“Often enough. I’ve had gravy, which comes on everything, and chili up to here.”
“Then, since you refused to go out with me last night, I’m glad I insisted on lunch today. I’ve frequently had to rescue ladies who work downtown from the high-calorie clutches of the B & B. The menu is hazardous to their waistlines.”
“Not that this is much more slenderizing,” she said, tasting the rich, creamy salad dressing.
“You don’t need to worry about that. You’re as slender as your mother.”
Alex rested her fork on the edge of her plate. “Even after having me?”
Junior’s blond head was bent over his plate. He raised it, noticed her earnest curiosity, and blotted his mouth on the stiff linen napkin before answering. “From the back you’d be taken for twins, except that your hair is darker and has more red in it.”
“That’s what Reede said.”
“Really? When?”
His smile faltered. The question had been posed a little too casually to be taken that way. A telltale crease formed between his brows.
“Soon after we met.”
“Ah.” The furrow between his brows smoothed out.
Alex didn’t want to think about Reede. When she was with him, the practical, methodical, professional detachment she prided herself on disappeared. Pragmatism gave way to emotionalism.
One minute she was accusing him of first-degree murder, the next, kissing him madly and wishing for more. He was dangerous, not only from her viewpoint as a prosecutor, but as a woman. Both facets of her, one as vulnerable as the other, suffered under his assault.
“Junior,” she said, after they’d finished eating, “why couldn’t Reede forgive Celina for having me? Was his pride that badly damaged?”
He was staring out the window at the golf greens. When he felt her eyes on him, he looked at her sadly. “I’m disappointed.”
“About what?”
“I thought—hoped—that you accepted my invitation to lunch because you wanted to see me.” He let out a discouraged breath. “But you just want to talk about Reede.”
“Not Reede, Celina. My mother.”
He reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “It’s okay. I’m used to it. Celina used to call me and talk about Reede all the time.”
“What did she say when she called and talked about him?”
Junior propped his shoulder against the window and began to play with his necktie, idly pulling it through his fingers. “I usually heard how wonderful he was. You know, Reede this, Reede that. After your father got killed in the war, and she was available again, she was afraid that she’d never get Reede back.”
“She didn’t.”
“No.”
“Surely, she didn’t expect him to be glad about Al Gaither and me.”
“No, she knew better than that. Neither of us had wanted her to go away for the summer, but there wasn’t much we could do about it once she’d made her mind up,” Junior replied. “She went. She was there. We were here, three-hundred-plus miles away. One night, Reede decided to borrow a plane and fly us there to bring her back.
“That son of a bitch had convinced me that he could get us there and back safely before anybody realized the plane was missing. The only person who would notice would be Moe Blakely, and in his book, Reede could do no wrong.”
“My God, you didn’t do it?”
“No, not then. One of the stable hands—Pasty Hickam, in fact—overheard us plotting it and told Dad. He gave us hell and threatened us within an inch of our lives not to ever try something that crazy. He knew all about Celina trying to make Reede jealous and advised us to let her have her fun. He assured us that she would eventually tire of it and come home, and everything would be just like it had been before.”
“But Angus was wrong. When mother came back to Purcell, she was pregnant with me. Nothing was ever the same.”
She toyed with her iced tea spoon for a long, silent while. “How much do you know about my father, Junior?”