Love Drunk Cowboy (30 page)

Austin pulled out a chair and was barely seated when the sundaes arrived. “How’d you girls know I’d be here?”

“You can’t hide that bright red sports car,” Greta said.

“We parked about the time you went in the bank,” Molly told her. “Now what’s this about Rye O’Donnell coming to see you real late last night?”

Austin’s face felt as if someone had just pushed her into a bonfire. “What?”

“Come on, honey, we’re talking Terral and Ryan. Together they might have a thousand people if they padded the census more than a little bit. We got gossips that would put them television soap operas to shame. ’Fess up. What happened? Did he miss you? Was that the reason you went back to Tulsa? Was the fire gettin’ too hot between you?” Molly fired questions more rapid than a machine gun spits out casings.

“We saw you at the rattlesnake festival with him and it looked pretty serious,” Greta said.

Molly pointed at the ice cream with her spoon. “Eat your ice cream ’fore it melts and figure out a way to tell us meddling old women to mind our own business while you cool off. You are blushing so bad it looks like your face is about to catch on fire. I betcha Greta could light a cigarette off the tip of your nose.”

Greta laughed. “That blushin’ stuff must come from your mother’s side. I never saw Verline blush in her life, not even when she got pregnant and…”

Molly slapped on the top of her hand with her spoon. “Shhh.”

“Don’t shush her. What about when Granny got pregnant?” Austin asked.

“Cat’s out of the bag now and it’s a helluva lot harder to put the damn thing back inside the bag than it is to let it out. We might as well go on and tell her. Besides, she’ll find the marriage license and her daddy’s birth certificate and figure it out herself,” Greta said.

Austin shook her head but the notion didn’t fly out of her ears. “Granny was pregnant when she got married?”

Greta nodded. “And Verline didn’t blush or fret about it, neither. She was eighteen and Orville was nineteen. Verline’s momma said that if she was the first one to get pregnant before she got married then we’d take her to the river and drown her right then. And if drowning her would guarantee no other young girl would mess around before they got a ring, then we’d toss her off the bridge in a burlap bag tied to a rock. But it had happened back before Jesus was ever born and would keep right on until the end of the world. Wasn’t the same story with Orville’s momma. She had a fit. Swore that Verline didn’t even know who the baby belonged to and wasn’t about to let Orville marry a cotton farmer’s daughter.”

“Cotton?”

“Yes, honey, fifty years ago we raised cotton down in these parts more than anything else, and Verline was the only daughter of a cotton farmer. Orville’s daddy was a big shot on the railroad and they lived down in Ringgold. His momma had come from back east.”

“Hampton, Virginia,” Molly said. “And God Almighty, but that woman liked to put on airs. She even wore white gloves to church on Sunday. Said her ancestors come across the waters on the
Mayflower
. Lord, we didn’t care if they walked across them waters but she took great pride in being a
Mayflower
woman.”

“And this would be my great-grandmother?”

“Guess it would since it was your granddad’s momma,” Molly said. “Verline and Orville had only been married a few months when Verline’s daddy dropped dead with a stroke out in the cotton fields. So she and Orville went to live on the property so she could help her mother. Orville had a real good job by then and he built that house for Verline. Grandma lived where the hog lot and garden is still at, down at the end of the property, in a house that was about the same size. She and Verline ran that place until she died. By then they’d already give up the cotton and started watermelons.”

“And she adored your daddy. Not as much as Verline but she did love that boy. She died right after you were born,” Greta said.

“Granny never talked about her.”

“Verline always set her course for straight ahead and didn’t dwell much on the past,” Molly said. “Now enough about that. Tell us what Rye was doing at your house last night.”

“A woman don’t kiss and tell.”

“If that didn’t sound just like Verline. We tried to get her to tell us about s-e-x when she got pregnant so we’d have an idea what it was like. You know, back in them days folks didn’t talk about such things. Not even women when they was all by themselves in a kitchen with the windows and doors closed. But she wouldn’t tell us a thing.”

Austin kept eating. If her grandmother had been as attracted to Grandpa Orville as Austin was Rye, then it was no wonder she got pregnant. Hell’s bells, in those days they didn’t tell girls a thing about birth control. Austin wasn’t even sure they had such a thing back then. She stopped eating and thought hard… she hadn’t used any protection last night. Dammit! She’d have to be more careful next time.

Next time!

That put some extra kick in her adrenaline.

“If you won’t tell us what went on last night, at least tell us what went on up in Tulsa.”

“Okay, it was a hectic week. I worked late every night so I’d be ready to leave yesterday. There’s a man there named Derk who wants my promotion and he’s lobbying behind my back for it.”

“Give it to him and move down here. We’ll adopt you,” Greta told her.

“My mother is terrified that I’m going to do just that. But I went to college for a business degree in management and I’ve got a fantastic job with a promotion in line that’s out of this world for a thirty-year-old woman.”

“Can it make your little heart go wild at night? Can you wake up in its arms? Can you argue and fight with it and then make love to it?”

Austin shook her head.

“Then kick it out in the road and tell it to go to hell and live down here,” Molly said.

Austin finished off the last of her ice cream and licked the spoon clean. “I’m not making a decision of any kind right now.”

Greta poked Molly on the arm. “At least she’s not turning us down flat.”

“Where there’s hope there’s a will.” Molly grinned. “Now get on out of here. I understand you got a date and he’s pickin’ you up at six. Don’t be sittin’ here with us old women when you need to be gettin’ all pretty, and don’t forget to shave your legs.”

Austin cocked her head to one side.

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m not so old that I don’t remember that men folks like to run their hands up a nice slick thigh,” Molly said.

“How did you know I’ve got a date?”

“Rye told Kent that they were callin’ it quits at five o’clock because he’s got a date with you tonight. Kent told his mother who called my neighbor because she’s Kent’s momma’s cousin and told her. Then the neighbor came over and I was at the beauty shop gettin’ my hair cut and curled up so she told Greta who was waitin’ for me to get finished so we could ride down here together. Greta called Pearlita but Kent’s momma done already called her by that time and she already knew all about it. She’s jealous as hell because she really wanted her great-niece, Pearl, to fall for Rye. Now she’ll have to pick out one of the other O’Donnell men and Rye is the prettiest one.”

Austin pushed back her chair. “Good Lord! Doesn’t anyone have anything better to do than gossip?”

“Probably but this is a hell of a lot more fun. Use some baby oil on them legs when you get done shavin’ them. Makes them all shiny and Rye won’t be able to keep his hands off them. We’ll expect a full report next Friday unless you want to talk and then you can call us any old time,” Greta said.

“Were you two wild in your younger days?” Austin asked.

“We were later bloomers than Verline but when we did bloom, honey, we made up for lost time,” Molly answered.

“Tell me that story next week?”

“We’ll tell you a story every week you make it for ice cream. Maybe not that one but we guarantee a good one,” Greta said.

Austin dressed that evening in a pastel plaid sundress that she’d bought when she and her mother went shopping. Barbara had declared that she was wasting her money because she’d never wear the dress but Austin purchased it and the pink knit cotton cardigan sweater that was shown with it. She straightened her hair, slapped on a bit of blush, and touched up her eye shadow.

All that was easy but then it came time to decide what shoes to wear. She had white leather flat sandals that were very comfortable, pink high heels that made her freshly shaven legs with baby oil on them look very shapely, and her cowboy boots. Rye knocked on the door and she had a high heel on one foot, a boot on the other, and carried the sandals in her hands when she opened it.

“Wow! You look handsome enough to…” she stammered.

“And you are beautiful enough to…” He met her halfway across the floor and wrapped her up in his arms. She dropped the sandals on the floor and wrapped her arms around his neck. When she leaned back his eyes were closed and his lips were already zeroed in on hers. She shut her eyes and got ready for the jolt. She was not a bit disappointed.

Finally, she broke away but he kept an arm around her waist.

“Which one?” She pointed at her feet.

“Boots. Nothing sexier than a woman in cowboy boots and a pretty dress.”

She kicked off the high-heeled shoe and went back to the bedroom for her other boot. He followed right behind her, slipping a hand up her dress and cupping her fanny.

“Checkin’ to see if you are going commando tonight,” he teased.

“Are you?”

“I’m not tellin’. You’ll have to find out for yourself. Just remember that I might be the whole time we are having dinner.”

“Where are we going?” She gasped when his hand moved under the elastic of her bikini underpants and she felt a calloused hand on bare butt.

“Steak house over in Wichita Falls. Then a movie or maybe to a honky tonk to do some dancing.” He bent down and kissed her bare fanny.

The fiery heat of his lips on her left cheek made her suck air.

What if I’d rather just go straight to a sleepover in your big king-sized bed?

“Enough of that or we’ll never get out of this room,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am!” He teased her mouth open with another kiss.

She managed to get the other boot on between kisses and then he picked her up and carried her to the pickup, settled her into the seat, shut the door, and whistled all the way around the truck.

You idiot!
that voice inside his head said.
You know down deep in your heart that she’s never going to leave Tulsa. Pull them reins in and put a halt to this.

He got into the truck and looked over at her sitting not three feet from him. He flipped the console back and patted the seat beside him. “Slide over here beside me.”

When she was plastered next to his side, he put a hand on her knee, then slid it up to mid thigh and let it rest there as he drove with the other one.

She threw her left hand up over the back of his seat and toyed with his hair.

“Next weekend starts the rodeo season with the Rodeo and Real Texas Festival in Mesquite, Texas. We’ll be down there all weekend from Friday morning until Sunday morning,” he said. Her hands felt like hot embers in his hair.

“Do you stay down there or drive back and forth?” She felt like someone had stuck a straight pin in her helium balloon. One minute it was flying higher than the clouds. Now it was tangled up in tree branches.

“We have reservations for the whole season at the Hampton Inn right there beside the Resistol Arena. That way we can keep an eye on the bulls. Raylen and Dewar do some team roping and bronc riding.”

“Do they bring horses from your folks’ ranch?”

“Momma doesn’t raise rodeo stock. Her horses are bred to race.”

“You ride?”

“I ride bulls. But not at the Resistol Arena. It would be a conflict of interest for me to provide the bulls and ride my own animals.”

“Why do Raylen and Dewar ride horses and you ride bulls?”

“I have no idea. Difference in brothers, I guess.”

“What about Gemma and Colleen? Do they rodeo?”

He slowed down and swung right onto Highway 82 toward Wichita Falls. “Gemma rides bulls in the lady’s division but it’s not a conflict for her to ride my bulls. Only for me to ride them. Colleen used to do some barrel racing but she broke her leg a few years ago and gave it up. That does not mean that she won’t be there to cheer on Raylen and Dewar and to check out the cowboys.”

“Your parents go to the rodeos too?” His hand had moved upwards a few inches. She couldn’t stop him, but if it didn’t stop, she was going to make him stop in Henrietta at a motel and forget about food.

“We’ve got a block of rooms on reserve from one year to the next. Momma loves it. Two nights a week from the end of May to the end of August.”

“I thought you said it starts next weekend.”

She was already missing him. She’d get into Terral on Thursday night and he’d leave Friday morning, returning Sunday morning after she’d already gone home to Tulsa.

“That’s the Texas Festival rodeo. It’s kind of like the hot pepper popper appetizer before they bring out the steaks at dinnertime. Gets the folks in the mood for the summer. The schedule for the summer is in the glove compartment. It tells when it’s just a rodeo and when it’s a rodeo with a concert afterwards.”

She removed a stapled set of papers. “Looks like they have a concert once a month. Oh, my! Cross Canadian Ragweed and Tracy Lawrence are among the performers.”

“Want to go? Gemma doesn’t come down until Friday night because she’s got appointments, and now that she’s putting in her own shop down by the Chicken Fried Café she’ll be real busy on Fridays. Colleen works Friday night and comes down on Saturday morning. You could catch a ride with either one of them. We’re home by early afternoon on Sundays.”

“Sounds like fun. Maybe I could work things around to go. When does Gemma begin to work on her shop?”

“She’s ordered the chairs and sinks and got a plumber coming to put everything in this week. She’s painting the inside herself and putting a tanning bed in the back room. Folks in Ringgold and the surrounding area have to go all the way up to Ryan or to Bowie for haircuts and tanning right now.”