Life After Wife (Three Magic Words Trilogy, #3)(59)

“Yeah, right!” he said aloud.

“Right what?” Sophie asked from the hallway.

His mouth felt like he’d just eaten alum pie. If he was forced to speak or be shot, he would have had to put on the blindfold and get ready to feel the bullets. She was wearing a white sundress with straps that tied on her shoulders. Her red hair was still damp, and kinky curls floated on her shoulders. And she smelled like something between heaven and angels.

“Who were you talking to?” Sophie asked.

“Momma,” he said before he thought. Mercy, the woman would think he was daft talking to his dead mother.

“She messin’ with your thoughts? Aunt Maud does that to me. She pops into my head like that crazy old aunt on those Bewitched reruns on late-night television. Remember how she used to pop in and out of Samantha’s house because she never could get her spells right?”

Elijah inhaled deeply and got another whiff of her perfume mixed with something tropical, like coconut and pineapple, that she must’ve used on her hair. He nodded and headed back to the kitchen with her right behind him.

“Aunt Maud ever fuss at you?” she asked.

“Nope,” he said.

“What was your momma tellin’ you?” she asked.

He finally found his voice. “To put the knives on the right side of the plates.”

It was a lie, but he couldn’t very well tell her what his mother was really talking to him about, now could he?

The back door opened and Hayden and Tanner came pushing into the kitchen. More Stetson. More soap smells. Just proof positive that Sophie needed her own place and soon!



Elijah paced the floor.

The week had flown by so fast that he wondered if it had sprouted wings. The new fence was coming along, and the pasture on the new property was losing a lot of mesquite trees. Hayden had found a rental place in Abilene and had a bulldozer delivered on Monday, and every day all week he’d reclaimed ground. The progress was phenomenal, and he was talking about renting the machine for another week.

Hayden and Tanner had left right at noon for Silverton to pick up a few more of their things and to see their older brothers. Randy, Frankie, and Kendall were off to visit their families. For the first time in months Elijah was alone.

And he paced the floor.

Back and forth from the living room to the kitchen, through the dining room and back to the living room, down the hall to his bedroom, then into his office where he toyed with a game on the computer for all of thirty seconds before he was up pacing again.

Sophie had gone with the girls to trailer shop. He’d known about it all week, and what it meant hadn’t hit him exactly until she waved at him from the truck. He’d been sitting in Aunt Maud’s rocking chair on the porch and, the minute she waved, it was as if she was telling him good-bye for good.

She’d bring home the deed and title to a double-wide, and in a few short weeks, she’d be out of the house. Already it was as quiet as a tomb and just as cold, even though the thermometer on the porch post said it was eighty-five degrees. It was another hot one for the last week in September.

Two months before he would have given Sophie his entire paycheck to get off the Double Bar M; now he wondered how he’d survive in the house without her. What had annoyed him to the point of homicide a few weeks ago was suddenly endearing and cute.

He checked the time on a pass-through of the kitchen. Barely one o’clock. They’d just be reaching Abilene about now, and she’d be looking over the first of the double-wide homes. Sophie didn’t belong in a trailer. What if a tornado hit the area? Everyone knew those things weren’t safe in a tornado.

He picked up his phone from the cabinet and sent her a text: Have you thought about tornadoes?

One came back immediately: They said they tie these down so they’re safe. Guaranteed!

He wanted to stomp the phone, but instead he tucked it into his pocket and headed for the tack room in the barn. Time would pass far quicker if he didn’t have a clock to keep checking and if he kept his hands busy. There was always tack to be polished, and, last time he checked the room, it looked like a real tornado had wound its way through there.

Determined to make it spotless and get everything organized, he dove into the work with the gusto of a hunting hound on the trail of a coyote. But as is often the case when the hands are busy, the mind takes off on a trip of its own. At two o’clock Elijah sent another text message: Found one yet?

One came back: You in a hurry to get me out of the house?

He sat down and propped his feet up on the worktable and typed with his thumbs: No, I am not.

She sent one back: Gathering brochures. You can help me choose when I get home. We’re off to the mall, but Fancy has to be back at five.

“Three hours,” he moaned.

He led Wild Bill, the big black horse that Maud bought just before she died, out of his stall and saddled him up. Maybe a ride around all three sections of land would take three hours and clear his mind.

Fightin’ with your heart is always a tough battle, his mother said as he cinched up the saddle.

“Yes, but maybe my heart shouldn’t win,” he said.



Sophie arrived at the ranch to find everything eerily quiet. The stillness was even more pronounced by the fact that she’d just left her friends where they were talking and giggling all at once about her new home options.