“Fine.” She leaned over and kissed him before getting out of the truck. “Night.”
“Night.” He felt a welcome rush of cold air as she stepped out—he could finally breathe again.
“Call me later,” she said.
“I’ll call you tomorrow.” He rolled down his window and drove away. But he made it only to the edge of town before using his cell to phone her. “Okay, what about Rebecca’s wedding?” he asked as soon as she answered.
“I thought you didn’t want to gossip,” she said, sounding smug.
“You’ve piqued my curiosity.”
She laughed, prolonging the suspense. “It’s been postponed again.”
Oh, boy. “How do you know?”
“Candace heard Delaney talking to Conner about it tonight while they were dancing.”
“Why?”
“Because she was dancing right next to them.”
Josh sighed impatiently. “No, why has the wedding been postponed?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “From what Candace could gather, what’s going on is pretty hush-hush. Delaney said something about Rebecca waiting until after the party to tell her parents.”
He remembered what Doyle had told him in the hair salon and knew Rebecca’s father wouldn’t be happy about this turn of events. He saw Buddy as Rebecca’s only wedding ticket, his release from further obligation to his difficult fourth daughter.
“When’s the new date?” he asked, wondering how much longer he’d have to deal with running into Rebecca everywhere he went.
“Candace didn’t say.” She paused. “You want to come back here? Watch a movie?”
“Not tonight,” he said. “I’m pretty tired.”
“Tomorrow then?”
“Okay.” He hung up and, suddenly feeling a chill, rolled up his window. What was going on with Rebecca’s engagement? Three postponements? Didn’t Buddy want to marry her?
Maybe her fiancé had figured out what everyone in Dundee already knew—that he’d never be able to handle her on a full-time basis. Doyle said Buddy was too mild-mannered for Rebecca. Maybe he’d seen something in her that had tipped him off.
But Buddy had to marry Rebecca. Josh needed him to make their marriage final so he could move on with his own life. And he needed him to do it as soon as possible, before Josh lost all perspective and did the absolute worst thing he could do—and started dating her himself.
Picking up his cell, he called Katie Rogers.
“It’s Josh,” he said. His mother was close to Katie’s mom and used to baby-sit Katie after school. She was a little like a kid sister to him, but he didn’t call her often and he knew his request was going to sound pretty strange.
“Hi, Josh. What’s up?” she said.
“Is there any chance you could get me Buddy’s phone number?” he asked.
“Buddy’s?”
“Rebecca’s fiancé.”
“Mona and I have both taken messages for Rebecca at the salon. I’m sure it’s on the duplicate copy of the message pad. Why?”
He slowed and pulled off the road. “Do you have a key to the salon?”
“Yeah. We all have a key. We take turns opening. What’s up?”
“Nothing. Would you mind meeting me there?”
“Right now?”
He flipped on the overhead and glanced at his watch. It was almost midnight. “If you can.”
“I can,” she said, “but I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what you’re doing to Rebecca this time.”
“It doesn’t have anything to do with Rebecca. Someone at the party tonight told me Buddy might be in the market to breed a mare. I thought I’d give him a call.”
“Oh, okay.” She seemed slightly disappointed that there wasn’t more fun in what he was doing. “I can be there in five minutes,” she said. “Where are you?”
His tires ground on the gravel at the side of the road as he turned around. “It’ll take me ten, but I’m on my way.”
“YOU ARE WHO?” Buddy said, sounding groggy even though it was nearly noon.
“Josh Hill. Rebecca might have mentioned me,” Josh said, standing inside the door of his largest stable and propping the telephone against his ear with one shoulder so he could remove his leather gloves. He usually took things easier on Sunday, but he’d already been working for six hours, trying to get the place ready for the mares that would start arriving in November. And he’d been tempted to call Buddy since dawn. But he knew not everyone kept the same kind of hours he did, so he’d made himself wait. Obviously he hadn’t waited long enough.
“I don’t think so,” Buddy said. “I don’t recognize your name.”
That was a little deflating to his ego, but Josh thought it could only help. Now Buddy would have no reason to suspect his motives.
“We’re old friends,” he said, slapping his gloves against one dust-covered leg to distract himself from the guilt twisting in his gut for meddling in something that was none of his business.
“You’re not the fellow she’s living with,” Buddy said.
Josh frowned and tried not to let his voice reveal his displeasure with that situation. “No, that’s Booker.”
“Oh.” He sounded a bit more interested. “What can I do for you, Josh?”
“Rebecca’s birthday is coming up in a few weeks and some of us are hoping to throw her a surprise party,” he said, using the only excuse he’d been able to think of that would be plausible enough to contact Buddy. “We were wondering if you might be here for it.”
“When is it?” he said. “We were supposed to be on our honeymoon for her birthday, but now that we’re not getting married until January, we need to make other plans. Do you have a date?”
Josh had thought so much about his main objective—removing Rebecca from his circle of acquaintances as soon as possible—that he hadn’t spent much time perfecting his cover. “Uh…we were thinking the first Friday in November might be good,” he said off the top of his head.
“That’s a week before the Saturday Rebecca and I were supposed to get married,” Buddy responded. “I already have a plane ticket, but I don’t fly in until the following Wednesday.”
“Maybe you could change your flight and come out a little early.”