“I just drove through the pasture at Glen Oaks. We had some mighty thirsty cows penned up there. I let them out and they followed me over to Oak Springs. I’ve trapped them in there for now. But I thought we’d agreed to keep them out of that quadrant during the drought.”
“We did. And I told Worth to keep them out—”
“How did you tell him?”
“What do you mean?”
“Were you talking? Or texting?”
“Ford sent me a text about moving that specific herd, and I told Worth—”
Bryce held out his hand. “Let me see.”
“You don’t need to look through my text messages. I’m telling you what happened, and—”
“And you have a problem with text messages. Give me your phone so I can see exactly what was said.”
Fine. If Bryce wanted proof that Beau hadn’t told Worth to pen the cattle up in a dry pasture during a drought, then he’d give him proof. He yanked out his phone, found the conversation thread, and slammed it into his brother’s palm.
Bryce looked at it. “You told Worth to pen them up at Glen Oaks.”
Beau yanked the phone back. “No way.” His eyes went straight to Worth’s message. Do we want that side herd over in Glen Oaks?
And then he saw his response. Yes.
“Dammit.” He’d obviously mistaken Glen Oaks for Oak Springs. It seemed like the word oak was part of every damn name of every damn location on the ranch. He could read it clearly now, but earlier, he’d obviously been confused. He sighed and shook his head, feeling like shit. “I’m glad you caught it. Were they too terribly thirsty?”
“They seemed okay. And it was just a simple mistake, but Beau, you always need to seek clarification. Just call and ask—”
“I don’t want to bother people with phone calls while they’re busy.”
“No. You just don’t want anyone to know that you struggle with reading. And that fragile ego could have killed some heifers and calves. Get over yourself. Because I might not be here to save your ass the next time.”
Beau hung his head, feeling stupid. As usual. And Bryce was right. He was absolutely embarrassed for anyone to know what his struggles were. But the necessity to hide it was so ingrained that he didn’t know if he could shake it. How could he earn folks’ respect if they thought he couldn’t read? There was just so much fucking shame associated with the inability to perform that particular life skill.
At least he could own up to his mistakes. God knew he’d had plenty of practice at that. “As I said, I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want an apology,” Bryce said. “We just need to keep it from happening again.”
Beau held up the book Alice had given him. “I’m getting a handle on it.”
“You’re reading that book?”
“Yeah.” Maybe he wasn’t reading it very fast. And he was skipping a word here or there. But like Alice said, he was good at context clues.
“Well, that’s awesome. I told you that Alice would be able to help you.”
They walked up the steps and entered the cabin. Bryce inhaled deeply. “Do I smell Mom’s special baked beans?” He sniffed. “And peach cobbler?”
“Yep.”
Bryce looked around stupidly. “Is Mom here?”
Beau laughed. “No. I called her. She talked me through it. And I’ve got two steaks ready to hit the grill.”
“I know you missed me, but you sure didn’t need to go to all this trouble.”
“Actually, Bryce, don’t take your hat off. You’re not staying. Alice is coming over for tutoring.”
“It looks like a little more than tutoring. It looks like dinner. In fact, it might look like a date.”
“I just wanted to show my appreciation.”
“We’ve talked about this. Just don’t appreciate Alice too hard, if you get my drift.”
“Believe me, Alice is not at all interested in any tutoring appreciation activities.”
Although, the memory of her warm, wet body pressed against his completely naked one popped up . . . The way she’d stared at his lips.
She’d seemed at least a little interested.
Alice helped Brittany into Anna’s car and headed back inside. Trista and Miss Mills had left earlier, so it was down to Claire, Maggie, and Carmen. Hopefully they’d leave soon, too, because she needed a little quiet time to recover from her embarrassing outburst.
Nobody was gathering their belongings when she walked into the house. Instead, all three women sat on the couch, quiet and subdued with their hands folded in their laps. Hopes of alone time dissipated into thin air. She’d already briefly apologized for her behavior. Were they expecting her to do it again?
Claire spoke up first. “Alice, we’re sorry.”
“For what?” Maybe they’d accidentally broken something, although nothing appeared amiss.
“For making you uncomfortable,” Maggie said.
“We just didn’t know,” Claire added.
“Know what?”
Carmen cleared her throat. “There is absolutely nothing wrong with being a virgin, Alice. Nothing at all. And if we said anything to make you feel self-conscious or embarrassed . . .”
Holy guacamole, this was not a conversation she wanted to have. “First of all, I’m not a virgin—”
“Whew!” Claire said. “We misunderstood.”
“Right?” Maggie said with a nervous giggle. “We should have known, since she’s dating Beau.”
“Yeah,” Carmen added. “And he’s not exactly beginner material. I mean, size alone—”
What? Had Carmen slept with Beau?
Alice’s head began to spin. Why hadn’t Carmen told her? But then again, why would she? People didn’t just go around reciting lists of who they’d slept with. And of course Carmen had slept with Beau. She was friendly and outgoing, and so was he. Also, he apparently slept with everybody. It actually made sense for them to have slept together. And that was fine, wasn’t it? They were all adults here. Yay! Carmen had slept with Beau. Wasn’t that awesome? She was so happy for Carmen!
“Why are you smiling like that?” Claire asked. “Are you okay?”
Alice’s
