Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

D awson glanced at the pair of tennis shoes as he went past them and into the cabin. They belonged to Dwayne, as the twelve-year-old could never find his shoes. Zona had simply started buying more pairs and leaving them wherever her son might go or be.

Therefore, Brandon and Dawson had some here; a couple of pairs waited at the homestead, and Dawson knew Zona had even put some in the back of every vehicle they owned.

He smiled to himself, because the soup pot he'd picked up from Etta Glover-Winters weighed a lot, and he didn't have the mental energy to smile, walk, and carry the soup toward the back counter. He made it, relief singing through the muscles in his arms and shoulders.

Brandon hadn't come in for lunch yet, and Dawson sighed as he took in the silence in their shared cabin. In that moment, something started clattering. It sounded like tires over rutted road, and it took Dawson a moment to realize what it was.

"Rain," he said, looking up at the ceiling. When he switched his gaze outside, he found the raindrops splashing angrily against the glass. "Great."

At least he wasn't outside, but Mother Nature had ruined his plans for that evening. "It's not the first time you've had to change things up last-minute," he muttered to himself and Ruffin. The dog looked up from his water bowl, decided Dawson wasn't talking to him, and went back to his drink.

He had modified his dates plenty of times in the past, but none of them had ever turned out all that well. His confidence level for this date already hovered near the bottom of the scale, and he desperately wanted to impress Caroline.

Why, he wasn't sure. And how? He had no idea.

The weather is making an outdoor walking tour of Main Street impossible , he sent to Finn. Other ideas for me for tonight?

Let me ask Henry.

Dawson looked up from his phone, trying to place Henry. Your cousin?

Yeah, and he dates a lot , Finn said. Same age as Link. A year younger maybe. He'll know of something.

I can text him. I think I have his number . Dawson started looking through his contacts while Finn texted back that he'd already asked Henry for something to do that night in the rain.

Dawson set down his phone and went to get down a couple of bowls. The front door banged open, and he dang near jumped out of his skin. "Bulls and broncos," he swore as he twisted and jumped away from the door at the same time.

"Whoo-ee," Brandon yelled. Or maybe he was just talking. He did everything louder than Dawson, that was for sure. "It is coming down out there." He brushed something off his shoulder that looked dangerously like hail, and with his adrenaline positively pumping through him, Dawson switched his gaze to the window.

Sure enough, he could see the rain more fully now, and the pounding on the roof intensified.

"You cooked?" Brandon didn't seem to care about the hail, but Dawson sure did. Hail ruined crops way more than rain did. Hail didn't seep right into the ground immediately. Hail meant the weather was more severe than one could tell from just looking at the flat, gray sky.

Hail could turn to snow. And while snow in the Texas Panhandle wasn't all that unheard of, it wasn't anything good either. Alerts would be sent out. Roads would get icy. More accidents. Heck, sometimes the over-anxious restaurant owners closed their doors for the safety of their employees .

"I didn't make the soup," Dawson said. "Etta did, and I went to pick it up."

"Even better," Brandon said, grinning his way into the kitchen. He lifted the lid and said, "Oh, boy. It's the tortellini kind. I love this stuff."

Dawson did too, but his phone had started chiming, one right after the other. Five, six, seven-eight-nine-ten times. The beeps crowded over the top of one another, and both he and Brandon looked at his device.

"That's not good," Brandon said. But he wasn't in charge of anything on the ranch, so he didn't have to carry that weight. Dawson did, but he tried to ignore it while he finished the task of getting down bowls and ladling up their lunch.

He couldn't avoid his phone when he sat down to eat, and he sighed as he pulled it toward him. The hail had softened back to rain that continued to lash out at the land.

"They've already issued a warning for the river," he said, swiping those texts away. "Duke's sending along every text from the other ranch owners." Dawson frowned at his phone, wondering why his older brother was doing that. He never had before.

He tapped to call him, glancing over to Brandon. "I need to talk to Duke."

"Fine by me." Brandon had already eaten half his bowl of soup while Dawson hadn't taken a single bite yet .

"Hey, Daws."

"Hey," he said. "Why are you sending me all the ranch owner texts?"

Duke sighed, and Dawson didn't like the sound of that. He stared into the depths of his tortellini soup, trying to get that sigh to line up with texts he didn't normally get. Duke was a lot more like him than Brandon, in that he only said what was absolutely necessary and wore his inner grump on the outside. Such things must come from their daddy.

"Listen, Dawson," Duke said, and whenever he started a conversation with "Listen," it was something he didn't want to say. And something Dawson wouldn't really want to hear.

"Spit it out, Duke," he growled. "I'm at lunch, and I just want to eat in peace."

"I think it's time for you to take on some more responsibility for the ranch," Duke said. "I'm not going to be around forever, you know? I have four kids that need their dad, and you're more than capable."

Dawson didn't know what to say. Of all the times for this to come. Last week, he'd have welcomed it, for it would've given variety to his monotonous days. He'd work out a schedule where everything lined up just right.

But now? He didn't have time for this bomb to be dropped into his lap. He had a date with Caroline to deal with. A date with nothing to do .

"Are you still there?" Duke asked.

Dawson cleared his throat. "Yes," he said. "I'm here."

"What do you think?"

"What do you need me to do?" He glanced over to Brandon, who looked at him with wide, blue eyes.

"I was thinking you'd handle things this winter, since the foreman and controller duties are less right now. And as they ramp up, we'll work on them together."

"I'm going to need your help in all seasons, Duke," Dawson said, his voice growing very quiet. "I—you know—you can't throw me to the wolves. I need to be walked through it at least once."

He hadn't spelled out everything for Duke, but he shouldn't have to. He knew about Dawson's challenges, and he'd always been kind and thoughtful with him, even when there'd been some resentment between them.

"Of course, brother," Duke said. "Maybe we can meet tonight to go over things like this."

"Emergencies."

"Right," Duke said. "Emergencies."

Dawson didn't want to say no, and Duke saved him from having to explain about his date by saying, "I'm getting a ton of texts. I'm going to forward them to you and then add you to the group text and let them know you'll be handling this for us."

"Duke."

"Don't worry, Daws. It's a lot of chatter about what's going on in various areas of town. If something happens up here, we report it. If it comes to organizing who needs help, we say we can come anytime. It's easy. This is something you can do."

Dawson took a deep breath, the knot in his throat starting to unravel. "Okay," he said, wondering how he was going to eat with so many nerves balled in his gut.

"And I'm right here if you need help." Duke wore a smile in his voice. "I hope you and Brandon are inside. Oh, you said you're at lunch, so you are."

"We are," he said.

"Come for dinner tonight," Duke said. "Zona and I will feed you like a king—if you can get here." He laughed and hung up before Dawson could protest.

Then he looked out the window. "If I can get there?" His brother and his family lived down the lane, around the corner, and past the homestead. All on dirt-gravel roads. Why wouldn't he be able to get there?

"Surely things aren't going to flood right now," he said as he got up and went to the window. His phone started going off in rapid succession again, which irritated Dawson to no end.

Outside, the rain continued to fall in a thick wave that blurred everything into something like an Impressionist painting. Or one of the watercolors of the ranch little Dallas had done as a four-year-old…that someone had poured even more water over.

"Come eat," Brandon said behind him, and Dawson turned away from the weather. He didn't see his phone sitting on the counter where he'd left it, and his younger brother nodded to the cooling bowl of soup. "The world isn't going to flood right now. Duke and the other ranch owners and controllers and foremen can wait."

"Where's my phone?"

"When you need it back, I'll give it to you." Brandon used his spoon to push Dawson's bowl closer to him. "Now, eat."

Dawson picked up his own utensil and dipped it into the soup. No, it wasn't as hot as he'd like it, but it had a great tomato tang, with creamy cheese inside the tender pasta. His taste buds sighed into bliss, and the unrest about being separated from his device blipped at him but didn't shout.

He wanted to look up places to take Caroline for dinner that night, then reminded himself that he'd already chosen a restaurant. His heartbeat came to a sudden stop when he realized he'd agreed to meet Duke at dinnertime tonight.

"Brandon, I need my phone."

"You're not done eating yet," he said.

Dawson threw him the most murderous look he could muster on a half-full stomach. "It's not about the ranch."

"Then why do you need it?"

He couldn't see a way around telling Brandon about Caroline. He'd never really hidden any of his other dates or girlfriends, and he wasn't embarrassed. He'd already told his friends about her—not by name, though, and that felt intimate.

"I have a date tonight I need to rearrange," he said. "If you must know, Mister Nosy."

Brandon's expression turned to delight. "Who with?"

"I don't want to say. It's the first date, and I might not even get another one." Especially after this.

Brandon reached out and plucked the phone from the lazy Susan on the counter, where they kept salt and pepper shakers, napkins, a bottle of ketchup, and a basket for their keys and sunglasses.

"Do you really have a date?"

Dawson navigated to his text string with Caroline, his heart feeling like someone had filled it with wet cement and it was now drying and settling into the soles of his feet. "Not anymore," he said. "I'm going to cancel."

"Then just set up something else."

"Duke wants me to start doing more running of the ranch." Dawson rolled his head to stretch his neck. "I don't really know what that's going to do to my schedule."

"For the right woman, you'll blow up your schedule," Brandon said.

Dawson gaped at him, only a few words typed out to cancel the date with Caroline. "It's like you don't know me at all."

Brandon laughed, because he did know Dawson. "So you'll get out your pink sticky notes and you'll make arrangements to include whoever this is into your schedule."

"And what color will the new ranch duties be?" Dawson could see his sticky note board, and it was already full. "And the owls? I already had to add them." He went back to his phone and the few words he'd typed out.

"Caroline," Brandon said, and Dawson caught him with his neck craned to see the phone. He slapped his palm over the phone, but Brandon added, "Wildlife Officer."

Dawson looked at his brother, pure fire raging in his veins. "It's not?—"

"You're dating the Wildlife Officer who made you stomp around like a raging gorilla? The one who badgered you—your words—about the paperwork?"

Maybe he had used those words, and maybe he had paced in the cabin while ranting about her semi-abusive emails insisting he file the habitat paperwork. "She likes her hash browns a certain way," he said, which explained nothing.

He finished his text to her and sent it, hoping he'd get another chance with her. Instead of leaving it up to her or chance or God, he quickly sent her another text.

"Nice," Brandon said with pure appreciation in his voice, and Dawson slid his phone away a couple of inches .

"Can't be clearer than that, right?" Now he just had to wait for Caroline to respond. She seemed to have her phone surgically attached to her fingers, so it shouldn't take long. He prayed it wouldn't—and that her answer would be positive—while he nervously took another bite of soup.