THE TALK 02

anything until now. Oh, I'd like to think I was good at acting and screaming at jellyfish and writing poems and all that, but I wasn't really." She tried to smile, but her eyes burned with unshed tears. "It's really not fair."

He stood up and went over to her, pulling her into his embrace. "What isn't honey?"

"That Le Cordon Bleu isn't in Paris, Texas." She wept a little against his checked shirt before pulling away to dig a tissue out of her shorts pocket.

"I hate it when women cry," Bobby grumbled, releasing her and jamming his hands in his pockets.

"We're getting married, aren't we?"

"Sure." She sniffed.

"Honey, you don't sound real enthusiastic." He smiled at her. "I don't want you to do anything you are not one hundred percent sure about."

"Are you sure?" She held her breath and waited for the answer.

"I'm sure I want you to be happy," Bobby said, and took her into his arms. "And I'm going to make sure you are."

"DO YOU WANT IT OR NOT?" Rose whispered.

"What do you think?"

"It will fit," she assured him, keeping her attention focused on the auctioneer. "And it's solid." She held up her numbered card and raised the bid to sixty-five dollars. Someone in back went to seventy-five, and Rose hesitated. It was Andrew's money and Andrew's house, and if the man didn't realize a bargain when he saw one, so be it.

"Do it," he said, so she raised the bid again.

"How high do you want to go?"

"You decide."

"115$."

She bought the massive pine farm table for one hundred and fifteen dollars, which she considered a bargain. She wasn't so sure that Andrew did, but she knew once he saw it in his freshly painted dining room he'd be pleased. Fifteen minutes later she bud in and won six chairs to go with the table, plus a bench that would look great if painted and seated on the porch.

"Okay," she said, examining the list of notes she'd made before the auction began. They'd arrived at the auction barn with enough time to examine just about everything before the auctioneer held up the first item. "Is there anything else you need?" She turned toward him and smiled when his brows lifted in amusement.

"I can think of something," he drawled.

Why did her insides melt when he looked at her like that? Rose fanned herself with her bidding card. "I meant here, at the auction."

"I can't think of anything."

She looked at the list. "I wish we'd gotten those rocking chairs for the porch."

"A rancher doesn't have much time for sitting in rocking chairs."

"You liked those rugs," she said, wondering if they would go high. "I wish I knew more about rugs and what's good and what's not."

"I can get them new in town."

"I suppose." She drew a line through "192---blue rugs." "What about the old tool chest you were looking at?"

For a second Andrew seemed tempted, then shook his head. "I can get tools at Sears. Let's go home." He hesitated. "Unless there's something you want to stay and bid on."

"No." She liked auctions but she likes going home with Andrew a lot better. She'd managed to bury herself in wedding plans since the last time she and Andrew talked, but the simple truth was she missed him. Missed being with him. Missed talking to him. Missed making love to him.

What on earth was she going to do with herself for the rest of the summer? She'd fallen in love with the man. She'd been in love with him since last winter, that love-at-first-sight feeling she'd so often scoffed at. And now here she was, waiting by the new table in the back of the barn for Andrew to pay for his furniture so they could take it to his house. Take it home, he'd said.

But it wasn't her home, and she didn't know how to turn a brief love affair into something permanent.

*****

CHECK OUT MY NEW STORY 'ANNIE'S PERFECT HUSBAND'

*****