Carolyn Brown - [Spikes & Spurs 07]

by Cowboy Seeks Bride

  “The spa manager is motioning for me to go to the next thing on the agenda,” Haley said.

  “And that is?”

  “A warm mud bath.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding. You had one of those when Eeyore and the coyote locked horns and you hated it. I’ll never understand women!”

  She stood up and took the hand the assistant offered. “We weren’t born to be understood, Dewar. We were born to be loved. I can’t take my phone in the mud bath area. Rules of the game. We are supposed to listen to soft music and breathe in the aroma of therapeutic candles with tea bags on our eyes so that the toxins will leave our bodies. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Sweet Jesus! You are sitting in mud! It’s putting toxins into your body more than it’s sucking out,” Dewar said.

  “Later,” she said and handed the phone to Mallory.

  ***

  Dewar was ready for work when he arrived home that afternoon, so Raylen gladly turned over the tractor to him and went with Liz to her doctor’s appointment in Wichita Falls. He’d dumped his bags at his house, talked to Eeyore a few minutes, and then started plowing.

  Everything felt right except that empty house. He was back on his home turf, among his own cattle, horses, and dirt. Eeyore was happy in the pasture with his Gypsy Vanner horses and Rye and Austin were coming to dinner that evening at his folks’ place with Rachel and Eddie. They had two kids already. His sister, Gemma, got one with a marriage license instead of a birth certificate, but no one would ever know she hadn’t birthed Holly, as much as she loved her. Now she, Liz, and Colleen were all expecting a baby.

  If Dewar had been a woman he would have felt the ticking of the biological clock. But he was a man and all he could do was yearn for what all his siblings already had. Trouble was he wanted it with Haley and that was as possible as Lucifer setting up an ice cream store in hell.

  He made a sharp turn to the left and started down the back side of the hay field. “She made it pretty damn clear when she said that there was no way she’d quit when she was ahead. So now what? The heart wants what it wants and it doesn’t accept substitutions.”

  He imagined her in a big claw-foot tub filled with warm mud. It wasn’t nearly as repulsive as he thought. Matter of fact, it was downright sexy seeing her breasts all covered with chocolate coating and her aqua eyes glittering as he drew pictures on the parts of her body that he could reach with his forefinger.

  He put the vision out of his mind and concentrated on the classic country songs on the radio, but every single one reminded him of her in some way.

  “Please Help Me I’m Falling,” an oldie by Hank Locklin, talked about a man who was already married and falling in love with another woman. In a sense that was the case with him and Haley because he was married to his way of life and he was falling in love with her whether he wanted to admit it or not.

  Charley Pride said it all when he sang that it would take a little bit longer to get her off his mind. He said that the lonely feeling would go away, but Dewar didn’t believe it for a minute. Half of his heart went to Dallas in that little sports car with a woman that was as married to her way of life as he was to his. Maybe he should just cut the strings right now, today, and forget all about the way he felt in Dodge City.

  “Walk Through This World with Me,” a George Jones classic, started playing and it said everything in Dewar’s heart. He asked her to go where he went, share all his dreams with him. He said that he’d searched for her and now that he’d found her, new horizons were in his world and all he wanted was for her to take his hand and walk through this world with him.

  He turned off the radio at the end of that song, but the lyrics kept running through his mind on a continuous loop. When the day ended, he parked the tractor at the edge of the field and waved at Wilma, who was taking clothes off the line in her backyard. Wilma was middle-aged and took care of cleaning and cooking for Liz since she didn’t like to do either one.

  “I could hire a woman like Wilma if Haley wanted to freelance. Lucy would know of a woman who would love to work for me, I bet,” he said aloud.

  Forget it! It’s not the cooking and housekeeping that she’ll shy away from. It’s a whole way of life. She needs more than a cowboy.

  His house was as empty as a tomb with only the noise of the shower beating down on his tired body. He leaned against the back wall and let the hot water massage the muscles in his shoulders. Riding inside an air-conditioned tractor wasn’t supposed to stiffen him up worse than riding Stallone all day long.

  Shower done, dressed, and a stuffed animal for each of the kids from the souvenir shop at Boot Hill in his hands, he closed the door behind him and walked the quarter mile from his place to the two-story farmhouse where he’d grown up.

  Rachel met him at the door, hands on her hips and eyebrows drawn down over her blue eyes. “No more.”

  He squatted down to hug her. “No more what, baby girl?”

  “No more go for Nunky Dewar.”

  “Okay, baby. No more go for Nunky Dewar. I promise, but I brought you and Eddie a present.” He brought the stuffed armadillo and the horse from behind his back and held them toward her.

  She grabbed the horse. “Star!”

  “Pretty close, isn’t it?” Dewar hugged her again.

  “Lookee, Mommy, Star!”

  Austin came from the kitchen, Eddie in her arms. “She’s going to do Maddie proud. All she talks about is Liz’s horse, Star. And he’s just as addicted to her. The horse sense has skipped a generation and landed right smack on her.”

  “I believe it. Let me see that boy.”

  She put the baby in Dewar’s arms and he headed for the nearest rocking chair. “Look at how you’ve grown. By the end of summer, you’ll be riding bulls with your daddy and me.”

  “That’s enough of that talk,” Austin yelled from the kitchen.

  Rye clapped a hand on his younger brother’s shoulder and sat down on the sofa near him. “So the trip was good?”

  “Great,” Dewar said. “No problems except that crazy donkey of Haley’s got a little jolt of lightning. And we faced a tornado and Haley had to bring the donkey into the old huntin’ trailer we were holed up in. Oh, and between the jackass and Haley, we did have a stampede. But other than that, not much happened. Well, we did meet an old whorehouse madam who told us some funny stories.”

  “Well, shit! I wouldn’t want to go with you on an exciting trip. Tell me about this woman who went with y’all.”

  “She did just fine. Hell, Rye, I thought she’d run back home an hour after she finally got into the saddle, but she was made out of tough stuff. She rode through rain and didn’t even bitch about not having a bathroom. She did carry her own toilet paper.” He laughed.

  “Do I hear a little bit of missing her in your voice?” Rye asked.

  “You hear a lot of missing her, but I’ll just have to get over it. She’s city. I’m just a cowboy. Be like…” He paused.

  “Like me and Austin. It’s doable if both hearts want the same thing. If one doesn’t, though, it won’t work. Give it time, brother,” Rye said. “When do we meet her?”

  “She’s coming to the rodeo on Saturday night.”

  “Oh, she is?” Maddie yelled from the kitchen.

  “Yes, Momma, she is. You are going to like her.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Maddie said.

  Chapter 32

  Haley really didn’t intend to go to work the next day, but her mother called and asked her to come in for half a day, so that morning found her right back in her old routine. High heels and her best black suit with the red satin button-up shirt under it felt strange on Wednesday morning when Haley dressed for work. She picked up her briefcase holding her laptop and that day’s printed agenda from her assistant, Joyce. She had a meeting with her parents in the conference room first thing that morning, after which there would be a larger meeting that would last until ten. From then until five she was booked solid with one thi
ng and another, then there was that dinner with Joel and her parents that she couldn’t figure a way out of short of crawling up in a casket and crossing her hands over her boobs.

  The first person she saw when she walked into the ground floor of the business was Joel holding the door for her. She waltzed through with a nod but he quickly caught up, grabbed her arm, and spun her around to kiss her right on the lips.

  “I missed you, darling,” he said.

  She wiped the back of her hand across her lips. “We’ll talk later. I’ve got to meet with my folks before the midweek conference.”

  “Yes, we will. I’m looking forward to dinner tonight.” He winked.

  “Lord, put me back on a damn horse,” she mumbled as she pushed the elevator button.

  Her mother crossed the room in long strides and hugged her tightly. “Look at you. I expected a holy mess from the way you talked, but you look wonderful.”

  Jenny Levy was five feet ten inches tall without her high heels. Her Cajun blood showed in her jet-black hair, ebony eyes, and the angles of her face. She wore a gorgeous blue sleeveless dress with a short-cropped jacket over it and shoes dyed to match.

  “Most of the mess is covered up. See?” Haley pulled back her bangs.

  “What in the hell happened? Do you have leprosy? My God, Carl, what did you do to my baby?” Jenny shot daggers at her husband.

  Carl wasted no time in setting his coffee down and getting to his daughter where he took a look at her snow-white forehead. “Hat?”

  Haley nodded. “My arms are the same. White above my short shirtsleeves and brown as toast from there down.”

  Jenny pointed at Carl. “Look what you caused. I told you to send Joel.”

  “She needed the experience. Now let’s talk. We’ve decided to trash the reality show after all. Joel has a new and fresh idea about country folks going to the city. Kind of like Crocodile Dundee when he came to New York, only with today’s twist.”

  Haley’s blood ran cold through her veins. She looked like a damn redneck. She’d lived through a tornado as well as a stampede, had almost gotten hit by lightning, and could have been bitten by a rattlesnake. She had spent hours and hours on notes for the show. And they were trashing it!

  “Get a cup of coffee, darling. I promise your father will never ever do this to you again or I’ll tell Granny to take him to the bayou and leave him there,” Jenny said.

  “I don’t want a damn cup of coffee,” she said coldly.

  “Now, don’t take that tone with us. It’s like writing a book, honey. You get rejections. The reality show was a great idea, but it was a day late and ten dollars short when it came to the market.”

  “When did you make this decision?” Haley asked.

  “Joel did the research while you were gone,” Jenny said. “He brought it all to us two weeks ago.”

  “And you let me stay out there with the mosquitoes, the chiggers, horse shit, and tornadoes? You didn’t even try to send a rescue squad to ask me if I wanted to come home?”

  Her father shrugged. “We weren’t sure where you were.”

  “I was on a freakin’ horse’s back going fifteen miles or less a day on the Chisholm Trail, which is marked pretty damned well. You could have found me,” she shouted.

  Carl held up a finger and narrowed his eyes. “Don’t raise your voice.”

  She spun around and headed out the door.

  “Where are you going? The midweek conference starts in five minutes,” Carl said.

  “Have it without me. Hell, you can make all kinds of decisions without consulting me. Why in the hell would you need my input in a little thing like a midweek conference? I’m taking the rest of this week and maybe next week off. Dock my pay if I don’t have enough vacation time to cover the damn days.”

  “Hey, there’s no need for this,” Jenny said softly.

  “Oh, I think there is.” She kept walking.

  “Where can I reach you?” Jenny yelled.

  “In an emergency—and it had damn well better be an emergency—you can call Granny. I’m going to Louisiana.”

  ***

  Dewar was mucking out a horse stall when his phone vibrated in his hip pocket. He leaned the shovel against the stall door and smiled as he answered it.

  “What are you wearing?” he asked.

  “A damn suit and a damn pair of high heels, both of which I’m going home to change,” Haley said.

  “Whoa, darlin’. Who done pissed on your bagel this morning?”

  “My parents, and I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to be fit to be around until I quit fuming and I won’t be at the rodeo on Saturday and I won’t be at my apartment. I’m going to Louisiana to spend a whole week with my granny and they can all slip in cow shit and fall right into hell.”

  “Whew! What on earth happened, Haley? Did they prearrange a marriage or sell you into slavery?”

  “They decided two damn weeks ago to cancel the reality show and they didn’t even have the decency to come find me. And Miz Sadie will be looking for us to film the whorehouse and don’t you dare kiss me again, Joel. I swear I’ll knock the shit right out of you,” she said.

  “I’m not Joel. What in the hell is going on there?” Dewar said.

  “Well, he was coming at me with a big grin and he already kissed me hello this morning. Joel, you can go to hell!”

  “Haley? Are you all right?” Dewar asked.

  “I’m fine and dandy and Daddy can adopt Joel’s sorry ass and call him a son. I’m going to Granny’s and we might just gamble the hell out of what’s left of my whole paycheck from the trail drive.”

  “When are you leaving?”

  “Soon as I go home, pack my suitcase, and get the valet to bring my car around.”

  “Drive safe and call me when you stop for lunch?” Dewar said.

  “Probably before then, and thanks for not trying to talk me out of it,” she said.

  “Hell, honey, I’d leave too. Carl was out a wad of money for that project.”

  Haley hailed a taxi and then said, “He’ll write it off as a tax expense. Give me an hour and I’ll call you when I’m not ready to burn down the corporation. I’m in a taxi going two blocks when I could have walked that far even in these ridiculous high heels. Don’t that make a helluva lot of sense.”

  “Cool down, darlin’, and don’t drive fast when you do get behind the wheel of your car,” he said.

  He stared at the phone for a long time before he put it back in his pocket. Life could turn on a dime and change in the course of a five-minute phone call. He’d been thinking about buying roses and champagne for after the rodeo on Saturday. Now he wouldn’t even get to see her for two weeks.

  “Your new girlfriend?” Maddie asked.

  She didn’t look old enough to have five grown children, three grandchildren, and three more on the way. She had a few crow’s-feet around her bright blue eyes, but her chestnut hair didn’t sport even one gray strand. She was tall and slim, wore tight jeans and a chambray work shirt out over an aqua-colored undershirt, the same shade as her eyes.

  “It was Haley. She won’t be coming to the rodeo. She’s going to Louisiana to visit her grandmother,” Dewar said.

  “Likely story,” Maddie grumbled.

  “It’s the truth. She’s mad at her folks. After all the money and time spent, they decided there would be no reality show and she really worked very hard on that trip thinking up ideas for the show. I’d be pissed too, Momma,” Dewar said.

  “Rich city people. No understanding the way they think. You going to exercise Glorious Danny Boy this morning?”

  “Soon as I get this stall cleaned out, we’ve got a date. He says he missed me pretty bad,” Dewar said.

  “Not as much as your family did.” Maddie led a saddled horse out of the barn and mounted up for a ride.

  ***

  Haley whipped around a few loops and caught I-30 west toward Shreveport, missing all the morning traffic and getting through town before
the lunch crowd found their way onto the streets. When she got there, she’d go south on 49 straight into Jeanerette and on out to the sugar plantation where Granny ruled the roost.

  She slapped the steering wheel when her phone rang and the ID said it was Joel.

  “What in the hell do you want?” she said.

  “If I was your father I’d fire you,” he said.

  “Well, you aren’t, and frankly I don’t care if he does.”

  “He and your mother have worked their whole lives to…”

  She did a head wiggle. “Don’t you start that shit with me. They’ve worked their whole lives because they wanted to. Why didn’t you come after me when they ditched the reality show idea?”

  “I’m the one who said you should stay out there and learn to appreciate how good you have it here.” He laughed.

  It all came tumbling down on her in the confines of a small car and made her mad all over again. He had called the shots and her parents had let him. She hung up on him without another word, steam practically shooting out her ears and from the top of her red hair.

  The phone rang again and she pushed the speakerphone button. If they wanted a war she could deliver it complete with weapons of mass destruction. She was a tough woman. Hell’s bells, she’d just ridden a horse for a month. They couldn’t win against her.

  “Haley Belle McKay Levy, you turn that car around and come back to work. If you weren’t my daughter, I’d have fired you on the spot. But if you are here by the time we go to dinner, I won’t.” Jenny’s tone left no wiggle room.

  “I’m just a stupid employee that you left out in the wilds for two weeks past when you knew you weren’t going to run the show, so fire my ass. I don’t care. I can find a job.”

  “Not without my recommendation,” Jenny said sternly.

  “Is Daddy standing right beside you?”

  “Yes, he’s here and so is Joel. You are on speakerphone. What in the devil has gotten into you?”

  If she told them that Dewar had gotten into her by the river, under a shade tree, in a hotel room, hell, even in an outhouse, they’d all three drop dead on the spot.