Read Online Honky Tonk Christmas by Carolyn Brown - Free Book Online Page A

didn’t go to sleep. I just gotted up here on the sofa and got you to sleep. I used to do that for Momma. She’d let me get her to sleep and then she’d feel all better after a good nap,” Judd said.
    “Well, thank you for a wonderful nap,” Sharlene said. “Are you two hungry? I always wake up hungry when I take a nap.”
    Both heads bobbed up and down.
    “How about some cookies and milk? I’ve got those soft chocolate chip ones and some Oreos.”
    “Oreos.” Waylon put his pillow on the rocking chair and pulled out a kitchen chair.
    Judd followed his example. “The other kind and do you have chocolate milk? I don’t like white so good.”
    “I like white,” Waylon said.
    “You are so different to be twins,” Sharlene commented.
    “That’s acause he’s a boy and I’m a girl,” Judd giggled.
    They ate their snacks, made a hurried rest room stop, and ran out the door yelling at Uncle Holt. She stood on the tiny back porch and watched him stop work, gather them up in his arms, and listen to their chatter for a few minutes. Then they raced toward the oak tree with Judd yelling that the last one there was a dummy.
    She walked out to the work site where a noisy concrete mixer turned slowly, getting the cement ready to pour into the foundation forms.
    “Is all this machinery yours?” she asked.
    Holt stopped and leaned on a hoe. “It belongs to the company and the four of us own the company equally. Do you want the outside to be rough wood like that part or are you going to paint it?”
    She looked at the weathered wood. “Just like that if you can get it. Got any ideas about the front to make it look connected?”
    “I’d just put two levels of the façade up, leaving three above the old part to hold the sign. That way it would look like it’s been here forever. That old stuff is weathered cedar. New cedar would be a different color. I’ve got some barn wood stored up in one of Bennie’s barns. There’s probably plenty to cover the outside and it’d look identical to what you’ve already got.”
    “How much?” Sharlene asked.
    “I reckon we could make a deal. You got time for two kids to take a nap and give them cookies and milk in the afternoons, it would make us even on the wood.”
    She smiled up at him. “Sounds like a good deal to me.”
    She turned around too quickly and ran into Kent. She started to tumble and he reached out and caught her pulling her close to his chest.
    “I’m so sorry.” She pushed away and blushed scarlet. “Grace is not any part of my name.”
    “Not me. That was the highlight of my day,” Kent said.
    “Well, thank you for not letting me fall on my face.” She hurried toward the apartment.
    “Might as well give it up, brother,” Chad said.
    “Why’s that? She’s a fine looking lady.”
    “Take my word for it. You ain’t got a chance. She’s already set her sights and they ain’t on you,” Chad told him.
    “Who’s she got her sights on, then?”
    “Boss man over there.”
    Holt threw up both palms defensively. “Don’t go gettin’ me involved. I’ve got kids to think about, jobs to line up, and I sure ain’t got time for romance.”
    Kent grinned. “Never know when romance might make time for you. I got to get me a couple of kids. They are regular chick magnets. Want to rent yours out for a night or two?”
    “I’d sell them to you some days.” Holt grinned.
    Chad turned off the cement mixer. “Don’t sell them to him until after Friday. Me and Gloria are taking them to see that new Disney thing. She says that you got to have kids to go to it and I was supposed to ask Holt already but I just now remembered.”
    “Why do you have to have kids to go to the movies?” Bennie asked.
    “Because Gloria says it’d look weird for us to go without them. It’s a cartoon movie and besides, she loves Judd and Waylon. Almost as much as she loves animated movies and musicals,” Chad said.
    Bennie wiped a hand across his forehead, leaving a