Chapter 8
8
SERENITY
" H onestly, I can't believe my boy didn't tell you to pack a few pairs of jeans."
Kim O'Leary fusses as she hands me another pair of blue jeans and a couple of simple tops.
"These should fit, based on that last pair."
Another stack of clothing gets passed over the door of the changing room where I already have several outfits hanging on hooks, waiting to be tried on.
Ranger's mom insisted we go shopping as soon as she saw me walk into the kitchen this morning in another skirt.
"Thanks, Kim," I say-- again-- taking the new bundle of decidedly country chic clothes from her waiting hands, "but honestly, I don't really have jeans."
Kim tsks outside the door.
"She really did a number on him."
I hear the words plainly even though they are definitely not meant for my ears.
"Who?" I don't think before I ask through a layer of cotton t-shirt as I pull it over my curves.
"Oh, sorry. I was just saying that Bernie really did a number on Ranger. Makes sense why he'd have found himself a girl who's so opposite of the one he left behind, you know?"
Shimmying a pair of stretchy jeans over my hips, I arrange the tags hanging off so they aren't poking me in the stomach and frown at my reflection in the full-length mirror.
For the record, the woman in this mirror doesn't look nearly as gullible as the one in the bathroom mirror last night. This woman looks like she's finally putting together the pieces of the puzzle that maybe she hasn't wanted to look at.
"Um, not really, no. Ranger hasn't talked much about Bernie." I go for casually curious, trying to coax more information out of Kimberly.
"How does that last pair fit? Come out and let me see."
I unlatch the door and let Kim assess the way the skin tight denim hugs my curvy body, feeling increasingly self-conscious as a variety of expressions cross her features.
"Okay, try the shorts. I'll find a more flattering blouse to go with those jeans."
Back behind the closed door of the changing room I run my hand down the front of the t-shirt, trying to smooth not just the places where the fabric bunches at the seams, but also the places where my body bunches as well.
It's hard not to think that the shirt would flatter Bernadine's curves just fine.
A soft, flannel in a feminine plaid appears over the door.
"That one's going to look fabulous on you, I just know it." Kim's voice sounds genuinely excited on the other side of the door. "What about boots? I noticed you did, at least, bring some flats with you, but everything I've seen you in so far is way too dressy for the ranch."
"Uh, no. I don't really have any use for boots back home." I half laugh at the thought, wishing I did have an excuse to own a pair of the pretty cowboy boots I saw lining the shelves when we walked into the store.
"We'll find you a pair to go with those skinny jeans once you're done trying on the clothes."
"So, what were you saying about Bernie and Ranger?" I button the shorts and stare at myself in the mirror.
"Oh, well..." Kim clucks her tongue like she's thinking how to word her response, then stalls by insisting I show her the shorts.
"Wow! Would you just look at that," she mutters to herself as she touches my shoulder to make me complete a twirl in front of her. "Definitely getting that outfit. I knew that blouse would look great on you."
The blouse does look good, it's a button down and the flannel has some stretch to it that makes my cleavage look amazing.
"Well, you know they grew up together. Bernadine's parents never seemed to be home and Ranger sort of adopted her. The girl practically lived at the ranch till the kids were nearly out of high school."
She tsks to herself again, then lists off all the clothes she tells me to keep before going on.
"I think she about broke Ranger's heart when she started seeing Wyatt."
"Wyatt?"
"Mmm, but he signed up for the Navy right outta high school-- wanted to go fly helicopters like his daddy. "
"Oh. So did Ranger and Bernie get back together?"
Kim looks at me like I'm not following the script.
"What size do you wear?" She gestures at the shelves of boots.
"Eight and half or nine, depending on the style," I answer, running my finger over the decorative stitching on a pair of black boots.
Kim gestures me into a chair and starts bringing me boxes.
"No, honey. Bernie married Brett Cranson just a few months after Wyatt left for boot camp. Of course, their first little one came along only seven months later, so we all saw the writing on the wall plain as day."
The first pair of boots pinches my toes. I really want the second pair to fit, but, of course, my calves are too wide for them. Kim scrunches up her nose in disappointment and returns with another style.
"I didn't know Bernie was married," I grunt as I yank the cowboy boots over my heel by the looped straps at the top.
"Oh not anymore," Kim goes on, "that lasted about ten years. That's when she took back up with Ranger but..." her voice trails off in the memory. "Oh, those are darling. How do they fit?"
The boots are a supple leather with a dark stain that has a weathered effect at the seams. They're comfortable and I like the way they look.
"Good, we'll get those, and let's find you a good pair of muck boots for tromping around the ranch. I know you said you're only here for the week, but if Ranger's going to be moving home..." she looks at me with a furrowed brow and I hear what she isn't saying. "Well, just in case you need them, it'll be good to have a pair here."
Just in case .
Because Kimberly expects Ranger and Bernie to get back together now that he's going to be moving back to Slow River Valley. I'm just a place holder, a temporary solution to a problem that'll get solved soon, and it's obvious that I don't actually belong here.
Not in Slow River. Not on the Delta O. Not in Ranger's life.
"So what happened?" I ask quietly, as Kimberly packs the boots back into their box while I gather up the pile of ranch-appropriate clothing I won't need past the weekend. "With Bernie and Ranger. Why did he leave Slow River?"
Kim adds a pair of tall, rubberized boots to the pile.
"I've never gotten all the details. Ranger and his father were having trouble agreeing on the ranch operations about that time. Ranger had been spending a lot of time with Bernadine and her kids, but then Brett came back and wanted to give their marriage another try. Bernie made it clear she and Ranger were together, but in the end, she agreed to give the marriage a shot. Ranger left the day she told him. I think it broke his heart."
I try to hide the emotions tearing through me by mentally tallying the cost of what nearly equates to a new wardrobe as I follow Kimberly to the registers.
"Oh! We should get you a hat!" Kim exclaims, veering right at the last moment to make a beeline for an entire wall of cowboy hats.
The stack of jeans, blouses, and boots in my arms is already going to set me back a month, but it's obvious that Kimberly is enjoying playing cowgirl make-over with me and I silently justify the expense by reassuring myself that I'll have use for these clothes with all the other small towns I'll be visiting once I get the field researcher position.
Which is the reason I'm really in Slow River Valley, and the real reason I'm playing pretend girlfriend with Ranger O'Leary-- who just needed a fake girlfriend to take to his father's memorial service and now I know he just wanted to save face in front of the woman who jilted him-- twice.
I'm going to max out my credit card on cute, country girl vibes clothes, spend the rest of my week interviewing the locals, then I'm going home and Ranger and Bernie can work out their second chance romance and live happily ever after while I... something .
I'm still in a daze when Kimberly swats at my hand, insisting that I put my card away and let her pay for the shopping spree.
"It's only fair, I'm the one who dragged you out shopping after all." She taps her card against the terminal while a cute, teenage girl with her hair in pig tails bags my things. "And, like you said, you don't really have any use for all these things back home. I just couldn't resist, everything looked so cute on you."
Kimberly O'Leary is sweet. She's been talking non-stop since she ushered me into the big, SUV as soon as I'd finished my first cup of coffee.
Under different circumstances, I think she'd be the kind of mother-in-law I'd feel comfortable calling "mom." She's been kind, generous, and welcoming. By the time we return to the ranch, she's happily told me the entire history of the Delta O, her family and the O'Leary history in Slow River, and shared her personal sadness of losing her husband and her frustrations with four grown sons who haven't given her any grandchildren yet.
But she's also given me all the information I need to know that whatever chemistry Ranger and I might have-- chemistry isn't enough to compete with personal history if you hope to land a Slow River Valley rancher.
Ranger
It's near supper time when I see Mom's car parked back up at the house.
Glad to get out of Gunner's hair down here at the office, I let the men know I'm calling it a day.
Gun grumbles as I go but it's an improvement over the cussin' he's been doing every other time I've stepped foot on the working side of the property, so I figure things are going well enough between us.
The person I need to touch base with is up at the house after being trapped with my mother all day, listening to God knows what stories about me.
"Heard Ma took you to town?"
I lean on the door jamb of the guest room and grin at the sight of my girl trying to fit a stack of denim into her already-stuffed suitcase.
Seri nods without saying anything.
"She take you to the big ranch shop and make you try on everything in the store?"
To this, I get a chuckle.
"Pretty much, yeah," she answers softly without looking up at me.
"You girls get dinner while you were gone? If you're hungry, we could go grab something to eat." I want to go to her, grab her up in my arms and kiss her, but the way Seri's acting, I get the feeling that maybe I'm the only one that expected last night to change where we stand.
"Oh. Actually, I called for a ride up to the Walking Y. I'm going to stay with Singer for a few days so I can get the ranch history from her before I head back."
Suddenly, it dawns on me that I'm not just watching Seri put away the new duds Mom talked her into, she's packing up to leave. And I don't have a clue why.
"Seri?" I move farther into the room, closing the door behind me for some privacy. "Is there some reason you don't want to stay here anymore? Did last night..."
"Last night didn't happen, Ranger."
"I admit to not remembering much of anything past getting through those stocking of yours, but don't tell me it didn't happen just because you want to forget it did."
Serenity latches her suit case and hoists it off the bed and onto the floor.
"No, Ranger, it didn't happen." She huffs indignantly as she rolls the case toward the door despite my attempt to block her way. "You passed out while I was in the bathroom, so nothing happened."
"I woke up buck nekked on the floor, Seri. We were both drinking, you sure...?"
She holds a hand up to stop me.
"I'm sure. Nothing happened."
She does not sound pleased about that and, to be honest, I'm a might disappointed myself. Even if I am relieved to know I didn't miss anything.
"Damn shame about that," I mutter, giving her my best shit-eatin' grin. "I'd be happy to make it up to you now that we're both sober."
"I think it's for the best this way, Ranger." Serenity opens the door and heads out toward the front of the house, rolling her suitcase faster than I can catch up and take it from her.
"Could you tell your mom and brothers I said goodbye?" Serenity asks, turning back to face me as she makes her way down the front walk toward Joe's taxi waiting on her in the circle drive out front. "I don't have time to round everyone up for one last hug but I really enjoyed meeting your family and, thank you-- for introducing me around and... stuff."
Joe gets out of the cab and puts Seri's things in the back of the little minivan he uses to haul people to and from where ever they're willing to pay him to go in the valley.
Serenity rushes up to me and pulls me into a quick hug; nothing like the intimate embraces we were sharing last night and not a damn bit like the way I want touches between us to be.
I'm so confused by the way she's actin', I just stand there like a stunned ox while she climbs into the back of Joe's cab and shuts the door between us.
"I hope things work out for you and Bern." Seri's voice comes out tiny through the window that she rolls down as the cab's tires start rolling."
Joe doesn't waste time pullin' out of the drive, even when I snap out of my stupor and chase down the car, waving at him like a maniac to hold up and wait.
Bern and me? Work out? What the mother of all hell is she talking about?
A sick feeling courses through my gut, thinking about how far today's ending from where we left off last night, and the only thing between those two points has been--
"Ma!"
Turning on my heel, I race back to the house.
"Mom!"
I find my chief suspect nonchalantly folding laundry out in the utility room.
"Oh! Hi, honey." Mom smiles up at me as I stalk into the small room, not even pausing her methodical motions as she transforms a heap of towels into a neat stack. "I had such a nice time with Serenity today. Have you taken her up to--"
"Ma, what the hell did you tell her about Bernadine and me?"
Mom's eyes widen; I can't recall ever speaking to her in such a rough tone before and the shocked look on her face has me feeling bad for it now.
"I-- uh," I watch Ma's throat work in a hard swallow, which tells me she's caught on to the fact that whatever she told Seri has caused trouble for me. "I was just tellin' her about how hard you crushed on Bernie growing up is all. How you two used to run around together till she up and dumped you for Wyatt."
Between clenched jaws, I glare down at the woman who raised me reminding myself that she loves me. She's been through hell over the last few years and her meddlin' is done out of love; but damned if it's not the reason I've been staying away all these years.
Ma puts the laundry aside, dropping a towel in mid-fold so it falls on the counter in front of her in a heap. With her fists planted on her hips she glares right back at me and gives me the look that used to send my brothers and me scurrying to get chores and homework done when she'd had enough of our horsin' around.
"Don't give me that look Ranger O'Leary, that sweet thing is head over heels for you and she deserves to know if there's some reason she shouldn't be looking to a future with you. I thought you'd have already mentioned your history with Bernie to the girl, but apparently Bernie and I weren't the only ones you blindsided showing up with a woman on your arm without mentioning a word of being involved with someone.
"The fact that you didn't tell her about Bernadine tells me I was smart to warn Seri off of getting her hopes up about the two of you. You'd have broken that girl's heart when you left her."
"There is no history between me and Bern, Mom."
I've been trying to convince her-- and half of Slow River Valley-- for years, but the truth of the matter has always been that yes, Bernie and I came up together and we were close as friends even after she fell for Wyatt Patterson. It was that bullshit she pulled when her marriage was bustin' apart that crossed the line and sent me packing.
"We were friends . Bernie's like a sister, I never saw her any other way."
"Well, I know you stayed closed even when she was running with the Patterson boy." Ma resumes her folding and, for lack of anything better to do with myself, I grab a towel off the pile and start helping.
"But when she and Brett split up... Well, everyone in town saw you go home together, Ranger. Penny McDaniels said you spent more than one night at Bernie's place. And you never denied it when Bernadine was telling the whole town you two were together."
"I told you and Dad we weren't," I remind her. "Gunner and Archer Dean knew. Bernie was going through a bad time, I wasn't about to humiliate her by calling her out, but I expected people knew me better than to think I'd be the cause of breakin' up a marriage.
"Hell, even Brett eventually came to understand that was just more of Bernie's drama."
I never was good at folding laundry. My stack isn't up to Mom's standards and she's refolding each towel I do as soon as I set it down.
We work in silence for the space of half a dozen kitchen towels. Hopefully, Mom's finally processing what I've been trying to tell her for a decade; she always believed the local rumor mill over my protests when it came to that fiasco.
Thought Bernadine had broken my heart by denying me my second chance at her when she and her husband decided to give it one more try.
Truth was, Bernie and I'd been seen drinking together down at O'Hare's. She'd been pouring her heart to me and I thought I was being a good friend. We'd ended up sharing a ride back to her place-- where I crashed on the sofa. Woke up with a stiff neck that lasted two days. Her neighbor saw me leaving the next morning-- and then Penny McDaniels watched the show unfold when Bernadine's then-estranged husband brought the kids back before I'd cleared out.
I was down to my skivvies because Bernie'd insisted on putting my clothes through the wash, since there'd been more than one spilled beer involved in our long night.
Things got heated, accusations were made, and Bernadine was all too happy to let Brett-- and the entire town-- believe we'd been having an affair.
Slow River's a small town, and my name gets attention when it's mentioned.
The story got out of hand, my reputation was being dragged through the mud in a place where a man's reputation still matters, and Bernie was too wrapped up in her own drama to give a fuck.
"You really think she's in love with me?"
Mom looks up from her side of the table, giving me a curious look.
"Bernadine?"
"Serenity."
A smile ghosts Mom's features before she looks back down at her folding.
"That girl would follow you through fire, Ranger. I like her. I don't want you to go breaking her heart."
"You think Bernie's in love with me?"
That question gets a terse noise as Ma sucks her teeth, setting the last of the wash cloths on top of the neat pile of hand towels, and considers her answer.
"I think Bernadine is a sweet girl who's prone to histrionics. She's a good mother and a good person who's looking for love. If she was the one you wanted, I'd have stood by your choice."
"Not an answer, Ma."
Mom grabs up a stack of her folding and gives me a shrug, telling me she knows she dodged the question and isn't planning on changing her answer.
"The fair opens tonight, you know. You should take Seri. Give her a chance to wear her new things."
"Can't, Mom."
I hold the door of the laundry room open so she can make her way through but she comes up short and gives me a curious look.
"Why not?"
"She left."
Mom's expression turns to confusion.
"Left?"
"Yeah Mom. Somebody told her I was in love with Bernie." I heave a hard sigh and follow Mom into the hall.
"You're going to go get her, right?"
Mom's voice hitches up an octave, sounding almost panicked as she stops dead in the hallway with her load of folded towels and linens and turns back to give me a pointed stare.
"What am I supposed to tell her?"
"Well, if you love her, you make sure she doesn't walk away thinkin' different, Ranger. If she brings up what I said about Bernadine, just tell her I was high."
Mom ends on that note, turns, and heads to put away the laundry, leaving me stuck in place trying to process her last comment.
Kimberly O'Leary might be a rough and tumble country girl, and I'm sure she's got stories that she's never shared with us boys, but "high" is not a thing I'd ever suspect her of being.
I think.
Scrubbing my hand down my face, I try to erase Mom's joke from my memory-- hope it's a joke-- and then my feet get moving.
Ma might have had her facts all screwed up about some things, but she's right about going after Seri-- I can't let her go without letting her know my real feelings.