by Lisa Wingate
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” I teased.
Zach coughed in playful indignance. “I was just wondering, because—”
“You are not stealing my dog, Zach Truitt.” I wagged a finger at him playfully. “So you can just forget about playing your little joke on Collie.”
“I wasn’t going to… .” He could tell I wasn’t buying, so he changed tactics and tried begging. “C’mon. I owe Collie one.”
Shaking my head, I made a tsk-tsk-tsk through my teeth. “What would Dr. Phil say about that?”
At the counter, Melvin coughed out a chuckle. I’d forgotten we had an audience.
Zach rubbed his forehead. “See? Now I’ve been putting up with the Dr. Phil jokes since last Christmas. Every time I come home, someone’s got to bring that up. Collie deserves this dog, and little Bailey’s going to love him. Heck, he’s big enough that she can use him for a pony.”
I vacillated, picturing Mr. Grits and my adorable red-haired goddaughter, Bailey, frolicking in the fields together. “You can’t take the dog to Bailey … unless Collie says yes.”
“It wouldn’t be any fun if Collie said yes.” Zach shifted his posture, bracing one long leg in front of himself so that his slim hips angled to the side. “How about a loan? I’ll just”—he leaned closer, and for a moment I thought he was going to kiss me right there in front of Melvin—“borrow him for a while.”
“I don’t think so,” I said, but my voice was thick and welcoming like warm honey. Taking a step back, I tried to shake off the heady feeling before things got out of hand. “The dog is safely tied to the car. Where he is going to stay, thank you very much.”
Glancing out the window, Zach drew back slightly. “No, he’s not.”
“Very funny. Yes, he is. I tied him in the shade.”
A muscle twitched in Zach’s cheek as he scratched his ear with the tip of one finger. “I just walked by your car. There’s no dog.”
I thought about the big double knot I’d tied in the rope. “There has to be. There’s no way he could have gotten loose.”
“He’s not there.” Zach was starting to smile, as if the joke were on me.
“He has to be.”
“He’s not.”
“Did you?”
“I didn’t.”
“But then, where—”
Melvin interrupted, wagging a finger toward the door. “That the dog?”
Zach and I turned in unison. Mr. Grits was standing in the doorway with a piece of the chewed-up water dish hanging from his mouth like bubble gum.
“Oh, no.” I gasped.
“He’s loose again.” Zach’s head fell back in disbelief. “I think we’ve played this game before.”
Turning carefully, I walked toward the door, patting my leg and saying, “C’mere, boy, c’mere. Good boy. You just stay there. You’re a very bad boy, untying yourself.” Through the screen I saw that the rope, or some of it, was trailing behind the dog. He’d chewed completely through it. “And look, you ate the water dish. That wasn’t nice. You bad dog. Shame on you.”
“Better talk sweet to him until you catch him,” Zach interjected.
“This is sweet,” I replied, reaching gingerly for the screen door. “Hey, there, big boy. You need your hair fixed. Sta-ay there, staaa-ay there.”
As I lifted the latch, Mr. Grits smiled at me, dropped his bubble gum, let out a baritone yip, and took off. He was across the parking lot and headed up the road before I made it onto the porch.
“Oh, no!” Squealing, I started after him in the fastest sprint I’d managed since high school track.
Zach followed, hollering, “I’ll get the truck!”
Crossing the parking lot, I dashed up the side of the road after Mr. Grits, who was loping along just fast enough to stay out of reach. Occasionally he glanced back over his shoulder with his tongue lolling out, ignoring me when I breathlessly called, “C’mere, boy, c’mere.”
He had the nerve to yip and wag his tail as he continued down the tiny main street, past the little post office, the closed-up brownstone stores, the Lover’s Oak Chapel, and into open territory, where he really started to run.
I skidded to a halt in the gravel next to a sign that read:
*
LOVELAND, TEXAS
HOME OF THE LOVER’S OAK
A GREAT PLACE TO FIND
YOURSELF
*
Only right now it didn’t seem like a great place. My legs felt like wet spaghetti, and the dog had just disappeared into the brush beside the road. I didn’t know how we’d ever catch him now. A rush of panic went through me. I felt like a mom who’d just lost my child in the mall.
Zach’s truck rattled up, and I crossed the ditch, jumping into the passenger seat without waiting to be invited.
“Hurry!” The tremor in my voice surprised even me. “He’s gone. If he gets away, someone might shoot at him for real this time.”
Zach gave my rush of emotion a double take. “We’ll find him,” he said with calm assurance. “Which way did he go?”
I pointed. “He went under that fence and disappeared into the brush. Then he was just … gone.”
Zach surveyed the escape route with the expert eye of a man who knew the terrain. “I bet he followed the deer trail through the fence.” He indicated a tangle of spiny brush that looked impenetrable to me.
“I don’t see a trail.” Stretching across the seat, I tried to see out his window.
Zach winked. “That’s because you’re a city girl.”
My stomach did a strange little hula. “Am not.” For just a second I forgot all about the dog. “I’ll have you know I’m a p—” I was about to say paleontologist, and my mind snapped into gear just in time to yank the word back into my mouth. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Didn’t Jocelyn tell you not to tell him that? “Hiker,” I finished lamely.
“That’s not what you were about to say.”
Think. Think fast. “P … retty serious nature lover,” popped out of my mouth. How idiotic.
He swung the truck through an open gateway so fast that I had to grab something to keep from falling over. I ended up clutching his arm.
“Sorry,” I said, righting myself in my seat. “Warn me next time.”
He gunned the truck through a rut, and we jounced through the gateway into the pasture where Mr. Grits had disappeared. “I thought you p … retty serious tomboy nature-lover types were ready for anything.”
“Very funny,” I retorted as we plowed over a three-foot cedar bush, bouncing together, then apart again. My hair fell across my face like a dark curtain, and I reached for the grab handle above my door. “Gee whiz. Do you always drive like this?”
“Not always.” The flush in his cheeks told me he was enjoying the chase. “But there’s your dog.” He hit the gas, and the truck shot across the pasture like a cowboy hovercraft, whizzing over a layer of cactus, assorted wildflowers, and cedar brush. Ahead of us Mr. Grits loped along, fanning his tail like a propeller and occasionally glancing at us as if this were a fantastic game.
A jackrabbit darted from its hiding place, and Mr. Grits kicked into overdrive after the rabbit.
“Shoot!” I hollered, leaning out the window to see if calling the dog would help. “Mr. Griii-its, Mr. Griii-its …”
“Don’t worry. We’ll catch him.” Zach shifted gears, and we burst forward at what felt like an insane speed, given the lack of pavement. Grabbing the back of my T-shirt, Zach yanked me in, calmly saying, “Look out,” just before a branch slapped my side of the truck, whipping in the open window, then back out.
“Whoa! My gosh!” I squealed, falling against him, then scrambling back up.
“Duck,” he said again, and another branch snapped in the window, depositing a few addled grasshoppers, who were quickly sucked out again by the g-force. “There he is.”
I swung around in time to see Mr. Grits follow the rabbit down a small canyon and up the other side. “We’re not going to …” Before I could finish the sente
nce, the truck plowed down the slope, bumped across some rocks in a dry creek bed, and scrambled up the other side like a mountain goat. Just as we topped the arroyo, I saw the rabbit dart off under the overhanging branches of a huge live oak near a barbed-wire fence. Mr. Grits followed, and we closed in just as the rabbit jumped into a hole beneath the tree. Skidding to a halt, Mr. Grits stuck his head in the burrow, then withdrew it, sneezed violently, and proceeded to calmly lie down in the shade beside the rabbit hole.
Zach hit the brakes, the truck slid to a stop, and we reverberated back and forth in the seat from pure inertia. Raising his head, Mr. Grits thumped his tail against the ground.
Untangling my Jell-O legs, I turned to Zach, openmouthed. His hair was sticking up in all directions, the wind having slicked it into sharp points. He looked good that way. Really good. “You are insane.” My voice quavered, either with terror or laughter, I wasn’t sure which.
Zach must have thought it was laughter, because he grinned and said, “That was fun, huh? There’s your dog. Looks like he had almost as much fun as we did.” I blinked at Zach, and he lifted his hands, palms up. “What? You’ve never chased jackrabbits with a pickup truck before?” He smiled in a boyish way that really was adorable.
I chose to be playfully coy. “Not until now,” I said, opening the door and stepping out.
He met me at the front of the truck, and we stood there for a moment, waiting to see if our quarry would bolt again.
“Well, then, it’s about time.” Zach’s voice was warm and low, and it occurred to me that we were standing shoulder to shoulder in the wildflowers. A breeze whispered by, lifting strands of hair and blowing them across my cheek. I felt him watching me. Overhead the branches of the ancient tree rustled, stirring the dappled shade and lifting the scent of wildflowers. I looked up into the branches, then down again into his eyes, the clear, pale green of desert sage.
The breeze lifted my hair again, and his fingers combed it away softly, as light as the touch of the breeze itself. Turning toward him, I leaned close, felt his body warm against mine. My heart stopped, and the breath caught in my throat. Lifting my chin, I gazed into his eyes, waiting, falling into an age-old dance to which I hadn’t forgotten the steps, after all. My eyes fell closed, my mind a heady swirl of his touch, his scent, his nearness. His lips touched mine, and everything else seemed a million miles away.
I abandoned myself to the kiss, my mind swirling until I felt dizzy, lighter than air, as if I were floating, or flying. The warm, strong circle of his arms caught me, and I lost all sense of who and where I was.
The only thing I knew for sure was that I’d never, ever felt like that before. Every thought in my head exploded into a burst of color and light.
Skyrockets.
Then the dog barked, and the rumble of a car engine wound into the mist of my thoughts. I heard voices. The sound of tires on asphalt told me that, in our wild drive through the pasture, we had come full circle, back to the road.
Zach’s lips parted from mine, and I stepped away unsteadily. Opening my eyes, I turned around in time to see a cream-colored Cadillac passing very slowly on the opposite side of the barbed-wire fence, the driver and passenger leaning to gape through the open window. Between us and the car, there was a wooden sign supported by old stone pillars. I knew what it said, even though I couldn’t see the letters.
My mind snapped to reality, and all at once I realized that the tree Mr. Grits had led us to wasn’t just any tree.
I had just kissed Zach Truitt beneath the Lover’s Oak.
And the Blum sisters had seen it all.
THIRTEEN
SOMEHOW I ENDED UP GOING WITH ZACH TRUITT TO FIX A windmill. I wasn’t sure how it happened, except that when we came back from the Lover’s Oak with Mr. Grits safely tied in the back of his truck, I was feeling light-headed. When Melvin met us in the parking lot and pointed out that I had a flat tire on my vehicle, I didn’t even care. That was odd, because right before the dog chase and the Lover’s Oak incident, I’d been gung ho about getting in my Jeep, racing back to the ranch, getting Caroline Truitt’s journals, and searching for the rest of whatever had yielded the femur that Melvin had found. Archaeologist Lindsey knew it was a scintillating mystery, and she might be on the verge of something big. And, of course, there was still the issue of tracking down the fossil thieves. Archaeologist Lindsey was very interested in that.
But she was nowhere to be found when we returned to the Over the Moon. Romance Lindsey was turning handsprings in my head, and there was no room for anyone else in there at the moment.
She couldn’t have cared less about the Jeep’s flat tire, especially when Melvin handed Zach a UPS box, which he must have come there to pick up before being sidetracked by the dog incident.
“Here’s your order for the windmill supplies.” Melvin studied Zach and me with a practiced eye. “You know, you ought to take Lindsey, here, with you. It’s a pretty drive through the canyon. Bet she doesn’t have any idea how a windmill works. Might be a couple hours before I can pull that tire off her Jeep and get it plugged for her.” On top of being the store owner, UPS agent, and fossil expert in town, Melvin was also the head mechanic and tire fixer. He had a shop out behind the store, it turned out.
I looked up from where I was sitting at the corner counter, eating my now-cold hamburger with a Dr Pepper in a real glass bottle. Melvin was also the dealer for what the locals called Dublin Dr Pepper—the real old-fashioned syrupy stuff bottled at the original Dr Pepper factory in nearby Dublin, Texas. It shouldn’t, Melvin told me, be confused with the other kind that came in mass-produced plastic bottles at Wal-Mart. Dublin Dr Pepper was the real thing—not to mix soda-pop metaphors—but you haven’t been to Texas until you’ve had one.
It was pretty good, I had to admit, but at that moment everything seemed good. I was in a state of floaty, fluttery goodness. I eyed the UPS box with interest. Windmill maintenance … interesting … hmmm …
Zach seemed to read the thought, and glanced at me with a twinkle in his eye. There was a ruddy flush in his cheeks that hadn’t been there before. Maybe it was just my own wishful thinking or some Cinderella fantasy, but he seemed in favor of my going along. “What about it, Lindsey? Want to play hooky from the afternoon session of horse headshrinking and go play windmill doctor?”
Melvin backhanded Zach in the shoulder, and a chuckle burst from my lips. “Sure,” I heard myself say. “Sounds … interesting.”
Melvin appeared to be pleased, and hustled us toward the door, even though I hadn’t finished my burger and Zach was occupied with opening the UPS box. “Guess you two’d better go, so you don’t have to rush. Zach, you ought to take this little lady ’round the long way and show her some of the countryside. Now, don’t worry about the car. I’ll get the tire fixed and drive the car out to the ranch later.”
“Oh, you don’t have—” I began, but Melvin cut me off.
“No. Now, that’s all right. I don’t mind a bit. I was going to drop by and look in on Pop anyway. I’ll just leave a bill for the dog food and the tire repair in the car, and you can settle up when you’re in town again.” He turned to Zach. “Speaking of animals, I was hoping maybe you’d take a look at Vanita’s old cat before you go. That broken leg you set last week is healing up, but he doesn’t seem very spry. He’s just lazing around behind the café. I could take him to the vet in Lampasas, but I figured maybe I could trouble you for a little more free veterinary advice.”
“I already looked at him,” Zach answered. “Melvin, that’s the fattest tomcat I’ve ever seen. He can hardly waddle. I told Vanita she’s got to cut back on the food, especially now, while he’s largely sedentary. I bet he’s gained two pounds since I saw him last week.”
Melvin grimaced. “That’s what I was afraid you’d say. It’d be easier if he had some rare disease and needed a vaccination or something. I could get Vanita to give him medicine, but it’ll be tough to stop her from handing out table scraps. Vanita likes
to feed people … and animals.” He patted his ample stomach. “Well, you two get on with your windmill fixing. I’ll run the Jeep out there to you later.”
I hesitated—a brief return to sanity, perhaps. I could almost, but not quite, hear the voice of reason in my head. But since I didn’t want to listen to reason, I downed the last of my Dr Pepper, left my keys on the counter for Melvin, grabbed the two extra hamburgers, and headed toward the door, saying, “Well, let’s go. This will be a first. I didn’t even know windmills had heads.”
Zach tipped the box so that I could see the nuts and bolts inside before he hefted it onto his shoulder, then grabbed my bag of dog food from the counter. “The head is up top by the fan blades,” he explained as Melvin said good-bye and we stepped onto the porch. “You’re not afraid of heights, are you?”
“No.” Lie, lie, lie. That was such a lie. I was afraid of heights almost as much as I was afraid of horses. Both phobias were born at the same Girl Scout camp. After the runaway horse incident, there was an event that involved a poorly executed trapeze maneuver on tree branches over the swimming hole, and me doing a painful belly flop into the water. Sometime after that, I discovered I didn’t like heights or tree climbing anymore. Funny how life is a process of developing fears, one by one. Eventually, or at least in my case, that became a fear of failure, which compounded into a near-phobia of anything that wasn’t firmly under my control, making me, of course, a control freak of legendary proportion.
Fear. The enemy of faith, my mother used to say in Sunday school.
Out the window with the fears! Today. I laughed in fear’s face as I left the Over the Moon with Zach to climb windmills. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Not afraid. Not me. I was one out-of-control oversize tomboy headed for adventure …
… or else a delusional thirty-something single mom trying to pretend she was something she wasn’t.
I tried not to analyze it as we crossed the parking lot, and Zach put the package and the dog food in his truck. My SUV was, indeed, parked nearby with one back tire flat.