Evidently, he was going to preach on love that morning, which was a wonderful topic for the first of February in any other church at any other time. But he’d already lost his crowd when he made that statement about being nice. Still, he plowed on, raising his voice to wake up the dozing folks at the right time, lowering it to get the attention of those who were drifting away to think of something else.
Jill blocked all of it out of her mind and let herself get giddy thinking about a real date with Sawyer. It was crazy, but she couldn’t help it. They’d been through so much together, including some damn fine hot sex, but this was a date. It wasn’t friends with benefits; it was the real thing.
She glanced over at the Brennan side and locked gazes with Quaid. There were no daggers, but he was not smiling. His jaw was set firmly, and the look in his pretty eyes said that he still had a lot of fight in him. A cold chill chased down her spine. Surely the two families wouldn’t do anything to take Sawyer out of the picture.
Sawyer’s hand covered hers in the narrow space between them and squeezed gently. Could he read her mind? Was he assuring her that he could take care of whatever the Brennans threw at them?
She tried to listen to the sermon, but starting in the middle didn’t work so well, so she looked at the Gallagher side of the church. Be damned if Betsy wasn’t eyeballing Sawyer like she had something pornographic in mind. Before Jill could blink, Betsy caught her eye and smiled. She made a pistol with her thumb and forefinger, aimed it at Jill, and snapped it as if she’d pulled the trigger. Then her eyes shifted to Sawyer, and she blew him a kiss off the tips of her fingers.
Holy freakin’ shit! The Gallaghers are going to shoot me, and the Brennans are going to do away with Sawyer.
Gladys poked her on the arm. “What’s goin’ on?”
Jill shrugged. “Just my overactive imagination, I’m sure.”
She kept her eyes straight ahead until the preacher finally asked them to stand for the benediction that Quaid Brennan would deliver. Sawyer did not drop her hand when they were on their feet but held it firmly for the whole congregation to see.
Immediately Finn and Callie turned toward them, and Callie asked, “Hey, y’all want to try again for dinner at Salt Draw with us today? And while I’m thinking about it, you want to go to the antique show in Gainesville next Sunday?”
Sawyer held up her hand. “We have a date, so we’ll have to take another rain check.”
“And, yes, for next Sunday,” Jill told Callie.
“Maybe we can invite these cowboys and make it a double date next Sunday,” Callie suggested.
“Shopping?” Finn raked his hands through his dark hair. “The only way I’ll agree is if Sawyer does. Otherwise, it’s going to be a long Sunday afternoon nap for me.”
“I’ll go,” Sawyer said quickly.
Gladys raised an eyebrow. “Two dates in as many weeks?”
“It would be three,” Jill said, “but we’ll have to work the bar on Friday night. If we didn’t, I might ask Sawyer to go with me to the Valentine’s party.”
“And I’d refuse,” Sawyer said seriously.
Jill cocked her head to one side. “Why?”
“Because I don’t want none of that speed-dating shit that Quaid and Kinsey have come up with. I don’t trust them. I’d rather sling burgers behind the bar with you all evening as do that stuff. Let’s have a Valentine’s party of our own at the bar on Saturday night. We’ll talk to Polly about it.”
“You’re going on a real date?” Callie’s daughter, Olivia, asked.
“Yes, we are.” Sawyer grinned.
“Is Jill going to wear a fancy dress like Mama did when she went on a real date with Daddy?” Olivia’s eyes glittered at the memory.
“How fancy was it?” Jill asked.
“It was the Christmas parties at Wild Horse and at River Bend,” Callie explained.
“I don’t think I’ll get that dressed up for a dinner date,” Jill said.
“When you do go to a party like that, will you come over to Salt Draw and let me see you? Mama looked like a princess,” Olivia said.
“I will, and I bet your mama did look beautiful,” Jill said.
“She was the queen, not just a princess,” Adam said shyly.
“Yes, she was.” Finn grinned.
It was the smile that said Finn and Sawyer were related. Jill wondered as they moved along with the congregation to the front of the church if maybe it hadn’t been the smile that had captured Callie’s heart in the very beginning. It certainly had been that quality that she first noticed.
No, it wasn’t. It was the way he filled out those jeans, and those dark eyes that bored right into your soul, her inner voice argued.
She let the sassy voice have the last word, because she couldn’t very well do battle with the truth. Besides, today was going to be perfect. No Gallaghers. No Brennans. No feud. Not even the faintest whiff of a pig war. It was the first date with Sawyer, and first dates were always exciting.
Even when you’ve already had sex?
She smiled and thought, So, I got things backwards. Maybe that’s what it takes to make something work. God only knows, I did it all the right way before, and it didn’t last.
She refused to listen to any more doubts and fears. “So where are we going for dinner?”
“You like Tex-Mex, American, or barbecue better?” he asked.
“Tex-Mex sounds really good,” she said.
“Then Chili’s it is.” He grinned. “Need anything from the bunkhouse before we go?”
“Not a single thing.” She smiled up at him.
“I thought we might catch a matinee afterwards. You’ve got a choice of six. I’ll even promise to stay awake in a chick flick if that’s what you choose.” He guided her toward the pickup with a hand on her back.
She wore a chocolate-brown corduroy skirt that morning with a matching jacket. She’d chosen it because it reminded her of the color of Sawyer’s eyes. The pointed-toed, heavily detailed cowboy boots were stitched in turquoise that matched the turtleneck sweater she wore under a jacket.
“Have I told you today that you look mighty fetchin’ in that outfit?” he said as he opened the door for her.
“Only three times,” she answered.
“Well, then make it four.”
After he shut the door, he rounded the front of the truck, climbed inside, and started the engine. “So what is it that you like in the Mexican line of food?”
“All of it, from enchiladas to tacos and everything in between. I don’t think I told you before, but my mama is half Latino. My grandmother was a Torres from just over the border in Mexico.”
“Does she make good tamales?” he asked.
“Oh, yes, she did, but she passed away. Haven’t had decent ones since.”
“My mama makes all the Mexican food, but I’m real fond of her tamales. I don’t eat them in restaurants, because they can’t begin to compare to hers,” he said. “They’re coming up here in the spring to see Fiddle Creek, so maybe we’ll talk her into making tamales for us while she is here.”
Jill’s gut clenched up in a knot. “This is our first date, Sawyer. It’s too early to talk about taking me home to meet Mama.”
“I’m not. She’s not coming to Burnt Boot to meet you, Jill. She’s coming to see me.” He grinned. “We are too busy with all that’s on our plate, so the family is coming to Burnt Boot for Easter weekend. We might even have an Easter egg hunt out in the pasture behind the bunkhouse. Depends on whether Finn’s folks all make the trip too.”
“Where are they all going to stay? We don’t have a single two-bit motel in Burnt Boot,” she asked.
“They have RVs. Remember, we’re a rodeo family, so we have trailers and RVs. All they’ll need is an electricity outlet, and they’re set to go,” he answered. “Don’t get your
little Irish knickers in a wad, darlin’. They’ll love you. Now tell me something more about this double date you and Callie have cooked up for next Sunday.”
“The antique stores and a lot of the little downtown places have a romance weekend planned, with sales and sidewalk sales if the weather permits,” she said.
“So you like antiques?”
“Old things, like old people, have such personality. Someday when I have a home, I want to furnish all of it in either handmade furniture or those with stories behind them. Imagine telling your child that the chair in the corner was the one that your grandma sat in when she read her Bible in the evenings by a kerosene lamp.”
He nosed into a parking spot in the crowded lot beside Chili’s and turned to face her. “I like that idea, Jill. Mama has an old buffet in the dining room that her grandpa made. It’s pretty rustic, but there’s something settling and homey about the old thing. But what I like even better is that we’re going out today as a couple.”
He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her, sweetly at first and adding more passion with the second and third kisses. “And I really like the way that makes me feel.”
“Well, shit!” she said.
“What?” He drew back to his side of the console.
She pointed. “Sure you want to go here?”
He followed her finger to see Betsy, Tyrell, and three other Gallaghers going inside the restaurant. “What in the devil are they doing here?”
“We could go somewhere else,” she said.
“They’re not going to run us off or ruin our day,” he said. “It does look like there is a rat in the henhouse, though. Someone is spreading news faster than we can even make it.”
Betsy looked up with an evil little grin on her face when Sawyer and Jill came in out of the cold. “Looks like we all decided to eat out today. Sawyer, have you met my cousins? Of course you know Tyrell. This is Eli, Hart, and Randy.” She pointed as she made introductions.
Hart stretched out a hand. “I’ve seen you in church and at Polly’s.”
Sawyer shook it and smiled. “Nice to meet y’all. Now if you’ll excuse us, we’ve got reservations.”
“How’d you do that?” Jill asked when the waitress took them to a private corner table.
“Made them just before church, soon as I knew the place was opened. If you’d have turned me down for a date, then I’d have called and canceled,” he said.
“And if I’d wanted to go somewhere else?”
“I had it all covered. Finn canceled for me at the other two places.”
The waitress handed them menus and took their drink orders before she disappeared. Sawyer leaned across the table and captured Jill’s hands in his. “I’m just going to say this, and then we aren’t giving the feud any more attention today. I recognized Hart Gallagher’s voice as one of the men who stole us from the Brennans. I knew I’d heard that voice in the bar before, but I wasn’t sure until right now. It’s not proof that we can take to the sheriff, but it’s enough proof for me.”
“This isn’t a coincidence about them being here too. Someone ratted us out,” Jill said. “But I refuse to let it ruin my date. Now tell me, Sawyer O’Donnell, are you more Irish or Hispanic?”
“Half and half. Love the Mexican food but also love a good Irish whiskey on occasion. They’re both really good lovers, you know. Hot-blooded and stand by their women.” His eyes met hers and twinkled in the dimly lit restaurant.
As luck would have it, the hostess sat Betsy and her four cousins at the next table. Tyrell was so damn close to her, that Jill caught a whiff of his expensive cologne every time she inhaled.
“If they follow us to the movies, I’m going to get the pistols out of the truck and start shooting,” Jill whispered.
“We can leave if you want.”
“Not on your life, darlin’. Now we were talkin’ about you. So how did your mama and daddy meet anyway?” she asked.
“Mama’s daddy was a horse trainer for my daddy’s parents up in Ringgold, Oklahoma. When her daddy took her up there to visit, my daddy met her, and they fell in love.”
“How old were they?”
“Mama says fifth grade, but Daddy swears he saw her first when she was in the third grade and knew he was going to marry her even then. They were young when they married. Daddy had just finished his first rodeo tour, and she was right out of high school. They bought a trailer and moved it on his folks’ ranch, and he went to work for them.”
“That was what, thirty years ago?”
“Try forty-five. They had my sister and two brothers pretty quick, and I came along as a complete surprise.”
Jill laughed. “That’s why your sister bosses you around. You were her real, live baby doll.”
The waitress came back with their sweet tea and took their orders. Sawyer leaned over and kissed Jill on the tip of the nose. “Now tell me about your parents.”
The Gallaghers were right there, but they weren’t important, not anymore, not when Sawyer’s eyes were locked with hers and his hands were on hers on top of the table.
“They went to school together their whole lives. Daddy’s folks lived out on the ranch, and her folks lived on the outskirts of town. She was determined not to marry a cowboy, and Daddy was determined that his future was in the military, so Mama says they were suited for each other. They were going to travel the world, but after basic training, Daddy got stationed in Wichita Falls for the first two years, then he was deployed to the Gulf War, and he never came home. I was just a baby, so Mama went back to southern Texas with me. She met my stepdad a few years later. He’d come to town to set up a new bank for his company, and they met at a party. They fell in love, married, and we moved to Harlan, Kentucky, but I came back to Texas to visit my grandparents every summer.”
“Kind of got in your blood, did it?”
“Grandpa said the ranchin’ bug skipped my daddy and landed on me.” She smiled.
He raised her hand to his lips and kissed each of her knuckles, slowly, one by one. When his lips touched the last one, there could have been Angus bulls roaming around in the restaurant and she wouldn’t have seen them. The Gallaghers, as well as all the other customers, vanished. She and Sawyer were the only two people in the whole building—hell, maybe in the whole state.
The waitress brought an appetizer of salsa and crispy tortilla chips. Sawyer picked up a chip and dipped heavily into the salsa. “Open up, darlin’.”
He slipped it inside her mouth and then did the same for himself while she chewed. When they’d both swallowed and sipped at their tea, he leaned across the table again and kissed her on the mouth. “A hot kiss with a cold tea back, can’t beat it.” He grinned.
“It’s amazing all right,” she said softly.
Their food arrived, and Jill filled a fork with her chicken enchiladas for Sawyer to taste before he got the taste of his beef tacos in his mouth. “See, the sour cream sauce is great.”
“Not bad.” He kept his hand on her forearm an extra few seconds. “But Mama’s are better.”
“I’m starting to wish we’d driven to Comfort, Texas, for dinner,” she said.
“It can be arranged any Sunday you want to go. Of course, we’ll be on the road about ten hours. Five down there, five back, but we’d have a wonderful two-hour dinner with the folks, and just think of all that time we’d have, just the two of us in the cab of a truck without any distractions,” he said.
“Well, thank you. It might be a nice date later on in the month. We could leave early on Sunday morning and not have to be back until Monday at noon if Aunt Gladys would do the Monday morning feeding for us,” Jill said.
When they were ready to leave, Jill glanced over at the Gallagher table to see the whole bunch of them staring at her. She smiled and hung her thumb in Sawyer’s belt loops, letting the rest of her hand fall onto the up
per part of his firm butt. The heat coming from Betsy’s glares was even hotter than her fingertips on Sawyer’s butt. It didn’t take a degree in advanced psychology to know that whatever plans the Gallaghers had made to ruin her day had backfired and that there would be consequences.
* * *
Sawyer didn’t hesitate when he bought tickets to the movies that afternoon. They were seeing the newest romance film, and in that very moment, Jill knew she’d found the cowboy of her dreams.
“I can’t believe you like love stories,” she said.
He threw an arm around her shoulders and stopped inside the lobby at the concession stand. “Popcorn?”
“I couldn’t put another bite of food in my mouth right now, and I never drink at a movie, because if I have to go to the restroom, I’m afraid I’ll miss something important,” she said.
“Then we’ll have ice cream afterward. And about love stories? Have you ever watched NCIS on television?” He found seats for them at about the halfway mark in the theater.
She moved all the way to the center of the row to get the best view possible. “NCIS is on the top of my favorites list, but what’s that got to do with romantic movies?”
“Tony?”
“What about Tony? I think Michael Weatherly does a fantastic job of playing that character.”
“I’m Tony when it comes to movies,” Sawyer said.
“Ohhh,” she said. Tony was always spouting off a reference to a movie, old ones particularly.
“So you like them that much, huh?”
“When Mama visits in the spring, she’s bringing my collection. I’ll have to build shelves or else run you out of your office for all of them.”
“I’m not using the wall space. You can cover all of them with shelves if you want,” she said. “Oh, my!”
“What?” he asked.
“Those roses are still in there. I bet the water is soured and they’re dried up and stinking.”
“Time to throw them over the pasture fence.” He grinned. “Where’s the daisies? I noticed that you’d finally taken the bowls out of the bunkhouse.”
She was glad he couldn’t see her scarlet cheeks. “I couldn’t throw them away. They are getting pressed between layers of wax paper in the pages of several books.”
The Trouble with Texas Cowboys Page 24