Those Texas Nights

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“FYI,” Clay said, taking his hand from his gun, “it’s not a good idea to start any conversation with a cop by yelling surprise. Nor is it a good idea to hide in his house and yell at him when he walks in.”

“How else were we going to give you a surprise party?” April answered. “We parked in the back so you wouldn’t know we were here.” She grinned, kissed his cheek.

Clay didn’t grin back. In fact, he narrowed his eyes, his normal reaction when it came to his kid sister and her husband. He’d accepted the marriage because he didn’t have a choice, but he hadn’t accepted that they’d been stupid enough not to use those condoms he’d sent them.

Hell.

His sister would be the mother of three—maybe four if she had another set of twins—before her twenty-fourth birthday.

April and Brantley had told him the happy news at the café the same day Sophie had found out. Clay had to hand it to her—Sophie had kept her cool despite his sister’s witchy comment. He’d kept his cool, too, but only because he hadn’t wanted to act like a horse’s ass in front of his nephews.

Of course, now he’d have another nephew or niece, and he would love him or her just as much. But since he didn’t have stars in his eyes like April, Clay knew she had a tough road ahead.

“Hayden and Hunter fell asleep so I put them on your bed,” April explained when Clay looked around for them. “Say, did you know you have a toilet in your closet?”

Clay could only sigh. No, he hadn’t known. The last he’d seen, it’d been in the corner of his bedroom, waiting to be installed in the guest bath. He hoped Freddie and/or his offspring had only moved it there to get it out of the way and that they hadn’t actually misrouted the plumbing again.

“So, is your mood better today?” he asked April, and he didn’t clarify what he was referring to because she knew.

April’s chin came up. “I meant it. I don’t want Sophie interfering in our lives. That includes your life.”

“I’m thirty-four. Last I checked, that makes me old enough to decide who I see or don’t see.”

“And you want to see my husband’s ex?” She didn’t wait for him to answer. “Brantley and I have enough adjustments to make without Sophie Granger watching our every move.”

“I doubt she’s watching anybody’s moves. She’s got her hands full with the ranch.” But he was talking to air.

“I don’t want her in our lives,” April declared.

The silence came. So did Clay’s temper, and he considered telling his one-and-only sister to take a hike. But he remembered this level of bitchiness. It’d happened with the last pregnancy so maybe it was just the hormones.

“We got you some presents.” Brantley tried to sound happy and not like he’d just got caught in the middle of a sibling shit-storm. He tied the balloons to the leg of the coffee table and took a couple of bags from the sofa. “The first one is from Vita.”

Clay’s hand hesitated in midreach.

“Vita saw us in town and said to give it to you but to be careful because it could break,” Brantley added.

Clay was certain that put a fresh scowl on his face, but he took the bag, looked inside and saw yet another crap-streaked chicken egg.

Brantley had a look at it, as well, though Clay doubted it was his first look. “Vita said the other one she gave you was too old and that you needed a fresh one.”

Even though he didn’t come out and ask, there was a definite question mark at the end of that information. Brantley and everyone else in town probably knew about Vita helping him with the feral chicken problem. Or rather what Vita considered to be helping. But Brantley must have guessed that if Clay didn’t volunteer anything, then it was a subject best not discussed.

But the first egg hadn’t exactly gotten old, not on his watch, anyway.

He’d tossed it the day Vita had brought it to his office, but Ellie had fished it out with the claim that she would keep it for him, that it wasn’t a good idea to diss Vita’s cures. So, Ellie had put it in double Ziploc bags and shoved it in the tiny freezer of the office fridge.

This one was going in the trash.

Clay put it aside for now and took the other bag, this one tagged from April and Brantley. There was a bottle of his favorite whiskey inside and an envelope.

“Now, don’t get mad,” Brantley said before Clay could open it.

Like the word surprise, that was not something he’d especially wanted to hear. At least it wouldn’t be news of April being knocked-up since she already was. And he doubted it was a divorce announcement since she was clinging like a vine to Brantley.

“It’s a subscription to a dating site,” April blurted out. She sounded considerably less bitchy than she had a couple of seconds ago. Maybe the shit-storm had passed. Maybe her hormones had leveled out.

“It was April’s idea,” Brantley quietly added.

No doubt. It was exactly the kind of thing his sister would do, and Clay would toss it out with the egg as soon as they left.

“It’s time you started dating again,” April went on, “now that things have cooled between Sophie and you.”

Things were never hot between Sophie and him. Well, they were, but only in a lustful sort of way. Hell, he’d never even kissed her.

Something he suddenly wished he’d done.

Clay frowned at that thought. He already had enough complications without adding his brother-in-law’s ex to the mix. Plus, Sophie hadn’t exactly stayed in touch or anything.

“The boys have gifts for you, too.” April made air quotes around gifts. “And I can’t wait for you to hear what Hunter told us.”

“He said he wanted to be a top like his Nunk Cay,” Brantley provided, followed by a laugh. “It was cute as all get-out.”

Cute, maybe, but also confusing. Clay got the Nunk Cay part because that was Hunter’s attempt at Uncle Clay. But it took him a second to realize that top was cop.

“No,” Clay snapped, a little sharper than he’d meant to. “You talk him out of that.” It made his stomach twist to think of a grown-up Hunter going through what he’d been through.

April rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. As if I’ve ever been able to talk Hunter out of anything. He’s like a mini version of me.”

He was, and that was even more reason to steer Hunter in another career direction. The next time he was at the bookstore, Clay would pick him up some kiddie doctor books. Lawyer books, too, if they published such a thing. Even books about cowboys. Anything but a cop.

“I’ll put the cake in the kitchen,” April volunteered. “We can cut it when the boys wake up. Oh, and we bought some steaks and burgers to grill for dinner.”

Clay thanked her and would have gone into his room to change if Brantley hadn’t caught onto his arm. “Can we talk?”

Hell. That was yet something else he hadn’t wanted to hear. “You’d better not be about to tell me that you’re dumping my sister.”

Brantley’s eyes widened to the size of salad plates. “No. Of course not. I love April. I love the boys, and I love our unborn child.”

“Good. And you’d better keep on loving them, or I’ll kick your ass into the next county.”

Brantley stared at him. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re scary?”

“All the time. And I also carry through on my threats.”

Clay waited. When Brantley didn’t say anything he asked, “Was that what you wanted to talk about—the threats?”

“Uh, no.” Brantley glanced into the kitchen as if to make sure April was still there. She was. “This is about Sophie.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I was, well, hoping you’d ask her out.”

Clay huffed. “First a dating site subscription and now this? I can handle my own love life.” Or lack thereof. “And didn’t you hear what your wife just said? She doesn’t want Sophie anywhere near her gene pool.”

Brantley huffed, too. “I’m not saying to ask Sophie out for your sake but for her own. She could be headed for some trouble.”

Until Brantley added that last part, Clay was about to tell him to mind his own business, but that got Clay’s attention. “Explain that.”

“Shane.” And Brantley must have thought that was enough of an explanation because he paused.

“Shane, the guy she’s got a date with tonight. Yeah, I know about it.” Clay had heard it from at least a dozen people who doled out sympathy over his and Sophie’s breakup. Apparently, Sophie was meeting this guy in a couple of hours at the Longhorn Bar at the end of Main Street.

“Shane Whitlock,” Brantley provided. He made another of those kitchen glances and leaned in closer. Clay was reasonably sure there was nothing Brantley could say that would interest him about Sophie’s date.

But Clay was wrong.

CHAPTER SIX (#u3622d7f9-d230-5874-beef-0c8c025c5f71)

SOPHIE HADN’T KNOWN there was a level of Hell below the internet dating sites, but she could say for certain that there was.

It was the date itself.

She’d been so hopeful about seeing Shane. Or at least curious. And eager to get on with her life and dipping her toes back into the dating pond so that her mom and Mila would get off her back. But what she hadn’t counted on was that she didn’t have much in common with a boy she’d crushed on in middle school. A boy she hadn’t even actually known that well.

Shane looked pretty much the same. An older version of the blond, blue-eyed kid who had first stirred her girl parts. He still had that little gap in his front teeth, a tiny flaw that she’d once thought of as a perfect imperfection. It was around the time she’d started reading Jane Austen books so she had been in somewhat of a romantic phase. In fact, maybe she should credit Jane’s books for helping stir those parts.

Her parts weren’t stirring now though, unless she counted her butt going numb from sitting so stiffly on the hard leather seat in the booth.

“And so after I got back from Italy, I moved in with a modern artist in Soho,” Shane went on. He was forty-five minutes into answering her question: So, what have you been up to for the past seventeen years?

From what Sophie could tell, he was on year seven or eight now.

“You know modern art?” he asked, gobbling down one of the nachos they’d just been served. It was the best one on the plate, loaded with jalapenos and dripping with cheese. Sophie had had her eye on it, but she apparently wasn’t fast enough because Shane had moved the plate closer to him.

“Not really.”

“Well, you should study up on it. Interesting stuff. There’s nothing like seeing a really good painting and just looking at it for hours to try to see what the artist saw.”

She made a noncommittal sound, reached way across the table to retrieve a less generously topped nacho. She also checked the time again on her phone. It wasn’t even eight yet.

Time had apparently stopped in this level of Hell.

“Anyway, after Soho,” he went on and on and on, “I moved to Merida down in the Yucatan. Hooked up with another artist there. Man, she was amazing.” He paused only long enough to drink some of his beer to wash down that nacho and move the plate even closer to him. “You’re sure you’re not into art?”

“Not really,” she repeated, and she prayed for an earthquake or something. Nothing major, just enough to shake things up so she could say she needed to leave to check on the ranch.

At least Shane hadn’t brought up the family business and their financial troubles with Billy Lee. Maybe because he already knew all the details from the gossips. Maybe because he didn’t want to bring up such a sour subject on a date. Or perhaps because her life in no way interested him.

“Merida was incredible,” he continued after wolfing down another nacho. He talked around the crunching and the swipes of his napkin to get the cheese drippings off his mouth.

Sophie listened in case she had to grunt in response or something, and she looked across the bar at the back booth where Mila was sitting. As planned.

Well, as Mila had planned, anyway.

She’d told Sophie that she wanted to be there for moral support, but Sophie figured Mila had also wanted to make sure she stayed put and went through with the date.

The door opened, bringing in a gust of the October wind. Not cold exactly, but since she was wearing a thin top—which she’d chosen because it was flattering—with her jeans, Sophie shivered a little. Her shiver turned to a shudder when her mother walked in.

Belle didn’t own any bar/clubbing clothes and had perhaps never been in the Longhorn, but she’d tried to dress to fit in. She had on mom jeans, one of Sophie’s work shirts and cowboy boots that she’d likely taken right out of the box. She smiled at Sophie, gave her a toodle-do wave and made her way to Mila’s booth. Apparently, her mom was there for moral support, too.

“...and after a year in Merida,” Shane was saying, “I stayed a while in LA. Great place. You know LA?”

Sophie caught enough of that so she could answer, “I’ve been there a couple of times on business. We distributed rodeo gear to—”