Cowboy Daddy

by Hannah McBride

  “Do you want a mother?” Caroline asked carefully.

  “Well, sure.” She paused to lick grape jelly from one finger. “It’d be fun to do things with a mother. Y’ know, help me buy clothes, and paint my nails, and play games with.”

  “I’m sorry, Sophie. Have you missed out on doing those things?”

  “Sometimes Marilou does stuff with me. Or, when she’s too busy, I get handed over to Tom. But it’s not the same,” she said matter-of-factly. “It’d be nicer with a mom.”

  This little girl was so adorable, so trusting, so sweetly earnest, in her rainbow-colored top and brief lime-green skirt and miniscule silver ballet flats, that Caroline, never demonstrative by nature, wanted to wrap her into an embrace that would shelter and protect Miss Sophie from all the hurt that might be inflicted.

  And that included the neglect of her own father.

  “Well, I don’t know about you, Sophie, but I’ve been hankering to find someone I can play My Little Pony with. What do you think? Do you like ponies?”

  Sophie’s eyes lit up. “Uh-huh. And Barbie. Could we play Barbie?”

  “Absolutely. How about you take a quick bath and get into your pj’s, and then we can explore your toy box. Will that be okay?”

  “Uh-huh.” She wiped off a milk mustache with the back of one hand and then scrambled down from her chair. “C’mon, I’ll show you. Uh.” She paused. “Caroline? Do I call you Caroline?”

  Caroline stood, smiling down at this interesting little human discarded so casually to her charge. “That’s quite a mouthful. How about Carrie, instead?”

  “Carrie,” repeated the child comfortably. “Okay. I’ve got special colored bath stuff, you wanna see?”

  “I sure do. Lead the way, Sophie Tucker.”

  Giggling, she looked back over her shoulder. “That isn’t my name.”

  “I know. But it’s a pet name, just between you and me, because I like you so much. Is that all right?”

  “Uh-huh.” Her favorite non-word. “And I’ll call you—uh—Carrie Cutie Pie!” she brought that out with a flourish. Then, laughing outright, she tugged at Caroline’s free hand. “C’mon, Carrie, let’s go!”

  Several hours later, an exhausted and frazzled Caroline emerged from the delightful bedroom upstairs to make her way back to the first level. She’d forgotten how much energy was required to keep up with an excitable first-grader.

  After the bath, which Sophie had insisted she was a big enough girl to do all on her own, she had proudly dragged out all her treasures to show off, with an explanation about every one. Caroline, sitting in awe upon an upholstered rocker that looked as if it had never been used, exclaimed over this or that, providing the audience that the child’s lonely heart craved.

  A fantastic Christmas music box, all in white, decorated with mirrors and glitter and tiny lights. What looked to be a few thousand miniature plastic things called Shopkins. A three story Barbie house, complete with fireplace and bathroom and working elevator. Numerous dolls—baby, Cabbage Patch, American Girl—each with its own set of clothing and accessories. Cupcake games and Princess games, Candyland and Hello Kitty. Crafts galore, from beading kits to candle-making to painted flower pots. A bookshelf, crammed full on every level.

  When they were finally finished, and Sophie, whose eyelids were beginning to droop, had brushed her teeth and crawled under the pretty pastel comforter of her canopy bed, Caroline was feeling overwhelmed by the sight of so many possessions. It required very few brain cells to realize that Ben was trying to make reparations for his prolonged avoidance of this precious little girl by simply filling her life with meaningless things. Much easier to spend cash than time.

  “Carrie, will you read me a story?”

  “Of course, Sophie. Any one in particular?”

  “Uh-uh. Whatever you decide.”

  Drawing a footstool closer to the bed, Caroline worked her way through a couple of Dr. Seuss books, and The Giving Tree. Before the last sentence was read, about eight o’clock, Sophie was yawning. “Don’t forget to—turn on—the night light,” she mumbled.

  Of course Caroline, who could sympathize with wanting something other than complete darkness around her, complied, after which she pulled the ruffled and rippled spread up over the little girl’s shoulders. Then, giving in to temptation, she bent forward to press a light kiss to Sophie’s smooth warm cheek. “Good night, sleep tight,” she whispered.

  There was no pulling away from the caress. No grimace of distaste. Just a vague half-smile that relieved Caroline’s mind of too much presumption.

  “G’night…”

  Leaving behind that endearing scene, she made it to the kitchen to face an entirely different one. Far less congenial, and far more confrontational.

  “You dumped one awful mess on me.”

  A voice from the far reaches of the room startled Caroline, who had assumed by this late hour that she was all alone in the house, into a gasp, and she jerked around at the table.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there. Hello. I’m Caroline Finch.”

  “I know who you are.” That came as an accusation, made by a heavy-set woman near the sink, where she was rinsing dishes. “Been told all about you comin’ down here from up Nawth, with prob’ly some high-and-mighty ways.”

  A blink of surprise. “And you are?”

  “I’m Emma Wyeth, cook and housekeeper.” Obvious dislike shone from the flat black eyes; contempt radiated from every line of the weathered face; contention and strife fairly pulsated from the position of folded arms and legs planted wide apart.

  “How do you do, Mrs. Wyeth?” Innate good manners must always take control of an uncomfortable situation, and Caroline was trying hard to use hers. “I know, that was quite a mess, and I apologize. I planned to clean up afterward, but it seemed more important to spend time with Sophie on our first evening together. I’ll take care of those dishes now.”

  “Don’t bother, I already done it. Crumbs everywhere, that’ll just draw in varmints.”

  “I’m sure that’s true. Do you always work so late, Mrs. Wyeth?”

  “I work as I’m asked to. Mr. Taggart, he gave me free rein to do whatever needs doin’ around here, and I don’t follow no clock.” Don’t follow no orders, neither, hung in the air, unsaid yet almost audible. Still belligerent, she stood her ground against the counter, as if to prevent anyone getting behind her. As if anyone could.

  “No doubt Mr. Taggart very much appreciates all your hard work,” soothed Caroline, in an attempt to mend fences she wasn’t aware had been breached. “Actually, now that Sophie is in bed, I find that I’d really like a cup of hot tea. Won’t you join me?”

  Implacable. Unmoving. “In this house, the help don’t eat with the—” A sudden break, searching for just the right description “—visitors.”

  “I see. Well, perhaps another time, then. Thank you again for clearing up after me, Mrs. Wyeth. Good night.”

  It was a firm dismissal. The cook/housekeeper, still as uncertain, did she but realize it, on the same shaky ground that Caroline was treading, shrugged, wrung out a sponge in her meaty fist, and stalked away to whatever lair in which she took residence.

  Shaken by such visible, active antagonism, Caroline managed to rummage together the hot tea she had been seeking, along with two slices of bread popped into the toaster. If this house and its environs were truly to become her domain, then it was only suitable that she should be given freedom to explore and change and use whatever she wanted.

  Finished, she carefully put her things into the dishwasher and wiped off the table top.

  Then, feeling as if this whole first day had passed by in an incomprehensible blur, worn out to every fiber of her being, she stumbled upstairs to her room. There, following Sophie’s example, she fell face first into bed and heavy slumber.

  Chapter Six

  Caroline woke with a gasp and a start next morning, in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar room, in an unfamiliar co
untry thousands of miles from what she had called home.

  Was it the vast silence all around, as compared to street traffic and city noises, that had jerked her to consciousness? Was it the welter of emotions pertaining to yesterday’s very full, very exhausting tide of events? Was it, with so many worrisome details nibbling at the edge of sanity, something left unsaid or undone?

  “Sophie!”

  Today was Friday. It was reasonable to assume that this was another school day. Who saw to her breakfast—that acid-tongued gargoyle in the kitchen? Who helped her dress, who got her to school? In fact, which school did she attend, and how did she get there?

  All these unanswered questions.

  As she flung herself out of bed, quickly washed, and then threw on a robe to race downstairs, she wondered if Sophie’s father had decided to grace the mansion with his presence.

  “Sophie?” She skidded to a halt in the kitchen.

  “Carrie!” said Sophie, with a big beaming grin. She was seated at the table, working on a bowl of grits and biting into a slice of raisin toast. “I was afraid you left.”

  “Oh, no, not at all. As you can see, I’m still here.”

  That merited a dyspeptic look from Mrs. Wyeth, who was cutting up vegetables to dump into a huge soup pot already simmering on the modern range. Soup, at least, to all appearances. Perhaps the ingredients were poisonous mushrooms, gathered from the forest, and she was preparing a witch’s cauldron of something or other.

  Caroline perched on one of the stools at the counter to smile at her new charge. “I was afraid I’d miss seeing you off to school this morning.”

  “Oh. Uh-huh. Well, Mrs. Sampson will pick me up pretty soon—when, Mrs. Wyeth?”

  “Half an hour,” the mountain mumbled.

  “And then she’ll bring me home afterward.” Sophie finished her last spoonful of gelatinous glue and shoved the bowl aside with obvious relief. “It’s my last day, Carrie. Uh—will you still be here when I get back?”

  Something struck Caroline in the region of her heart, hit hard with an almost audible twang, and zipped away again. “Yes, Sophie,” she said quietly. “I’ll be here. Are you ready to get dressed?”

  “Uh-huh.” Sliding down from her chair, the child slipped a trusting hand into that of Caroline’s. “Wanna help me choose what to wear today?”

  By eight o’clock, with Caroline freshly showered and dressed, she could straighten Sophie’s little pink top, brush a kiss across the top of her head, and wave a cheerful goodbye as the child clambered into the back seat of Lila Sampson’s sleek black SUV.

  “Buckle up!” she called in warning. And got a thumbs’-up in return, as the vehicle pulled away from the circular drive.

  “Well, now, that’s nice to see.”

  Another voice from nowhere that startled the liver out of her.

  “Oh. Mr. Sinclair. Good morning.”

  He was standing behind her, on the top of three steps, his tall cowpuncher frame leaned like a vining wisteria against one of the round pillars. In his hand he carried a coffee cup, whose enticing aroma, for one who had put nothing but the dregs of toothpaste in her stomach, wrinkled her nostrils and clenched her gut with almost animal desire. Glimpsing the expression on her face, he grinned that slow, pleasant grin that could only be responded to in kind.

  “Takin’ hold already,” Tom said, with what seemed to be approval.

  “Well—trying to.”

  Faded blue far-sighted eyes sent her a long, steady look. “Ahuh.” A moment or two passed, during which a soft breeze stirred leaves of the giant oaks overhead, and the lowing of a few cattle could be heard in the distance. “You got a few minutes free, Caroline?”

  “It’s Carrie, evidently. And—yes…” She gave a short, helpless laugh and a small shrug. “I seem to have all sorts of free time.”

  “Well, that’s fine. C’mon, let’s fetch you some coffee and head out t’ the back patio for a bit. I’d like t’ get t’ know you.”

  She accepted the welcome gesture of his extended hand to take a step up, but with a shake of the head. “I’m persona non grata in the kitchen, I’m afraid.”

  Tom’s chuckle warmed the air between them and deepened the sun lines of his face. “Met up with Emma, didja? Yeah, she can be a pistol, all right. But don’t you let her wear you down, Carrie. That’s gonna be your kitchen right soon.”

  With a tightening of the lips, Caroline stopped short. “How much do you know?” she asked quietly.

  “Well, now, a fair amount, I reckon. Ben does talk t’ me on occasion. C’mon, sugar, there ain’t nothin’ like that first cuppa coffee in the mornin’. And I’m guessin’ you haven’t had one yet. By the way, may I tell you how pretty you’re lookin’?”

  Another spurt of laughter. “With that kind of talk, you can tell me anything. Lead on.”

  At this hour of the day, in the shade of a multitude of mature trees, surrounded for privacy even on these unbounded acres by flowering hedges and rosebushes, this flagstone terrace attached to the rear of the house was one of the most sumptuous—and sensuous—spots Caroline had ever seen. Once they had braved the cook’s sulfurous glares for fresh coffee and a plate of Bismarcks, Tom escorted his guest to one of the spacious white wicker chairs cushioned in blue.

  “This is lovely. Utterly lovely.” Sighing, Caroline sipped from her cup, then leaned back, crossed her ankles, and relaxed. Almost the first moment her nerves hadn’t felt on edge since she’d entered the front door—had it been only yesterday?

  “Yeah, one of my favorite places.” Sun and shade dappled the scene as he squinted into the distance, at the long low buildings, the corral fences, the satisfying sense of prosperity and well-being.

  “The roses could use a little work, though.”

  Needing not quite so much direct hot sunlight and lots more misting and raining, the shrubs would have grown stronger and more prolific in the coolness of a Vermont summer. Caroline’s palms itched for the cool feel of good clean soil and a watering can. She could do so much here, just as she had done with that sweet, secluded garden tucked away at the back of her condo in Juniper. There, the roses had responded to her loving care by gushing forth in a multitude of blooms and scents. Lord, how she missed that place!

  For a few minutes they simply sat, enjoying the view, and the fresh air, and the feeling of contentment and ease before the day’s chores must be started.

  “I suppose you’ve been up and going for hours already,” Caroline ventured.

  He sent her an amused glance. “Putineer. Can’t get anything done, lollygaggin’ around in bed half the day. But that Ben, he’s got me beat. Left at five for some kinda meetin’ halfway across the state.”

  “He’s gone again? Oh, that wretch!” Exasperation twisted her words. Now that she had been in residence for almost twenty-four hours, she was being plagued by a whole ream of questions. Many of which concerned the daughter he had professed to love so much but whom he apparently found it so easy to ignore.

  Over the rim of his cup, Tom gave her that slow, speculative survey once more. “You knew that, goin’ in, didn’t you? That, even without the call of business takin’ him hither and yon, he’s a sugarfoot.”

  “Sugarfoot?”

  “Tumbleweed. Wanderer. That gonna be a problem?”

  Considering, she reached for a Bismarck, wondering at the same time whether happy Emma had spiked this particular one with ipecac, in her honor. “I didn’t think so—before,” she slowly admitted. “I’m having second thoughts now, and it’s all because of Sophie.”

  “So you’re not sure if an arranged marriage is the way to go.”

  “Not—entirely…”

  “Maybe you shoulda pondered more on that b’fore you come down here,” he suggested gently.

  She turned toward him, this man who was so easy to talk with, so comfortable to be around, so much a piece of the whole ranch yet part and parcel of his own skin.

  “Are you married, Tom?”

&
nbsp; “My, my, not exactly what I was expectin’. You’re fulla surprises, aren’t you, Carrie?”

  “Never any interest?”

  “No, ma’am. Too busy when I was younger, and then—well, things kinda got away from me. What are you gonna do about our boy, Ben?”

  “Marry him, of course. It’s what I agreed to. And someone has to look after that child.”

  With each slow nod of his head, the overlong black hair, attractively streaked with gray, tumbled down. He was a fine-looking man now; he must have been a finer-looking man, in his youth. “That’s good. That’s what I was hopin’ you’d say. She’s been a little lost soul for too long, dependent on the kindness of strangers. I’d like to see someone act like a genuine mama.”

  “There’s so much I don’t know,” she said with obvious frustration. The cup was empty, and she was longing for a second. But this discussion must come first. “So much Ben hasn’t told me about. I don’t know how he can expect—”

  “He just does, sugar. He can’t help it; it’s the way he’s made. He does all the decidin’, and figures everybody else will just go along, without any questions, b’cause he knows best.” Tom laid a light hand on her forearm. “I’ll help you any way I can. You just come t’ me when you have a question. Or when you get so mad at him you’d like t’ whack the boy with whatever stick of firewood is layin’ around. We’ll work it out. I promise you, we’ll work it out.”

  There was still the matter of her own background.

  “You saw the dossier I provided?” she asked doubtfully.

  Tom planted one lanky leg across the other thigh, prepared to take as long as necessary with this confidential talk. “Well, now, you might say I’m sorta the consigliere of this here outfit. So Ben, he bounces a lotta ideas off me, discusses what’s botherin’ him, and so on. He wanted my opinion when he first started this mail order bride business.”

  Farther out, in the mown grass, an ornate fountain sprayed its lovely glittering drops into the air and back down into a shallow pool. Refreshing. Carolyn could hear the musical tinkle from where they sat. How nice it would be to recline on that circular base and trail her fingers in the water.