McKettricks of Texas: Tate

by Linda Lael Miller

  He wished he’d spent more time riding with Pablo now, both on horseback and in the company truck. And not just because of the things he might have learned.

  The man’s absence was still a persistent ache in Tate’s middle, a wind that sometimes abated and sometimes howled.

  He saddled his horse and Libby’s, checked to see that the girls had gotten their cinches tight enough and wouldn’t be rolling off their ponies’ backs onto the ground.

  Not that they’d have far to go, he thought, with a smile.

  The ponies were about the size of a large dog.

  Once Libby was on Buttons’s back and squared away, Tate handed Hildie up into her arms, made sure she had a good grip. That dog looked as easy in the saddle as if she played polo on weekends.

  Letting the kids get a head start, Tate took his time swinging up into the saddle and turning Stranger in the direction of the main house.

  Sometimes I wonder who I’d be, away from here.

  Libby’s remark had snagged in his mind, beneath all the sunshine and the fishing and the easy enjoyment of a sunny day.

  If she thought he was going to let that one go, she should have damn well known better.

  “So,” Tate began, as they rode slowly onto the range again, the big house towering in the distance, like the castle it was. “Who do you think you’d be, Lib, away from Blue River?”

  She nestled her chin onto the top of Hildie’s head, her arms stretched around the dog’s ample body, holding on to the saddle horn for balance and letting the reins rest loosely across the mare’s neck.

  After a long time, she replied sadly, “I don’t know. Maybe someone who’s accomplished things.”

  Tate nudged his horse a bit closer to Libby’s, not to crowd her, but in case holding the dog got to be too much for her. He raised an eyebrow and shifted his gaze to the space between Stranger’s ears, though he was still watching Lib out of the corner of one eye.

  “Like what?” he asked, very carefully.

  If Libby truly believed she had something to prove, well, as far as Tate was concerned, that was cause for concern. Especially if she thought she had to leave Blue River to do it.

  She sighed. She shook her head.

  Gently, he took Hildie from her.

  Their horses moved apart again.

  Hildie tilted her head back to lick the underside of Tate’s chin.

  He chuckled. The girls were too far ahead, almost to the fence, the pups weaving around them.

  Tate gave a shrill whistle to get Audrey and Ava’s attention, signaled them to wait for him and Libby.

  “Will you do me a favor, Lib?” he asked, when she didn’t say anything. “Before you decide to take off for parts unknown, so you can ‘accomplish’ things, will you give us a chance? You and me, I mean?”

  Tears glistened in her eyes when she looked at him. “What kind of chance?”

  “You know what kind of chance.”

  “What if it doesn’t work?”

  “What if it does?”

  Libby bit down on her lower lip and looked away. “It didn’t before.”

  “That was before. We weren’t living in the same town. And that was a long time ago, Lib.”

  She met his eyes, with a visible effort. “Isn’t that what we’re doing now, Tate?” she asked quietly. “Giving things a chance?”

  “I want to sleep with you every night, Libby. I want to shower with you and eat breakfast with you and do a whole lot of other things with you.” He paused, looked back over his shoulder. “The house isn’t finished, but it’s livable. I’ll rustle up some furniture, and we’ll move in. You, me and the kids and the dogs.”

  She was quiet for a long time. So long that Tate started to get nervous.

  “You’re suggesting that we live together?” Libby finally asked. “In the same house with your children?”

  The scandalized note in her voice made Tate chuckle. “Hello? The parents of half the kids in their kindergarten class ‘cohabitate.’”

  “There’s cohabitation,” Libby said, “and there’s shacking up.”

  “You know, for someone as sexually responsive as you are, Lib, you can really be prudish.”

  Her cheeks glowed with pink splotches. “You’re not concerned that Audrey and Ava will be—confused?”

  Tate huffed out a sigh. “No,” he said. “Did Ava seem ‘confused’ this morning, when she found us in bed together? For better or worse, it’s a different world, Libby.” He watched her for a long moment, trying to gauge her reactions. They had almost caught up with the girls, so he lowered his voice. “If it really bothers you, though—living in sin, I mean—we could go ahead and get married.”

  “Married?”

  “Well, wouldn’t that be better than ‘shacking up,’ as you put it?”

  “What about—” She stopped, swallowed so hard that Tate felt the dry ache in his own throat. “What about love?”

  “Love isn’t our problem,” Tate replied quietly. “Trust is our problem.”

  Libby didn’t affirm that assertion, but she didn’t deny it, either. So he still had a fighting chance.

  For now, though, the conversation was over.

  Deftly, Ava reached, without dismounting, to work the gate latch.

  In the distance, the stud kicked and squealed like he’d tear that pen apart, rail by rail and bolt by bolt. The sound of that animal’s rage sent a shiver tripping down Tate’s spine.

  As soon as he’d ridden through the gate, Tate got down from the saddle, set Hildie on the ground and strode toward the pen, leaving Stranger to go into the barn on his own.

  “Shut that gate,” he called over one shoulder, “and go on into the barn.”

  Through the gaps between the steel rails, Tate saw the stallion bunch its hind quarters, put its head down and send both its back legs slamming into the pen’s gate with enough force to shake the ground.

  The gate held.

  Tate swore under his breath. Fumbled for his cell phone and called Brent Brogan’s direct line.

  “Hey, Tate,” Brent said, affably distracted, like he was doing paperwork or something. “Everything okay out there on the Ponderosa?”

  Tate answered with a question of his own. “You heard a decision on what Animal Control wants to do with this stud?” he asked. “Because he’s in a foul mood—fixing to kick his way out of the pen and kill somebody else.”

  Brent sighed. “I’ll make a few calls,” he said, “and get back to you.”

  “Thanks,” Tate said. Call waiting clicked in his ear. “Later.” Then, after pressing the appropriate button, “Tate McKettrick.”

  “It’s Julie Remington, Tate. I need to speak with Libby.”

  So much, Tate thought, for loving the “kinks” out of Libby’s delectable little body later on, when they would have been alone. He grabbed hold of the pen gate with his free hand and gave the thing a hard shake, making sure the stud hadn’t sprung it.

  “Sure,” he said glumly. “Hold on a second.”

  Libby had gone into the barn, along with the twins, and when Tate reached the doorway, she and Audrey and Ava were all in separate stalls, unsaddling their horses and getting ready to brush them down. Stranger stood in the breezeway, waiting his turn, although Libby must have removed his saddle and blanket and bridle.

  The old horse ambled toward Tate, nudged him good-naturedly in the chest.

  Leaving Buttons’s stall, Libby was smiling, dusting her hands together.

  Job well done.

  “For you.” Tate held the cell out to her, and she took it.

  “Julie,” he added, opening the door to Stranger’s stall and stepping aside so the animal could precede him.

  Libby nodded, looking mildly troubled, and headed for the open door at the end of the breezeway.

  Tate closed the stall door and began brushing down his horse.

  “I’M NOT KIDDING,” Julie said. “Marva is leaving. For good. The movers will come in a few days and clear out
her apartment.”

  Libby rounded the corner of the barn, keeping to the shade, and gazed at the stallion in its big metal cage. The creature had quieted, but its flanks and sides were lathered as though it had run for miles and miles. It stood with its head hung low, its sides expanding, drawing in, expanding, drawing in again.

  She thought about Pablo; how startled and afraid he must have been when he fell under the stallion’s hooves. The pain, though probably brief, would have been horrendous.

  “Julie, what do you want me to say?” Libby asked, backing away from the stallion now, resisting a strange and probably suicidal desire to reach between those steel slats and try to comfort it somehow. Speak softly and stroke its sweat-drenched neck. “If Marva wants to leave, she can leave. Hitting the road is her forte, after all, isn’t it?”

  “Nobody’s denying that she left us, Lib,” Julie said so quietly and so gently that Libby was ashamed of herself. “We were little girls. We needed her. She abandoned us and she abandoned Dad. But—”

  “But?” Libby snapped.

  On some level, she was still that terrified, heartbroken and furious kid who wanted her mother.

  “Look,” Julie went on, when Libby was silent for a long time, “she wants to see all three of us, tonight. At her place. She says it’s important.”

  Libby wanted to scream, though of course she didn’t. That would have alarmed the kids, and Hildie, who had followed her out of the barn and sat looking up at her now, pink tongue lolling.

  “Why does it have to be tonight?”

  “Because she’s flying out of Austin tomorrow,” Julie said. “Libby, I know you have issues with Marva—valid ones. We all do. But the woman is our mother, and I think we can do this much for her.”

  Libby’s head began to throb. She dug into her right temple with three fingers and rubbed.

  Returning to town meant she couldn’t pretend the Perk Up was still standing.

  It probably meant no sex with Tate.

  And she’d been looking forward to that, to getting naked in the shower with him. To soaring outside herself.

  Love isn’t our problem, he’d said. Trust is our problem.

  Did that mean he still loved her?

  Dammit, she wanted to know. She needed to know.

  “Just come,” Julie said. “Please, Lib. Six-thirty, Marva’s place.”

  Libby looked at her wrist, realized she wasn’t wearing her watch, and asked, “What time is it now?”

  “A little after five,” Julie answered. “You’re with Tate, aren’t you?”

  “Not for long, it would seem,” Libby lamented. We were starting to get somewhere, Tate and I.

  “I’m sure he’ll understand.”

  “Of course he will. I’m the one having a hard time understanding.”

  “Well, that was certainly cryptic,” Julie remarked. Then, barely missing a beat, “You’ll be at Marva’s, then?”

  Libby nodded, glummer than glum. “Yes.” She looked up, and Tate was standing maybe a dozen yards away, waiting, looking pensive.

  And so deliciously hunky.

  “See you at six-thirty,” Julie said.

  “See you,” Libby answered, and closed the phone.

  Walking up to Tate, she handed the device back to him.

  “I have to go back to town,” she said. “It seems my mother is leaving Blue River again—her work here is done now that my business is in ruins—and she wants to say goodbye. Tonight.”

  Tate sighed, took Libby’s shoulders in his hands. “You’re okay with this? Her leaving, I mean?”

  “It’s not as though she’s been an integral part of my life, Tate.” Libby spoke without bitterness; she was simply stating a fact she’d accepted long ago. Mostly.

  He drew her close, as she’d hoped he would do, and held her, resting his chin on the top of her head. “Let me make sure Esperanza can look after the kids tonight, and then I’ll drive you to town.”

  She nodded, wanting to cling to him, forcing herself not to clutch at the fabric of his shirt. “I don’t want to go.”

  “Then don’t.”

  “I have to, Tate.”

  She felt the motion of his jaw; knew he was smiling even before he held her a little way from his chest so he could look down into her face.

  “This was a good day,” he said.

  “It was a good day,” Libby agreed.

  But the best part was over.

  Fifteen minutes later, they were in Tate’s truck, headed for Blue River. Hildie rode in the rear seat, but she wasn’t any happier about leaving the Silver Spur than Libby was, evidently. The dog sat backward, looking out the window over the truckbed, and every few moments, she gave a small whimper.

  Libby wanted to reassure Hildie that they’d be back, but she was strangely hesitant to make such a promise.

  At home, she took a quick shower and put on a simple cotton sundress. She tracked Tate to the kitchen, where he was leaning calmly against the counter, arms folded, watching Hildie gobble up her kibble. He’d refilled her water dish, too, and even brought in the newspaper and the mail.

  Libby, her hair still damp from the shower steam, searched for her car keys until she finally found them—hanging on their hook near the back door, where they were supposed to be.

  “It always throws me,” she admitted to Tate, “when things are where they’re supposed to be.”

  He chuckled at that.

  “You don’t have to stay,” she said, hoping he would.

  Which was crazy, because he had children at home. He had a ranch, livestock. Responsibilities. It was just plain wrong to expect him to sit here in this house until she got back from Marva’s at whatever time, in whatever emotional condition, just because she might need someone to talk to later on.

  He crossed the room, opened her refrigerator, shook his head. The pickings were slim; she had to admit that.

  “What do you live on?” he asked, and from the tone of his voice, he was only half kidding. “You have three green olives, a box of baking soda, and I don’t even want to think about the expiration date on that cheese. It’s not supposed to be blue-green at the corners, is it?”

  Libby laughed. “I depend heavily on canned goods,” she said.

  “Yuck,” Tate said.

  The wall phone rang.

  Libby grabbed the receiver, hoping for a reprieve. In a fraction of an instant, she came up with the perfect scenario: Julie was calling to say that Marva was still leaving, soon and for good, but tonight’s visit had been postponed—better yet, canceled altogether.

  “Good, you’re home,” Julie said. “Can you pick me up? Paige is still at work, so she’s going to be a few minutes late, and—”

  “Sure,” Libby broke in, deflated. So much for perfect scenarios. “I’ll swing by and get you. But chill out a little. This isn’t a rocket launch, Julie. There’s no second-by-second countdown.”

  Incredibly, Julie burst into tears. “Maybe you don’t want to know where the hell our mother has been all these years,” she blurted out, in a very unJulie-like way, “but I do! By God, that woman isn’t going anywhere until she gives me some kind of explanation!”

  “Julie,” Libby said gently, her gaze connecting with Tate’s, “where’s Calvin?”

  Julie sniffled inelegantly. “He’s spending the night with Justin.”

  “All right. That’s good. I’ll be over in a few minutes.”

  Goodbyes were said, and both sisters hung up.

  Tate jingled his keys at Libby. “Hildie and I are going out to pick up something decent for dinner,” he said. “We’ll be here waiting when you get back.”

  “It might be late,” she warned.

  He approached, kissed her lightly. “We’ll be here,” he repeated. “Hildie and me.”

  She nodded, too choked up, all of a sudden, to say more.

  Since the Impala was parked in her garage, off the alley, Libby couldn’t avoid getting a glimpse of the caved-in roof and tumbled-dow
n walls of the Perk Up.

  It wasn’t enough that Marva had abandoned them all way back when, she reflected bitterly.

  Six months ago, with no warning at all, she’d returned to Blue River, rented the condo, furnished it and begun trying to “make up for lost time” and get to know her daughters.

  But an invasion of their lives wasn’t enough for Marva. Oh, no. She had to destroy the one thing Libby had to show for her attempts to jerry-rig some kind of career for herself. She had to reduce the Perk Up to scrap metal and firewood.

  Libby climbed into the Impala, started the engine, calmly backed into the alley, remembering those early days after Marva’s sudden reentry into her and her sisters’ lives.

  She’d seemed genuinely baffled, Marva had, when they resisted her overtures—the phone calls, the unannounced visits, the gifts.

  Julie had been the first to give ground.

  She wanted Calvin to know his grandmother, she’d said.

  Paige, to Libby’s initial surprise, had fallen under the spell of Marva next. Of course, Paige was the baby; she’d still been wearing footed pajamas and sucking her thumb when their mother bailed.

  She’d cried the longest and the hardest. Climbed into Libby’s or Julie’s bed at night, dragging her tattered “blankie” and whispering, “Do you know where Mommy is? When will she be back? Tomorrow? Will Mommy come home tomorrow?”

  Remembering, still the big sister, Libby ached with the same helpless fury she’d felt back then.

  Julie was waiting by her front gate when Libby pulled up, the diamond-paned windows of her pretty cottage alight behind her. Flowers climbed trellises, tumbled, riotous, over fences, and the fierce dazzle of the setting sun glowed around it all.

  “I can’t believe she’s just going to take off again,” Julie said, instead of hello.

  “Believe it,” Libby said grimly.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  AFTER A SHORT SPEECH, Marva produced three envelopes from her handbag and, with a flourish, presented one to each of her daughters.

  To Libby, it seemed that the floor of the condo’s living room pitched from side to side, like a swimming raft bobbing on choppy water. She squeezed the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger, trying hard to stem the headache beating behind her eyes like a second heart.