Larissa waited for Hank to call or come by but he didn’t. She rationalized that it might not be raining in the northern part of the county. He and his dad only had a few more days before he went back to Dallas.
On Wednesday it cleared off.
Hank called to tell her that he wouldn’t be by that day either because the house would still be wet, making it impossible to scrape or paint.
“So I guess I’ll see you tomorrow?” she asked.
“At noon. We got to get the rest of that place scraped and painted so it’ll be done before I leave,” he said.
“Which is when?”
“Right after the meeting on Saturday. I promised I’d be back in the Dallas office by Monday morning. I’m flying to Paris on Tuesday and I need to get everything together,” he said.
“Aha, the cowboy turns professor. That sounds like a good plot for a thick romance book,” she said. “Want some romance before we start scraping?”
“I reckon if we’re going to get this house painted turquoise before I leave then we’d best get busy,” he drawled. “I’ll be there tomorrow. Will you be cooking at the Smokehouse for us?”
“Not tomorrow. I’ve got a surprise,” she said.
It was evident from the minute he showed up the next day that something wasn’t right. She couldn’t put her finger on it but her gut said that something had changed drastically in his life. Had she done something to offend him the day they had dinner with the ladies?
“So tell me, are you tired of the ranch and ready to get back into the fast life?” she asked when they’d finished scraping in the middle of the afternoon.
“Honestly?” he asked.
“Is there any other answer? We’ve joked. We’ve made love but we are friends, Hank. What’s on your mind? What happened since I saw you last other than rain?”
“Always before I’ve been so ready to go back to my friends, my condo, and my lifestyle in Dallas. This year I’m not. My dad is getting older and slower. I feel like I’m needed on the ranch more than in the office,” he said.
“So stay,” she said. “Surprise is that we are having dinner today over at Linda’s place. She made pot roast and invited us to come over and eat leftovers. They all had hairdo appointments in Abilene but I know where the key is. We just have to heat up a plate in the microwave. She even made pecan pie.”
“That sounds wonderful.” He smiled but it did not reach his eyes.
Linda’s house was close enough that they walked. Twice his hand brushed hers and he made an excuse to distance himself from her. Both times she wondered if he was battling a difficult life decision or if he was sorry about their skinny-dipping that Sunday.
Larissa turned over a rock in the flower bed and brought up a key. The house still smelled like roast and yeast bread and she was starving. “You really should put in a café with these women, Hank. You’d run the Smokestack some serious competition.”
He didn’t have the heart to tell her that in three days none of them would even be speaking to him, much less wanting to go into business with him. She helped her plate and stuck it in the microwave for a couple of minutes. He’d barely gotten his loaded when she pulled hers out and carried it to the table.
“Go on and eat. You don’t have to wait for me. I ate breakfast. You probably had a cup of coffee and a cookie,” he said.
“It was a chunk of leftover snicker doodle dipped in coffee.” She cut a piece of roast and moaned when she put it in her mouth. “This is soooo good.”
He removed his plate from the microwave and joined her. He’d worked up an appetite in spite of the conflicting emotions and the roast was seasoned just right. Linda could easily run a café.
“Are we going to start painting today?” he asked.
“I’ve got more than three hours before I have to take a shower and go to the Honky Tonk. I’m anxious to get started. Way I figure it is with both of us working we can get a lot done in three hours. The house isn’t very big. We should have it done by quittin’ time on Friday if we keep after it. Want to start earlier tomorrow? I’ll give up some sleep to get it finished before you leave.”
He buttered a hot roll. “I’ll be here at nine.”
“I’ll be up and ready then. Are you going to miss me when you go back to Dallas?” She held her breath waiting on the answer.
He looked across the table and his eyes went all soft and dreamy like they’d been on Sunday when they were making love. “I’ll always miss you, Larissa. This has been an incredible month. I’m glad that crazy deer introduced us.”
She smiled.
He didn’t ask her if she’d miss him. He already knew the answer. Once the cat was out of the bag she’d never want to set eyes on him again.
***
“I cannot believe you are really going to paint this house turquoise. I thought you were joking with me like you do all the time,” Hank snarled when he opened the first can of paint.
“I told you I love the islands. If I hadn’t found myself in Mingus I might have gone back there. I love the bright colors, the siestas, and the laid-back lifestyle.”
“How long were you there?” He remembered her talking about the islands before and he’d brushed it off as fantasy.
“Six months. In a turquoise house with hot pink trim. It was about this size only it did not have air conditioning. It was right on the beach though. Want to go there with me sometime?” she asked.
“Just tell me what time to meet you at the airport. We’ll have to get a red-eye on Sunday morning and fly back on Monday.” He slapped the first brush load onto the siding and grinned. The Chicken Ranch didn’t have a thing on Larissa Morley.
“I’ve got Sharlene helping me now. I could manage a long weekend.”
“Tell you what, you give me a couple of weeks back at the Dallas grindstone and call me anytime you want. I bet I can get away for any long weekend that you can,” he said.
She smiled brightly. He wasn’t upset with her after all.
She started painting. “Will we go skinny-dippin’ in the saltwater?”
He kept his eyes on the bright colored paint and didn’t look at her. “If you want to skinny-dip, we’ll hang our clothes on the bushes and dive right in.”
“Gawd Almighty, what are you doing?” Amos parked his motorcycle in the driveway and shook his head.
Hank was glad for the distraction. He’d been amazed that Amos hadn’t recognized him and had been nervous as hell around him those first few times he’d been in the Honky Tonk. But lately he’d begun to fit into the Hank Wells cowboy skin better and better.
“I know. It looks like shit, don’t it?” Hank said.
“That’s enough from both of you. When it’s all done it’ll be beautiful. Hell, everyone in Mingus might be painting their houses to look like Bahama homes,” she said. “Beer is in the fridge if you are thirsty.”
“Thirsty, hell! I need a dose of Pepto after looking at that color. I cannot believe you went to all the trouble to scrape the old paint off if you were going to put that shit on your house,” Amos said.
“That’s what I told her,” Hank said.
“Looks like I’m outnumbered today but you’ll both rue the day you made fun of my pretty house,” she said.
Amos grinned. “I’m thirsty enough to shut up right now. Has Linda and the ladies seen this?”
Larissa shook her head. “I’m surprising them.”
“You sure are, darlin’.” Hank laughed.
Chapter 10
Larissa was working on the west side when Hank parked his pickup in the driveway the next morning. If her mother was really as wealthy as the picture Larissa had painted the last time she talked about her, the woman was going to have a cardiac arrest when she removed her fancy sunglasses and the color blinded her.
“I’m around here,” Larissa called. “Your brush and paint bucket are on the front porch.”
“Coffee?” He rounded the end of the porch and stopped. She had a bandana around her forehead and wor
e paint splotched cut-off jeans and a bright pink tank top. She was barefoot and sweat glistened on her lightly toasted skin. She was a hippy, born forty years too late, and desire flooded his body.
“In the pot. Heat it in the microwave.” She didn’t look at him. Didn’t need to. He still looked like the devil in tight blue jeans, still smelled like him with Stetson shaving lotion, and his voice hadn’t changed a bit. She hadn’t found out a thing about Hank Wells except that he was Henry’s son by a woman named Victoria. That’s all her investigators could find out. Hank was thirty-two years old and had been born in Dallas.
Her mother might seduce him and play with him like a cat with a mouse for a few weeks, but she’d die if she thought Larissa was really falling for the guy. When Larissa got ready for a permanent commitment and a trip down the aisle wearing the traditional white dress, it had better be with someone other than a cowboy, no matter how sexy he was. She continued to slap paint on the house, liking it better with each section.
“I stole one of Linda’s cookies too,” Hank said.
“Help yourself,” she said.
He sipped the coffee and waited until she finished spreading out the brush load of paint. He’d wrestled with his conscience all night and was ready to cowboy-up and do the right thing. He’d tell her exactly what he’d been up to from day one. That would end his painting days as well as any relationship they had or ever could have had. It just flat out wasn’t right for her to walk into the Honky Tonk on Saturday and find out he was working for the other side.
“I’d like to…” He had to come clean or his heart was going to explode with guilt.
A blaring car horn stopped him from saying anything more. Larissa leaned out around the house and Hank frowned.
Sharlene crawled out of a hot pink Volkswagen bug. “Hey, y’all need another hand? I’m damn good at paintin’. I love the color. It’s gorgeous. Reminds me of pictures of an exotic island.”
“I don’t turn down help,” Larissa called back. “You got any old clothes? If not, you can wear some of mine.”
“I brought old cut-offs and shirts to clean the apartment this weekend. Mind if I change in your house?”
Hank sighed. Maybe he’d have time to tell her while Sharlene changed.
“Not a bit. Here, Hank, take this brush and I’ll show her where things are. I need to take a bathroom break anyway,” Larissa said.
Sharlene grabbed a duffle bag from the backseat of her car and followed Larissa into the house. “Nice place you got here. It’s about the size of the house I grew up in up outside of Corn.”
“Your house was this small and you had four brothers?” Larissa’s eyes widened.
“Yep, two sets of bunk beds in the bedroom off the kitchen. Momma and Daddy had the bedroom off the living room. By the time I came along they’d enclosed the back porch into a laundry room so when I outgrew the crib in their room, they put a twin-size bed out by the washer and dryer. That was my room. It worked and we weren’t inside kids anyway,” Sharlene explained.
“My bedroom is off the kitchen. You can change in there,” Larissa said.
“I got a favor to ask,” Sharlene yelled through the door as she peeled her miniskirt down over her legs and kicked off her boots.
“And that would be?” Larissa poured half a cup of coffee and dipped a snicker doodle in it.
“They cut back my hours at the newspaper. Last to arrive; first to get the pink slip boot and all. Anyway, I’m only working three days a week. Mind if I use the apartment more than two nights a week?”
“Honey, you can live there and I’ll pay you to help me in the bar. Can you do your work from the apartment and send it in?”
She opened the door and stepped out into the kitchen in shorts that had dried paint on them and a shirt that was two sizes too big.
“Probably,” she said.
Larissa pointed at the cookies and coffee.
“Thanks. I am hungry. Didn’t take time for breakfast. When I got the news I just went back to my place and drove straight up here.”
“Is your placed rented through tomorrow?”
“Yep, rent is due on Monday.”
“Move into the Honky Tonk. We’ll talk about wages later. Right now we’ve got a house to paint and I’ll pay you for that too. Hank is going back to his Dallas job after the meeting tomorrow and he can only help today and tomorrow. With another paintbrush we might get it finished.”
“Can I paint the Honky Tonk like this?” Sharlene asked.
“Hell, no!” Larissa laughed. “Where did you get that shirt and what did you paint last?”
“It’s my brother’s cast off. I figured it would be good and floppy to wear for cleaning the place. I got a friend who’ll help me move on Sunday. My living room stuff is early redneck attic, so I’ll leave it behind. My bedroom furniture doesn’t have two pieces that match but they’ll fit in the apartment right fine. And the last thing I painted was an old VW bug for a friend. He wanted it to look like an old hippy wagon. Daisies, peace symbols, and the whole nine yards. Then he took it to a body shop and had a shiny clear finish put on it. Damn, it was pretty. Let’s go get this house done. What color is the trim going to be? I’ve got a right steady hand. Want me to start on it while y’all do the flat work?”
Larissa smiled and started out the front door.
Sharlene grabbed two cookies and followed her. “I know I talk too much but it’s me. I tried to stop it in the army but I either talk or bust. I get mean when I hold everything in.”
“I like a person who’s upfront and honest. Talk all you want. What did you do in the army?”
Sharlene suddenly clammed up. “I have to use an old line if I tell you. It goes like this, ‘I’d tell you but then I’d have to kill you.’”
Larissa laughed. “Someday you’ll tell me because we are best friends and you are an honest soul.”
That comment shot a hole through Hank’s already guilty heart but he couldn’t blurt out what was on his mind with Sharlene there. She’d probably stay all day. At least he still had one more day before the meeting. And he vowed he’d do what was right before that meeting started.
“What color is the trim?” Sharlene asked.
Larissa pointed. “Hot pink. That can right there.”
“Ah, man, you sure I can’t do the Honky Tonk up like this? It would stand out like a beacon in the night to every hotheaded, lusty cowboy and good-time cowgirl in the whole state,” Sharlene said.
“How much did you pay her to be on your side?” Hank drawled.
Sharlene opened the can and dipped a small brush into it. “She didn’t pay me anything. I like these colors.”
“You wouldn’t really paint the Honky Tonk like this, would you? It’s got an old-time ambience that is its trademark.” Hank kept painting but stole glances at Larissa working beside him. Why couldn’t he have met her in different circumstances?
His mother’s voice came to haunt him as continued to work. “Life is not fair.”
But this time I want it to be fair more than anything else in the world. I’d give anything to be able to stay on the ranch and have a long lasting relationship with Larissa. I would like to be Hank Wells, the cowboy, forever. I don’t want to go home to Dallas. My heart aches to stay in Palo Pinto or even in this Bahama-style house. Hell, I’d even put a thatch roof on it if I could wake up with Larissa by my side every morning.
“What are you thinking about?” Larissa asked.
“Why?”
“Your forehead was all wrinkled up in a frown.”
“I’m not ready to go back to Dallas,” he said.
“Then don’t. Henry would be tickled for you to come to the ranch permanently.”
“I know. It’s been his dream since I was a little boy.”
“Then stay.” Her heart floated somewhere up around the wispy white clouds drifting over a blue summer sky.
“It’s complicated,” he said.
She nodded. “You’re talking to t
he poster child for complicated. I understand.” But she didn’t understand at all. She wanted to grab him by the hand and take him to the bedroom. But lust wasn’t reason enough to change a person’s lifestyle.
“You won’t be that far away. You can always drop by the Honky Tonk,” Sharlene said from the front porch where she painted window frames. “Are the porch posts going to be pink too?”
“No, yellow,” Larissa said.
“Man, it’s just not fair. If you ever sell it can I buy it? I’ll hock my twenty-year-old bug and my tomcat. Oh, I forgot, can I bring a cat to the apartment? I promise he’s litter trained and he’s a good boy.”
“No problem,” Larissa said.
“What’s his name?” Hank asked.
“I found him when he was a little kitten last year. Someone threw him in the dumpster. He barely had his eyes open and I couldn’t leave him there even if I wasn’t supposed to have him in my apartment. So I snuck him up in my purse and bottle fed him for a month before he was ready for real food. He’s been to the vet and he’s a good boy. Oh, you asked about his name, not how I came about having a cat, didn’t you? I couldn’t decide on whether to name him Willie, Waylon, or Merle, so I just named him all three. I call him Waylon most of the time, though.”
Hank rolled his eyes at Larissa.
She grinned.
“I’m glad I don’t call him Merle now that I’m going to be staying in Mingus because it might offend Merle Avery and she’s so sweet.”
“Merle?” Larissa chuckled.
“She’s a barracuda,” Hank said.
“Well, she’s been sweet to me. I’ll bring Waylon on Sunday when I officially move in. Damn, I’m so excited I could dance a jig in a fresh filled pig trough,” Sharlene said.
Hank grimaced. She might not be so excited come Saturday when her boss was throwing things and cussing a royal blue streak. He wasn’t sure Texas was big enough to house him and Larissa both after that meeting. If not, she could sell her crazy house to Sharlene and move on back to Perry, Oklahoma, or wherever her imagination took her on her next lark.
He worked up a mad spell as he painted. She’d lied to him about her mother living in Tennessee and that sent him on a wild goose chase for information. She’d lied to him about being from Perry, Oklahoma. There wasn’t a Larissa Morley on any records up there. Not pictured in a high school annual, not a single newspaper article about a Larissa Morley winning an award at school, and not on the rolls at Oklahoma State University, either.
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