“Lila Mae Dixon?” Daddy asked. “The cat woman who you’re building that sanctuary for?”
Trap bristled at the words “cat woman,” because he hadn’t actually seen Lila Mae with any cats but her own. And now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen Cleopatra at her house last night. Perhaps she kept the Bengal over in the main building.
“Yeah,” Trap said. “Anyway, there’s a good reason, but I don’t want you to freak out about it.”
“I love it when we start conversations with ‘Don’t freak out about it.’”
“I didn’t start it like that,” Trap said.
“Yeah, you started with, ‘It’s not a big deal,’ and that’s almost worse. Doesn’t she live in a tiny house?”
“Yep,” Trap said, keeping the word short. Four hundred eight square feet, in fact, and he knew because he’d built every one of them.
“All right. I’m waiting for the good reason,” Daddy said as Trap came to a stop at the stop sign with the little mechanic shop in front of him.
Trap sighed and looked over to his daddy. He checked his rearview mirror, didn’t find anyone behind him or approaching, and looked back into eyes that he saw every time he looked in the mirror. His nose reminded him of his mother, and both ofhis parents had dark features, so his hair didn’t have a chance of being anything but dark brown. His beard grew in a little bit lighter, and he reached up and rubbed one hand over it.
“Right then.” He took a breath. “I was laying flooring out in her new building that I’m working on,” he said. “It’s her animal hospital, right?”
“If you say so.”
“It’s an old stable, and it obviously doesn’t have any air conditioning yet.”
“I thought you’d done the infrastructure for that,” Daddy said.
“Yeah, I have,” Trap said, plenty of ire in his tone. “But it’s not on. The place barely has walls.”
“All right,” Daddy said, giving his attitude right back to him. “Go on.”
“Well, I guess I got overheated. The last thing I remember before waking up at Lila Mae’s place was that I was thirsty, and I was reaching for my big gallon jug that I take everywhere with me.”
“You passed out?” Daddy’s eyebrows flew toward the brim of his cowboy hat.
“Yes,” Trap clipped out. “Lila Mae found me and woke me up and got me back to her place.” He glanced over to his father. “I atefruit, Daddy.Coldfruit—watermelon and oranges—and I drank three sports drinks and a bunch of water, and every time we checked my temperature, it was normal.”
“You had heat stroke,” Daddy said.
“Yeah,” Trap admitted. “But I think it was real mild, Daddy. It was nothing.”
“It’s not nothing.” He sighed, rolled one shoulder, and then his neck. Trap made the turn onto the street that would take them over to the new part of Three Rivers where some of the bigger buildings were and several new restaurants had gone in.
“She wanted me to go to the hospital,” Trap said. “But I really didn’t think I needed to.”
“I wasn’t aware that you’d earned a medical degree,” Daddy said.
“I’ll go today if you want me to.”
“So let me get this straight,” Daddy said, and his voice sounded like it had been laced with venom. “You were working in the heat and passed out. Aclientfound you and took you to her house, got you all fixed up, and you were so—what? Impaired? Or tired? That you couldn’t drive yourself home, so you slept there. And you think youdon’tneed to go to the hospital?”
“That’s not it at all,” Trap said.
“Oh, well, then tell me which part I got wrong.”
“It wasn’t that I was too tired to come home,” he said. “Or that I was too impaired. I just didn’t want to.” He chanced to look over to his father, but didn’t keep his gaze there long enough to truly meet his eyes and read his expression. Trap knew he wouldn’t like what he saw anyway. “I stayed because I like her, Daddy. I asked her to dinner, and we’re going out tonight.”
“Oh, this just keeps getting better and better.” His daddy gave a mirthless laugh. “So now she’s not only a client, she’s a potential girlfriend. So you stayed at your almost girlfriend’s house.”
“She’s not almost my girlfriend,” Trap said. “Not even close. We haven’t even been out once.”
