The Princess of Coldwater Flats (12 page)

“Ah, yes. Josh here says you’re tryin’ hard to hang onto the Triple R.”

“That’s hardly a headline,” Sammy Jo answered dryly.

“He also says you’re lookin’ for a husband. Ain’t that right, Josh?” Tommy glanced at Josh for confirmation.

“Whoa, now. Uh-uh.” Josh’s complexion turned as red as his beard. “We were all just kiddin’ around the other day, right, Sammy Jo?”

“Just kidding around,” she agreed soberly.

Tommy looked down casually at his fingernails. “That ain’t what I read in the
Corral
.”

“If you believe everything you read in the paper, especially that paper,” Sammy Jo said with forced calm, “you’re more gullible than I thought.”

“It’s common knowledge, Sammy Jo, babe.” Tommy grinned like a lecher. Then again, he
was
a lecher.

“Get lost,” she told him, smothering a smile. What a juvenile. She couldn’t take him seriously.

A couple separated from the crowd that was milling around, and walked along the split-rail fence that surrounded Granger’s Shopping Center. Sammy Jo swept in a surprised breath. Immediately, Josh and Tommy turned to follow her gaze.

Cooper Ryan was strolling toward them, Bev Hawkins hanging on his arm.

“I heard she and Roy broke up,” Josh said, stunned, “but I didn’t know she was out huntin’ already.”

Sammy Jo’s heart beat so hard it threatened to suffocate her. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from Cooper and Bev.
Bev Hawkins!
She should have known. Men couldn’t help falling under Bev’s spell, and Sammy Jo never had rightly believed that Bev was as happily married as she’d lead on. Roy Hawkins was one of the wealthiest men in the area, but he was nothing compared to Cooper Ryan.

“How come the
Corral
hasn’t reported on this yet?” Sammy Jo asked, forcing a lightness she didn’t feel.

“Next week’s edition,” Tommy predicted. He seemed completely amused by the whole thing, but then he and Bev had shared some wilder times when she was younger.

Cooper and Bev spied their group just as Sammy Jo was trying to escape. They came over, arm in arm. Bev was delicately sucking on a gossamer strand of a lethal-looking blue cotton candy.

Be
polite
, Sammy Jo warned herself a trifle desperately.

“Hi, Cooper. Hi, Bev.”

“Hello, Sammy Jo,” Bev said, smiling happily. “Cooper was just telling me how you and he are neighbors.”

“Really?”

Cooper was eyeing Tommy. Sammy Jo glanced at Tommy, too, trying to see him as a stranger might. Tall, lean, looking appealingly worn-out, Tom was really just an overgrown boy.

But the look Cooper gave him could have melted steel. Sammy Jo’s heart lifted. Could he be just the tiniest bit jealous?

“I’m bringing Emmy over on Saturday,” Bev said. “And she’s got a couple of friends. Ginny’s daughter, Vanessa, and of course, Tess’s daughter, Alex.” Sammy just stared at her. “For the riding lesson? Tess did tell you, didn’t she?” Bev asked anxiously. “She promised she would.”

“Oh, yeah…‌I think she did mention it.”

In truth, Sammy Jo wasn’t completely sure. Hadn’t she said no to Tess? They’d talked about riding lessons, but they’d never settled on a date, had they? Or, had Sammy Jo given Tess the impression that she’d changed her mind? If so, she’d been too unfocused to write the date down. With all her other problems in her life, she wasn’t even sure she could deliver on them.

“Emmy would be so disappointed,” Bev babbled on, clearly picking up the correct vibes no matter what Sammy Jo said.

“Saturday at ten o’clock?” Sammy Jo suggested reluctantly, thinking she might as well get the lessons over with.

“Tess said noon, but ten o’clock would be fine if it’s more convenient. I can call the girls—”

“No, noon’s fine,” Sammy Jo cut her off. She glanced at Cooper, but couldn’t read his thoughts. What did she care, anyway?

“We’re headed over to the High Noon before the rodeo,” Josh said. “Want to join us?”

Sammy Jo wasn’t certain if he meant her or Bev and Cooper. Apparently, his invitation was for all and sundry because when Bev and Cooper demurred, he turned to her. “Sure,” she said with a forced smile.

It took all her willpower not to watch them walk away, arm in arm, Bev’s laughter light and sensual, mingling with the powerful scents and calliope music of the carnival in the glow of the multicolored lights that circled, kaleidoscope-like, from the Ferris wheel.

* * *

An hour’s worth of raucous High Noon patrons and a shot of tequila Tommy had practically poured down her throat and Sammy Jo was about fed up. She wished she’d called Brent. Tommy Weatherwood was no answer to her problems. In fact, he
was
a problem. If he’d really inherited money, he was bound to drink it all away before the new year.

“Hey, where ya goin’?” Tommy demanded, clamping a hand on her shoulder.

“To the rodeo.” She slipped away. Easy enough, since Tommy swayed uncertainly on his feet.

Josh, who was a man who could hold his liquor, asked, “Can I take you?”

“Thanks, Josh, but I’m feeling like being alone.”

“Suit yourself.” He shrugged, happy enough to keep his barstool warm.

Sammy Jo drew a deep breath as she stepped onto the wooden sidewalk. She strode toward the carnival and rodeo grounds, the sky a deep purple bowl overhead sprinkled with a dusting of stars.

She stood in line and bought herself a ticket to the grandstand, then sat down beside a jolly, potbellied older man and his equally jolly wife. Calf-roping, wild cow milking, the tense acrobatics of the rodeo clown…‌it was always the same and its familiarity was soothing. Sammy Jo tensed during the barrel-racing, critically watching the latest contenders. They were good, and more important, the horses were good. Cheers rose in the crowd.

The couple next to her bought a bucket of beer. Out of the corner of her eye, Sammy Jo watched them balance the oversize container as they passed it back and forth, giggling. Beer sloshed over the rim several times but they didn’t seem to notice.

Through it all, the loudspeaker rang over the noise, the announcer’s voice a corny blend of homespun jokes and fast-talking patter guaranteed to whip the most lethargic spectator into a frenzy of excitement.

Sammy Jo slipped out halfway through, feeling disappointed somehow. No Gil to laugh with. No one to enjoy the sheer silliness with. No one.

Mad at herself over her doldrums, Sammy Jo set her jaw. Maybe marrying Brent had other possibilities. He could be with her.

“I’ve been getting an earful about your rodeo history,” Cooper’s voice said, somewhere behind her.

She turned swiftly. He was balancing two colas and a tray of curly fries. “From Bev?”

“She thinks you’re going to turn her daughter into a rodeo queen.”

Sammy Jo snorted. “Bev’s daughter? Only if she can stay on a horse. And sorry, I can’t picture it.”

“Snob.” He grinned.

“Yeah.” Sammy Jo shrugged, unrepentant. “So, what do you think of the rodeo?”

“I’m getting a charge out of it. I like Coldwater Flats.” He slid a look to the stands. “Your friends waiting for you?”

“I left Josh and Tommy drinking tequila at the High Noon Saloon.”

He absorbed that in silence, and then Sammy Jo thought of Bev waiting for him in the stands. “See ya,” she said.

Cooper walked back to his date. Bev took her drink and chattered about the rodeo, her daughter, and how she wished her soon-to-be ex-husband would stop bothering her. She’d practically invited herself to be his date, and Cooper, feeling oddly lonely, hadn’t turned her away.

Besides, he needed a reason to forget about Sammy Jo. He’d been cold and ruthless and it was eating away at his insides like acid.

“Happy Fourth of July,” Bev suddenly said, leaning upward, eyes shining. Her lips were bare millimeters from his, a deep, luscious rose-pink

But Cooper couldn’t bring himself to do it. With a smile, he murmured, “Happy Fourth of July,” then turned back to the action of the rodeo.

Saturday, promptly at noon, a car pulled up to the front of the house. Groaning, Sammy Jo met them on the gravel strewn front driveway. Emmy Hawkins jumped out, dressed in white jeans and a pink cowboy shirt with long, silvery fringe that jingled and danced as the five-year-old rodeo-queen wannabe ran to Sammy Jo.

“Hello,” Sammy Jo drawled, shaking Emmy’s hand.

“I want a white horse with blue eyes!” she cried.

“Emmy, you take whatever Sammy Jo has,” Bev chided her. Bev wore black slacks and a white blouse. She carefully shook Sammy Jo’s hand, wrist limp as a noodle.

“Emmy knows how to ride with a saddle. I don’t know about this,” she fussed.

Bev clearly was getting cold feet. Sammy Jo could just picture it. Emmy’s father, Roy, probably suggested riding lessons to the little tomboy. Emmy had whooped and hollered and generally annoyed her mother until Bev, pleading a headache, had thrown up her hands and agreed. But clearly, Bev had dressed Emmy. No one who really rode horses wore white.

“You won’t do anything dangerous, now?” Bev asked anxiously.

“Emmy will do only what she’s capable of.”

Bev glanced at her daughter and paled. “Oh, Lord! Look at her!”

The little girl was doing cartwheels on the dusty gravel driveway. Even Sammy Jo was impressed that Emmy seemed to feel no pain in her palms.

Emmy disregarded her mother entirely until Bev was screeching at the top of her lungs. Another car appeared as Bev sought vainly to corral her daughter. Emmy ran and squealed as the newcomer stopped. Sammy Jo felt like groaning again when she recognized Ginny. Ginny climbed from the driver’s side and another little girl, this one as stone-faced and stubborn-looking as Emmy was animated, reluctantly slid across the seat to stand in the hot sun.

“Did Bev tell you I was bringing Van?” Ginny asked by way of greeting.

“She mentioned it.” Ginny had suffered through one abortive marriage. It had been full of turmoil, fights and brawling—or so Sammy Jo had heard—and just when it was ending, Ginny had learned she was pregnant. The father left before the child’s birth and, as they say in the movies, had never been seen or heard from again.

“Van wants to learn trick-riding,” Ginny explained.

Sammy Jo smiled at the little girl who hid behind her mother’s leg and watched Sammy Jo with somber, suspicious eyes. “Van” did not appear to want to learn anything. Sammy Jo had the feeling this trick-riding lesson, as a means to further their daughters’ chances at the rodeo court, was more popularity contest between the mothers than anything else.

Tess’s smoke-belching compact drove up next. “Hi there,” Tess greeted Sammy Jo with a big smile as she helped her daughter, Alex, from the car. “Y’all ready?”

“Raring to go,” Sammy Jo told her dryly. “How about you?” she asked Alex.

Alex’s thumb was firmly stuffed in her mouth. Since this was the child’s usual state of affairs, Sammy Jo grabbed the other hand and led all three girls to the fenced paddock where Pokey, her Shetland, whose irascible temperament could be tamed by succession of sugar cubes, waited under a solitary pine while flicking flies away with his tail.

“Okay, who wants to be first?” Sammy Jo asked, keenly aware of the group of mothers waiting by the fence. Tess would be no problem, but anything could happen with Bev and Ginny. Bev stood apart from Ginny and Tess, brushing dust off her blouse. Sammy Jo and Ginny definitely had their differences, but Bev was in a class by herself.

“I do! I do!” Emmy yelled.

“I do,” Alex echoed in a subdued voice.

Van said nothing. Sammy Jo smiled at her. “Don’t you want a ride?”

“No.” Van was perfectly clear on that.

“Okay, Emmy, let’s set you on Pokey.” Sammy Jo picked up the little girl and plumped her onto the bareback saddle, a thick foam pad covered with heavy-duty yellow cotton. It saved the uninitiated from the soreness of real bareback riding and got the saddle out of the way.

Sammy Jo led Emmy around in a circle. The little girl squirmed and kicked and begged Pokey to speed up, but the Shetland listened only to Sammy Jo—and the call of the sugar cubes.

“I want to stand up!” Emmy cried. “Stand up!”