lungful of air, sat down on it.

  “That rain and all that work made you brave enough to sit in Ezra’s chair?” Abby asked.

  “Not brave at all,” Bonnie said. “But Ezra is not going to have power over me where this chair is concerned.”

  Vivien left the fire and curled up at her feet. Martha stretched to take up the room Vivien left behind.

  “Kind of funny how they know which woman they should take up with, isn’t it?” Bonnie rubbed Vivien’s ear between her thumb and forefinger. “Strange thing is that I like this old hound more than I do my mama most days. Don’t get me wrong, I’d fight to the death with anyone who said a word against her, but some days I don’t like her too well.”

  “I understand,” Shiloh said.

  “You? I thought you had a perfect life with your mama and aunt,” Bonnie said.

  “There’s no such thing as perfect. My mama said that when you live with someone twenty-four-seven, you will fight occasionally. It doesn’t matter if it’s a parent-kid relationship or a husband-wife one, because nobody agrees every minute of every day on everything. Take this stupid carpet. I think it should be taken out and some kind of tile put in here,” Abby said.

  “We do need new carpet, but it should be a nice neutral color that doesn’t show dirt or dog hair,” Shiloh said.

  “I think it should be bright orange to liven up the room,” Bonnie said.

  “Point proven,” Abby said at the same time the oven timer dinged. “Cookies are done. Meat should be cooked, so let’s eat.”

  Poor sisters! They looked like they were about to cave in. Bonnie had done 90 percent of the actual work, but Shiloh had given it her all and couldn’t be faulted one single bit. Abby had lived in horrible situations for days on end but her sisters hadn’t. They deserved a break.

  “I’m doing the feed by myself tonight, ladies. My truck only seats two people. It’s still raining and neither of you are riding in the back and I damn sure don’t want my passenger seat to get wet, either,” she said.

  “No argument from me, but why don’t one of us go?” Shiloh asked.

  “And get my passenger seat wet? No, thank you,” Abby said.

  “What about the driver’s seat?” Bonnie asked.

  “I intend to take that quilt you are using and pad it really well,” she told Shiloh.

  “If I don’t have to go back out there, you are welcome to it. There’s a brand-new shower curtain still in the package in the linen closet. You could put it down first and then the quilt,” Shiloh answered.

  “I’ll get all the towels washed up and put away after dinner,” Bonnie said.

  “I know where Ezra hid the whiskey and tequila. I’ll have drinks ready when you get back,” Shiloh said.

  Abby nodded. “I’ll be ready for a dry towel and a drink.”

  “Hamburgers have never looked so good,” Bonnie smiled.

  She still had an hour after dinner to go to her room, sit in the old gold rocking chair, and relax. She leaned her head back and had dozed off when she heard Bonnie and Shiloh arguing.

  “What?” she asked.

  Bonnie was in front of the fireplace, arms folded over her chest, glaring at Shiloh. Her book had been tossed to the end of the sofa and Shiloh was firing back dirty looks at Bonnie.

  “I think we should call Rusty,” Shiloh said.

  “I don’t. We took care of the problem. It’s our ranch anyway,” Bonnie shot back.

  “Not for a year,” Abby told them.

  Their mean looks took a ninety-degree turn and landed on Abby.

  “You are going to cast the deciding vote. Yes if we call him. No if we don’t,” Shiloh said.

  “I don’t give a shit either way.” Abby would love to hear Cooper’s voice, but she really could care less whether they told Rusty about the stampede or not.

  Bonnie shifted her gaze back to Shiloh. “You’re just wanting to brag that we took care of it on our own.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” Abby fished her phone from her pajama pants and dialed Rusty’s number. She hit the button for speakerphone and laid the phone on the coffee table.

  “Hello to you. Is it still raining?” Rusty asked.

  “Cats and dogs and baby elephants,” Abby said.

  “Well, sunshine is on the way. We’ve outrun it and I heard on the radio that it’s moving out of the canyon in the next couple of hours. Everything going all right?”

  “We’ve got it under control. This is on speakerphone and we’re all here,” she answered.

  “Good. Coop wants to talk to you, so I’ll put this one on speaker, too.”

  “Hey, it’s come a real toad strangler, hasn’t it?” Cooper said.

  “Something like that. Y’all got the prisoner delivered?”

  “Just now did and now we’re on the way to the hotel.”

  “So you can go drinkin’ and flirtin’ with the pretty ladies?” she asked.

  “We’re both exhausted. We’ve decided to buy a six-pack of beer and a pizza and watch hotel movies in between naps,” Cooper said. “What have y’all been doin’ all afternoon? Paintin’ your fingernails and readin’ romance books?”

  “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you, but it hasn’t involved pizza and naps,” she said.

  “Okay, now you’ve got my curiosity workin’ double time. What did you do?” Cooper asked.

  “Well, there was a stampede and we had to put most of the cows back where they belonged, and then we had a busted-up fence and then there was a big old bull lyin’ up on the porch like he owned it, so the dogs had to come in the house,” Shiloh said. “And tell Rusty that his four-wheelers look like shit.”

  Cooper chuckled. “And then the aliens landed in their flat little spacecraft and carried you all away to examine your brains. I know it’s been raining like hell up there and y’all couldn’t even get out of the house, so don’t spin yarns to me.”

  “The real story is that we laid up in front of the television, got drunk on Ezra’s moonshine we found hidden in the pantry, and painted our toenails, just like you said,” Abby said.

  “Are you mad? You sound angry,” Cooper asked.

  “Just how drunk are y’all to call me with a cock-and-bull story like this?” Rusty asked.

  “Nope, just hurt that you don’t believ
e our story. I was going to ask you to show me how to fix barbed-wire fence, but now I don’t have to. Bonnie gave us a lesson and I can do it underwater,” Abby answered. “Hell, I might join the navy so I can be a SEAL when I leave the canyon.”

  Cooper laughed again. “See you tomorrow. Don’t forget we’re going to the Sugar Shack on Saturday night.”

  “Come rain, shine, or snow, we—as in Abby, Shiloh, and I—are going to Amarillo tomorrow for dinner and to shop. If we’re not back by evening, Rusty, the cows and feeding belong to you,” Bonnie said.

  Rusty laughed. “Your hangover should be gone by evening, but I’ll take care of things for you since you want to get away from the ranch. Maybe you’ll all be gone for good.”

  “Not in your wildest dreams,” Shiloh said.

  “And you can get the bull off the porch if he’s still there when you get here,” Bonnie said.

  “I sure will and I’ll shoo all those aliens away, too,” Cooper said. “Y’all might want to stop drinkin’ now, or you are going to hurt tomorrow. Good night, ladies.”

  Abby picked up the phone and shoved it back in her pocket.

  “Well, we’ve told him,” Shiloh said.

  “And a hell of a lot of good it did. Neither one of them believed us,” Bonnie said.

  “They will tomorrow. I’m going to go stretch out on my bed and get a twenty-minute power nap. You both going to be here when I come back?”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Bonnie said.

  Shiloh picked up her book. “Wild horses couldn’t drive me away.”

  “Good,” Abby said.

  Martha followed her into the bedroom and settled down on the rocking chair. Abby plopped down on the bed and pulled the side of the spread up over her feet, but instead of falling asleep instantly, the back of her eyelids became a never-ending slideshow, all of Cooper. There he was at the funeral, jumping over the barbed-wire fence, feeding her pecan pie, sitting beside her in the truck on the way to Silverton. And the one that she settled on at the end of the show was the one of his naked backside that Sunday when they’d had sex.

  “Dammit,” she said without opening her eyes. “Not a bad picture in the whole lot.”