Page 65 of For Always
But it was too late, Ted was headed around the table. Tyler stood before the man could reach him.
“You’re gonna pay for what you did to her you pampered punk!” Ted yelled in Tyler’s face and grabbed his shirt.
Ted Palmer was a fifty-eight year old man whose diet had consisted of nothing but fried and greasy foods his entire life. The paunch in his belly told that story even if Tyler couldn’t see it in the pallor of his skin and hear it in the congested sound of his breathing. So pushing the older man off him barely required any effort.
Jagger and Alex had also stood, ready to do whatever the situation might call for.
“Get back outside Ted!” the sheriff yelled again. “That’s an order!”
“He’d better,” Clyde said. “This is private property and he’s trespassing.”
“I’ve got a security pass,” Ted said and held it up in Tyler’s face before he continued. “You wanted to get your piece of black ass—that was all fine and dandy. I wasn’t gonna mess up my long-time relationship with your daddy and this ranch because of it. But I’ll be damned if I sit quietly and let you and that woman get away with murdering my babygirl!”
Tyler snatched the pass from Ted’s hand and stepped up to his face. “You can take your business elsewhere, Ted. Westwind doesn’t work with bigots. Now I see where your daughter got her foolish way of thinking. Get off my land now, before I have your ass thrown in jail.”
“Your daddy is tossing in his grave right now! He didn’t have no blacks here except for the working ones!” Ted spat.
“That’s a lie, Ted Palmer and you know it,” Dessie added. “Verna was my best friend for more than thirty years. She was the sweetest woman I ever knew and she was not a racist. Neither was George.”
“Get him out of here, Sheriff,” Tyler said slowly. “Take him off my land before you end up hauling me in for beating the taste out of his racist mouth.”
Ted lunged then, yelling at Gabriella. “This is all your fault, you little slut! All your fault that my girl’s gone!”
Tyler stood firm in front of her and pushed Ted back again, this time with more force. The older man stumbled back and Jagger caught him.
“Time to go old man,” Jagger said as he hauled Ted to the doorway.
Ted continued to yell profanities and racial slurs until Sheriff Alvarez followed him out threatening to cuff him and put him in a cell if he didn’t calm down.
“Well,” Monica said when they were the only ones left in the room again. “I think we’re gonna need something a little stronger than orange juice after that performance.”
“I concur,” Dessie said and headed to the hutch behind the table where there were a few bottles of liquor and glasses. “I’ll pour.”
She’d been thinking about him all afternoon. She’d been thinking about a lot this afternoon. Including the fact that per the sheriff, she was not to leave town because apparently she was still a suspect.
Hannah Palmer was a hateful, ignorant racist, but the police suspected Gabriella of a crime. How was that for progress?
Gabriella frowned as she walked across the grass with the sun beaming down on her bare back. Her sundress was light as she held the bottom of it bunched in her hands while she walked. She could move faster that way. And fast was definitely what she had in mind considering she felt like it was the sun’s goal to bake her and anything else that happened to be outdoors today.
Tyler was where she’d thought he’d be after she’d checked everywhere else—in the east corral with GG. He wasn’t riding the horse, but walked him slowly around the circle. He loved that horse, and the other ones that were now being temporarily housed in the barn. But he loved GG best. From a distance Gabriella watched and wondered what fate had in store for the two of them.
He waved at her and she stopped staring at him like a starry-eyed schoolgirl and continued her trek towards the corral. Once she was at the fence, she leaned on it and lifted a hand to fan herself.
“Still not used to the Texas heat, huh?” Tyler asked when he walked GG over to where she stood.
“It’s hot, I can tell you that,” was her reply.
He chuckled. “Yeah. It is. But GG doesn’t like the barn too much so I wanted to bring him out for a walk before dinner.”
She nodded. “I’m sure he appreciates the loving attention you give him,” she said. “What’s he going to do when you decide to go back to your life in L.A.?”
Tyler held GG’s reins and rubbed down the horse’s neck.
“Been thinking about that,” he replied. “Been thinking about a lot of things actually.”
She stopped fanning herself because it wasn’t working. “That makes two of us.”
“So much has happened since I came here three months ago. I hadn’t expected to be here that long,” he said.
