The Cedar Tree (Love Is Not Enough) (37 page)

She didn't say anything on the five minute drive to her cousin's house where she stayed during her weekend visits. He stopped his truck in the drive.

"I didn't know you two were together, now," she said stiffly.

"We are."

Her eyes narrowed. "Since when?"

"Since always."

"So… All that at the ball game and that night didn't mean anything? You were just using me to make her jealous?"

Oh, boy. She was getting ready to blow a gasket. He'd never guessed she'd take him serious.

"Sorry."

Her eyes narrowed to slits and hot color flooded her cheeks. "You…creep," she shrieked, nearly spitting at him. She shoved open the pickup door and jumped out. "I hope you get fat and bald, and then I hope you die, you stupid jerk."

She slammed the door hard enough to rock the truck. With an enraged toss of caramel colored hair, she slung her big purse over her shoulder and huffed off toward the house.

He backed out of the drive with an irritable spin of the steering wheel.

Well, he'd probably die anyway.

Chapter Twenty-one

Two weeks later, his grandfather's living room door slammed on a warm June night, rattling the windows. Molly started up from the old man's lap where he sat in his chair and burst through his cattleman's paper like a circus trick, yapping shrilly.

At the door, Gil ripped his hat off his head and flung it at its hook beside the door. "Shut your little trap, Molly," he yelled. "It's me. The guy you sleep with."

The hat fell to the floor. He swung a kick at it. Molly stopped barking then hopped down, trotting briskly across the room to sniff his jeans. He reached down to wrench off a boot.

"Have a good day, Son?" his grandfather asked mildly, gathering up his paper.

"Oh," he grunted, yanking off his other boot, "it wasn't bad for a day straight from hell." He hurled the boot across the room where it thumped down with a clank of spur. Pacing across the room, he churned his hair. "I can't take it anymore. I'm done with her. I mean it."

"That's what you said yesterday."

"I really mean it today. I can't take any more."

His grandfather shook his paper. "What'd she do today?"

"What didn't she do?" He stopped suddenly, taking a girlish stance with his hands on his hips as he rolled his eyes. "Don't tell me what to do, Buster," he said in squeaky falsetto. "If I wanna ride Candy at a dead run down the steepest, rockiest hill I can find, I will. What's it to you?" He tossed his head and twitched his hips.

The old man eyed him over his reading glasses.

"You think this's funny, Gramps? This ain't funny. She's seriously messed up." He strode to his grandfather's chair, thrusting his right index finger at him. The finger sported a piece of blood soaked handkerchief wrapped around with grey tape. "Look at this. She nearly cut my finger off today while we were castratin' a lamb we missed earlier. Just because I yelled and jumped around a little, she called me a pansy and—"

The old man ducked behind his paper.

"Hey. What's it called when you don't have any feelin's? Psychopathic? Psychotic? That's her. I was bleedin' like a stuck hog all over the place, but all she cared about was me gettin' blood on her shirt." He glared at the paper. "That's just wrong. I didn't think church girls were supposed to act that way."

"They ain't, Son." His grandfather's voice sounded choked. "That little gal's plumb outta hand."

Plumb outta hand. The old man could say that again.

He flung himself into his chair, puffing up dust in a cloud. Katie was driving him crazy. He sneezed thunderously. Molly fetched her toy bear to drop it at his feet.

He automatically reached for the bear, hurling it across the room. "I can't say or do anything right. She don't even like how I ride. Dad sat me on a horse before she was born, for Pete's sake. I was winnin' rodeo buckles before she could even pick her own nose."

At that, the old man burst into hearty laughter, letting the paper fall to his lap.

"Laugh away, Gramps," he said, scowling, "but I guarantee there's always been plenty of girls who think I look good on a horse."

"Oh, mercy," his grandfather mumbled finally, dabbing at his watering eyes with his handkerchief. "What'd'you reckon's the matter with her?"

"How the heck should I know? I thought we were gonna get things worked out the night of her graduation, but she ran off mad and she's been mean as a rattlesnake ever since."

His grandfather folded the paper. "I wouldn't put up with her, then, was I you. Even when she was a little bitty gal, curls flyin' around, eyes flashin', she was sassy with fellers." He stood, pulling his suspenders over his shoulders. "It's a shame 'cause she can be sweet as sugar pie when she takes a mind. You ate anything, yet?"

Sugar pie. Ha. More like razor wire pie. He could hardly remember his brief taste of sugar pie.

"We ate at the café." Rubbing his eyes, he chuckled mirthlessly. "Get this. She took the burger I bought her and sat with that smart mouth 3T hand. Fed him her fries, too. She says he reminds her of Robert Redford. He reminds me of a chipmunk. No kiddin'." Scowling, he wiggled his fingers in the area of his jaw. "His smart mouth and little brown sideburns. He's so pretty. Man, I can't stand that guy and she knows it." His scowl deepened. "If she always looked at him like she was sightin' her rifle between his eyes he wouldn't think she was so darn hot."

"Well, there you have it, Son." The old man turned away. "Time to move on. She ain't worth takin' a bullet over."

Molly squeaked her toy impatiently.

"Hear that, Molly?" he muttered, kicking the bear. "Find a new home. I'm movin' on."

In bed later, he glared into the dark. What kind of idiot would keep putting himself through that for a mean little firebrand who had ripped his heart into shreds and stomped all over it?

Not him.

He was finished.

Done.

He kicked off the sheet and rolled over. The bedsprings shrieked. Molly growled, impatient with his restlessness. He reached down and dropped her out of the bed. She jumped back on. Disgustedly, he flopped back onto his pillow.

Tomorrow they moved the cattle herd to mountain pasture. After that came the sheep move. He had to have some sleep. Determined, he closed his eyes.

Katie's image stood burned into the backsides of his eyelids, hands on her hips, sassing him. With a snarl, he lunged at her. He grabbed a fistful of shining ponytail with one hand, her slender throat with the other. Slowly, he squeezed her silky skin. He enjoyed it…almost like he enjoyed smooth chocolate melting on his tongue. Forcing back her head, he met her eyes, like blue torch flames.

Her soft lips formed strangled words. "Drop. Dead. Buster."

Seriously? That's what she wanted to go out on?

He smiled grimly. No problem. He tightened his hand on her throat, glaring into her gaze only two inches away.

Then he…kissed her until she had to just…just…

Shut up!

He rolled over with a groan, covering his head with his pillow. Molly snapped at his leg, growling. He ground his teeth, shoving her small body away with his foot.

He had to give the mutt to Katie. They belonged together…alike as two short-fused sticks of dynamite.

***

A few days later, the first gold rays of sunlight lit a cloudless blue sky, burst over sandstone canyon walls and flooded down over a roaring whitewater of sheep. The canyon walls thundered with echoes from thousands of throats as the flock streamed from Sunnyside's dirt track onto asphalt road where Gil, nearly deafened, sat on Lucky. Shouting and whistling to the border collies slinking and darting around the river of sheep, he waited for Katie's red tee shirt and straw Stetson to materialize through the cloud of dust at the tail of the flock.

He trotted Lucky close to her mare. "You got this?" he shouted.

She gave him a snippy nod. He eyed her narrowly, his patience with her already stretched thin. She had showed up at Sunnyside with her father and Tim before daylight, her mood ugly. She'd told him to shut up, called him a moron twice, and buster once…all within the space of thirty minutes.

"I'm movin' on, then," he shouted. "Stay on the flank away from the traffic."

Her brows snapped together. "I'm not stupid."

He opened his mouth, but thought better of it and wheeled Lucky, urging him to a trot. What was the use?

Earlier he'd argued with her about her bringing up the tail of the flock on the dangerous five miles of asphalt road between the intersection and the deserted mountain road to the grazing allotment. Even with his grandfather trailing along in the pickup a quarter mile behind with the truck's flashers on, some idiot was bound to ignore the warning and roar past on the curving road, maybe plow right into the flock and run over her, too.

But she always had to prove a point, she always—

An air horn blared behind him. He spun toward the sound. Smoke billowed from the squalling brakes of a semi-truck barreling toward her. The blood drained from his heart.

"Katie! God, no," he yelled. He jabbed Lucky with his spurs, forcing him against the tide of sheep.

Katie frantically kicked her heels into her mare's sides. Wild eyed, the horse responded with an out of control lunge for the edge of the road and a steep drop-off high above the creek. Katie lost a stirrup and clawed for a hold on her saddle. The truck relentlessly skidded toward her on smoking trails of rubber.

Lucky shoved through the last of the sheep and he made a desperate grab for the mare's bridle. The truck juddered to a stop two feet away from them. He hauled the mare onto solid roadway in front of it.

"What the heck are you doin'?" he roared over the truck's diesel motor.

"I was trying to keep your stupid sheep out of the creek," she yelled back, pale and shaking, but still defiant even after missing death by two feet.

His weak-kneed terror fed his wrath. "I always thought I'd rather clean sheep off the highway than you, but I'm about to change my mind. If you do one more stupid thing, I'll snub Candy to my saddle and make you ride beside me all—"

"Don't threaten me."

"I'm tellin' you."

"Well, you'd better bring some friends, buster, because you'll need help…"

She shimmered through a red haze as the veins in his neck and forehead swelled tight. Her mouth kept moving, but his heartbeat throbbing in his ears blocked out her voice. The agitated horses danced restlessly around on the road in front of the truck. He glanced up at the shaken truck driver, and then wheeling Lucky, he loped away.

She'd never quit back-talking until she was actually dead and if he stayed an instant longer, all the blood vessels in his head would explode.

Thirty minutes later, she trotted Candy to him at the mid-point of the flock. "About fifty of your stupid sheep are down in the creek bottom," she shouted.

"Where?"

"About a mile—"

He tore his hat from his head, hurling it viciously to the ground. "Why'd you wait so long to tell me? You make me so mad I could just…just…" She made him wish so bad he hadn't stopped cussing. He dismounted and snatched up his hat, shoving it onto his head. "Y'know what? I'm glad I found out how you really are before—" He snapped his teeth shut, hauling himself onto his saddle.

"Before what?"

"Before I married you," he bellowed. "What a life I would've had."

"I wouldn't have married you if you were the last man alive anyway, Gil Howard," she yelled back.

"Katie, you practically begged me to marry you."

"You liar."

"Oh, yeah? How about—" he changed his voice to a falsetto—"Gil, ain't there somewhere we could get married where Dad wouldn't have to sign for me?"

"You're such a jerk," she shrieked, hot color flooding her cheeks. "I'm getting back together with Lance. We've got a date tonight."

"Congratulations." He glared at her triumphantly. "You never told me you broke up."

She flushed a deeper shade, apparently annoyed by her admission. "He's just been on a trip."

"Oh, right, Miss Pinocchio. You'd better check your nose."

"He went fishing in Alaska."

"Who cares? I'm takin' Tracy out tonight. Or Laura. Maybe even Annie. They'd all be glad to get me."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh, please. You're so full of yourself."

"My only problem is I can't decide which of 'em to marry. They're all hot, but Tracy—"

"Woo hoo," she shouted, twirling her hand in the air. "I'll dance at your wedding with every man there."

He gave her a final glare. Now she was just being ridiculous—nobody at church danced, not even at weddings. He jabbed Lucky with his spurs, whistling for the nearest dog. Why had he ever been so sure God had chosen her to be the only woman in the world he could endure for a lifetime? He couldn't even endure her for a few minutes.

A mile later, he found where the sheep had scattered in the thick brush along the creek. Lucky scrambled for footing on stones slick with water and moss, then stumbled into a boulder, ramming his bad knee into it with a solid crack.

He shouted with pain, rubbing at the joint through the leather of his chaps. After that, he fought his way over rocks and through brush on foot, leading Lucky. He turned his ankles and broke the rowels from his expensive spurs, but finally, he and the dog had the noisy band gathered and back on the road.

He pushed the sheep to a trot. At the tail of the main group, Katie gave him a haughty glance.

His nose burned. It hadn't stopped burning all day. All week. All—

"Don't look at me like that," he roared.

"I'll look at you any way I like, buster."

Something inside him snapped. He grabbed for her horse's bridle and caught a rein, yanking it from her hand.

Like a match to gasoline, her Campbell temper exploded. She lashed at him with the end of the other rein while Candy scrambled back, wild eyed and snorting, her metal shod hooves slipping on fresh sheep manure.