“Bekka,” he warned gently. Teasing her sisters was one thing, but sassing was another.
“Sorry, Daddy. I’m not going to get abducted by a bag. Let’s taste cinnamon rolls.”
“Yes, and afterward we can all talk about Girl Scouts if we want,” Lori added.
Bekka nodded, Rachel cheered, and Sarah just rolled her eyes.
As for him, he got a cinnamon roll and started eating it while he tried to figure out how the hell he was going to make this whole thing work.
Chapter Three
Campbell had left his gelding, Firewater’s Cyclone, also known as Fire, in his dad’s small pasture, and his duffel was in his momma’s guest room.
And, somehow, he was sitting in the driveway of Mitchell Gonzales’s house, an aluminum pan of green chile chicken enchiladas in his hands.
His boots felt too tight, and his neck was hot, and he’d rather beanywhereelse. But his momma had pushed and poked and prodded until he decided to go ahead to Mitch’s, even though he’d been in town less than an hour.
“Son, that man is in need of a friend, and you are going to go be that friend.” Momma had glared at him, fire in her eyes.
“He doesn’t want to see me, Momma,” he’d argued.
“You don’t know what he wants or doesn’t want; you haven’t talked to him in God knows how many years, so stop it.”
So Cam had closed his eyes, counted to forty, and had gotten in the truck.
He had to say that the house had seen better days. It wasn’t like a ramshackle shed or anything, but the siding needed painting and patching. It needed new screens here and there, and the driveway needed to be graded and re-graveled.
The whole thing just kind of looked depressed, old and sad.
He sat there in his truck trying to figure out what to do when a little girl came out on the front porch. She was dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, her bright red hair braided, and the poor baby was skinny as a rail.
She glared at him and then kind of stomped down the steps to his truck.
“Hasn’t anybody ever told you little girls aren’t supposed to go walking up to strange men’s trucks?” he asked her.
She tilted her head. “Do I know you? Does my daddy know you? Seems to me somebody ought to have told you that it’s not nice to sit in your truck in front of somebody else’s house and not get out.”
Ho ho! All right then, this one was a firecracker.
“I suppose you’re right. My momma is Mrs. Halley. She had some green chile enchiladas, and she asked me to stop by and bring them. I used to be a friend of your daddy’s a long time ago.”
“Miz Halley is very nice to us. Very. Miss Lori is my Girl Scout leader. You can come up to the porch. I’ll let Daddy know.”
She trotted inside, leaving him there, holding the casserole. He got out of the truck, heading for the door, and then another girl came onto the porch. This little one was dark as the night—eyes and hair and clothes and expression all.
“Sister said I should come out here and watch you and make sure you’re all right.” She stared at him, searching his face. “I think you look enough like Miz Halley that it’s okay, but whatever. Do you live here? I’ve never seen you before.”
He shook his head, gobsmacked by this girl — she was solid as a rock, and her gaze was like what he imagined Medusa’s would be. “No. I came in from out of town. I’m visiting my momma.”
“Oh, okay. Well, you’re welcome to have a sit. The rocking chairs don’t hurt your butt or nothing when you sit in them. They’re not pokey.”
“Thank you.” Lord have mercy. He chuckled and sat down, trying to figure out what one said to a girl in this situation. “You got a nice place here.”
She shrugged. “It’s where I was born. It’s an okay place. We have lots of critters. I have my books and my sisters.”
“I have a lot of brothers and sisters too. Sometimes it’s good.”
She nodded. “Sometimes it’s not. Watch out for the black dog; he bites.” She pointed over across the way to where a grumpy-looking Rottie was sitting, scowling at him. Not a barker, then. More a sneaker.
