She smiled at him. “Thank you. I needed to hear you say that.” Glancing at the note in her hand, she said, “So. I’m down a girl. I guess that’s a good thing, considering I had to cut my staff in half two months ago.”
“Heard those gals you had to let go are rocking it in Union Junction. Stopped through there last week to check on them, and every last one of them is happy in the salon they started. And the Jefferson brothers are fixing up the house for them real nice.”
Delilah nodded. “That just leaves me to figure out why Hannah suddenly up and left me. It’s just so unlike her to be ditzy.”
“Think it was the love bug.” Jerry emptied his coffee cup.
“What love bug?”
“The one she caught for Ranger Jefferson when he was here helping Laredo ride Bloodthirsty Black last month.”
“I didn’t know she’d caught a bug,” Delilah said, surprised. “Seemed like she was totally focused on helping Katy metamorphasize into the woman-she-could-be to catch Laredo.”
Jerry shrugged. “And at some point, Ranger got under Hannah’s skin. Only Hannah thought Ranger liked Cissy, so she gave him a wide berth. Hannah’s a firecracker when she’s made up her mind something’s one way or the other.”
“But now Cissy’s gone and Hannah’s gone, so that means they struck out together. I just don’t imagine the two of them would willingly share a truck with Ranger Jefferson. Marvella can’t be right about that.”
The phone rang in the kitchen, and Delilah answered it.
“Hey, Mason. Fine, everything’s fine here.” Her eyes widened as she listened, giving Jerry a stunned glance. “No, Ranger’s not here. Neither is Archer. Haven’t seen either of them. Okay. Will do. See you this weekend.”
She hung up the phone. “Malfunction Junction’s missing two cowboys. Twins. Mason sounded like he was standing in a pot of boiling water.”
Jerry started laughing.
“It’s not funny,” Delilah said, her good mood totally shot. “The four of them’ll not last long in the same truck. It’s a volatile mixture, and I wish Hannah was back here where she belongs before she gets her feelings hurt!”
“DOES DELILAH KNOW you’ve gone?”
Hannah’s eyes met Ranger’s in the rearview mirror of the truck. Dark and expressive eyes. She should have been able to read his thoughts.
It annoyed her that she couldn’t. She’d never carried on a conversation with Ranger from behind, and she couldn’t measure him without being able to see the rest of his face or at least his posture—it was hard enough to feel comfortable around him when she could meet him face forward. Prickling ran down her arms and tingled her neck.
“Hannah,” he said. “Does Delilah—”
“Heard you,” she replied quickly, realizing his tone was telling her a lot, mainly that he thought she was ignoring him. “I left Delilah a note.”
The dark gaze left the road and met hers in the mirror again for the briefest of moments. “Did something happen to make you leave?”
I fell in love with you and had to get away from here knowing you didn’t feel the same about me. And did you have to kiss Cissy?
Dumb question. There wasn’t a man alive who could resist Cissy.
That didn’t mean she had to be Heartbroken Hannah. “Did you leave Mason a note?” she snapped back.
His eyes hooded.
“Then I assume nothing in particular happened to make you leave.” She settled herself in her seat and stared out the window. Beside her, Archer cleared his throat.
“I didn’t leave a note. I signed my name to the pithy message Ranger left beside Mason’s plate,” he offered.
She turned to stare at him, as did Cissy. Archer shrugged. “Seemed like Ranger said everything that needed to be said.”
“I said I was going to join the military,” Ranger stated. “Did you actually read it before you John Hancocked it? Not writing your own note seems rather lazy, by the way, for a man who nearly wore his fingers out hitting the send button to Australia.”
“Easy, bro,” Archer said mildly. “Ye ol’ love life is none of thy concern.”
Hannah shook her head, perplexed. “Besides Mason who works hard, and Frisco Joe who figured it out, and now Laredo, who’s moved to North Carolina to be with Katy like a real man would, are all of you pretty much rascals?”
“And relationship-dysfunctional?” Cissy put in. “It’s almost scary that the two of you could be in the same truck and not know it.”
“How was I to know that my twin was a stowaway?”
Cissy shrugged. “I heard twins had some special extrasensory perception for each other. Y’all seem to be blocking your ESP.”
“Heaven forbid he could have just asked for a ride,” Ranger complained.
“Heaven forbid you could have offered,” Archer rejoined.
“Did I know you’d be up for the military?”
“Did you think to ask?” Archer demanded. “Why did you think you could leave me behind with His Highness the Hardheaded?”
Cissy and Hannah both turned to face Archer again.
“Well, that’s what Mimi calls him,” Archer said sheepishly. “Mason, that is, before she quit hanging around our place.”
“She probably had to leave out of self-defense,” Hannah said. “Your family isn’t exactly easy for a woman to bear.”
In the mirror’s reflection, she saw Ranger’s eyebrows peak over his eyes. “How would you know?”
Caught, because she didn’t want to admit that her feelings had been hurt by Ranger, Hannah said, “Keep your eyes on the road, cowboy. All of us want to reach our varied destinations safe and sound.”
“And I want to talk about your destination,” Ranger stated. “Where exactly are you two going?”
Cissy turned completely to face Hannah. “I don’t know that it’s such a good idea to tell him. They’re just going to say that we don’t know what we’re doing.”
“You said it for me,” Ranger pointed out. “I think it, I know it’s true and now you’ve put it out in the open. We’re all prepared for my reaction, so just say it: What’s your end-of-the-line destination?”
“I called a friend of mine who runs a gambling riverboat in Mississippi,” Hannah said. “Cissy and I are going to be hostesses on the boat. Well, I’m going to be a card dealer. I got Cissy a job as a hostess.”
Both men started laughing, immensely
