Seven Sisters - Earlene Fowler [7]
In the bedroom, Gabe was sitting on our bed staring at the floor. I sat down next to him and rubbed small circles on his solid back. “Friday, it’s a baby. It’s not the end of the world.”
“He’s so young and irresponsible. And one of my own officers! It’s just too much of a coincidence. What was he thinking? What was she thinking? What . . .”
I laughed out loud, grabbed the back of his neck, and squeezed it. “Thinking? Friday, they weren’t thinking, anymore than we were when we were so in lust a year and a half ago. Remember how many people whispered about us when we got married so quickly? Did we care? Not one bit because all we could see was each other. We were in blind love, just like Sam and Bliss. It’s just a fluke that she works for you. I haven’t heard how they met, but I’m guessing the first time was last year when he and I tried to stop those jerks from wrecking your dad’s truck. I also bet they’ve really worried about how to tell you about their relationship. I’ve talked to Bliss a few times, and she doesn’t strike me as being a frivolous woman.”
“She isn’t,” Gabe said, his face thoughtful. “I imagine this has been difficult for her. She must care a great deal for Sam to risk it.”
“Not hard to do. You Ortiz men do tend to be irresistible.”
He turned and pushed me down on the bed, covering me with his heavy, warm body. “By the way, what do you mean were in lust? What’s with the past tense?” He bent down and kissed me deeply, his tongue hard and sweet and tantalizing.
“Okay, okay, are in lust,” I murmured, as his lips moved down my throat, setting a line of electric sparks on my skin.
“And don’t you forget it,” he said, unbuttoning my shirt.
“Hmm, this will be something new. I’ve never made love with a grandfather before.”
He undid the last button and pulled my shirt back, his blue eyes bright against his mahogany skin. “That, niña,” he said, “is something you won’t be able to say an hour from now.”
4
AT THE MUSEUM the next morning, before tackling my accumulating paperwork, I called the ranch.
“Did Sam finally tell you?” I asked Dove. I’d called her last night and after swearing her to secrecy, told her about the baby.
“Yes, he told me and your daddy at breakfast,” she said. “I pretended to be surprised, but I suspected something was going on. He’d been off his feed for about a week. When he turned down a second helping of my banana-cinnamon rolls morning last, I knew something fishy was up. I’m already looking through my patterns for a crib quilt. What do you think of Tumbling Blocks?”
“Can’t think of a more appropriate pattern, but maybe you should think about a marriage quilt first.” I doodled interlocking circles on the scratch pad in front of me. “Maybe the Wedding Ring pattern.”
“That’s too predictable. The Broken Dishes pattern is nice, and I could make one a lot quicker.”
I laughed and started coloring in one of the circles. “Not to mention it could be a prediction of what’s in their future. Are you coming into town today? Want to have lunch?”
“Wish I could, honeybun, but I’m brainstorming down at the senior citizen center all day trying to figure out a way we can earn the seven thousand dollars we need to replace our kitchen.”
“Didn’t the insurance company cover the fire?” One of the members (a man, Dove and the ladies immediately pointed out to anyone who asked) had attempted to fry some tacos and started a grease fire that gutted the kitchen.
“They covered it, but they’re wanting to do it the cheapest way possible. We need the money to upgrade and enlarge our capacity.”
“So, any great money-making ideas yet?”
“This is the most pathetic, unimaginative group of busybodies I’ve ever laid eyes on. Can’t think beyond bake sales and quilt raffles. We need big money fast. Like I said, we’re brainstorming today. I told them that this dang committee has six hundred years of experience between them. Land’s sake, we should be able to come up with something more clever than selling cupcakes.”
“Well, good luck.”
“Luck is for the birds. We need cold, hard cash.”
“Put