LITMIR.BIZ

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and set them on a cold burner.

      Mary sat up. “Shots? Why would I?”

      “Mr. Tanner’s bull got in with Jason’s cows. He went over that way with his Winchester.”

      The older woman leaned forward to light a cigarette, ignoring Kate’s disapproving gaze. “I’ll die of something one day,” she said before her daughter could protest. “Turn on the fan and it won’t bother you. Jason took a gun after Henry Tanner?”

      “After the bull. It was on his land.” Kate pursed her lips. “We’ve been invited to a steak dinner. Guess who’s providing the steak.”

      “Mr. Tanner, no doubt. Well, Jason’s attorneys have had a slack month, they need the business.”

      “Mother!”

      Mary studied her daughter curiously. “How do you know about all this?”

      “Jason got hurt and they sent for me. I got him to the doctor and patched up, and the bull was discovered about the time I was getting ready to leave.” She shook her head as she poured iced tea into thick glasses, taking time to sip one so that it didn’t overflow. “Sheila was screaming her head off. It didn’t even slow him down.”

      “That’s nothing new. Poor Sheila. Poor Mr. Tanner.” She stood up and stretched. “I wonder what Jason’s going to do when you go off to be a famous designer?” she wondered aloud. “I expect he’ll die from lack of medical care because everybody else around San Frio is scared to death of him.”

      “You could take over for me,” Kate teased.

      Mary’s eyes bulged. “Not me. I like living. I hope you didn’t put too much cumin in that taco casserole.”

      “Only half a cup, isn’t that what you put?” Kate asked with a blank smile.

      “If you poison me, I’ll tell Mr. Rogers to throw your designs out the window.”

      “Okay, I’ll behave. Sit down and eat something. You’re going to blow away.”

      “I’m a good size. I can walk through a harp sideways.”

      Kate turned away to flip the switch on the old rusted table fan that her father had bought when she was just a baby. There was no money for a new one, not even a cheap new one. But money, Kate reasoned, had never made anybody happy by itself. She’d rather have her mother and friends like Jason any day than a bankroll.

      “You’re very quiet tonight,” Mary remarked as they finished off the small casserole and homemade Mexican corn-bread Kate had cooked with it.

      Kate linked her hands around her coffee cup. “Well, I’ve been thinking.”

      “About what?”

      About Jason, she could have said, and that he almost kissed her today. But that was a memory too precious to share, even with her mother.

      Smiling, she tilted the cup and watched the ripples move with the overhead light that hung from the ceiling. The kitchen was worn, like the rest of the house. The walls needed painting. They were a dirty unpleasant yellow, and the gold and green linoleum on the sloping floor was torn in places and cracked in others. The stove was almost as old as Kate, and the sink had stains that nothing would get out. Faded yellow curtains hung over the windows, their miserable condition reflecting the stains on the ceiling where a leaking roof had left its mark before its haphazard repair. The house was falling apart, and there was no money for maintenance. Kate wondered sometimes what she and Mary would do if the roof fell in or the floor gave way. She’d seen some winged ants just yesterday. If they were termites, even now the house could be under a death sentence. The only new thing in the place was the new zigzag sewing machine that Jason had given her last Christmas, and it was the first thing she’d have saved if the house had caught fire.

      “I said, what are you thinking about?” Mary prodded as she flicked an ash into the cracked glass ashtray with Phoenix, Arizona in faded letters in its gray-caked center.

      Kate looked up. “About if the house is going to fall around our ears.”

      Mary’s thin shoulders lifted and fell. “It’s lasted fifty years already. I guess it’s got a few more in it. And we can always cry on Jason’s shoulder if things get desperate. God bless him, he’ll do something.”

      “We shouldn’t depend on him too much, Mama,” Kate said, her tone hesitant.

      “Why not? He doesn’t mind, honey.”

      “I mind.”

      Mary grimaced. “Katy, pride won’t satisfy hunger or fix leaking roofs.”

      “I know that.” She sipped coffee. “But it’s not right, to always be asking him for things.”

      “Did something happen today? Did the two of you argue?” Mary probed.

      Kate laughed nervously. “When have Jason and I ever argued?”

      That seemed to be a relief to the older woman. She smiled. “Silly thought, wasn’t it? It amazes me, the things he’ll let you get away with.”

      “Like taking him to the doctor?” Kate smiled back. “He likes me.”

      “You like him, too, don’t you?”

      “Stop digging, Sherlock Holmes,” the younger woman said firmly and got up to wash the supper dishes. “You won’t find romance. I’m not Jason’s type. He’ll want a society girl who can organize business dinners and act sophisticated for his rich friends. I’m just his late foreman’s daughter and he feels sorry for me.”

      “Rich men have married poor girls before,” Mary said doggedly. A match between Kate and Jason was the dream of her life, and the source of the only arguments she and Kate ever had. Mary had been poor since childhood. She wanted a way out of the rut, at least for Kate.

      “I don’t want to marry Jason,” Kate replied. She ran water in the sink. It wasn’t the whole truth, but she didn’t dare confess to Mary that she was madly in love with their rich neighbor and would give her left arm to live with him. There was some truth in what she’d said about Jason’s future bride, anyway—that he’d want a society girl. She’d never thought about Jason getting married, but inevitably, he would. He’d want an heir for the Diamond Spur. And, although it hurt to admit it, a poor girl like Kate would never fit into his world.

      “If only we could afford some fancy clothes for you,” Mary moaned. “I’m sure he’d noticed you if you had pretty things to wear. Not that these things you sew yourself aren’t pretty,” she was quick to add. She was proud of her daughter’s accomplishments, but some nice store-bought things would catch a rich man’s eye even better.

      Mary couldn’t know that Jason had noticed Kate. Her eyes went dreamy as she relived that unexpected and exciting interlude in the field, felt his arm around her, felt the warm and vibrant urging of his hard mouth, his body. She was aware of a new, nagging hunger that made her restless, and hoped that she could hide it from her mother. The last thing in the world she needed was to have her ambitious mother pushing her at Jason. He might be her best friend, but he’d already said that he didn’t want commitment. Her mother could easily cost her his company forever by making it look as if Kate were trying to trap him into marriage.

      “How about some dessert?” Kate hedged. “I made an apple pie.”

      “Well, aren’t you the smart one? I’d love a slice. Make that two slices, I feel like living dangerously.”

      Kate grinned and got down two saucers to put the pie in. Thank goodness for her mother’s appetite. It saved her from a modern Spanish inquisition.

      * * *

      THE NEXT MORNING, Kate rode into San Frio with her mother. She was wearing one of the outfits she’d designed herself—a simple, loose, sky blue blouse with set-in cap sleeves with lots of embroidery in Indian patterns on the square yoke and bodice and sleeves,

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