Louis clapped Trace on the shoulder. “Of course I grilled the steaks. Teamer would char them so black that the hound dogs out in the yard would be gnawin’ on them when the winter snow comes. And I made the chocolate pies for dessert, and the rest of the meal. I keep tellin’ that old fart that we need a woman on the place. One that can cook. Then I could go on back out in the fields and do some real work. I’m gettin’ fat stayin’ in the kitchen so much.”
Teamer sat down at the end of the table and pointed at Louis. “And I keep tellin’ that old fart that a woman would mess up our way of doin’ things. Hell, she’d probably want to put doilies all over everything and start collectin’ ugly ceramic ducks and elephants. And besides, he’s old so he’s got a right to get fat.”
Gage and Kevlin both came through the kitchen door at the same time. Gage was eighteen and starting college that fall. He was six inches shorter than Trace but square built and strong as an ox. It was his fourth year working for Teamer in the summer months. His young brother, Kevlin, would be a junior in high school come fall, and it was his second summer on the Coleman ranch.
“Thank God you are here for a few days!” Gage said. “Those two need some discipline, and me and Kevlin, well, they don’t listen to a thing we have to say.”
“Y’all had to put up with this ever since I left?” Trace asked.
Gage nodded, but his face split into a wide grin. “They’re like an old married couple. Bitchin’ and snappin’ at each other all the time. But let me or Kevlin say a word and they stick together like Siamese twins. You need to straighten ’em both out while you are home.”
Trace looked at Kevlin.
The younger boy just shook his head. “Never a dull minute. We missed you, and what’s this about you foolin’ around and lettin’ a girl whip your scrawny ass? We need to give you some more lessons on stayin’ in the saddle?”
Trace shook his head slowly. “That’s one piece of sassy baggage that’s been whippin’ me. And if you got any magic tricks about how to get more points, I’m all for learning. How about right now we dive into those steaks before Louis throws it all out for the dogs in a fit of anger.”
Teamer passed the platter of steaks, followed by bowls of steaming fried potatoes, fried squash, and black-eyed peas. Then he started a platter of sliced cucumber, tomatoes, and peppers around. The finale was a big plate of hot biscuits.
They set into their food like hungry hounds after a long night of coon hunting. Teamer was the first one to break the silence and only after he’d finished half his food.
“So talk to us and tell us why that woman is beating your ass,” he said.
“Because she’s that good. We’re both linin’ up pretty solid to be finalists. I just hope that she’ll have a big wreck then and I can come home with the win at the end,” Trace said.
“And maybe she won’t,” Louis said.
“Guess we’ll know soon enough.”
“What does she look like? We saw her on television, but mostly all we saw was a blur of hot pink when she come out of the chute. Is she all mannish lookin’, and does she dip snuff?” Kevlin said.
Trace thought before he spoke. “She’s about five feet three inches tall and has to put rocks in her pockets to hold her down in a hard windstorm. She’s got red hair, but she tells me it’s out of a bottle and she is a natural brunette, the most amazing green eyes, and she’s meaner than a rattlesnake when it comes to riding and soft as an angel when she’s not riding.”
“I’d let someone like that win for sure. You kissed her yet?” Kevlin said.
“You better watch that hussy. She’ll be throwing you off your ride, and when the dust settles she’ll have the prize and you’ll have a busted ego,” Louis said.
Trace looked at Teamer.
“She as good as they say?”
Trace nodded.
“She know anything about ranchin’?”
Another nod.
“Now answer Kevlin’s question, son,” Teamer said.
“Which one?” Trace asked.
“That one about kissin’ her.”
Trace shook his head. “Good cowboys don’t kiss and tell. You taught me that yourself, remember?”
Teamer chuckled. “I’d say she’d do to ride the river with, son. Now eat the rest of your dinner. Potatoes and squash ain’t worth shit when they’re cold. Besides, we got chocolate pies in the icebox, and Louis will whine like a little girl if you boys don’t brag on them.”
***
Lucy looked around the room at the decorations, the cake, the presents, and all her friends.
“Hey, you aren’t supposed to cry,” Wilma said.
“But you all did this just for me.” Lucy sniffled.
“And look what all you’ve done for us,” Wilma told her. “I work for Liz, and Noreen is picking up her life at the beauty shop, and look around, Lucy, at all the women you’ve helped get their lives back on track.”
Gemma patted her on the back. “And those like me who still need you to get theirs on track.”
“Come on and sit down. You are going to open presents first and then eat cake and talk until we run out of things to talk about,” Liz said.
Lucy dabbed her eyes. “Then I reckon I’d better call Tyson and tell him I won’t be home for two days because it’ll take us that long to catch up on gossip, and let me tell you right now, I’ve never opened this many presents in my whole life, total, not just at one sittin’, and I’m going to enjoy every moment, so don’t rush me.”
Lucy was a small woman with nondescript brown hair, big soulful eyes, and a heart as big as the whole state of Texas, especially when it came to those in her abused women’s program.
She’d barely gotten started opening presents when Gemma’s phone vibrated in her back pocket. She slipped off to the bathroom, put the potty lid down, and sat down before she answered Trace’s tenth call that day.
“Party over?” he asked.
“Just beginning. Lucy is opening presents, but she’s slow as molasses in Alaska in December. She even keeps the paper and the ribbons. So we can talk for a few minutes,” she whispered.
“Where are you? I don’t hear squealing and lots of woman oohing and ahhing over presents.”
“I’m in the bathroom.”
Trace chuckled in his deep drawl. “Lock the door, take off all your clothes, and send me a naked picture of you in the mirror.”
“Trace Coleman!”
“I will if you will,” he teased.
“I don’t need a picture. All I have to do is shut my eyes to see you are doing a strip to ‘Hillbilly Bone.’”
A long pregnant pause made her hold the phone out to see if she’d lost connection.
“Trace?”
“I’m lying here on the bed looking out at the stars. I’m naked and the cold air from the ceiling fan is making the hair on my arms stand straight up. I’m thinking about you all wet and slick doing that little dance for me in the Jacuzzi,” he whispered.
Crimson crept up her neck and into her cheeks. “I will get even.”
“Turned you on, did I?”
“Let’s just say I’ll have to wash my face in cold water and stay in here until I stop panting before I go back out there.”
“Hey, Gemma. I… miss… you,” he said seductively.
“You are in big trouble.”
She’d barely gotten back to her chair when her phone vibrated again. She slipped it out and laid it on the chair seat beside her. Trace had sent her a text: Does being in big trouble mean you’re going to let me win in Dodge City?
She carefully sent back a message: Dream on!
She turned off her phone and shoved it in her hip pocket.
“Okay, Lucy, now tell us all about this wedding and why it was so sudden,” Gemma teased.
“Sudden!” Lucy exclaimed. “I thought I never was going to get that man out of his shell enough to propose to me. And when he finally did I got him to the altar as fast as I could so he w
ouldn’t change his mind.”
Gemma wondered what she’d do if Trace proposed. Would she rush him to the church the very next day or would she want the big wedding that Colleen had? Could they live together more than a week without the wildfire burning itself out? She loved everything about Ringgold, but she also wanted to be back at the rodeo with Trace. She already missed bickering with him, his kisses, and the way her body felt when he touched her. The week was going to last forever.
***
Trace was in the hay field when his phone rang. He drug it out of a sweaty shirt pocket and answered, “Hello, darlin’,” in his best Conway Twitty impression.
“Is it really only Thursday? I feel like I’ve been home a month.”
“Momma still mad?” Trace asked.
“No, she’s over that. Momma don’t stay mad long. But I’m ready to bust broncs and smell rodeo dust.”
“It’s addictive, isn’t it?”
“Tomorrow won’t never get here, will it?”
“Want me to put down these hay hooks and come get you right now?” he asked.
“What I want and what I’ll get are two different things. Since I’m home and there’s an extra rider to exercise the horses, Raylen and Liz went off on a three-day holiday to spend time with her grandpa and uncle. They’re over in your part of the world and I’m in Ringgold.”
“Seems to me that not long ago you couldn’t wait to get home to Ringgold where your roots are. Why aren’t you fixing hair this week?”
“I’m going to fix hair this afternoon,” Gemma said.
“I need a haircut. If I wait until next week, will you cut it for me? Naked?” he asked.
She moaned at the picture that produced. “Which one of us?”
“Both,” he said.
“One naked haircut after I win in Dodge City.”
“You will never get to me say yes to that,” he said.
She laughed. “I’ll give you a haircut no matter who wins and we can both be naked. You sure you’ll trust me with scissors when I win? I’ll be pretty giddy.”
“Well, I sure wouldn’t trust you with them when you lose and I win,” he said. “You’ll cut my ear off just for spite.”
“Long as I don’t harm your hands, I reckon you could give up one ear,” she teased.
“What are you wearing right now?”
“Nothing, darlin’. I’m riding bareback as naked as the day I was born. My hair is flowing down my back, and the wind is in my face.”
“You are a witch, Gemma O’Donnell. Now I’ll have that picture in my mind all day.”
“I told you paybacks are a bitch, didn’t I? Now we are even.”
He slid the phone back in his pocket, picked up the hooks, and slung another bale of hay off the back of the truck into the barn. Kevlin grabbed it, stacked it, and turned for the next one.
“Was that the hottie you been moonin’ around about all week?” he asked Trace.
“It was Gemma, but I haven’t been moonin’ around,” Trace answered.
“Yeah, man, you have. You better be careful or that hussy will use all that moonin’ to make you feel sorry for her and let her win. Then she’ll run off with some other rich cowboy and you’ll be left with nothin’ but a pair of spurs and a gold hat pin.”
“You sure are wise for a sixteen-year-old kid,” Trace said sarcastically.
Kevlin smiled and wiped sweat from his forehead with a red bandana. “Out of the mouths of babes. I been around the rodeo arena a few times. Them women can sure mess you up, no matter how old you are or how pretty they are.”
***
It was noon when Gemma opened the door to her beauty shop and got a whiff of hair spray, dye, and fingernail polish all mixed together. It was almost as intoxicating as the dust in the arena while she rode a bronc.
“I was wondering if you’d come around or if you’d call and tell me you had something else going today, what with Liz and Raylen gone.” Noreen’s Native American blood showed in her high cheekbones, her long dark hair, and brown eyes. She was tall and rail thin, wore jeans, a knit shirt, and sneakers.
“Oh, no! I had to see how things were going. Looks like you are keeping the place up in fine style,” Gemma said.
“Here comes Nellie Luckadeau and her sister. Which one do you want?”
“I’ll take Ellen. I need to get my hands in the dye and do some ratting. The higher I can get that red hair for Ellen, the better she likes it,” Gemma answered.
Ellen’s eyes lit up when she saw Gemma. “Well, lookee here—who has come home just to fix my hair today? I swear Noreen is good, but darlin’, she don’t know how to rat like you do. No offence, Noreen. And you are keeping your hair red. That’s what’s bringing you good luck with that cowboy that has Maddie in a mood. I told you that red hair was the best good luck token you could take with you on this trip.”
“This girl has been ratting hair so long it’s second nature to her. Get in a chair and let her take them pins out before she goes to washin’ and settin’,” Noreen said.
Gemma fell into the work just as easily as she rode the broncs. Both were second nature like Noreen said. She removed the pins from Ellen’s hair and brushed it out, then fastened a cape around her shoulders and led her back to the sinks.
“So what’s been going on since I left?” she asked.
“Slade and Jane are expecting their third baby. This one is a boy, and them two girls they’ve already got is going to make him toe the line. Two older sisters need a little brother. Me and Nellie needed a brother, but all we got was each other. If we’d have had a brother he would make her not be so grumpy in her old age. I tell you, she’s got so cranky that I can’t hardly even live with her. Do you know she still won’t let me drive?” Ellen tattled.
Nellie piped up from the sink right next to her sister. “She hasn’t driven in years because she’s got lead feet and thinks she’s a teenager. Hell, Gemma, I don’t even drive anymore except for the old work trucks and tractors out on the property. Jane just dropped us off for our hair fixin’s while she runs into Bowie for her doctor’s appointment.”
Ellen shut her eyes while Gemma scrubbed her scalp. “She’s not lyin’. I do like speed and hot men and hard liquor.”
“She’s been wild her whole life.” Nellie sighed.
“And I’ve lived every minute of it.”
“If you want to drive so damn bad then you can drive the work truck, but you can’t drive the tractor because they are too damned expensive to fix and you’d break something for sure.”
Ellen giggled like a schoolgirl. “Can I drive the truck to the dance tomorrow night?”
Nellie almost came up out of the chair but checked herself. “Hell, no! You can’t drive it off the property. It’s not even tagged.”
“Well, I could drive it so fast that the policeman couldn’t even tell that it didn’t have a tag,” Ellen said.
“No! And that is final,” Nellie said.
“Shit! What’s the use of gettin’ my hair all done and not even be able to cruise over to Wichita Falls for a dance?”
Gemma giggled.
“Don’t laugh at her,” Nellie said. “It makes her worse.”
“Oh, hush. Just because you got old don’t mean I intend to,” Ellen said.
Gemma rinsed and conditioned Ellen’s over-dyed, over-ratted, and over-sprayed hair. Then she wrapped a towel around her head and pushed the lever to raise the chair up.
“Let’s go get your dye mixed and on. Nellie, has she always been a redhead?” Gemma asked, knowing that question would set them off again.
“Ever since she was born, and she’s had the temper to go with it. I swear I didn’t think that attitude came in a box of hair dye, but it does.” Nellie laughed.
She loved listening to them bicker and argue and hoped when she and Colleen were old that they were just like them. If she lived in the Panhandle they’d be close enough as old women that they might even end up living on the same property in their
old age, like Nellie and Ellen.
“Okay, enough bitchin’ from us two old women,” Nellie said bluntly. “We want to hear about this cowboy who is makin’ Maddie close to havin’ a heart attack.”
It was on the end of Gemma’s tongue to say, “I miss him like crazy.”
But Ellen took off before she could say a word. “I know menfolk real well. How is he in bed?”
“Ellen!” Noreen said.
“Well, I got to know if he’s any good in bed before I pass judgment. Does he make you go all oozy when he kisses you?” Ellen asked.
“Ellen, for God’s sake!” Nellie slapped her arm.
“I’ll call the cops and sue you for elderly abuse if you do that again.” Ellen glared at her. “Does he?” She looked in the mirror at Gemma’s reflection.
“Yes, he does,” Gemma said.
Ellen stuck her tongue out at Nellie. “Then I expect he’s worth whatever it takes to get him roped down.”
“Maddie is going to be a handful,” Nellie said.
“Yes, she is,” Noreen agreed.
Gemma listened with one ear to them go from one gossip topic to another. The other ear stayed focused on the cell phone in the back pocket of her jeans. Maybe Trace would call when he took a break. She missed him so damn much that it hurt, and her mother could get over it. If he appeared at the door of her beauty shop right then and asked her to run away with him, she’d drop the hair dye and be gone before Nellie could roll her eyes at Ellen one more time.
***
Gemma awoke on Friday morning at the crack of dawn. She couldn’t sleep so she went to the stables and saddled up a mare. When the sun peeked over the horizon she was exercising her third horse of the morning and heading out over the rolling hills toward her Granny’s house. The door opened before she could rap on it, and Granny motioned her inside.
“We seen you ridin’ out over the rise and hoped you’d come for breakfast. Your grandpa made pancakes and sausage this morning. Never cooked a meal in his life until he retired, and now I gotta fight him to get in the kitchen.”
Just a Cowboy and His Baby (Spikes & Spurs) Page 20