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"That's a nice shirt. You wearing your church clothes?"
He looks down at the shirt. Not especially nice. When Sara had been alive, if he'd been caught wearing anything to church that wasn't starched and pressed he'd be skinned alive after.
"I guess it is," he says, finally. Sara wasn't alive to skin him for wearing it, and nobody was starching his shirts for him any more, either.
"What was it about, anyway?"
"Just going to meet somebody."
They share a look. He's ducking the question because he doesn't want to bother with it any more, but they're reading into it and he can see it on their faces.
"Somebody female? Somebody who's a girl?"
For a second he considers telling them that she wasn't. Because if he tells them that Morgan Lowe is a girl, yes, then they'
re going to read into it in all the wrong ways.
On the other hand, one couldn't spend more than a few moments looking at the woman to know that she's exactly a woman. She's about anything a man could want out of a woman, with the single exception that she wasn't Sara, and she wasn't going to be any time soon.
"You boys talk too much, you know that?" He scowls.
Too much free reign, these brothers. James very pointedly and very openly looks from one of his brothers to the other, before announcing in the loudest 'quiet' voice that Philip's ever heard that that meant 'yes.'
"You boys didn't go out to lunch and not bother getting your boss anything, did you? Lunch, without calling to check and make sure I didn't have more work for you to do? You wouldn't have done that, would you?"
"You don't like Mexican food, boss. You wanted a Burrito, you shoulda said something."
Philip puts his foot up on the tail of the truck and steps up into the back alongside them. Michael's already reaching down into a big white paper bag.
"You're right, I shoulda said you three were on thin ice." He can't keep up the act, but he can sure keep talking like he was fooling somebody.
"We're sorry, boss. Would a burrito make you feel any better?" James takes the burrito that Michael surreptitiously passes him. "We got an extra, for nobody in particular, but we made sure it didn't have any tomatoes, just cause we know how particular some people can be."
"I'm not particular." Philip takes it. James cocks an eyebrow. "I just know what I like."
"Of course."
The boys continue eating. They've got a little head start on him, but Callahan's not an old man yet, and he can still eat. He might have taken a few weeks off, after everything went south, but he'd realized not long after that it was either eat, or die, so he decided to eat.
"I'm thinkin'," he says after a while. The boys get quiet. There's a time to play, and a time to work, and he's got the working face on, this time. "It's about time we get rid of that Black."
The boys exchange glances. "Well, sure," James says finally. "What's your point?"
"He'll need to be saddle-broken, 'course." He takes the last bite of the burrito, and then balls up the aluminum foil that had been keeping it warm. "I could call someone, have them do it, but if one of you boys wants to get a good bonus, I'd rather give you the money than some stranger."
The boys are that age. The right age to do stupid shit, even if it weren't for a paycheck. You offer them permission and the money, and… well, it only takes one look at their faces to know exactly how they feel about the offer.
"Well, sure. We could take a look at him. You know. Give it a shot. What kind of money we talking about?"
"Don't know. I figure that if we brought somebody in, I'd probably end up paying a couple hundred bucks. Call it a hundred if y'all manage it. Cash bonus."
"And when are we supposed to do this? Plenty of post-holes need digging."
"I don't damn know. You boys complain too much. Here I am, offering you extra money, and you're bellyachin' about when should you do it?"
The youngest is nineteen and his boots are kicking up dust before the other two know what's going on. Randy's quiet, but he's got a wildness to him, as well. Rash. Making the offer might as well have meant Phil was just asking him to do it.
For all that Callahan knew, the boy had already been trying on the side, and the only difference now was that he had permission to do it in the open. If that were the case—and a creeping doubt in his mind couldn't quite be forced into a box that said it wasn't—he'd better not find out about it.
