The Other Brother

by Janis Reams Hudson

“But I smell wood smoke, too.” She noted the turn she’d just made, next to the fence. A thick stand of scrub oak grew on the other side of the barbed wire, with dozens of limbs hanging over. “Could have picked up a small limb.”

  Caleb looked up at her. “Only one way to tell.”

  “I’ll get the toolbox.”

  “You notice the fence there?” he called.

  “Yeah, I saw it. One problem at a time. I’ll get the fence tomorrow.”

  By working together they loosened the tension on the conveyor and found a mass of twigs caught up in a place it shouldn’t be. The clump had managed to get caught in just the wrong spot to gum up the works. They had it cleaned out and the belt operating smoothly in minutes.

  “Oh, we’re good.” Melanie put the tools they’d used back into the toolbox.

  “Never doubt it,” Caleb said. He met her gaze, held it. His voice deepened. Softened. “We make a good team.”

  Melanie couldn’t have looked away if she had tried. She felt mesmerized, held captive by the questions in his eyes, questions she didn’t understand.

  He put out his hand. “Put it there, partner.”

  Melanie blinked and, in slow motion, reached for his hand. If, on contact, she flinched slightly at the sharp charge of electricity that raced up her arm, well, maybe that was okay, because he flinched, too.

  They broke contact.

  Caleb’s lips quirked. “That just keeps happening to us.”

  Melanie reminded herself that she didn’t intend to screw up their friendship. Just then, looking into his deep brown eyes, she wasn’t sure why—oh, yeah. Best friend she’d ever had. Only person she could be herself with. Okay. Okay. She wouldn’t let a little fact like heated blood and tingling skin make her do something, something else, anyway, to damage their friendship.

  “You drive.” She grabbed the toolbox and turned back toward the truck. “I’ll stack for a while.”

  Caleb started to argue. There was no need for her to lift and stack bales of hay. He wasn’t tired, wasn’t likely to get that way anytime soon, and wasn’t likely to keel over dead if he did get tired.

  But he’d seen that don’t argue with me, my mind’s made up look in her eyes when she had turned away. Hell with it. If she wanted to wear herself out, who was he to stop her?

  If, in the back of his mind, he knew that he had never before—before he’d gotten a good solid taste of her Saturday night, and last night, and this morning—if he’d never worried about her working too hard and wearing herself out, well, that was something to think about. Later.

  Caleb drove the truck, and Melanie found her rhythm stacking bales. Slip fingers beneath baling wire. Grab, lift, swing, stack. Pull hands out from beneath baling wire. Turn. Do it all again. Honest work that taxed the muscles and worked up a sweat. Mindless work that left the brain free to wander. Hers wanted to wander to her friend in the driver’s seat.

  She blanked her mind and thought instead of her father, wondered where he was, when he would be back. She thought of her mother, wondered how she was, when she would call.

  Then she thought of nothing at all except lifting the next bale.

  They didn’t yet have a full load when Caleb suggested they take what they had to the hay barn and come back for the rest.

  Melanie would have argued, despite the growing ache in her hands and muscles, but she could see that they’d already loaded more than half the field, but they couldn’t get all of the rest of it this trip. It would take a second load, regardless.

  Besides, she was hungry.

  Caleb drove to the hay barn in the pasture beyond the hay field while Melanie sat on the water jug and let the slight breeze dry the sweat on her face. At the barn Melanie jumped down and opened the doors so Caleb could back the truck in.

  “You want to eat first?” Caleb asked once he stopped and killed the engine. “Or unload?”

  “Eat,” she said. “I’m starving.”

  They carried their coolers to the hay bales already stacked in the barn, then Melanie darted back to the truck.

  “Wait,” she said, digging into the toolbox. A moment later she was back at his side handing him a moistened towelette in a packet.

  Caleb smirked. “Afraid of a little dirt?”

  “We’re civilized here on the PR. We wash up before we eat.”

  “You carry these things in the toolbox?”

  “Why not?”

  Caleb shrugged and tore the end off the packet. “Shrimpfest?”

  “They give them out at the all-you-can-eat fish place up in the city.”

  “And you bring them home.”

  “Whatever works.”

  As soon as their hands were clean they dived in. After the first sandwich and two full cups of water Melanie felt better. She let out a long sigh, certain now that she was in no danger of starving to death.

  “Tell me something pleasant,” she said.

  He plucked an apple out of the cooler. “What would you consider pleasant?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. How is it having a woman and two kids living in the house these days? Are you guys used to them yet?”

  Caleb chuckled. “Sloan is.”

  “Do tell. I’m sure he’s happy as a lark. Must put a crimp in your style, though, and Justin’s.”

  “Well, we don’t walk around the house in our underwear. Or out of it. But then, Grandmother would have boxed our ears if we’d ever done it once we passed the age of about four, women and girls around or not.”

  “So it’s no big deal, then, having a woman and two little girls around.”

  “Are you kidding? It’s great. Emily makes these great desserts, and there’s always fresh-baked cookies of one kind or another in the kitchen, and fresh flowers all over the house. And those girls, they’re so cute you just want to hug ’em.”

  “Food and fun,” she said with a smirk. “Is that what it takes to please a man? Comfort and entertainment.” She shook her head. “Which would explain why I’m not married.”

  Caleb bit into his apple and chewed thoughtfully.

  Melanie frowned. “The fruit’s supposed to be dessert.”

  “Why aren’t you married?” he asked. “If you’re really not still hung up on Sloan—”

  “If?” She gaped at him. “What do you mean, if?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged and unwrapped another sandwich. Roast beef this time. “I guess I’ve been thinking lately that maybe you aren’t as over him as you thought you were.” He shrugged again. “Maybe I was wrong.”

  “No maybe about it.” Suddenly it became more important than ever that he believe her. “You know I’ve been over him for a long, long time. You know that.”

  “I thought I knew that.” He studied his sandwich as if trying to figure out what it was and how it got into his hand. “Until the other night at the party.”

  “I told you I had a lot on my mind but that it had nothing to do with Sloan.”

  “Yeah.” He looked her in the eye. “And then you kissed me.”

  Heat stung her cheeks. “Next time I’ll just let the barracuda have you.”

  “Then you went out two nights later and got yourself drunk. That’s not like you, Mel.”

  “No,” she agreed. “It’s not like me. I didn’t set out to get drunk, you know. I just kept thinking about the money and Daddy’s gambling and Mama’s bills, and I just kept drinking. Stupid.”

  “You’ll get no argument from me.”

  She made a face. “I can always count on you for comfort and support.”

  “Hey, what are friends for?”

  Melanie grabbed a banana from the cooler and pulled the peel down. She was losing her appetite fast. She ate her banana in silence, then dropped the peel into the cooler.

  “I’ve had enough. I’ll get started.” She climbed onto the truck and started tossing bales to the ground.

  Caleb ate a third sandwich in four quick bites. If he lived to be a hundred he would never understand women. He
had thought, for most of his life, that he knew this one, understood her mind and heart. But since Saturday she had done nothing but confound him time after time.

  He’d even confounded himself a time or two in regards to her.

  And if she threw those bales down any harder she was going to dislocate a shoulder.

  One thing he did know when it came to women. No matter the situation, a man could never go wrong with an apology. Didn’t matter if there was anything to apologize for. A man had nearly always done something wrong. In the eyes of a woman.

  He cleaned up the remains of their lunch and stowed the coolers back on the truck, then climbed up with Melanie, who kept her back turned and ignored him.

  “Melanie.” He waited until she had tossed the bale she held, then put his hands on her shoulders. “Melanie, I’m sorry.”

  She whipped her head around, surprise written across her face. “For what?”

  He turned her until she stood facing him, and brushed his fingers along her cheek. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just, I don’t know, trying to figure things out, I guess.”

  She stared up at him, her green eyes clouded with questions. “What kinds of things?”

  Overhead a carpenter bee buzzed loudly as it drilled a hole in a wooden beam, and from farther up in the rafters came the flutter of wings. Caleb didn’t look up to see what kind of bird intruded on them. Probably a pigeon.

  “Things,” he said, “like why we all of a sudden seem to end up kissing every time we turn around.”

  Her throat worked on a swallow. “Kissing?”

  “Yeah.” He leaned closer. “You know, your lips, my lips, lightning bolts.”

  Something skittered across her face, through her eyes, that looked suspiciously like fear. “Good grief.” She stepped back and laughed. Nervously. “Not here. With our track record we’d set the hay on fire. Let’s get back to work.”

  He wanted, badly, to ask her what that look had meant. She couldn’t be afraid of him. Not him. It wasn’t possible.

  But she lifted another bale and tossed it down. She wasn’t going to talk. Not now.

  That didn’t mean he intended to let the matter drop for long. Not when all he could think about was kissing her again.

  They finished unloading and stacking the bales, then drove back to the field to get the rest. When Caleb moved to the back of the truck to start stacking, Melanie didn’t object. He was bigger and stronger than she was. She’d be an idiot to try to match him bale for bale.

  Besides, all she had to do was readjust her rearview mirror slightly and she could watch those beautiful biceps flex and bulge. Best view in the county.

  She wondered if she’d ever before seen that particular lock of black hair fall from beneath his cowboy hat at just that angle across his forehead. In defense against the urge to walk back there and smooth it back from his face, she gripped the steering wheel tighter.

  There was no use trying to talk over the rumble of the engine while Caleb worked in the back and Melanie sat in the driver’s seat, but they didn’t find much to say to each other later, either, when they returned to the hay barn or while they unloaded, or during the drive back to the house.

  Melanie knew they wouldn’t be using the truck again until next season, so instead of pulling into the equipment shed she stopped in the yard.

  “Drain the water jug?” Caleb asked.

  “You read my mind.”

  “I’ll get it.” There was enough water left that letting it drain out the tap would have taken several minutes. Instead he unstrapped the jug, opened the top and dumped the water in the flower bed beside the house.

  Melanie gathered up the coolers from lunch and carried them to the house while Caleb backed the truck into the shed. He met her in the kitchen where she was cleaning up the coolers.

  “I really appreciate all your work today,” she told him.

  “You’re welcome, but you know you don’t have to thank me. You’d do the same if I had a need.”

  “Of course I would. Still, I’m grateful. If I’d had to do that job alone it would have taken me days, and who knows what the weather might do before Daddy comes home.”

  “I was glad to help.”

  “I was glad to have you.”

  “Are we through yet?”

  She blinked. “Through with what?”

  “With whatever this polite, I-barely-know-you-but-thanks-anyway nonsense is.”

  This time she blinked twice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Okay, fine.” He threw his hands in the air. “But if that look of fear I see in your eyes is for me you’re really going to piss me off, pal.”

  “You think I’m afraid of you?” she cried.

  He wished he knew if the outrage on her face was real or feigned. He suddenly felt as if he was walking through a minefield where she was concerned.

  “You’re afraid of something,” he said. “Every time I’ve been near you today you get this look of panic in your eyes. Maybe I’ve come on a little strong a couple of times, but for crying out loud, Melanie, this is me. You have to know I’d cut off my right arm before I’d hurt you.”

  “Good grief.” Melanie gaped. “You think I don’t know that?”

  “For the past few days, when it comes to you I don’t know what to think.” But he breathed easier.

  “Well, there you have it. We’re in total agreement. This whole…whatever it is…is just crazy. We need to go back to the way things were.”

  “Were?”

  “You know. Before.”

  “Before what?”

  “You know.”

  “What’s the matter, can’t you even say it? We kissed. More than once.”

  “I don’t need to say it. You’re saying it enough for both of us.”

  “And you’re avoiding the subject entirely. Except for last night.”

  “Now you’re throwing last night in my face?”

  “Absolutely not,” he argued, fighting a grin. He didn’t care how mad she got as long as she wasn’t indifferent.

  With narrowed eyes, she tapped her toe and folded her arms across her chest. “I’m glad we got that cleared up. Now, as grateful as I am for your help today, I’ve got things to do. Give your grandmother my best, and say hi to Emily and the girls.”

  “I’ll do that. When I call home later.”

  “When you—” She planted her hands on her hips. “Go home, Caleb.”

  “Not gonna happen,” he said. “I don’t see your dad around here anywhere, and I’m not about to go off and leave you here, isolated and alone, when you’ve had strangers snooping around the place.”

  Melanie opened her mouth to protest, but then she remembered her father saying he needed to pay off a man named Bruno. Bruno. It could be that Caleb was more correct than he’d realized when he’d called her snooping strangers thumb breakers.

  Bruno, for crying out loud. She was just worried enough to shut her mouth on further protests of Caleb’s intentions of staying.

  But there was no sense in giving in too easily and giving him a swelled head.

  “I didn’t notice any strangers out there when we came in.”

  “I’m staying. If you weren’t so stubborn you’d agree it’s a good idea.”

  “Stubborn. I’m stubborn?”

  “If the shoe fits—”

  “If you call me Cinderella again, I might have to hurt you.”

  “I’m shaking in my boots.”

  “You should be. Stubborn. This from a man they call yanasa.”

  “Aw, come on. Don’t start that.”

  His family had given him the nickname when he’d been a kid. The Cherokee word meant buffalo. His grandmother and brothers said it fit him because he was about as immovable as that hairy beast.

  “Gotcha.” She gave him a cheesy grin. “Well, don’t just stand there, go get cleaned up for supper. But you’re doing the dishes.”

  His smile was slow and devastating. “I’
ve got no problem with that.”

  That smile was all it took to make her pulse spike.

  There were a few more chores to do after supper. Caleb tagged along and helped gather eggs, lock up the chickens to keep the coyotes and possums from getting them, bring the mares back into the stable and give them some grain.

  Afterward Melanie told Caleb to make himself at home while she did some paperwork at the desk in the den. She heard him turn on the television while she made note of the final hay load. Unless they had the worst winter on record—and the way the PR’s luck was going, that was entirely possible—there should be plenty of hay to see the cattle and horses through the winter.

  She smiled as a feminine Southern drawl came from the television in the living room. “As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”

  Then she heard Caleb change channels.

  She was in the living room and grabbing the remote from his hand in under three seconds.

  “You can’t do that,” she cried, changing the channel back.

  He looked at her as if she’d lost her mind. “Jeez, sorry. All I did was change channels. You weren’t even in here.”

  “You did a lot more than change channels. You committed a supreme no-no.”

  “Let me guess. You’re on medication and you missed your last dose.”

  “You are sooo funny.”

  “I’m glad one of us is. Supreme no-no,” he muttered.

  “Supreme no-no,” she repeated. “The top three supreme no-nos would be, you never turn your back while the flag is being raised, you never walk out during ‘Amazing Grace,’ and you never change channels during Gone With the Wind.”

  “I won’t change the channel, if you sit here and watch it with me.”

  “Good enough.”

  “Do we get popcorn?” he asked hopefully.

  Despite brushing and flossing, she was still picking popcorn hulls out of her teeth hours later when she went to bed.

  Sleep, however, eluded her. How was she supposed to relax when she knew that Caleb was only a few feet away, across the hall in the spare bedroom? How was she supposed to close her eyes when every time she did she kept seeing that errant lock of hair fall forward onto his sweat-dampened forehead?