Page 101 of Nashville Cowboy
“Yup,” Jackson said, shaking Riggs’s hand and throwing a sly look at Eve. “Busy.”
“Boy, that’s the kind of busy I’d like to be,” Riggs said with an equally lazy smile.
Riggs was one of the most eligible bachelors in Stone Ridge and a real catch. Unfortunately, a widower for years, he mostly kept to himself. They chatted for a few more minutes and then Riggs excused himself to join his brothers for a beer.
“Poor sucker,” Jackson said, watching him go. “Any place else and you’d have to peel the women off him. Baby, thanks for sticking with me.”
“Aw.” She patted his cheek and kissed him square on the lips, eliciting a dimpled smile. “You are sowelcome.”
Jackson pulled out his wallet from his back pocket, paid at the bar, then tugged Eve off the stool. “C’mere.”
“Where are we goin’?”
He pulled her out the door, and down the steps to the alley between the Shady Grind and the General Store. “There’s somethin’ I have to see.”
He pinned her to the side of the building, holding her arms tightly to her side.
“What is it you want to see?” she said.
His callused hands slid down her bare arms and came to rest on her waist and then…lower.
“Everything.” A single dimple flashed, and she might have climaxed. “If that’s okay with you.”
“I think you know that you have an all-access pass.”
Chapter 33
Lillian wrung her hands together. “Oh, Albert! What have I done? He’s leavin’ us again and I’m about to lose them both.”
Albert lay on the couch, arms crossed behind his neck, boots propped on the couch pillow as he watched his favorite John Wayne movie. Lillian had put it on for him and sure enough, two seconds later, he’d shown up. Her old man loved his westerns. Maybe he wasn’t really “here” among the living but interesting how old habits never died.
“Serves you right interferin’ the way you done. Now Eve’s probably leavin’. What a fine mess you’ve made.”
Just the thought of that precious child she’d come to love like one of her own leaving Stone Ridge was enough to make Lillian’s poor old heart want to plum give out.
She paced the living room, clutching her chest. “I might be comin’ to be with you sooner than we both thought.”
Albert pushed back his Stetson and rolled his eyes. “Woman, stop. You’re not joinin’ me just yet.”
“How do you know?” Lillian clutched her heart. “I swear it hurts so much right here somethin’ must be givin’ out.”
“That’s a good kind of hurt. Reminds you that you’re still alive.”
“Well, I’d rather be dead. Worked so hard to get those two back together, and now they’re both leavin’ me.”
“You don’t know that.”
Lillian could tell that Eve wanted to be with Jackson but was afraid. And all of Stone Ridge could take the blame for that. Because Brenda, Hank, Lillian, Sadie, Lincoln, and the entire town had become her safe place after the attack. They’d coddled her. She’d only felt safe here where she knew almost everyone, including the good and protective men of Stone Ridge that she’d known most of her life. In Nashville, life would be different.
She’d be in a larger city again, maybe even some triggers would rise up, and she might be miserable. And even with all that, Lillian saw clearly in Eve’s eyes that she wanted to be with Jackson, no matter what. She just needed a little push to get past that last wall of fear, but surely Lillian shouldn’t be expected to be the one to do this. That was asking too much. Leave that one to Brenda, or Sadie. They probably had stronger hearts, anyway.
All Lillian had ever wanted was to have her entire family surrounding her. They had enough land not to be crowding each other. Room for every Carver grandchild to build a house and fill it with her great-grandchildren. Why were kids always growing up, everything always changing, and people always leaving? She yearned for the security of knowing exactly where her little chickens were every night. Back in the old days, when all three were underfoot making messes everywhere they went, she’d taken it all for granted.
A Texas storm had kicked up suddenly in the early afternoon and the wind now battered against the willow trees. A sudden flash of lighting with the resulting crack seconds later had Lillian jumping out of her skin. Lord have mercy. Speaking of her heart! Albert was gone after the flash, like he’d been a figment of her imagination all along. In that terrifying moment, she feared he wouldn’t be back.
Not even in her dreams.
And she was alone now,reallyalone.
