Uninhibited in Apple Trail, Arkansas - Volume 2 (25 page)

The sun shown bright through the windows. She reached across and pulled the curtains closed, blanketing the room in darkness. She turned away from the hidden panes and lowered her eyes. Today, she would do nothing but lay in this bed. Tomorrow, she would crawl out and salvage her things, begin cleaning her property and be ready to build new.

Henry cupped her cheek. “I need to clean up. You climb under the covers.”

“Sounds like a deal.”

“I think so. Especially when you warm up the bed and I have to climb my cold ass under those covers with you”

She laughed and he stole another kiss.

Chapter Twelve

Henry drove up her long driveway, ready for this day. He knew she’d be good to go this morning, so he’d woken before her. Taken time to close the blinds she’d opened last night and left the house, leaving a note behind saying he’d be back around lunch.

They were going to work on this. Together. He turned the last corner, hoping she was still asleep, but knowing she wouldn’t be. He wasn’t overly surprised to find her standing in the center of the rubble, picking at things here and there.

He put the truck in park and walked to the edge of the remains.

She stared at him. “You’re back.”

He smiled. “I bought you something.”

“You shouldn’t have, but I hope it’s lunch if so.”

He laughed. “Not lunch.” He turned and pointed to the tractor sitting on the trailer behind his truck. “I bought you a tractor.”

She blinked. “You bought me a tractor?”

He grabbed her hand and tugged her to it, hardly able to wait to see her on it. He knew she’d love it. “I did. Nice broad bush hog on the back that will cut this yard in a second. There’s a bucket for cleaning up the house and I have a tiller attachment coming too, since you garden.”

She just stared and blinked. “You bought me a tractor.”

“Yes.” He opened her hand up and dropped in the keys. “Let’s get her unloaded.”

She rolled the keys around in her hand and wasn’t exactly what he would call happy. “No.”

“No?”

She shook her head and pushed the keys back out. “No. Take it back. I don’t want it.”

He stared. “I’m not taking it back. It’s a present.”

Her mouth fell open. “That is not a present! A…a potted plant is a present!”

“You need it. I got it for you.”

“I wanted to buy it myself!”

He sighed. They were past this. After yesterday she’d opened up. Been his. Relaxed. They’d talked about today, about cleaning up. That’s why he’d gotten the tractor. “You’re being stubborn.”

She shook the keys in her hand, dropped them on the trailer and turned away.

“Jessie.”

“Stop. Just stop. You don’t know how to just let me take care of myself, do you?”

“I am helping you.”

“No, you’re not. Helping me would be letting me do things my way.” She gestured toward the tractor. “This is you trying to take over. Did I want a tractor, yes, but I have the money to buy one myself, the kind I wanted. You didn’t even ask. You just did with no thought for me or what I liked or how I like to do things.”

He stared at her as she started walking away again. “I did this for you as a gift!”

“Did you? Or did you do it to satisfy your good ‘ole boy need to sweep everything up and take care of everything?”

His eyes narrowed. “There’s nothing wrong with being a good guy.”

“There is if you’re pushing me into a rocking chair where I do nothing but sit and rock and drink my tea that someone brings me.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Red bloomed across her cheeks. “No it’s not. Admit it, you’d love nothing more than a future with a woman where you take care of all her needs. She has a maid to wash clothes, clean the house, cook the food.”

He crossed his arms over his chest. “Women everywhere would love a maid.”

Her fisted hand smacked against her chest. “But not this one. I thought you were finally getting it, Henry. I thought you were starting to understand that I’m not some soft-handed little woman. I like having responsibilities and things to do. I have my own mind, but if it were up to you, I would do nothing with it.”

Engines rumbled in the distance and Henry closed his eyes as she focused on her driveway.

“What is that?”

He shook his head. “More of my unappreciated help.”

The truck of workers he’d hired to start cleaning pulled in the drive.

She shook her head. “Leave me alone, please. I’m asking you to take your stuff back and leave me alone. I can’t live like this. It’s why I don’t like people on my property. I’m not a homeless animal you can take home, give some water, put in a warm bed and be happy. Everybody tries treating me that way. It’s why I don’t do this Henry. I thought yesterday you got that. It’s why I don’t do relationships. Please, leave.”

He swallowed and grabbed the keys from the trailer. “Fine. I’m going. I can’t do this with you anymore, Jessie. I can’t keep chasing after you, in the hopes you’ll let me see the woman inside you’ve hidden away. So that’s fine. If that’s what you want, I’m gone.”

Chapter Thirteen

Jessie turned and walked away from Henry who was climbing in his truck.
Finally
she could get to work and return to the rubble with the sound of everyone leaving at her back. When silence was only split by wind rustling leaves, she looked back, half expecting to see Henry still there, still being stubborn.

But he wasn’t. There was nothing but her front yard and empty driveway.

“Finally,” she said out loud this time.

She bent and looked at the mess of bricks, shingles, sheetrock. All of her things. She needed some sort of organization. Piles. Piles would be good here. She glanced at the yard just off the crumbled mess. A burn pile for some things. A nearby one for bricks. The once tall and strong chimney stood before her, still standing, only a little crumbled. Bricks could go over there.

It was time to get to it. Stay busy and she’d get there. Life had so far worked for her that way. She bent and reached at a long flat piece of sheetrock and tugged. It didn’t give away from whatever held it, but she worked it sideways, up and down, tried turning it and gave it a hard jerk.

Her hands slipped. Feet went out from her under and she fell back on her ass in the middle of it all. She got up and went for it again.

Again, she landed on her ass.

She flattened her hands down. “All right. You’re coming out.”

She walked to where it was hanging up and jumped around, hoping to loosen or break it off. She cracked her knuckles, grabbed the same sheet again. And landed back on her ass.

Frustration welled up tight around her eyes and she sat, right there in the rubble, amongst everything she owned that was completely destroyed and it couldn’t be held back any longer. She wrapped her arms around her legs and dropped her face on knees.

A cold bite on the wind blew. The sweat from trying to pull the board loose chilled against her hot skin and she shook.

There was so much… she didn’t even know where, how, what to work on. What corner or spot to start on. Where to dig for things or begin.

Sitting out here, on top of this heap, in this open space, and something was closing in. Pushing. Walls squeezed around her. A hundred things at once pulled and tugged at her, needing to be done now. Jessie hugged herself tight and when that didn’t work, pressed her hands over her ears, wanting it to all go away. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried thinking of anything but the hundred thousand things she needed to do right now, but didn’t even know where to start.

Henry jumped to mind. With his soft touch. Whispered words. Strong body against hers coaxing her to relax and fall into his arms. She hiccupped. She might have done a good bit more falling than that. Then Henry looking at her, shaking his head. And Henry leaving her.

The silence in the wake of him going. Her stupidly being glad for it.

And…oh, God. What the hell was she doing? She slapped her hands down beside her and jumped from the spot she’d been sitting. Where she’d wanted to do nothing, nothing but just give up and sit there and what was she doing to herself?

She ran from the crumbled home to her truck to go…well, she wasn’t sure. He lived in Ruston. That’s all she knew. It was a college town, not an overly huge city. He was in the phone book likely. She had paperwork from his lawyer’s office and could find him that way. And she would say...she wasn’t sure.

She stopped running and stared at the ground. She just didn’t know. She wanted a lot, but didn’t know how to get it. What to do about it. She curled her hands to fists. She was Jessie McBride, damn it. She rolled her shoulders back. All it took was a little hard work and she’d have what she wanted. Just for the first time in a long time, what she wanted was suddenly different.

She reached for the handle of her truck, but an engine coming up her drive stopped her. She smiled, thinking Henry was back and she walked forward, ready to meet him there and let him know that he was wrong. That he could—had—changed her and made her see.

A red pickup that wasn’t Henry’s truck pulled in her drive. She squinted, seeing her friend Stephanie driving up. Another half dozen cars at least were behind her.

Stephanie parked and hopped out. “Hey, babe. Need some help?”

Jessie smiled. No actually, she didn’t. What she needed was to run down the road and catch Henry before it was too late. “Now isn’t a good time.”

“Jessie, honey.” Stephanie put her hands on her shoulders. “I love you, that’s why I’m here. That’s why I told Tiffany we were coming even though you wouldn’t want us here and she said no.” She pushed on her shoulders and spun her around until they both faced the pile. “Look at that mess, Sweetie. The faster we get this shit picked up, the quicker you can build a new home with the money that Henry Green is paying you. And make it a big one. You’re a god-aunt to a bunch of kids running around this place and you need
lots
of space for when we dump them off on you.”

“But—”

“
And
,” Stephanie cut her eyes over and back to the pile. “Look at all this parking you have in this front yard. We definitely have to start having holidays here.”

Jessie shook her head. “Grant and Rebecca will live in the manor in Apple Trail. That place is way bigger than anything I’ll ever have.”

“Yeah, but they have that river that runs through the backyard and we’d have to watch the kids like a hawk.”

She glanced to her friend. “That ‘river’ is a six inch deep long, skinny mud puddle.”

Stephanie shrugged. “Six inches is enough they say, if they get their faces in it. Here we won’t have to worry. We can drink margaritas and they can run, like you and Tiffany used to do.”

Oh, that image struck hard in her chest. “Stephanie.”

Her friend waved her off and continued. “Now, the way I got it figured is, Memorial Day is five months off, the Fourth of July is six. We better get busy if we’re going to barbeque here.”

“But….” Jessie looked at the piles. At the trucks still parking in her driveway. Riley Hamilton and Stephanie’s husband, Parker, pulling in with his tractor. Grant Iverson and
his three older brothers were there digging in the back of their trucks for god only knew what. Mike directing in a city dumpster. Jessie looked back to the pile where her friends, Tiffany, Lette, Shellie and Rebecca were already plucking through.

She looked at her family.

“But what?” Stephanie asked.

Jessie blinked off tears and put her arm around Stephanie’s shoulders. “But Rebecca doesn’t need to be out there in her condition. Christ Almighty, Stephanie, she’s seven months pregnant, are you sure you haven’t
already
started Margaritaville before coming?”

Stephanie smiled and stroked her thumbs under Jessie damp eyes. “That’s my girl. And Rebecca insisted and wanted to come because she loves you too. Don’t worry though, we’ll send her along to make us some tea and snacks in thirty minutes to an hour. Bet you a tall margarita later she falls asleep waiting on the water to boil.”

Jessie nodded and pulled in a breath. Stephanie was right. They were all right. Henry, she swallowed the sudden knot in her throat, had been right. She could do this on her own, but she didn’t have to and it seemed her friends—family—weren’t going to let her anyway. “Let’s get busy then.”

Stephanie blinked and started walked. “I have to say, this was easier than I thought it was going to be. I expected you to kick us out.”

Jessie dropped her gaze to the ground. “I already did that. With Henry. And he left. And I think I screwed everything up there.”

Stephanie stopped her just away from the rubble. “From what Tiffany has told me, I promise you haven’t screwed up a thing. Let’s clean up for now. This evening we’ll get the tequila and between all of us women, I know we can find an answer to fix it. Parker says I do my best thinking after a drink or two.” She winked. “If you’re willing to listen.”

Jessie bit her lower lip and nodded. Yes, yes before she lost everything she’d just found, she was ready to start listening.