Life After Wife (Three Magic Words Trilogy, #3)(38)

Sophie managed a weak giggle. “That sounds just like her.”

Elijah joined her at the table with a huge stack of steaming hot pancakes and a whole plate of sausage patties that he set between them. “Two little old sausages ain’t goin’ to hold you through the whole sale. Eat up, girl, we got quite a mornin’ ahead of us.”

She forked two more patties to her plate, covered the pancakes with warmed maple syrup, and cut off a bite. “Mmmm, good! You share recipes?”

“No, you want those pancakes, you got to ask me to make them,” he said.

“Meanie!”

He grinned. “Yep, that I am.”

“OK, then while we eat tell me about your brothers. You didn’t even tell me their names,” she said. “Besides, you’ve been getting letters about me ever since I moved here, and I don’t know hardly anything about you.”

Elijah swallowed and sipped hot black coffee. “Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.”

“I didn’t ask you to recite the books of the Bible,” she said.

“I’m not. Those’re my four older brothers. Matthew is fifty-two, Mark is fifty, Luke is forty-eight, and John is forty-six. Momma gave up on havin’ a girl when John was born. She was twenty when Matthew was born, and the old folks out in West Texas say it’s not good to have kids when you are past thirty. I kind of snuck up on her and Dad when she was thirty-two. Then they got Jed when I was two and Noah when I was four. By then she said she could live without a daughter and seven boys were enough kids. The older four were all teenagers, and I was eight when she got pregnant at the age of forty. I remember it well, because she was sure she was going to have a sweet little daughter. She got twin boys: Tanner and Hayden, who were thirty-two this past summer.”

“Tanner and Hayden? All the rest of you have Bible names,” Sophie said.

“Guess she gave up on God blessin’ her with a girl when she had two more mean old boys at forty. Matthew got married the year before the twins were born, and Momma got her first granddaughter just a few weeks after she gave birth to the twins. That granddaughter is married now and has three kids of her own. It’s a big family reunion, but like I told you before, there ain’t many girls at it.”

Sophie finished off the last of her breakfast and poured herself a cup of coffee. “Sounds like it. And the twins, are they married, too?”

“No, just me and the youngest two are still runnin’ from the noose. Oh, I forgot to tell you, Tanner and Hayden are coming to the sale. They’re between jobs, and they’ve got lots of experience on a ranch. Tanner’s been foreman of a big operation for the past five years. Owner sold it last week. Hayden taught agriculture at the high school in Silverton, but he’s not renewing his contract. Says he’s had all he can stand of teaching, and he’d rather ranch. I’d like for us to have a sit-down visit, the four of us, after the sale is finished. I’ve got some ideas,” Elijah said.

Sophie rolled her eyes and carried her plate to the dishwasher. Elijah always had “ideas” and she was running as fast as she could to stay up with him already. Now what did he have up his sleeve?



At ten o’clock the barn was full, the balconies elbow to elbow, the sale floor crowded, and caterers were weaving in among the people with trays of ice-cold soda pop and sweet tea. The refreshment table offered little yeast rolls stuffed with barbecued beef, ham, a delicious cream cheese with a faint pineapple flavor, and pulled pork, as well as three-tiered trays with petit fours and bite-size pieces of cheesecake in a dozen flavors.

At noon Tillman would bring out the ribs and brisket. At three the sale would be over, and they’d have to hustle to get the barn ready for the big party, which started at seven with buffet supper and a live band.

When the auctioneer took his place and the first heifer was brought into the circular sale pen, butterflies began doing a fast line dance in Sophie’s stomach. She and Elijah were sitting on the top bleacher in the south-side balcony. She held a copy of the sale book in her lap; both she and Elijah wore worried expressions. That cow down there would set the precedent for the whole sale. If she went at above fair market price because of her excellent bloodlines, then the rest of the sale had a pretty good chance at doing the same. If she sold for next to nothing, they’d be running in the red next year.

Even if they had a lean year, Sophie had enough money in her personal bank account that she did not intend to go to the bank for a loan. Aunt Maud had never borrowed against the land, and Sophie wasn’t starting now, no matter what this great plan of Elijah’s was.

The smell of so many bodies (so much perfume from the ladies and aftershave from the gents), blended with the odor of cows, blowing dust, and the faint scent of burned land added to the excitement of the first sale of the day. Conversational chatter slowly died when the microphone emitted a high-pitched squeak as the auctioneer adjusted it.

Sophie wasn’t sure when she and Elijah laced their fingers together until he squeezed her hand. She looked up and their eyes locked, neither of them saying a word, yet reading each other’s thoughts as clearly as if they were written in indelible ink on their faces.

“It’s OK,” he finally said. “Breathe.”

“I can’t until this first cow is sold. Aunt Maud always laughed at me but…”

Elijah leaned down and whispered. “Stop worryin’. It’s taken care of.”