Page 101 of The Honorable Texan
His eyes narrowed.“What dark secrets are you keeping, Meredith?”he asked quietly.
“None that should bother you, even if you found them out,” she assured him.She smiled at him from the stove.“Meanwhile, you’re getting fresh biscuits every day.”
“Yes, we are,” he had to agree.“And you’re a good cook.But I don’t like mysteries.”
She pursed her lips and gave him a teasing glance over her shoulder.“Too bad.”
He put the last place setting on the table and sat down at his place, just staring at her, without speaking.“You know,” he said after a minute, frowning, “there’s something familiar about your last name.I can’t quite place it, but I know I’ve heard it somewhere.”
That wasn’t good, she thought.He might remember Leo talking about her brother.She didn’t want to have to face the past, not just yet, when she was still broken and bruised and uncomfortable.When she was back onher feet and well again, there would be time to come to grips with it once and for all—as her poor father was already doing.
“Think so?”she asked with forced nonchalance.
He shrugged.“Well, it may come back to me one day.”
Fortunately Leo came in and stopped his train of thought.Meredith put supper on the table and sat down to eat it with the brothers.
* * *
The next morning,Rey came out to the kitchen with a bright silver metal gun case.He set it down beside the counter, out of the way, before he started eating his breakfast.
“Going hunting?”Meredith asked impishly.
He gave her a wary glance.“Skeet shooting,” he corrected.“The season’s over, but I practice year-round.”
“He won two medals at the World championships in San Antonio, this year,” Leo told her with a grin.“He’s an A class shooter.”
“Which gauge?”she asked without thinking.
Rey’s face became suspicious.“All of them.What do you know about shotguns?”
“I used to skeet-shoot,” she volunteered.“My brother taught me how to handle a shotgun, and then he got me into competition shooting.I wasn’t able to keep it up after I grad…after high school,” she improvised quickly.She didn’t dare tell him she gave it up after she finished college.That would be giving away far too much.
He watched her sip coffee.“You can shoot, can you?”he asked, looking as if he were humoring her.He didn’t seem to believe what she claimed.
“Yes, I can,” she said deliberately.
He smiled.“Like to come down to the range withme?”he asked.“I’ve got a nice little .28 gauge I can bring along for you.”
By offering her his lowest caliber shotgun, he was assuming that she couldn’t handle anything heavier.
“What’s in the case?”she asked.
“My twelve gauge,” he said.
She gave him a speaking glance.“I’ll just shoot that, if you don’t mind sharing it.Uh, it doesn’t have a kick or anything…?”she added, and had to bite her tongue to keep from grinning at her innocent pose.
He cleared his throat.He didn’t dare look at Leo.“No,” he said carelessly.“Of course it doesn’t have a kick.”
In truth, it would kick worse than any other of the four gauges, but Rey was planning to call her bluff.She was putting on an act for his benefit.He was going to make her sorry she tried it.
“Then I’ll be just fine with that gun,” she said.“More apple butter?”She offered him an open jar and spoon.
“Thanks,” he replied smugly, accepting the jar.He put it down and buttered another biscuit before he spooned the apple butter into it.“Don’t mind if I do.Leo, want to come along?”he asked his brother.
Leo was also trying not to grin.“I think I will, this time,” he told his brother.This was one shooting contest he wasn’t about to miss.He knew that Mike Johns was a champion shooter.If he’d been the one who taught his sister, Meredith would shock Rey speechless when she got that shotgun in her arms.He was going along.He didn’t want to miss the fun.
“The more the merrier, I always say,” Rey chuckled.
