Page 59 of Love and Loathing

“Then we’re done here.” Jessie hung up. “Agh! Now I know where he gets his argumentative side.”

Grandpa Bo came down the aisle and picked up the magazine she’d thrown down. “You all right, sugar? That sounded like a real heated conversation.”

“Alex’s mom just warned me away from him.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “Apparently I’m not good enough for her son. She hasn’t even met me, for crying out loud.”

Grandpa Bo stared his nose down at her. “I hope you didn’t put up with that.”

She lifted her chin and gave him a little grin. “Nope.”

He chucked her in the arm. “That’s my girl. Now,” he said, getting serious. “Do you like this boy?”

She let out a breath that she felt like she’d been holding and nodded.

He handed her the magazine. “Then make him some Brunswick stew. Worked for grandma.” He winked at her, and she burst out laughing.

She walked over to the trash can and threw the magazine in the bin. Alex wasn’t like his Ma said. Not at all. And they weren’t a couple. She’d turned him down flat, and she’d been harsh in doing it too. If he was together with Roxy again, it would make sense. But she couldn’t worry about that now. Her phone beeped.

She picked it up and found a text from Charlie.

Charlie: Did you get him?

She frowned. No, she definitely did not.

Jessie: His mom answered.

Charlie: Sweet baby cheeses, are you all right?

Jessie: Hanging in there like a hair on a biscuit. Though you could’ve warned me she breathed fire.

Charlie: First of all, yuck. And second, I didn’t think she’d be there. What did she say to you?

Jessie: Oh, not much, just that I wasn’t good enough for her son—you know, the usual.

Charlie: She did not! Are you okay?

Honestly, not so much.

Jessie: I’m fine. You forget who you’re talking to. Listen, when you see Alex, would you tell him I said thank you? Thank you for the Whitleys.

Charlie: You don’t want to tell him yourself?

Jessie: Maybe someday. Talk to you later.

If he ever came back to Harvest Ranch. She shot a glance toward the trash can and the magazine there. If.

Chapter 23

Several days passed without a word from Alex or Charlie. Jessie had resigned herself to the fact that she would probably only ever see him again in his old films. She sat huddled under blankets in her house that had been air-conditioned to a cool twenty below by Ma, and she worked on this week’s edits for Emma Lee Bradford. She finished up and looked at her phone. It was a quarter to one.

It was Friday, which meant a half day for Caroline at the elementary—she’d be home by one-fifteen at the latest, and then the two of them would veg their I’m-single-and-heartbroken Friday together. It’d become their sad routine the last little while. But Jessie had decided this was the last Friday for it.

She pulled up listings and started sorting through. They would go back to how things were before Young and Beaumont had plowed their way into their lives. They’d been happy then, and they’d be happy again, if they could just get out of this slump. And the first thing they needed to do was get out of this house.

Her phone beeped, alerting her to a text. It was probably Caroline. She hit the heart button on a house she kind of liked, so she could come back to it, and picked up her phone. There was a text from Alex. She jumped, of all the ridiculous things to do. She set her phone down, stared at it, then picked it up again, took a deep breath, and opened it.

Alex: Cotton-Eyed Mo’s.

Tonight.

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