The Cowboy Way

“It have any lace on it?”

Rooster shook his head. “Flowers,” he said, as he tossed down a single card and signaled for one to replace it.

Quiet reigned for a moment as they all studied their newly reconstituted hands. Bob Evers and Tiny O’Leary, both buddies of Rooster’s from the rodeo circuit, threw down their cards in disgust and got up to get more beer and scavenge at the remains of the deli platter. The other five men all added chips to the pot.

“You know who I wouldn’t mind seeing in her pajamas is that redhead,” Tiny said as he wandered back to the poker table to kibitz. He had a fat dill pickle in one hand and a beer in the other. “That LaWanda what’s-her-name?”

“LaWanda Brewster,” Rooster said.

“Yeah, that’s the one.” Pickle juice dripped down onto the front of Tiny’s plaid shirt but he paid it no mind. “She’s built real nice, that one is. I bet she looks fine in her pajamas. Or in nothin’ at all, if it come to that.”

“Well, hell, if we’re fantasizin’ here and pickin’ favorites, I’ll admit to some curiosity about that slick little gal who flew in from Atlanta yesterday.” Joel Boyd, who ran the local feed store, had been a friend of Rooster’s since they both got sent to detention in high school. “I bet she wears one of those thong things. Most city women do.”

“And you’d know that how?” Tom said. He’d known Joel since high school, too, and felt free to razz him when the BS quotient got too high.

“I read about it in Cosmo,” Joel said, deadpan. He tossed a chip into the pot. “Call.”

Rooster grunted derisively. “I think you’d be ashamed to admit you read that kind of smut.” He tossed in two chips, doubling the bet. “Call and raise.”

“I’m out.” Tom laid his cards facedown on the table and reached for his beer. “You know, I saw all Cassie’s bridesmaids in their pajamas once,” he said into the silence, as they waited for Clay to decide whether he was in or out. “Briefly. It was back in high school. Me and Rooster and a couple of our buddies got it into our heads to crash the cheerleaders’ annual slumber party.”

Rooster smiled in fond remembrance. “The girls started screamin’ and runnin’ around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off when we tapped on the window glass. You’d’a thought we was serial killers or somethin’. A right fine sight, it was. All those cheerleaders flittin’ around in their baby-doll nightgowns.”

Clay glanced up from his contemplation of his cards. “Any of ’em wearing lace?”

“Not that I recall.” Tom finished off the last swallow of his beer and flipped the empty can into a wastebasket. “’Course I have to admit I was kind of distracted by LaWanda’s sister. She’s seven or eight years older, which would have made her all of about twenty-four at the time. She was chaperoning the party.” He shot a grin at Rooster. “Remember?”

Rooster gave a bark of laughter. “I ain’t likely to forget it. She came chargin’ out onto the porch with her daddy’s shotgun pumped and ready, wearin’ nothin’ but a skimpy little black nightgown—”

“With lace,” Tom added for Clay’s benefit.

“—and her hair done up with them big pink rollers with one of those what’d’ya call ’em?—beauty masks?—smeared all over her face. Threatened to pepper our asses with buckshot if we didn’t hightail it outta there. She would’a done it, too.”

“She a redhead, too?” Tiny took up the subject of LaWanda and redheads as if they’d never left it. “I’ve always been partial to red hair on a woman. Top and bottom, if you know what I mean.”

“Gentlemen, please.” Hector “Padre” Menendez censored them all with a look from beneath his grizzled brows. He was an imposing patriarchal figure, more than twice the age of most of the other groomsmen, and had had a hand in raising both Rooster and Tom. “You’re talking about our friends and neighbors, and the wives and daughters of our friends and neighbors. Show a little respect.”

They all had the grace to look shamefaced, except Clay, who sat brooding at his cards, wondering why no one had picked Jo Beth Jensen as an object of their erotic fantasies. True, she wasn’t as out-and-out, in-your-face sexy as Tom’s wife Roxy. She didn’t have flaming red hair and generous curves like LaWanda. She lacked Cassie’s kittenish cuteness. But, damn, she was hot— burning-up-the-stove, curl-your-toes, fry-your-brain hot.

Hadn’t any of these jackasses ever looked at her, he wondered, forgetting that he himself hadn’t really looked at her, either, until she appeared naked in the viewfinder of his binoculars.

“Hey, pard.” Rooster nudged him with his elbow. “You gonna hold ’em or fold ’em?”

“Sorry.” Clay tossed in the chips necessary to stay in the game. “Hold,” he said, and then sat silently while the game progressed, entertaining himself with fantasies of Jo Beth Jensen wearing nothing but a black-lace thong while performing lewd and wonderful acts upon his body.

It was a shame, really, that he wouldn’t be in town long enough to make those fantasies a reality. On the other hand, he wasn’t planning to leave Bowie until the day after the wedding. Two days was more than enough time to make his fantasies—and hers—come true.

“Well, hell, if you’re gonna sit there grinnin’ like a skunk eatin’ cabbage, I’m out, too,” Rooster said, and tossed down his cards.

THEY WERE STILL TALKING about cowboys when Jo Beth came back into the living room with an icy can of soda in her hand.

“It’s not just that they have the…um…bucking technique down pat,” Roxy was saying as Jo Beth carefully folded herself back down between the coffee table and sofa. “Or how great their hands and butts are. It’s their incredible stamina. That’s what’s really impressive.”

Melissa’s gulp was audible. She licked her lips. “They have incredible stamina?”

“Oh, yeah.” Roxy nodded sagely. “In-cred-i-ble. And it’s not just bull riders. It’s bronc riders, too. Think about it. They’re in the saddle, on top of those bulls and broncs, day after day. Sometimes two and three times a day during the summer season. And night after night, too. Isn’t that right, Cassie?”

Cassie nodded so hard she nearly toppled over.

“For a bull or bronc rider the job is all about holding tight and staying on till the ride’s over. That’s the cowboy way. And they tend to keep right on doing it that way.” Roxy flashed a wickedly smug little smile. After all, her husband had been a champion bronc rider. “Even after they retire.”

Jo Beth snorted derisively, deciding it was time to inject a little reality into the conversation. They could all use a dose of common sense to counter the braggadocio. And she could certainly do with a change of subject. All this talk of cowboys and sex was getting her hot. Okay, hotter.

“Cowboys may stay on till the ride’s over,” she said, “but in rodeo, remember, the ride’s over in eight seconds.”

“Yeah, but it’s a wild ride,” Cassie said. “And they’re always ready for a second and third go-round to better their score.”

Roxy hoisted her empty glass. “To the cowboy way!”

The other women whooped and hollered.

Jo Beth pressed the cold soda can to the pulsing vein in her neck to cool herself down. It didn’t help.

“WELL, BOYS, I think I’ll call it a night.” Hector rose stiffly from his seat, mindful of the arthritis that stiffened his joints when he sat in one position for too long. “I’m not as young as I used to be, and sunup seems to come earlier every day.”

“I think I’ll chuck it in, too,” Joel said. “I promised Margie I wouldn’t stay out too late.”

“Since when is ten o’clock late?” Tiny asked.

“Since Joel Jr. started teething and Margie started having her morning sickness at night.”

“Well, if that don’t beat all.” Tiny shook his head in disbelief. “Breakin’ up a perfectly good poker game because of a cranky baby and a woman who can’t keep her supper down.” He leveled a half-humorous, half-serious glance at Rooster. “That’s what happens when you get married, you know. You sure you wanna go through with it?”

“Sure as death and taxes.”

“Well, don’t say nobody warned you.” Tiny pushed to his feet. “See y’all tomorrow at the church.” He cuffed Rooster on the shoulder as he rose. “’Less you come to your senses before then, that is.”

“Hey, the game don’t have to break up just because Hector and Joel are out,” Rooster protested. “Five players is more than plenty to keep it interestin’.”

“Naw, I think I’ll head back to the motel and hit the sack. I’m kinda tired now that I think on it.” Tiny yawned hugely. “And my luck ain’t been all that good tonight, anyway.” He nudged Bob Evers with the toe of his boot. “You ’bout ready to roll?”

“Yeah, sure.” Bob lumbered to his feet. “You own the keys to the truck.”

“They ain’t goin’ to the motel no how, no way,” said Rooster as the door to the bunkhouse swung closed behind his two escaping groomsmen. “Tiny O’Leary ain’t never hit the sack before midnight for as long as I’ve known him, unless he had a woman in it with him. They’re headin’ over to that honky-tonk out on 81. They got strippers there.”

“I thought about getting strippers for tonight,” Clay said. “Bachelor party tradition an’ all, you know? But, then, I decided against it because, well, hell.” He shrugged. “I figured Cassie and the rest of the ladies wouldn’t like it if they found out we’d had strippers.” It was the truth, as far as it went, just not the whole truth. The whole truth was that he’d kind of lost his taste for that sort of thing even before the run-in with ol’Boomer had put a crimp in his love life. But that wasn’t the kind of thing one man admitted to another—especially when that man had a reputation to protect. “We could head over to the honky-tonk if you want to, though. It’s your bachelor party.”

Rooster thought about it for a second or two. “Naw.” He shook his head. “You’re right. The ladies wouldn’t like it none.”