Читать книгу Made in Texas! - Crystal Green, Crystal Green - Страница 7

At the first peek of dawn, Donna was up and about because, no matter how long she’d been in Texas, she was still on New York time—an hour ahead of the dear Old West.

After doing a quick check of her email—nothing new or exciting there—she tucked her iPad into the crook of her arm, then went to the kitchen to grab one of the luscious chocolate chip muffins Barbara the cook had already made. After downing that, then a mug of Earl Grey tea, she scooted out the back door before a real breakfast could be served buffet style in the dining room.

A million things to do, Donna thought as she made her way to the nearest renovated cabin. And the first item on her list was to double—no, quadruple—check this particular room’s condition.

It had cute embroidered curtains and valances, rustic Southwestern furniture, faux-Remington sculptures and “hotel amenities,” as Caleb Granger might’ve called the fancy bathroom vanity basket that included everything from soaps and shampoos to more private items, like toothbrushes and even condoms for the younger, hip crowd they were targeting for business. But, at the sight of that last item, a flurry of sensation attacked Donna, and she frowned, turning away from the bathroom sink and its basket.

Putting Caleb Granger and condoms in the same train of thought brought back those tingles she’d been trying to ignore ever since she’d officially met him yesterday.

Yet she left all of that behind as she focused—and focused hard, to tell the truth—on switching a rugged cowboy sculpture on one oak end table with a second horse sculpture on a highboy chest by the door.

Afterward, she stood back to assess the look of the room again.

Not bad. Not bad at all. The Flying B and B would impress anyone, even the college friend she’d invited for the weekend. Theo Blackwood worked at Western Horizons travel magazine, and Donna hoped he would be swayed enough by the ranch to do a layout during their grand opening in a little less than a couple of months.

After brushing some dust off the rough cowboy sculpture, Donna couldn’t find anything else to nitpick. It all really was tip-top. That’s how everything needed to be. That’s how life had always been for her, and someday soon, it would be that way again. All she needed to do was create a smashing success of this B and B, and she would be on her way out of Hoop-De-Do, Texas, and back to the glamour and rush-rush of the big city.

She sat on the bed, the foam mattress and beige duvet as comfortable as sin, then fired up her iPad. The screen saver still featured the swirly, creamy logo she’d commissioned for Roxey magazine, but instead of feeling sorrow at its demise, Donna only wanted to live up to its failed promise.

But first, there were personal matters to attend to. One of her To-Do’s today was an activity she managed every day—tapping the name Savannah Jeffries into an internet search engine. She was hoping that this time of all times she would discover something new that their P.I., Roland Walker, hadn’t found out about the woman who’d torn this family apart.

Yet all that popped up on the screen were the same old results and links Donna always got, so she checked her email for the second time this morning.

But there was no word from their P.I., either, even though Donna contacted him religiously.

She blew out a breath. She didn’t like being ruled by anything—another person, life’s circumstances… even a growing obsession like this one. And just why did Savannah have a hold on her? Maybe it was because Donna had taken such stock in whatever her father, Sam, had taught her throughout life—at least, before he’d fallen from grace in Donna’s and Jenna’s eyes.

Know your opponents, he would say from behind his corporate desk whenever he brought her and Jenna to work. Don’t ever let them surprise you.

But was Savannah the enemy? Or was it her dad, who had betrayed Uncle William and stolen his own brother’s girlfriend that one summer when they’d all been on the Flying B?

She kept remembering something else her dad had taught her and Jenna. Go after what you want at any cost, girls…

His voice faded from Donna, and she tried to believe it didn’t matter. Ever since the news about Savannah had come out, she’d been avoiding Dad. It’d been easy, too, since he was off with Uncle William again, this time in Hill Country, hunting and trying to iron everything out with his twin.

She was still attempting to figure out how she could talk to the stranger that Dad had become. They’d never been ultraclose, but she’d worshipped him as a daughter; she’d at least thought she’d known who he was, and it wasn’t a man who would work his brother over.

Chasing all the alienating numbness away, Donna fully immersed herself in her computer, mostly with news of the publishing world. She liked the isolation of the cabin since it allowed her to get a lot of work done without interruption.

Then she heard something outside the door.

Boot steps on the small porch.

A knock.

Finally, the whisper of the door as it opened to let in a stream of morning sunlight.

“Anyone home?” asked a voice that had become all too familiar to Donna, since she couldn’t seem to forget what it had sounded like yesterday when it had scratched down her skin, infiltrating her every vibrating cell.

Caleb Granger.

She sat up straight on the bed. “I’m in here.”

Dumbest announcement ever, but what else could she do? Pretend she was invisible, just so he would go away?

When he pushed open the door, her heart started to beat with such an all-consuming volume that she could barely hear herself breathing.

Or maybe, just like yesterday, she’d stopped breathing altogether at the sight of Caleb Granger in those boots, Wranglers and T-shirt.

And when he doffed his cowboy hat in her presence to reveal shaggy dark blond hair, then smiled with those lethal dimples, she wasn’t sure she would ever breathe again.

THE MERE SIGHT of the early light flirting with Donna Byrd’s shoulder-length blond hair and her skin, which she somehow kept smooth and creamy out here in the elements, was enough to send Caleb’s pulse into a kicking frenzy.

She was something to behold, sitting on a bed wearing a sleeveless white halter top that was kind to every curve of her body. Her creased dark blue shorts clung to her lush hips, and even her Keds somehow came off as classy. She was certainly a far cry from when he’d seen her that first day, months ago, in suede boots and an expensive outfit that had marked her as anything but a country girl.

She seemed to realize that she was sitting on a bed, and she stood, brushing off her shorts with one hand while the other put one of those computer pad things that everyone in the suburbs had seemed so enthralled with down on the mattress. He noticed a fancy logo on the screen saver and recalled some gossip about a defunct magazine she’d run back in the city.

Drive and gumption. That’s what this woman had, and hard times hadn’t seemed to dampen her ambition at all, based on what she was doing with the B and B.

“Can I do something for you?” she asked.

He wasn’t going to touch that innuendo-rife question with a ten-foot stick. “I saw you headed in here earlier, and I thought I’d say a good morning.”

For the first time in Caleb’s life, a woman was looking at him as if she couldn’t understand why in the world he would’ve gone out of his way for something so unimportant.

Was Hugh right when he’d told Caleb yesterday that Donna Byrd wasn’t winnable? Or was she so far into her own business that she had no idea that Caleb was even interested?

Well, he didn’t know just what to think of either option, but it didn’t stop him from making himself at home and leaning against the door frame.

“I suppose I had another reason for stopping in,” he said, flashing his smile at her again, pulling out the big guns.

She wrinkled her brow, as if he were a creature who’d wandered out from the woods, a previously unidentified species that absolutely perplexed her.

“Your reason being…?” she asked.

“Simple hospitality.”

She laughed. “I’ve gotten plenty of that, Mr. Granger. Everyone on the Flying B has been more than cordial.”

“And I’ll extend that trend by asking you to call me Caleb. There’s no need for ‘misters’ around here.”

“Caleb it is, then.”

Now she was looking at him expectantly. But that—and the compelling depth of her blue eyes—only made him forge on.

He’d never turned down a challenge before, and now wouldn’t be the first time.

“Word has it that you’re putting on some sort of movie night this weekend,” he said.

“Oh. Right. Yes, we’re attaching a screen to the side of the barn and setting up a picnic area in front of it for the staff, just like we’ll be doing for our guests when we open the B and B. Barbara is planning a country menu, so you could call this a dry run for the real thing.”

“A country menu? You mean basic Texas staples, like barbecue baby back ribs and steaks, hot biscuits and corn?”

“That’s exactly what I meant.” She stuffed her hands into her pockets. “We’ve got a special guest coming to the Flying B this weekend, so that’s another reason for the show. He’s a journalist friend of mine, and we’re hoping he’ll write an article for a B and B marketing push.”

All Caleb heard was “friend” and “he.”

“A friend, huh?” he asked carelessly.

“Yes, a…” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Never mind.”

“No, go on, Lady Bird. I’m just curious.”

“First off, my name’s not Lady Bird.”

Caleb smiled. “Okay, Donna Byrd.” He liked the ring of that better, anyway. The way it flowed made her sound exotic, which she was to him; it made her sound as if she was a hothouse breed. But even if she wasn’t so hothouse on the surface, Caleb would bet there was a soft, melting center to her, and he was going to find it.

She didn’t seem amused by the adjustment to the nickname. “You were about to tell me why you were here?”

Yeah, that. “As I said—movie night. There’s a lot of excitement in the air. Everyone’s talking about how the ranch hasn’t seen much in the way of celebration since Tex passed on.”

He hadn’t meant to change tone after saying Tex’s name. Quieter. Reflecting a grief that still lingered.

When Donna removed her hands from her pockets and slightly tilted her head, as if in sympathy, he stood away from the door frame.

He hadn’t come here to be a downer.

“I heard that you were close to Tex,” she said softly. “I barely got to know him, but…”

She pressed her lips together, as if banning herself from saying anything else.

Yet he’d seen that sorrow in her gaze, and as much as she was attempting to cover it now, it wasn’t working.

She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“And yours,” Caleb said.

She paused, then casually walked to the other side of the bed, straightening the thick quiltlike thing on top of it, but her actions didn’t fool him for a moment. She was putting a barrier between them, just as she did with everyone else.

Good try.

“As far as movie night goes,” he said, getting back on the subject, “I was only wondering what your plans were for it.”

Donna stopped her fussing with the bed and watched him again, obviously trying to sort out his true meaning.

Caleb put on the charm once more. “I thought I’d bring some wine and—”

“Are you inviting me to my own function?”

“In a manner of speaking, yes, I am.” He shrugged. “You’ll have to take a break sometime that night.”

Astonishment. Was that what he was seeing on her now?

He’d take it, because that meant he was getting a rise out of her, and if there was nothing about her that was interested in him, she wouldn’t have bothered with any kind of reaction.

“You’ve got some chutzpah,” she finally said.

“What I’ve also got is great taste in wine.”

“Do you really.”

“Sure. Tex and I used to sit on his porch swing and talk about everything while we drank from his spirits collection. He was a wine guy, you know.”

Donna had her arms crossed over her chest now. She seemed to do that around Caleb frequently.

“I saw his cellar,” she said. “It is extensive.”

“He had vintages shipped from all over—Napa Valley, Bordeaux, Chile, the Rioja region of Spain.”

She surveyed him, seemingly taking a second look at the cowboy loitering near the doorway, and hope sprang in Caleb’s chest.

Was she seeing beyond the Stetson and boots?

When she went back to straightening the pillows on the bed, he wasn’t so sure.

“Thanks for the offer for movie night,” she said, “but I’m afraid I won’t have a second to rest.”

Caleb let her excuse go. If she didn’t come around this weekend, he would find another time to be alone with Donna Byrd.

Before he went, he took one last opportunity to be complimentary, glancing around the room. “As I said yesterday, you’ve done a real good job with the ranch so far. You should be proud.”

She actually beamed, and it made him think that all the trouble she’d been dealing to him had been worth it.

“That’s nice of you to say,” she said.

“It’s just the truth.”

She sat on the bed, as if forgetting he was in the room and she had been using the mattress as an obstacle only a short time before.

Beds.

Donna Byrd.

Stop it, Caleb.

She said, “I’ve been going over the cabins again and again, looking for faults. It’s good to hear that we’ve been successful.”

“There’s one place that you left out of your makeover, though. Savannah’s old cabin.”

The name hovered, as if circling them.

But if he was going to get to know Donna Byrd, Savannah was bound to come up sometime or another.

“It’s a cabin that’s just as good as any of the others,” he said.

“No. That antique bed has been stored in there for a while, and… Well, we modernized the kitchen, but moving anything else around in there seems like bad luck or something.”

This was unexpected. Was she superstitious?

Maybe she would believe in fate just as much as he did—that his destiny was tied to hers….

“You know all about that bed,” she said. “Don’t pretend you’re oblivious.”

“Tex told me a thing or two about it.” But not everything, I suppose.

“I know that my great-grandmother first brought that bed to the ranch. This sounds like such a cliché, but she was supposed to have the gift of second sight, and she would dream of the future when she slept on that feather mattress.” She hesitated, then said, “I know other people who’ve had… experiences… in the bed, too.”

“You?”

It was dangerous to ask such a forthcoming question about beds. About Donna Byrd.

But she didn’t shoot him one of those what-are-you-all-about? looks this time. She only laughed a little.

“No, I haven’t been on the bed. But I do wonder if Savannah ever had dreams there since she stayed in that cabin.”

“You think you’ll have the chance to ask her?”

Now he knew he’d gone too far, because she stiffened.

Was she thinking that Byrd business was Byrd business, and he had no part of it?

Before he could decide, she gave him a curious look. “You haven’t been around the ranch in a while, right?”

Aha, she’d noticed. The news did him good. “Right.”

“There’s a lot that’s been happening with Savannah Jeffries. Nobody caught you up on all of it?”

“I’m afraid not.”

Donna sighed. “Tammy found a grocery receipt while she was snooping around Savannah’s cabin. You remember that day.”

The day Tammy had injured herself in the cabin and he’d first seen Donna. He’d never forget.

“A receipt?” he asked.

“It was from the time Savannah spent on the ranch, and there was a pregnancy test on it.”

Caleb froze. “Are you saying there might be another Byrd running around out there?”

“There could be.”

He was getting better and better at recognizing Donna’s body language. She was already shutting him out with her cool voice. But damned if he’d let her do that. He had an investment in this family, too, an interest in seeing that Tex’s love for this land and his family was never tarnished.

But Caleb would have plenty of time for trying to make Donna come around, and he moseyed toward the door. “You’ll want to be deciding on your favorite vintage, Donna Byrd. I’ll have it ready when you are.”

He received one of her miffed expressions in return, putting them back to where they’d been when he’d first entered the cabin. And just before it seemed that she was about to follow it up with a tart remark, the sound of a cell phone—a businesslike digital ring—interrupted them.

She stood, reaching into her pocket to answer as Caleb smiled at her in parting.

As he exited, he glanced back, just one more time, and when he found that Donna Byrd was watching him while answering her phone, he went on his way, his smile growing even wider.

HOURS LATER, DONNA was in her room in the main wing of the big house, sitting in the bay window and rubbing her temples to chase away a headache as she waited to go downstairs to share the news from the call she’d received earlier.

She was still reeling from what their investigator, Roland Walker, had told her, and, surprisingly, the only thing that was keeping her from stressing out entirely was the thought of Caleb and his promises of wine.

How strange was it that Caleb seemed to be her only bright spot during the day? She wouldn’t have predicted that in a thousand years because he was a distraction. A man with a killer smile who only messed up her head and took her offtrack.

But every time he would cross her thoughts—and he seemed to be doing that quite a bit—she would find herself fighting a smile.

Her—the remote Byrd. The prickly one who had never found the kind of love Tammy and Doc or Jenna and J.D. had, and the one who probably never would, based on her record of dating, then deciding her time was better spent on whatever project she had on the front burner.

Speaking of which…

Her alarm clock read 5:00 p.m., and she inhaled, standing, then leaving her bedroom. When she got to the living room, everyone was waiting: Jenna, who sat in the new rocking chair by the fireplace; Tammy, who perched on a leather sofa in between her brothers, Aidan and Nathan, both dwarfing her with their size.

“What’s so all-fire important that you pulled me out of my cabin?” Nathan, the younger brother, asked lightly. He and Aidan hadn’t just been staying in their own cabins on the property, they had been making improvements bit by bit, practicing their home contracting business skills on the Flying B’s structures.

Donna tried to smile at Nathan’s high spirits. At least her cousin’s jocular sense of humor was intact… for now.

Aidan, the serious one, merely waited for Donna to start.

“I got some good news today from Roland Walker.” Donna had learned from Dad that you always started out positive if you were about to lower the boom on someone. “But it’s also news you’ll want to brace yourselves for.”

Jenna sat forward in the rocking chair. “Roland found out that Savannah did have a child?”

Donna nodded, letting them all take that in.

On the sofa, Tammy bit her lip, suppressing a smile. She’d been the most curious out of all of them when it came to Savannah. Jenna just sat back in her chair, thoughtful, but Aidan was running a hand through his black hair, cursing under his breath, exchanging a look with an equally darkened Nathan.

“It’s a boy,” Donna said, still not knowing exactly how she felt about all of this, herself, now that matters had gone so far. “His name is James Bowie Jeffries.”

Aidan let loose with that curse, following up with, “Are you kidding me? That woman had the gall to name him—”

“In the same way our dads were named?” Nathan interrupted, his mood definitely blacker.

“William Travis Byrd,” Aidan said. “Sam Houston Byrd. Now James Bowie Jeffries. All named after Texas heroes.”

“Except James Bowie isn’t a Byrd,” Nathan said, all traces of humor gone now.

Tammy said, “I have to admire Savannah.”

“For what?” both brothers asked.

“For owning what she did.” Tammy’s black hair swung over her shoulders as she looked at one brother, then the other. “I wonder if she told James who the father was or if she raised him to be a Byrd.”

“What is a Byrd?” Aidan asked. “None of us even knew that until we met Tex, and based on what we gleaned from the little our dads have told us, Tex didn’t want any part of Savannah. So how would she know the definition?”

Nathan folded his bulky arms over an equally wide chest. “Tex threw her off this ranch after he found Sam and her together then everyone went their separate ways.”

The last thing Donna wanted was for this to disintegrate into a Sam versus William match. All of them were getting along way too well for that to happen.

“The bottom line is,” she said, “we’re going to have to make a decision. It doesn’t have to be tonight, but Roland said he can track James down if we want to meet him.”

The boys chuffed.

Jenna rose from the rocking chair. “He’s our brother… or cousin. Any way you put it, James is one of us.”

Aidan stopped laughing. “That’s another thing. I’d like to know just why it is he needs to be tracked down. Roland found Savannah already. Why isn’t James easier to find?”

Donna automatically walked toward her sister, whom she had supported during the family’s first vote, when they had debated whether to hire a P.I. to investigate Savannah in the first place. She’d had mixed feelings about locating Savannah then, too, but she had wanted to turn over a new leaf and support Jenna and her desire to find Savannah more than anything else.

“Roland told me,” Donna said, “that James and Savannah are estranged.”

“Seems like she has somewhat of a pattern,” Aidan muttered.

Tammy elbowed him in the ribs and he gritted his jaw.

“Why’re they estranged?” she asked.

Donna shook her head. “Roland doesn’t have that information right now, but we could ask him to find out.”

Now Nathan was on his feet. “This is how I see it—we’ve already had any curiosity about Savannah appeased.” He shot a look to Tammy, making sure everyone knew that she had been working overtime to assuage his feelings about that family decision. “But do we really want to take this further?”

Aidan stood, too, and although Nathan was a big man, his older brother was even larger. “Right now, we don’t know who fathered James. I’m fine with keeping it that way.”

“Why?” Tammy asked from her seat on the sofa.

“Because knowing the answer is going to put a real wedge between all of us,” Aidan said. “Can you imagine trying to work together on the Flying B after we know the truth? Tex didn’t bequeath his properties to us in order to tear us apart—he wanted us to stay together.”

Nathan raised a finger. “We haven’t even talked about what kind of canyon this is going to put between our dads. They’re off traipsing around the wilderness right now on some male twin bonding ritual that I hope will finally do the trick and bring them together again, and here we are, debating about ruining that. They both have egos, and…”

Donna had gone pricklier than ever. “You mean my dad has the ego, don’t you?”

Jenna came closer to her as the boys, and even Tammy, got an I’m-not-saying-another-word-about-that look on their faces.

Donna sighed. “It’s true that our dads have mended a lot of old wounds lately. But part of me wonders if putting this information in a proverbial closet will do more damage than ever.”

Then again, no one was talking about how James might feel about a decision that was really his.

“I agree about ignoring the truth,” Tammy said. “We should just lay everything to rest now. It could be that the revelation of whose son James really is will heal us altogether since not knowing would eat away at us and make things much worse.”

Silence bit the room until Jenna took a breath, then spoke.

“We should get in touch with our dads to see what they think.”

When Donna glanced at Jenna, she knew that her sister would take it upon herself to contact their father since she had already reconciled with him. Donna sent her a smile of thanks, even while she ached to talk to him, too.

But how, after everything he’d done to let her down?

Tammy fetched a phone from a holster on her jeans. “I’m calling Dad now. I talked to him last night, so I’ll bet they’re within service range.”

“We really want to ruin their idyllic nature walk?” Nathan asked.

Tammy moved her thumb over her smart phone screen. “I don’t see that there’s a choice. They can hash this out together in the boonies.”

“My vote’s still a big no about having our P.I. find the kid,” Aidan said.

Nathan chuffed. “That ‘kid’ is just a little bit older than Donna.”

This seemed to bug him, too, since it was obvious that his uncle Sam had gone straight into the arms of another woman—Donna and Jenna’s mom—after his affair with Savannah. Honestly, Donna didn’t like the thought of this, either, because it made it seem as if love was cheap to Dad. She’d never known that about him. Never even expected that he could be so loose with his affections, and it made her feel protective for Mom, even if she’d been gone a long time.

“All the same,” Nathan added, “I vote no on this situation, too.”

“It’s a yes for me,” Jenna said, “and I’m guessing Tammy, as well.”

As Tammy nodded, she glanced at Donna, and no one had to tell her that she just might be the tiebreaker, depending on what their dads said.

Jenna jerked her chin toward the room’s exit, and it was apparent that she wanted a private word with Donna.

As they left the room, Jenna addressed Tammy. “Can you give us a few minutes before you call Uncle William? I’d like to reach Dad at the same time, if possible.”

“Sure.”

And, while they exited, Tammy launched into every argument she could probably think of to sway her brothers.

After a little walking down the hall, Jenna pulled Donna into the dining room, the dark wood and stag horns above the long table looking more imposing than usual.

Jenna shut the double doors behind her. “You don’t seem convinced, Donna.”

Was it that obvious? “I’m sorry. But the ramifications of this decision could be…”

“A real challenge? We’re up to it.”

For the first time in Donna’s life, she actually felt as if she was close enough to her sister so that she could confide in her. The realization tightened her throat, and she had a hard time getting the words out.

“It’s just that we were about to mend all of our own fences because of our dads, and then Tammy found that clue about Savannah’s baby. We were doing so well for a while.”

“You’re still mad at Dad for being with Savannah, aren’t you? He didn’t try to fall in love with her, Donna.”

“He didn’t try to stop having sex with his brother’s girlfriend, either.” Harsh. But this wasn’t the man Donna had grown up idolizing.

She calmed down. “I just remember how he used to tell us to go after everything we wanted, Jen. It looks like he really practiced what he preached, and the fallout isn’t pretty.”

Jenna laid a hand on Donna’s arm. She was getting used to the contact. Donna’s friends didn’t even show this kind of sympathy, but since coming to the Flying B, Donna had begun to wonder if she’d actually had friends or just people she went out with after work at night to blow off steam.

“After I finally talked to Dad about this,” Jenna said, “I found out that he was inconsolable when Savannah left the ranch and disappeared afterward. He got hurt in this, too, and I only came to understand that after I fell in love myself.”

Was she saying that Donna didn’t have a chance in hell of understanding since she had no one?

An image of dimples flashed into her mind. Pale blue eyes sparkling with humor and lightness.

Caleb.

She shook him off. “Yeah, Dad was so inconsolable that he married Mom on the rebound. No wonder they split up.”

“Donna, you really should talk to him. We can call, right now.”

Her stomach turned with nerves. “No. I don’t want to say to him what I have to say over the phone.”

“Then when will you do it?”

“Soon.” She walked to the doors, paused. “Thanks for taking care of this, though. It means a lot.”

Jenna merely nodded as Donna opened the doors, closing them behind her, yet hardly shutting out her sister’s voice as she said, “Hey, Dad, it’s Jenna.”

As Donna walked away, her footsteps echoed off the walls, the sound mocking the dull thud of every isolated heartbeat.