“It’s not a date and it’s not every week,” Jennie Sue protested.
“Thank goodness,” Cricket snapped, and then changed her tone. “Lettie, darlin’, come over here and sit with us girls. Those guys are all plannin’ Rick’s stand idea.” Cricket turned back to Jennie Sue. “I intend to put out the news that y’all had a big argument at the market and you’ve broken off your relationship.”
“Kind of difficult to break something off that hasn’t even begun.” Jennie Sue’s tone could be every bit as cold as her mother’s.
“That’s not what the talk in town says—I’m nippin’ it in the bud,” Cricket said.
“Be careful,” Lettie said in all seriousness. “You might cause a bigger problem than if you let the whole thing die in its sleep. We all know that they’re just friends, and pretty soon everyone else will know it, too.”
Cricket changed the subject without commenting on Lettie’s advice. “So what’s our book for next month?”
“I’d like to do a mystery this time. Maybe the newest Sue Grafton?” Nadine offered.
“How about instead of the newest, we go back and do the first one, A Is for Alibi, and then do one of her newer ones and compare them?” Cricket suggested.
Jennie Sue didn’t like to read mysteries, and right then, she wasn’t too fond of Cricket. She’d just invent an excuse not to go to the book-club meeting the next month. Maybe by then she’d have a lead on a new job in Dallas or Austin.
Rick tossed and turned for an hour after he crawled into bed. Finally, he got up, made himself a cup of hot chocolate, and carried it back to his room. Cricket was in a snit, but then, she’d never liked Jennie Sue. She might come around someday, but maybe not. It didn’t matter anyway. He could be friends, even long-distance friends, with Jennie Sue, whether his sister was or not.
When he awoke before daylight the next morning, he tiptoed around in the house so that he didn’t wake his sister. Elaine had offered Cricket a ride, but she wouldn’t show until a bit before nine o’clock. While he was being considerate, he also didn’t want another lecture. He just wanted to spend the day with Jennie Sue.
He loaded his truck bed, and an hour later, he parked in Lettie’s driveway, expecting to go up to the door and knock. But Jennie Sue came out of the shadows and got into the truck before he could even shut off the engine.
“Hello. Don’t you just love the smell of early morning?” She held up a brown paper bag. “I brought a thermos of coffee and biscuits stuffed with sausage. They’re those kind you buy in the frozen-food department, but I promise I cooked the sausage all by myself.”
“Hey, any woman who can cook biscuits without burning them is a star in my book.”
She opened up a plastic container and handed him one. “Don’t judge until you’ve tasted it.”
“Mmm.” He made appreciative noises at the first bite. “Amazing. You are now invited to go with me every Saturday that you want. I’ll even throw in an extra cantaloupe for the breakfast.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” she said. “But don’t pencil me in for every Saturday. The ladies could need me to drive them somewhere, and I sure wouldn’t want to take Cricket’s job.”
They ate in silence all the way to the market, where Rick backed his truck up to his regular stall. Jennie Sue was out of the vehicle and had the tailgate down before he could join her.
“So we put some of each on the table and then keep it replenished as the day goes on, right?” She was already filling one of the small baskets with tomatoes.
“You sure you haven’t done this before?” He picked up two huge watermelons and set them at the back of the wooden shelf.
“Nope, but I loved going to the market with Mabel when I was a little kid. I used to play farmers market at home after we’d been. This is going to be a fun day,” she told him.
Why oh why did she have to be so perfect in every way and so determined to leave Bloom? They were becoming friends, and there was a possibility that could lead to more.
Maybe.
Chapter Eight
Dill sat across the booth from Jennie Sue in the Main Street Café. They’d both ordered the chicken-fried steak special that Sunday afternoon. She didn’t mind the silence between them, yet with her father’s expression and the way he kept sighing, it wasn’t hard to guess that he had something on his mind.
“Spit it out, Daddy.” She pushed her empty plate back. “You’ve got something on your mind. So let’s clear the air and then go on to more fun things to talk about. I’m dying to tell you all about the farmers’ market and how much fun I had at the book club on Friday night.”
His gaze locked with hers across the table. “Your mother is mortified about what you are doing.”
“And you?” Jennie Sue asked.
“It’s complicated.”
She shook her head. “You don’t get to use that. It’s my generation’s go-to, not yours.”
He laid his paper napkin on the plate, picked up a half-empty glass of sweet tea, and took a sip. “But in this case, it’s the only word that describes the problem. Everything about your mother is complicated.”
“And you?”
“The same.”
“From the beginning?” she asked. “Were you both this complicated when you first got married?”
Dill nodded. “My grandfather Eugene Dillard Baker founded the Baker Oil Company, and it did very well in the days of the oil boom here in Texas.”
“So I get a history lesson?” She raised an eyebrow.
“You get the undercurrent of what it really means when I say it’s complicated. Listen and learn. So Gene turns over the company to my father, Robert Dillard, your grandfather Bob, who died when you were a toddler. The bottom fell out of the company, and we were struggling to keep afloat about the time that I finished college. The Wilshires stepped up and were willing to plow a lot of money into the company, but there was a catch—I had to marry your mother. With the marriage, she would retain eighty percent of the company.”
“I didn’t know they did that kind of thing thirty years ago.” She could hardly believe her ears.
“Honey, even these days they still do,” he sighed.
“Percy? Did you pay Percy?” That would explain a lot.
He nodded. “Not me. I was against it. I kind of liked that boy you brought home from college, but your mama said that she wasn’t havin’ a son-in-law that was constantly trying to analyze her with his psychology stuff, and besides, she thought you could do better. So Charlotte met Percy at some fund-raiser and pushed him toward you with the promise of investing in his sagging diamond business. She lost a good chunk of money when he took off.”
“She gave him money to marry me?” Jennie Sue’s voice sounded like her mother’s, even in her own ears.
“Not exactly. She kind of pushed him toward you, and then when he started to back off, she had a talk with him and—dammit, Jennie Sue, I wouldn’t have any part of it. But he said he wanted to support you in the style you were used to, and so your mother wrote him a check to buy into the diamond partnership with his cousin.”
Dill looked absolutely miserable.
“So basically, when you get right down to brass tacks, they came to an agreement. Did he propose before or after she gave him the check?”
He hesitated.
“It can’t get much worse. I guess somewhere down deep in my heart, I knew all along that something wasn’t right. Tell me,” she demanded in a shrill voice.
“After it cleared the bank,” Dill said. “In Charlotte’s defense, she wanted to be sure you were taken care of properly. Don’t be angry.”
“Oh, the naive ship already sailed, Daddy. I’m really, really mad, and I don’t know when I’ll be over it,” she said. Tears welled up, but she’d be damned to hell before she’d let anyone see her cry. Not over this pile of crap. For the first time in her life, Jennie Sue felt like throwing something at a nearby wall.
Dill had trouble looking her in the eye. “You shouldn’t know it now, but maybe it will help you understand the way things are.”