Texas Thunder

by Kimberly Raye

  Pappy seemed to think, his gaze intense as he mentally waded through the fogginess that threatened his brain. “I don’t know. Did you check the records?”

  “The records say we’ve got ten head missing. I’ve searched everywhere, but I can’t find a trace.”

  “Did you ask the men?”

  Brett nodded. “No one claims to know anything.”

  “They’re good men,” Pappy said. “It wasn’t their fault. I may not know much here lately, but I do know that. It was probably my mistake. I’ve made a lot of them lately.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped at his suddenly misty eyes. “I don’t mean to forget, but it just happens. One second I know what I’m doing and the next, it’s like I’ve never seen my own hands before. Things just don’t make sense.”

  “You’re sick that’s all.”

  “But I don’t want to be sick.” His gaze met his grandson’s. “I don’t like forgetting stuff.”

  “It’ll be okay. You’ll get better. Today’s a better day, right?”

  Pappy nodded. “It is.”

  “If you can have one good day, you can have more. You just have to get plenty of sleep and take your medication. The doctor put you on some new stuff. It helps keep the disease from progressing. It’s even stopped it in some cases. That’ll happen for you. Everything will be okay.”

  Pappy nodded, but he didn’t look convinced. “I think I’d like to take a look out in the barn,” the old man finally said. “Did Jewel birth her new calf?”

  “Not yet, but it should happen anytime. We’re keeping an eye on her.”

  The old man pushed to his feet. “I’ll go look in on her.”

  “I’ll go with you.” Brett rounded the desk, but Pappy held up a hand.

  “I need to do this by myself.” He eyed the ledgers spread out on the desk. “And you need to do this by yourself. I can’t do it anymore.”

  But he could, Brett told himself as he watched the old man walk out the door and head to the barn. If Pappy had another good day like today, and another, he could eventually get back to his old routine.

  He would.

  It was just a matter of helping out until then.

  Until things got better.

  “He’s in good shape today.” Karen’s voice drew him around and he turned to find his sister standing in the hallway. “He knew me right away, and he asked about your last ride.”

  “He looks good.”

  “For now.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” He turned on her.

  “That it can’t last. You know that, even if you don’t want to admit it.”

  “I know that there’s no rhyme or reason to his disease. That things can go north just as fast as they go south. The doctor said as much. Pappy can get better just as easily as he can get worse.”

  “Just because you want him to get better doesn’t mean that he will. We don’t always get what we want.”

  But he already knew that.

  He thought of Callie and how badly he wanted her and how she was right there, so close yet she might as well have been a million miles away.

  “He isn’t gone yet,” he told his sister. “Pappy is still right here even if it doesn’t seem like it sometimes. We can’t just give up on him.”

  “I’m not giving up. I’m accepting the truth. And so should you. He’s not going to get better.” She caught her bottom lip and chewed for a long second as if searching for her nerve. Just like that, she found it and her gaze met his. “I’m not going back to school.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I withdrew for the semester.” She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin an inch. “I’m not going back to College Station. I’m going to stay here and look after Pappy.”

  “You can’t give up everything you’ve worked so hard for. You can’t give up your life.”

  “Somebody has to. You won’t.”

  But it wasn’t that he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. He couldn’t give up on Pappy. Not when the old man had never given up on him. He’d always believed in Brett. Always kept the faith no matter what boneheaded thing his grandson might have done. He’d loved him when no one else had.

  “You might be ready to give up on him, but I’m not,” Brett said, stuffing his phone into his pocket and heading for the back door. “He was always there for us. Always.”

  “It’s not about giving up. It’s about accepting him the way that he is. The way he’s going to be.”

  But Karen was dead wrong. One good day meant hope for another. And another. Why couldn’t she see that?

  Brett did and he intended to do everything in his power to help keep Pappy in the here and now.

  Slamming the back door, he headed for the barn.

  * * *

  Talk about stubborn.

  Karen ignored the urge to storm after her brother and pound some sense into his thick skull. But that wouldn’t help. He was in denial and nothing would change until he changed.

  And based on this last conversation, that metamorphosis wasn’t coming anytime soon.

  All the more reason she’d come home for good. For Pappy. To ease his mind and care for him when he lost what little connection he had left to this reality. And for Brett. So that he didn’t have to come home to the one place that held so many bad memories.

  That’s why he’d left in the first place.

  To escape the past with their father, and the time after when he’d been following in the man’s footsteps. Accepting Pappy’s situation would have brought him back home and forced him to face the man he’d been.

  The man he was.

  He wasn’t ready for that. He might never be ready, and that was okay. Karen could handle things here at home.

  She headed down the hallway to her room and the laptop sitting on her bed. She was just about to log on to her Facebook page when she heard the front door.

  “Can I help you?” she asked the man standing on the doorstep.

  He had dark hair, an easy smile, and an air of surprise that said he’d expected someone else to open the door. “I’m looking for Brett Sawyer.”

  “You just missed him. I’m his sister, Karen. Can I help you with something?”

  “You could tell him I stopped by.” He pulled a business card from his pocket. “The name’s Mark Edwards. I’m with Foggy Bottom Distillers. He called me a few days ago about your family’s half of the Texas Thunder recipe. He wanted to know if our offer is serious. I’m here to confirm that it is, indeed, very serious.”

  “You want to buy our moonshine recipe?”

  “Your half. The Tuckers own the other half, but we’re ready to purchase theirs, as well, contingent on finding your half, of course. We can’t make it without a full recipe.”

  Which explained why Brett had asked about the family Bible and why he’d been up in the attic every night with Callie Tucker. Karen figured they were just spending time together. It had been no secret that he’d always liked Callie back in the day, and so Karen had come to the conclusion that they’d decided to mend fences and see where things might lead. And she’d certainly never thought to ask him. It wasn’t as if Karen and Brett had spent a lifetime confiding in each other. They were seven years apart, and while Brett had always been a good older brother and she’d done her best to be the best little sister, they didn’t exactly confide in each other when it came to their sex lives.

  Or lack of.

  But the meetings with Callie hadn’t been about that. They’d been about the old recipe.

  The money.

  A sliver of disappointment went through her. A crazy reaction for a cynic who’d given up on love completely. So what if Brett and Callie weren’t rekindling their romance? All the better. Love sucked. Karen knew that firsthand.

  Which explained why she handed the business card back to Mark even though he had the most incredible gray eyes she’d ever seen. And he was cute. In a buttoned-up, three-piece-suit, yuppie sort of way that said he’d neve
r climbed onto the back of a horse or stepped in a pile of steaming manure.

  He was one of those pretty boys.

  A man exactly like her rat bastard of an ex with his polo shirts and Citizens of Humanity jeans and Sperry Top-Siders.

  “I’ll tell him you stopped by.” She started to close the door, but he caught the edge with one hand.

  “What’s the hurry?”

  “I’ve got things to do.”

  “So do I, but that’s no reason to be rude. I’m not finished talking.”

  She pulled the door back open a few inches and eyed him. “What else is there?”

  “Maybe I can come inside and we can sit down. I’ve got some samples of our current whiskey.” His gaze caught hers. “You are twenty-one, right?”

  “Sorry. Two months shy.”

  “I’m twenty-four,” he offered, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he smiled.

  “I don’t recall asking.”

  He shrugged. “I just thought since we were sharing.”

  “We aren’t sharing. You’re sharing and I’m tolerating.”

  “Are you always so personable or is it just me?”

  “Do you really want me to answer that?”

  “Ouch. Talk about prickly.” He grinned then, a slow slide across his lips, and a balloon expanded in Karen’s chest. “But then I like prickly.”

  Not that she cared what he liked. She didn’t. Sure, he had great eyes and a nice smile to go with them, but looks could be deceiving. She knew that firsthand. Just because he seemed harmless enough, didn’t mean she was going to let her guard down and talk to him.

  Flirt with him.

  “Are you going to leave the samples or not?”

  “Yeah. Sure.” He leaned down and pulled a bottle from a duffel bag at his feet. “Here you go.”

  His hand brushed hers and a sizzle of heat went through her.

  Duh. Karen was on the rebound and Mark was a good-looking guy. It made sense that she would feel flattered. Turned on, even.

  She was vulnerable, and he was off-limits.

  “Thanks.” She started to close the door again and his foot stopped her a second time. She frowned. “What now?”

  “Have you had lunch?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to have lunch?” He held up a hand before she could answer. “Before you say something you’ll regret, just think about it. I don’t have to head back to Austin for another hour. We could drive into town, pick up something at the diner, and get to know each other along the way.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to get to know you.”

  “And maybe you’re just scared because you do.”

  And that was it in a nutshell. Karen was scared.

  Scared because he was too good-looking. Too sexy. And she was far too gullible after her recent breakup.

  At the same time, she’d never been the type of person to give up just when things got tough. Sure, her ex had broken her heart, but what she was feeling had nothing to do with her heart and everything to do with good old-fashioned lust.

  Mark had great lips and she couldn’t help but wonder what those lips would feel like. Taste like.

  “It’s just lunch,” he pressed. “Besides, it’s a beautiful day. We should get out and take advantage of it. You know how it is in Texas. It could all go to hell tomorrow and a hurricane could blow through just like that.”

  He was right.

  She thought of her pappy and the smile he’d given her that morning. A good smile because he’d recognized her. While Brett was way off the mark when it came to the future, he’d been right about one thing.

  Today was a good day.

  Even more, she could relax knowing that everything was okay. For now.

  “I’ll get my purse.”

  CHAPTER 22

  One good day turned to two. Three to four. A week.

  Brett spent every second with his pappy, touring the ranch, going over the existing problems and exploring all the ways to solve them. Selling acreage was the answer. They both knew that, but it didn’t make the reality any easier or lessen the shine in the old man’s eyes.

  Brett spent his days taking care of ranch business and his nights searching for the recipe. He even asked his pappy about it, but the old man only remembered as much as Karen—the recipe had been stuffed in the family Bible, which had been stored somewhere in the attic. As far as the safe, Pappy couldn’t remember what had happened to the contents. Not that Brett made a big deal about it. He didn’t want worry dragging his grandfather back down into confusion and so he kept Pappy busy with the day-to-day demands of the ranch.

  Brett would handle the worry, just as he would find that recipe. Pappy’s good days sent a renewed determination through him and he moved faster that night, plowing through boxes so quickly that he almost missed the small Mason jar of gold liquid stashed inside one of them, half-buried beneath a stack of his grandmother’s antique quilts.

  “You don’t think that’s actually Texas Thunder, do you?” Callie voiced the question that raced through his mind the moment he held up the glass container.

  “If it is, that would make it over eighty years old.” He eyed the clear gold liquid. There wasn’t a speck of anything floating in the jar. No cloudy spots. Nothing. Just pure perfection.

  “Liquor gets better with age, right?” Callie asked, as if reading his thoughts.

  “I’m not so sure that applies to moonshine.” His family had been in the cattle business his entire life and while the patriarch of his family had been half of the duo involved in the best liquor to ever come out of the Lone Star state, Brett himself had zero experience with the stuff.

  “It could be the real deal, or it could just be what’s left of someone’s stash.” Maybe Pappy’s. Maybe his own father’s. Berle had been a serious alcoholic and while he never would have bought the mediocre stuff that James had cooked up, he’d gone to great lengths to buy some decent shine, even going as far as driving across state lines, whenever the urge hit him.

  “We have to find out.”

  “We could call that Edwards guy. He might have some connections to help get some answers.”

  “If he wants the stuff bad enough, I’m sure he’ll try.” She took the jar from him and stared at the liquid. “Can you believe it? This could really be it.”

  “Does that mean you’re going to head home and start sending out resumes?” He wasn’t sure why he brought it up, or why it bothered him so much that she’d put her life on hold.

  Maybe because he never had. The first chance he’d had, he’d left Rebel far, far behind.

  “I’m not sending out anything until we know for sure what’s in that jar, and then only if it’s the real deal.” She set the jar to the side and went back to the large trunk she’d been digging through. “In the meantime, we need to keep looking.”

  “There’s no better time than the present,” he said after a silent moment.

  “For what?”

  “The resumes. You keep waiting for a right time, but there isn’t one.”

  “What does it matter to you? It’s my business.”

  He shrugged. “Just thought I’d initiate a conversation. It beats this silence.”

  “Silence is fine by me.” That’s what Callie told him, but after twenty minutes going through the chest of drawers, awareness zipping up and down her spine as Brett worked nearby, she was more than ready for a distraction.

  “I can’t send out resumes yet.”

  “Not until we get an exact ingredient list for the jar. I know.”

  “It’s not that.” She thought of the stack of tear sheets sitting in her bedroom next to her laptop. All she had to do was shove them in an envelope and send them off.

  “Then why not?”

  “Because the closest I’ve been to a newspaper in the past ten years are the property listings that I handle for Les. I just started doing a few things for the local newspaper last year. I need more new stuff.”

 
“Why not just send the old stuff?”

  “What if it’s not good enough? What if I’m not good enough?”

  “What if you are?”

  His question echoed in her head, prodding a truth she’d done her best to ignore. She’d made so many excuses—she was rusty, she was out of practice, she needed time to get back into the swing of things, but the real worry was that she would get a yes.

  The realization hit her as she sat in front of the open trunk and pulled out several old black-and-white photographs of her patriarch Archibald Tucker and his archenemy Elijah Sawyer. Only they weren’t enemies way back then. They’d been business partners.

  Friends.

  Family.

  And that was the real trouble of it all. As much as she wanted to get on with her life, her career, she wasn’t so sure if she was ready to leave her family.

  Or if she would ever be ready.

  “With all the bad blood,” she blurted, eager to change the subject, “it’s hard to believe they were once such good friends.” She held up the old black-and-white photo. The two men posed in front of an old Chevrolet, a shotgun in Archibald’s hand and a jug of moonshine dangling from Elijah’s beefy fingers.

  “They were really close,” Brett said, letting her shift them onto a different topic. “That’s what Pappy always said. He told me that at one time, Archibald was his godfather. Then the shit hit the fan and that was it. The friendship was over.”

  “What do you think did it? What could have been big enough to kill that kind of a friendship?”

  He shook his head. “I wish I knew. Whatever it was, it was enough to divide an entire town. Say, would you look at this?” He pulled the sheet off a nearby table that held an old phonograph and a stack of ancient records. He dusted off the machine and reached for a record. A few cranks of the handle and Roy Acuff’s “Wabash Cannonball” carried from the speaker. “My pappy always loved that song. He used to crank up this old machine when I was a kid and dance around the kitchen with my grandma.”

  “That sounds nice.”

  He grinned and a faraway light touched his gaze. “I miss those days.”

  “My parents used to do the Cotton Eyed Joe around the living room on Saturday night. We never had a lot of extra money, so they didn’t get to go out much. They would roll up the rug and dance the night away right there at home.” Callie fell into her own memories then, seeing her parents in her mind’s eye, feeling their giddiness as they twirled around the room.