Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
“You’re overmixing that pumpkin bread batter, Cadee Lynn.”
Her mama’s words snapped Cadee out of her thoughts, and she realized she was whipping the hell out of the batter in the bowl in front of her. She stopped stirring and tapped the spoon on the side before setting it down.
“Sorry. I was woolgathering.” She picked up the bowl and started pouring the batter into the prepared loaf pans.
“And just how did this wooly sheep tick you off?” Birdie asked.
Birdie was Tully Hennessy’s grandmother.
She owned a cotton farm and still worked a piece of it herself.
She was feisty and blunt and rarely seen wearing anything but her signature overalls and flannel shirt.
She had come over to help bake the pumpkin bread for the Harvest Festival the church held on Halloween.
It was Cadee’s great-grandmother’s secret recipe that had been passed down for generations and they sold like hotcakes at the festival.
Which was why they started baking the loaves in early September and freezing them.
“I’m not ticked off,” Cadee said.
Birdie snorted. “That was pissed off whipping if ever I saw it.”
She was right. Cadee was pissed off. Just not at someone else.
She was mad at herself for letting Huck kiss her after he’d run off and left her without a single goodbye.
But she wasn’t about to share that information with Birdie.
Especially when only her family—and now the Hennessys—knew Huck was Camden’s father.
And even her family didn’t know she had arranged a meeting between them.
What a bad idea that had turned out to be.
Not because of the fiasco it had turned into, but because of what seeing them together had done to Cadee’s heart.
She hadn’t realized how much her son looked like Huck until she’d seen them together.
They were like carbon copies. The same wayward hair.
The same beautiful hazel eyes. The same handsome but stubborn features.
But what really had her heart tightening was the way Huck had looked at Camden. With awe and reverence. Like Cam was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his life.
The same way Cadee had felt the first time she’d laid eyes on her son.
“Cadee Lynn?” Her mama’s voice broke through her thoughts, and she turned to find both women looking at her as if waiting for an answer.
“Sorry. What did you say?”
“I asked if something is going on with Camden,” her mama said. “That’s usually why you become distracted.”
Cadee did worry about her son a lot. She worried about him eating all the sweets out of his lunch and throwing away the healthy sandwiches she packed.
Worried about him getting enough sleep at night, enough vitamin C, becoming constipated, working too hard on the ranch.
Recently, she’d been worried about him getting bullied.
She latched onto the last worry as an excuse for her frustrated batter beating. “I have been concerned that Miles Lynch might be hassling him on the bus ride home from school.”
Birdie grunted as she wrapped a cooled loaf of bread in plastic wrap. “I wouldn’t doubt it. If ever a kid needed a trip to the woodshed, Miles does. He’s as ornery as those Hennessys used to be.”
At the mention of the Hennessys, Cadee almost dropped the loaf pans she carried to the oven. Mama hurried over to open the oven door, then waited for Cadee to slide the loaf pans in before closing it.
“Those kids certainly could get into trouble when they were little, but I don’t think they ever bullied anyone.” She glanced at Cadee. “They didn’t bully you, did they, Cadee?”
She shook her head. One of them had just ripped her heart out and stomped on it . . . and then kissed her as if he hadn’t. Not that she hadn’t asked for it. She’d provoked it by smoothing down his hair and taking way too much time enjoying the feel of the thick strands slipping through her fingers.
“So what makes you think Cam is getting bullied on the bus?” Birdie asked.
“He started begging me to let him ride his bike to school. When I said no because most of that ride would be on a dangerous highway, he then started purposely missing the bus, so I’d have to take him to school and then talking his uncles into picking him up.
And those aren’t the only things. He loves his roper boots, but suddenly he won’t wear them to school.
He says he doesn’t want kids thinking he’s a country hick. ”
“And what makes you think Miles is behind it?” Mama asked.
“The other day, I was driving home from town and saw the school bus, so I followed it, intending to give Cam a ride back to the ranch from the bus stop. I pulled in behind it to wait for him to get off, and I saw Miles getting off with him. He had his arm hooked around Cam’s neck and was whispering something in his ear.
When Cam got into the car, he looked upset and said that he doesn’t want to be a raptor anymore for Halloween because that’s babyish. ”
“Maybe that had nothing to do with Miles. Maybe Camden just changed his mind,” Mama said.
“If I had a dollar for every time one of you kids wanted to change your costume, I’d be a billionaire.
One year, you wanted to be a ballerina. Then as soon as I finished making your tutu, you wanted to be a ninja turtle. ”
That had been all Huck’s fault. He’d talked her into being Raphael to his Leonardo, even though she had loved that pink sparkly tulle tutu her mama had made her. But that was how it always worked. Huck could talk her into anything.
Being a Ninja Turtle. Kisses in bookstores.
She set the dirty mixing bowl in the sudsy water in the sink and started scrubbing it.
“Maybe, but there was something so threatening about the way Miles had his arm around Cam’s neck. Something that didn’t look like it was just two boys being buddies. Miles bullying him would certainly explain why he doesn’t want to ride the bus anymore.”
“Well, you can’t talk to Miles’ mama,” Birdie said. “That woman thinks the sun rises and sets on her kid and spoils him rotten. Even if he is bullying Camden, she wouldn’t do anything about it. I’d talk to the school and see if they can’t keep an eye on Miles.”
Cadee nodded as she rinsed the bowl. “That’s a good idea. I’ll make an appointment to meet with his teacher and the principal tomorrow after school.”
“Something sure smells good.” Callum walked into the kitchen, followed by Cooper.
Even though they’d been born fourteen months apart, the brothers could pass for twins.
They had the same thick, dark hair. The same pale blue eyes.
The same angular features and strong Roman nose.
And the same tall, muscular bodies that had excelled at sports and made their daddy so proud.
But personality-wise, they were as different as night and day.
Cooper was the serious oldest brother while Callum was much more relaxed and fun-loving.
“Are you responsible for that yummy smell, Birdie?” Callum reached for one of the loaves of cooling pumpkin bread, but Birdie smacked his hand away.
“Those are for the Harvest Festival.” She nodded at the overbrowned loaf pushed to the side. “You can have that one.”
Callum laughed. “Yes, ma’am. I’ve always had a thing for rejects.” He picked up the loaf. Rather than get a knife and slice off a piece, he took a big bite.
“Callum!” Mama scolded. “You weren’t raised in a barn.”
“I kinda was,” Callum said around a mouthful of pumpkin bread. “I spent more time there as a kid than I did inside.”
Mama picked up a wooden spoon and gave him a slap on the butt. “Don’t be a smarty pants.”
Callum reeled their petite mama into his chest with one arm and gave her a kiss on the top of her head. “Now you know I’ve always been a smartie pants, Mama. Which is why you love me better than your other two kids.”
Mama rolled her eyes, but her smile told a different story.
She loved Callum’s teasing. Just as much as she loved Cooper’s solemn personality.
She loved all her kids equally and thought each one of them was something to be proud of.
Even when her daughter got pregnant at eighteen .
. . only months after her husband’s death.
Cadee would always feel guilty about that.
Especially when she now knew what it was like to worry about your child.
Which was why she had decided to contest Rosie Hennessy’s will.
Rosie had told her about the clause she’d put in her will.
If the Hennessy siblings didn’t finish Honky Tonk Heaven in the allotted time, Cadee would inherit everything for Camden.
Cadee didn’t want everything. She wasn’t about to take the Hennessys’ family home.
Nor did she want a country honky tonk. She just wanted a share of the sale of Honky Tonk Heaven.
She didn’t doubt for a second that the Hennessys planned to sell.
All the siblings resented the dancehall for taking all their mama’s time.
With her share, Cadee intended to pay off some of the ranch’s debt.
Stockton Ranch had been running in the red for years now due to Daddy’s cancer-related medical bills, drought, low market prices, and high production costs.
Cooper and Callum had worked hard to pay down that debt, but the possibility of losing the ranch still hung over their heads on a daily basis.
Now Cadee had a chance to take away some of that pressure. If that meant being a hardass with the Hennessys, so be it.
But she lost some of her spunk when her lawyer called a few days later and said the Hennessys and Billy wanted to meet with her.
The following day, she couldn’t help her shaking knees when she stepped into Billy’s office and came face to face with the Hennessy Hooligans.
All of them but Dawson, who was rumored to be in California with Magnolia Hastings visiting her daddy.