Wild Cowboy Ways (7 page)

“Maybe they were only flirting.” Allie laid a hand on her mother's arm. “And you don't have to worry, Mama. I'm not so sure there's a man out there that I could even learn to trust. I loved Riley with my whole heart and look what happened. If it hadn't been for hard work, I would have lost my mind that first year. I couldn't eat or sleep and my brain kept running in circles trying to figure out what I could have done to prevent it. I don't think I can ever take a chance on hurting like that again. It might never be all put back together enough to trust someone else.”

Katy stood up and carried a stack of tea towels to the cabinet. “You deserve something better than a pocketful of bad luck if you ever do fall in love again. And like you've already heard dozens of times, no one stays on the Lucky Penny very long.”

“Thank you, Mama, but you don't have anything to worry about.”

Katy sighed. “It's late and we've got a full day ahead of us tomorrow. When you finish your day's work at the ranch, you need to figure out a way to lock those windows. It's a wonder Mama didn't break a hip or an arm crawling out. And that first love business. You'll know or you won't. No need to talk it to death.”

“I'll get new locks put on the windows tomorrow and be sure they're the kind she can't work.” She dropped a kiss on Katy's head as she passed by her and went straight to her room.

She eased down into an overstuffed rocking chair in the corner and looked up at the moon hanging in the top half of her bedroom window. Only a quarter of a mile across the pasture, Blake could be looking at that same moon.

Shaking her head did not erase the picture of him in those pajama pants and that tight knit shirt. And that kiss! His soft lips on her forehead, the heat it had fired up in her heart, the way it had made her knees go so weak that she had to stiffen her whole body—all of it combined to awaken emotions she thought she'd finally buried.

She'd known Riley her whole life. He'd loved her and they'd had a marriage and still he'd broken her heart. Besides, according to what she'd learned, Blake Dawson was as wild as a class-five tornado and Allie did not need that in her life.

But need and want are often two different things altogether, and Allie's heart was daring her to test the waters in a river that she had no business putting her toes into.

Blake was amazed at how much work Deke and Allie had gotten done in only half a day. The front part of the roof was without shingles and covered with black tar paper. Deke had said that tomorrow, they'd put on the new gray shingles and on Thursday they would repeat the process on the back side of the roof. With that in mind, they'd be done Friday, so Blake only had three more days to enjoy having someone to talk to at noon.

Suddenly, the loneliness of living so far from his family and friends hit him. He'd thought it would be easy because he'd work hard all day and be ready for bed come nightfall, but he hadn't figured in the fact that dark came so early in January. It wasn't even eight o'clock and he was bored out of his mind. It was five months until Toby would move to Dry Creek. That meant lots of lonely nights on his own if he didn't make friends.

Make friends,
the voice in his head said loudly.
Go to church. Drop in the feed store and make friends with the lady who answered the phone. Go to the convenience store to buy a coke. Talk to Allie. You can ask about her grandmother.

He started to poke the telephone numbers into the phone and made it to the last number before he stopped. That was the lamest excuse to call a woman that he'd ever used and besides after that impromptu kiss on her forehead, she might not even finish the roof. He could be up there trying to figure out how to get the final half of the roof done by himself come daylight.

He tried to watch a movie but it couldn't hold his attention. Then he picked up a book and read ten pages without knowing a single thing he'd read. He could call Toby but he'd only get a hat full of sarcasm out of him.

Yes, Blake had volunteered to live on the ranch alone for the first stretch, to get enough land cleared, to get enough fences repaired or built to hold a small herd by summertime. Then Toby would join him and then the house wouldn't seem so empty. Then in the fall, Jud would move in with them and he'd be wishing to hell he had some peace and quiet.

He paced the floor, went to the kitchen, and opened the refrigerator. Nothing looked good. He took a cookie from the jar but it didn't have any taste and he gave the last half to Shooter. He went to the window and pulled up the ratty blinds. The moon hung out there with a whole sky full of stars around it. They looked cold up there in the sky, as if they were aware that in a few days they'd be blotted out from sight.

What in the hell was wrong with him? He had called many women with less reason than to ask about her grandmother. Had this place robbed him of all his wild ways? No, sir! Nothing could tame a wild Dawson cowboy! And if Allie didn't want to talk, he could call Sharlene or Mary Jo.

He poked in the numbers again without pausing.

“Hi, Blake. Please don't tell me Granny is back over there,” Allie answered.

He paced the floor again as he talked, moving from living room to the kitchen, around the table and back to the living room. “No, I wanted to be sure you got her home all right, though.”

“She's fine,” Allie said.

“You got time to talk?”

“About what?”

He hesitated, looking for something, anything, to keep her on the phone other than the job. “Did you figure out who Walter is or was?”

“Mama says he moved in over there more than thirty years ago.”

“I wonder what it is that she remembers in bits and pieces.” He could listen to her read the dictionary with that soft southern twang in her voice.

“Mama said it was the year she was planning her wedding and she got married when she was eighteen. I think Granny had her when she was about nineteen because Mama is fifty-one.”

Shooter looked up from the end of the sofa and Blake stopped to scratch his ears. “And you are how old?”

“Twenty-nine in the spring, and you do know it's not polite to ask a woman how old she is or how much she weighs?” Allie said.

“One hundred twenty-five pounds but that's with your boots on.” Did that slight lilt in her voice mean that she was enjoying talking to him?

A long pause made him check the phone to see if she was still there. Then Shooter went to the door and looked up at the doorknob.

“Just a minute, old boy,” he whispered. The dog could cross his legs for a few minutes. Blake was just starting to get Allie to open up and he wasn't about to lose the opportunity to talk to her some more.

“What did you call me? Did you really say
old boy
to me? And I'm going to shoot Deke for telling you my weight,” Allie said.

“Deke didn't tell me. I caught you when you fell and I'm a pretty good judge of how much dead weight I can hold.” Blake started for the door to let Shooter out, but the dog changed his mind and returned to his rug by the fire.

“So how old are you?” she asked.

“Twenty-nine last November and I weigh two hundred pounds without my boots.” He searched his mind for something else to talk about so she wouldn't make an excuse to end the call. Church! He planned to go on Sunday to get to know more people in the area. That was a safe topic. “Do you go to that church down the road from the feed store?”

“It's the only church left in Dry Creek, so yes, that's where my family goes on Sunday.”

She surely must not be nervous because she wasn't talking too fast or spitting out too many details like Deke said. Was she only being nice to him because for the next few days he was her employer?

Shooter went back to the door and he headed in that direction. “Do they make newcomers walk through hot coals?”

“Not last time a stranger attended. We tend to welcome them, not punish them. But we might kill a chicken and use the blood for war paint on your cheeks.” She giggled.

He shivered at the visual that reply produced. “Is that initiation, or do you get your cheeks painted, too, since you invited me?”

“I didn't invite you. I just said that we have church and we welcome newcomers,” she argued.

He opened the door but Shooter barely stuck his nose out. “So if I showed up in my best jeans and polished boots, they might not tar and feather me?”

“No, but they might make you eat the raw chicken, feathers and all, to prove you are tough enough to live in our part of Texas.” She laughed.

Her laughter was like tinkling bells on a belly dancer's costume. Matter of fact, the only time he saw a real belly dancer she had dark brown hair and brown eyes. Could Allie have secrets hiding somewhere in the pockets of those cargo pants?

“Sounds like I'd better sneak in late and sit on the back pew so I can make an escape if I hear clucking.”

“You might as well sit on the front pew. Where's the fun in not taking risks?” she answered.

She was warming up. He could hear it in her voice. He closed his eyes and imagined her doing a seductive dance for him in a flowing costume with little bells sewn into the fabric around the hips. His breath caught in his chest and he gasped.

“So you don't take risks?” she asked.

“Shooter can't make up his mind whether to go out or stay in. Cold wind about took my breath away. And, honey, I do take risks. I bought the Lucky Penny, remember?” He closed the door but Shooter didn't go back to the rug.

“Point taken,” she said. “Don't bother polishing your boots or they might take you for a city boy. We're pretty casual here in Dry Creek.”

“Do you polish your boots?” he asked.

“Mama says that on Sunday I have to wear shoes and a dress. It's painful but I do it for her.”

Blake sat down in his recliner. “Where do the strangers sit?”

“Anywhere there's an empty pew.”

He would have liked it a lot more if she'd said that he could sit with her family, but then that could prove disastrous if Granny decided he was Walter halfway through the service.

“So are you thinkin' about coming to services on Sunday morning, then?” she asked.

Shooter came over to his side and he scratched the top of the dog's head. “Thought I might. You want to drive over to Olney and get a hamburger with me afterward?”

“Already got plans for Sunday dinner but thank you all the same,” she said.

“Another time?”

“We'll see,” she said. “I hear Shooter whining. Sounds like he's ready to brave the cold. Thanks for checking on Granny.”

“I feel sorry for her, trying so hard to get things in order. Poor old girl doesn't need to be traipsing through the cold. See you tomorrow at noon. Hey, would you know anyone who'd like to have some firewood? I'll give away all the mesquite wood that anyone wants to haul off. It's already piled up so they can bring their chainsaws and help themselves.”

“You could put up a sign in the feed store and Mama's place. Lots of folks around here use wood in the winter, and mesquite burns really well,” she said.

“Good idea. Thanks, Allie. And thanks for visitin' with me. See you tomorrow.”

“Good night, Blake,” she said softly.

He hummed all the way to the door to let the dog out one more time that night and decided as he waited for Shooter to water a nearby bush that he didn't want to talk to Sharlene or to Mary Jo. Maybe he was making progress after all.

A
blast of warm air and the familiar smell of a feed store hit Blake square in the face when he opened the door to the Dry Creek Feed and Supply store that cold Wednesday morning. He removed his sunglasses and tucked them into his coat pocket while he took stock of the store. Not too different from the one he and his folks used in Muenster but quite a bit smaller. Shelves of supplies to his right along with a small assortment of tools, three or four round racks of clothing to the left, with a few sacks of feed piled up at the back of the store. Most likely that door at the back led into a warehouse where folks who bought large quantities of feed backed their trucks up to load them.

“Can I help you?” A lady made her way to the front.

“I need to place an order for about three hundred steel fence posts, five feet tall should do it, and maybe ten rolls of barbed wire,” he said. “I'm Blake Dawson and I'm new in town.”

“I know who you are.” She was pretty danged cute in those tight-fitting jeans and chambray shirt tucked in behind a cowgirl belt that cinched up to show off a small waistline.

“But I don't know you.” He smiled.

She smiled. “I'm Lizzy, sister to the woman who is putting a roof on for you. Welcome to Dry Creek.”

“I'm pleased to meet you, Lizzy,” he said.

“I have what you need in the warehouse. It's twenty dollars extra to deliver it unless you spend five hundred dollars, and I can get it there tomorrow.” She circled around behind the cash register and hit several buttons, then looked up and said, “Cash or credit card?”

“Credit card and I reckon that order mounts up to a lot more than five hundred dollars so I'd appreciate it if you'd deliver it to the Lucky Penny. Tomorrow is fine. You mind if I put a flier up there on your bulletin board with those others?”

“What are you selling? Surely you're not already leaving the ranch.” Her dishwater-blond hair was pulled up in a ponytail, and those light brown eyes had more questions behind them than whether he was leaving Dry Creek before he'd even unpacked.

Blake headed toward the front of the store. “Not selling anything and, no, I'm determined to make that ranch profitable so I'm not even thinking about leaving. I'm giving away mesquite wood to anyone who wants to come get it. Folks are welcome to cut down however much they want for free.” He used four thumbtacks stuck on the outside of the corkboard to attach the flier he'd made the night before on his computer. “How long have you been in business?” He handed her his business credit card.

“My whole life.” She pulled it free from his fingers and ran it through the machine, then handed it back, waited a second for the tape to roll out of the cash register, and laid it in front of him. “Sign right there.”

He scrawled his name on the bottom. “Are you the person I talked to when Irene showed up on my doorstep?”

She gave him his copy. “Yes, I am. Are you going to be home before noon today? I hear the church ladies are bringing more food.”

“Yes, ma'am, I will definitely be there. How long have you worked here?” he asked.

“I own this place,” she said.

She'd been coolly friendly but she hadn't flirted with him. Was he losing his touch? What if he was never able to entice a woman into his bed again?

Then he saw the engagement ring on her left hand and he could breathe again. “When are you getting married?”

She held up the ring and looked at it as if seeing it for the first time. A bright smile lit up her face. “In March. If you are still here, you are invited to the wedding. It will be held at the church with the reception in the fellowship hall.”

“Thank you. I'll be there for sure because, Miz Lizzy, I will definitely still be around.” He stopped at the door, settled his cowboy hat on his head, and turned around before he opened the door. “You own the store down the block, too?”

“No, that's still Mama's business but she won't mind if you put up a flyer,” Lizzy answered. “Don't forget. Eleven o'clock. And act surprised. Don't tell them I told you. Don't want them to be disappointed if you weren't home. They've probably been cooking for two days.”

He gave her the thumbs-up sign and stepped out into the harsh January wind. Oklahoma had its own song about the wind coming swooping down the plains, but they couldn't hold a candle that day to the Texas wind blowing dead leaves and dirt down the sidewalk between the feed store and the service station–slash–convenience store on the other corner of the block.

Four empty buildings with either dirty windows or newspaper covering the windows separated the feed store on one corner of the block and the convenience store on the other end. The faded signs said at one time there had been a beauty and barbershop combination, a clothing store, a café, and a bakery in Dry Creek. He glanced across the street at the empty places on that side with windows so dirty that he couldn't even see what kind of signs might have been written on them in past days.

He bypassed two gas pumps and crossed a wooden porch into the store that was set back from the rest of the empty buildings. The windows were sparkling clean and the inside of the store was neatly put together. He was met with the rich aroma of breakfast food, maybe sausage gravy and hot biscuits.

“Hello, what can I help you with?” It was easy to see that this was Allie's mother. They had the same brown eyes and although her hair had a few gray streaks, it was still mostly dark brown. Katy was taller than Allie by a couple of inches and a few pounds heavier. Crow's feet around her eyes said that she'd enjoyed life and laughed a lot.

The store was set up with the cashier's counter to the right inside the door and shelves of staples lined up neatly to the left with restroom signs in that corner. Tables were back there with chairs pushed up around them, and a meat counter with a stove behind it took up the room beside the counter.

He removed his cowboy hat. “I'm Blake Dawson and I'd like to put up a flyer to give away mesquite wood. So this is a gas station, convenience store, and a café all combined?” he asked.

“Not a real café. Since we don't have a place for folks to grab a bite of lunch on the run I put in a small deli counter and I make one thing at noon. Something simple like chili or soup or maybe tacos.”

“Beer, bait, and ammo,” he said with a smile.

“Something like that only it's gas, cokes, and tacos.” She grinned back at him.

“Walter! What are you doing here this time of morning?” Irene pushed back a chair from one of the three old tables covered with yellow Formica with mismatched chairs around them. “You moved away and said you'd never come back to Dry Creek.”

“Miz Irene, look at me closely. I'm Blake Dawson, not Walter,” he said gently.

“That's right. You're that scoundrel who's trying to get Alora Raine into bed with you. Well, it won't work. I'll protect her.” Irene stuck her nose in the air and disappeared behind a curtain separating the front of the store from the back.

“Sorry about that,” Katy said.

“It's all right. If I tell her often enough that I'm not Walter maybe she'll forget about him. So I can run in at noon if I don't want to cook?”

“Or in the morning.” She pointed to the chalkboard above the counter.

He took his gloves off and shoved them into the pockets of his coat. “Breakfast and dinner, both. I'll have to remember that.”

“Breakfast is the same every morning. Sausage gravy and biscuits. Dinner is take it or leave it but I've got a lot of folks who are willing to take it. I do make deli sandwiches out of the meat market back there.” She nodded toward the display of pork chops, steak, and lunch meats.

“And I thought this was only a convenience store,” he said.

Katy handed him a roll of tape. “Go on and put your flyer in the window. But you might get more folks on your ranch than you want though. Mesquite makes for some good hot fire.”

He laid two packages of chocolate chip cookies and a bag of chips on the counter. “I'd also like two pounds of bologna sliced thick and a pound of ham sliced real thin. My dog, Shooter, likes a piece of bologna every night before bedtime.”

She headed for the back of the store. “And the ham?”

“That's for me,” he said.

“I'll take care of it. Blake, you do know what they say about the Lucky Penny?”

“I'm hoping to change that,” he said.

Allie was sitting on the roof waiting for Deke to bring up another roll of tar paper, when her phone rang. “Hey, Lizzy. Please tell me Granny hasn't run off again.”

“Nope. But I did just meet your hot cowboy. No wonder you keep going over there every chance you get.”

Allie wanted to chew up shingles and spit out bricks. “You're right, darlin'. I might seduce him soon as I crawl down off this ladder,” she said, her voice laden with sarcasm.

“Alora Raine!” Lizzy gasped.

“For the last time, I'm only here to put on his damn roof. Now Deke has the paper ready to roll so we can get this job done. Was there something you needed, or were you just calling to annoy the crap out of me?” Icicles dripped from Allie's words.

“Well, for your information,” Lizzy huffed, “Mitch's cousin Grady is coming for his tux fitting, and we've planned a dinner for the four of us in Wichita Falls on Friday night. He sounds really eager to see you again. Play your cards right, and I bet he could make you forget all about your cowboy.”

Allie came close to dropping the nail gun at the thought. The way Grady looked at her made her skin crawl. “God almighty, Lizzy. I'm perfectly capable of taking care of my own love life, and I'm absolutely not going to dinner with Grady.”

“Yes, you are. Be ready at seven and that means good jeans or a dress and makeup, too,” Lizzy said.

“You'd better have a backup plan in your hip pocket because I'm not going,” she said.

The phone went silent and she looked at it. Sure enough her sister had hung up on her. Deke had barely gotten the tar paper unrolled across the length of the roof, when her phone rang again. She fished it out of her pocket, hoping that it was Lizzy so she could give her a piece of her mind.

“I know you are busy so I won't talk but a minute,” her mother said. “I really think you should go with Mitch and Lizzy on Friday night. You will be standing up there with her and he's the best man. It's not a date but an evening to discuss wedding plans.”

“That damn tattletale! What makes you take her side in this? Why would you want me tangled up with Grady? He's even worse than Riley was,” Allie fumed.

“She's your sister and she's worried about you and frankly so am I. Blake came in here today and the way he looks, he's got heartbreaker written all over him. Come on, Allie, listen to the voice of experience when it talks to you,” Katy said tersely.

Allie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I'm not going to dinner with them.” Allie heard Deke huffing and puffing as he climbed the ladder with a heavy roll of black roofing paper on his shoulder.

“Okay, then I'll invite them to Sunday dinner and you can discuss wedding plans then,” Katy said.

Allie had never wanted to hit something so badly in her life. “Mama!”

“Friday or Sunday. Your choice?”

She thought about it a second. “I'm not going Friday.”

“Then Sunday it is,” Katy said. “Blake bought a few things and put up a flyer to give away mesquite for firewood. And Allie, the church ladies are coming at eleven this morning to welcome him to Dry Creek. You might want to be on the roof working instead of in the house with him. Even if y'all are only talking business, it wouldn't look good.”

Allie motioned for Deke to drop the roll of black paper beside her. “Good way for Blake to get to know the people, ain't it? Give them something for free? And Mama, stop worryin' about me.”

“I'm a mother. It's my job to worry. Men that good lookin' are out for a good time and all they leave in their wake are tears. Grady is a good man. Youth minister at the church up around Gainesville,” Katy said.

“Whoopee for him. I've got to get to work. Deke is ready for me to start nailing. See you at supper.” Allie pushed the
END
button.

“Who's giving away what for free?” Deke asked.

Blake poked his head up over the edge of the roof. “I am. News travels fast around here, don't it? I'm giving away all the mesquite wood anyone wants to cut up for firewood.”

“You care if we sell it once we take it off your place?” Deke asked.

Blake chuckled. “You can boil it and make mesquite pie with it for all I care. I want it gone.”

“You've got a fireplace.” Allie looked up from her nail gun. “Why don't you use it?”

His gaze locked with hers, the heat melting the cold all around her. She'd never had a man look at her and create such an intense reaction. One part of her, the emotional side, wanted to dive into those green eyes and see what lay beneath that flirting nature—down deeper than his wild cowboy ways and into the very man. The other side, that sensible side, told her to run from him as fast as she could.

“I'm going to cut up as much as I can this afternoon and stack it up behind the house. I can probably save enough on my heating bill to pay for the ceiling and the paint that way,” he said.

She looked down at her nail gun and snapped another shingle in place. “Price of fuel these days you just might.”

“Thought I'd check on the progress before I take the chainsaw out to the brush pile. This roof is lookin' really good. I guess you really will get it done by the weekend.” He took a step back down the ladder.

Allie looked up from the nail gun and nodded. “If the weather holds for us, we will. I told you in the beginning I thought we could get it done by quittin' time on Friday.”