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“Dallas,” Gina whispered, but that didn’t stop Ella. Her restaurant had been in Dallas, not Houston. She also couldn’t stand to continue to be yelled at by her sister. “Enough,” she said, snapping her eyes open. “Okay? I hear you. Okay?”
Ella panted on the other end of the line, and Gina’s shoulders straightened and then slumped. “When will you be at the park?”
“We’re leaving in fifteen minutes,” Ella said, her dignified voice back in place.
“I’ll find you,” Gina said, and then she ended the call. She glanced around the dining room, expecting everyone in the vicinity to be looking at her, sorrowful looks on their faces for the way she’d been utterly humiliated and dressed down by her sister.
No one looked her way at all, and that only made her tears burn hotter. She spun toward the administration hall and marched that way. Blake knew her family was coming for the chuckwagon dinner and he hadn’t told her? Why not?
He stood in the employee break room, talking to Adam and Kyle, all three of them sipping coffee and eating the extras from breakfast. He looked over to her upon her entrance, his smile disappearing in less than a breath.
“What’s wrong?”
“My family is coming to the chuckwagon dinner?” She copied Nash and did the stomping as she approached him. She folded her arms and stopped in front of him. “When did that happen?”
Blake slid a look to Kyle and Adam and put his hand on her elbow. “Let’s talk outside.”
“Yes.” She pulled her elbow away from his touch. “Let’s.” She ignored Adam and Kyle as she went by them, and Blake came with her. Outside, Gina breathed a little easier, but her step didn’t slow as she practically ran toward the picnic table.
Nash sat there, and he turned as Gina and Blake approached. He didn’t look happy either, and Gina had enough room inside her heart to feel bad for him. He clearly liked Starla, and yet Starla and Jesse had been kissing in the walk-in. Life and relationships could be so complicated sometimes.
“More than sometimes,” she muttered to herself.
“Thanks, Nash,” Blake said, and they’d clearly had a conversation she’d missed. Nash left, and Blake faced Gina.
“Okay, look,” he said. “Ella called me a few days ago, saying that…she wanted tickets to the chuckwagon dinner.”
“You tell me everything.” Gina whipped the words at him, and Blake reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. Instant regret lashed at her, and she sighed. “I’m sorry, Blake. Please tell me what she said.”
“She’s worried that you came home to help, but you’re not helping,” he said, blurting out the sentence. “She says you never visit your mom and dad. You don’t invite them to anything, and they wanted to come out here for the dinner. I gave them tickets. I invited them to everything. I thought she’d tell you.”
Gina searched his face, which held anxiety and compassion at the same time. “I…” She threw up her hands, spun, and went around the picnic table. She stood on the other side of it, next to the bald cypress, and looked out over the ranch. “I don’t know what to do.”
“She thinks you’d rather be part of my family than yours.” His footsteps came closer, and Gina craved his presence in her life.
“I would,” she whispered, looking at him as he joined her at her side. She put her fingers in his and held on as tightly as she could. “The truth is, Blake, I like being here. I love your siblings. I love this job. I love this ranch.” She looked up at him. She didn’t—couldn’t—sayI love you, but the more time she spent with him, the more she fell in love with him.
“My family is…boring,” she said. “Ella is bossy, and Brody is like a stranger. I do love their kids, but again, it’s like I barely know them.”
“Yeah,” Blake said, and then he let a few seconds pass. “You barely knew me or my siblings when you got here. Yougetto know them.”
Gina sniffled, the things she needed to acknowledge foaming inside her. “My mom is sick,” she whispered. “I don’t know how to be around her anymore. It’s like…all I can see is everything I’ve missed by leaving years ago, and I don’t want to see them.”
Blake put his hand around Gina’s waist and pulled her into his body. “I know, sweetheart.” He didn’t tell her it would be okay. He didn’t say she’d find a way to make things right. He didn’t try to give her advice about what to do.
He simply held her while the sun shone brightly over the Texas Hill Country. While life went on, and the earth continued spinning on its axis, and while her heart throbbed out painful beat after painful beat.
When she started to cry, she turned into his chest, and he hushed her and stroked her hair. He let her cry as long as she wanted, and then he pushed her hair back and asked, “How can I help you?”
“They’re going to the park this afternoon,” she said, wiping her face. Crying made everything in her head hot, and she certainly didn’t need more heat during a Texas July. “They want me to come. I’m going to go.”
“Okay,” he said.
“I guess we’ll be back for the chuckwagon dinner,” she said. “I’m going to sit by them.”
Blake gave her a soft smile. “Okay.”
“Will you come sit by us?”
