Chapter Seven
On Sunday morning, Holly talked her father into going home for a shower and change of clothes by promising to never leave her mother’s side while he was gone.
“Thank you,” Noreen said as soon as Fletcher was gone.
“I’m more worried about him than I am about me.
He wakes up every time the nurses come in to do vital signs at night, and he goes to sleep holding my hand.
If I try to slip mine away, he comes alive and wants to know if I’m okay. His shoulder has to be hurting.”
“Someday I want that kind of relationship.” Holly thought of Bubba. If she had told him the truth about who she really was, could they have gotten past the lie and had a real relationship?
“I want it for you, but I also want to go home so your dad can get some real sleep,” Noreen told her.
“Has the doctor said when that might happen?”
“Tomorrow, if my temperature doesn’t spike. If they still used those under-the-tongue thermometers, I would slip a piece of ice in my mouth when the nurse wasn’t looking,” Noreen said. “I feel like I could leave this place and go straight to the office. I’m sorry we’re putting this burden on you.”
Holly patted her mother’s hand. “Don’t be. You’ve trained me well, Mama. I can do this for a couple of weeks.”
“If you get overwhelmed, I’ll be a phone call and an email away,” she assured her daughter. “Now that we’re alone, tell me about your vacation. Darlene called and said that you’d met someone at a speed-dating event.”
“I didn’t. Lula Ann Smith did,” Holly answered with a long sigh.
“Who?” Noreen frowned.
“Darlene was going to be Sally June for a week, and I was Lula Ann Smith,” Holly said.
Noreen grabbed a small pillow and held it tightly over her abdomen. “Don’t tell me jokes like that. It hurts when I even giggle. Y’all didn’t really do that, did you?”
“Darlene didn’t tell you the whole story?”
Noreen shook her head and tried to hold more laughter, but a few giggles escaped. “No, but I want to hear it.”
“I hated that speed-dating event, right up until the final guy sat down at my table,” Holly said, and went forward, right up until her father knocked on the door.
“I was so stressed about whether to tell Bubba the truth or to just disappear. It seemed like fate intervened for me and said that I should forget all about him. Besides, it doesn’t take a genius to know what would happen if I had brought home a ranch hand for you to meet, and his name was Bubba …
“Come on now. Give us a little credit. We wouldn’t have pitched him out if he ate with the wrong fork,” Noreen said.
“But be honest. Do you want me to move in with someone like Bubba?”
Noreen shook her head. “No, I would not, but it wouldn’t be because of his status. I would question it because you would get bored with him.”
“Because he’s beneath me?” Holly asked.
“Social standing isn’t the issue. He met you as Lula Ann. How is he going to feel when he finds out that you are Holly McLean? That’s like trying to build a house with no foundation.”
“Mama, I really, really like him, more than anyone I’ve ever dated,” Holly admitted.
“Then give him a call and a chance to at least tell you to get lost,” Noreen advised. “Has he tried to get in touch with you?”
Holly nodded. “He’s texted once a day, but I haven’t answered. I want to, but, Mama, I don’t know much about him, and what do I say? What if he’s seen me on social media or in the newspapers, and he’s only being nice to me for what he can get?”
“You’ll never know if you don’t talk to him. Speaking of social media, all your generation is on TikTok, Snap-something-or-other, and all those other apps these days. Go searching for him. You’ll figure out real quick if he’s a good one.”
“He did ask me if we could continue seeing each other after I came back to work.”
“If you don’t talk to him, then you’ll never know what might have been when you told him the truth. I can’t believe you have fallen for a guy named Bubba Jones, or that Darlene talked you into using Lula Ann Smith for your alter ego.” Noreen shook her head.
“Me, either, but I liked being her,” Holly admitted. “She had so much fun.”
“Then answer his texts or call him, but do not tell him that you are Holly McLean by text or on the phone. Meet him somewhere nice,” Noreen suggested.
“Or at the Hole in the Wall burger joint where we had our first date?”
“No, ma’am. Let him get to know Holly to see if he likes her as well as he did Lula Ann,” Noreen answered. “It could be one of those out of sight, out of mind things, and he’s moved on to another woman.”
“Or one of those absence makes the heart grow fonder things,” Holly muttered.
Miles was not in the mood to interview another cook after turning down five in the last ten days, but Elijah had one lined up that morning.
The bunkhouse was full now, and four guys were traveling back and forth from nearby towns.
Most of them had worked for the previous owner and knew the place, so that was a plus, but all of them were used to having a decent lunch every single day rather than sandwiches and chips.
The ones who lived in the bunkhouse were tired of cold cereal for breakfast and what little Elijah could rustle up for supper.
The gray-haired lady came into the office and sat down on the other side of Miles’s desk. “As you know from my resume, I have worked as the cook on ranches since I was in my twenties. I’m a widow with no children and have my own travel trailer that I bring with me.”
Miles looked over the resume in front of him and liked what he read. “Why did you leave the past five that you worked on, Mrs. Watson?”
“Call me Stella. Mrs. Watson was my mother-in-law, and she never liked me.”
“Okay, then, Stella.” He nodded and asked the question again.
She held up a finger. “First one sold to new folks, and the wife said she could take on the cooking job.” Another finger went up.
“Next, the owner’s father couldn’t keep his hands to himself.
” Third and fourth fingers. “The owners wouldn’t give me a budget for food that I thought was fair, so I quit.
” Then her thumb popped up. “The owner died at the last one, and the government bought his place to use as a wildlife refuge.”
Miles’s thoughts raced back to the food that Lula Ann put on the table and the fried chicken she brought to the picnic.
If she didn’t already have an important position, and if he could ever locate her, he would offer her the job.
He wished that he’d asked a few more questions.
Like the name of the company that she worked for, and if it was in Houston or up in the Texas Panhandle since she had mentioned that place in one of their conversations.
“Well?” Stella asked with a little edge to her tone. “Am I wasting my time and yours?”
“I’m sorry,” Miles apologized. “My mind was somewhere else. So, you do your own shopping?”
“Yes, I do, and I stay within whatever budget you give me. How many men will I be cooking for and how many meals?”
“Eight of us for breakfast and supper, twelve for dinner,” he said. “We have seven living here all the time, and that includes Elijah, the ranch foreman. Four others come and go.”
“I like those numbers,” Stella said. “How ’bout I go out to the bunkhouse and make dinner out of whatever I can find? If the guys like it when they come in at noon, then I’ll make supper. This evening we’ll talk again over a couple of beers.”
“That would be a pretty good test,” Miles said, “but it’s only three hours until noon.”
“Honey, I could whip up a banquet with the proper food in that amount of time.” Stella smiled. “And for your information, you are not testing me. I’m testing you and the men that work for you. Point me to the bunkhouse, and we’ll see if y’all pass the tests after supper.”
“Sounds good to me. I’ll walk with you,” Miles said, and led the way through the house and outside. He was surprised to see that her trailer was behind her truck and parked under a big elm tree. “You are pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am,” Stella answered, “but we’ll see if I have a vibe, as you kids call it, with the crew. If they are a surly bunch, I’ll get in my truck and go on down the road.”
She went into the bunkhouse with what seemed like eagle eyes, grabbed a bibbed apron from a hook and slipped it over her head, and then proceeded to check out the refrigerator, freezer, and the pantry.
“Looks like it’s fairly well stocked with staples, but I’ll need to make a grocery store run if I stick around.
Now get on out of here and let me work my magic.
I’ll have a buffet-style dinner ready at noon. ”
“Yes, ma’am,” Miles said, and headed across the room.
He’d only taken a few steps when he met Elijah coming toward him. “What did you think of this one? And what is that trailer doing here?”
“It belongs to our new prospect,” Miles answered. “If she takes the job, she’ll live in it, and she’s bossy as hell. She’s in the bunkhouse making dinner, and if she likes the boys then she will make supper.”
“Halle-damn-lujah!” Elijah said. “Maybe we’ve found the right person. Now on to your other problem. Has Lula Ann got in touch with you?”
“Nope. I went to the house. Since she wasn’t home, I figured she was still with her mother.
When I went back on Tuesday of that week, there was a FOR SALE sign in the front yard.
I asked a neighbor who was outside mowing if he knew the new owner.
He said that the older folks who lived there for fifty years had passed on and left the place to their granddaughter. ”
“Lula Ann?” I asked him and he said no.