“Sounds good to me,” she said. “Good night, Blake.”
He tipped his hat brim toward her and whistled all the way to the truck.
Allie took a deep breath and pushed the door open to find both her mother and Lizzy sitting on the bottom step of the staircase. She exhaled slowly and smiled brightly.
“I guess you heard the news,” she said.
“You could have told us yourself,” Katy said. “Not that it’s a big surprise but to announce it like that, are you crazy?”
“No, I’m weak. Ask Lizzy if you don’t believe me.”
Lizzy rose to her feet. “Are you doing this so you have an excuse not to go out with Grady?”
Allie put her foot on the first step of the staircase. “I’m dating Blake, plain and simple, and if you would please relay that to Grady so he’ll leave me alone, I will love you forever. And Lizzy, the next time you call me weak, you might do well to remember this night.”
“I know I’ve been mean but it’s only because I worry about you and I’m sorry,” Lizzy said.
“Alora, are you sure about this?” Katy asked.
“I am, Mama and Lizzy, thanks for the concern. Family is always there when friends and marriages collapse and Lizzy, we’ll be here for you no matter what, just like y’all are for me,” Allie said and then went straight to her room and shut the door. She removed her clothing down to her underpants and pulled on a soft night shirt before slipping between the covers.
She’d made the first call in saying that she and Blake were in a real relationship when she didn’t know if they were or not. She’d changed the whole course of her world in a single night and now she had to face the consequences. She turned the switch on a bedside lamp, putting the room in soft shadows. She’d had more fun this past couple of weeks than she’d had in her whole life. What she and Blake had might not last forever but she’d never know if she didn’t give it a shot. And besides, Allie liked her life that night. She liked what she was doing and who she was sharing it with and that’s all that mattered. She shut her eyes and dreamed of Blake Dawson.
Chapter Twenty-five
Allie left the Lucky Penny on Wednesday afternoon in a pissy mood. She’d gotten the ceilings in the hallway and the living room bedded and taped, ready for the texturing the next day. That should have made her happy, but it didn’t. She’d spent most of the day in the house all alone without even Shooter to talk to. Call it PMS or just plain old bitchiness, but she was in a horrible mood and hoped that Lizzy and Mitch had already left for midweek church services.
There had been a note beside the coffeepot that morning saying that Deke had a couple of cows delivering calves, so Blake had gone to help with the birthing process. Allie had lived in a rural community her entire life so she understood that friends helped friends.
At lunch she had heated up a bowl of leftover tortilla soup from the day before and ate it at the cabinet straight from the pan. While she was washing the pan, she got a text saying that one calf was on the ground but the other heifer was still in labor. Nothing about missing her or a mention of the date planned for the next night.
Snow fell in big fluffy flakes, melting as soon as it hit the warm van windshield on her way home that evening. The clock on the dash said that it wasn’t even five o’clock yet, which was hard to believe with the darkness surrounding her. She followed Lizzy’s truck and her mother’s car down the lane and they all parked side-by-side right next to the gate leading into the yard.
“I hate snow,” Irene declared as she held tightly to Katy’s arm. “Old people shouldn’t be out in this crap. I’m not leaving the house tomorrow, so y’all best make some plans. I could break a hip in this shit.”
Allie raced ahead and unlocked the door and held it open for her mother and grandmother. Irene was still grumbling about the cold when out of nowhere a snowball hit Allie smack in the side of the face. She slammed the door and whipped around in time to dodge the second one, which hit the house with enough force to send it flying apart and peppering down into her hair.
Lizzy was scrapping up snow around the fence post and patting it together to make another one when Allie bailed off the porch and tackled her, landing them both in the half inch of snow already lying on the ground. She scraped up all she could hold in one fist and smeared it over Lizzy face. Then her sister did a roll and came up with a leg on either side of Allie’s body and pinned her hands down above her head.
“You are right,” she panted.
“About what? That this shit is cold?” Allie laughed for the first time that day.
“No, about needing family. Mitch is leaving for three weeks and I have to give up my honeymoon for God and I’m so pissed I’m not even going to church tonight,” Lizzy said breathlessly.