The Girl with the Golden Spurs. Ann Major
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“go,” again.
Walker was all male, tougher than any cowhand she knew. He was! Hadn’t her daddy told everybody that over and over again? Walker wasn’t… He couldn’t be…gay. Not her brother.
But despite her fierce determination to cling to what she wanted to believe about him, her life with him was flashing before her eyes like images on cards. Only now every image had a new meaning as she viewed it with fresh insight.
Walker was as formidably large and male as his brother Hawk and as tough as any man. He could stay on a bucking bronc longer than any of them—but he was so kind and gentle and thoughtful. He never bulldozed over people the way Daddy or Hawk or even Cole sometimes did. He loved art and the theater.
Walker couldn’t be gay. Women threw themselves at him.
They asked him out on dates.
But he never asked them.
The big glass doors downstairs opened and crashed closed. Even before she heard Walker’s heavy boots on the carpeted stairs, she jumped up, took the tape out of the player, rushed to the second bedroom and hid it in a drawer.
As her brother strode up the stairs, she ran into her own bedroom and took the phone off the hook, so it couldn’t ring again. If he knew Mother was calling, he’d call her.
By the time Walker walked inside carrying Vanilla, Lizzy was back on the couch with her hands folded primly in her lap.
Vanilla clapped when she saw Lizzy.
Lizzy wished she’d had time to turn the lamp on. She wished she’d grabbed a book or something. It probably looked odd, her just sitting there in the dark.
She steeled herself to look at Walker and felt instantly guiltily disturbed when she did. Instead of his kind, handsome, dark face, she saw those seven tattoos and the joined forbidden parts of those two male bodies.
She took a deep breath.
“You seem in an odd mood,” he said.
“I—I’m fine. H-how come you and Daddy… How come you left Texas?”
“Well, I never was Daddy’s favorite. Maybe I got tired of always having to prove myself.”
“What did you and Daddy fall out over?”
“We had a different vision for the museum.”
“That artist painting the murals was a friend of yours in college, wasn’t he? You brought him home to the ranch once? Were his paintings too abstract or something?”
“Something like that,” Walker agreed vaguely.
Their father had very strong opinions about modern art. If a painting wasn’t like a photograph, he thought it was hogwash.
“You hungry?” Walker asked, changing the subject abruptly, but still in that gentle, comforting tone, as he carried Vanilla to her.
“Starved,” she managed to say as she took Vanilla, who clapped and smiled some more.
Walker made Vanilla a bottle while Lizzy settled Vanilla in her high chair with a cardboard book. She got plates and silverware out, then brother and sister sat down together at the scarred table she and Amanda had bought at a fair in the Village. Vanilla placed the book aside and guzzled her bottle noisily.
Walker spooned steaming rice and vegetables onto their plates. With her chopsticks, Lizzy toyed with her food. Everything was exactly the same between them as it had been before she’d watched the video, and yet nothing was the same.
“I never did find the knack of eating with those silly sticks, either,” Walker said.
Lizzy dropped them with a clatter and picked up her fork. Then she took a deep breath to ward off the panic that threatened to overwhelm her.
He watched her when she set her fork down a few minutes later.
Vanilla pounded her high-chair tray with her bottle, and Lizzy forced a smile.
“You want me to go out and get something else?” Walker said.
“No… No. The food is great…really. I guess I’m not as hungry as I thought I was.”
Her stomach churned. No way could she swallow a bite.
“Well, I reckon I’ll be leaving in the morning,” he said. “Early—before you get up.”
“Are you going home?”
“No. I’ll call from time to time to see how you’re doing. I’ll give you my new address when I have one.”
It occurred to her he was going through some crisis as bad or maybe even worse than hers. But her own pain and inhibitions wouldn’t let her reach out to him.
Maybe that was for the best. She hoped so. Maybe it was better for them both if he kept his secrets and she kept hers. That way, their lives looked perfect…on the surface.
“I’m glad you came,” she said, studying him until he looked up and did the same.
He nodded.
She lifted her fork again and then set it down. “Come back anytime.”
“New York’s a great city. Tell Bryce…”
She bit her lips. Then her hand knocked the fork off the table.
“Hey,” he said. “It’s okay.”
“I know. Everything’s fine. Just fine. Perfect.”
“Sure.”
“He’s just working late.”
“Sure. You oughtta take him home to meet the folks some time.”
She drew a deep, shaky breath and looked away. “I—I will. First thing.”
They spoke in generalities until Vanilla started banging her empty bottle on the high chair again and then threw it down on the floor.
Lizzy used that as her excuse to get up. Scooping Vanilla out of the high chair, she gathered her plate and glass and began to wash the dishes. Later, after Vanilla was asleep in her crib, Walker and she finished decorating the table by the door for Halloween. Not that they said much until she came out of the bathroom in her bathrobe and was on her way back to her bedroom to go to bed.
“Your turn to shower,” she said a little too brightly before she headed to bed.
He got up off the couch and went to her and pulled her close. “I guess I’d better say goodbye now.”
“I’m glad you came.”
“I love you, Lizzy. I wish you the best. You take care of yourself. And thank Bryce when he comes home.”
She wrapped her arms around Walker and held his solid, muscular body tightly. “You’re the most wonderful little brother a girl ever had.”
“Little?” He smiled down at her, and when she met his gaze, for an instant she felt incredible pain in his dark eyes.
“I love you,” she said simply, not knowing what else to say.
“I know,” he said, letting her go, but he looked trapped.
“Wherever you go, don’t you do anything wild and crazy.”
“The same goes for you.”
Houston, Texas
Joanne
It’s my fault, Joanne thought coolly as she let out the water and got out of the tub. She reached for a thick towel and wrapped herself in it.
Why had she gone to the board with her demands? Why hadn’t she simply told Caesar privately she couldn’t face the museum opening with him parading around Texas with Cherry on his arm?
He’d