While Caleb rinsed and filled the big water jug on the truck Melanie got the toolbox from the shed and slid it in behind the driver’s seat. They checked the gas tank, found it full, and Melanie climbed into the driver’s seat.
Caleb frowned.
“What?” she asked, her lips twitching.
“I thought I’d drive,” Caleb said.
“Did you, now? And why is that?”
He bit the inside of his jaw. “Habit? Never mind.”
“You offered to help,” she told him. “Tell me I’m not going to be butting up against your he-man ego all day.”
His eyes widened. “My what? I don’t have a heman ego. Whatever the hell that is. When have I ever tried to stop you from doing anything you wanted to do?”
“How about that time I wanted to drive Jerry MacKenzie’s motorcycle in high school? You had long since graduated. Just what were you doing in the school parking lot that day?”
“I was saving your hide. That motorcycle was a death trap, and you weren’t even going to wear a helmet.”
“I suppose you wear a helmet when you ride a horse, which is a darn sight more unpredictable than a motorcycle.”
“A horse doesn’t have anywhere near the torque that a Harley does.”
“Did you ever ride a Harley?” she asked pointedly.
“We’re not talking about me.”
“Oh, yeah, the old double standard.”
“You were a seventeen-year-old kid.”
She started the truck and put it in gear. “Don’t you mean girl?”
“If the shoe fits, Cinderella.”
“Oh, ugh.”
“What? I thought girls liked Cinderella.”
“Sure.” She headed for the first of several gates they would have to open to get through, then close behind them to keep cattle and horses in their pastures. On horseback, gates could be fun, a challenge. You leaned down from the saddle without dismounting and opened a gate, rode through, then closed and latched it behind you. No big deal. At least not the first seven hundred times you did it. After that it was just a necessary nuisance.
In a vehicle it was a royal pain in the tush, especially if you were alone. Drive up, stop, get out, push the gate all the way open and make sure it doesn’t swing shut. Drive through, stop, get out, walk back to the gate, realize you didn’t drive through far enough to close the gate, get back in and pull forward, get out and walk back, close and latch the gate, walk back to the truck. A pain in the tush.
“Cinderella was a great role model for little girls,” she informed him. “She got her heart’s desire not by having to work for it, but by having small feet. Gives every little girl something worthwhile to strive for, don’t you think? Teaches a valuable lesson about life.”
He scrunched up his face. “Small feet?”
“Forget it.” She pulled to a stop. “Passenger gets the gates.”
He scowled. “That’s why you wanted to drive.”
“Of course.”
She watched as he got out and walked to the gate. Sauntered was more like it, with a cute little bobble and wave from the leather work gloves, the fingers of which were sticking out of his right hip pocket.
Hello, gloves.
Hello, nice butt.
She blinked and found him standing there holding the gate open, a puzzled look on his face as he stared back at her.
Oops. Caught, she thought. Better keep her mind on the business at hand. Which meant keeping her mind off Caleb, which was going to be hard to do, since they were going to be joined at the hip, so to speak, all day.
She drove through the open gate and idled, waiting while Caleb closed the gate and climbed back onto the water jug he was using as a seat. They repeated the process three more times before reaching the far hay field.
The sky was a clear, cloudless blue. The angle of light and shadow where the woods met the field spoke of fall. The breeze carried that sweet, pungent perfume of twenty acres of freshly cut alfalfa.
Melanie scanned the field, then looked at Caleb.
“I’m betting we can get all this stored in the hay barn before dark,” he said.
“How’s your shoulder?” she asked.
“It’s fine.” He stood up and tugged on his gloves. “Just drive. I’ll stack.”
“I can stack bales,” she said.
“I’m sure you can. But you wanted to drive.”
“All right,” she said. “But I’ll spell you.”
“We’ll see.”
Melanie drove the big lumbering truck straight and slowly down each row of bales, aiming the end of the loader at each next bale. The conveyor belt carried the bale back to the truck bed where Caleb added it to the growing stack.
The day was warm for October. Mother Nature decided to give them a late dose of summer and pushed the temperature up into the mid eighties, which wasn’t necessarily hot, unless your body protested that, Hey, it’s October already, cool it down some, will ya? The heat, Melanie realized, was both a curse and a blessing. A curse because lifting and stacking bales was hot, heavy work even in cool weather; now it made the sweat roll. A blessing because the warmth had Caleb taking off his shirt before they made it to the second row. The T-shirt he wore beneath it hugged every curve and dip and bulge in his muscled shoulders and torso.
Nice, she thought. Very, very nice.
When Melanie made the turn at the end of the fourth row she had just enough time to notice that one of the old wooden fence posts was down and the wires sagging when the loading conveyor jerked and let out a squeal, then made a hideous grinding noise before it stopped altogether. Melanie shut it down immediately then killed the truck engine. The acrid stench of burning rubber stung her nostrils.
She jumped left off the truck; Caleb leaped off the right side. They met on opposite sides of the loading conveyor.
“If we can’t fix this thing,” Melanie muttered, “Daddy’s going to have my head on a platter.” Heaven knew she was already in the running for his least favorite person of the year after this morning. “I smelled burning rubber.”
“Me, too.” Caleb knelt at the front end of the loader.
“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.
The Chisholm Brothers:Friends, Lovers... Husbands? Page 27