The Texan’s Bride(12)

“Get a grip, Jessie,” she said to herself as she reached for a long strand of pearls her father had bought her in New York. Slipping into high heels, she hurried downstairs to wait.



CADDE WAS RUNNING LATE, but he couldn’t help it. He’d had a call from one of his engineers and they talked about the Louisiana leases.

He rushed through the back door and found Jessie pacing in the living room, her dog trailing her every step.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” The rest of his excuse evaporated as he stared at his wife. He knew the poised Jessie in business suits and the casual Jessie in jeans, but the sexy siren in front of him was someone else entirely. He could feel his blood pressure taking a hit.

She looked at the gold watch on her arm. “Fifteen minutes, to be precise.”

“I told you I had a lot of work to do and I got away as quickly as I could.”

“And so gallant about it, too.”

“Let’s go then.” He struggled to look anywhere but at her cleavage. He felt like a teenager seeing breasts for the first time.

Jessie bent to pat the dog. “Go upstairs to your bed, Mirry. I’ll be back later.” The little thing trotted away as if she understood every word.

“Where did you get her?” he asked to focus his attention on something beside her. If it was up to him, they’d just go upstairs but he knew that wasn’t what she wanted—just yet. Damn! Why did women have to be so picky?

“I found her on the side of the road,” Jessie was saying. “Someone abused her severely and left her for dead.”

He experienced a moment of guilt for not liking the little dog. The cruelty of people floored him, but Mirry seemed to have found a savior in Jessie.

“You’re staring,” she said.

He blinked. “I’ve never seen you with your hair down.”

She called his bluff immediately. “My hair is here.” She touched her head.

“Okay, I was staring at your breasts,” he admitted like the honest Christian boy that he was. “I never realized you had…”

“Breasts,” she finished for him.

He nodded, wishing they’d never started this conversion.

“They’re pretty much standard equipment, Cadde.”

He sighed. “Could we go?”

“Sure.” She picked up a small purse from the coffee table.

“Do you want to go in my truck or your Suburban?”

“Your truck,” she replied. “My vehicle has feed in it and it’s smelly.”

“What do you feed?”

“Animals that would starve if I didn’t.”

They talked as they walked through the dining room to the kitchen. Rosa had said something about animals and now he was curious.

“What kind of animals?”

“I have five horses from the Houston SPCA. Their owner left them to starve to death in a pasture. I know someone there and she calls me when they have an animal that’s been mistreated or abused and needs a home. I also have a donkey that had an infected eye and a ram with one horn. Gavin cut off the other one and operated on the donkey’s eye. They’re doing very well. The horses were skittish at first, but between Gavin, Felix and me we’ve managed to gain their trust. Gavin doctors their sores every week or so.”

“Who’s Gavin?”

“The vet.” He opened the back door and she asked, “Do you want to know who Felix is?”

“No. I sign his damn paycheck. Why isn’t he picking up the feed?”

“Felix was busy and I was in town at a board meeting, as you may recall, so I picked it up. No big deal.”

As soon as they stepped into the garage, the Dobermans sniffed at their feet.

“Oh, I hate these dogs.” Jessie made a face.

“Why?” Again he was curious. She seemed to have an affinity for animals.

“They’re trained to kill. I told Daddy I didn’t want an animal like that, but he insisted when he went on that trip to Alaska. He was afraid someone would breach the security system while he was gone. And he wanted a surprise for the perpetrator.”

Cadde remembered that trip with Roscoe. They were checking out the oil situation, but Roscoe decided it was too damn cold for his Texas blood. Roscoe called Jessie two to three times a day and sometimes more if he was feeling restless and worried. Fear was his constant companion. He never lost the paranoia that someone was going to take Jessie from him.

“Why don’t you just get rid of them?” he suggested.

“I tried. No one wants a dog like that. I might see if Gavin can gently put them to sleep. I hate doing that but they kill every animal that comes into their perimeter—squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, possums, birds, anything. There’s always something dead in the yard in the mornings.”