Mandy appeared at her elbow with a tray. “Angel sent out the lunch you asked for.”
“I didn’t ask for it. He did,” Miss Joan corrected. Taking the tray from the waitress, the diner owner quickly distributed what was on there and placed it in front of Sully. “Here’s your lunch, boy. Hope it meets with your expectations.”
The statement was politely worded, but there was no mistaking the confidence that was behind it. Miss Joan was expecting nothing short of a euphoric response from the first forkful to the last.
Well, Sully thought, half amused, half bemused, he could always fake it if need be.
He cut into the steak and eased the first piece into his mouth while Miss Joan watched him, waiting for his response.
When flavor exploded in his mouth, he was slightly surprised and deeply relieved.
“It’s good,” he told his great-uncle’s friend.
“Of course it’s good,” Miss Joan answered. “I told you it would be. Were you expecting that it wouldn’t be?”
“No, Miss Joan,” Sully answered politely, “I wasn’t expecting anything else except what you said.”
Miss Joan merely smiled, knowing that he was humoring her. But given who he was and who his great-uncle was, she didn’t mind. She nodded her head. “You’ll do, boy. You’ll do.”
Miss Joan smiled and nodded with approval as she cleared away the empty plates.
“Well, for a man who didn’t want to eat anything, you certainly did justice to that steak and apple pie,” she commented, then swiped a cloth along the counter, getting rid of any lingering crumbs. Finished, she asked, “Can I get you anything else?”
“Only if you want to watch me explode,” Sully answered.
He placed his hand against his stomach as if he was trying to keep the contents inside from suddenly emerging.
“Wouldn’t want to see that,” Miss Joan told him with a puckered expression. “All right then, if you can wait here for a while—no more than an hour—Harry said he can come by and bring you up to the J-H Ranch.”
Sully saw no reason why he needed to be taken by the hand and escorted. “I don’t want to put you out any further,” he told Miss Joan. “I’m sure I can find the ranch on my own. Just point me in the right direction and tell me approximately how many miles the ranch is from here.”
The lines along Miss Joan’s forehead furrowed, forming a skeptical pucker.
“Are you sure?” she asked. She was used to townspeople finding their way around, but this was a tenderfoot, and she had no knowledge about his innate skills. “Because Harry won’t mind. The man loves company and he loves to talk. Says he doesn’t get much practice with me around. Something about sucking up all the oxygen in the room,” she added, shaking her head and dismissing her husband’s words.
“Yes, I’m sure,” Sully told her. He noticed that Mandy reached under the counter to take the dishes that Miss Joan had cleared away. The waitress lingered just long enough to look at him longingly. “Once I get settled in, I would love to meet with your husband, Miss Joan, but right now, I’m anxious to see where I’ll be hanging my hat for the next few weeks.”
“You’re not just going to be hanging your hat,” Miss Joan informed him. She eyed Sully, trying to decide if he was just talking or if he was serious. If it was the latter, he needed to be set straight. “You understand that you’re going to be working for your keep once you’re at the ranch. My foreman doesn’t have much patience with people who don’t pull their own weight or are waiting to be served,” she told Sully.
“Oh, I understand,” he answered, not wanting there to be any misunderstandings. “Uncle Seamus made the terms of this arrangement very clear, and to be honest, I’m really looking forward to working with my hands.”
Miss Joan studied him for a moment, decided he was being honest and then nodded. “All right then, about those directions you wanted.”
Flipping over the menu she had just used earlier, Miss Joan took out the pencil she had in her apron pocket. Using a minimum of strokes, she drew a very basic map for Sully that took him from the center of the town to edge of the ranch that she and Harry owned.
Finished, she put the pencil back into her pocket with a flourish and let him have the map.
“You sure you don’t want to wait for Harry?” she asked, looking at him somewhat dubiously.
“No, this’ll do fine,” Sully assured her, tapping the map she had drawn for him.
Miss Joan had never accepted anything at face value. This was no exception. “How often do you get lost?”
“I don’t,” he said simply. “I just keep on going until I get there.”
Her expression was only partially skeptical at this point.
“All the same, I wouldn’t want to be the one responsible for losing one of Seamus’s great-grandkids, even if he does have a bunch of them to spare,” Miss Joan said.
“You won’t be.” His tone was final, indicating that the discussion was at an end. Sully reached into his pocket again, this time to take out his wallet. He was about to flip the folded leather open. “How much do I owe you for lunch?”
Miss Joan’s face darkened, like clouds gathering in the sky just before a storm. “You take your hand out of your pocket, boy, or your journey’s going to be over before it ever gets started,” she warned him. Under her watchful eye, Sully did as he was told—for now. “Nothing was said about there being a charge for lunch.”
Still, Sully’s hand lingered by his pocket. “I’d feel better paying my own way.”
“And I’d feel better if I were twenty years younger, but we can’t all get what we wish for,” Miss Joan snapped. “Now get going. And be sure to tell Rae I sent you.”
“Ray?” Sully asked.
Miss Joan nodded. “That’s the foreman. Rae Mulcahy. Otherwise you might find yourself being shot for trespassing.”
He should have known, Sully thought. People out here stripped things down to the basics.
“Right. I’ll introduce myself first thing,” he promised the woman. “Thank you for lunch, Miss Joan. It really was every bit as good as you said.”
She accepted her due. “Of course it was. You don’t stay in business as long as I have by lying to people. Don’t let Rae work you too hard,” she told him as an afterthought as Seamus’s great-nephew began to leave the diner.
Sully’s mouth curved a little as he took in her warning. “Not possible,” he replied just before he took his leave.
* * *
The twenty-some-odd mile trip to the J-H Ranch went by so quickly, Sully found that he was there before he realized it. If it weren’t for the tall wooden gate proclaiming the ranch’s name, he wouldn’t even have known that he had reached his destination. He would have just thought he was out on the open range.
Part of the problem was that the land had a sameness to it that didn’t set apart one area from another.
Getting out of the 4x4 truck he had rented at the airport when he had landed here in Texas, Sully opened the gate. Getting back in, he drove through to the other side, then got out a second time in order to close the gate behind him. He didn’t want to accidentally allow one of the horses to escape, although right now, he saw no sign of any kind of life forms in the vicinity.