* * *
Sawyer didn’t hesitate when he bought tickets to the movies that afternoon. They were seeing the newest romance film, and in that very moment, Jill knew she’d found the cowboy of her dreams.
“I can’t believe you like love stories,” she said.
He threw an arm around her shoulders and stopped inside the lobby at the concession stand. “Popcorn?”
“I couldn’t put another bite of food in my mouth right now, and I never drink at a movie, because if I have to go to the restroom, I’m afraid I’ll miss something important,” she said.
“Then we’ll have ice cream afterward. And about love stories? Have you ever watched NCIS on television?” He found seats for them at about the halfway mark in the theater.
She moved all the way to the center of the row to get the best view possible. “NCIS is on the top of my favorites list, but what’s that got to do with romantic movies?”
“Tony?”
“What about Tony? I think Michael Weatherly does a fantastic job of playing that character.”
“I’m Tony when it comes to movies,” Sawyer said.
“Ohhh,” she said. Tony was always spouting off a reference to a movie, old ones particularly.
“So you like them that much, huh?”
“When Mama visits in the spring, she’s bringing my collection. I’ll have to build shelves or else run you out of your office for all of them.”
“I’m not using the wall space. You can cover all of them with shelves if you want,” she said. “Oh, my!”
“What?” he asked.
“Those roses are still in there. I bet the water is soured and they’re dried up and stinking.”
“Time to throw them over the pasture fence.” He grinned. “Where’s the daisies? I noticed that you’d finally taken the bowls out of the bunkhouse.”
She was glad he couldn’t see her scarlet cheeks. “I couldn’t throw them away. They are getting pressed between layers of wax paper in the pages of several books.”
“All of them?”
“Yes, every one of them.”
“Excuse me.” A lady flipped down the seat next to Sawyer and settled in for the show.
“So sorry.” A man with a half-gallon-sized container of popcorn sat down next to Jill.
The seats behind them and those in front of them quickly filled up, and the smell of buttered popcorn filled the air. It was an expected aroma in a movie theater, but something wasn’t right. She could feel it down deep in her gut. The feeling was verified when Sawyer squeezed her shoulder and leaned over to kiss her gently on the ear.
“Don’t look now, but we’ve got Gallaghers behind us and Brennans in front of us. Kinsey is sitting by me, and her knee is pressing against mine.”
“What in the hell is going on?” she asked. “We’re not part of their pig war. And why are both families here? Did they band together against us?”
“Shhh, the movie is starting,” Quaid said beside her. “Well, imagine this. You are going to the movies with me after all.” He offered her popcorn.
Jill ignored him and cupped her hand over Sawyer’s ear. “There really is a rat in the woodpile. I can understand the restaurant. We talked about it in church, and someone could have easily overheard, but they had to be stalking us to show up here.”
Sawyer pulled her to her feet. “Excuse us. Got to make a popcorn run. Oh, hello, Kinsey. Didn’t recognize you in the dark.”
“We’ll gladly share.” Kinsey smiled.
“Wouldn’t want all the Gallaghers behind you to think we were takin’ sides,” Jill said.
“So what do you want to do now? See another movie or what?” Sawyer asked when they were finally out of the theater and in the lobby.
“Let’s get out of here and go to the antique stores. Callie said they’re open on Sunday afternoons. We could just browse for a little while and then go home and take a nap.” She shivered and said, “Quaid beside me. Tyrell right behind me. I may never like popcorn again.”
Sawyer chuckled.
“What’s so funny?”
“Do you think that they are like Tony and love to watch all movies or that this is going to be a real chore for all those guys?”
A smile played at the corners of her mouth. “I’m not sure there’ll be a theater still standing in a few hours, with both of the feuding families in the place. I hate that you’ve lost your money on a movie we won’t even see.”
“Money is just dirty paper with dead presidents’ pictures on it.” He chuckled again. “Now let’s go pick out the furniture for your dream house.”
* * *
“Well, isn’t that the cutest thing? I can see it sitting on a chest of drawers in a nursery.” Jill picked up a teddy bear made from an old quilt. The primary colors were yellows and browns, and the piece making the fat little bear belly was a yellow daisy on a brown background. He had chocolate-colored buttons for his eyes, and someone had painstakingly embroidered his nose and mouth.
Sawyer knew handiwork when he saw it. His maternal grandmother always had a hoop and a needle lying close by, and he’d watched her embroider from the time he could pull up to her rocking chair.
“It’s a cute little bear.” A few weeks ago, any talk of a nursery would have sent him spinning and running toward the woods. Now it didn’t seem like such a big deal.
“Oh, look at this, Sawyer. Both of my grandmothers had these and used them right up until they passed away.” She held up a metal ice tray with a lever in the middle that released the thick cubes.
“Mine still do. Let’s buy it and display it to remember our first date,” he said.
She held it in her hand, working the lever up and back several times. “Where would we put it?”
“How about in the freezer with water in it to make ice?” he said.
“I love it. Then every time we fill up a sweet tea glass, we will remember how much fun we had today.”
She was absolutely amazing. Most women would have whined for days about how the Gallaghers and the Brennans had destroyed their entire day. But Jill brushed it away like a fly on her shoulder.
She was looking at a display of gravy boats when he carried the ice tray to the front counter. He hoped that she couldn’t see the bulge in the side of his jean jacket made by the patchwork bear. He might not be ready for a nursery, but he had other ideas in mind for the daisy bear.
“Please put these in a big bag that you can’t see through,” he told the cashier.
“A little surprise for someone?” Her mouth curved upward in a shy smile.
“Yes, ma’am. Hopefully, a big surprise later on down the road.”
Chapter 25
Gladys, Polly, and Verdie were sitting around a table at the back of the bar when Jill and Sawyer unlocked the place and went inside, out of the blustery cold February wind.
“Guess the groundhog wasn’t lyin’ last week when he predicted six more weeks of winter, was he?” Verdie said.
“What are all y’all doin’ here?” Jill asked.
“We’re having a beer and trying to decide what in the hell we can do to end the pig war,” Verdie answered. “And we had to convince Polly that her bar was still in one piece.”
Polly lifted her bottle of beer. “Y’all have done a fine job of keeping it running for me. Thank you.”
“You are welcome, Aunt Polly, but why would you think you could end the feud?” Sawyer asked. “If it’s not this, it’ll be something else. It’s been here for a century, and it’ll take something major to end it for good. You might end the pig war, but the feud will keep coming back to life over and over again.”
“You got a point there, but it really got hot today,” Gladys said. “Tyrell Gallagher sent Leah Brennan a lovely box of long-stemmed roses. Tyrell is denying it to Naomi, who is threatening to have him drawn and quartered in the church parking lot. Mavis wouldn’t even let Leah bring them in the house. She said that they were probably poisoned with arsenic.”
“Not arsenic, that other stuff. What’s it called?” Verdie tapped her chin.
“That shit that’s worse than bubonic plaque,” Polly said.
“Anthrax?” Sawyer asked.
They all three pointed at him. “That’s it!”
Jill tied an apron around her waist. “She really thought the Gallaghers would send over anthrax?”
“Before she’d let Tyrell and Leah start dating, or any other Gallagher and Leah for that matter, Mavis would give them a bath in it,” Verdie answered.
“We all knew the day would come eventually when one of them fell for the other side, and we knew it would be a big battle. It’s just hard to picture Tyrell interested in Leah. If anyone would have a torch for her, it would be Tanner.” Polly sighed.
Jill’s eyes opened so wide she couldn’t force them to close. She knew in her gut what had happened, because she’d done the exact same thing with the doggie treats and the pork rinds.
She slapped the bar. “Sawyer?”
“What’d I do?” He chuckled.
“This is a come-to-Jesus moment, which means it’s confession time,” she said.
“Forgive me, darlin’, for I have sinned, but they tried to ruin our date, and they shouldn’t have brought us into their shitty old pig war to begin with. And I’m not really sorry for a bit of it.” He bowed his head and looked up at her with a broad grin and mischievous eyes.