Page 31 of Riding the Storm
Shelby chuckles beside me. “Oh, please, he’s polite and sexy as hell. You just don’t want to admit it.”
“Right?” Imma Jean agrees.
“He’s just charmed you all. Putting on a show of Southern manners. Trust me, when it’s just the two of us, there’s nothing polite about him.”
“I wouldn’t mind seeing the impolite side of him,” Shelby mutters under her breath, and I swat at her.
“Oh, I see,” Imma Jean says cryptically.
My eyes snap to her. “See what?”
“You finally found yourself a challenge,” she says. “Hmm.”
“Just what she needs,” Shelby adds.
“What I need? What are you two talking about?”
Imma Jean smiles a knowing smile. “Oh, I have a feeling you’ll figure it out soon enough.”
I shake my head at the two of them. They’re both crazy if they think Bryce Raintree is going to be anything more than a thorn in my side. Sure, we fell into a sort of truce the last couple of days, but it’s tentative at best. Both of us have come to the fact that we’re stuck with each other for the next couple of months, and if either of us is going to survive it, we both have to wave the white flag, so to speak.
We finish our meals and head out to the parking lot with two pastry boxes, tied with yellow ribbons. Matty’s birthday cakes. The smaller one is a decoy. She thinks that tonight’s family dinner is the “party,” but the real celebration is planned for tomorrow.
Caison, with Grandma and Imma Jean’s help, organized the entire thing. Which thrilled them both. Matty has never been one for fanfare. She loves to shower the rest of us with gifts and praise, but hasn’t ever needed or taken those things for herself.
But Caison is having none of that. He treats her like the treasure she is.
We place the boxes securely in the back of Daddy’s Jeep with the rest of the supplies that were on the party list and head back to the ranch.
Once Shelby returns from checking the barn and finding Luna’s—Matty’s horse—stall empty, the two of us hurry inside with the cakes and the flowers. Leaving the rest in the Jeep.
Grandma is waiting for us. She opens the small box to reveal a beautiful chocolate-covered cake with horseshoes and cacti decorating the sides and the wordsHappy Birthday, Mattywritten in yellow script across the top. Then she lifts the lid of the other box to inspect the three-tiered faux bois decorated confection with a molded chocolate replica of Luna in a fence as a cake topper.
“Oh, it’s perfect,” Grandma gasps, her eyes filling with tears.
“Don’t,” I warn. “You turn the waterworks on like that during dinner tonight, and she’s gonna get suspicious.”
She wipes at her cheeks. “I know. I know. Just let me get it all out before she gets back from riding the south pasture with your uncle Boone.”
She has us set the smaller cake box on the kitchen island and place the other in the back of the refrigerator located in the laundry room off the back porch. We fill mason jars with water and store the fresh-cut blooms in Grandma’s sewing room, which she locks for good measure, not that Matty would be snooping around in there.
Once we’re done hiding all the evidence, we help Grandma in the kitchen, washing and peeling potatoes. She’s serving Matty’s favorite meal of chicken-fried steak, cowboy potatoes, and fresh green beans with homemade biscuits. Something she does for each of us on our birthdays.
“Charli, can you go grab some parsley and cilantro from your grandfather, please?” Grandma asks.
“Sure.”
I lay my knife on the cutting board and wipe my hands on the kitchen towel.
I push open the screen door, the hinges creaking, and step out onthe back porch into the afternoon heat. The air smells faintly of earth and tomato vines, sun-warmed and sweet.
I spot movement in the garden beds and see Grandpa standing in the second row. He’s looking down over the shoulder of someone on their knees, a stake in their hands.
“Grandpa,” I call as I descend the steps that lead from the porch to the stone garden path. “Grandma needs some parsley and cilantro.”
He steps back, and the man at his feet looks up and turns in my direction.
Bryce?
