Always a Cowboy Read Online Free PDF Page B

Cabernet.”
    â€œStop,” Grace said, closing her eyes for a moment.
    Luce giggled, although the sound was nearly inaudible.
    â€œWhy?” Mace asked reasonably. Like Drake, he loved Grace.
    â€œBecause it wasn’t a tenpenny nail,” Grace replied, looking to Slater for help, which wasn’t forthcoming. Her husband was buttering his second biscuit and grinning to himself.
    â€œYour problem,” Mace told Drake, “is that you are totally unsophisticated. To you, warm generic beer from a can is the height of elegance.”
    Let the games begin.
    â€œ I’m unsophisticated?” Drake raised his brows. “This from a man who wore different colored socks just the other day? That was sophisticated, all right.”
    Mace looked and sounded pained. “Hey, it was dark when I got dressed, and I was in a hurry.”
    â€œI bet you were,” Drake shot back. “Come to think of it, little brother, those might not have been your socks in the first place. Guess it all depends on whose bedroom floor you found them on.”
    â€œOh, for heaven’s sake,” Grace said, tossing a sympathetic glance Luce’s way.
    â€œAre they always like this?” Luce asked.
    â€œUnfortunately,” Grace answered, “yes.”
    Just then, Blythe Carson breezed in, carrying a place setting and closely followed by Ryder.
    â€œWe’ve decided to join you,” Blythe announced cheerfully.
    â€œThank God,” Grace murmured.
    Ryder, holding a bowl and silverware of his own, sat down next to his mother. “Basketball practice got out early,” he said. He nodded a greeting to Luce and reached for the stew.
    Blythe Carson, more commonly known as “Mom,” sat down with a flourish and beamed a smile at Luce. “How nice to see you again,” she said. “I hope my sons have been behaving themselves.”
    â€œNot so much,” Grace said.
    â€œHey,” Slater objected, elbowing his wife lightly. “I have been a complete gentleman.”
    â€œYou’ve been a spectator,” Grace countered, hiding a smile.
    â€œAll I did,” Mace said, “was warn Luce about Drake’s tendency to skinny-dip at every opportunity. Seemed like the least I could do, considering that she’s a stranger here, and a guest.”
    â€œHush,” said Blythe.
    Harry reappeared with a coffeepot in one hand and a freshly baked pie in the other.
    Once she’d set them down, she started whisking stew bowls out from under spoons. When she decided a course was over, and that folks had had enough, she took it away and served the next one.
    Blythe sparkled.
    The coffee was poured and the pie was served.
    Ryder excused himself, saying he had homework to do, and left, taking his slice of apple pie with him.
    The others lingered.
    Grace, yawning, said she thought she’d make it an early night and promptly left the table, carrying her cup and saucer and her barely touched pie to the kitchen before heading upstairs.
    Blythe remained, watching her sons thoughtfully, each in turn, before focusing on Mace. “Seriously?” she said. “You brought up skinny-dipping?”
    Luce, who had been soaking up the conversation all evening, and probably taking mental notes, finally spoke up.
    She smiled brightly at Slater, then Mace, and then Drake. “I enjoy skinny-dipping myself, once in a while.” She paused, obviously for effect. “Who knows, maybe I’ll join you sometime.”
    Blythe laughed, delighted.
    Mace and Slater picked up their dishes, murmured politely and fled.
    â€œI’d better help Harry with the dishes,” Blythe said, and in another moment, she was gone, too.
    * * *
    L UCE TURNED TO D RAKE , all business. “Now, then,” she said, “the wild herd has almost doubled in size since you first reported their presence to the Bureau of Land Management several years ago. What accounts for the increase, in your