Authors: Carolyn Brown
The lawyer reached for the phone. “Well, that’s mighty fine of you. Maybe I will do just that.”
Beau laid the ring on the desk and started toward the door. “Excuse me.”
The band struck up the first notes of “A Picture of Me Without You,” by Lorrie Morgan, as Milli entered the barn to find only a few people already at the party. Granny and Poppy had laid claim to a table on the edge of the circular dance floor. The lady singing for the band did a pretty good imitation of Lorrie as she crooned into the microphone, expecting to see Beau and his fiancée enter the barn any minute, and then she was supposed to break into a very different song. They were going to dance a slow waltz and then Beau was going to take the microphone and make a speech. Then the real dance would start up.
Jim Torres wiped his brow in mock shock. “Whooo! What happened to my country granddaughter? You look like one of them city women or one of them models.”
Milli tried to smile but couldn’t. “Thank you, Poppy, but you are looking at me through those grandfather’s rose-colored glasses. I feel out of place without my jeans and boots. I don’t know whatever made me put this on to begin with.”
Beau was suddenly so close to her that she could smell his aftershave and feel his breath on her bare neck. “Amelia? Amelia Jiminez?” He held his breath, fully well expecting the girl to turn around and tell him to drop dead.
Jim laughed. “No, not Amelia Jiminez. Just Milli. Camillia Torres. Her mother was a Jiminez… Angelina Jiminez from down in the valley, before she married my son.”
The pieces fit snugly into place and he swallowed three times before he could speak. She’d been right next door all that time and she must have known from the first day who he was, and yet she hadn’t said a word. He should wring her neck, but if he put his hands on her slender neck it wouldn’t be to hurt her. His heart told him he was looking at a woman who just fell into bed with him on a whim, then ran away before he awoke. His body said it wanted more of what it remembered from that night in Texarkana.
Milli turned slowly to face him. “Hello, Beau. I think we met a long time ago, didn’t we? Only a few people call me Camillia. I guess it does sound like Amelia, doesn’t it?”
He was afraid to blink. “You’re real. You’re not adream?”
“I’m real. I’m Milli Torres, your neighbor’s granddaughter. Small world, ain’t it? Where is your fiancée?”
“She broke up with me. Refused to sign the agreement about the ranch and.., why didn’t you tell me you were…?”
“Well, praise the lord!” Mary exclaimed. “That girl wasn’t the right woman for you Beau. I don’t mean to be ugly, but she was bad news.”
“It don’t matter,” Beau tried to drink in every detail of Milli’s face.
“I’m sorry about your engagement,” Milli lied.
“I’m not. Could I have this dance, Milli?” He touched her hand and sparks flew.
“Well, would you look at that?” Mary said. “You know, I believe that boy is thunderstruck. I guess they’ve met somewhere before and he just now realized it.”
“And I think I smell a rat,” Jim said. “You’ve known all along, haven’t you? And… oh, my lord, that’s who it is? Now why didn’t this old monkey-assed, mindless fool see it before? That boy is Katy’s daddy, ain’t he? You figured it out the first day and that’s what you was talking about.”
Mary put her fingers over his mouth. “Shhhh, he don’t know about Katy yet. We’ll have to be very quiet and let them work it all out. They don’t need a couple of old meddling fools like us to help them. They’ve found each other. Lord, Jim, look at the way they dance together. Like they was made for each other. And just think about all the fun we’ll have with Katy right next door.”
“Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched,” Jim said with a grin.
“Why didn’t you tell me the first day?” Beau whispered in her ear.
“Because, you were screaming and cussing, and besides, I was shocked out of my mind about how in the hell you got from Louisiana to southern Oklahoma on the farm right next to my Poppa’s,” she whispered back.
“But what about at the Spencers’ barn dance when we danced?”
“You were going to propose to Amanda, remember?”
The song ended and another began. “Don’t go. Dance with me again.”
She nodded and he drew her even closer.
“What happened to you? I got out of bed and you were gone. They told me I’d just dreamed you and you were never there,” he asked.
“And I shouldn’t have been. It was a mistake from the beginning. I was mad at my boyfriend and I was out to get even, so I used you.”
“Did you go home and make up with your boyfriend?” He held his breath as he waited for an answer.
“No, I did not. I guess we just used each other. I knew your girlfriend had just broken up with you.”
“What did happen, then?”
She leaned back and smiled, lighting up his whole world. “The whole thing backfired. How’s your head?”
“You are changing the subject, but that’s all right. I’ve got all summer to show you just how it did backfire. My head is still stitched - or rather, stapled. Was it you at the hospital with me?”
She stepped back and pulled his shoulders down so she could see the top of his head. “Yes bend down here and let me see. They look pretty clean. Here I’ll kiss them and make it all better.”
Buster wandered into the barn, a hangdog look on his face and a shuffle to his walk. Lord, but he hated that uppity Amanda, and to think he might even have to take orders from her was enough to make his butt want a dip of snuff. He was too damned old to quit the Bar M and find another job and besides, this was home. It was where he and Rosa came with their three children when they were in their early twenties to work for Tony and Alice. And the ranch had been good to them. To leave would wrench his heart right out of his chest. To stay would drive him smack dab crazy.
He stopped dead in his tracks as Milli kissed the top of Beau’s head and then put both her arms around his neck as they continued with the dance. He shook his head violently. Surely he wasn’t seeing what he thought he was. “What the hell?”
Jim motioned toward a chair. “Engagement’s off, praise the good lord above. I ‘spect Beau will make an announcement when everyone arrives. Seems like he ain’t too broke up over it. He waltzed right in here and saw Milli, and was as thunderstruck as any man I’ve ever seen. They’ve been out there dancin’ ever since. Guess he met her a long time ago somewhere. We’ll find out the whole story later.”
Buster threw his straw hat into the air and caught it when it floated back down. “Well, hallelujah. There is a God up there after all. I’d begun to think maybe He had turned off His hearing aid when I prayed. Miss Milli, huh? Well, ain’t the whole evenin’ lookin’ a lot brighter now! Wait ‘till tell Rosa. She’s going to pass little green apples, she’ll be so excited. This is goin’ to be a good party, after all!”
“Yep, it is,” Jim nodded and grinned from one ear to the other. Just wait ‘til Buster found out about Katy. He’d really be dancing around on the clouds. Come to think of it, Buster hadn’t ever even seen Katy. Maybe Jim would just make a point to invite him over one day next week. He’d see just what kind of expression Buster had on his face when he looked at the spitting image of Beau.
Beau kept Milli’s hand in his as he approached the bandstand and reached for the microphone. “Folks. This was supposed to be a party to celebrate my engagement tonight. But things took a strange turn and Amanda and I decided we weren’t cut out from the same bolt of cloth. So she’s gone her way and I’m finding a new way, so we’ll celebrate that instead of an engagement. The tables are ready for supper and the band will keep playing. Those of you who haven’t met Milli Torres, please come around and I’ll introduce you, but don’t any of you fellers ask for a dance. She already promised them all to me tonight.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Oh, did I?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He took her in his arms and they waltzed out into the middle of the floor to “It’s Your Love,” by Faith Hill and Tim McGraw.
The black brooding feeling of something very wrong evaporated through the wooden rafters of the barn and a lighter mood of something entirely right replaced it. Smiles replaced grimaces, and the band members brightened up with a livelier crowd to play to.
Milli felt as though she was sitting on a keg of dynamite and the fuse was getting shorter and shorter. Any minute her whole world was going to go up in an explosion big enough to rock the whole state of Texas - and Oklahoma, too. But until the blast she was going to enjoy dancing around this big barn in the arms of the only man who’d ever made her soul complete.
“Now, let’s talk about the past two years,” Beau said. “Are you for real? Am I going to wake up in a little while and this will be a dream, too?”
She pinched his arm solidly.
“Ouch,” he looked at her, disbelief on his face. Could this really be the woman who had kissed his head so gently just minutes before?
“Did that hurt?”
“Hell, yes, it hurt,” he said.
“Good. I’m not an angel. I’m a real woman and you’re not dreaming. This is a real night and it was a real night two years ago. I shouldn’t have let things go as far as they did, but that’s water under the bridge. I can’t undo it now. But, rest assured, I’m not an angel. I’m full of spit and vinegar. Wasn’t it you who asked me just this week why I was grouchy early in the morning, and who accused me of being a bossy bitch? After tonight, you’ll probably be glad I was gone when you woke up that morning.”
“Ain’t damn likely.”
“You’ve had two years to make me into a perfect woman. Now I’ve got a summer to show you I’m not perfect. I’ve got a hellacious temper. I can be as hardheaded as a holiness preacher at a revival meeting, and you can tell me to back off anytime you want to.”
“Like I said, it ain’t damn likely. Was it your earring that got lost in the bedroom that night? I found a silver teardrop on the floor next to my boot.”
She stopped and pulled back her dark hair to reveal the match to his earring. “I figured I lost it in the bedroom.”
He reached in his pocket and drew out the match, hanging on his key chain. “You didn’t lose it. You just left it for me to find you with.”
“Can I have it back now?”
“What are they doing?” Jim asked Buster. “Looks like they’re comparing her earring to his key chain.”
Buster was so excited he all but shouted. “Well, I’ll be damned. She’s Amelia! That boy’s carried that earring in his pocket for two years. Said when he was down at his cousin’s wedding in Texarkana he met this woman and she lost her earring. Said all the boys thought he just dreamed her up and he kept saying her name was Amelia.”
“Camillia,” Mary told him. “He misunderstood. Milli’s full name is Camillia.”
Buster slapped his knee. “Well, hot damn! He’s been in love with her for two years and now we find out it’s our Milli.”
Beau put the earring back in his pocket. “No. It’s mine. It’s all I’ve had for two years of a dream I’d begun to think couldn’t be real, and I’ll just keep it.”
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MARY TOSSED HER WESTERN STRAW HAT ON THE burgundy leather sofa in the den and plopped down without any trace of the grace she usually displayed. Jim crutched into the living room and eased down into his chair. Milli stood in the doorway with a grin on her face even sucking a lemon wouldn’t erase.
Mary spoke first. “I sure didn’t want to go, but I wouldn’t have missed that party for all the dirt in Texas and half the tea in China. It’s been the most wonderful night we’ve had in so long I can’t remember. Wait ‘til I tell you about it, Hilda. You wouldn’t believe what happened in your wildest dreams.”
Hilda put her magazine in the rack. “Did the witch fall in a cow patty? Baby’s been sleeping for hours. Didn’t even know you were gone. Think we might talk Milli into leaving her here when she goes back? Sure does spice up this quiet old house. I can see you all three are bustin’ at the seams to tell me a story and you better start talkin’ before I lay down and die of curiosity.”
Milli tugged her boots off and rubbed her tired feet. “Amanda didn’t fall in a cow patty. It was even better than that. I don’t think I’ve danced so much since before Katy was born.”
“Well, somebody spit it out,” Hilda demanded. “Just what did happen over there at the big engagement party?”
Jim cleared his throat and spoke up. “Hilda, you’ll never believe what happened. That Amanda girl got mad over the way Alice set up the ranch and she just called off the whole engagement.”
Hilda rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. “Well, praise the lord. Even if Beau’s heart is broke right now, in a few months he’ll figure out he’s been saved from worse than hellfire.”
“Oh, he wasn’t too broke up. He waltzed into the barn, took one look at Milli, and got a case of thunderstruck love. They danced together all night. Wouldn’t be surprised if something don’t become of it,” Mary said.
“Oh, hush, Granny,” Milli said. “He just used me so everyone wouldn’t think he was tore up with her acting like that. I’m going to bed. Tomorrow is church and it’s already past midnight.”
“Me, too,” Hilda said with a broad wink at Mary. Tomorrow she’d find out every single little detail, such as the way Beau got thunderstruck, but Mary wouldn’t part with the good stuff until Milli wasn’t listening. “Better all of us attend in the morning and give thanks for answered prayers. I’ll even make Slim crawl out and go, and when he finds out why, betcha he don’t even carry on about having to get dressed up. Good night, y’all.”
“Good night,” Milli headed toward the stairs.
“Just a minute, young lady. I think it’s time we talked, don’t you?” Mary said.
Milli sat down on the floor in front of them. The time had come and there was no way around it, over it, or even through it. Granny had known for weeks and probably by now she’d told Poppy, so she might just as well face the fiddler and tell the truth - or as much of it as she could get away with. Maybe she could just tell them that she and Beau met at a wedding.
“So, what do you want to know?” She tried to keep her face passive.
“Let’s start with the time you met Beau,” Jim said. “Something about you going to a friend’s wedding, was it? And he was there?”
“Yes, in Texarkana, a couple of years ago. We were friends in high school and she went out there to college, then her folks moved away from Hereford, but we kept in touch. She went to college on one side of the state and I went to West Texas over in the panhandle. Anyway, she invited me. and it was just about the time I’d broke up with Matthew, and I went.” She squirmed in her chair.
“And Beau was at the wedding?” Mary asked.
“Yes, he was. His girlfriend had just thrown him over. And he was pretty drunk when I met him. He didn’t remember who I was until tonight. Guess someone told him I was Camillia and he thought they said Amelia since he’d had too much liquor. Then I flew home the next day and forgot all about him until he came charging across the pasture ranting and raving about me cutting the fence on my first day to go out and check the cows.” She hoped that was enough to appease them for one night.
“So how come he didn’t recognize you until tonight?” Jim asked. “You been together more than once and Buster says he’s been talking about Amelia ever since he got to the ranch. So why didn’t he know you? And why didn’t you tell us you recognized him that day?”
She stifled a real yawn. “When I met Beau he was very drunk. And he didn’t hold his liquor so well. He was all shook up because his sweetheart just dumped him and his mind wasn’t any too clear. I guess that’s why he didn’t remember. Can we talk about this tomorrow? I’m tired, Poppy.” She started to get up.
He shook his head. “Nope, I think we’d better get it all took care of now. I don’t think I can sleep for thinking about this whole thing, so we’ll just talk tonight.”
She rubbed her eyes with the back of her fist, wishing they’d tell her to go on to bed and they’d finish tomorrow. “Okay, then what else do you want to know?”
“I want to know just what happened that night. Did you dance with him?”
“No, I didn’t. Like I said, he was drinking pretty heavy and that’s probably why he couldn’t really remember me so well. We sat in the corner and talked for a while. He went to get another glass of champagne and I asked an older fellow about him and he said he was one of those Luckadeaus from down in Shreveport. Told me about the family and said Beau was lucky in everything but love. Said his girlfriend had just dumped him.”
“Evidently he asked someone about you, too. Because Buster said he knew your mother was one of the Jiminez girls from down in the valley. Guess him drinking too much is the reason he thought your name was Amelia instead of Camillia. But he must have remembered Amelia all this time, because he asked about you in the emergency room last week,” Mary said.
“Well, that’s that. If you want to know anything more it’s going to have to wait until morning or the only answers you’re going to get is snores. I’m beat, Granny. And Poppy, I should have owned up to having met him. Good night.”
She made it to the door and thought she was home free. “Want to tell us about Katy and what went on after the wedding party? Or did you fly back out there later on?” Mary asked.
She turned around and sat down in the floor right in the doorway. The words wouldn’t come. Her hands were clammy but her backbone was as straight as a rod. Tears welled up in the back of her eyes, but they wouldn’t spill, either.
“I don’t know if I can talk about it,” she whispered. “It was all such a terrible mistake. I was still hurting and angry from the way Matthew had treated me. Telling me he loved me and treating me like some kind of porcelain doll while he was taking women to the motel right under my nose. Then not even calling to apologize or explain why he did what he did. I don’t think he ever really loved me. I was just a good girl from a good family and his father wanted him to marry me for that. He wanted someone who was a virgin, who hadn’t been around and wouldn’t bring shame on his family name. It didn’t matter that he had a different woman in bed with him every night. Just that I was a good girl.”
“And Beau was there and drunk,” Mary nodded.
“Yes, and he said why didn’t we get away from the noise and confusion and go to his cousin’s trailer where it was quieter. I was playing with fire but I didn’t care. I’d been good my whole life. Saving myself for marriage so my husband could be a proud man. And what did that get me? A heartache bigger than Dallas. I’d had a couple of glasses of champagne, but I wasn’t drunk and I knew what I was doing. You can’t blame Beau. I was just available after his girlfriend dumped him. Kind of like tonight. I was there and he needed someone. And I…”
“And when you found out Katy was on the way?” Jim asked softly. “Why didn’t you get in touch with him? Beau is a good man. He would have done the right thing.”
“Poppy! It was a consenting one-night stand. How do I call someone in Shreveport and ask for Beau Luckadeau and say, ‘Hey do you remember the woman you slept with a couple of months ago? Well, guess what? There’s a baby on the way and what do you want to do about it?’ It was my problem. I was naive enough to think I wouldn’t get pregnant the first time and I did. Besides I had precious little pride left after Matthew and my own stupid mistakes. I didn’t think I could stand another rejection. I didn’t know anything about the man. But I did know that if I’d been in his shoes I damn sure wouldn’t have hopped on the next airplane and rushed out to marry some girl who’d fallen into bed on a whim. He probably thought I was just a loose-legged woman out on the prowl at her friend’s wedding.”
Jim shook his head. “Beau is a decent fellow.”
“I know that now. But I didn’t know anything about him then, except he drank too much. Besides, I don’t want a man to marry me just because he’s decent and I’m pregnant. I acted cheap and he… well, Poppy, he doesn’t know Katy belongs to him. And I’d just as soon leave it that way.”
Jim Torres couldn’t refuse her anything when she was a child. She’d looked at him like that when she was three and her father wouldn’t buy her a pony so she could ride with her brothers. Jim bought one at the next sale. But this was a whole lot different than buying a pony. Katy’s future was at stake. And Beau had every right to know that he had a daughter.
“I don’t know, Milli. You need to think about Katy growing up. Someday she’s going to ask questions. It wouldn’t be right to deprive Beau of knowing his child until she’s eighteen and demands an answer. I’m not sure I could keep him in the dark.”
“And I’ll answer her honestly when she asks. But until then, let’s don’t tell. At least give me a few weeks to get all this sorted out. There are emotions, anger, relief, so many things jumping around inside of me right now I can’t even think straight. Can you just give me a little while to get my own mind straight? Lord, if I’d known Beau was living next door to you, I’d never have set foot in this state again.”
“Okay,” Mary said brightly. “We won’t tell. But you won’t throw ice water on Beau if he comes around askin’ to take you out to dinner or something? You will get to know him better? From the way he looked at you tonight, I think he’ll be around in a day or two. And I don’t want that Torres temper of yours to run him off.”
“Torres?” Jim snorted. “That Jiminez temper can out shout the Torres anytime of the week. Angelina might look like a cream puff, but she’s tough as nails, and Milli gets her temper from her mother. We won’t open our mouths, child, if you won’t be ugly to Beau.”
“That’s blackmail.”
“Temper, temper,” Jim chided. “Jiminez coming out.”
Mary looked at her granddaughter from the corner of her brown eyes. “Don’t matter if she got it from the devil himself. What we’re doing here is making a deal, isn’t it?”
“Deal,” Milli nodded. “You don’t blow the whistle on me - that’s not to Hilda or Slim or Buster, and especially not to Momma or Daddy - and I’ll give Beau a fair shake. But he probably won’t come around at all. Tonight was a special set of circumstances. He would have been poor old Beau, lucky in everything but love, if he hadn’t remembered me at just the right time. But I promise if you don’t tell him about Katy, and if he comes around, I’ll be gracious.”
“Good enough,” Mary said. “Now give us a kiss, girl, and get on to bed. Church in the morning, and that old sun don’t set still for nobody. Not even those who’ve danced all night and been forced to bare their souls. We love you, child, and we ain’t judgin’.”
“Thanks, Granny.” She blew them both a kiss.
“Now why’d you go and promise not to tell a single soul?” Jim fussed when Milli’s bedroom door at the top of the stairs was shut.
“Why not? We don’t have to run an ad in the Ardmoreite and publish what we know, Jim. And we don’t have to tell Beau. He’s not totally stupid, you know. Someday he’s going to look at that child and know where she got that dimple in her cheek and those big blue eyes. Or else he’s going to look in the mirror and suddenly see something in his face that reminds him of her. Or maybe he’ll go home for the holidays and see a picture of himself as a baby and make the connection. It will take care of itself. Now, let’s go to bed and go to sleep. Like I said, the sun will come peeking over the horizon in a few hours.”
“Wisdom of the sages, woman. I knew when I married you I’d gotten a prize.”
“Oh, shush that sweet talk and come on.” She slapped his arm playfully.
Milli pulled the straps down from her lace dress and let it fall in a puddle around her feet. So much for wearing the dress and surprising Beau at his engagement party. Fate sure had a strange sense of humor. Poppa and Granny knew all about Katy. Thank goodness Hilda didn’t know. She’d bust a seam if she knew something like that and couldn’t even tell Beau.
She took a quick shower, dried off, and slipped into a pair of white cotton bikini underpants and a nightshirt with two holes in the sleeve. But it was soft and old and comforting. She pulled the crib sheet back from Katy’s legs and stared at her for a long time. Her blonde curls could get darker as she got older and her eyes might not stay that strange shade of pale blue. No one in Hereford knew about Beau and no one ever would. And after this summer, she would go home and he would forget her. Another big, blonde woman like Amanda would come along and take his eye and before long the Bar M would be overrun with tow-headed Luckadeau boys.
She leaned down and pushed the curls back from her precious daughter’s forehead and kissed her lightly. At least tonight the baby wasn’t old enough to ask questions about her parentage, and for that Milli was grateful. She’d answered enough questions in the past half hour to last for ten years.
She turned out the light and fluffed up her pillow. Sleep would come soon, as tired as she was. She shut her eyes and a vision of the singer’s voice singing, “A Picture of Me Without You,” appeared. She felt Beau’s presence behind her before he even spoke her name. Her heart threw in an extra beat; her mouth was as dry as if it had been swabbed out with a cotton ball; her insides went all oozy, and the world stood still as she waited on him to speak.