Lone Star Hero

by Jennie Jones

  Molly flushed from head to toe. She raised her bottle but only pretended to drink. She couldn’t swallow beer and heaven all at once.

  Saul lowered his beer bottle and glanced at Molly again, wanting another shot of that appreciation he got whenever he looked at her, and froze instead as a cold, weird chill crept up his spine.

  It was such an eerie sensation, he turned to look behind him.

  Everything looked the same as it had a few minutes ago when he’d entered the room.

  “What is it?” Molly asked.

  He shook his head. “Nothing. Just a funny... I don’t know. A chill, or something.” He glanced down at her, with a smile, ready to leave the chill where it was and take up where he’d left off—enjoying that appreciation he got when he looked at Molly.

  She was peering at him, her mouth twisted in a ponderous manner and her fern-green eyes full of concern.

  “What sort of a chill?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

  Saul remembered what she’d said about the builders leaving six years ago after Alice had begun the renovation. They’d been scared off by superstition.

  Not much scared Saul these days. He leaned down to Molly and whispered back, in a deep, horror-movie voice, “A ghostly chill, Molly Mackillop.” He expected her to break her studious concentration and smile, maybe laugh, but she didn’t. Her frown deepened and she stepped back.

  “Don’t joke about that,” she said, shooting a look around the room. She looked up at roofless space above them, then at the door they’d come through.

  “Did you feel it, too?” he asked, checking the room out again. The eerie chill had gone now, the room felt the way it had a minute ago, an easy, peaceful place.

  “No,” she said, and headed out the room. “But they’re not after me. Not directly anyway.”

  By the time he’d thought about what she’d just said, then followed her back to the kitchen, she was in busy mode. Getting the beef out of the fridge, and plonking it next to the vegetables on the counter.

  “You don’t believe in all that superstitious nonsense you were telling me about, do you?” he asked, putting both beer bottles into the recycle bin—Molly’s bottle was now empty, so she must have slugged it just a moment ago.

  “I don’t discount it,” she said, almost to herself. “So,” she continued in a brighter tone. “Want to go for your bathroom stint first? I’ll cook dinner. You worked so hard while I was in town. You really are a brilliant handyman and I’m sure you’re an expert roof builder.”

  Saul leaned against the counter and folded his arms over his chest. “What’s got you so sweet-as-pecan-pie suddenly?”

  “I’m just trying to be a friendly boss.”

  Saul watched her for a few minutes, moving around the blue-tinged kitchen, collecting chopping boards and spices, then thumping a big roasting pan onto the counter. Something about the superstitions and the chill he’d felt had bothered her quite a bit.

  As he watched her move, he had an urge to walk up to her, put a hand on her and halt her. To turn her to him and make her look into his eyes. To watch her settle as his hand squeezed her shoulder in reassurance, and his gaze fixed on hers, drawing her in and calming her. As he still wasn’t sure what his decision was regarding making a move on her, he felt it best if he didn’t do any of that.

  Molly needed someone strong by her side. Not to coerce or control her, just someone to steady her when she got uptight, and remind her she was doing her best, and if her best wasn’t good enough—nobody could say she hadn’t given it her all.

  What suddenly disturbed him was the conversation he’d overheard earlier, while she’d been on her cell, telling some guy to send her money. For the life of him he couldn’t see a grain of greed in the woman. She was too damned determined to do things for herself. So what was the deal with the twenty grand she’d demanded?

  “I’ll go clean up now, then,” he told her, moving from the counter. “I’ll be quick. Then you can take the bathroom and I’ll finish up dinner. That way we both get a shot at being boss.” He walked out of the kitchen before she had a chance to answer.

  Molly gulped a breath, banged a loaf of bread onto the counter and threw the knife down after it. He’d scared the heck out of her in the salon. Or the great-grandfathers had. She hadn’t felt anything, only the usual peace that descended on her when she walked through the empty hacienda.

  She had the deepest need to go and see Alice, but she wasn’t going to. She’d stand firm on this. She had to do things for herself now, not go asking her grandmother to look into the future and tell her what was going to happen next. Women who were making a stand didn’t ask for help. Even if the help concerned was a visionary.

  Lauren’s words rang in her head. You’re going to get a whole lot more. The trouble with expecting more trouble was that she already had enough. There was nowhere to fit in extra trouble.

  What problems would Saul cause her? Nothing she could think of, unless he was on the run from the law and that was why he’d left the rangers. Would she turn him in if she discovered something shady or criminal about him?

  Probably—after he’d built her roof.

  So if she wasn’t going to visit Alice, Momma or her cousins were the only people she could talk to who wouldn’t already know what was in store for her—although she’d have to be careful what she said to Momma, because she might not have any spooky-genes but her female intuition rated higher than a dozen mothers put together. Momma had always had that mother’s instinct about all the cousins and their needs. Poor Lauren and Pepper, losing their moms the way they had. But God bless Momma, for being a momma to everyone who needed one.

  She tugged a breath and picked up the bread knife. Tonight, she’d shower, she and Saul would have dinner, then she’d say she was tired and go to bed early. Tomorrow, she’d see how she felt about everything. The crane, the GGs, Saul getting the chills—and about Saul himself.

  Please don’t let me dream about that short, sweet kiss.

  Since Sunday meant still no building gear, and Molly still hadn’t figured out how to get hold of a crane for free or next to free, and since the Mackillops had never been a family that went to church—not that they didn’t believe, but it was difficult to explain to the clergyman and the congregation why the grandmothers were talking to dead people in the empty pews—and since Saul hadn’t asked about any local churches or services, Sunday was a work day.

  She pulled her gloves from the back pocket of her dusty, and now torn at the knee jeans, then pressed her hand against her stomach.

  She’d had to force breakfast down that morning, and then lunch, and now felt sick. Or perhaps the sickness came from the restless night she’d had.

  She’d woken umpteen times thinking Alice had come to visit her. She shouldn’t be concerned because this had happened on and off all her life. Usually at times of great stress. Like when she’d arrived in Colorado and it had taken her so long to feel normal, not having to fight to be accepted. Or when she’d met Jason.

  She stopped pulling at her work gloves and thought about that. She’d been blinded by Jason’s good looks when she first met him, and by his immediate response to her, but Alice had turned up in her dreams.

  “Ready?” Saul called.

  Molly yanked the gloves on and got set for an afternoon of roof inspection after a morning of roof-building preparation. “Ready.” Tiredness seeped through every muscle.

  That could be due to the rafter-hauling work they’d done this morning though. Half of the stored rafters from inside the hacienda were now stacked neatly and in some semblance of order in the shed closest to the kitchen. Once he got his construction calculator and the rest of his building gear, Saul was going to draw a plan of how the roof frame slotted together. Then they’d restack the rafters according to what he would need first. Then the crane would haul them up to the roof. Hopefully the crane would do that because Molly’s arms and shoulders were killing her. Although Saul had done mo
st of the lumber hauling, and he’d even suggested she leave him to it. But women in trouble who were making a stand didn’t get all simpering and weak-kneed. They got into the fight and fought. So that was what Molly had done. Much to the chagrin of her shoulders.

  But what was she thinking? She didn’t have a crane yet!

  “You don’t have to do this,” Saul said as she reached the ladder he’d propped against the deep-cream plastered exterior wall.

  Molly looked up at him, a third of the way up her ladder. She grabbed the sides and stepped up.

  “You’re paying me to do it,” he said, already at the top and stepping onto the thick rim of the walls on the roofless single story.

  “I’m not paying you enough though, am I?” she said as she reached the top.

  He held out his hand and she took it without thinking, then pulled it away. “I’ve been up here hundreds of times without you,” she told him. “I can manage, thanks.”

  “Watch your step,” he said.

  Molly sighed. He was getting all male about it. Probably not used to having a woman on his work site. “Anyway,” she said, getting back to the original answer she’d been giving him. “I told you—I’m not the sort to sit knitting a sweater while my contractor gets all the sexy jobs.”

  That earned her a laugh. “You call walking a roof sexy?”

  “This way,” she said as she passed him and stepped onto one of the thick wooden planks she’d placed on the walls of the salon below, in order to get across the ceiling-less corner space to the tiled roof of the two-story side of the hacienda. “Come across on all fours if you’re scared of balancing so high up,” she told him.

  “That’ll be the day,” he muttered as he followed.

  Molly climbed the next ladder. “Don’t slip,” she called behind her. “There’s no roof to catch you.” She laughed at her own joke and he grunted in response.

  Up on the roof edge of the two-story section—with four rooms on ground level and three bedrooms on the top story—Molly felt all the tiredness drift out of her.

  She made her way across the roof, already knowing where to put her feet because Davie had shown her how to watch out for stressed places so she didn’t crack any of the clay tiles.

  “Be careful, would you?” Saul asked as he joined her. “I don’t want to have to take a dive trying to save you.”

  “No need,” she said, letting her head fall back. “I’m a mountain goat up on this roof.” She spread her arms wide, and stared at Calamity land. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  He didn’t answer, so Molly looked at him. He was staring out, too, and he’d narrowed his eyes but not in contemplation, more in wonder. A thrill trickled through her, like a feather brushed over her skin. He felt it, too. He didn’t only see the beauty, the beauty seeped inside him. Like he was swallowing heaven.

  “Fine land,” he said eventually.

  “It’s not all ours. A lot of it belongs to Texas.”

  He scoped the entire vista, east to west and back again, gauging the distance to the horizon. “It’s pretty,” he said. “And what’s more—it’s natural. That’s what I like most. Undisturbed harmony, just waiting for someone to walk it.”

  “You must love your hiking,” Molly said. “If you were planning on walking until forever.”

  He chuckled. “Not quite forever. It’d be interesting to find some place close enough to pure heaven to make me put up camp.”

  Molly understood that. “I didn’t think I’d love my hacienda so much when I came back.”

  He looked over his shoulder. “I can tell how much it means to you. It’s in your eyes.”

  She hadn’t been aware that her newfound love of the valley would show in her eyes, or that anybody would recognize it. She guessed Alice understood, but Momma and Winnie and Davie probably just took it for granted that she was happy about having some place to call home. She doubted they’d thought about her falling so hard for the hacienda and the land around it. She’d shunned it most of her life, like everyone else who lived in the valley. It was interesting to note that having spent three days fairly close and personal with Saul, he’d noticed what her family hadn’t. She grinned, making it purposefully cheeky. “Not feeling vertigo yet?”

  He aimed a shrewd look her way, then moved off, making his way back to the roofless section.

  “Come on, Molly,” he called from the top of the ladder. “No more, eh?”

  She walked carefully across the thick plank, arms out for balance. “I’m not scared.”

  “No, but I am.”

  She stopped and looked across at him.

  He beckoned her. “Come on. You’re scaring the life out of me. Does your mother know you walk the roof when you’re on your own?”

  “If you tell her, I’ll kill you in your sleep.” She made her way back, picking where to walk. When she reached him, she took his hand. He gripped it, as though she might change her mind and get away from him. “Thanks for caring about your boss,” she said.

  He smiled his lazy, masculine smile and helped her as they walked to the top of the ladder.

  “I’ll go first,” he told her, starting his descent. “That way if you fall on me I’ll be prepared to hold on for dear life while you tumble to the ground.”

  Molly laughed, stepped onto the top rung of the ladder, then realized that if he looked up to check on her, all he’d get was a bird’s-eye view of her ass. Still, her ass was in pretty good shape.

  “By the way,” he said below her, “I’ve guessed you can’t afford to hire a crane. So don’t worry about it. I’ll figure something out. I might know someone who owes me a favor.”

  “Thanks.” Relief poured through her, even though she’d be taking from him, but she’d find a way to repay him, just as soon as she got her money back from Jason.

  “And I don’t know about you,” he continued, “but I’m starving. Why don’t you head for the bathroom and I’ll figure out dinner tonight?”

  Molly paused, blanketed in pure heaven. It was extraordinary to be cared for in this manner. Even for a moment.

  “How’s that big hunk of beef, baby? Is he treating you right?”

  “Momma—he’s my employee. I get to treat him right.”

  “If I were twenty years younger I’d be fighting you for his labor.”

  Molly turned, cellphone to her ear, and grinned as she checked her reflection in her bedroom dresser mirror. She couldn’t see Saul working in the hair salon or the takeout. She didn’t answer momma though. If she did, she might unintentionally say more than she should.

  “Are you being sweet?” Momma asked.

  Molly picked up her hairbrush. “Generous and kind. That’s me.” Being sweet to her builder was easier than she’d thought it would be. Not only because he was a good-looking, sexy guy but because of the caring instincts he had. There was power in a caring manner. Molly had best watch out for that. She’d thought Jason considerate and look where that had led.

  “Good,” Momma said. “Hope you’re letting him do all the high-level work. I don’t want you on that roof.”

  “He’s just as concerned for my safety as you are,” she said, sweeping the brush down the length of her hair, and twisting on her chair to reach the tips below her waist—and thinking about the too-short kiss they’d shared yesterday, and the way he’d held his hand out for her on the roof an hour ago.

  Perhaps she could tell Lauren and Pepper all about Saul and how she’d frightened him with her daredevil bravery. Lauren probably needed cheering up. Except Molly had better not mention him. Her cousins had a way of reading between the lines, and she didn’t want them, or Momma, to know she’d succumbed to Saul’s masculine charms. They’d take it the wrong way and she’d never hear the end of it. Anyway, he wasn’t right for her, plus, she didn’t need a man. Only a roof builder.

  “Is Lauren all right?” she asked suddenly, a knot of worry twisting in her stomach. “She shouldn’t have gone into business with that man, should she?”
>
  “Don’t worry about Lauren, she comes from wild stock. She’ll get herself through whatever she needs to.”

  “I hope so.” She didn’t want Lauren to fail.

  Molly had failed. She might be failing again—so soon after the last time. But Momma would keep an eye on the cousins.

  Lauren had lost her mom due to a wild streak in her mother’s nature which had seen her killed by a drunk driver as she rode her motorbike at some hellish speed around the valley. Pepper had lost her mom due to a rock landslide while she was off on one of her camping trips to study native plants. A natural disaster, it was decided. One that some said was caused by the great-grandfathers.

  “Did you say something to Lauren about me getting a whole lot more?” she asked her mother.

  “Isn’t what is going on now a whole lot more?”

  “I just get the feeling there’s something not right. A whole lot more of what?”

  “What do you think?” Momma said. “Everything.”

  “Will you call Lauren to check on her?”

  “You call her, Molly. I’m busy with my ideas. No need to go into detail, they don’t need to come home yet. It’s not their time.”

  “Not their time for what?”

  “Don’t listen to me, I don’t know what I’m saying. My mind is elsewhere.”

  “Momma?” When Momma got evasive, everybody better watch out. “Do you know something I don’t?”

  “Of course not! How could I?”

  Molly wondered about that for a second. “What are you up to and is it legal?” she demanded.

  “Have you seen Alice?” Momma asked.

  Molly stilled, and forgot all about how Momma said it wasn’t the cousins’ “time” to come home. She was still determined not to visit her grandmother to ask for assistance. “No. I’ve been busy.”

  “That’s all right, honey. She’ll know what’s going on.”

  This was Molly’s worry. That Alice knew just what was going on—somehow.

  “I couldn’t use some of those photos you took of the hacienda in ruins, could I?” Momma asked.