Page 3 of The Honorable Texan
“Cooking isn’t exertion.I do love it so,” the older woman replied, her blue eyes that were so like Violet’s sparkling with pleasure.Her hair was silver now, short and wavy.She lay on the sofa in an old gown and housecoat, her feet in socks.Nights were still chilly, even though it was April.
“Want to eat in here on trays?”Violet offered.
“That would be lovely.We can watch the news.”
Violet grimaced.“Not the news,” she groaned.“Something pleasant!”
“Then what would you like to watch?We’ve got lots of DVDs,” her mother added.
Violet named a comedy about a crocodile who ate people living around a lake.
Her mother gave her an odd look.“My, my.Usuallywhen you want to watch that one, you’ve had an argument with Mr.Kemp.”She was fishing.
Violet cleared her throat.“We did have a little tiff,” she confessed, not daring to tell her mother that the family breadwinner was temporarily out of work.
“It will all blow over,” Mrs.Hardy promised.“He’s a difficult man, I imagine, but he’s been very kind to us.Why, when I had to go to the hospital last time, he drove you there and even sat with you until they got me over the crisis.”
“Yes, I know,” Violet replied, without adding that Mr.Kemp would do that for anybody.It didn’t mean anything, except that he had a kind heart.
“And then there was that huge basket of fruit he sent us at Christmas.”The older woman was still talking.
Violet was on her way to her bedroom to change into jeans and a sweatshirt.She wondered how she was going to get another job without naming Mr.Kemp as a reference.He might give her one.She just hated having to ask him to.She’d told her co-workers, and Kemp, that she was going to work for Duke Wright, but it had been a lie to save face.
“Going to the gym tonight?”her mother asked when she reappeared and rifled through the DVD stack for the movie she wanted.
“Not tonight,” Violet replied with a smile.Maybe never again, she was thinking.What use was it to revamp herself when she’d never see Mr.Kemp again, anyway?
Later, she cried herself to sleep, hating her own show of weakness.Fortunately, nobody else would see it.By dawn, she was up and dressed, her makeup on, her resolve firm.She was going to get a new job.She hadskills.She was a hard worker.She would be an asset to any prospective employer.She told herself these things firmly, because her ego was badly hurt.She’d show Mr.Kemp.She could get a job anywhere!
* * *
Actually, that wasn’tquite the case.Jacobsville was a small town.There weren’t that many office jobs available, because most people lucky enough to get them worked in the same place until they retired.
There was one hope.Duke Wright, a local rancher who had a real verbal war going with Mr.Kemp, couldn’t keep a secretary.He was hard, cold, and demanding.At least one secretary had left his employment in tears.His wife had left him, along with their young son, and filed for divorce.He consistently refused to sign the final papers, which had led to a furious confrontation between himself and Blake Kemp.The fistfight escalated until Chief of Police Cash Grier had to step in and break it up.Duke threw a punch at Cash, missed the chief and landed in jail.There was certainly no love lost between Duke Wright and Blake Kemp.
With that idea in mind, and gathering up her courage, she phoned him from home the next morning while her mother was still asleep.
His deep voice was easily recognizable the instant he spoke.
“Mr….Mr.Wright?It’s Violet Hardy,” she stammered.
There was a surprised pause.“Yes, Miss Hardy?”he replied.
“I was wondering if you needed any secretarial help right now,” she blurted out, embarrassed almost to tears just to ask the question.
There was another pause and then a chuckle.“Have you and Kemp parted ways?”he asked at once.
She felt her cheeks redden.“In fact, yes, we have,” she said flatly.“I quit.”
“Great!”
“Ex-excuse me?”she stammered, surprised.
“I can’t get a secretary who doesn’t see me as a matrimonial prospect,” he told her.
“I certainly won’t,” she replied without thinking.“Uh, sorry!”
“Don’t apologize.How soon can you get out here?”
