Hard Rustler. B.J. Daniels
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remind me.” Luke took a drink of his beer, clearly upset that this was all he was going to get. He sighed. “I haven’t gotten my deer yet. But you know Mom. Said not to be late. She’s invited some of the neighbors.”
Dawson nodded, smiling to himself at the thought of their mother. There was no one quite like Wilhelmina “Willie” Rogers. She’d managed to raise both of her sons on her own after their father died when they were boys—and run the ranch, as well. When it came to anyone who needed a hot meal, Willie was always ready to rustle something up. His mother equated love with food. She spent half her time making casseroles for anyone who’d fallen on hard times or families who’d had an illness. Anyone in town die? The family would have a dish on their doorstep within the hour.
“Mom said we both better be there,” Luke said. “She already read me the riot act about going deer hunting beforehand. Speaking of hunting, how’d you do down in the Breaks? Get anything worth bringing home and stringin’ up?”
Dawson shook his head. “I saw one big buck, but didn’t get a shot.” The truth was, he loved hiking around looking for deer and elk, but when he still had plenty of meat in the freezer, he wasn’t much for killing anything. He wasn’t a trophy hunter.
Two weeks in hunting camp with some buddies, though, was a tradition he wasn’t apt to miss. He liked sleeping out under the stars, working his way through rugged country during the day, eating food cooked over a camp stove and sitting around the fire later, listening to his friends’ outrageous stories before climbing into his bedroll. He always slept like the dead at hunting camp.
Not that he wasn’t glad to get home to a hot shower and his own bed.
“Any idea how much the old Clementine place might go for?” Luke asked.
“Haven’t given it any thought.”
“Still, you have to admit it’s strange that Annabelle wouldn’t let Mary Sue handle it so she didn’t have to come back here,” Luke said. His brother was dating Mary Sue’s younger sister, Sally. “Unless the house wasn’t the only reason she’s back,” he said, clearly baiting him. “Kinda makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”
“What makes me wonder is what your interest in all this is,” Dawson said and looked over at his brother.
“Actually, I find your apparent so-called lack of interest more fascinating. You don’t think I didn’t know how you felt about her? Now she’s back. You aren’t even going to stop by her place and talk to her?” Luke shook his head. “My big brother, as it turns out, is a coward.”
“It’s not going to work,” Dawson said and drained the rest of his beer.
“The brother I knew would have given his left arm for that woman,” Luke said. “He wouldn’t pass up a possible second chance to be with her. You telling me you don’t still feel somethin’?”
Dawson shook his head as he stood. “I’m not tellin’ you anything. I’ll let my walkin’ out of here speak for itself. Thanks for the beer.”
Luke sighed. “Fine, have it your way, you stubborn jackass. But you’re going to be sorry.”
“I’ve been sorry before. Tell Mom I’ll stop by early tomorrow to see if she needs any help.”
“You always have to be the good son, don’t you? I’m going deer huntin’. Save me a place at the table just in case I get something and run late.” The door closed on his last words.
Even as Dawson started his pickup, he knew he was going to do it. And it made him madder than hell. He turned down the street. It wasn’t late, but it was already dark this time of year. Deep shadows hunkered in the trees. The temperature had dropped.
As he drove by her house, he saw that the light was on. There were more boxes stacked up under the porch roof. He turned out his headlights as he stopped across the street again. Several large pines blocked most of the house, but he would get glimpses of her inside working.
There was still no sign of anyone helping her. “What’s going on, Annie?” he asked in the dark cab of his truck. If she didn’t get out of town before the next snowstorm, she probably wouldn’t be able to in that impractical car of hers. He doubted she had snow tires on it since she’d been living in California. Not that they would help much. A car like that would get high-centered on the first snowdrift across the highway. Hell, she’d be lucky if she could get out of her driveway.
Dawson reminded himself that it wasn’t his problem. And yet he couldn’t help thinking about what his brother had said back at the bar. Unfortunately, he’d already been a fool when it came to her. He liked to think he was too smart to do it again as he watched her pass in front of the large picture window. She looked exhausted. How many hours had she been packing up her grandmother’s things by herself?
But even from this distance, he could see the determination in her expression, in the way she moved. There had never been a more stubborn woman, he thought, as he turned on his headlights again and headed for the ranch.
* * *
ANNABELLE HURT ALL OVER. She closed another box on more of her grandmother’s chipped and cracked knickknacks, but realized she was too tired to take it out to the porch. For hours, she’d been boxing up her grandmother’s junk. Now she looked around the room with growing discouragement. She’d thought she was making progress, but she hadn’t even made a dent in all this...stuff.
Earlier she’d removed what she could from the front bedroom. Her grandmother had been using the one in the back of the house opposite the shared bathroom. Apparently, she’d turned the bedroom Annabelle had chosen into an extra wardrobe. An array of ugly, gaudy sweatshirts was hanging in the closet. Each was bedazzled with anything shiny you could tack onto it. Where did the woman find these horrific things? A lot of them were seasonal, with Santas, elves, Christmas lights, overdecorated wreaths, even an Easter egg one that was so bright it could put an eye out.
Not wanting to ruin the last of the good clothes that she hadn’t sold to pay for the trip north, she’d changed into one of the less garish ones, a sweatshirt with a bejeweled clown face, along with a pair of her grandmother’s pull-on jeans that she had to tie around her waist so they’d stay up, a pair of sneakers and socks with lacy tops. They’d do to work in.
After she’d decluttered the bedroom, she cleaned. She’d discovered some laundered sheets and made the bed so it would be ready for tonight. Then she’d gone down to the recycling building in town and loaded as many boxes as she could into her car by putting smaller ones into larger ones and holding some out the window as she drove.
Back at the house, she’d started dumping the worst of the junk into boxes and carrying them out to the porch.
Now she just wanted to sit down. You were so right, Mary Sue. I really could have used some help. But not at thirty dollars an hour. And no one was going to work for her with only the promise of getting paid after the house sold.
She wandered into the kitchen, one of the only rooms that had chairs that weren’t covered with junk. As full as the place was, she couldn’t help but be thankful to her grandmother. Frannie had never had a lot of money, but in the will she’d made sure that the taxes and utilities were paid six months in advance.
Clearly, she’d known what a job it was going to be to clean out this house and sell it.
Brushing an errant lock of hair back from her dirty face, Annabelle wondered if her grandmother had also somehow figured that she was going to need financial help. Six months was generous. Frannie had to have known that Annabelle wouldn’t be staying that long. But it definitely allowed her time to get the house sold.
She glanced around the kitchen, tempted to fill another box with the ceramic knickknacks that crowded the windowsill. Her grandmother had saved everything. Was it an old lady thing? Or had her grandmother lost her mind before the end? She couldn’t understand how the woman had been able to live here with junk piled waist high throughout