The Sweet Spot (27 page)

“Sure thing, Charla Rae.”

“And another thing. I’m taking half the responsibility
for running this operation. If you don’t like it, you can get happy in the same pants
you got mad in.”

His smile cranked up a few watts. “That’s great, but as I see it, you’ve already done
that. Been doin’ a good job too.”

She narrowed her eyes. He looked back, relaxed, open. Sincere. The last of her anger
whooshed out of her in a rush, its boiling heat melting all her starch. Her shoulders
slumped. She tipped her head and squinted down at him. “Who
are
you?”
And what are you up to?

He chuckled. After setting aside the bridle, he lifted a clean towel from the pile
beside him, snapped out the wrinkles, and laid it on the opposite end of the hay bale.
He patted it. “Sit down, Char. You look flat tuckered.”

She sank onto the contrived seat, as far from him as possible. “It’s been a long morning.”

She put her head in her hands, almost dizzy from the hot-flash mood shift. “It’s just
that everything keeps…
changing
.”

“That’s true enough.” Jimmy turned to her, his shoulder resting on the stall behind
him as he studied her. “Char, I’m proud to have a partner as savvy as you.”

“Don’t you dare patronize me, James Benton.”

“For such a smart woman, I swear.” He shook his head. “Charla, you’re much better
with the calves than I am. This year’s crop has more solid growth and weight on them
than they ever have. What are you doing different?”

She blinked. “I gave them some love and fed them the vitamins I found on a shelf in
the tack room.”

He tipped his hat back and scratched his forehead. “I bought that last year, but they
won’t eat it.”

She couldn’t help it. Her lips twitched. “They will if you mix it in molasses.”

“Now there, see? I didn’t think of that.” He raised his knee and rested it on the
bale. “No one person can do it all, Char. Ever wonder why you don’t see many unmarried
ranchers? Back when Benje was little, the only reason I could take the PBR announcer
gig is because you were home, holding down the fort.”

“Yes, but now—” A whisper of despair echoed down her awareness, and her jaw locked,
midsentence.

Jimmy must have heard it. He jumped in. “Now you’ve got some time to help with the
operation, and like it or not, you and I are partners.” He slapped his hands on his
thighs and leaned in, too close. “With all these brains, talent, and hard work, we’re
going to make PBR stock contractor of the year one of these days. See if we don’t.”

He straightened and stood, resettling his hat, his eyes holding hers all the while.
“Had you forgotten? We’ve always made a great team, Charla.”

Regret lay etched in the furrows bracketing his mouth. Lines that weren’t there last
year. She wasn’t the only one who had suffered. “Yeah, Jimmy, we did.” It came out
in a whisper.

A slice of sun hit his cheek, highlighting the silver in the beard stubble. His gaze
lingered, considering, before he spun on his heel and strolled out of the barn whistling.

Thanks to the blazing light, his silhouette stayed burned on her corneas long after
he was gone. No matter what he’d said, Jimmy hired Rosa for her. He had no more money
than she, but he’d sacrificed to make her life easier.

Did she dare trust that softened spot on her freezer-burned heart?

Rosa glanced from her book as Char walked into the great room. Her father snored softly
in the La-Z-Boy beside her rocker. “How was church, Charla?”

“Enlightening. But not in a religious sense.” She smiled down at her father. In sleep,
the confused look he wore most often nowadays melted away, leaving instead an almost
cherubic peacefulness.

“You can relax, Rosa. I know that Jimmy hired you.” The rest came out in a rush. “I’ll
be paying you from now on, but I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry. This must have
been so uncomfortable for you. Why on earth did you agree to it?”

Rosa watched her with bright sparrow eyes. “I had my doubts, I will admit. Then, when
I came out that night, you so obviously needed help. I couldn’t say no.”

Char lifted the dirty teacup from the table. “Yes, Daddy was getting to the point
that—”

“I’m not talking about your father, Charla. I’m talking about you.”

The teacup chattered in the saucer, and she covered it with her other hand to make
it stop.

“Can I speak freely?”

Why do people ask that? Once asked, it’s impossible to say no.
Char nodded.

“I work with people every day who, because of disease, have lost their ability to
communicate. They fall out of the current of society, to live on the shadowed edges.
You’re not so different from them, Charla. Except you’ve chosen the backwaters.” Rosa
set the chair to rocking, but her gaze never wavered. “I’ve been here for months now,
long enough to see that you have people who love you
standing by, waiting to help. And yet you shut them out.” The rocker stilled. “Why
do you do that?”

Char set the teacup back on the table. It made it easier to pace, with her hands empty.

“I’ve had to work through some things… inside myself, before it felt safe to let anyone
in. I’m doing better with that now and—”

“Do you feel guilty, Charla?”

Her heart faltered, skittered, then settled in a gallop that thrummed in her ears.
A strangled sob burst from her throat before it clamped shut. The stunned echo of
the question that no one had yet asked hung lingering in the quiet room. This was
the monolith that had risen from stinking mudflats left behind as the tide of anger
had receded. Behind the blockage in her throat, emotion built, pressing up from her
core, filling her chest with a seething, restless heat.

Rosa reached to touch her. “You know that it is natural to feel this?”

Char jerked away. “I know. They told us about it in the grief group. I’ve read about
it in a book I have too.” She tightened her lips, trying to put words to the Gordian
knot she’d worked at until her mind frayed. She touched two fingers to her forehead.
“I have it here.” She swallowed back the pressure below her throat. Her chest felt
swollen with it, hot to the touch. “But my heart isn’t buying it.”

Rosa cocked her head. “Then is Jimmy guilty as well?”

Char reared back, stunned. “Of course not!”

“Why not? He was on the property that day, right?”

Rosa’s soft words hammered her heart.
How could anyone think it was Jimmy’s fault?
Char heard a familiar
buzzing in her head and an itch in her brain that only Valium would assuage. The buzz
increased to the manic humming she remembered from the day of the funeral. Terrified,
she squeezed her eyes shut and covered her ears to block it out. A touch at her shoulder
startled a wail from her throat. “But I was his MOTHER!” The blockage in her throat
gone, the pent-up sobs burst from her mouth like a confession.

Rosa enfolded her into her arms, and Char clung, terrified by the howling wind raging
inside.

“Come on, JB, a badass cowboy like you can do better than that.” Dana stood in front
of the tilted sit-up board, stopwatch in hand, barking like a drill sergeant.

Squeezing his eyes shut to block the sting of sweat, he tried not to grunt as he forced
his shaking stomach muscles to finish one last sit-up. “One fifty.” He grabbed the
bar anchoring his feet and sat up, panting.

“A six-pack of muscle would be easier to develop if you didn’t drink the other kind,
you know.” She dropped a towel over his head.

When he’d first moved in with the Galts, he’d thought Dana had bought the gym for
a steady revenue stream. She’d corrected that misguided opinion right off. The woman
was obsessed with fitness, and no politician ever stumped harder for a cause. It started
with a raised eyebrow when he opened a beer with Wiley at night. Then there were the
subtle-as-a-hammer fitness sermons, spouted whenever she cornered him long enough
to listen. When she’d started serving turkey burgers and tofu salad for dinner, he
cried uncle and agreed to a workout.

Funny thing though. He was starting to see the draw.
Timing his workout in the late-morning lull, he and Dana were often the gym’s only
patrons. He pulled the towel off his head and wiped his sweaty face. “Six-pack? I
drink one beer a night and you know it.”

“Yeah, but herbal tea would be so much better for you.”

“Jesus, woman. You’ve got me down here working out three times a week. Hang it up,
Dana. You’re not turning me into some simpering city dude, getting my nails buffed
and my body hair waxed.” He glanced at his profile in the mirrored wall surrounding
the workout room. In a pair of sweats and a T-shirt with the sleeves torn off, he
was hardly the height of fitness fashion. “Besides, you have to admit, this old body
is looking better than when I showed up, fat and bedraggled, on your doorstep.”

She tilted her head and studied him. “The fat is gone, I’ll give you that. Speaking
to that bedraggled part, how’s it going with Charla?”

His hands clenched at the seemingly innocent question. He knew Dana better. Between
the aerobics and weight-lifting sessions, he’d found her a good listener. Not to mention
her good insight into the mysterious turnings of the feminine brain. He draped the
towel over the back of his neck and moved on to the quad machine. “It’s not. She’s
as skittish as a mustang filly, and she tends to take everything I say the wrong way.”
He slid the weight peg down two slots, settled his feet on the vertical platform,
and pushed, liking the feel of his muscles bunching. “I’ve tried being subtle, I’ve
tried being up front. She always finds a way to skirt around a deep discussion, much
less let me ask her out.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard your ‘big move, small move’ theory, JB.” Dana tapped his foot, and
he shifted it a bit to the
right. “Slow the reps a bit.” She crossed her arms on her chest and waited. “Are you
asking my opinion?”

The muscles in his neck strained, and his leg muscles burned. “Damn, woman, you’ve
got me sounding like a guest on
Dr. Phil
as it is. Jump in anytime.”

“Well, I’d never offer an unsolicited opinion, but since you asked…” She sat on the
trapezius machine next to him and leaned in, elbows on knees. “JB, this woman has
listened to you talk for what, twenty years?”

“And your point?”

She rolled her eyes. “You guys kill me. The key to having a woman fall in love with
you is so simple. We tell you what it is all the time, and so few of you get it. Why
is that?”

He grunted. “Are we having a philosophical Mars/Venus discussion here, or are you
going to tell me?”

Dana sighed and did the hair-flip thing. Did they teach all the girls that in junior
high? Must have, because every woman he’d ever been around had it down cold.

“In a word, communication.” She sat back, smug, as if she’d delivered the Holy Grail.

Clang!
He let the weight down hard and glared at up her.

“JB, you
cheated
on her.” She held up a hand to silence his protest. “Oh, I know, you moved out before
any bonking commenced. And maybe in a man’s mind that carries weight. But as far as
Char is concerned, you and Jess might as well have been doing it in Charla’s bed.
Don’t you see? It’s about trust. And you betrayed her in every way possible.”

He ducked his head and fiddled with the weight selector. “Yeah, I see. Look, I know
I screwed up.” He
stopped fiddling and met her gaze. “Sincerely, I do.” He grabbed the ends of the towel
around his neck in his fists, to have something to hang onto. “But even murderers
can be pardoned. I’ve apologized. I’ve tried to make her understand how bad I feel
about making things worse for her.” He winced, remembering the ragged scarecrow he’d
glimpsed the day he’d brought Mitzi to pick up the bulls. The downhill slide had been
so evident in Charla’s haunted eyes and ravaged body, it had frightened him. “I was
an idiot. I’d give anything if I could go back and make it unhappen. But—”

“Yeah, JB, you told her.” Dana addressed the ceiling. “And like I said, she’s heard
you talk for twenty years.” Dana studied him as if he were a slow four-year-old. “She’s
not listening, JB. Not anymore.”

Her level stare made him cringe, and he wasn’t sure why. “That’s what I’ve been trying
to tell you!”

“She’s not listening, JB. She’s
watching
.” She let that zinger sink in. “Women are tough, but we’re vulnerable. No one can
hurt us worse than someone we’ve allowed close. You snuggled up next to her heart
and settled in for all those years.”

He felt sure she didn’t know that her hand stole up to cover her heart. “Then you
took out the knives and diced it up into little pieces.”

“I’m not saying that Char will let you in again. I’m not saying she won’t. I do know
the only way to get close is for her to trust you.”

“Hell, Dana, I’m forty years old. I don’t have enough time for that!”

The serious fled with her sunny smile. “JB, you just made me feel better about you.
If you understand that,
there may be hope for your black soul yet.” She stood. “You need to show her that
you’re worthy of trust. And I’m not talking flowers and hyperbole. I can’t tell you
how.” She touched her fingers to her chest. “That has to come from here.”

“A woman holds as great a capacity for forgiveness as she does for love.” Dana’s doe
eyes softened as she took a step and touched her fingers to his cheek. “Charla knows
you’re a good man. You only need to remind her of what she’s forgotten.”

D
innng!
Char’s hand jerked at the sound of the doorbell. Her finger brushed the metal spike
at the middle of the hot roller. “Dang it!” She shook her hand to cool it, then inspected
the angry mark. “Who the heck?” She glanced in the mirror. Rollers covered the left
side of her head, the right side lay flat and lifeless. Her pre-makeup face shone
ghastly in the fluorescent light. The terry zip-front robe covered her from neck to
ankle but was hardly fit for company.
Dinnng!