Chapter 7: Chapter Seven

“I can handle Stock Show by myself,” Sara tried to convince Cord in his hospital room two days later.

“You’re not ready to go alone.”

He sounded tired, and winced when he raised an arm to run a hand through his hair. Obviously, he was in a lot of pain, even on the medication. He tried to push himself up but dropped back down to the pillow with a moan. Sara felt bad he was in that much pain, but she wasn’t leaving until she’d convinced him she could go to Houston without him.

The door swished open and she glanced over her shoulder as Buck and Susan walked in. Her sister glanced from Cord’s strained features to Sara’s glare and rushed to the bed.

“Sara, this isn’t the right time to argue with him. Can’t you see he’s in pain?” Susan fussed over Cord and fluffed his pillows.

Sara snorted then turned to the window. She grimaced at the boring view of the parking lot below.

“What’s going on?” Buck asked.

“I...” Cord swallowed hard, beads of perspiration breaking out on his face. “I told her...I wanted you to go to the Livestock show…with her and she argued...with me.” His voice broke with the effort it seemed to take even to speak.

“She’ll get over it.”

Sara spun around and glared at Buck. “You’re an ass. I don’t need you to babysit me in Houston.”

Cord went on as if she hadn’t even spoken. “You and I both know...she doesn’t have enough experience to do this alone. I need someone...to go with her.”

Buck shrugged. “If she doesn’t like it, she can stay home.”

Sara raised one brow. “Fine. I’ll stay home then.” Her heart clenched. Another way she was being pushed out of the decision-making. Is this how it will be from now on? Would she be the little woman who didn’t know her own mind and needed someone behind her all the time? This wasn’t what she envisioned when her father told her she’d one day take over his half of the empire.

“That’s mature.” Buck shook his head as if she was being difficult.

Her jaw dropped. Buck never spoke to her like that, as if she was a moron. What was up with him?

Susan, who’d been standing by not saying anything, spoke up. “Have you ever done the show without Daddy?”

Sara shook her head. “No.”

“When you did the show with him, did he ever let you call the shots, make the plans, do anything other than just tag along?”

“No, but I watched everything he did,” she defended.

Susan nodded. “Okay, but don’t you think it would help if your first time doing this, you had someone along you could turn to?” She put a hand up as Sara opened her mouth to argue. “Just to have your back—to make sure you do right. I mean, this is the most important event of the year, right?”

“Yep.” Cord’s eyes were closed but that obviously didn’t stop him from listening.

Her father hadn’t felt she was good enough to run the ranch and Cord didn’t think she was good enough to go to the livestock show alone. Sara stared back at her sister, hating that she made sense. Her pride was stung. She let her breath out, but refused to look at Buck. “Yeah, okay. I don’t want it all on my head I suppose.”

Buck snorted. “If I go, she can always blame me.”

Sara nodded and tried to grin. It wouldn’t be that bad. She and Buck used to have a ball when her father let them go with him. Of course, that was back when Cord did all the work and she and Buck were free to party all week. This time would be different. Plus, the tension between her and Buck in the last two weeks made her nervous about spending an entire week alone with him.

The door opened again and Diane walked in. The hospital room was the largest private room they had, but it was getting more than crowded.

“How is he?” Diane whispered.

“He is still here, you don’t have to ask them how I am.” Cord snapped, but his eyes remained closed.

Diane rolled her eyes and Sara touched her arm as she walked past. “I’m out of here, you two can fuss over the patient. I got work to do.”

Buck watched Diane touch Cord’s arm. “I’m going to go too. Is there anything you want Flo to bring when she and Sam come up tonight?”

“Actually, yes. Ask Sam to bring my laptop. If I can sit up tomorrow, I need to get some spreadsheets worked on.”

Buck shook his head but Susan gave a brief nod. “Okay Cord, I’ll see if I can catch him.”

“No—wait.” Cord opened his eyes and winced. “If someone could convince them...not to come back up tonight, that would be even better. I just want...to get some sleep.”

Buck moved to the bed. “I’ll tell her that they gave you something to make you sleep. I can’t promise she won’t come anyway. You scared ten years out of her.”

Cord’s eyes met Buck’s and he swallowed hard. The accident had woke them all up out of the bickering. Everyone had thought the same thing, how close they came to losing him. The doctors said he was a lucky man to be alive. For Buck, he was ashamed at the animosity he’d felt towards his older brother in the past two weeks. His parents would have been furious. And to think that Sara was caught in the middle too, they’d have skinned him alive. Sara had been the light of his parents' lives. They’d loved all the Sampson daughters, but his mother had a special place in her heart for the rough around the edges cowgirl.

Leaving Diane in the room with Cord, the other three stepped out into the hospital hall.

“Can you drive Buck back?” Susan asked. “I want to stay in town and talk to Brad over at the community theatre.”

“That’s fine. We need to talk about the trip anyway,” Sara agreed. “Unless you had somewhere else you had to go?”

She turned to Buck, and, for a second, their eyes connected. He stared back for a moment and then realized what he was seeing. She was scared of this trip, nervous about going with him. Well, he planned to make sure she had the time of her life, and they’d deal with whatever they had to when they got back home. With all she’d been dealing with this week—including his stupid poker bet and subsequent kiss—she deserved to get away and have some fun.

Buck dropped his arm across Sara’s shoulders in as casual a move as he could. “I’ll even buy you a coffee and some pie at the diner.”

Sara grinned. “If you’re buying, I think I’m pretty hungry.” She slid her hand along her stomach. “Yep, I’m thinking I could go for a late lunch.”

“Okay then, I’ll see you guys later.” Susan left them in the parking lot with a wave and climbed behind the wheel of her sports car.

Buck stared at Sara’s truck for a minute. “Is that thing leaking oil now?” He bent down and reached under the truck then straightened and looked at her. “You know, someday it’s going to leave you at the side of the road and you’re just going to have to walk away.”

“I know.” She shrugged and headed to the driver’s door.

He put his hand out. “Let me drive.”

“Chicken?” She lifted a challenging eyebrow but tossed him the keys without arguing.

****

The rain dripped off the brim of Sara’s hat as she reached the back door. She shivered as another drop slipped down the back of her long duster. “Freakin’-A,” she muttered. It was coming down way too hard and bouncing off the dry ground. They needed the rain, just not like this. A nice, slow, steady ground drenching is what they needed, not this downpour.

Satan, her bull with the personality disorder, had picked this morning to get ornery again. She’d just spent two hours dealing with him—no one else would go near him anymore. Finally it had come down to who was meaner, her or the bull. Today, the bull had retreated. “Someday, you miserable thing, you’re going to push me too far, and you’re gonna get a bullet!” she had warned him as he glared from behind his fence. He almost appeared to be laughing at how mud soaked and wet she was.

She shrugged out of her long coat and left it piled on the floor. She pressed her mud-covered hand to the wall and yanked on her boot. They wouldn’t budge. “Son of a—”

“Watch that mouth, girly,” Flo scolded. She grabbed a thick towel off the basket of laundry sitting on the floor and ambled towards the doorway. “Look at you,” she fussed. “Can’t you leave that dang bull alone for one day? Mud everywhere. Give me those wet things right now before you catch your death.” She held out the towel. “Ain’t you and Buck leaving in like half an hour?”

Sara glared, but did as she was told, knowing Flo wasn’t about to let her traipse mud through the kitchen to the back stairs. The housekeeper’s hand moved to Sara’s wet flannel shirt and helped unbutton it.

“I’m not seven, Flo,” she grumbled, slapping the dark hand away. “I can take my own damn shirt off.”

She unzipped her wet jeans and yanked her shirt out. Then, wiggling and shimmying, she managed to get the wet denim off her legs. She kicked them away as she pushed the shirt off her shoulders and reached for the towel. She wrapped the blue terrycloth around her shoulders and wiped at her face with the ends as she stepped into the kitchen.

“You’re gonna pay for the way you run around without a bra on, little girl. You wait, you’ll see. When you’re as old as me, they’ll be hanging down to your waist.”

“What a sight that would be.”

Sara’s head jerked up to find Buck leaning against the door, a grin splitting his face. She scowled and pulled the ends of the towel tight across her front. His gaze lowered to her bare legs.

“Did you get a good look?” she spat out.

“Actually, not as much as I would have liked, maybe if you opened up that towel a bit...”

Sara’s bare feet slapped on the kitchen floor as she stormed past him. “When hell freezes over, Beauford.”

She raced up the back stairs, Buck’s chuckle ringing in her ears.

Flo came out of the laundry room. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself. I didn’t raise you to be no peeping Tom.”

Buck grinned. “I’m a red blooded male. You can’t deny me a peek every now and then.”

She slapped her wrinkled hands on her ample hips. “You listen to me, boy, and you hear me good.” She pinned him with a glare. “You mind your manners and watch yourself with her this week.”

Buck sauntered across the room to kiss her cheek. “No worries about me, Ma’am. I’ll be a perfect gentleman.”

Flo nodded. “I made some snacks and hot coffee for the road, and don’t forget that little cooler there. If she doesn’t have her Pepsi, she’ll be as ornery as an ol’ polecat.”

She bustled around the kitchen, thrusting enough food to last them a month into bags. Buck started to remind her that it was only a couple hours drive, and they could easily stop and grab a burger, but he knew it would fall on deaf ears.

“Cord coming home tomorrow?” he asked, grabbing a handful of cookies out of the jar.

“Yep. Diane and Teddy will go pick him up. I opened up that old guest room off the den. Since he can’t do steps at all—and you know he’ll be trying to get over here to the office anyway—we figured the best place for him was here.”

“Didn’t that used to be your room?” Buck leaned a hip against the counter. The water rushed through the pipes upstairs and he fought down the urge to picture Sara naked and soapy under the shower.

Flo smiled as she folded towels. “Yep, seems like a million years ago. That’s where I stayed before Sam and I were married.”

“Sam told me it’s coming up on fifty years for you two. We should have a party.” Buck brushed the cookie crumbs off on his jeans and moved to the refrigerator for a Coke. He wanted to get on the road, not so much because he was in a hurry to get there, he just wanted to get off the ranch before some issue cropped up that would prevent the trip.

“Oh go on, we don’t need no party. Sam and me, we’re simple folks. We’ll celebrate just the two of us. Maybe go to supper somewhere in town or something.”

“I’m sure, knowing you two, there’ll be more to the celebration than just dinner.”

Flo cackled and Buck grinned.

“What’s so funny?” Sara bounced down the backstairs. Dressed in newer looking jeans and a short sleeve sweater, she looked almost dressed up—at least for her.

“You look very nice, honey,” Flo said. “Is that the sweater you got in town the other day?”

Buck loved the way the sweater outlined her breasts.

Sara pulled a face and looked down at her chest. “Yeah, Susan thought I needed some new things for the trip. I don’t know though, it’s kind of fussy isn’t it?”

Flo shook her head. “It looks nice, feminine for a change. Now, you two better hit the road.” She waved her hands in the air as if to shoo them. “It’s going to be a long drive with all this rain. Don’t you worry about anything round here.“ She picked up the last bag of snacks. “Everything will be just fine.”

Several minutes later, they passed through the Double B arches. Buck glanced at Sara but she stared straight ahead. He felt good about this trip. They were going to have fun. Even though he wasn’t going to talk about the Will and all that, he was going to try to convince her not to race into a marriage with Cord. He wasn’t going to do that, though, by crossing any lines. This week was all about their friendship, being buddies and hanging out together.

The windshield wipers couldn’t keep up with the stream of water that constantly hammered the window. Sara could barely make out the arches as they passed through them on the way off the property. If anyone other than Buck had been driving, she might have been nervous, but she had complete confidence in his ability to handle the truck even as it fishtailed through the standing water on the road. She opened up one of the magazines she’d brought with her and flipped through it. The atmosphere in the truck felt strained. She reached over to turn up the radio as Toby Keith came on, hoping the country singer with an attitude would lighten the mood.

An hour into the trip she glance over to Buck. “Want me to drive for a bit?”

He shook his head. “No, I’m fine. Would you grab me a can of Coke though?”

Sara set her magazine aside and turned to reach behind them to the cooler in the backseat. She’d just closed the lid when the truck lurched. Tossed into Buck’s side, he swore as he struggled to keep the truck on the road. Her gaze darted outside the truck, trying to figure out what had happened.

Buck cursed again. The truck stopped and he cut the engine.

“What the hell happened?” She brushed back her hair and sat back in her seat.

“We blew a tire.” He glanced up through the windshield at the pouring rain and grimaced. “This ought be fun.”

Sara set the can of cola in the cup holder. “Why don’t we sit here a while and see if the rain lets up?”

“I’m not waiting here like a sitting duck for some idiot to sideswipe my new truck.”

Sara rolled her eyes, but recognized the truth of his words. It was difficult to see and anyone could hit them.

With a sigh of resignation, Buck turned up the collar on his denim jacket and opened the door. She turned to watch him through the back window as he opened the tool compartment and hauled out the spare and jack. I can’t just sit here. She shrugged her jacket on and pushed open the truck door, wincing as her boots sunk into the thick mud.

Buck had put out his emergency flares and was squatted next to the front driver’s side tire. With his back to the traffic and the rain coming down he was in a very dangerous spot and she shivered, hoping the tire change would go fast.

“Get back in the truck,” he yelled, glancing over. “You don’t need to stand out here in the rain.”

“I couldn’t just sit there—thought I could help.”

“That’s stupid, it’ll only take a second, go on back in the cab.”

Sara stuck her hands deep in her jacket and glanced up the highway again. She wasn’t going to sit in the truck while he was out here completely vulnerable. Cars whizzed past, but most gave them a wide rein.

He started to let the truck down when a car came flying up the highway, too fast and way too close. The driver wasn’t slowing down or moving out wide like the others had.

“Buck!”