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He waved and, as she pulled back onto the highway, she wondered if the people of Telarosa weren’t exaggerating Mr. Sawyer’s villainy. He seemed like a very pleasant man to her.
Despite his dry diaper, Elvis screwed up his face and began to fret. She glanced at her watch and saw that she’d been gone well over an hour. “Time to get you back to the old chuckwagon, cowboy.”
The sack containing the box of condoms bumped against her hip, and she remembered her vow not to ignore Bobby Tom’s faults just because she’d fallen in love with him. With a sigh of resignation, she knew she had to take action. Even though he was officially her boss and the man who made her heart race, he needed a reminder that he couldn’t run roughshod over her without accepting the consequences.
“Four clubs.”
“Pass.”
“Pass.”
Nancy Kopek gave her bridge partner a sigh of exasperation. “That was Gerber, Suzy. I was asking you for aces. You shouldn’t have passed.”
Suzy Denton smiled apologetically at her partner. “I’m sorry; I lost my concentration.” Instead of her bridge game, she had been thinking about what had happened in the drugstore several hours earlier. Gracie seemed to be preparing herself to make love with her son and because she liked her very much, she didn’t want to see her hurt. Nancy nodded good-naturedly at the two other women sitting around the table. “Suzy’s distracted because Bobby Tom’s home. She hasn’t been herself all afternoon.”
Toni Samuels leaned forward. “I saw him at the DQ last night, but I didn’t get a chance to mention my niece to him. I know he’ll be crazy about her.”
Toni’s partner, Maureen, frowned and led the six of spades. “My Kathy is a lot more his type than your niece, don’t you think so, Suzy?”
“Let me freshen everybody’s drinks.” Suzy laid down her hand, glad she was the dummy so she could escape for a few minutes. Normally, she enjoyed her Thursday afternoon bridge game, but today she wasn’t up to it.
When she reached the kitchen, she set the glasses on the counter and walked over to the bay window instead of going to the refrigerator. As she stared out at the bird feeder that hung from a magnolia next to the patio, she unconsciously pressed her fingertips to her hip and felt the small flesh-colored patch that supplied her body with the estrogen it could no longer produce on its own. She blinked her eyes against the sudden sting of tears. How could she be old enough for menopause? It seemed as if only a few years had passed since that hot summer day she’d married Hoyt Denton.
An all-encompassing wave of despair settled over her. She missed him so much. He had been her husband, her lover, her best friend. She missed the clean soapy smell of him after he got out of the shower. She missed the solid feel of his arms wrapped around her, the love words he’d whisper when he drew her down on the bed, his laughter, his corny jokes and awful puns. As she gazed out at the empty bird feeder, she folded her arms across her chest and squeezed, trying for a moment to imagine that he was holding her.
He’d just turned fifty the day before his car had been broad-sided by a semi during a terrible storm. After the funeral her desperate grief had combined with a stomach-gnawing anger at him for leaving her alone and putting an end to the marriage that had been the foundation of her life. It had been a horrible time, and she didn’t know how she would have survived it without Bobby Tom.
He had taken her to Paris after the funeral, and they’d spent a month exploring the city, driving through French villages, touring châteaux and cathedrals. They’d laughed together, cried together, and, through her pain, she’d been filled with a humble gratitude that two scared youngsters had managed to produce such a son. She knew she’d begun to rely on him too much lately, but she was afraid if she stopped, he’d slip away from her, too.
She’d been so certain when he was born that he would be the first of several children she would bear, but there hadn’t been any more, and sometimes she ached to have him small again. She wanted to hold him in her lap, to stroke his hair, bandage his bruises, and smell that sweaty, little boy smell. But her son had been a man for a long time now, and those days of dabbing mosquito bites with calamine lotion and healing hurts with kisses were gone forever.
If only Hoyt were still alive.
I miss you so much, my darling. Why did you have to leave me behind?
By six o’clock, shooting had finished for the day. As Bobby Tom walked away from the corral, he was hot, tired, dirty, and irritable. He’d been eating dust all afternoon, and the schedule called for more of the same tomorrow. As far as he was concerned, this Jed Slade character was about the stupidest excuse for a human being he’d ever seen. Bobby Tom didn’t consider himself an expert on horses, but he knew enough about them to be absolutely certain that no self-respecting rancher, whether he was a drunk or not, would try to break a horse while he was half dressed.
Throughout the course of the day, Bobby Tom’s irritation over his artificially oiled and dirt-smeared chest and his unzipped jeans had flared into righteous indignation. They were treating him like a sex object! It was damned demeaning, that’s what it was, being reduced to a set of oily pecs and a tight ass. Shit. A dozen years in the NFL, and this was what it had all come down to. Pecs and ass.
He stormed toward his motor home, the heels of his boots churning up puffs of dust. He intended to take a quick shower, head for home, and lock the door for a while before he went to visit Suzy. He hoped to hell Gracie hadn’t run off because he was looking forward to taking out his bad mood on her. He pulled the door of the motor home open and stepped inside only to come to an abrupt halt as he saw that the interior was filled with women.
“Bobby Tom!”
“Hey, there, Bobby Tom!”
“Hi, cowboy!”
Six of them were scampering around like cockroaches, setting out homemade casseroles, cutting pies, and pulling beer from the refrigerator. One of them was an old acquaintance, three others he remembered having met that day on the set, two of them he didn’t recognize at all. And every bit of the activity was being directed by the seventh woman, an evil witch in a black-and-brown-striped dress that looked like a raccoon tail, who gave him a gloating smile as she stood in the middle of the commotion and handed out orders.
“Shelley, that casserole looks delicious; I’m sure Bobby Tom is going to enjoy every bite. Marsha, I don’t remember ever seeing such a beautiful pie. How thoughtful of you to bake it. You did a wonderful job on the floor, Laurie. I know Bobby Tom appreciates it. He’s very particular about his linoleum, aren’t you, Bobby Tom?”
She gazed at him with the serenity of a madonna, but her clear gray eyes glittered with triumph. She knew damn well that a gaggle of matrimonially inclined females was the last thing he wanted to face right now, but instead of getting rid of them, she had encouraged them to hang around! He finally understood Gracie’s function in his life. She was God’s joke on him.
A woman with big hair and a stretchy top handed him a can of beer. “I’m Mary Louise Finster, Bobby Tom. Ed Randolph’s nephew’s wife is my first cousin. Ed told me I should stop in and say hello.”
He took the beer and smiled automatically, even though his cheeks ached from the effort. “It sure is nice to meet you, Mary Louise. How’s Ed doing these days?”
“Why, just fine, thank you for asking.” She turned to the woman at her side. “And this is my best friend, Marsha Watts. She used to go out with Riley Carter’s brother Phil.”
