34. Willy
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Willy
Red’s chair scrapes across the floor before Arizona finishes speaking, and I’m already watching him when he reaches for his truck keys.
Emmett keeps Beau’s business card pinned beneath two fingers on the table, while Sadie presses closer to Arizona with both hands twisted into her sweater sleeve.
Arizona holds her against her side as she finishes explaining what she saw, but Red’s attention has already shifted toward the door.
His jaw tightens as his fingers close around the keys. “I’m going.”
Arizona lifts her head. “Red—”
“His actions threaten a little girl,” Red says as he grabs his truck keys. “I’m ending this.”
I step between him and the front door before he reaches it. “You go over there angry, Beau gets exactly what he wants.”
Red meets my eyes. “He gets a broken jaw.”
“And you get arrested.” I hold his stare. “Beau denies everything, points at your temper, and spends the rest of the week pretending he’s the victim. Meanwhile, we lose the chance to figure out what he’s doing.”
Red’s grip tightens around the keys. “You expect me to sit here?”
“I expect us to be smarter than he thinks we are.”
The room stays still until Emmett reaches over and slides the business card across the table.
“We find proof,” Emmett says. “Beau’s been careless before. He’ll be careless again.”
Red looks at Arizona, then at Sadie curled against her side. Whatever he sees there gets through where the rest of us couldn’t.
He walks into the kitchen and drops his keys onto the counter. “I still want to hit him.”
“I’m not removing violence from the plan,” I tell him. “I’m putting it under optional activities.”
The corner of his mouth moves before he rubs a hand over his face.
I’ll take it.
Sadie yawns and pulls Arizona’s sleeve closer. Arizona smooths her hair back.
“You hanging in there, sweetheart?”
Sadie nods without looking up, and Arizona lets the answer stand because pushing her won’t help.
Red clears his throat. “I’m checking the horses.”
Emmett glances toward the back door. “They’ve already eaten.”
“They can eat twice.”
He heads outside before either of us answers.
Emmett watches the screen door swing shut, then looks at me. “I’ll keep him company.”
As soon as Emmett steps outside, the house sinks back into the kind of silence I’ve spent most of my life trying to defeat.
Sadie stays curled against Arizona, looking exhausted in a way no five-year-old should ever look. I glance at her, then at the television, and the solution presents itself.
It isn’t a good solution.
Those are usually my best kind.
I clap my hands once. “Sadie, have you ever seen one of Red’s old cowboy movies?”
She finally looks up. “No.”
I grin. “Perfect. I can improve every one of them.”
She frowns with just enough curiosity to tell me I’ve got her attention. “How?”
“I give every cowboy terrible dialogue until Red threatens to throw me out of the house.”
Arizona catches on and gives me the smallest nod. “I think we can manage that.”
The screen door closes behind Emmett, and I get to work before anybody can question the idea that’s just volunteered itself.
I raid the hallway closet, steal every blanket I can find, and bury the couch beneath enough fabric to survive a winter none of us is expecting. Then I dump two bags of popcorn into the biggest bowl I can find.
Arizona watches from the kitchen with her arms folded. “You always go this far?”
“If we’re cheering up a kid, half measures are irresponsible.”
Her smile follows me into the living room. That does something inconvenient to my chest, so I concentrate on the popcorn.
Sadie watches me spread another blanket across the couch.
“Choose carefully,” I tell her. “Movie night seating is legally binding.”
She climbs onto one end, Arizona settles beside her, and I head for the cabinet under the television where I stop with three identical DVD cases in my hands. “I’ve discovered a problem.”
Arizona looks over. “What is it?”
I hold up the movies. “Red bought the same western three times.”
A laugh slips out before she can stop it. “Maybe he forgot.”
“I was hoping for a better explanation.”
The screen door opens, and Red walks back inside with Emmett. I hold the cases toward him. “You planning to explain this?”
Red glances at them while grabbing a beer from the fridge. “One quit working.”
“They all look like they’ve been dragged behind a truck.”
He shrugs. “They worked when I bought them.”
That’s somehow the least convincing defense he’s offered all evening.
Emmett shakes his head. “I told him to mark the good one.”
Red ignores him and settles into the recliner while Emmett takes the chair beside the couch.
I slide one of the DVDs into the player. “Tonight’s entertainment is brought to you by a man who panic-buys westerns.”
The opening music swells with enough drama to suggest somebody’s about to lose a ranch, a woman, or both.
Before he speaks, I clear my throat. “Frank,” I rumble, providing his voice, “I’ve been riding since Tuesday and forgot where I live.”
Sadie looks at the television, then back at me. “They didn’t call him Frank.”
“They haven’t asked him.”
Arizona laughs into her hand.
The cowboy rides toward a ranch house. “Mildred,” I continue, speaking for him again, “the beans have declared war again.”
Sadie covers her mouth, but the giggle escapes anyway.
A few minutes later the sheriff appears, and I lean forward. “Terrible news,” I announce. “My mustache disappeared overnight, and I’m taking statements.”
Sadie laughs harder. “He doesn’t even have one.”
“Exactly,” I say. “That’s how serious this is.”
She shakes her head, reaches for more popcorn, and starts watching me as much as the movie.
Every serious scene collapses the second I get hold of it. Cowboys argue over casseroles instead of cattle, outlaws forget which bank they meant to rob, and somewhere along the way, Sadie stops waiting for me to make the joke.
She starts correcting the movie herself.
“He said cattle,” she says, laughing.
“I heard casseroles.”
Arizona looks at me over Sadie’s head, and the softness in her expression catches me completely unprepared.
I turn back to the television before she notices.
By the time the credits roll, Sadie has vanished beneath the blankets with her head against Arizona’s shoulder and one hand still buried in the empty popcorn bowl.
Arizona brushes the hair from her face and smiles when she realizes she’s asleep. “I think that’s our cue.”
Red sets his beer down, crosses the room, and lifts Sadie into his arms without waking her. She settles against his chest as he carries her toward the hallway.
Emmett gathers the bowls and bottles. “I’ll clean up.”
I leave the rinsed popcorn bowl beside the sink and step onto the porch, where Arizona rests against the railing with her gaze fixed on the pasture.
I stop beside her, close enough that our shoulders nearly touch. “You survived movie night.”
Her mouth curves as she keeps looking ahead. “Barely.”
“I thought the missing mustache investigation might push you over the edge.”
“The casserole argument saved the evening.” Her laugh fades as she turns toward me. “You knew what Sadie needed.”
“I made an educated guess.” I brace my forearms against the railing beside her. “When you’re a kid, laughing can make a bad night easier to survive.”
She watches me before asking, “Is that how you got through losing your parents?”
The question catches me where I’m least prepared, although there’s no gentle way to ask about the worst part of a person’s life.
“Everyone watched me after they died because they thought I might fall apart when they looked away,” I say. “I started making jokes before they could ask how I was doing, and eventually they laughed instead.”
Arizona shifts closer. “Was that what you wanted?”
“At the time, it gave me control over the conversation.” I turn my attention toward the pasture. “After a while, being the funny one became easier than working out who I was without them.”
She slides her hand into mine and links our fingers. “You spend every day taking care of everyone around you.”
“Someone has to stop Red from declaring war before breakfast.”
Her thumb moves across my knuckles. “You deserve someone who takes care of you too.”
I start to reach for the joke that usually gets me out of conversations like this, but Arizona steps in before I find one and presses her palm to my cheek.
“You don’t have to make me laugh right now,” she says.
The simple statement unsettles me because she isn’t asking me to perform or make the pain easier for her to handle, and when she rises onto her toes and kisses me, I let her see the part of me I usually keep hidden.
I draw her against me as her fingers grip the back of my shirt. She deepens the kiss, I stop searching for a way to turn it into anything less than what it is.