One Ticket To Texas

“No. Yes.” Kyle dropped his hat on his knee and ran his fingers through his hair. “Hell, I don’t know. But I wouldn’t want to fall for a gold digger. For the moment I’d just as soon that she not know that you’re wealthy or that I’m wealthy or—”

“Or that you’re a plastic surgeon.”

“Right. Or that Jackson is your grandson and my cousin.”

“Why is that?”

Kyle grinned. “Because I’m going to see if I can stall Jackson and that bunch of his in Dallas for an extra day or two. I don’t want Irish tempted by all those men and all that money until I can get a toehold in her affections.”

“Won’t she suspect something if she sees the oil wells on the property?”

“If she mentions it, I’ll tell her that they belong to Jackson or somebody. She won’t have any way of knowing that the land is yours. Will you play along with me?”

“My lips are sealed. As far as I’m concerned, you’re nothing but a shiftless bum, and I’m one step away from food stamps.”

“You don’t have to go quite that far.”

Cherokee Pete’s eyes twinkled. “I do believe you’ve taken quite a liking to our Irish already for you to go to so much trouble.”

“I’ll admit that she intrigues me.”

Pete cackled. “Intrigues, hell. She’s got your juices pumping. I ain’t so old I can’t remember. Check that roast you put in the oven, then go on down there and get to courtin’.”

Kyle decided to do just that.

He and Irish spent the rest of the afternoon in the store, waiting on the occasional customer and talking about everything from favorite colors to politics. They found that, despite a difference in their backgrounds and the fact that he liked blue to her green, they had a lot in common. In fact, after gazing for a spell into those lovely emerald green eyes of hers, he was beginning to change his mind about blue. Green was enchanting.

At dinnertime, They went upstairs and Kyle checked the roast that he had prepared earlier under Pete’s tutelage. He poked the meat with a fork, then poked the carrots, onions and potatoes. “That looks done to me. Does it look done to you?”

“I’m no expert, but it seems to be.”

“We’ll declare it done. Want a salad?”

“Sure,” she said. “I can make salad.”

They both pitched in to chop the vegetables, and Irish prepared a tray for Pete. While she took the tray to his grandfather, Kyle set the kitchen table for them. He started to put a candle in the middle, then decided that was pushing it a bit. He dug around until he found a cheap jug of burgundy and an expensive bottle of chardonnay. He put the chardonnay in the refrigerator and unscrewed the cap on the burgundy.

Irish returned as he was taking glasses from the cabinet. The Baccarat crystal stems that Kyle had given his grandfather on his last birthday were next to the jelly glasses. Kyle smiled, shook his head and poured a little from the jug to taste.

“Not bad for the price,” Kyle said. “Grandpa Pete isn’t much of a wine connoisseur. Will this do?”

“Sure. I’m not too fussy myself. Truthfully, some of the stuff that’s supposed to be so fine tastes like medicine to me.”

After dinner they cleaned up the kitchen together and got Pete settled down watching a John Wayne movie on cable.

“I guess that I’d better mosey on back to my tepee,” Irish said, smiling. “Thanks for dinner.”

“My pleasure. Want to take a walk first?”

“Sure.”

Outside the evening was still pleasantly warm, even though it was October. The air carried the crisp smell of pine trees and the watermelon scent of fresh cut grass. In the gathering darkness, crickets and tree frogs tuned up. Irish had noticed earlier that everything was still green; even the hardwood trees mixed in with the pines showed no signs of fall. She commented that the weather surprised her. “When does it get cool here? When do the leaves change?”

“Depends on what you call cool. Brief fronts begin pushing through beginning about now. The temperature will drop a few degrees, then warm up again in a day or two. We rarely get a frost before November, sometimes later than that. The leaves start turning about then, too, but because of the weather and because we have so many pines, autumn here is nothing like New England. A few trees are colorful—sweet- gums, tallows, some elms and oaks. Most of the others that lose their leaves stay green until frost, then turn brown and shed in November or December. By March they’re leafing out again.”

Because of darkness outside the range of the tall vapor lights, they didn’t wander far from the trading post and their walk was more amble than exercise.

As they strolled by the shed, Irish said, “I see that you’ve started a new bear.” She stepped inside where the strong odor of fresh sawdust and wood shavings scented the air. She rubbed her thumbs over the roughcut ears of the bear that stood as tall as she. “I felt so terrible about making you ruin the other one that I was relieved when Corrie bought it.”

“Nothing for you to feel terrible about. It was an accident.”

“Is this what you did in California, carve bears?”

“No. I, uh, did a different kind of sculpting.”

“What kind? Clay?”

Kyle gave her a vague answer, and she gathered that he wasn’t comfortable talking about his time on the West Coast. She could understand that; she wasn’t too comfortable talking about the last couple of years she spent in New York.

He ducked and entered the shed to stand beside her. The space suddenly became smaller, the raw wood smell more pungent. One of his thumbs traced a path over the bear’s ear, a path that was parallel to the course her thumb took and only a millimeter away from touching hers.

The space grew smaller still. His scent mingled with the woody aroma and his closeness bombarded her senses until his presence loomed larger than life and seemed to crackle and glow in her awareness.

Jerking her thumb back, she tried to step away from him, but she bumped against the bear’s outstretched paw. Finding herself penned between the bear’s paws and Kyle, she glanced up, her mouth open to deliver a clever quip.

The words vanished from her mind.

He hesitated for a moment, then slowly his head lowered. “May I kiss you?” he asked as his lips came closer and closer. They stopped when they were a hairsbreadth from hers.

Her heart began racing, and his breath against her skin sent tingles of excitement over her. A part of her wanted to shout, “Yes!” Another part wanted to smack him for putting her in such a bind and growl, “No!”

But she was mute. Neither word would form on her lips.

For an eon, they stood there. The air around them hummed with sensual awareness.

Her knees twitched.

Her ears roared.

Don’t do this, a rational part of her brain whispered.

Get lost, her libido replied.

Yes was winning.

She moistened her lips and was about to close the tiny gap when a loud pistol shot cracked the quiet.

Four