The Wedding Pearls Page 14

  Tears escaped through a forced smile. “Does Lola know?”

  “Honey, Lola don’t need that burden on her heart right now. She needs this trip to get to know her mama better,” Ivy said. “Me and Frankie and Lola, we’re all independent, good businesswomen, but every one of us is broken in some way and we want you to grow up to be better than any of us, but you need to know us before it’s too late.”

  Ivy took a short draw, exhaled the smoke, and then coughed so hard that Tessa grabbed for her phone to call 911.

  “Put that thing away.” Ivy panted. “It’s not my time yet. Go get Blister.”

  Tessa jogged across the street, tucked the tank under her arm like a football, and hurried back to Ivy’s side. She helped her wrap the tubes around her ears and get the nose pieces in place and then turned the knob.

  Ivy inhaled several times and held up her hand. “You can wipe that expression off your face now, honey. I’m going to live to smoke a few more, but that’s the last time I’ll try two at a time. Good boy, Blister.” She patted the tank lovingly. “Now, where were we?”

  “Something about going out with your boots on?” Tessa said.

  “Oh, yeah. That’s right. Me and Frankie have been closer than sisters even though we ain’t a bit kin when it comes to blood and bone. I can’t imagine life without her, don’t want to, and we’ve already made a pact. If we don’t die together, then whoever goes first will drag up a lawn chair outside the pearly gates and wait for the other one.” Ivy’s breathing stabilized more with every bit of pure oxygen she sucked in.

  “Why ain’t you married?” Ivy asked bluntly.

  “Why aren’t you?” Tessa fired back.

  Ivy’s giggle was still raspy. “Why settle down with one man when a woman could have all the men she wanted if she was discreet? Frankie had a little more of the old puritanical nonsense pumped into her brain as a child than I did, and besides, she and Lester fell smack-dab in love. Wasn’t no two people in the world loved each other more than they did. No, sir! It might not have been so good for Lola, but she survived.”

  Tessa raised one brow. “Oh?”

  Ivy’s cigarette package had been lying on her lap. She picked it up and slid it into her shirt pocket. “It’s like this. When a couple has children, they have to give a lot of themselves to that child, and Frankie and Lester had a love that was all consuming. They couldn’t give any of it away. It wasn’t possible, so Lola suffered for it. She had everything she wanted or needed, but they couldn’t tear themselves away from each other long enough to be parents. It’s hard to explain.”

  The south wind whipped across Tessa’s face, flinging her long blonde hair into her eyes. She pushed it back behind her ears and asked, “Couldn’t they love each other and her, too?”

  “They loved her, Tessa. They really did, but they loved each other more. It’s complicated, as you kids say these days.” Ivy bit her lip. “You need to understand that to know Lola better. You can’t give away what you ain’t got to give.”

  Tessa hugged Ivy closer. “I believe that. You ready to go back inside?”

  Ivy shook her head. “Just another minute out here with the sun on my face. Indian summer, that’s what this is. It’s the last dregs of summer trying to hang out and not let fall come out to play.” Ivy tilted her face up to catch the sun’s rays. “Kind of like us old women. We’re hanging on one more month to our dream of taking a long road trip together before the cold sets in.” She turned around and stared right into Tessa’s eyes. “Take some advice from an old woman and don’t let life pass you by while you are waiting for something wonderful to happen. Make it happen today and enjoy it when it does. Now, you’d best help me and Blister back to our room, and don’t you be tattling on me for smokin’ two cigarettes. I don’t want Frankie to be worryin’. This is her dream trip.”

  “I won’t. I promise,” Tessa said.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Tessa peeled off her shorts and knit shirt on her way to the bathroom, tossing them in the general direction of the sofa on the way to the shower. She dropped the soap three times, got shampoo in her eyes twice, but was happy her hair was dry and she didn’t smell like cigarettes when Branch rapped on the door.

  “You look beautiful, Miz Tess. But are you plannin’ on wearing shoes?” he asked.

  “I was patting myself on the back for getting ready so quick and I forgot to put my sandals on,” she admitted.

  “I think you are adorable in your bare feet. I could carry you to the car, but if you had to get out for the ladies’ room, you might get stickers since it’s an outdoor movie,” he said.

  She sat down on the sofa and buckled her sandals. “Unless you carried me there, too.”

  He leaned against the doorjamb and smiled down at her. “I could do it if you want.”

  The scent of his shaving lotion wafted across the room when the air conditioner kicked on and stirred the air. Creased jeans, polished cowboy boots, and a plaid shirt that showed signs of an iron said he’d gone the extra mile to get ready that night. She stood up and waited a second before she took a step. With an empty bed that close and her roommate out for the evening, it would not be a good time to trip and fall into his arms.

  “Are you sure you are a lawyer? I’d swear you were a sexy cowboy,” she asked.

  He offered her his arm. “Thank you. I can clean up good when I have a reason.”

  She slipped hers through it. “And this is a reason?”

  “Of course it is. You are a beautiful woman and we’re going out to a drive-in movie in Mollybedamned. I feel like I’m taking a step back in time to the sixties,” he answered.

  “And we’re sixteen again and this is . . .” She stopped.

  “Our first date?” he finished for her.

  She picked up her purse. “But it’s not a date. It’s two people going out to a movie.”

  “Hey, I don’t offer my arm to my buddies when we go out for drinks or to the movies.” He chuckled.

  “Then this is a date?” she asked.

  “I think it might be.” He led her out into the parking lot. “Top up or down?”

  “Up, at least until we get there.”

  He opened the door for her and waited until she pulled the skirt of her sundress in before he closed it. Suddenly, she felt cramped and slightly claustrophobic. The old Caddy was big enough to haul eight people in a pinch and she’d ridden right up next to Branch for several days, so why did she have the jitters when there was at least three feet of space between them?

  He started the engine and adjusted the air-conditioning. “I bet this hasn’t been used half a dozen times in all the years Mollybedamned has been going places. Does this feel strange to be just us in the car, or is it because the top is up?” he asked.

  “A little, and I’m not sure which it is,” she admitted.

  “I thought it was because I was alone in the car with you and your beauty filled the whole car,” he drawled.

  Tessa wiggled down into the seat and wished that she was sitting right up next to Branch like always, but that would be presumptuous on a first date. “That, Branch Thomas, is a pickup line. Does it ever work?”

  He found a radio station that played current music by Blake Shelton, Miranda Lambert, Florida Georgia Line, and several of her other favorite artists. “It is a pickup line, and it does work in a bar.”

  They’d gone through two little towns when she looked up and saw a sign that said they weren’t far from Turkey, Texas, and the town after that was Quitaque, Texas.

  “I wonder how that town is pronounced,” she said.

  “Tur . . . keee.” He drew out the syllables.

  She air slapped his arm. “Not that one, the other one. Are we going to Tur . . . keee or that weird name? Is it Quit-a-eeek?”

  “No, we’re not going to Turkey. We’re going to the other one, and it’s pronounced Kit-a-key,” he answered. “I looked it up on the Internet before we left. Had to get directions. It’s a little place,
kind of like Boomtown. Lots of teenagers frequent these places. We’ll be the old people there.”

  Tessa liked the comfortable aura in the car. She’d been afraid things would be awkward between them but they weren’t. She enjoyed his company whether they were riding in silence or talking about anything and everything.

  “I don’t mind, do you?”

  He kept time to a Miranda Lambert tune with his thumbs on the steering wheel. “Not if once we are parked, you slide across this seat and let me put my arm around you. What have you been thinking about so hard since we left Childress?”

  “Did you know that Ivy only has about three months to live?”

  He took his foot off the gas pedal and tapped the brakes before he whipped his head around toward her. “Are you serious?”

  “She told me today just before we left. It breaks my heart.”

  He pulled her close to him with his right arm and drove with his left one. “So that’s what this trip is really all about. I had no idea she was that bad. What will Frankie do without her?”

  “I don’t know. They are so close. It’s a farewell party for Ivy and she doesn’t want Lola to know.”

  His arm around her proved that old saying her grandmother had about a good friend cutting sorrows in half and doubling the joys in life. Suddenly that big black cloud looming out there three months in the future wasn’t nearly as formidable.

  “I hate to hear this. I really like that old girl,” Branch said softly. “Draws us up short and makes us think about the brevity of life, doesn’t it?”

  “I’ve been thinking about how it can be possible that people I barely knew only a few days ago are now important to me,” she said.

  Branch gently squeezed her shoulder. “Are you saying I’m important to you?”

  If he didn’t stop looking at her with those dreamy eyes, she was going to tell him to forget the movie and stop at the next motel.

  “You are all important to me, and it is absolutely beyond words unexplainable. I’ve known people in New Iberia my whole life and it wouldn’t make me this sad to know they only had a few months to live,” she said.

  He turned his head enough to gaze into her eyes a couple of seconds. “Think about it, Tessa. You’ve been with these people basically twenty-four hours a day for four days. If you only saw someone, say, for an hour at church on Sunday, it would take two years for you to get as close to them as you have to Frankie and the rest of us. Time is fickle anyway. It’s nothing but hands moving around a clock face. Life is reality. Living and getting to know folks’ hearts, that’s what matters.”

  “He’s not only handsome and sexy, but a philosopher, too.”

  “So you think I’m sexy?” He checked his reflection in the rearview mirror.

  “Don’t be all shy, Branch. I bet women flock around you like flies on a fresh cow patty.”

  Branch sighed. “Now you’re talkin’ about my brothers, not me. One of them got the brains and the other one got the looks.”

  “Poor baby. Dumb and ugly both,” she teased.

  “It’s a burden, but I do my best to bear it without complaining.” His eyes sparkled.

  “Like my clumsiness? I bear it most of the time without bitchin’ about it,” she answered.

  “You’ve got to put that card away,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s only when you are agitated or nervous that it happens. Have you ever noticed that? And you have nothing to be stressed out about. Not with me.”

  And just like that, he’d pulled her away from the dark cloud hovering above her and brought her out into the bright sunlight.

  Branch drove up to the ticket window and handed the girl inside the little building a bill. She made change and gave him a free drink voucher. “It’s Friday, freebie night,” she said.

  “Well, thank you. Does that include a beer?”

  “If you are twenty-one, but I doubt if y’all will get carded,” she said.

  “Ouch!” Tessa grinned.

  “Well, y’all are thirty or more, ain’t you?” the girl asked.

  “Thank you, honey, for that compliment. We’re both actually lookin’ sixty right in the eye,” Branch said seriously, and then drove on to let the car behind them pull up.

  “Speak for yourself, cowboy. I’m almost seventy,” she teased.

  “I’ve always been drawn to older women.” He found a place to park, hit the button to put the top down, and rolled the window down to within six inches of the bottom. Then he detached the speaker from the pole and hung it on the glass.

  Tessa watched every movement. “Looks like you’ve done this before.”

  “Few times. There used to be one of these theaters in the town where my grandparents lived, but it closed down years ago. I’ll go to the concession stand before the show starts so we don’t miss anything. Popcorn, beer, soft pretzel with or without melted cheese and jalapeños, or a pickle or soft drink? Name your favorites and I’ll go get them.”

  “Cold beer and a soft pretzel with no cheese,” she said.

  “Because you don’t like cheese or because you’re afraid you’ll make a mess?” he asked.

  “The latter,” she answered honestly.

  “Then I will get it with cheese and feed you,” he said.

  Watching him swagger from the car to the concession stand sent her desire button spiraling to the top of the scale. But then she noticed people pointing at the car and at the sexy cowboy and her pulse jacked on up. She was sitting in a vintage car and Branch was handsome enough to make any holy woman’s granny panties sneak down around her ankles, and both were all hers that night.

  Then her phone rang.

  She unfastened the seat belt and fished around in the dark until she found the thing. “Hello, Mama.”

  “Where are you? It sounds like you are outside,” Sophie said.

  “I’m at a drive-in theater in Quitaque, Texas, on a pseudodate with Branch Thomas,” she said. “He’s gone to the concession stand so talk fast.”

  “Date? What are you talking about? Date?” Sophie’s voice was high-pitched and shrill.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not going to run away with him tonight, but I did shave my legs,” she said.

  “My God!” Sophie gasped.

  “I hope so,” Tessa said.

  “Don’t you sass me! You know very well your father and I want you to go out with our youth director as soon as you get home. You can’t date a man you’ve only known what? Four days?”

  Tessa wasn’t about to tell her mother that when she was in college she’d dated men she’d met only one time in the college bar down the street from her dorm. “It’s okay, Mama. Didn’t you hear me say pseudo? Lola and Melody went to a play at an old refurbished theater and we didn’t want to go. So we drove about forty-five minutes down here in the Caddy to watch a movie. I’d never been to a drive-in, and it looks like fun,” she said softly. “And Branch will be back soon, so I can’t talk right now.”

  No way was she going to start a big fight with her mama about the youth director at this time. But something in her heart said that ship had done sailed. Strange as it was, right then her mama seemed a million miles away and this night, in an old Caddy waiting for an outdoor movie to start, was more important.

  “You will call me tomorrow, promise?” Sophie said.

  “I will and we’ll talk in the morning right after breakfast. I usually have about half an hour before we leave. Don’t worry, Mama, Branch is a good person. Someday you might meet him and see for yourself,” she said.

  “That’s what I’m afraid of,” Sophie groaned.

  Branch bought two pretzels, two Dr Peppers, two candy bars, and a big box of popcorn. Then he added two bottles of beer to the order and asked the lady if she could put it all in a bag.

  “Yes, sir,” she said without asking him for identification.

  “You don’t card your customers?” he asked.

  “You are teasing. Old guys do that to me all
the time and I never catch it.” She giggled.

  Previews of upcoming movies had started when he made it back to the car. She slid into his seat and set the bag between them.

  “Will you marry me?” he asked.

  “What did you say?” Tessa whipped around to glare at him.

  “It looks like I’ve got one foot in the grave and one on a banana peel, and I’m worried that I’ll leave no one behind to mourn me. So say you will marry me and we’ll drive Mollybedamned to the airport and fly to Vegas, get married, and be home by daybreak,” he said.

  Her laughter echoed through the night air. “Are you insane, Branch?”

  He shook his head and removed her pretzel from the bag sitting between them on the seat, broke off a small piece, dipped it in cheese, and put it in her mouth. “No, darlin’, I’m old but I’m not crazy yet.”

  “What happened? Did the smart-ass teenager behind the concession stand window tell you that she didn’t need to see your ID?” she asked when she’d swallowed and sipped the beer he’d handed her while she was chewing.

  “Yes, and my ego is wounded.”

  She turned up the cold beer and swallowed twice. “You are old and my mama called and she thinks I’m still fifteen, so I’m way too young to be out with you tonight.”

  “Just my luck,” he said.

  Branch parked Mollybedamned and walked Tessa to her hotel door, penned her against the wall by putting a hand on either side of her shoulders, and looked deeply into her eyes. God, she could have dived right into those green eyes and stayed the rest of the night, but Lola was in the room and she wasn’t about to suggest they go to his room.

  “I had an absolutely wonderful time tonight,” he said.

  “So did I,” she said softly. “But it’s because it was a pseudodate. Neither of us was nervous or antsy.”

  His eyes went all dreamy and fluttered shut. “Does a fellow get a good-night kiss after a fake date?”

  She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue and got ready to feel the heat, but he bypassed her lips and kissed her on the soft spot where her shoulder and neck connected. The next kiss landed on her forehead and she felt cheated. Sure, that was nice and the kisses on her neck were scrumptious, but she really wanted a real kiss to end the night.