Her Dakota Man (Book 1 - Dakota Hearts)

by Lisa Mondello

  A splash of suds hit his face, pulling him from the thoughts. The way his body immediately reacted to the memory only fueled his anger toward Poppy, but he pushed it aside as he pulled the plug on the tub and grabbed a towel. He wasn’t a teenage boy lusting after a beautiful girl. He was a father and a rancher.

  “Okay, little man, I think you’re wrinkled enough. I smell pancakes downstairs.”

  Within a few minutes, they both made their way downstairs, the creaky stair tread announcing their approach. Keith ran to the kitchen and climbed on a kitchen chair in front of a place setting with a tall empty glass in front of it. Without a word, Poppy reached over and swapped the empty glass with a cup of milk in a plastic cup. Keith grabbed the cup and took a quick sip.

  Logan looked at the table, set with a tablecloth he’d forgotten they’d had. He could smell the warmed strawberry jam now sitting in a gravy boat on the table. He looked at everything Poppy had put together and then glanced at the smile on her face. Even still tired, with her face scrubbed of the makeup she’d worn yesterday, she was an incredibly beautiful woman. The years hadn’t changed that.

  He cleared his throat and searched for something appropriate to say.

  She tilted an eyebrow at him. “You hungry?”

  “Yeah,” he finally said. “This is…this is nice. Thank you.”

  “You haven’t tasted it yet.”

  “Can I have a pancake?” Keith asked.

  “Please,” Logan reminded him.

  “Can I have a pancake, please?” Keith repeated with his best manners.

  “Sure can.”

  “I don’t ever remember you being this chipper first thing in the morning,” he said as he sat down.

  Poppy took in the surprised look on his face. “I'm used to New York time. To me it seems much later than it is right now.”

  “Oh,” Logan said.

  “Sit next to me, Auntie Poppy!” Either way, Poppy would be sitting next to Keith at the table. But the sweetness of his request startled Logan, making it clear to him that his little guy missed having a mother, or at least a woman around the house, more than he thought.

  * * *

  Poppy washed the dishes like she’d done hundreds of times at that very sink. She hadn't wanted to admit how stiff she was from the days’ worth of work and playing in the yard with Keith. Her only reprieve had been when Keith had gone down for a very brief nap.

  But more than the work of watching a young boy in his quest to explore endless puddles in the yard, Poppy was emotionally drained. March was always a cold month, but the chill she’d been getting from Logan all day had gotten the best of her. As the water drained from the sink, she felt the tears that she refused to let fall. How had the man who’d once been her best friend become this stranger? How could she have let it happen? Even if she’d known about what Kelly had done at the time, would things between her and Logan been different? She had to believe they would be. Otherwise, why had she bothered to come?

  When the last of the dishes from their dinner of grilled cheese and tomato soup were dried and put away, Logan came into the kitchen.

  “You don’t seem as peppy as you were yesterday,” he said.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Keith can really run you in circles. It can be a lot when you’re not used to it.”

  She wiped her hands with the dishtowel and dropped it on the counter. “You still trying to get rid of me, Logan?”

  “I’m trying…to say thank you.”

  The sincerity in his voice managed to squeeze out the rest of the irritation Poppy had felt all day by Logan’s cold shoulder toward her.

  “Keith has always been fascinated by the heavier equipment and I couldn’t have managed to get as much done as I did if you weren’t here to keep him at a safe distance.”

  “He told me about a hundred times how much he loves to ride the Bobcat with you.”

  “Yeah, he does. But today wasn’t the day for that. You were a…help.”

  She drew in a deep breath and smiled, hoping the tears she’d been on the verge of shedding all day would go away completely.

  “Careful, Logan. You may just remember you actually like me.” When he didn’t reply, she added, “You’re welcome.” She motioned to the living room where Keith was playing with some monster trucks on the floor. “He played hard out in that mud today. He needs another bath.”

  Logan gave her a half smile. “Of course he does. He’s a McKinnon.”

  Poppy used the time while Logan was giving Keith a bath to unpack the clothes that had been in her suitcase since the day she’d arrived. She hadn’t been sure how long Logan would tolerate her being there and didn’t see the point in unpacking. Until now.

  There’d been a shift. Something she didn’t think was possible. Small as it was, the look Logan had given her in the kitchen was void of the anger she’d seen and felt since she’d arrived. They were still light years away from where she wanted to be, and they’d have to confront the truth before there’d be any real change, but this was a start.

  As she hung the last shirt in the closet, Poppy’s eyes fixed on the big decoupage hatbox that Kelly had always used as a little girl to put notes and mementoes in. It was sitting on the top shelf of the spare room almost like it was cast away. Kelly had always kept it by her bed, but that was when they’d been teenagers. They’d lie on the bed and look at the little notes they’d passed to each other in class and talk about boys and their future.

  She couldn’t take her eyes off the box for fear of what was in there now. Were there love letters from Logan? Had Kelly kept the angry letters that Poppy had sent her after she’d learned the truth? She reached up, put her hands on the box and then paused.

  Regrets were a hard thing to live with. Kelly had died with regrets. Poppy only hoped that during their last meeting, when Kelly was too sick to even pick up a pencil, that Poppy had been able to ease some of her friend’s regrets with forgiveness.

  She pulled her hands away from the box. It wasn’t her place to rummage through Kelly’s past without first talking with Logan about her true reason for coming back to Rudolph. As she closed the closet door she played that conversation, as she had done many times, over again in her mind. Maybe unpacking hadn’t been such a good idea.

  Twenty minutes later both Keith and Logan were emerging from the bathroom and Poppy was still sitting on the bed mulling over how to muster up the courage to start the conversation she knew she had to have with Logan.

  “Where are you going? You know it’s time for bed,” she heard Logan say. Keith came barreling through the bedroom in his motorcycle pajamas and launched himself onto the bed.

  “I want Auntie Poppy to put me to bed.”

  Logan stopped short at the door.

  “But we always read a story and say prayers together. Just you and me.”

  “No, Auntie Poppy do it tonight!”

  Poppy’s heart squeezed as she gazed on Logan’s hurt expression. He glared at her, and she knew any ground she’d covered today was now lost.

  #

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “Okay, I’ll come in and give you a kiss when you’re all tucked in,” he said. Logan had never felt like an outsider with Keith since the day he was born, but tonight he had. And he didn’t like it one bit.

  He wasn’t used to his son being so openly eager to spend time with someone outside the family. But then, Logan reasoned, like father like son. There had always been something about Poppy that had a hold on him. Despite the anger that had sustained him all this time since Kelly’s death, it was still true and it was a bitter pill to swallow.

  He’d forgotten just what it had been like all those years ago. The memories of his quiet life with Kelly had forced those memories of laughter and wild teenage antics aside. He wasn’t that man anymore and Poppy wasn’t that woman. But at some point today it sure began to feel like it and the realization of that rattled him to the core.

  There were times when they’d been
kids that he’d felt the odd man out when he’d been with Poppy and Kelly. They had a sixth sense with each other, exchanging looks he couldn’t decipher. Back then, things had been different. Back then, he’d secretly been in love with Poppy. He’d never told her, of course. He’d never told anyone. Not even Kelly.

  Especially not Kelly.

  But Hawk knew. He had always ribbed him about Poppy, just like he had yesterday when Poppy had arrived. He could keep the truth from everyone else. But he couldn’t keep it from himself and it suddenly dawned on him that he was angry at Poppy as much for not being there for Kelly as he was for not being there for him when Kelly had gotten sick. If nothing else, he and Poppy had been best friends, something he’d mourned when she’d left. His whole world had once been wrapped up entirely in his feelings for Poppy.

  He walked into the back den and sat behind his desk, deciding it was better to put his mind to work in the present than let it roam in the past. But the memories he hadn’t dared think about in years continued to flood his mind, just as they had since Poppy arrived.

  But despite his own internal war, Logan couldn’t help but marvel at how comfortable Keith was around Poppy. It was if they’d known each other his whole life. And he was beginning to wonder if perhaps, he’d been the odd man out there as well. Poppy said she’d been talking with Keith on the phone, something his mother finally confirmed to him last night at the shelter. Logan knew Kelly had taken Keith out to New York for visits, but Keith had been so young then. None of it added up to the type of warm and easy relationship that seemed to be building between Poppy and Keith now.

  The light knock on the door startled him. Poppy was leaning against the door with a slight smile on her face.

  “Book is read and prayers for everyone in Rudolph have been made.”

  “That fast?” Logan asked.

  It was if Poppy was having a hard time holding back her smile as she nodded. In the end it broke free. “He’s a speed demon, that little one. He wants you to give him a kiss.”

  Logan’s heart melted. “Tell him I’ll be right up.”

  He stayed with Keith until he’d fallen asleep. On any other night he probably would have left his son’s bed sooner. But Poppy was still awake. He could hear her moving around downstairs as if she were rearranging the kitchen pantry.

  But when he finally left Keith’s side, he took the stairs and found her in the living room. Photo albums that had been tucked away were spread out on the coffee table. And the anger that had slipped away during the day came surging back.

  “What are you doing?”

  Poppy glanced up at him quickly and then just as quickly she turned away. But not before he saw the tears staining her cheeks. She wiped her face with one swipe of her palm and sniffed. “Reminiscing.”

  “Don’t.” The harshness of his demand had her hands stiffening on the photo album. She stared up at him with confusion.

  “I was just looking at pictures of us from—”

  “Don’t,” he said, this time quieter.

  He knew the photo album well. He’d stared at it many times since Poppy had left Rudolph and then again when Kelly had gotten sick. This photo album was filled with a life he used to live, before things had become just he and Kelly. And then just him. It was of a time when he’d had wild dreams of a young woman he didn’t marry. It was a reminder of what would never be again.

  Looking at Poppy’s determined expression now, it was easy for Logan to see how he could have forgotten those times and the man he used to be. He’d been different then. Different with Poppy.

  Kelly had always been the predictable one who was very dedicated to a quiet and humble life. She was slow and steady, something he could always count on until cancer had blindsided them.

  Despite being such close friends, Poppy was the polar opposite of Kelly. Everything about her was full of passion. Full of life and adventure. It didn’t matter if the adventure was a grand dream or a quick little jaunt to the pond for a quick swim.

  In those few seconds that passed between them, the memory was so clear in Logan’s mind that it was if it had happened yesterday. He could still hear the splashing of water as he ran through the trees toward the sun-filled pond where they always swam. Even now, his body still reacted with the memory of finding Poppy’s naked body, wet and glistening in the sunlight as she unabashedly floated on her back.

  When she’d finally caught him standing there staring, his body hard and aching so strong with arousal that it didn’t even embarrass him that she knew, she’d just smiled and asked him if he wanted to join her.

  Poppy was all about living life to the fullest and had never held back on adventure, whatever the type. And she never held back what was on her mind. Logan had a feeling he was about to get a piece of it right now.

  “Is remembering the way we used to be such a bad thing?”

  “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “That kind of avoidance only worked with Kelly. Not with me.”

  “Don’t you dare bring her into this.”

  “I think it’s about time we should. After all, she is the reason we are where we are today.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “You tell me. You were the one who was here when I was hundreds of miles away waiting for any kind of word from you. When the only word I got was through her.”

  He drew in a deep breath and held it, trying to reign in the confusion he felt.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t be a coward about this. Not now. Kelly isn’t standing here to facilitate our words anymore.”

  “That’s right. Kelly’s not here at all.”

  “I know. And in spite of everything, I miss her so much.”

  “In spite… What are you talking about?”

  She proceeded as if she were walking on eggshells.

  “Haven’t you ever wondered what happened to us, Logan? Did you ever wonder how our friendship fell apart? I don’t mean Kelly and me. Not the three of us. You and me.”

  He stared at her for a long moment. He had wondered. The woman who’d left Rudolph as a teenager, crying in his arms that she would do everything in her power to come back, him promising her the same, was staring up at her now. It amazed him how the years melted away in an instant. He wondered if he’d ever see this side of Poppy again. And now he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

  “Just leave it in the past, Poppy. It doesn’t matter now.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I don’t want to talk about this. And no amount of looking at that photo album is going to change a thing.”

  “That’s just it, Logan. We don’t talk at all. We haven’t in years. Think back. We let Kelly do all our talking for us. I still don’t know exactly how that happened. And now that she’s gone, when you have the chance to actually say something to me, yell at me, curse me, to finally talk for ourselves, you just avoid me.”

  “We’ve just spent the last two days together.”

  “Talking about the flood and work and Keith needing a bath or breakfast. Anything but what we need to talk about. I could have been anyone lugging those branches yesterday or cooking in your kitchen today. You avoided talking to me. With me. You just talk at me as if I were some stranger.”

  He started to protest but she broke in before he could utter a word. “Think about what’s gone on here. We haven’t seen each other in years and all you have to say is ‘we have no food in the kitchen’ or ‘would you mind watching Keith’. We need to talk, Logan.”

  “No, we don’t.”

  He started to turn away, but she stopped him.

  “Is that what it was like with you and Kelly? Did you ever get angry or argue about anything? Or did you just take everything she said at face value?” She shook her head, knowing the truth without his answer. They both knew Kelly too well. In the end, she answered for him. “Of course you didn’t. I know I did. Why would I have any reason to believe othe
rwise?

  “Kelly was as steady as the day was long. She never rocked the boat. That was Kelly’s way. But it was never your way, Logan. We argued plenty and we laughed and talked. All of that made us closer. That’s what made us such good friends.”

  He sighed and turned to her. In his eyes Poppy saw truth and a war waging that Logan didn’t want to fight. And she could hardly blame him after the tragedy he’d gone through in the last year.

  “Kelly wasn’t like you, Poppy,” he said, his whole body showing defeat.

  “Why do you think I came back here, Logan?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Sure you do. You knew the moment I pulled into the driveway. There’s some unfinished business between us, something that was brewing long before I left South Dakota all those years ago. Things we should have said, but didn’t because we were too young and naïve. You knew it and so did Kelly. That’s what frightened her so much.”

  In the dark room, Logan’s expression should have scared her. But it didn’t. In his eyes, she saw need, something she’d felt herself for a long time. It wasn’t just that she was standing mere inches away from a man she’d loved virtually her whole life. It was that they were so close to either finally coming together as she’d always wanted, or totally self-combusting when all the secrets that had pulled them apart years ago came to light.

  “Now is not the time for this,” Logan said in warning.

  “Really? And just when will the right time be? When we're all old or dead and no one cares anymore?”

  “You're a fine one to talk about caring. Where the hell were you when Kelly needed you?”

  He picked up the photo album and shoved it back in place on the bookshelf.

  “You’re the one who left.”

  Poppy knew she wasn’t going to gain any ground with Logan. She had left. The fact she had no choice didn’t matter anymore.

  “A long time ago, long before Kelly died, you let everything about you die. And since Kelly’s been gone, it’s like you’re content to stay there. Don't deny it. Even your family--”