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“No, thanks. I’ve had enough this morning.” With too little to do and too much time on his hands, Chase rose from his chair and wandered restlessly to the window. “It’s going to be another hot one today.”
“Not as hot as it would be in Texas. Why don’t I cut up that leftover chicken and make a cold salad for lunch? Does that sound good to you?”
Chase turned from the window, arching an eyebrow in her direction. “You aren’t already thinking about lunch, are you? It wasn’t that long ago that we finished breakfast.”
“Do I detect a testy note?” she countered lightly. “It wouldn’t surprise me if you came down with a touch of cabin fever considering how long you have been cooped up here. If that vehicle is gone, why don’t you take a walk?”
The breeze carried the faint rumble of an engine turning over. “Sounds like it’s leaving now. And as for the walk, as much as I would like to get out and move around, I better not. O’Rourke hasn’t been around in a while, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t hunkered down somewhere watching the place.”
“He’s always snooping around, isn’t he,” Hattie said with disapproval and set a container of leftover chicken on the countertop.
“He doesn’t have anything else to do. Even if he did, he’s too much like his father to get too friendly with hard work.”
“You remember a lot more, don’t you?” Hattie remarked as she set about deboning and cutting up the chicken.
“Maybe, but I still can’t remember why I needed to see the banker in person. There was a reason, and it had to do with Markham and something about cattle.” Chase frowned, straining to recall the exact details. “I was puzzled about something.”
“It will come to you,” she said confidently.
“There is another name whirling around in my brain, too. Pauley or Monte, something like that.”
She gave him a startled look. “You aren’t thinking about Carlo Ponti, the Italian movie director—Sophia Loren’s husband.”
Chase drew his head back in surprise. “I don’t think so.”
“You’re beginning to worry me, Duke.” Hattie glanced at him with narrowed eyes. “It’s one thing to stand around and daydream about Sophia Loren. And quite another to be thinking about her husband.”
Chase laughed in genuine amusement and slipped up behind her, sliding his arms around her waist. “If I was thinking about him, it was probably with envy,” he murmured near her ear and bent his head to nibble at her neck.
“Stop that,” Hattie said in false protest while a pleased smile curved her lips. “If that isn’t just like a man. Here I am, trying to fix something for lunch and you start feeling frisky.”
“Is that bad?” he teased.
Turning in his arms, she looped her hands around his neck, still holding the knife. “Now, I never said th
at,” she said, tilting back her head to invite his kiss.
Cat stood in the barn’s lengthening shadow and anxiously scanned the broken country to the south and east. With the lowering of the sun, the afternoon breeze had died, leaving a sultry quality in the air that added to the tension she felt.
“What are you looking at, Mom?” Joining her, Quint glanced in the direction she was looking.
“I thought I might catch a glimpse of your uncle Culley,” she admitted, careful not to voice the uneasiness she felt at his continued absence. “Have you finished haying the horses?”
“All done,” he announced. “Dad will be surprised when he gets home and finds out we already did the evening chores for him, won’t he?”
“He certainly will.” Cat managed a smile and stole another look at the empty land. She knew Culley wasn’t anywhere out there; it was a feeling she had. “Let’s go to the house and get out of this heat,” she said to Quint.
Side by side, they set off for the house. “Dad said the hay should be ready to bale this weekend,” Quint announced in a businesslike tone. “It looks like we’ll have a good crop this year.”
Cat was too used to his adultlike ways to take much notice of it. “Let’s hope it will be enough to carry us through the winter and we won’t have to buy more.” As they drew close to the house, Cat automatically looked toward the stand of trees beyond it.
“He’s not there, Mom,” Quint said.
With a guilty start, she jerked her gaze away from it then smiled ruefully at her son. “You see too much.”
“Why don’t you call Dad and have him swing by Shamrock on his way home?” he suggested. “Uncle Culley might be there.”
“That’s a good idea. I’ll do it. And you can go take a shower. You are covered with hay chaff.” She brushed at the bits clinging to the sleeve of his T-shirt.
