The Trouble with Texas Cowboys(52)

Jill laughed. “I’m in the bathtub, and the water has gone cold. I’m going to end this call and get out. And, Mama, I’m not going to answer that question.”

“Where are you sleeping tonight?”

“That is need to know, and you don’t.”

“Hey, now, we’ve been sharing some pretty big secrets.”

“Good night, Mama,” Jill said and hit the “end” button.

Sitting in the rocking chair, towel drying her hair, and thinking about the conversation, she didn’t hear her bedroom door crack open. She was so deep in her thoughts that she didn’t even see Miss Piggy chasing a bit of ribbon across the floor.

“You take my breath away,” Sawyer said. “No wonder I fell in love with you.”

As if in slow motion, her head raised. The hinges squeaked when he pushed the door wide open. The thought that ran through her mind was that she’d have to put some oil on them or she’d get caught sneaking across to Sawyer’s room after Rhett arrived. Then she wondered if she’d heard what she wanted to hear, not what he’d actually said.

“Say that again,” she whispered.

“I said I’ve fallen in love with you, Jillian Cleary. My heart has known it for a while. It just took my mind a while to catch up,” he said.

“One more time, just so I’m sure there’s no water in my ears.”

He took the towel from her hands, picked her up, and sat down in the rocker with her in his lap. “I love you, Jill.”

“I love you, Sawyer,” she whispered.

“That makes me the happiest cowboy in all of Texas,” he drawled. “I’d planned all these beautiful scenarios to say those three words, but they just slipped out tonight. I guess we aren’t destined for roses and romance.”

“Roses? No, darlin’, we are not. Romance? It goes much deeper than just saying words, although they are beautiful and I want to hear them every single day. FYI, right here in our bunkhouse at the end of a workday is the best place ever to say it for the first time. Romance is wonderful, Sawyer, but it needs actions to back them up. Your bed is bigger than mine, and I’m not sleeping alone anymore, so…” She hesitated.

“Yes, ma’am, I’m right good at showing instead of telling.” He stopped any further talk with a searing-hot kiss.

* * *

Decorating the next day involved stringing up some crepe paper, putting a glittery heart garland around the mirror behind the bar, using red paper liners in the plastic burger baskets instead of the customary white ones, and hanging a big red foldout heart above the jukebox. It took all of thirty minutes to do that and take the chairs down from the tables.

“Now what? I was expecting an all-afternoon job,” Sawyer said. They could go back to the bunkhouse and spend the afternoon in bed or maybe drive around the ranch and talk about the changes they’d like to make.

He looked around the pitifully decorated bar. He’d been out to dance and drink on Valentine’s Day, and this place sure didn’t scream romance.

“If we had a pool table, I might suggest a nap on it until opening time,” she said.

“How about a trip into town? If we hung a paper heart over where the Gallaghers sit and one above the Brennans, it might put an end to the pig war,” Sawyer said.

“It’ll take more than a paper heart to create that miracle. But I do think we need more than this after that big ad in the paper,” she agreed. “Let’s make a run into Walmart—no wait, isn’t there a party store in that outlet mall?”

“I wouldn’t know. Guess we could check on it first, and if there isn’t, we could go on into Walmart.” Sawyer was already getting their coats from the backs of two bar stools. “Last time I was in a bar on Valentine’s, they had put little fancy things on the tables. Folks fought over who got to take them home.”

“I know what you are talking about. They have a weighted bottom with something that looks like red heart fireworks shooting out of the top. Lord help us if Betsy gets drunk and takes one to Kinsey’s head.” She slung her purse over her shoulder.

“Hey, Jill,” he said as he took her hand in his.

“Hey, what?”

“I love you,” he said.

“Hey, Sawyer, I love you back,” she told him. “Red plastic tablecloths?”

“You sure are romantic this afternoon,” he teased.

“What’s not romantic about red plastic tablecloths?” she shot right back.

“For starters, they’d be real easy for Betsy or Kinsey to accidentally-on-purpose grab if they were fake falling. Can you imagine Betsy if a whole table full of burger baskets landed in her lap?”

Jill laughed as he opened the door and helped her inside his truck. “It might end the pig war and begin the burger war.”

“Where they throw food rather than steal pigs.”

When he was inside the truck, she said, “Or where they poison food instead of stealing livestock, so scratch that idea. We just need some cutesy things that remind the folks that it’s a fall-in-love day, not a war day.”

“How about a couple of bags of those heart-shaped red hots and some of those conversation hearts to go on the bar instead of pretzels and peanuts?”

She pulled her wallet from her purse, ripped off a check, and fished around until she found a pen. “I’m going to make a list. Candy for bar. Keep thinking, and I’ll write it all down as we travel.”

By the time they reached the outlet mall, the back side of her check was filled with ideas. He parked, and hand in hand, they started toward the party store. It was two stores up from the jewelry store and just past the leather-goods place where they sold boots, saddles, and all kinds of hand-tooled jewelry and luggage.

“Want to dash inside the leather store for a few minutes?” he asked.

“No, darlin’, I want to get this list taken care of and then get an apple dumplin’ over at that Cracker Barrel place,” she answered. “But it doesn’t take two of us to buy party goods. You go to the leather store if you want to.”

He gave her a quick peck on the cheek. “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

He darted into the leather store for about thirty seconds and then went straight to the jewelry store. He wanted a necklace with a heart pendant to give her for Valentine’s Day. The one he’d seen online had a banner across it with I Love You written in tiny, sparkling diamonds. If he couldn’t find that, then a bracelet with interlocking hearts, but it had to be yellow gold.

“Help you, sir?” an older woman said from behind the counter. “I bet you are doing late Valentine shopping.”

“Yes, ma’am. I was thinking a heart necklace,” he said.

“Sold the last one a few minutes ago. This year, folks are going in for infinity symbols more than hearts, so we didn’t order many of those. Want to see what we’ve got left?”

“Yes, thank you. Yellow gold.”

“That limits it. White gold is still the rage with the young girls. Yellow gold hasn’t been in vogue in years. In my opinion, it’s far classier. We have one double infinity bracelet in yellow gold. It’s all the way to the end of the display case beside the collection of antique rings we just got from an estate sale.” She motioned for him to follow her.

She brought out the bracelet, and he nodded.

“I like that better than hearts. I’ll take it.”

“Wrapped? We have some lovely red-rose wrapping paper.”

“Yes, but nothing with roses,” he said.

“Pink hearts?” she asked.

“Or yellow daisies,” he answered.

“For Valentine’s? We do have some yellow daisy paper that we got for Easter, but…” She paused.

“That’s what I’d like.”

“Be right back then,” she said.

He leaned on the counter and looked inside at display after display of diamond rings. It was way too early to think about that, but he wondered what Jill would choose. Then his eye settled on the small black velvet ring case with the antique rings. Six in all, and every one of them yellow gold.

The last one in the case was Jill. No doubt about it. That was what she’d choose, and it wouldn’t be just an engagement ring. It would be her wedding band as well. One emerald, half the size of a dime, graced the middle. Diamonds were scattered in the open scrollwork around it. The stone was the color of her eyes; the diamonds the twinkle in them when she was happy.

“Gorgeous, isn’t it?” The clerk set his wrapped present in front of him. “Cash or credit card?”

“Can I look at that ring?” he asked.

“The diamond one in the middle?”

“No, the emerald,” he said.

“It has a story behind it,” she said.

Remembering what Jill had said about liking things with a story behind them brought a smile to his face. “Written down?”

“No, just what the folks told my boss when he bought the rings. That one was the only one they knew much about. It was given to a lady in 1880 as a betrothal ring. She and her husband were married fifty years before he died, and although she was elderly, she was still healthy. Three days after he died, she joined him. They said it was from a broken heart. Her son inherited the jewelry and gave that particular ring to his grown son to give to his fiancée. They were married sixty years when she died, and he lived only a few days afterward. It was put in a lockbox and sold last week at a jewelry auction.”