Wild Cowboy Ways (5 page)

“Hush. I'll meet you on the roof in thirty minutes.” She marched out the back door, back straight and chin up.

So Allie wasn't married. She wasn't afraid of hard work. She liked chili better than anything in the world, and she had a temper to boot. His kind of woman if she'd been tall, blond, and had clear blue eyes.

“I've never been in this house. Looks like it needs more than a roof job,” Deke said.

Blake removed a block of cheese from the refrigerator along with a jar of hot dill pickles. “Yes, it does. You reckon you and Allie could do some patch jobs in here to get us through until we can start showing a profit on the ranch? It needs new drywall on the ceiling and maybe some paint on the walls. Don't want to spend a lot until we start making money, but that shouldn't make me have to take out a mortgage on the place.”

“If Allie's got time to do some work for you, I reckon I could help her. But come spring, I'll be busy with my own place and the rodeo rounds,” Deke answered.

“We don't need three bowls, Deke. My dog, Shooter, he doesn't like chili.”

Deke chuckled. “Allie will be back. She don't turn down chili for nothing.”

And they called the cowboys who bought the Lucky Penny crazy? Hadn't Deke seen the look on Allie's face when she marched out of the house?

“How long has it been since a real family lived here?” Blake kept an eye on the door and an ear tuned to the sound of boots on the wooden porch.

“Maybe four years. Last bunch didn't last a month. Moved in, came to church one time, and left. Guess they took one look at all that mesquite and cactus and threw up their hands in defeat before they even got started. Before that they came and went so fast the folks in Dry Creek didn't even get a chance to get to know them. Do you really think you can make this work?” Deke asked.

“Hope so,” Blake said. “My brother and cousin and I've sunk a lot of money into the place. I was just wondering if the place had gone empty for seventeen years since the calendar on the wall is that old.”

“Be damned if it ain't. Guess someone liked that picture of a barn on it,” Deke said.

Allie bit into a cold bologna and cheese sandwich and got madder each time she chewed. Chili—damn fine chili—Mary Jo's chili, which was the best in the whole county, was in that house. What was wrong with this picture? She took her phone from her coat pocket and called her sister.

“I hope you are happy. Blake and Deke are eating chili and I'm sitting in a cold truck eating a soggy, cold sandwich, because I'm proving to you and Mama that this is just a job,” she blurted out before Lizzy could even answer.

“You get one star in your eternal crown for such a sacrifice,” Lizzy said sarcastically.

“I deserve two diamond stars because it's my favorite food and Mary Jo made it and it smelled so good.”

“It's not a social call,” Lizzy smarted off. “Eat your sandwich and do the job and forget about the chili. Folks are already gossiping. I'll be glad to report to the next one that comes in the store that you didn't succumb to the devil's wiles because he offered you chili. Got customers. See you later this evening,” Lizzy said.

“Somebody's Knockin'” started playing on the radio and Allie groaned.

She remembered the lyrics so well that said someone was knockin' and she wondered if she should let him in; that she'd heard about the devil but who would have thought he'd be wearing blue jeans and have blue eyes when he came knocking on her door.

Allie squeezed the sandwich so hard that her fingers went through it. She wanted a bowl of that chili so bad she could taste it. And she was meaner than the devil and one bowl of chili did not mean it was a social call. It was food that would provide warmth for her to work on the roof in the bitter cold all afternoon.

Lizzy could fuss at her later that night, but she was going back into that house and eating chili at a table and maybe even a piece of chocolate pie afterward. Besides, Deke loved Mary Jo's chili even more than she did and he'd tease her all afternoon about how good it was if she didn't eat with them.

The house smelled scrumptious when she knocked on the back door and entered without waiting for an invitation. “I changed my mind and I don't want to hear jack shit from you, Deke Sullivan.”

“I ain't sayin' nothing. I was about to walk on back to my ranch if you hadn't come on back in here,” Deke said.

“Why did you change your mind?” Blake asked.

“Because the day she turns down chili, then I figure she's gettin' that stuff that her granny has and I ain't workin' with a woman who's holdin' a nail gun if her mind ain't right. Why are you in a bad mood today anyway?” Deke asked.

Allie scowled at him. “I'm not in a mood. Where are the bowls?”

Blake pointed. “There's a bowl beside the slow cooker. Help yourself.”

She removed her coat and hung it over the back of a chair.

Blake's eyes caught with hers and sparks flew. “Well, whatever the reason, I'm glad you changed your mind. A dinner table is always nicer with a lovely woman sitting at it.”

Deke pushed back his chair and in a couple of long strides he was beside Allie. “You best not skimp on your helping because I'm having seconds. Mary Jo hasn't made chili for me in more than a year.”

Allie filled her bowl to the brim and carried it carefully to the table. She sat down and dipped her spoon deep into the chili, keeping her eyes on the food instead of looking at either Deke or Blake. “Mmm. Mary Jo's chili is the best in the world.”

Deke set his second bowl on the table. “If you hadn't come back I really was going to give you hell about it.”

Blake pushed back his chair and went to refill his bowl. “Sometime I'll make a pot of chili and let y'all be the judge if it's this good. My mama had four old ornery boys and she said that we had to learn our way around the kitchen. So every fourth day one of us had kitchen duty. We hated it but I can make a pretty good pot of chili and I know how to grill a steak. And sharing it with a pretty lady and a friend makes everything better.”

“Allie still hates the kitchen. Only thing she hates worse than cooking is cleaning. She's pretty good at both but that don't mean she enjoys it,” Deke said between bites.

“I'm sitting right here,” Allie said bluntly. “You aren't supposed to talk about me when I'm close enough to smack the shit out of you.” Allie reached for a piece of cheese and then cut it up in cubes on top of her chili. “I'm surprised you didn't buy this place, Deke.”

“I started to. Went to the bank and asked for a loan and then changed my mind. It's not what I really want.”

“And that would be?” Blake asked.

One of Deke's shoulders raised a couple of inches in a shrug. “I want the place my cousin has across the road from mine. He'll get tired of his bitchin' city wife within the year and put it up for sale. Besides, this place ain't nothing but mesquite and cow tongue cactus. Only thing it's got going for it is those three spring-fed ponds so you don't have to carry water to the cattle in the hot summertime.”

“Mesquite can be removed right along with cactus, and the ranch was cheap.” Blake changed the subject. “Got a wife and kids, Deke?”

Deke slapped his forehead. “I forgot the beer. Not that this sweet tea isn't good, but I said I'd contribute the beer to our dinner. Sorry about that.”

“He doesn't have a wife or kids.” Allie answered the question for him.

“And you, Allie? Got a husband or kids?” Blake asked.

“No.” Her answer was tight and left no room for discussion.

Deke went on. “I got a little spread of about three hundred acres and I run some cattle, grow some hay, and do odd jobs with Allie when she needs a tough cowboy. It butts up to your place on the west side. Other than that, I'm a rodeo junkie. I ride a few bulls and broncs and even play at rodeo clown when they need me. No wife. No kids and ain't interested in neither one right now.”

“That's because no sane woman could live with you. He's so set in his ways that you'd think he was eighty-five rather than twenty-five.” Allie pushed back her chair and took her bowl to the cabinet for a refill. Lizzy could scream that she'd sold her soul but the chili was worth every bit of her sister's bitching.

When she returned she reached for a piece of cornbread at the same time Blake did, and a shiver ran from her fingers to her gut. Dammit! She was not giving in to her hormones. She had to keep things in perspective.

“You look like you are getting in that mood again,” Deke said.

“She might be fighting with the voices in her head. My brother gets that look on his face when he is doing that,” Blake said. “Most of the time it involves which woman he's taking home from a bar. You thinkin' about a fellow, Allie?”

“Hell, no! That's the last thing on my mind. Do you ever fight with yourself, Blake?” Allie asked.

One of Blake's shoulders hitched up a few inches. “I do it all the time.”

Deke made circles with his forefinger up next to his ear. “I swear she'll be loony by the time she's thirty. Maybe I should leave the beer in the truck. She can't hold her liquor worth a damn.”

“What are you talkin' about? Just because you are big and mean and tough don't mean I can't drink you under the table,” she protested.

Deke held up a finger and swallowed. “They say that liquor kills brain cells and you've been talking to the voices in your head. I rest my case.”

Allie shook her fist at Deke. “Enough. Eat your dinner and stop being a clown. We've got to get at least half the shingles kicked off today and new felt put down if there's not rotting boards.”

“Y'all get in a bind, holler at me. I can leave what I'm doing and help any way I can,” Blake said.

“We might do just that if it starts to get dark. Days don't last nearly as long in January as they do in July.” Deke polished off the last of his chili. “Is it all right if I get the chocolate pie out and slice it up?”

Blake refilled his glass with sweet tea. “Help yourself to the pie. There's a Mexican casserole in the refrigerator and lots of leftover chili. Y'all might as well join me at noon while you're workin' on the roof. I hate to see good food go to waste.”

Deke said. “Count me in. Is that Sharlene's Mexican casserole?”

Blake nodded.

“Thanks for the offer, but you don't have to feed us every day.” Allie met Blake's steely gaze down the length of the table.

“It's no problem. The food is already here. We just have to heat it up and I sure like to have someone other than Shooter to talk to while I eat.” He smiled and went back to eating.

Deke reached under the table and squeezed her knee. She jumped like she'd been hit with a stun gun and shifted her gaze to him. He was warning her that he could and would go home before the first shingle was removed if she didn't agree to Blake's offer.

“Okay, then,” Allie said. “Thank you. It's very generous of you to invite us.”

An hour later, Deke had unloaded shingles from the trailer onto a couple of pallets, and had repositioned the trailer to catch the old shingles as they threw them off the roof. The sound of the dozer tearing trees up by the roots could be heard in the distance as Deke set up a boom box on the roof and put in a Conway Twitty CD.

“I'm a pretty damn good judge of bulls, broncs, and cowboys,” Deke said, climbing back down the ladder and then toting two shingle remover tools up to the roof.

“So?” Allie scrambled up the ladder right behind him.

“So Blake Dawson is a good man.”

“And?” Allie picked up one of the bright orange tools with a long handle and slid it under the shingles at the peak of the roof.

Deke started on the next row, sending shingles sliding down the roof to land on the trailer.

“He won't be our neighbor long. And besides I did my homework on this one.”

Deke's eyes widened. “You investigated him?”

“Gossip works more than one way. I can find out things pretty easy, especially if it happened only a little more than a hundred miles from here. There are four of the Dawson boys. The older two are married and settled, but the younger ones have quite a reputation,” she said.

“For ranchin'?” Deke asked. “Or with the ladies?”

She expertly popped off a shingle and moved down to the next one. “Both. Rumor has it that they're both crackerjack ranchers and their cousin Jud, who's buying the Lucky Penny with them, is not only good with ranching but he can smell an oil well. How are you going to feel if they strike oil on the Lucky Penny and we've got all those trucks running through Dry Creek night and day?”

“Hell, Allie! That might be the kick start that Dry Creek needs to grow and maybe some of us other ranchers can talk Jud into sniffin' around our land. Now, tell me about the part about him being a wild cowboy.”

Shingles started sliding down the slope of the roof and landing on the empty trailer. “Why? You afraid of the competition?”

“Hell, no! I'm the most eligible bachelor in the whole county. I can share. Come on, Allie. Tell me.”

“They call Blake the wild Dawson and his brother, Toby, the hot cowboy. They say that they can talk women out of their underpants in less than two hours of the time they meet them.”

Deke threw back his head and laughed. “So that is the reason you wouldn't look at him at the dinner table. Don't worry, darlin', you can super-glue your under britches to your butt and you'll be safe.”

Allie moved on down the roofline. “Maybe I want him to sweet-talk me.”

“What did you say?” Deke yelled.

“Nothing,” Allie replied from the other end of the roof.