"Well, I hate fractions. An' I miss Rance," Daniel said stubbornly. "I wish he'd come back."
"Well, he's not going to." She was determined to force realism on her children, even if she still dreamed about him herself.
"Ever?"
How could a mother look into eyes that deep and trusting, eyes that had known a lot of hurt in eight years, and deny that Rance would ever come back.
He might, after all, someday … even if she didn't want him to.
"No time soon," she hedged.
Daniel brightened. Then he stabbed his well-used eraser at his math paper and his smile faded. "Not soon enough," he said glumly.
"I want him to come to my birthday," Carrie said. "Do you think he'll come for my birthday?"
Ellie picked her up and gave her a hug. "I don't think so, sweetie. But there will be so many kids here, you won't miss him."
Carrie wriggled to get down. "Will, too."
Only Josh, bless his heart, seemed to be immune.
He actually seemed glad Rance was gone, even though it meant more responsibility fell on him. He didn't seem to mind. He even whistled when he went to feed the horses these days.
"You're certainly cheerier about having to get up and at 'em anymore," Ellie said to him late that week.
Josh shrugged. "It's my job."
She should have left it at that, but perversely, and maybe because she wanted someone else to express relief that Rance was gone, she pressed on.
"I'd have thought you'd have been glad to have help. He did a lot," she added. She didn't have to say who she meant. They both knew.
"I reckoned you missed him," Josh said, almost accusing.
She wondered if he suspected what had happened the night he was gone to Matt's birthday. Sometimes the way he looked at her … half lost, half searching … made her think that he might.
But he never said anything. And he never brought Rance up unless she did. Sometimes she thought he looked so much like Rance she was amazed that if he looked in the mirror he couldn't tell.
Until Rance had come back into her life, she'd never given much thought to how much Josh was like him—in looks and in temperament. They were both unholy stubborn. They both were opinionated, argumentative and right ten times out of ten. They had high expectations for everyone, including themselves. And they couldn't be pushed. Nowhere. No how. No time.
And yet, he was just as much a product of Spike's love and devotion. He had Spike's ready grin, his willingness to take on anything, to do the best he could, to go the extra mile.
Ah, Josh, she thought, watching him go out the door and across the yard, wearing Spike's old cowboy hat and walking with Rance's easy, rolling gait.
He was such a combination of the two men she loved that sometimes her heart ached just looking at him.
"The tour bus was a bad idea." Trey Phillips was popping the tab on a beer can when he spoke, and his words were so astonishingly unexpected that for a moment Rance thought he was hearing things.
The old man had been gruff upon Rance's return. He'd said, "Where the hell have you been?" and, not getting a satisfactory answer, had stalked off, saying, "Some folks have work to do—taking up slack for those who don't bother doing theirs."
Rance's hands had curled into fists, but he had forced himself not to respond. They'd made brief and desultory remarks on the few occasions their paths had crossed in the ranch house living room and kitchen for the next few days.
Tonight, though, Clara the cook's night off, they seemed to be stuck with each other. Rance had been wondering if he ought to stay at the office and claim to be working late. God knew he could spend hours on the paperwork alone that he'd left behind. But he hated paperwork—even more than he hated the thought of dinner with his father.
And he wanted to be at the ranch. It felt somehow closer to Ellie, though it wasn't.
Now he propped his backside against the kitchen counter and took a deep, wary breath.
"Quantity isn't the answer," Trey went on, his voice muffled as he bent over and peered into the refrigerator. He took out last night's roast and several plastic containers of leftovers. Then he turned to face Rance. "Quality's the name of the game." He beamed, as if he'd just answered the final Double Jeopardy question.
Rance just stared at him.
Trey opened a beer and handed it to him. Then he lifted his own can in a toast. "To Stephanie."
Rance, the can halfway to his lips, stopped dead. "Stephanie? Who's Stephanie?"
"A woman of quality," Trey said. "Bright, beautiful blonde. Legs from here to Missoula. Mount Holyoke honors grad. She works for Owens. She's a CPA." He whistled as he put the leftovers in pans and set them on the stove. "Why don't you slice that roast?" he suggested.
Rance thought that offering him a knife was not the smartest move his father had ever made. He stayed right where he was, silent as a stone. He just stared at the old man, didn't even move.
Finally Trey noticed. He put the pans on the stove to heat, got plates out of the cupboard and set them on the table, took another swallow of beer, then glanced over at his son. A frown line appeared between his brows as he met Rance's stare. "What?"
"Who's Stephanie?" Rance repeated with deadly calm.
"I told you," Trey blustered. "A glorious girl. Puts me in mind of your mother when she was that age. I'd take her out myself if I hadn't already promised you to her." He put knives and forks and spoons alongside the plates, slanting a narrow glance in Rance's direction to see his son's reaction to that.
Rance felt a muscle in his jaw twitch. His fist curled so tightly around the beer can that it began to crumple in his hand.
"Not marriage," Trey said, noticing the crumpling sound. "I didn't promise marriage, boy. I just said dinner."
"No!"
The force of that one word was enough to make Trey take a quick step back. But then he stopped and planted himself firmly to meet Rance, glare for glare. "Why not?"
"Because I don't want to. I didn't ask her. You think she's dating material, you take her out!"
"I'm not in the market for a wife! You are."
"I am not!" Not anymore.
Trey went stock-still. His gaze narrowed. He looked at Rance closely. "Is there something you're not telling me?" he asked, and he seemed suddenly rather pale.
"What?"
"I mean, well…" Trey swallowed awkwardly. "You're not … gay, are you?"
Rance groaned. "No, Dad, I'm not gay."
Trey's relief was palpable. "Well, then, for God's sake, what's the problem? It's only dinner."
"I don't need you finding me a woman," Rance said firmly, but at Trey's intense scrutiny, he found his gaze sliding away.
Trey picked up the butcher knife and began to cut the meat himself. He focused on it, not even looking at Rance. "Found one of your own?" The question was casual, the intent was not. Every fiber of Trey Phillips's being seemed to be waiting, primed for Rance's reply.
He would have liked to say no.
But he wasn't ashamed of his choice, damn it! And he didn't want his father to think he was.
If he married Ellie, she was going to have to go nose to nose with Trey Phillips for the rest of her life. He couldn't hide his feelings now.
But he couldn't tell his father her name, either. The last thing he wanted was the old man meddling in this. He thought Ellie would say yes. If the way she'd loved him was any indication, he had nothing to worry about. But he hadn't asked her yet.
"Maybe," he said now.
"Maybe?" It wasn't a question; it was a yelp. "My God, boy! Don't you know your own mind?"
"I know my mind," Rance said stubbornly. "I don't know hers yet."
"Well, she'd be a damn fool to turn a Phillips down!"
"In your opinion," Rance said drily.
Trey just looked at him. Rance knew the meaning of the look—that Trey's opinion was the only one that mattered.
"Tell me about her," Trey commanded.
"No."
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"Afraid I won't approve?" Trey lifted a brow mockingly.
Rance tipped his beer and took a swallow. "Actually, I'm afraid she won't like you."
For a moment Trey looked startled. Then he laughed. "I'll be looking forward to meeting her."
Ellie was elbow deep in five-year-olds.
They'd played pin the tail on the donkey, London Bridge is falling down, and find the potato in the garden. They'd sung a thousand verses of "There's a Hole in My Bucket, Dear Liza" and twice that many of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat." They'd picked their own toppings and had garnished their own tiny individual pizzas, which were now baking in Ellie's oven—but not fast enough.
"When can we have the cake?" one five-year-old asked, tugging at the leg of her jeans.
"An' ice cream?" asked another.
"An' when do I get to open my presents?" Carrie whispered in her ear.
"Soon," Ellie said to the first child, the second child and then to Carrie. "Soon."
But definitely, as far as Ellie and everyone else was concerned, not soon enough.
Birthday parties were not Ellie's forte. The boys had never wanted them.
"Games?" they'd said. "Favors? Yuck."
They'd just wanted each other to wrestle to the ground, a little cake and ice cream and maybe a trip to a movie on Saturday afternoon. But Carrie had had her heart set on a "scrumptious party" ever since she'd been to Ashley Dean's fifth birthday last Halloween.
"We dipped for apples," she'd told her mother, eyes wide with excitement as she'd climbed into the truck, wearing a nylon net tutu over her jeans. "An' we made costumes an' dressed up, an' we had a parade, an' prizes an' dancing!"
"Dancing?" Ellie had echoed doubtfully.
"It was swell." Carrie had given a little bounce on the seat of the truck. "I want a party like that."
There was no way on earth Ellie could have come up with a party to rival the Dean extravaganza. But when Carrie kept asking, she found herself committed to at least having Carrie's preschool friends over for the afternoon.
It escalated from there. Of course there had to be games, Carrie decided. And prizes. And food.
"Cake," Ellie agreed. "And ice cream."
"Ashley had chicken à la king," Carrie looked at her mother hopefully.
Ellie suppressed a gag.
"How 'bout pizza," Caleb, bless him, had suggested.
"Oooh, yes!" Pizza was Carrie's favorite.
Ellie didn't remember how on earth pizza had become, over time, individual pizzas with individual garnishes. She supposed it might have come from the day she'd run into Ashley's mother in the grocery store and had been a little airier about party plans than she'd had any right to.
"Do you want me to come out and help you?" Ashley's mother, a vivacious, terribly competent transplanted Californian called Melanie, had asked.
The last thing Ellie wanted was some ultracompetent party giver helping her paltry efforts. "Just drop Ashley off and come and get her," she'd said.
"Will do," Melanie agreed cheerfully. "But if you find you've bitten off too much, don't hesitate to let me know, and I'll help."
She would call in the Marines first, Ellie had thought then.
And she might have to, she thought now as she watched as half a dozen little boys pretended to sword fight with plastic tubes and wrapping paper roll cores. One thumped another on the head. That one took a roundhouse swing at a third.
"Watch it," Ellie cautioned. She caught a whiff of the pizzas in the oven, yet wasn't sure she dared leave the fledgling knights long enough to get them out. The girls were climbing the fence and trying to balance on it. Mostly they were teetering and falling off.
Ellie held her breath. She needed reinforcements. Badly. When she'd scheduled the party, she hadn't known Sandra would be getting a root canal this afternoon.
"I can cancel," her mother-in-law had offered.
But Ellie knew the pain of an abscessed tooth. "No," she said firmly. "I can manage."
Perhaps she'd overstated things a bit. She sniffed the air. The pizzas were burning.
"Watch those boys with the swords," she commanded Josh, who was sitting on the porch looking bored. He was there under protest, anyway.
"Why can't I just come for the food?" he'd asked. "I don't wanta mess with a bunch of kindergartners."
"They aren't even in kindergarten," Caleb, drat him, had reminded him.
Ellie could have shot them both. And Daniel, too, she thought, looking around for him now and not seeing him.
"Just watch them," she said to Josh again. And, please God, don't let anything happen! Then she made a mad dash for the kitchen.
She needed ten hands. Why had she ever decided letting fifteen five-year-olds make individual pizzas was a good idea?
She grabbed two pot holders, flung open the oven door and began hauling them out as fast as she could. The ones closest to the door were still pretty edible. When she got to the ones farther back, she understood where the burning smell had come from. They all had a certain "blackened" look.
She tried scraping off bits of burnt pizza crust as she arranged them on a platter. As she did so, she heard a truck pull up outside. Please, she thought, don't let it be Ashley's mother!
Melanie had looked around doubtfully when she'd dropped her little darling off earlier that afternoon, as if she wondered what she was letting the little girl in for.
"Sure you don't want me to stay?" she'd asked.
"Quite sure," Ellie had replied, smiling through her teeth.
"Whatever you say," Melanie said. "But I'll stop back early just in case."
Ellie glanced at her watch now as the door opened behind her. Drat the woman! she thought. Oh well, it couldn't be helped.
She picked up the tray, pasted a cheerful, welcoming, totally hypocritical smile on her face as she turned around. "Ah, Melanie, you're just in time for—"
"Rance?"
The platter of pizzas hit the floor with a crash.
Chapter 8
« ^ »
She could have looked happier to see him.
She could have thrown her arms around him, instead of throwing a whole cookie sheet full of pizzas into the air. Rance thought she was looking at him as if she'd seen a ghost, or a two-headed monster—or Cleve Hardesty on her doorstep with the deed to the ranch.
"Hey, El, it's not that bad, is it?" he said with a grin.
But when she continued to look stricken, and her gaze moved between him and the mess on the floor, he had to rethink the homecoming he'd been planning.
"I guess maybe it is," he said with a grimace. But then he bent and began to clean up the mess. "Look, I'll just clean it up and it will be fine."
He expected her to help him. She didn't move. She looked like she was about to cry.
He scrambled to his feet. "Don't," he said, putting his arms around her. "Don't cry, El! For God's sake—for my sake—don't cry!"
"Hey, Mom! They're about to mutiny," Josh yelled from the yard. "Bring on the pizzas!"
"Oh, God." At least Josh's desperation galvanized her. Ellie looked around frantically. "What am I going to do?" Then she looked back at him. "What are you doing here?"
It sounded so much like an accusation he didn't think now was exactly the time to propose.
"Well, it is Carrie's birthday, and I was invited." He grinned at her hopefully. Was this the woman who'd loved him so desperately just a week ago? The woman who had made him rethink and then change every resolution he'd ever had about getting married and settling down?
"Oh." Her face cleared. "Yes, of course. But I didn't think—" She broke off.
"But you didn't think I'd come?" Well, he supposed she might not. After all, he'd left her once before. But they'd been little more than kids then. And he hadn't said he'd be back that time!
This time he had—and he'd moved heaven and earth and five court dates to get here, as well. But before he could tell her any of that, Josh burst into the room.
"
Food! We need food." The boy looked as if he were being pursued by all the hounds of hell. "They're gonna eat me alive if you don't bring on those—hey!" He spied the mess of pizzas on the floor. "What happened?" Then his gaze nailed Rance accusingly. "What'd you do to her?" Then he turned to Ellie. "Mom, what's wrong?"
"Nothing," Rance said firmly, "that a loaf of bread and some peanut butter and jelly won't fix. Get the jelly," he commanded Josh.
Ellie looked horrified. "We can't feed them peanut butter and jelly!"
Rance spread his hands and looked at her, waiting for whatever she had that was a better idea.
But she just looked around helplessly for a moment, then shrugged and reached for the bread. "What's Melanie going to say?" she murmured.
"Who's Melanie?"
"Never mind. You're right. Of course you're right. We have to feed them something. It's just— Get a grip, El," she commanded herself. Then, giving herself a little shake, she grabbed a knife from the drawer and began slapping on the peanut butter.
Outside, the mutterings of small, hungry children grew louder.
"Mom, they're gonna come in here," Josh warned at the door.
"So go entertain them."
"Me?" Josh looked appalled, shook his head and started backing up.
"Then find Caleb and Daniel and tell them to! Where are Caleb and Daniel?" she muttered distractedly.
"They were down at the corral when I drove in," Rance said.
"The corral? What were they doing? Ruckus is in there, and he's still skittish. I don't want them messing with him."
The words were barely out of her mouth when more footsteps pounded across the porch.
"Ma!" Caleb came running. "Daniel's hurt!"
"What!" Ellie dropped the peanut butter knife and whirled toward the screen door.
Caleb's face was flushed as he gasped, "Ruckus kicked 'im!"
Ellie shot Rance a stricken look. "He's not supposed to be messing with Ruckus!"
No, he wasn't. The roan gelding was a handful even for Rance, though he'd got him in pretty good shape before he'd left. In any case it was too late to worry about that now.
Rance beat her out the door, striding past the clamoring horde of five-year-olds, whose interest in their stomachs was momentarily diverted by this new disaster. By the time Ellie caught up with him, he was kneeling in the corral beside Daniel. The boy's face was chalk white and he had dusty hoofprint on his bright yellow T-shirt.
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