Meant to Be Mine (A Porter Family Novel Book #2) (15 page)

“What can I do to help you?”

“You can get yourself single. You’re really still dating Dr. Amateur?”

“Dr.
Amsteeter
and I are still dating, yes.”

“He hasn’t bored you silly yet with all that talk about himself?” He’d bored Ty silly with it the two times he’d met the guy.

“Not yet.”

“How long have you been together?”

“About a year.”

“Huh.” Ty scratched his jaw. “You usually stay with your boyfriends between fourteen and eighteen months. The doctor’s running out of time.”

“Is that so?”

“I’ve been patient for years, but as soon as you break up with Amateur, I’m going to put a ring on your finger.”

She regarded him with such open feminine speculation that he forgot about the pain in his leg.

“Are you divorced yet, Ty?”

“I can be tomorrow if you’d give me a reason.”

She held his gaze for the length of a few heartbeats, then broke the moment with an airy laugh. “Go ahead and stay married. Vance and I are happy together.”

The pain in his leg returned. “You’ll continue to be happy for two to six more months. Then it’ll tank.”

“I think he might be the one.”

“
I’m
the one. As you well know.” He tugged at his T-shirt, then spread his hands. “Me.”

“I’m glad to see you’re feeling like your usual self. I’ll be praying for you, and I’ll call your mom tomorrow to see how you’re doing.”

“Stay.”

“I can’t. Vance is baking me peach cobbler for dessert.”

“What man does that? Is he even straight?”

She waved and walked out of sight in the direction of the front door.

“Thanks for coming,” he called.

“You’re welcome,” she called back.

Tawny Bettenfield had been raised on fried okra and good manners. Her dentist father and stay-at-home mother had sheltered her and done all the things small-town southern parents
should
do with their daughters: take them to church, teach them to ride, encourage them to be cheerleaders, and pay for sequin dresses so they could compete for Miss Teen Texas.

Ty had met Tawny in the first grade. Back then she’d had two perfect brown pigtails and worn ironed dresses. She’d been sweet and easy to get along with. When he’d gotten out of the service and they’d started dating, she’d still been sweet and easy to get along with.

She loved Holley as much as he did and wanted to live here all her life.

She was a lady.

She was a Texan, for pity’s sake.

Ty had known since their very first date that the two of them were destined for each other.

He swiveled his chair to face his computer and went back to the videos of his final ride. He watched them long after his mom’s attempt to get him to go to bed. Watched them past midnight, then one o’clock.

When at last he shut down his computer, he was no closer to understanding what had caused his fall. He used his arms to push himself to standing, hissing at the pain.
Blasted knee
. He set his crutches under his arms and made his way slowly down the hallway and through his master bedroom. Crutches, foot, crutches, foot, agony knifing up his leg into his hip and ribs.

By the time he reached his bathroom, his hands were shaking.
He fumbled through the medicine bottles the hospital had given him as a party favor. Anti-inflammatories. Antibiotics. Cursing, he grabbed a bottle off the counter and squinted at it through the headache pounding the front of his skull.

Vicodin.
Don’t mind if I do
.

He couldn’t remember and didn’t care how long it had been since his last dose. He cared even less about how many pills that pansy doctor in Idaho wanted him to take each time. He drank water from the sink’s spout and swallowed two.

If he’d had the strength for a shower, he’d have showered. Turned out it was all he could manage to get himself from the light of his bathroom to the dark of his bed. His knee screamed at him as he lifted it onto the mattress. Once he’d gotten it settled, he peeled off his shirt and rested against a stack of pillows with a groan.

His house echoed with emptiness. His future had turned gray, his purpose grayer.

Where was Celia? That he knew the answer didn’t stop the question from coming. Since he’d wrecked his knee, the fact that she and Addie lived in Oregon irritated him constantly. Which must be why he thought about Celia so much. Every time he woke: her. When out of it with drugs: her. When tired. When surrounded by his family. When the pain was worst.

Her. Her. Her.

Tawny had been here a few hours ago, yet as soon as he’d stretched out here on his bed, who had he thought of?

He wanted Celia and Addie to move to Holley more than he wanted pain meds or sleep or even health. It wasn’t logical.

He bent an elbow over his eyes. A while back, Celia had lectured him about trying to buy them stuff. He’d heard her. But in his experience, money got things done. He’d never been a patient man. It wasn’t in him to sit around politely, doing nothing except hoping that Addie and Celia would move to Holley.

He needed to get them to Texas.

He knew exactly what gift he’d purchase Addie for her birthday.

And tomorrow, he’d buy Celia a house.

We’ve got to stop meeting like this
, Celia thought, staring at her online bank account.
This weekly
date of
ours depresses me to no end
.

Planting an elbow on the kitchen table, she dropped the side of her head into her hand. She still needed to pay the electric bill, and Addie would need school supplies—

Her cell phone rang, the sudden sound startling her. She flipped the phone face up, confirming two suspicions. It was after ten thirty at night. It was Ty calling.

Since his injury three days prior, he’d called her often. He’d gotten grumpier and become even more blunt. All of which she could deal with far better if this weak, melty feeling would quit coming over her whenever she thought of him. A cowboy had been stampeded by a bull, called her eyes crazy pretty, and—
boom
—she’d gone to mush. Disgusting! She brought her phone to her ear. “Hello?” A purposefully businesslike tone.

“I want you to move to Holley.”

“May I ask who’s calling?”

“I’ve been real patient about this whole thing, but now I mean business. I want you to move here.”

“Seriously? Huh. You don’t say.”

“Do you have five hours? I’m about to go over all the reasons,
again
, why you and Addie should move here.”

“Thanks, but I don’t really want to hear them.”

“Well, I’m going to tell them to you anyway—”

“I’m considering it, Ty.” She said the words calmly. They held enough power, however, to stretch silence across the line. She could sense the weight of his surprise. “I’m considering moving to Holley.”

“I’ll have a truck at your door tomorrow.”

“I only said I was considering it!”

“Well, consider this. If you don’t move here, the house I just bought you will have to sit empty.”

Her spine snapped straight, and she frowned at the reflection of herself visible in the sliding glass door. A puff of curly hair on a slim frame. “You bought us a house?”

“I thought about just emailing you a copy of the deed, but I didn’t want to be pushy.”

“In your case, the not-pushy ship sailed long ago.”

“School’s starting in three weeks, sweet one. I wanted to have a house ready in case ya’ll decide to come to Holley.”

“You bought us a house.
Seriously
?”

“You can hang your hat on it.”

She assumed that was Texan for
yes.
“When you’ve mentioned buying us a house in the past, I’ve advised you against it, Ty.”

“It made me happy to buy it, Celia.”

“I think you’re using the gifts as a shortcut to get what you want.”

“Is it working?”

“Absolutely not.” She chewed the edge of her lip, curiosity overcoming her desire to remain impervious. “What does the house look like?”

“It looks like a cross between a shoebox and a dollhouse. I don’t like it a bit, so I figured you’d love it.”

She smiled and tapped her pencil on the tabletop. Her gaze ran down the computer’s list of her withdrawals. “Here’s my concern.”

“Yes?”

“Let’s just say that we relocate all the way across the country. Maybe Addie and I take a liking to our new house. Maybe it’s even possible that you can find me a job—”

“Oh, I can find you a job. I’m like a king down here.”

She snorted.

“I’m still waiting,” he said, “to hear the concern part.”

“I’m concerned that you can’t afford to be so generous anymore. It looks to me like your career is kaput.”

She could hear him shifting, as if readjusting his position in bed. “I’m embarrassed to have to tell you this, Celia. I really am. I was hoping to keep it a secret, because my image as a dumb hick cowboy is important to me.”

“I’m pretty sure nothing will ever threaten your image as a dumb hick cowboy.”

“I’ve had . . . a little bit of luck with the stock market.”

Celia knitted her forehead.

“The BRPC paid me well, but let’s just say the stock market has paid better. Way back in the early days, I invested what I made off riding, and then that made money and then that made money and so on.”

“Do you have a financial planner, or do you invest the money yourself?”

“Myself. But if you tell anyone in Holley about this, I’ll be mad. I’ll have to . . . I don’t know, pay you back by taking Addie to a PG movie.”

“You’re a stock market investment guru?”

“I can easily afford a car that’s the size of a Coke can and an itty-bitty house.”

“Will you email me some pictures of the house?”

“Yes. Will you move to Holley? Soon? I want to see you so I can argue with you in person.”

“Will you email me the pictures tonight? Like, in the next ten minutes?”

“Man, you’re bossy. I have a blown-out knee, you know.”

“Don’t pretend you don’t have some sort of computerized device right beside you in bed.”

“I know something else I’d rather have right beside me in bed.” His voice had a smooth-rough timbre. Like hot, nutty caramel.

Desire coiled in Celia’s stomach. She’d have chided him for the comment, except that chiding only encouraged him. “Just email me the pictures, showboat. Your sweet-talking has no effect on me.”

“You sure? My sweet-talking is known to work pretty well on most females. No effect on you whatsoever?”

“None,” she lied.

“What if I were to tell you how much I like your—”

“Nope. No effect whatsoever.”

Once they’d disconnected, she pulled up her email. She hit the
button to retrieve mail over and over until at last an email from Ty arrived. Celia downloaded the images of the house.

Oh
. She stared, rapt, at a small Victorian. It had been painted French blue, with paler blue trim and lots of old and intricate white gingerbread accents. Instead of rectangular roof shingles, it had small shingles that formed half circles at the bottom. The porch’s snowy white fence and posts wrapped around the front and one side of the house.

It looked like the kind of backyard playhouse a millionaire’s little girl might have dreamed of. Only bigger.

The next image showed a close-up of the entry. The front door had been crafted from beautiful old mahogany and inset with four square panes of beveled glass.

The final photo pictured what must be the living room—a cheery space full of windows. Sunlight cascaded in, illuminating a fireplace and mouth-watering wooden floors.

Swiftly and uninvited, a deep love for the place clutched at Celia’s heart.

Ty—the terrible scoundrel, the bum-legged charmer—didn’t play fair.

Over the next few days, Celia and Addie shared some serious conversations about the realities of moving. Celia pointed out the differences in climate. The loss of Uncle Danny, Addie’s friends, her favorite parks, their apartment, the pool.

Addie assured Celia that except for Uncle Danny, she’d give the rest up. For them both, Danny was the deal breaker. He’d moved to Oregon specifically for them, to be their family. How could they abandon him? Whenever Celia thought about doing so, her stomach twisted. She relied on him, but he also relied on her.