LETTING ARCHER TALK HER INTO THE MIDDLE OF LAKE ODESSA ON Atwo-person dinghy certainly wasn’t the worst decision Cordelia had ever made. This month, anyway. It didn’t occur to her until they were a good hundred yards from shore that she didn’t have an escape if he wanted to start prying and asking questions she didn’t want to answer. Plus, she’d never learned how to swim, but that was the least pressing of her current worries.
The pads of her fingers dug into the thin plank of wood that made up one of the bench seats. “What do you plan on doing with me now that you’ve got me out here?”
“I have so many options.” He gave her a roguish grin. “Might be hard for me to decide.”
If he was thinking of pushing her in the water as some kind of joke, she’d take a chunk of him with her on the way in.
“Please try to be serious for once in your life,” she said.
Undeterred, he reached into the thin plastic box lining the inside of the boat and pulled out two rods. “I thought we could do some fishing.”
“Fishing?” Cordelia held the rod between two fingers, like it might bite her if she brought it any closer. “What would we want to do a thing like that for?”
“Because it’s relaxing.” He chewed on the end of a toothpickas he baited his hook and cast his reel into the water. “I can show you how if you need help.”
“I most certainly do not.” Cordelia sniffed.
She’d never actually been fishing—dirt and worms represented everything she stood against—but she’d be a June bug in a chicken coop before she ever let Archer Reed-Smythe think he’d gotten the better of her.
She pulled a worm from the dirt cup and tried not to gag as it curled its fat, slimy body around her finger. The worm wriggled around her hook, and she dropped her line before he could change his mind and crawl off. She’d save casting for another time. Unfortunately, the worm immediately lost his hold on the hook and sunk to the bottom of the lake, but that was all right. She didn’t want to deal with the horror of catching something.
Archer peered over the edge of the dinghy, his gaze landing on her empty hook, but he didn’t say anything. He just gave her that grin.
“Oh, bugger off,” Cordelia said.
Archer laughed. “I knew this would be a good idea.”
After several extended minutes of silence, Cordelia bobbed her line up and down on the water and drummed her fingers against the metal hull of the tiny two-person boat just to break the tension in the air. She’d always been comfortable with the quiet. It was the only time she could ever hear herself think. But being out on the water with Archer and the gently lapping waves wasn’t the same kind of quiet as alone quiet, and it made her want to fidget just to fill the space where there ought to have been words.
“Any thoughts on this heat we’ve been having?” Cordelia asked. Talk about the weather was about as basic as one could get, but she had to fill the void somehow.
“It’s summer in Texas.” He didn’t elaborate beyond that.
“How about the Cowboys? Think they’ll have a good year?”
Archer raised an eyebrow, knowing damn well she didn’t give a hoot about football. “Are you trying to chase the fish away on purpose? I’m not sure if we’ll have a prayer of catching anything if you keep making this much noise.”
She shifted on the wood bench. “I’m not usually like this.”
“I get it. I make you nervous, don’t I?” He winked at her from under the brim of his Stetson. “Sorry I wasn’t born uglier.”
She choked on the laugh that bubbled up without her permission. “I think you get a rise out of baiting me. You make me nervous, but not for the reason you’re thinking. I’m just waiting for you to toss me overboard.”
“My momma raised me better than that.” He took their fishing poles and packed them up, resigned to the fact that he wouldn’t be catching anything other than hell today.
“She tried her best, anyway.” Cordelia tilted her head as she studied him. “Did you really bring me out here to fish?”
“Yes and no.” He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “I thought we could use some time away from the prying eyes of the rest of the town to clear the air.”
“If you’re talking about what happened in your office—”
He held up a hand. “I consider that matter closed. I wasn’t lying when I said I have no problem with the word ‘no.’ But there is still the matter of my father’s death between us.”
Cordelia gulped on the cork that tried to clog her throat. “I’m not sure if that’s a thing that’s between us, seeing as I hadn’t seen your daddy since I was half as big as a minute. Don’t tell me you’re listening to Edna.”
“This ain’t about Edna. Everyone knows the Abernathys are so crooked they’d spit up a screw if they swallowed a nail.” He lowered his voice as if the fish had ears. “But I know he was withDaisy that night. She done told me she was expecting him that day. He wouldn’t have changed his mind, and he never wrote sermons on Friday evenings.”
“You’re barking up the wrong tree.” Cordelia shifted her gaze to the water. “Daisy didn’t kill your daddy. She wouldn’t even kill a fly if it landed in her oatmeal.”
