Calder Pride (6 page)

“It must have been a bitter blow to the Andersons.” Cat looked to the south where the land stretched in an undulating sweep of untamed plains.

“Bitter ain’t the word for it.” Culley snorted a laugh. “I heard the old lady went after Jim Farber with a shotgun when she found out what he was there for. Old Neil Anderson managed to talk some sense into her.”

“I wonder what they’ll do?”

“It’s hard to say. But I wouldn’t be worrying about the Andersons.” He sat loose and easy in the saddle, his body swaying with the rhythm of his horse’s striding walk. “That Emma is a canny woman, sharp as a New York banker where money’s concerned. Most folks don’t give her enough credit for them keeping the farm as long as they have.” He glanced sideways. “I’d wager that Emma knew that
foreclosure notice was coming. They sold their herd of dairy cattle two weeks ago, and nobody’s been able to figure out what became of the money. The Andersons claim they had to use it to help their son, which strikes me as unlikely, considering Rollie’s got himself a public defender for a lawyer. Me, I figure Emma socked that money away knowing they would be needing it. They’ll get by just fine. You wait and see.”

She said nothing, her attention drifting to some far-off point.

Watching her, Culley could tell she had something else on her mind.

“What are you thinking so hard about?” he asked at last.

A soft laugh feathered from her. “Am I that easy to read?”

“To me, maybe. What’s the problem?”

“I wouldn’t call it a problem, really. It’s just that I’ve decided I’m not going back to college this fall.” The announcement was made with a large measure of calmness and certainty.

Worried that he might say the wrong thing, Culley stopped to think this thing through, searching his mind for the right response. In his heart, he was glad that Cat would not be leaving. But Maggie had set great store on a college education. It was something she would have wanted for her daughter. On the other hand, if Cat didn’t want to go, would Maggie have made her?

“What did your father have to say about it?” he asked finally.

“I haven’t told him yet.”

“You don’t figure he’s going to like the idea, do you?” Culley guessed.

“That may turn out to be an understatement,” Cat replied with a casual wryness.

That settled the issue in Culley’s mind; if Chase Calder would oppose her decision, he was for it. The fact that it was what Cat wanted to do only added weight to his reasoning, tipping the scales.

“It’s your life. You got to live it as you see fit,” Culley stated, hearing his words and liking the sense they made. “You’re a grown woman. It ain’t his place to be telling you what to do anymore. You can tell him I said so. And if he gives you any trouble, you have him talk to me.”

The underlying thread of fierceness in his voice moved Cat. She turned to him with a look of affection. “I love you, Uncle Culley.”

He reddened and ducked his head, embarrassed by her simple declaration. “Guess you’ll be sticking around here, then,” he remarked needlessly, self-conscious and struggling to cover it.

“This is my home.” The quiet conviction in her voice had a steely quality.

Her gaze lifted to travel over the wide, rolling plains, cloaked in their summer-tan colors beneath a big, brassy sky. It was a strong land, in some ways a hard land, its vastness stretching the eye farther and farther. Every bit of it, close to six hundred square miles, was Calder range. Born and raised on it, she knew this land in all its tempers—the harsh savagery of its winter blizzards and the warmth of its chinook winds, the awesome violence of its spring thunderstorms and the lush green of its new grass. It was a land and a heritage that she had thought she would share with Repp. But that wasn’t to be now. The thought of him was like a pain squeezing her heart again, making it ache.

“If I have to live the rest of my life alone, then I’ll do it here.” Her head came up when she said that, pride asserting itself, making it less a statement of loneliness and more one of resolve.

Culley knew she was remembering Repp again. He wanted to say something to assure her that things would get better, but he didn’t know the words. In the end he decided it was best to get her thinking about something else.

“Do you want me to be there when you tell Calder you aren’t going back to college?” he asked.

“Thanks, but I’ll handle it.” Cat glanced at the sun, gauging the hour by its position in the sky. “It’s time I was heading back.”

“I’ll ride with you part of the way.” He reined the bay horse to the left, pointing it toward the headquarters of the Triple C, Cat’s home.

Cat made her announcement at dinner that evening after coffee was served. As expected, her decision was lot greeted with approval. To her father’s credit, he reacted to the news with commendable restraint. It was Ty who erupted. “Good God, Cat, you only have a year left. It’s idiotic to quit now.”

“Some may think that, but I don’t.” Cat toyed with her coffee cup, conscious of her father’s cool gaze.

“I know these last couple months have been difficult for you,” her father began smoothly. “But before you make any hasty decisions, I think we should discuss this.”

“There is nothing to discuss,” Cat replied. “I have already sent a letter to the dean of admissions, informing her that I won’t be returning for classes his fall.”

“Without talking to me first?” It was that, more than her decision, that raised his eyebrow. “I think you could have told me about this before you mailed he letter.”

“Maybe I should have,” she conceded. “But it is my life and my decision to make.”

“Cat, you know how much your mother wanted you to have a college education,” he reminded her.

“Yes, I do.” She was stung by the implication that she was somehow being disloyal to her mother’s memory. “But it was never what I wanted.”

“Of all the selfish—” Ty hurled his napkin on the table.

“I am not selfish!” Cat came out of her chair. “All my life I have done what somebody else wanted me to do. I was never given a choice about boarding school; I was sent. Out of high school, I was told not to get married, but to go to college first. I didn’t even get to choose what university to attend. Before I knew it, I was enrolled in your alma mater.” She flung a hand in Ty’s direction, giving full rein to her temper. “And heaven forbid that I get married while I’m still in college. I was told that was unthinkable. And being a good little girl, I did what I was told. Well, not any more.”

There was an instant of stunned silence in the room. Only Jessy showed no surprise at the vitriol that laced her outburst. The glimmer of approval in her eyes told Cat that she had at least one ally present.

“I still have some of my things there that I’ll need to go get,” she said. “I plan to leave in a day or so, pack them up and come home.”

Chase tried again to talk her out of it, but Cat was adamant in this. In the end, he accepted her decision.

T
he rear of the Blazer was jammed with boxes, framed pictures and assorted odds and ends, the accumulation of three years at the University of Texas. Cat had only one stop to make, the result of a phone call to her friend and sorority sister Kinsey Davis Phelps.

The instant Kinsey had learned of her decision to drop out of college, she had wailed, “Cat, honey, you can’t do this! I know you’re all broke up about your fiancé dying, but this will be our last year. You’ve got to come back.” After thirty minutes of trying to talk Cat into changing her mind, Kinsey had finally given up. “To tell you the truth, honey, I thought we Phelps were good at digging in our heels, but you Calders have cornered the market on stubborn. But you can’t break up the gang like this. Have you told the other girls yet?”

“I haven’t had time, and I don’t now. I’ll get hold of them once I’m back home. Which brings me back to the reason I called you—I’ll be pulling into Waco around suppertime. If you’re free tonight, we could get together.”

Kinsey groaned in regret. “J.J. asked me to spend
the weekend with her in Fort Worth. Daddy’s flying me up there this afternoon. Wait a minute,” she said with sudden excitement. “We’re getting together with Babs and Debby Ann tonight at the White Elephant Saloon, probably go over to Billy Bob’s later—You know there’s talk that Billy Bob’s might be closing,” Kinsey had added as an aside. “Why don’t you meet us there? Then the whole gang will be together again. If we can’t talk you into staying, then we’ll have one big blowout of a party to send you on your way back to Montana.”

Cat had quickly agreed. It was the one regret she’d had, coming back before fall classes resumed: she wouldn’t see any of her college friends. Now that had been handled.

By the time Cat reached the city limits of Fort Worth, the sun had slipped below the horizon, leaving long streaks of red in the sky to form a vivid backdrop for the concrete and glass towers of downtown. She followed the north-south freeway that bisected the city.

But it wasn’t the coming reunion with her college friends that occupied her thoughts. It was pieces of her own family’s history, the stories that had been passed down about her great-grandfather Chase Benteen Calder. Texas-born, he had been raised on a ranch somewhere south of the city and had fallen in love with the daughter of a local store owner. Fort Worth had been his last stop before heading north with a herd of cattle, his young bride at his side, to build a permanent home in Montana.

Cat was struck by the parallel that Fort Worth was to be her last stop before going to Montana for good. The difference was, she was making the journey alone, without the one she loved. The loss of Repp twisted through her, sharp enough to bring the sting of tears to her ears and blur her vision. Cat
almost missed seeing the exit sign for the historic Stockyards District. Hurriedly she switched lanes and took the off-ramp, then turned west on Twenty-eighth Street.

As Cat made the swing onto East Exchange, the Blazer’s tires rumbled over the street’s old-time paving brick. Directly before her, the famous
FORT WORTH STOCK YARDS
sign hung above the street. More pickups than cars were parked along the street, and the wooden sidewalks, covered with shed roofs, were crowded with pedestrians, tourists, and locals alike, all garbed in western gear.

By some miracle that Cat didn’t question, she found a parking place only two doors from the White Elephant Saloon, her rendezvous point with her sorority sisters. The twang of guitars and the rhythmic pound of piano keys from a honky-tonk band filtered into the street from one of the bars.

Before locking the Blazer, Cat took her credit cards, cash, and identification out of her purse, pushed them all deep in the side pocket of her Wranglers and shoved her purse under the driver’s seat, then locked the vehicle and tucked the keys in the other pocket. August’s sweltering heat still clung to the air, bringing beads of perspiration to the surface of her skin.

Yet, standing there, surrounded by the flavor of the Old West, Cat felt the infectious spirit of the place swirl around her—something reckless and carefree, something that grabbed the moment and squeezed every drop of enjoyment from it, the devil with tomorrow. It was a feeling that said a night on the town was a time to put aside your woes and celebrate something, anything. Suddenly that was exactly what Cat wanted to do.

“Cat! Cat Calder!” A familiar voice yelled her name. It came from the White Elephant.

Cat turned and saw a long and lanky Kinsey Davis Phelps running to greet her, turning heads as she came, with her model-like mane of long brown hair, lavishly fringed western shirt, skintight jeans, and real lizard-skin boots.

“Honey, when I saw that Blazer go by, jammed with boxes, I knew it was you.” Kinsey wrapped her in a girlish hug, then hooked an arm around her and swept her toward the saloon. “Everybody’s inside waiting for you, except Debby Ann. She won’t be off work for another hour yet. You’ve lost weight, haven’t you?” she said with a quick, assessing look. “Babs is going to kill you. The poor girl has put on another five pounds this summer, and the way she’s gobbling down nachos she’ll add another five pounds tonight. J.J. has just about convinced her to go to a spa for a week before classes start. Personally, I think she should go for
two
weeks. But you know J.J.—she would never tell Babs that for fear of hurting her feelings.”

“While you spare no one’s,” Cat chided in a laughter-laced voice.

Grinning, Kinsey lifted a shoulder in a careless shrug. “As my daddy always says, the truth only hurts for a little while.”

“Maybe, but with you, truth tends to be a blunt instrument. You keep hitting people over the head with it.”

“Little ol’ me?” Feigning innocence, Kinsey pressed graceful fingers to her throat.

Cat laughed, then forced herself to ask, “So, how is J.J.? Is her wedding still on for Christmas?”

Kinsey stopped and drew Cat aside before they walked into the saloon. “I can’t believe I forgot to tell you.” She dropped the pitch of her voice to a conspiratorial level. “The wedding’s off. It seems Donnie Paul got another girl pregnant, somebody in
Houston, and he’s going to marry her instead. J.J. is just devastated. Personally, I think she’s well rid of him. Men are not worth half the tears we cry over them—” Kinsey stopped abruptly and cast a guilty look at Cat. “I just put my foot in my mouth again, didn’t I? I honestly wasn’t thinking about Repp when I said that. I’m sorry, honey.”

“I know that. Believe me, if I didn’t, I would be pulling that lovely hair of yours out by the roots,” Cat replied. This time Cat was the one who took Kinsey’s arm and led her inside the crowded saloon. Kinsey directed her toward a rear table where the two girls waited.

Blond and apple-cheeked Babs Garvey greeted Cat with a warm hug and an immediate, “You rat, you’ve lost weight.” Behind Babs’s back, Kinsey gave Cat an I-told-you-so look. “J.J. has, too. Grief does that to you, I guess.”

“I guess,” Cat replied with deliberate vagueness, then turned to J.J. Richardson. Freckled and sandy-haired, J.J. was the plain one of the group, average in height, build, and looks. Like Cat, she came from a ranching dynasty, except that her ancestors had discovered a huge pool of oil beneath their West Texas spread. Instead of stepping forward to welcome Cat, J.J. hung back, eyeing her with a mix of hesitation and dread.

Cat guessed at its cause. “Kinsey told me about Donnie Paul.”

“Thank God,” J.J. murmured and caught Cat’s hands in her own, squeezing them tightly.

Kinsey flopped onto one of the chairs, managing to look graceful doing it. “Donnie Paul is a jerk, and J.J. is well rid of him.”

“I wish you would quit talking like that, Kinsey,” J.J. complained. “When you call him names like that, you make it sound like I have no taste at all in men.
For your information, Donnie Paul is pretty wonderful in a lot of ways.”

“Drop that torch you’re carrying, honey, and name one,” Kinsey challenged her.

“Wellll,” J.J. dragged the word out, stalling to give herself time to come up with a convincing answer.

“Look at her—she has to
think
” Cat teased, sitting down and joining the familiar and affectionate baiting.

“No, I don’t,” J.J. retorted. “You all saw him. You can’t deny Donnie Paul has a great body, gorgeous shoulders—

“Substance.” Kinsey waved off her answer and reached for the pitcher of margaritas on the bar table, then filled two salt-rimmed glasses, one for herself and one for Cat. “We want substance, not surface.”

“Substance?” J.J. looked blank.

“Substance,” Babs chimed in. “You know, the important stuff—”

Kinsey interrupted again, “—like—is he any good in bed?”

When Babs exploded with laughter, Cat forced a smile, on edge as she always was whenever their conversations turned to the subject of sex.

High color rosed J.J.’s cheeks. Briefly she dropped her gaze, then looked up with an embarrassed grin, and admitted, “Actually, Donnie Paul was fabulous in bed.”

“Donnie Paul?!” Kinsey hooted in disbelief.

“Yes, Donnie Paul,” J.J. asserted, then leaned forward, inviting them closer while she confided, a naughty light dancing in her eyes, “To be honest, guys, he is like the Energizer bunny in bed. He just keeps going and going and going.”

Laughter exploded from Cat, joining Babs’s gleeful squeal and Kinsey’s full-throated roar. The slyly
sexual remark was completely out of character for J.J.; it was the surprise of it, even more than the humor in the comment, that had the entire group holding their sides.

“Oh, mercy.” Wiping the tears from her eyes, Kinsey sighed in exhaustion. “No wonder you want Donnie Paul back.”

“Who wouldn’t?” Babs murmured.

“Do you all remember the football jock I dated last spring?” Kinsey asked.

“Chris Harper, the running back?” Cat picked up her glass and took a sip of the tequila-laced drink.

“I thought Harper was the tight end.” J.J. frowned.

“No, but he did have great buns.” Cat grinned.

“That’s the one I’m talking about.” Kinsey pointed a finger at Cat. “He was always bragging about what a love machine he was. Believe me, the batteries were not included.”

When the second round of laughter died, Babs rubbed her hands together in gleeful anticipation. “Another kiss-and-tell session, what fun!”

“Speak for yourself,” J.J. countered. “Because I certainly haven’t kissed anyone other than Donnie Paul to talk about.”

“You know what this means?” Cat raised her drink glass and waited while the others followed suit.

Before she could offer the toast, Kinsey said, “To the Kappa gang, and our last manhunt together.”

“Hear, hear,” they all echoed and clinked their glasses together above the margarita pitcher, scattering clumps of damp salt onto the table.

Cat had barely swallowed her drink when Babs nodded to point out someone. “There’s one for Kinsey.”

“Where? Which one?” Cat turned in her chair, readily joining in the window-shopping game they
frequently played, surveying the selection of males present and picking one out for an unattached friend. It was done mostly in jest, although there were always those rare occasions when they spotted a guy who was too good-looking to pass up. At those times, they would push the girl forward, urge her to check him out—sit behind the wheel, so to speak, maybe take him for a test drive.

“The guy in the plaid cowboy shirt and ten-gallon hat just coming back from the rest room,” Babs identified her choice.

Kinsey took one look at him and muttered in horror, “Good grief, you take that hat off his head, and he wouldn’t be more than five foot four, if that.”

“But he could be a great dancer,” Cat teased. “You should go find out.”

“No thanks.” Kinsey shuddered expressively and lifted her glass, taking another quick drink.

“What about the guy playing bass guitar in the band?” J.J. suggested. “He’s not bad.”

By the time Debby Ann Spring joined them twenty minutes later, the margarita pitcher was empty, and they had exhausted the supply of likely male candidates for their game. “What d’you say we all go to Billy Bob’s?” Babs looked around to see their reaction.

“Sounds good to me.” Cat stood up, then swayed a little, suddenly light-headed. Shaking it off, she guessed at the cause. “As soon as we get to Billy Bob’s, I have to get something to eat. One more margarita on an empty stomach and you’ll be picking me up off the floor.”

“I’m hungry, too,” Babs said as Cat dug the money from her jeans pocket.

“How can you be hungry after eating that whole platter of nachos?” Kinsey argued in reproof. “You all but licked the platter clean and you know it.”

“I did not!” Babs stalked alongside her as the
group exited the saloon en masse.

“You did so. I saw your tongue prints on that platter,” Kinsey fired back.

“That’s a lie!”

“You two, stop bickering for a minute.” J.J. called for peace, or at least a temporary truce. “Are we walking or driving to Billy Bob’s?”

“It’s only two blocks,” Cat pointed out. “Let’s walk.”

For once Kinsey had little to say during the two-block-long walk up Rodeo Plaza to the Texas-sized nightclub, billed as the world’s largest honky-tonk. The place was jammed with Friday night revelers, a living sea of cowboy hats, pearl snap shirts, blue denim, and cowboy boots. With J.J. plowing a path for them, they curled past the huge dance floor and finally found an empty table near the back. When the harried cocktail waitress stopped at their table, Cat added a barbecue sandwich to Kinsey’s order for a pitcher of margaritas and five glasses.

For a time, the din of thousands of chattering voices, punctuated now and then by an exuberant “Yee-haw,” made conversation difficult. With a host of new candidates available to them, the manhunt game was quickly resumed, despite the interruption caused when J.J. dragged them all on the floor to do a line dance.

When the noise and the crowd became old, they left Billy Bob’s and ventured back to Exchange Avenue. “Where to next?” Kinsey wanted to know.

“How about the Longhorn?” J.J. suggested.