“Maybe we’d best see if I’m indicted for murder before we think about us or the future,” she said. That could have a huge bearing on whether he’d ever see the color of her eyes again.
He covered her hand with his. “I do not believe you killed Conrad. I just have to find who did so that you are cleared.”
“Thank you for that. Now let’s talk about today and whether the chili in this place is as good as what you make. Or we can talk about how much I adore Gracie and really would steal her if I could figure out a way to do it legally.”
“Whatever you want to talk about is fine with me. Hell, woman, you could read that menu backward to me,” he said.
“Now that’s a pickup line if I ever heard one.” She laughed. “When we finish eating, would you mind if I did some shopping?”
“Darlin’, I’ll sit outside the dressing room door and enjoy the show as you try on clothing. Think you could model one pair of jeans for me?”
“It could be arranged.” She nodded. Jeans? She hadn’t bought jeans in years. She worked in power suits, and when she was at home, she wore sweatpants and T-shirts. It might be fun to try on a pair and maybe some boots. If she was going to work on a ranch in the wintertime, she would need boots.
Where in the hell did that thought come from? She almost gasped.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Is my mama going to die?” Gracie asked Amanda over breakfast the next morning.
“Of course not! Why would you ask that?” Amanda frowned.
“My daddy just up and died. He didn’t tell me he was going to die, and if my mama is going to die, will my Mama Rita take care of me? Will I have to go back to Dallas and leave the cabin?”
“Your mama would have told us if that was happening, don’t you think?”
“My daddy didn’t tell me anything. I wish I could stay here forever.” Gracie propped her elbows on the table and rested her chin in her hands. “I didn’t like that funeral. Everyone was so sad and then after the preacher finished, everyone was mad. Mama was really mad until we came here and now she is happy. I don’t ever want to live in our old house again, because she might be mad like that again.”
“We were all mad. So was Kate and so was I,” Amanda said.
Gracie went back to eating. “You’d tell me the truth if my mama was going to die, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes, I would,” Amanda said.
“Would you tell me if Kate was going to die?” Gracie asked.
“I promise that no one is going to die,” Amanda said. “And if I know they are going to pass away, I’ll tell you. Now let’s finish our breakfast.”
“Okay, but did my daddy die because I didn’t tell him good-bye the last time he came to see me and Mama? Lisa said she wouldn’t tell her mama good-bye when she was sick and she died. Is it our fault?”
Why couldn’t Gracie have gotten up with her mother that day instead of sleeping until almost nine o’clock? That way Jamie would be answering these questions. Amanda wasn’t a mother, not yet. A little voice in her head reminded her that she would someday have to answer more questions than these. Her child would want to know why the other kids had a father and she didn’t. What had happened to him and could she see pictures.
“No, darlin’, your daddy did not die because you didn’t tell him good-bye. Some really bad men killed him.”
“Why?” Gracie’s eyes widened. “I heard all y’all talking about it, but why? I want to know why bad men killed my daddy, but everyone talks in whispers or in big-people talk when I’m there.”
Amanda hauled her heavy body up from the chair and hugged Gracie, then took her by the hand and led her to the sofa. “You didn’t have anything at all to do with your daddy’s death.”
“Promise?” Gracie snuggled in close to Amanda.
“Cross my heart.”
Gracie held up her hand. “Pinky swear and I will believe you.”
Amanda laced her smallest finger with Gracie’s. “I do hereby pinky swear.”
Gracie giggled. “That sounds funny.”
Sighing with relief, Amanda nodded.
Kate and Waylon were on the way from plowing fields all morning to the ranch house when Waylon hung back to answer the phone. She went on into the house and washed up in the bathroom. When she came out, he was still talking, and from all the gesturing, it was not a good conversation. She knew anger when she saw it.
He was probably mad about something with the investigation or with his paperwork concerning when he could leave the precinct permanently. It had nothing to do with her, she hoped. She kept walking right out the front door without looking back over her shoulder.
When she parked in front of the cabin, her phone pinged with a text from Waylon: Can we talk?
She turned off the engine and typed: For what and why?
The return message said: Meet me at the dock?
She sent back: One hour in the church parking lot.