Escaping the Past (Wester Farms) (22 page)

“Thank you.” Brody clapped him on the shoulder and stuck the envelope in his suit pocket. He walked into the house.

Chapter Fourteen

Everyone changed clothes and lingered over a long lunch at the kitchen table. The mood was somber. The farm was quiet. Most of the hands had the day off and were spending the time with family or friends after the funeral. Lou was looking forward to being alone with Brody the way that someone
might
look forward to going to the dentist. One thought of the way he kissed her
had her face filling with heat. And other places
. But one thought of having to explain Sarah’s parentage made
her
ice right back up.

Lou strolled out to the barn and looked over the stall door at one of the new foals. The gangly little one was just getting steady on his feet
,
toddling around the stall. The brood mare hung her head over the stall door and nudged Lou’s pocket, looking for a piece of peppermint or a sugar cube. Lou smirked and produced one. “Girl, I know you so well. I think you would sell that baby for a piece of peppermint.” She unwrapped the peppermint and held it in the palm of her hand. The horse ate it hungrily while Lou stroked her face.

“Mrs. Wester would have been really proud of you today, girl
,” Lou said.
“
That’s one healthy looking baby you have, there.”

The horse nudged her pocket again. “Sorry, girl, that’s all I have.” Lou held up both hands in surrender and stepped away from the door.

“Good thing a Boy Scout always comes prepared,
”
John said as he hobbled up behind her. He was no longer on crutches but he still had to wear a walking cast for four more weeks.

He pulled a peppermint from his own pocket, unwrapped it
,
and held it out to the mare. “Do you know this one was bred with Wester’s Folly? So that’s a little champion we have there.”

“I don’t think you
’
re supposed to be out here, are you?” Lou asked him, shaking her motherly finger at him.

John sighed long and loud. “Lou, if I have to stay cooped up inside for one more minute, I’m going to lose my mind. I love Sadie to death but she’s driving me nuts.” He puffed his chest out like a strutting rooster and grinned. “Sometimes, a man’s just got to act like a man.” Then his chest deflated.

Lou laughed out loud at his antics.

“What are you doing for the rest of the day?” John asked shyly.

He was plotting something. She just didn’t know what.
“I don’t have any specific plans. Why?”
He would drop some sort of trouble in her lap without even thinking about it twice.

“There’s a stallion two counties over I want to go and take a look at. He's still a young’un but I think he would be a great sire. He has great bloodlines. Today is the only day I can go and look at him. The bank is foreclosing on the property and they are selling all the horses at auction. If I can sneak
the stallion
out before they do, I have a chance at getting him.”

“So, why don’t you go and look at him?” Lou asked. “Doesn’t Jeb usually go with you for things like that?”

“See, Lou, that’s the problem. This one is going to be mine. I have some money saved up and I want to get my own stallion. I want to train him, work with him
,
and stud him out. I want to see if I am any good.” He kicked up sawdust from the barn floor with the toe of his cast. Then he pointed at it. “But, see, this thing is in my way. I can’t drive.” He put on his best little boy’s pleading face and gracelessly dropped to one knee. “Will you, please, please, please be my…”

A third voice broke in, “I swear to God, John. If you ask that girl to marry you, I’ll knock you flat on your ass.”

John whispered the last word so that only Lou could hear it,
“
…chauffeur?” Then he smiled broadly and rose to his feet. They both turned to look at Brody.

His grey eyes flashed as his cheeks reddened. 
“Just what the hell is going on here?”

John
rushed to explain
, “Brody, I was just asking Lou…”

“No need to explain, John.” She touched his arm gently. “I accept your proposal. Why don’t you go inside and see if Sadie can watch Sarah and then we’ll go.”

“Go where?” Brody growled through gritted teeth.

Lou pushed John toward the door. “Go ahead.” She shooed him with her pointed finger.

Brody grabbed Lou’s elbow and spun her around as soon as John was outside of the barn. “And just where do you two think you’re going?”

“Why is that any of your business?” Lou threw back at him.

He grabbed both of her arms and pulled her to him. “Do I need to remind you why it’s suddenly my business?” he said, his mouth inches from hers.

Despite her anger, Lou felt her pulse begin to quicken. She pushed it down and
let
the anger
rise back
to the surface. “How dare you manhandle me?” She shrugged her arms out of his grasp and stepped away from him. “Don’t ever grab me like that again.” She stomped out of the barn and toward the house.

****

Brody watched her through the barn door as she walked to the house, spoke to Sadie, grabbed her purse
,
and kissed Sarah on the head. She slid into the driver’s seat of John’s pickup truck and John got in on the passenger side. Brody watched as John turned to Lou and smiled
. Damn them. Where the hell were they going?

Brody’s mood became more and more disturbing as the day wore on. He sat on the front porch, tapping his foot on the wooden planks, his muscles drawn tight as guitar strings. Jeb walked through the screen door and sat down in the chair beside Brody’s.

“You look nervous as cat sitting in a room full of rocking chairs, boy,” Jeb said quietly, talking around a toothpick.

Brody stopped thumping his foot long enough to shoot Jeb a heated glance.

“You waiting for her to get back with John?” Jeb asked pointedly.

“Who? Lou?” Brody chewed his fingernails.

“Who else?” Jeb
chuckled
. “I doubt it’s John who has your tail in such a twist.”

“Actually, it’s both of them. They just took off and didn’t say a word about when they would be back. I had hoped to get to talk to Lou before I leave to go home tonight. I wanted to talk with her about something important.”

“How important?” Jeb asked.

“I’m not sure, Jeb.” Brody sighed and reached into his back pocket, retrieving the envelope Lou had dropped in the limo the night before. He held it out to Jeb. “Do you know what this is about?”

Jeb accepted the envelope and opened it with his weathered old fingers. “This looks like it’s her business, Brody.”

“Not any more, Jeb. I want it to be my business now.” He drew in a deep breath. “I had hoped to get to talk to her about it before I left today. But then I acted like an ass and she took off with John
.
”

Jeb chucked
again
and adjusted the toothpick in his mouth. “That happens to all of us sometimes. What are you in such a hurry to get home for?”

“Work, Jeb. I have a lot of work to catch up on.” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration.

“Is that really what you want?” Jeb asked candidly.

Brody sighed. “I don’t know what I want, Jeb.”

“I think you need to figure it out. Quickly,” Jeb replied. He waved the envelope. “But don’t you worry none about this. I’ll see what’s going on.”

“My flight is at eight tonight, Jeb. Can you give me a ride to the airport?”

“If that’s what you need, I reckon I can.”

Brody got up from the chair and went inside to pack his suitcase.

****

As
Lou and John pulled out of the drive
,
Lou reached over, pulled her sunglasses from her purse and put them on.
Her hand tapped against the steering wheel.

John
sang out
, “Somebody’s got a boyfriend
…
”

She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. He continued to grin at her boyishly.
It was hard not to laugh at John sometimes, no matter how stern she wanted to be.

“I bet he’s seeing red right now because you just drove off with me.” He patted his chest proudly, a feigned show of bravado.

“He was seeing red before I drove off with you,” Lou mumbled at him.

John soberly replied, “Jealousy is a hard emotion to deal with, Lou.”

“He doesn’t have any reason to be jealous. It’s not like he’s staying or anything. We don’t even have a relationship.”

“Sure looked like a relationship to me, with the way he was clinging to you at the funeral.”

“He wasn’t clinging,” Lou protested.

“Yeah, right.” John snorted.

“You think he was clinging?” she asked shyly.

“Well, yeah,” he said sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

“Maybe he was a little,” she said quietly.

John snorted.

The afternoon passed quickly after the mood shifted. Lou and John pulled up outside around six o’clock with John grinning from ear to ear, having just purchased his first stallion. He sat down beside Jeb to tell him all about it.

Lou got out of the truck. Her legs stuck to the seat of the
truck
and her skin pull
ed tight
as she slid across the seat after the long ride home. She was hungry, irritable
,
and still
more than
a little ticked off at Brody. She sighed long and loud as she looked across the driveway and saw him stomping toward her across the graveled drive. She put one finger up and halted him with just one word.

“Don’t.” She walked around him, creating a wide circle. He stepped in front of her and blocked her path. She avoided looking at him and just walked around him again.

He huffed. Then asked quietly,
“Would it help if I said I was sorry?”

She finally stopped and looked at him. She crossed her arms against her chest and tapped one foot, looking him in the eye. “Sorry for what?”
She probably shouldn’t goad him, but it was hard not to.

“Sorry for acting like a jackass?” he asked with a questioning look on his face.

“Brody Wester, if you don’t know why I’m mad, I’m certainly not going to tell you!” She stepped around him again. He blocked her again.

“
Damn it, Lou,” he groaned
. He sighed deeply and said with a straight face. “I am sorry for acting like a jackass this morning.”

She crossed her arms
across
her chest again. “Then why did you?”

“Jesus,” he whispered. Then louder, “I don’t know. He stepped close enough to her that only she could hear him. “I spent the most amazing night making love to you. Then I had to get up and leave you all alone in bed before the sun even came up.”

“And that put you in the foul mood?” she asked sarcastically.

“Yes. Well. No. Not exactly. Then I got to kiss you in the kitchen but we had to spring apart so no one would see. Then I walked into the barn and John was on his knees in front of you.”

“He wanted a favor, Brody,” she confessed. “He was begging. John does that all the time because he knows it works.”