Dana couldn’t make herself go inside the house, no matter how cold it was. “That’s horrible. I can imagine being disappointed in Brook if she made bad choices, but I’d never disown her.”
“That’s because you are a good mother. I should be getting back. I feel better having told Granny Annie goodbye. I think she’d even like the way all three of us did it.”
“Me too.” Dana nodded. “Good night, Tawny.”
“’Night,” she said.
Dana sat there for a long time, a smile covering her face. Tawny had said that she was a good mother. Her youngest sister would never, not in a hundred years, ever know how much she’d needed to hear that.
Finally, she went inside to find Brook wrapped in a long terry-cloth robe and wearing a towel turban-style around her hair. She hugged her daughter tightly and said, “I love you, kiddo.”
“Love you more,” Brook giggled. “I left you some hot water. Do I smell liquor on your breath?”
“It’s whiskey. Your two aunts and I said goodbye to Granny Annie out on the porch.”
“She’d like that.” Brook grinned.
CHAPTER FIVE
Only a few parking spots were left at the bar up the road from the lake on Saturday night when Harper arrived. She snagged one of them, checked her hair and makeup in the rearview mirror by the streetlight behind the truck, and slung open the door. She hadn’t gone five yards when she heard a long, drawn-out whistle, but she ignored it. She’d heard those noises too many times in the past to let it excite her. Paying the cover fee to a big, burly bouncer at the door, she could hear boots on a wooden floor and a few “hell, yeahs,” which meant there was a line dance already going on.
She missed the days when a fog of smoke rushed out to meet her when the bouncer opened the door to let her inside. Progress, they called it—cut down on cancer. It was probably a good thing, but she still missed the gray layer up by the ceiling. There was something sexy about the smell of smoke in the air when a cowboy with whiskey on his breath kissed her after two-stepping around the dance floor.
A woman wearing enough bling to blind a person slid off the last vacant bar stool and staggered toward the bathroom. Harper made a beeline for it and had just parked her fanny when a short woman in tight jeans and dangling belly button jewelry tapped her on the shoulder.
“That’s my sister’s seat. I was on my way over to save it for her when you stole it,” she said.
Harper pointed at the guy’s beer beside her, and the bartender nodded. “Sorry about that, but it’s mine now.”
The woman glared at her. “So when she returns you’re going to let her have the seat back.”
“Nope,” Harper answered.
The bartender set the longneck bottle of Coors in front of Harper and then hurried off in the other direction to wait on a couple waving bills between two old cowboys deep in conversation.
“You will give that bar stool back. I’m not takin’ no for an answer.”
Harper took a long drink from the bottle and set it back down. “Is that a threat?”
The woman glared at her. “It’s a fact.”
Harper ignored her and took another drink.
The woman who’d vacated the stool staggered out of the bathroom and stopped ten feet from the end of the bar. “I told you to save that for me, Daisy. Some sister you are.”
Harper couldn’t fathom either of her sisters ever going to a bar with her or saving her a seat if they did. Maybe they’d throw her off a stool, too.
“What are you smilin’ about?” Daisy asked.
“Didn’t realize I was, but if I was then it’s my business,” Harper told her.
“I’m makin’ it mine.” Daisy grabbed the half-empty beer bottle and smashed it against the bar. The jagged edge was nothing more than a flash as it came up and sliced open Harper’s chin.
Tawny appeared out of nowhere, ground the heel of her cowboy boot into Daisy’s foot, and then popped her right between the eyes with a fist. Daisy fell like a big oak tree, and her sister dropped down on her knees beside her. “You bitch! You’ve killed my precious sister,” she screamed.
“Why in the hell did you do that? And why are you even here?” Harper demanded as blood ran through her fingers and dripped onto her shirt.
“She wasn’t going to stop cutting you, and I’m over twenty-one and I can go where I want,” Tawny said.
Daisy sat up and shoved her sister out of the way. “I’m not dead, but your damned bar stool is empty, so grab it and don’t bitch at me. You’ll have a good seat to watch while I whip this woman’s ass.”
“Honey, if you think you’re big enough or mean enough to whip two Clancy girls, then you better pack a supper, because it’s going to take you all damn night,” Tawny told her.
Evidently Tawny had gotten there before Harper and into a couple of drinks, because she had fire in her eyes and her fists were knotted. Her little sister might be tiny and delicate-looking, but put two margaritas in her and she thought she could whip a grizzly bear with one hand tied behind her back.
One big, burly bouncer wrapped fists the size of hams around Daisy’s and Tawny’s arms and escorted them across the floor. Another bouncer got a firm grip on Harper and the other sister and followed right behind them. When the two men got them outside, they gave them all a push with enough force that Daisy hit the ground and Harper had to do some fancy footwork to keep from biting the gravel.
“You’ve ruined my night.” Daisy popped up and screeched at Harper. “We were celebrating my divorce.”
“Too bad.” Harper continued to catch the blood dripping from her chin as she headed toward her truck.
“No husband, no kids. My first time to party in twenty years. You are a bitch for ruinin’ it for me,” the woman moaned.
“You shouldn’t call a woman who just crippled you and bloodied your nose a bitch unless you want more of the same. You gave your kids away?” Tawny looked over her shoulder.
“Every damn one of them. I’m sick of whinin’ teenagers blamin’ me for the divorce.” She slurred every word.
“You are batshit crazy,” Harper whispered.
“What did you say?” Daisy screamed.
Harper turned around to face her and repeated the sentence.
“Don’t judge me until you’ve had to walk in my shoes,” Daisy growled.
Tawny took a step toward her, and Harper used her free hand to pull her back.
“It’s not worth jail time. Just walk away,” Harper said.
“Jail would be worth it,” Tawny muttered.
“Then think about Uncle Zed and Granny,” Harper said. “You need me to drive you home?”
“Hell, no! I’m not drunk, barely even buzzed,” Tawny protested.
Daisy rushed across the parking lot and pushed Tawny backward.
Harper got between them and glared down at the woman. “Touch her again and I’ll mop up this parking lot with you, woman.”
Daisy backed off, and Tawny got into her little sports car, fired it up, and squealed the tires on the way out of the parking lot.
Harper crawled into her truck, locked the doors, removed her shirt, and held it against the cut on her chin while she drove south toward the lake with one hand on the steering wheel. The wound was still seeping and had begun to sting like hell by the time she parked in front of her cabin.