Toughest Cowboy in Texas Page 12

  He crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m not sixteen anymore.”

  “Too bad,” she said as she took off in a blur around the truck. She glanced in the rearview mirror to see him slap his thigh with his hat.

  Brody got back into his truck and gripped the steering wheel so tightly that his hands ached. That woman had always twisted his insides in knots and time had done nothing to change that. He turned the truck around and drove toward the ranch. He felt like he’d been doing that for years—leaving her and going to the ranch. It didn’t feel right but he had no idea how to fix it.

  Not even the kids chasing lightning bugs out in the yard put a smile on his face when he parked next to the yard fence, got out, and slammed the truck door. He stomped toward the porch where Jace and Kasey were sitting and went straight into the house without a word. Getting out the bottle of Jack Daniel’s from the cabinet, he set his mouth in a firm line, and poured a double shot in a water glass.

  Kasey followed right behind him. “What’s got your britches in a twist? You don’t get that bottle down unless you’re mad, sad, or a mixture of both.”

  He took a sip, letting the smoky flavor sit on his tongue a second before the warmth shot down his throat. It didn’t replace or erase Lila’s kisses. “Nothing that you’d understand.”

  “We might understand if you’d explain. Use your words, brother. What’s her name? Lila Harris?” Jace joined them with the three kids trailing right behind him.

  “Is Lila comin’ to see me?” Emma crawled into a kitchen chair. “I want cake and milk.”

  “You’ve had enough sweets for one evening. Peanut butter sandwiches are what y’all are havin’ for night snacks,” Kasey said. “I saw Lila this evening. She kept the café open late and made me a burger and fries. We had a wonderful visit.”

  Brody tossed back the rest of the shot. “What did you talk about?”

  “Your name didn’t come up, believe me.” Kasey put the bottle back in the cabinet. “We talked girl stuff that guys aren’t interested in.”

  Brody settled Silas into his high chair, then helped Emma get into her booster seat.

  Jace headed toward the counter to help make sandwiches. “So, am I right? Lila?”

  Brody shrugged. “I’m going for a walk to clear my head.”

  “If you find Lila, can she read me a bedtime story?” Emma asked.

  “Girls!” Rustin rolled his eyes.

  “Boys!” Emma huffed.

  He could hear Jace’s laughter all the way out into the yard but it did not lighten his mood one bit. With no place in mind, his long strides and anger soon took him toward Hope Springs. The sound of bubbling water calmed him before he ever sat down under the drooping branches of a weeping willow tree.

  A splash out there in the water took his attention slightly upstream from where he was sitting. There was no doubt that it was Lila even if her back was toward him. Moonlight lit her up, showing jet-black hair flowing over white skin, water rippling around her in big, wide circles.

  He blinked twice and then a third time but every time he opened his eyes, she was still there. Then a flicker of white caught his eyes and he realized he was looking at a T-shirt lying not four feet from him. Thrown beside it were jeans and shoes, along with a white bra and a skimpy pair of underpants.

  He stretched out his long legs, crossed them at the ankles, and drank in his fill of her. The water covered most of her body, but he didn’t need to see her to know what she looked like or even how she’d feel in his arms if he were out there below the rocky water falls with her. Those things had been burned into his mind for years and years.

  She finally turned around and sank down farther into the water. “What are you doin’ here?”

  “Hot night brought on thoughts of cool water,” he answered. “I would’ve brought a bottle of Jack Daniel’s if I’d known you were here.”

  “How long have you been there?”

  “Long enough to know that you’re skinny-dippin’. I thought you were going to the canyon.”

  “Changed my mind.” She moved to the shallow edge and hurriedly sat down so that she was still covered.

  He kicked off his boots and tossed his plaid shirt and white T-shirt over with her clothing before he waded out toward her.

  “What changed your mind?” He gasped when the water reached his knees.

  “Needed cooling off after that kiss.” Lila never beat around the bush or played games. She dealt in black and white, not shades of gray.

  “Well, this will for sure cool a person off.” He sat down beside her in the shallow edge and quickly ducked his whole body under the water. “I haven’t done this since…”

  “Since when?” she asked.

  Use your words, Jace had said, but when it came to Lila there were no words. Only raw emotions and hot passion, both of which were the lifeline to his heart.

  “I think you remember as well as I do. After all, you have the memory of an elephant, right?” With very little motion, he was glued to her side. “I’m just now realizing it was our body heat that kept us from freezing to death.”

  “Why, Brody Dawson, have you gotten too old for sex in cold water?”

  “Probably, but five minutes under that willow tree would cure the problem in a hurry,” he answered.

  “If that willow tree could talk, it could tell some tales, but we can’t go back,” she said. “And even if we could, I’m not sure I want to.”

  “No, but we can go forward,” Brody told her.

  “I’m not so sure that’s a good idea, either,” she said. “There would always be the shadow of the past hovering nearby.”

  He moved his foot slowly down the side of her leg. “That might make for an interesting relationship.”

  She moved her leg away from him. “What brought you out here anyway?”

  “Thinkin’ about you and worryin’ that you’d get hurt in the canyon. When you left that summer, I’d sit under the willow tree and imagine you like this in the water on hot evenings. I’d go to Henry’s barn in the wintertime and wrap up in that old quilt we liked.”

  “Oh!” she gasped.

  “What?”

  “I’m going to name my white cat Cora. It just came to me when you said something about that old quilt.”

  He’d been baring his soul to her. Using his words. And she was thinking about naming a stupid cat? What was wrong with this picture?

  “That’s a definite change of subject. And what’s this about cats?”

  “I got two from Henry’s old barn. I’m naming the white one Cora from that old movie we saw. Quigley Down Under. Remember Crazy Cora?”

  Suddenly it all made sense. They’d snuck into Henry’s house one time, just the two of them, and put the old movie into the DVD player. She’d wrapped a quilt that had been draped on the back of a rocking chair around both of them. He’d wanted to have sex right there on the sofa but she wouldn’t. Said it wasn’t right. Borrowing his house to watch a movie and his quilt to stay warm was one thing and a few kisses were okay, but nothing past that.

  “The black one is Duke,” she said.

  “For John Wayne?”

  “No, for the character in The Notebook. Did you ever see that one?”

  “Only movie that ever made me cry,” he said.

  “I didn’t know that tough cowboys ever cried.” She stretched.

  He sucked in air when part of her breasts showed in the moonlight. Even though the water was cold, he was getting hard. “I believe that Hope Springs might be the fountain of youth. Looking at you in this light—God, Lila, I want you so bad but I want more than a fling.”

  She leaned over and cupped his chin in her hands. “I’m not even going to answer that, Brody. It’s getting late. I should be going. Shut your eyes.”

  “I’ve seen you naked, Lila. I’m sitting close enough that I can feel a lot of your bare skin right now.” He covered her hand with his and brought it to his lips to kiss each knuckle.

 
“Tonight you’re going to shut your eyes and promise me that you won’t open them until I tell you that I’m dressed,” she said.

  “Whatever you say,” he said. “Can I have a good night kiss?”

  She leaned over and gave him a quick kiss. “Good night, Brody. Now shut your eyes.”

  He pulled her closer and tangled his hands in her wet hair, pulling her to his body for a real kiss so hot and passionate that it left them both panting. He pulled away, his eyes still closed. “Now you can get dressed.”

  He waited a few seconds before he opened his eyes. If possible, Lila was even more beautiful than she’d been when she was younger. Shapely legs and a small waist above the curve of rounded hips. She disappeared under the willow tree branches and when she reappeared, she was fully clothed.

  “Your turn.” She raised her voice. “I’m being a good girl and not taking your clothes with me. I should because you opened your eyes.”

  “Seems only fittin’ that I get a little glimpse of you since you got a full-frontal nude shot of me when I got into the water,” he said. “Did you like what you saw?”

  “Did you?” she threw back at him.

  “Oh, honey,” he groaned.

  “Liking the way you look was never my problem,” she said. “Be seein’ you around, I’m sure.”

  She disappeared into the night and he got out of the water, let the warm night air dry his body before he got dressed, and whistled all the way back to the house.

  Chapter Ten

  Four days.

  She’d had four days to talk to the cats about the skinny-dipping event, to relive every word and feeling that she’d experienced sitting next to Brody with nothing but water between their naked bodies. For the next three days—Thursday, Friday, and Saturday—she’d watched for him every single moment of the day. And that night she’d thought he might be at church but he wasn’t.

  After services, she’d driven out to the cemetery and laid a wildflower bouquet wrapped with a bright red ribbon in front of her father’s tombstone. She removed her sandals, sat cross-legged on the grass, and ran her fingers over the engraving: BILLY HARRIS, 1962–1999.

  “Happy Father’s Day, Daddy.” She wiped a tear from her cheek.

  She felt a presence before she got a whiff of Brody’s shaving lotion, but before she could turn around he’d sat down beside her. They were as close as they’d been when they were skinny-dipping out at Hope Springs. His bare skin wasn’t touching hers but the heat still flowed through his jeans and plaid shirt just as well as if it had been.

  Brody took her hand in his and rested it on his knee. “I’ve missed seeing you, but we’ve been so busy on the ranch that I couldn’t even get away for an hour. Thought I could make it to church tonight but Sundance got out of his pen again. Sometimes I’m ready to let Jace turn him into dog food. I finally got things finished and remembered that it was Father’s Day. I didn’t bring flowers but I had to come see Dad and Gramps.”

  “It’s been years since I got to visit my dad on his special day,” Lila said softly.

  “I remember when he died in that oil rig accident. We were in the seventh grade and it was the first time any of us had lost a parent. I didn’t know what to say to you.” Brody’s sincere voice reached deep into her heart, making her forget the angst over the past four days. It had been like that when they were in high school. She was constantly watching for him, disappointed when he wasn’t around, and then when he was, everything was all right.

  “You hugged me at the dinner they had at the church after the funeral. You didn’t say a word but that hug meant the world to me right then,” she said. “You must have been totally devastated to lose both your grandpa and your dad the same summer.”

  “It was the toughest year of my life,” Brody said. “You left and then I lost them. Mama wanted me to go on to college that fall, but I couldn’t leave her and Granny both with big ranches to take care of. We had a foreman on both Prairie Rose and Hope Springs but…” He shrugged.

  Lila waited a few seconds while he collected his thoughts. He swallowed hard several times before he said, “Even more than being tough, it was the loneliness that was horrible. I threw myself into the work and that was that.”

  Lila nodded. “I did the same with college. Turned my DNA completely around and became more like Mama.”

  He drew his brows down. “How’s that?”

  “Mama was the stable one. Daddy was the fun parent. Probably because he was gone a lot of the time and we all wanted everything to be happy when he was home. When we moved, I made a complete switch and went from the fun Lila to a more serious girl. Looking back, it was a form of coping and escapism, I guess.”

  Brody gently squeezed her hand. “Funny how that works, isn’t it?”

  “I still miss him.” She swallowed hard and a lonely tear found its way down her cheek.

  He let go of one hand and gently brushed it away. “I’m sorry if I brought back sad memories.”

  Her mind flashed back to that day. She had come home from school and found her mother sitting on the sofa crying with her Sunday school friends surrounding her. There was already food everywhere, more than two people could use in a month. She knew before Daisy even stretched out her arms what had happened. She dropped to her knees and put her hands over her ears. If no one said the words, then it wouldn’t be true.

  He took her hand back in his and made lazy circles on her palm with his thumb. “And right after that, y’all moved to the back of the café. My family was there on the first Sunday to eat dinner and you were helping by serving the drinks. It was the first time I ever really noticed how pretty you are.”

  “I hated it,” she whispered. “It was like we left Daddy behind in that trailer. I knew he was dead but his spirit lived and we didn’t move it to the new place with us. He was back there with strangers. I used to sneak out at night and go sit in the backyard and pretend that he came outside to talk to me.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Brody said.

  She stared at the tombstone and visualized her father sitting beside her in those old metal lawn chairs in their postage-stamp-sized backyard. Sometimes they didn’t talk at all but if she had a problem concerning anything, from snotty girls to pre-algebra, they’d discuss it.

  “Then we left him again when Mama made us move. I didn’t want to leave Happy. I even offered to not go to college and to help her run the café if she wouldn’t make me leave. It took a long time for me to forgive her.” Lila’s voice sounded hollow even to her own ears. “Her only sister was out there in Pennsylvania and she wanted to get me out of this atmosphere and for me to go to college. She was afraid I’d never get an education if we stayed here. She was probably right.”

  He dropped her hands, wrapped both arms around her, and pulled her close to his chest. With an ear pressed right next to his heart, she could feel the steady rhythm of the beat—not just hear it, but actually feel him doing his best to ease the pain they both felt in remembering.

  “This is always an emotional time of year for me too,” Brody whispered hoarsely.

  Lila nodded and then repositioned the side of her face so that she could hear his heart again. “It was a bad summer for both of us, wasn’t it?”

  “You leaving broke my heart, Lila.”

  “Sure didn’t seem like it at the time.” She leaned back and their gazes met in the few inches separating their faces.

  “Men don’t cry. Cowboys don’t cry. Boys don’t cry.”

  “And that has to do with what?”

  He gulped a couple of times. “I wanted to be with you that last night but I couldn’t bear to see you in tears again. When you told me you were moving away—well, like I said, boys don’t cry and I would have carried on like a little girl.”

  “But I did cry, remember? When Mama said that we were moving in a week, I cried until my face hurt and your shirt was wet.” She looked even deeper into his eyes.

  He nodded. “So did I when I got home but I coul
dn’t go through it again. So I went out with the guys and was miserable all night. I was going to apologize to you the next day but you wouldn’t roll down the window. Not that I blame you one bit.”

  “I thought I would die just looking at you in the rearview mirror,” she said.

  He buried his face in her hair. “I sat down behind the café, put my head in my hands, and thought the worst thing ever had happened. Then…” He hesitated again.

  She wrapped both arms around his neck and hugged him tightly. If she’d lost her mother and Aunt Tina that summer in addition to leaving Brody behind, she might have truly stopped breathing. How Brody had survived was a mystery.

  She had shared things with him that evening that she’d kept closed off from the therapist she’d started seeing last winter in Florida. Raw things that brought about pain and yet, there she was sitting in a cemetery telling Brody about them.

  “Have you forgiven and forgotten?” he whispered.

  “Who? You or Mama?”

  “First, your mother.” He inhaled deeply. “I love the smell of your hair.”

  “Forgiven.” She nodded. “She was only doing what she thought was best for me and she let me finish school here with my class. She’d wanted to be near her sister for a long time.”

  Lila loved Aunt Tina and all her kids and grandkids. Thanksgiving and sometimes Christmas was fun at her house, but Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, would never be home, not like Happy, Texas. Not even if they moved her father’s body out there and she could visit him every week.

  “And your dad’s family?” Brody asked.

  “Dad was a foster child from the time he was about two years old. Thrown about from place to place until he was eighteen and then he went to work in the oil fields. He didn’t talk about his life but he did say that all those drunk driving tickets he hadn’t paid was the best luck he’d ever had.”

  “How could unpaid tickets be lucky?” Brody asked.

  “They put him in front of the judge, who said that he had a choice of six months in jail or he could join the service. He chose the army and got stationed over in Lawton, Oklahoma. A guy invited him to go home with him one weekend and it turned out the fellow was from Tulia. He was dating my aunt Tina and they introduced Dad to my mother. He and Mama married when he got out of the service and he moved here so he could work in the oil wells again. My aunt Tina didn’t marry that soldier but she did marry an oil man and moved back east the next year after Mama and Daddy married.”