Wyoming Tough - Diana Palmer [17]
SHE HAD A NICE PAIR OF SLACKS and a pink-and-lime embroidered sweater. She wore those for her date, and let her long hair down. She brushed it until it shone. It was thick and black and beautiful, like her mother’s. When she looked in the mirror, she saw many traces of her mother in her own face. She wasn’t beautiful, but she wasn’t plain, either. She had the same elfin features that had taken Shelby Kane Brannt to such fame in her modeling days. And Morie’s grandmother, Maria Kane, had been a motion-picture star, quite famous for her acting ability. Morie hadn’t inherited that trait. Her one taste of theater in college had convinced her that she was never meant for the stage.
She had a lightweight denim coat, and she wore that over her sweater, because it was cold outside. The weather was fluctuating madly. Typical Wyoming weather, she thought amusedly. The Texas climate was like that, too.
She heard a car drive up to the bunkhouse. She whipped her fanny pack into place and went out to meet Clark. He was sitting behind the wheel of the sports car, grinning.
She noted that he didn’t get out to open her door. He leaned across and threw it open for her.
She climbed in. “Hi.”
“Hi, back. Ready for a nice movie?”
“You bet.”
He put the car in gear and roared out down the driveway.
“Don’t do that,” she groaned. “We have heifers calving in the barn!”
“Oops, sorry, didn’t think,” he said, but he didn’t look concerned. “They’ll get over it. Nice night. They said it might snow, but I don’t believe the forecast. They’re mostly wrong.”
She was thinking about the nervous heifers being kept up because it was their first breeding season, and wondering how much flak she was going to get from her boss if anything happened because of Clark’s thoughtlessness.
“Stop worrying,” he teased. “It’s just cows, for heaven’s sake.”
Just cows. She loved to stop and pet them when she was in the barn. She loved their big eyes and big noses, and the soft fur between their eyes. They were so gentle. And these little heifers, even if they were animals, must be so scared. She’d always had a terror of childbirth, for reasons she could never quite understand. It was one of many reasons that she was hesitant to marry at all.
“Do you know that Elizabeth the First never married and never had a child?” she remarked.
He made a face. “History. I hate that. Let’s talk about who’s leading the pack in American Idol!”
She gaped at him. She didn’t watch television very much. “I watch the Weather Channel, the military channel and the science channels mostly,” she remarked. “I’ve never watched any of those audience-participation shows.”
“I can see that we’re never going to meet in the middle on issues,” he remarked. “Doesn’t matter. You’re cute and I like you. We can go from there.”
Could they? She wondered.
THE MOVIE WAS FUN. It was clever and funny and both of them came out of the theater smiling.
“Now let’s have some nice Chinese food,” he said. “You hungry?”
“Starved. But we’re going Dutch,” she added firmly. “I bought my own movie ticket…I’ll pay for my food, too.”
His eyebrows arched. “I wouldn’t expect you to owe me anything if I bought dinner.”
She smiled. “Just the same, I like everything on an equal footing.”
“You’re a strange girl,” he commented thoughtfully.
“Strange?” She shrugged. “I suppose I am.”
“Let’s eat.”
He led the way into the restaurant and they followed the waitress to a table in a corner.
“This is beautiful,” Morie remarked, loving the Asian decor, which featured nice copies of ancient statues and some wood carvings that were very expensive. Morie, who’d traveled Asia, appreciated the culture depicted. She’d loved the people she met in her travels.
“Junk,” he told her casually. “Nothing valuable in here.”
“I meant that it was pretty,” she clarified.
“Oh.” He glanced around. “I guess so. A little gaudy for my taste.”
She was about to respond