Texas Rose Forever (Texas Rose Ranch #1) (9 page)

Old furniture that looked like it was from Edith’s time was neatly covered in white sheets and stacked in one corner. Perfect columns of boxes were laid out in a grid. Her palms actually itched with the need to run her hands over the things that Edith loved. Mundane artifacts made history real to her. Her heart went pitter-pat as she fairly vibrated with excitement. This was going to be fun.

CHAPTER 9

Seeing CanDee rolling around on his bed had almost cost Cinco the romance he wanted to give her . . . well, both of them. He’d rushed into things with Naomi and he wasn’t going to make the same mistake with her. She was special. With CanDee he wanted to savor . . . everything. First kisses, first touches, first dates . . . first everythings.

“I can’t believe that this stuff is so well preserved.” She went to the furniture stacked in the back. “Is this Edith’s parlor furniture?”

“It sure is.” He knew she’d love it almost as much as he did. The only reason that it wasn’t downstairs was because it was horribly uncomfortable. He didn’t have the heart to throw it out, so it just sat up here collecting years.

She whipped one of the white sheets off of a pink velvet high-backed chair and sat. “Wow, this sucks.” She moved around, trying to get more comfortable. “It’s both lumpy and hard, which is difficult to achieve.”

She stood. “What’s in the boxes?”

She walked over to the first stack, leaned up on her tippy-toes and tried to peek into the sealed wooden crate, but the top didn’t budge.

“Clothes, housewares, you name it. Apparently we Roses are hoarders.” He picked up the box for her and set it on the floor by the furniture. “I haven’t been through them since I was a kid. I just remember there’s lots of stuff.”

She bent over with her butt in the air and tried to lift the top off.

He had to admit, she had a nice ass. All he could think of was last night and her tiny underwear.

“Are you staring at my butt?” She wiggled her backside.

“Yep.” No use in denying it.

“Maybe you could give me a hand with this?” She wiggled her backside again.

He squatted down in front of her and came face to chest with her gaping-open green shirt. He got a great view of her black, lacy bra and the outline of her breasts.

“I’m beginning to get the idea that you’d rather see me naked.” She stood and propped a fist on her hip.

“I’m not going to lie, the idea has merit.” His gaze took its sweet time roaming down her body.

“Stop picturing me naked and open the box.” She rolled her eyes. “Now you have an attack of the libido? Where was that ten minutes ago after your brother left?”

“You have a nice body and I like looking at it.” He grabbed the lid and pulled, but it didn’t move. He peered down at it. Tiny squared nails kept it closed tight. “Sorry I didn’t think of this sooner—give me a second and I’ll get a hammer.”

He ran down the stairs to the second floor, bolted down the hall, then down the set of stairs to the first floor. He rocketed into the kitchen, went to the pantry, and grabbed his toolbox. He clomped up the attic stairs two at a time.

CanDee’s back was to him. She’d slipped off her shirt and jeans. A tiny strap of black lace was tucked between the round cheeks of her bottom and a black, lacy bra strap wrapped around the middle of her back like a band. The little thing didn’t have straps. She was even better in person than in his imagination.

She pulled something over her head. A dress? The shiny gold beads blinked in the light of the three bald light bulbs. He stepped heavily on the top step and it creaked under his weight.

She whipped around. “What do you think?”

She picked up the matching feather headband and slipped it around her head. The feather was a moth-eaten mess, but the gold beads winked in the low light.

She hummed a few bars of “Puttin’ on the Ritz” and did the Charleston. “Wasn’t Edith a little too old to be a flapper?”

The dress was at least two sizes too wide and two sizes too short. It barely covered her ass. She looked good enough to eat.

“Yes, she was a little too old to be a flapper, but her daughter-in-law wasn’t.” He loved her energy. CanDee enjoyed life and saw things differently than others. She didn’t just see an old dress, but something fun to play dress-up in.

CanDee stopped dancing and her eyes squinted like she was trying to figure out string theory or where the other sock disappeared to in the dryer. “Edith had a daughter-in-law? Er . . . um, that would have meant that she had a child . . . how did that work?”

“She and Mel adopted my grandfather, Tres, after his family died in a fire in 1915. It destroyed the main house and part of the cottage. Tres was the only one to make it out and he was burned very badly. Edith nursed him back to health. He lived here until after he married and a new house was built.”

“Well, that’s just sad.” She climbed onto a chair that she’d pulled over to another stack of boxes and pulled something out. It was a black top hat. “Sir, I believe I found your hat.”

She handed it to him.

It was sturdier than it looked and weighed a couple of pounds. He popped it on his head. “How do I look?”

“All you need is a monocle and you can be Mr. Peanut for Halloween.” She leaned back and eyed him. “Or that dude from Monopoly.”

He turned and the hat banged on the rafter. With the hat, he had to be seven and a half feet, easy. Tall hats weren’t meant for tall men. Still, he left it on and went to the crate. He pried it open with the back of the hammer. Inside was a mess of rags.

“Why would anyone want to keep rags?” He looked up at CanDee.

She walked over, knelt down, and sifted through the rags. She pulled out a long length of gauzy off-white material. “It’s a wedding veil.”

Carefully, she pulled it free and slid the cap part onto her head. She struck a pose. “What do you think?”

His mouth turned dry as the Sahara. She looked so beautiful. In his mind’s eye he could see her wearing that as she walked down the aisle toward him. His chest felt like an elephant was sitting on it. He couldn’t seem to pull enough air into his lungs.

“That bad?” She whipped off the veil and leaned down to get a better look at him. “You’re looking a little gray around the gills. It is a little hot in here. Maybe we should do this another time?”

He’d never thought about getting married again, but he hadn’t not thought about it either. His palms began to sweat and blood drummed in his ears. Still holding the veil, she leaned over and rummaged around in the box.

“Look, here’s the dress that goes with it.” She pulled out a faded blue dress with lots of faded pink and white ribbons. She stood and held it against her. “That is the ugliest wedding dress I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s Edith’s. She was wearing that in her wedding photo.” He had to agree with CanDee. While he wasn’t into fashion, he had eyeballs and that dress was making them hurt.

“Thank God those photos were black and white and couldn’t capture the poor choice of colors.” She glanced skyward. “I’m losing faith in you, Edith.”

She rummaged around in the bottom of the box and came out with some pink leather boots with buttons all the way up the sides.

“Dang, she had some big feet. I wear a nine and a half so these have to be twelves at least.” She held a shoe up next to her foot. It looked like a giant pink banana next to her creamy white foot. “These are like transvestite big.”

She handed him one of the pink shoes and he held it against his socked foot. It was almost as long as his foot. “These are huge.”

She set the shoe down and felt around in the box. “I think this is all that’s in here.”

She tucked both shoes back into the crate, carefully folded the veil and then laid it in the open crate, and did the same with the dress. “These really should be in a museum so that others can see them. Does Roseville have a museum? I think the family museum is too small to house this collection.”

“Roseville doesn’t, but the next town over, Fredericksburg, does. Let’s see what’s in the rest of the crates before I call the museum. I’ll need to check with the rest of my family, but since I’m really the only one who cares about history, it shouldn’t be a problem.” He’d never really thought about donating anything to a museum. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, it was only that he thought of these things as family history and wasn’t sure anyone else cared to see them. Until now, no one had.

“On to the next box.” She stood and weaved her way around the stacks to the back. “Holy cow, this is cool.”

She’d found the old Victrola. He smiled to himself. He remembered when he’d found it twenty or so years ago. He’d loved it and had it downstairs until Naomi had moved in and moved it back to the attic. Since they were too bulky to collect, she’d had no use for it. He’d forgotten about it and should bring it back downstairs. Maybe he’d do it tonight.

“Does it work?” He could hear the smile in her voice.

“Yes, ma’am.” He meandered through the box maze. “Let me pull it out and we can listen to it while we sift through the rest of the boxes.”

He liked doing things for CanDee; he had the strangest urge to beat on his chest and drag a brontosaurus home to feed her. In an effort to impress her, he walked right up to the free-standing Victrola, wrapped his arms around it, and lifted it. It only weighed one hundred and fifty or so pounds, but it was bulky and awkward. One of the doors on the front where the records were stored popped open and a few of the records teetered to the side and threatened to fall on the floor.

“Let me help you.” CanDee caught the records before they spilled out and shattered. She walked beside him, holding the doors closed until he gingerly lowered it to the floor.

“So you wind this crank to power it?” She touched the lever on the side.

“Yes.” He straightened and stretched his back. “Open the lid, choose a record, fit it on the turntable, and place the needle on the first groove in the record.”

She opened the door on the front and carefully pulled a record out. “How about Vess Ossman’s ‘Maple Leaf Rag’?”

“Whatever. I’m sorry to tell you that they all basically sound the same.” He liked music, but this was more tinny than acoustically pleasing.

She pulled the record out of its paper sleeve, opened the Victrola’s lid, placed the record on the faded green turntable, and applied the needle. She cranked the handle and a fast-paced banjo ragtime tune drifted out. The tune was so fast that it was hard to believe that anyone’s—presumably Vess Ossman’s—fingers could move so fast.

“It sounds like he’s at the bottom of a well.” CanDee listened intently. “I guess it’s all they had and was probably a major technological advancement in its time. I have to say that it looks better than it sounds.”

She kept nodding along with the beat. “I’m getting use to it. Perfect music for attic hunting.”

Two hours later, they’d been through every box, stacked them based on contents—clothes in one corner, furniture and housewares in another, documents and photos in another, and a miscellaneous stack for the stuff that didn’t fit into the first three categories.

“I’m trying to think of a reason why someone would have a box full of porcelain doll heads, but I have to tell you that serial killer is all I’m coming up with.” She patted the box she’d just stacked in the miscellaneous pile.

“My grandmother painted china as a hobby. I guess she didn’t get around to making the bodies before she died.” He didn’t want the night to end, but it was well after midnight and he needed to be in the saddle no later than six.

CanDee yawned and threw her arms up in a deep stretch. The hem of the too-short flapper dress rode up as he was standing behind her, and he got a nice view of creamy cheeks. He wanted to unwrap her like a present on Christmas morning.

“So, are you going to continue to stare at my butt or are you going to turn your back so I can change back into my jeans?” Slowly, she lowered her arms and turned around. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m okay with stripping down in front of you, but I’d hate for you to revert back to whispering.”

She grinned.

“You love taunting me.” He tried to sound wounded, but he couldn’t control his smile.

“I do. I’m thinking of taking it up as a hobby. Sudoku is so boring.” Her voice was low and seductive. “Maybe I should take off my clothes and see if it gets your attention. Because if I wait for you to remove them for me, I’ll be old enough to join AARP.”

“What’s the harm in taking our time?” He had his reasons, but when she looked at him like that, he could barely remember his own name.

She ran her hand up her shirt. “I’m only here for six weeks. Wouldn’t you rather have five and a half weeks of amazing sex over, say, four weeks of amazing sex?”

He’d forgotten that she was only here for a short while. Maybe he could convince her to prolong her stay. He had a feeling that she wouldn’t leave until she’d had her fill of him and he aimed to make sure that never happened.

“Dusty up here.” He reached up and ran a finger along one of the overhead beams, then showed her his dust-covered finger. “Aren’t you worried about getting dusty?”

“Nope. I plan on being on top.” She stepped back, picked up her clothes, and sauntered down the attic stairs.