A Cowboy at Heart

by Roz Denny Fox

  Pocketing the card, Miranda swept a hand toward the living room. “Please, won’t you have a seat? Someone just went out to the bunkhouse to get Linc, er, Mr. Parker.” Miranda wanted to bite her tongue for calling him Linc. She caught hawk-eye Bishop’s swift intake of breath.

  “Is Mr. Parker sleeping at this time of day, for mercy’s sake?”

  “Sleeping?” Miranda blinked. “Oh, no. He’s working with a contractor on the second bunkhouse. They’re building a bathroom like he did for bunkhouse one.”

  “Children sleep in a bunkhouse where there’s currently no bathroom?”

  “No, ma’am. I mean, yes, ma’am. I mean, no one sleeps there,” Miranda said, flustered. “If you’ll sit down, I’ll go make coffee. It’ll only take a jiffy. Oh, would you like a cup? I’m sure Parker will want one.” Dang, now she’d disrespectfully called him by his last name.

  “Coffee would be nice, thank you. I’ve recently moved here from the Mojave area. This rain seeps right through a person’s bones.” The woman glanced around the room as if cataloging all the faces, especially Cassie’s red, swollen eyes. Before she perched on the edge of a chair and snapped open her briefcase, a second gaze swept the pile of decorations and the partially trimmed tree. She calmly put on a pair of glasses and extracted a yellow legal pad and pen. Seemingly oblivious to the hard stares, she began to write.

  Jenny scurried into the kitchen on Miranda’s heels. “She’s even more uptight than the counselor who used to come to my mom’s house. I’ll bet she’s listing every fault she’s found in the living room.”

  “Well, she ought to have seen it before the improvements.” Miranda poured water in the pot and after adding grounds, she pressed the start button, surprised to see her hands shaking. “Do you suppose the boys made their beds this morning? Maybe one of us ought to check.” She grabbed the backdoor knob, only to have the door thrust inward, all but knocking her off her feet.

  Linc swept in with Wolfie at his heels. He was covered in sawdust from head to toe, and windblown and rain-soaked to boot. “Sorry, Miranda. I didn’t mean to hit you with the door. Wolfie tells me there’s a woman here. Mrs. Bishop, I presume. I thought she’d phone first. Where is she and what’s she up to?”

  Jenny jerked a thumb to signify his quarry was in the living room. “So far, she’s writing a book. Just kidding.” Jenny grimaced. “But she’s writing more than asking questions. I think she’s waiting for you.”

  Linc stripped off his gloves and used them to dust off his shirt and pants.

  Miranda waved at the flying particles. “Couldn’t you do that on the porch? You want her to think I’m a lousy housekeeper?”

  “Of course not. Why are you pitching such a fit?”

  “Maybe because your Mrs. Bishop looks like a witch. If something looks like a witch and acts like a witch…chances are she is a witch.”

  “Shh.” He clapped a hand over Miranda’s mouth. The feel of her soft lips against his fingers sent a crash of excitement to his groin. Dammit, not now. If the Bishop woman did have a burr under her saddle, this was the last thing he needed her to see—him with a hard-on for a young woman supposedly in his custody. Especially as the other kids still considered her a peer. Boy, oh, boy. He saw now what a mistake he’d made in not making Miranda tell them sooner.

  Wheeling, he slapped his gloves on his hip and stalked from the room.

  Miranda didn’t know what had happened just now, but she knew something had. As the coffee gurgled its last, she delayed checking on the boys’ beds. Instead, she poured two cups and motioned for Jenny to bring cream and sugar.

  They reached the living room in time to hear Mrs. Bishop demand to know why Linc had collected all these children without benefit of a state license.

  He removed a folder holding several papers from a bookshelf. “I have a license. Ted Gunderson from the Oasis Foundation left me theirs. He told my representative that your predecessor agreed to let me use the balance of the time on their contract. Subject to your inspection of my facility, of course.”

  She didn’t even glance at the certificate. “You know that paper is worthless. My receptionist told you Oasis lost their service agreement over a year ago.”

  Linc didn’t quail under her stern gaze. He slapped the folder shut. “Your office offered me no help in obtaining a license in my own right.”

  “Well, Mr. Parker, until you have a valid operating license, you’re not supposed to shelter anyone on state welfare rolls.”

  “I’m not.” Linc’s mouth quirked ominously. “That’s the hell of it. Oasis walked away and left three of their former residents. I was told your office has no welfare records for Wolfie, Hana or Cassandra. No one ever checked on them when Oasis was ordered to cease and desist. Wolfie and Cassie didn’t attend school for eight months, and not a soul asked why. In Wolfgang’s case, the houseparent had him chopping wood and running errands ten hours a day. And if the boy hadn’t cared for Cassie and Hana as well as he had, I would’ve found them even filthier and more malnourished. As it was, they were borderline. But there was nothing borderline about the condition of the house—it was a disgrace. I’m prepared to deal reasonably with your office, Mrs. Bishop. I doubt you want the local press to get hold of our story. This county’s welfare service record is iffy at best.”

  “Be that as it may,” she sniffed, “I can’t be held accountable for things that happened prior to my tenure here.”

  “Oh, but I’m responsible for not being aware of things I wasn’t told about? Things I took in good faith?”

  Evelyn Bishop sank back against the chair cushion. Looking up, she accepted the cup of coffee Miranda offered her. “Thank you. Where, uh, is your house mother? Would it be possible for her to oversee the children elsewhere while we conduct business? I believe the young woman who invited me in mentioned a bunkhouse. Could they go there? It sounded as if one’s under construction, but the other is fully operational. Am I correct in assuming that?”

  “You are. Your mistake is in thinking I have a house mother. Or any employee, for that matter. I’ve run an ad in the local paper for weeks. Not one person has phoned or come in to answer the ad. And your office was zero help there, too, I might add.”

  “No woman on board?” Her mouth opened and shut. The coffee cup wobbled in her hand. “Why, that’s totally unacceptable! The children…the children cannot stay here a moment longer.”

  “No,” they all cried at once. “We don’t wanna go.”

  The older boys formed a chain in front of Wolfie, who clasped Hana and Cassie to him, as he’d done the day Linc first showed up at the ranch.

  Mrs. Bishop and Linc stared at each other, both steely-eyed. Linc took a bracing swallow from the steaming mug. “You have a court order giving you permission to remove them from my care?”

  “What?” the woman sputtered. “Those three are wards of the court. I’m authorized to take them into protective custody at any time of the day or night.”

  Linc dropped his chin and pinched the tight muscles in his neck. “Then you found documents proving Wolfgang and Hana Schmitt and Cassandra Rhodes are in your system? The others came here from Southern Cal. I’m quite confident they’ve never been on your rolls.”

  The Bishop woman averted her eyes, but not before Linc saw a degree of uncertainty. Feeling more magnanimous toward her than at any point since he’d walked in, he sank into an adjacent chair. “For the kids’ sake, it behooves us both to try and work together. If you ask them, they’ll tell you they have food and warm beds now. You’d take them tonight and you’d place them where?”

  Her shoulders slumped and she shook her head. “Frankly, I don’t know.” Removing her glasses, she rubbed tired-looking eyes. “At the moment, our computer shows no vacancy in any of our foster homes. None. The situation in this county is dire.”

  “I suggest, then, that you leave them where they are for the time being.”

  Miranda thought her heart would burst with joy when Linc added, “
We can set an appointment to meet again. I’m thinking…maybe the week after Christmas?”

  The director sipped her coffee. No one breathed until she set down the mug, rose and extended a hand. “Fine. Let’s say the Friday after New Year’s? Ten a.m. in my office. I promise, Mr. Parker, I will have done my homework on every one of these children by then.” Then, like a threatening black cloud, she departed, leaving sunny smiles behind.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  WHILE NO ONE at the ranch, except possibly Linc, was anxious to see time pass and bring the dreaded meeting with Social Services in the new year, the kids did look forward to celebrating Christmas.

  “This is the first time I’ve ever had my own money and could actually buy gifts,” Jenny confided to Miranda one afternoon when the two had driven into town by themselves, ostensibly to register for college.

  “Don’t go overboard. We have to stretch our funds to buy for eight people.”

  “Eight? Oh, you’re including Linc?”

  Miranda frowned. “Well, sure. If it wasn’t for him, this Christmas wouldn’t be possible for anyone.” She’d never make an issue of it to Jenny, but Miranda sensed that Linc was getting into the holiday spirit himself. From unguarded remarks he’d made during the minutes they grabbed alone, she’d gotten the impression that nothing was ever made of the holiday when he was a boy. As a kid, he’d been left to fend for himself over Christmas while his actress mother skied the Alps or gambled at Monte Carlo. And apparently his grandmother, the one who’d raised Felicity, considered Christmas just another day.

  According to Linc, he gave Felicity a check each Christmas so she could buy what her friends received as gifts from their parents. Big deal. Miranda gathered he’d shelled out money any time the girl asked. But then, she knew he was a generous man.

  Jenny interrupted Miranda’s ruminations. “It was good of Parker to give each of the little kids twenty bucks so they could buy us gifts. I heard you offer to help them make gifts. Since Linc bought that sewing machine, you’ve been zipping up curtains and bedspreads like mad. How come you know how to sew? I thought you were really little when your mom died.”

  “I was. But my dad hired female tutors to travel with us when he was, uh, on business. They didn’t only teach me academics. The women had hobbies. Sewing, painting and handicrafts. Most of them hung out with me after the lessons, so I did whatever they were doing.”

  “That sounds like a neat way to live. I couldn’t even keep up with my core classes in school. My mom kept me out so often to take care of my younger brothers and sisters. And there was never money for extras. But she managed to buy booze and cigarettes. She always had a boyfriend we fed, too,” Jenny said bitterly. “None of them were remotely as nice as Parker.”

  “But you want better for your own kids when you have them, right?” Miranda stopped on their walk into the college administrative office. “That’s why you should get your GED and prepare so you aren’t dependent on a man to support you. Don’t you want to look at requirements for the GED, as well as sign up for a continuing-ed poetry class?”

  “I suppose. But I’m never having kids. No way.”

  “Oh, Jenny. Someday you’ll change your mind.”

  Miranda needed to steer her friend elsewhere, to keep Jenny from seeing the transcripts that had arrived last week from Tennessee. Requesting them had been risky, but Miranda hoped school wasn’t something that would occur to Wes Carlisle. She counted on the fact that he knew almost nothing about her, other than her ability to write and sing songs. His lack of caring about the people he had under contract was another thing Miranda despised about her manager.

  Jenny wandered off to read class brochures while Miranda met with her counselor. Even then, the chance of being found out stressed her out so much that Miranda thought again about revealing her age to the younger girl. The truth would surface, anyway, at the meeting with Evelyn Bishop.

  But no opportunity presented itself. Miranda and Jenny parted ways in town, each heading off to do her private Santa business. Conversation on the drive home centered on the holiday. They had a heated debate as to whether Santa should arrive Christmas Eve or Christmas morning and finally agreed to let Linc decide.

  That evening, after the others had turned in, Linc and Miranda met in the kitchen for coffee and to chat about their day. It had become a ritual each looked forward to.

  Linc sipped coffee and thumbed through the college catalog. “You’re really staying on, then? I wasn’t sure you would.”

  “I told you the other night I planned to stay.”

  “I know. But that was before Mrs. Bishop dropped in. By the way, she phoned today. She ran their routine check with the California department of motor vehicles, and it gave your real age. Apparently Eric told her you were seventeen. She called to ask if I’d like to have a police background check done on you.”

  Miranda’s blood backed up in her veins. “Uh, did you request one?”

  “No! As if I would.” He reached over and lightly skimmed his knuckles along Miranda’s tense jaw. “I said you’d been truthful with me. I also informed her you were all that kept this household running at the moment. I let her know I paid you and Jenny a fare wage for chores. She was impressed but shocked, I think, when I said you two had gone to register for college classes. Although she scoffed about Jenny signing up for poetry.”

  “Did Mrs. Bishop find problems involving any of the others?”

  “As you’d guess, she didn’t have any report on Greg. She’s in possession of several on Eric’s checkered history as a habitual runaway. Shawn’s definitely not eligible for state benefits. His dad’s worth ten mil or so, she said.”

  “Money doesn’t make a man a good person.”

  “I know that. So does she. It’s…” Linc hesitated. “Mrs. Bishop has the authority to send Jenny back to her mom. Apparently Jenny is sixteen, not seventeen.”

  “Oh, Linc. Her mom’s an alcoholic and maybe a…hooker. The state took the other kids away. Why would she send Jenny back? From something Jenny said about her mom’s revolving boyfriends, I’d worry that she could be in danger.”

  “I can’t help that, Miranda. The director has rules to follow.”

  “You could help. Go to bat for Jenny, like you stood up for keeping the little kids the other night. If you don’t, Jenny and Eric will run again. They’ll be back living hand-to-mouth on the streets.”

  “Whoa! Wait a minute. I intervened that night when Mrs. Bishop came without phoning, but it doesn’t make me a guy who’ll buck the system for no reason. I’ve explained why Wolfie and the others can’t stay indefinitely. They need real parents. You said yourself that Cassie needs vigorous medical intervention. I hope you’re prepared to hand the kids over at our next meeting.”

  Miranda’s lower lip quivered. “How can you be so cruel? We can get Cassie medical help. Have you forgotten the school nurse had me make doctor and dental appointments for the kids at a clinic where she said they’d gone before?”

  “I know, but if anything significant’s to be done for Cassie in the way of surgery, she’ll need easier access to doctors and hospitals.”

  “But the kids trust us. They’re comfortable here. Sure, Eric and Jenny may still talk about hitting the big time and joke that your connections in L.A. could open doors, but it’s mostly talk. Shawn’s content. And Wolfie just plain looks up to you, Linc.”

  Linc’s jaw tightened. “I never asked him or anyone to look up to me. I said from the start that I wasn’t the man to raise kids. The screwed-up role models I had for parents have never made me a good bet. And don’t even think of asking me to help Eric and Jenny break into the entertainment business. It’s no place for kids their age. Good God, it killed Felicity.” His eyes begged her to understand.

  She didn’t. All her heart felt was a horrible ache. Deep sadness for the children, yes. But also for herself and Linc, who was so afraid to risk his heart. How could she ever reveal the facts about her past after listening to hi
s views regarding her profession? That knowledge hurt badly.

  Lately they hadn’t slipped off to Linc’s bed to take solace in each other’s arms. Tonight, however, without a word, they dumped their coffee, turned out the lights and held hands as they trod silently to the master suite.

  They rarely talked during these encounters, for fear of alerting the kids. This time they shed their clothes with a kind of reckless abandon. Miranda hoped that if she gave him her all, Linc would feel and accept her love. She thought Linc Parker had known so little love. And yet, she’d never known a more considerate lover.

  Tonight, even sensing her haste, he lay facing her, doing nothing except stroking her skin. Eventually she relaxed and began to explore the taut muscles of his back. Only then did Linc close the gap between them to kiss her.

  They were slow, methodical kisses that had heat pooling in her belly. Miranda couldn’t think when he kissed her like this. She couldn’t think about her shady past or her troubled future. Murky lies blended with partial truths as she curved a leg over Linc’s hips and accepted his hardness deep within her. Kissing him desperately, accepting and storing up everything she could get.

  Linc had immediately realized something was different about their lovemaking that night. As always, he hated sneaking around. He hated knowing Miranda purposely muted her expressions of need and muffled her joyous cries of release. His guilt increased tenfold with each stolen moment. And yet he felt helpless to deny either of them this pleasure. He wasn’t a man who indulged in whims, but Miranda had become his addiction. And yet if he’d learned anything from living and working in Hollywood all those years, it was that addictions were never good.

  Holding her close, he tasted tears on her cheeks and lips. He was too scared by the thought of losing her to question why she was crying. Not tonight. Maybe not ever. He hugged her tighter, as if holding her would make the world go away. Silently he vowed this had to stop until he was in a position to offer her more than clandestine moments. He swore he’d stay awake until it was time for her to leave his bed. But he fell asleep—shortly after he pulled the comforter up to cover their cooling bodies.