He nodded.
“Yeah, I remember her. She was nice, I guess. Y’all aren’t still dating are you?” I knew they’d gone off to school in Dallas together, but I hadn’t heard much from Jack since. I hadn’t thought about Amy in years.
“No, we broke up about a year after we moved.” He grinned and waved a hand like it didn’t matter much to him. “But I bet you never knew that Amy absolutely hated your goddamned guts.”
I frowned hard, my eyebrows pulling down sharply. “What? Why? Did I do something to her I don’t remember?” I couldn’t think why that girl would’ve hated me.
“She didn’t like how close we were. I told her all the same things you just said Pete and Lacey told you — that we were friends and more like brother and sister after growing up together for years.”
“Well, that was true!” Jack and I had never once had feelings for each other.
He nodded, smiling a little, his dark eyes shining. “I know it was. And that’s what I told her, but she was jealous anyway. It really started to eat at her.”
The waitress came by again, this time with our food, setting down Jack’s meatloaf and mashed potatoes and then my burger and fries.
“Remember that day we drove to Austin for that concert?” he asked.
I nodded, smiling before sticking a French fry into my mouth. That had been one hell of a day.
“Well, when I got home that night, Amy came over and was mad as hell. She accused me of picking you over her and said she was going to break up with me if I didn’t make some hard choices right then and there.”
He watched me for a moment, not even touching his food, which wasn’t like him. “I didn’t know what to say. I loved Amy, or I thought I did at the time. So, when she asked me to choose, I picked her. I knew you’d be there for me no matter what, but I was afraid to lose her.”
“Goddamn, Jack, I wish you would’ve told me.” That explained a lot about why we didn’t have much to do with each other after graduation.
“I’m only telling you now so you’ll talk to Pete about all this before you do anything else. Just get the story from his side. We never had feelings for each other and look what happened.” He stuck a fork in his meatloaf and scooped a big hunk into his mouth.
“Yeah, I know we didn’t,” I said with a sigh. But none of that changed what I’d seen the other day with my own eyes. I didn’t know how Pete could explain that away. He loved Lacey, and I’d been a fool to think otherwise.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Pete
Friday
I couldn’t sit still that morning. I went out to the porch and paced, walking up one side and down the other while Riley slept on, unaware. Emma hadn’t been to the farm all week, hadn’t answered my calls, and hadn’t been anywhere around town. I didn’t know what to do. She had to be pissed at me something fierce, but I didn’t know why. Had I said or done something stupid at her daddy’s house? She’d said things had gone well when she drove me home. I didn’t understand it.
I had to get the fuck off the farm. I jumped in my truck and drove out to the Texan, just wanting to put my mind on something else. The old timers called me over to their table, and I went gratefully.
“Hey, Petey,” Big Tom said. “Where’s that sweet girl of yours?”
I waited for the waitress to set my mug down, fill it with coffee, and be on her way before I answered.
“I haven’t seen much of Emma lately,” I said, looking around at all of them, just feeling so goddamned lost. “I don’t know what happened. She just stopped turning up at work and stopped taking my calls.”
“What did you do?” Laraby asked, smiling a little as the other men chuckled.
“I don’t think I did anything,” I replied. “Things were going great between us and then she just stopped showing up at the ranch.” I shook my head as I rubbed the back of my neck. I felt better getting some of this off my chest, even if it really wasn’t helping me figure out how to solve this Emma problem.
“You love her though, right?” Tex asked.
I nodded, sighing as I answered. “Yeah, I do. I just don’t know what happened.”
“Relationships aren’t all sunshine and roses,” Big Tom said, leaning over onto his elbows on the table and staring hard at me. “You have to work at them to make them successful.”
I took a sip of my coffee, not really wanting it, but just needing the time to think through this. When the waitress wandered over to take breakfast orders, I asked for toast and nothing else. I hadn’t been very hungry lately. Emma not being around had twisted most of the desire to do much of anything right out of me.
“Women aren’t easy to figure out,” Laraby said. “I’m still trying with my wife, and it’s been close to fifty years.”