Page 27 of The Soldier and the Cowboy

“Would you like to prove it on Friday?” he asked.

“I…” she froze, realizing he’d bested and trapped her. Shesighed, resigned. “Fine.”

“That’s the spirit, Major. I’ll pick you up at seven. You don’t have to wear a dress, but I’d clean the mud off your face a bit.”

“I’ll go do that now,” she said, escaping inside before he tricked her into dinner with him.

“Looks like you did your homework,” Cal commented.

“You gotta know your audience, Cal,” Sully agreed, tipping his hat. “That’s my new and improved A-game, by the way.”

“Best of luck to you and yours,” Cal said, tossing the football up in the air and catching it handily a few times.

“You worried?” Sully asked.

“Do I look it?” Cal asked. “Dances are a young man’s game.”

“What’s an old man’s game?”

“When I figure it out, I’ll let you know,” Cal promised.

“I used to watch you play ball when I was a kid, Cal. Some of my earliest memories are watching you tear it up on the field. You were something else.” He motioned to the group of boys standing behind him. “I gotta say, I like you better now.” He held his hands up for the ball.

“Me, too,” Cal agreed, lobbing him an easy pass.

“Are we okay?” Sully asked, tossing it back.

Cal caught the ball and turned his hand to show Sully his ring. “I’ve still got this, don’t I?” He tossed the ball back.

“And when you don’t, what happens then?” Sully asked, catching the ball and tossing it back.

“I can hardly imagine,” Cal said.

Sully caught the ball and held it, scanning the horizon before he spoke. “You be careful, Cal. Isabel is…things aren’t good.”

“I can handle Isabel. I’ve been doing it the last ten years,” Cal said.

“This time’s different. It’s a bad time to get a guard girl,” he said.

“Bailey can handle herself,” Cal assured him.

“Maybe she can handle herself in a war with a platoon of men backing her up, but this is Texas. She’s all alone and rules don’t apply,” Sully said, finally tossing the ball.

Cal handed it off to the group of boys behind him, indicating with a nod of his head for them to run off. Two of them were Estralita’s grandsons. The others he wasn’t exactly certain where they came from or how much English they understood. They were nice kids, but without knowing who their relatives were, he couldn’t trust them completely.

“I trust Bailey. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t keep her here.”

“You sure that’s why you’re keeping her here, Cal? Because of trust?” Sully pressed.

“Why else, Sullivan?”

“Can’t think of a reason, Calhoun. See y’all Friday.”

Cal crossed his arms over his chest and watched him drive away, a vague sense of foreboding filling his chest. He felt Sully had been trying to warn him about something, but what? Or, as with rams, had it been merely the jousting of two males over the attention of an eligible female? He’d been away from the game so long it was hard to tell.

He turned toward the house and felt the telltale pain of a strained muscle in his hip. Reluctantly he admitted he had put a bit too much of himself into the game, not only because he wanted to win but because he wanted to impress Bailey. And now he was paying the price, proving it was possible to be old in body and young in stupidity. On the other hand, it was good to know despite his age, some things remained the same. Once stupid for women, always stupid for women; the consistency was heartening.

Chapter 12

---