Love Inspired January 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: Her Unexpected CowboyHis Ideal MatchThe Rancher's Secret Son

by Debra Clopton

  She hesitated at the door, one hand grazing the knob, and studied her sleeping charges. Still snoring. Still unmoving. Nothing to worry about—after all, hadn’t Faith left the girls alone for a short time yesterday, before barging in and catching Emma in her verbal blunder? They’d be fine.

  Careful not to let the door slam, Emma slipped outside the dorm and into the main house. Since Mama Jeanie did all the cooking and served their meals, Emma hadn’t had reason to rummage through the refrigerator yet and didn’t know where anything was in the kitchen. Probably wouldn’t find it in the pitch black. She flipped on the low light over the sink, brightening the stone tiles on the floor. The room felt different this late at night, and she tiptoed quietly toward the refrigerator, aware that Mama Jeanie’s sleeping quarters weren’t far down the hall.

  She quickly found the milk, searched in vain for a bottle of chocolate syrup and finally discovered a drinking glass in the cabinet to the right of the pantry. She took a big gulp of plain milk just as heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs.

  Pausing midsip, she stared at Max over the rim of her glass.

  He raised his eyebrows, the corner of his mouth quirked as amusement danced in his eyes. His wrinkled T-shirt and pajama pants, along with rumpled hair void of its usual cowboy hat, gave testament to his own lack of sleep. “Thirsty?”

  A flush heated her neck, and she swiped her mouth with the sleeve of her robe. Juvenile, but faster than trying to find a paper napkin—and better than conversing with a liquid mustache. “Couldn’t sleep.”

  “Long first day, huh?” He reached for the fridge and pulled out the carton of orange juice.

  “You could say that.” She stepped back as he rummaged for a cup. Memories long buried burned for release. He’d always preferred juice over milk, regardless of the time of day or food he was eating. Some things never changed.

  “I feel like I need to apologize for earlier.” Max set the carton back in the fridge and turned to her, sincerity shining in his gaze. He ran his finger around the edge of his full glass, meeting her eyes briefly before averting them.

  She threw him a proverbial bone, however grudgingly. “You did the right thing.” The words tasted unfamiliar. Max Ringgold, making the right decision? But she had to somehow let go of the Max she knew from the past and reconcile it with the one standing before her now. Old Max drank orange juice out of the carton, cared about nothing but his own next adventure—illegal or not—and lived for the moment.

  New Max poured juice into cups, helped troubled teens and ran a successful ministry.

  Somewhere in between the two extremes lay a missing puzzle piece, and Emma couldn’t help but long to find out where it went. Where it fit.

  What hole it might fill.

  He picked up his glass but still didn’t drink, rather studied it as if the yellow liquid held answers. “I wasn’t apologizing for the why, but the what. I was abrupt.”

  Well that sounded more like the Max she knew. But this one wasn’t arrogant, only confident. There was a difference if one looked hard enough.

  She just didn’t think it wise to stick around and try.

  “It was the right choice.” She took another quick sip of milk and rinsed her glass in the sink. “No worries.” There was so much more she wanted to say, but standing in a dark kitchen with Max in their pajamas didn’t exactly lend to the right timing.

  “I know it’s awkward.”

  She hesitated, her back to him as she turned off the faucet. She didn’t want to turn around, didn’t want to risk seeing something in his eyes she only once imagined she’d see—change. Pure, heartfelt, hard-core change. Max had clearly made something of himself, had chosen a better path after she abandoned their sinking ship of a relationship by escaping to college and never looking back. She’d wanted to see that change in him so bad then but had gotten burned. He’d not only broken his promise to her to change, he’d flat-out mocked it. How could he whisper such heartfelt assurances of her being good for him, of her being enough—and then turn around and do another drug deal the minute he thought her back was turned?

  It was too late.

  And she couldn’t bear seeing the change in person when it couldn’t undo the past.

  She lowered her eyes as she turned, wiping her hands on the sides of her robe. “What’s awkward?” Denial at its worst. But what choice did she have? None of the events of the past few days made any sense to her heart, already fragile and weary from the strain of Cody’s rebellion.

  “Us.”

  She lifted her gaze, grateful for the shadows shrouding his half of the kitchen, and moved away from the light lest he see too much. “It’s just a month.” That currently felt as if it’d already been about six. Sort of reminded her of another time in her life where nine months went by as slowly as a decade. Her cheeks burned.

  “There was just so much...left...” Max coughed and took a long drink from his glass. He didn’t bother to finish his sentence when he set it back on the counter.

  “Between us.” The words drifted from her mouth, as lazy as a warm wind on a summer’s day. She didn’t even mean to say them. But they hung in the gap.

  “You left.” His voice barely rose above the hum of the ice machine kicking on in the freezer. “And you never came back.”

  A fist of tension closed around her throat, and she opened her mouth, unsure what to say or what she even could say at this point without ruining everything. Blinking rapidly, she stared at him, anxiety pressing in on her chest.

  He moved toward her, as if taking her silence for regret. And was there regret? Plenty. But not in the way he’d anticipate.

  She held up one hand as he drew nearer, her fingers grazing the muscles of his chest beneath his T-shirt. “That’s not true.” If he came closer, she’d forget who she was, where she was—how old she was—and slam right back into the past. Straight back into the body of her naive, eighteen-year-old self who couldn’t see that her daddy was right about more than she wanted to admit. Who couldn’t see that flirting with fire guaranteed burns.

  Who couldn’t look past the chemistry with Max still currently flushing her cheeks.

  Even back then there’d been this innate urge to fix people. To see past the surface and reach through the exterior to the heart of someone hurting. As a young adult, Max had hurt. And she’d been drawn to him, convinced she’d turn him around. It brought a sense of purpose, knowing she’d made a difference in someone’s life when she couldn’t do a thing to help her own family’s problems. She couldn’t pad the checking account or convince the stubborn soil to yield produce for her father—but maybe she could heal with love.

  She just never thought she’d get sucked in. That the darkness would overcome the light, that the single step she took down a path would pull her along until she was miles deep.

  “You came back?” He took a step away from her, whether out of shock or because of her raised hand she couldn’t tell. “When?”

  She couldn’t answer that one. Not now. What could she say? I came back to tell you I was pregnant with Cody and caught you in the middle of a drug deal with one of the area’s “most wanted”? She hesitated, and he filled in his own blank.

  “For your dad’s funeral.”

  That was true. She’d been there and stayed as incognito as possible.

  She didn’t even get a chance to nod before he wrapped her in a hug. “I’m sorry I didn’t know you were here.” His strong arms curled around her waist and held her tight. “I’d have come and found you.”

  The heartfelt words sank into her dry heart like a desert rain and soaked in deep. She returned the hug automatically, hands pressed against the hard contours of his back, certain he felt her heart pounding out of control under her robe. He radiated warmth, familiarity, memories...

  No. No. She was back in Max Ringgold’s arm
s, after-hours. Maybe some things had changed, but apparently not enough.

  She jerked away. “I’ve got to check on the girls.” She flew through the kitchen door, wincing as the screen slammed behind her.

  The perfect punctuation to the turmoil in her heart.

  Chapter Eight

  If Max batted zero one more time with Emma Shaver, he’d make some kind of unfortunate, proverbial hall of fame. She’d pulled out of his arms faster than he’d run out of church the first time Brady dragged him—and with just as many fears etched across her face.

  But not before she hugged him back. Not before she’d fit against him like a missing puzzle piece from his past. As if the past decade plus hadn’t separated them at all.

  And that might be the scariest part.

  He adjusted his cowboy hat as he leaned against the door frame of the recreation room, where he supervised the kids’ free time. He really needed to get his mind off Emma and what transpired—or almost transpired—in the kitchen last night and back on the kids before him. All but two were enjoying the rewards of their hard work and the bonus system he’d put into place last year. For each good deed done or extra mile taken in conduct toward their peers, they were awarded an extra ten minutes of free time for the week.

  The two that hadn’t earned any rewards yet, Peter and Ashton, were in the kitchen helping Mama Jeanie—peeling potatoes for soup that night. Mama Jeanie always made soup on Fridays. She said in life, it was the little things you could count on that meant the most. And that these kids coming through the program needed stability, needed to be able to depend on the little things, so she made soup.

  There was probably a lot of genius in that.

  Max shifted his weight, watching as David and Hank shot a puck at rapid speed across the air hockey table. Luke always loved playing that game with the teens. Thankfully Nicole’s doctor had put her on bed rest at the hospital, so Luke still had a little bit of freedom to help out at the ranch periodically while she rested. He’d be there tomorrow for the next group trail ride and could fill in with the boys while Max did more One4One sessions. He couldn’t wait to meet with Cody again so they could dig deeper on the issues the boy had. He’d barely scratched the surface, but Max could tell that the lack of a father figure in Cody’s life had affected him. How badly, he had yet to determine.

  Sometimes he wasn’t sure if physically absent fathers were better or worse than the emotionally absent ones like his own had been.

  His eyes drifted toward the younger boy, who lounged on the couch in front of the TV, fingers furiously punching at the Xbox controls. Cody’s speed and concentration were testament that the fast-paced car game on the screen wasn’t his first rodeo. The kid definitely had a mind geared toward technology—though in the past few days, Max had noticed his confidence increase with the animals, as well. He had the capability to be well-rounded, but clearly the video games and iPod buds were a bigger draw. Hopefully they’d break through that before the end of the camp, since the violence utilized in most of those games—and the lyrics of the music Cody chose—didn’t lend to good behavior. In fact, he was surprised Emma hadn’t made more rules about those choices.

  And then she was there, as if his thinking about her had drawn her. Her fresh, peppermint scent wafted past him as she peered around the door frame into the room, her blond hair sweeping her shoulders. “Are the girls okay?”

  Emma’s tone, all business, doused the spark of hope that had birthed last night. He eased aside to give her space, though his instincts warred inside him to press closer. But it was like working with a frightened filly—pushing only led to someone getting trampled.

  He forced what he hoped looked like a casual smile and hoped she couldn’t tell that just minutes ago he’d been psychoanalyzing her child. “The girls have been playing board games. Tonya seemed to get bored and hit the treadmill earlier, but now I think the competition is pretty fierce.” He gestured toward where the girls were gathered in one corner of the room, hunched over a board with multiple pieces. Katie frowned as she rolled the game dice, while Stacy grinned as she counted her wad of paper money.

  Emma acknowledged the update with a slight nod, though she still didn’t meet his eyes. Probably a good thing, too. At this proximity, with last night still fresh in his mind, he might forget his batting average altogether and do something crazy—like kiss her. Just to see if the sparks they’d once lit like the Fourth of July were still flammable. To see if he could detect even a hint of their old relationship like he’d imagined he’d felt in her hug.

  To see if there was any reason at all to reignite the embers he’d never been able to fully put out.

  He kept his eyes on the room of kids, the knot in his throat growing until he thought he’d choke. The tense silence between them spoke more than most words could, and he hated what the message relayed. “You ready for the trail ride tomorrow?” Not the most genius of topics, but at least it broke the ice freezing him out.

  She stiffened beside him at the reminder of the horses. “Ready as I’ll ever be to sit on top of a moving beast.”

  “Come on, now. You’ve ridden before.” Settled in front of him while they rode bareback together, if he remembered correctly. And he didn’t forget most things involving Emma Shaver.

  She met his eyes then, with a pointed look that shot like a barb into his heart. “And it’s still not my cup of tea.”

  Ouch. Point taken.

  Definitely not the time to remind her she’d once ridden on his friend’s Harley, either.

  He opened his mouth to say something, anything to get her head away from the negative past, when one of the biggest boys in the camp, sixteen-year-old Jarvis Mason, sat down suddenly on the couch next to Cody. “My turn.”

  Cody wrangled the controller slightly out of reach, his eyes never leaving the TV screen as the race car continued careening at high speeds around a digital track. “Not yet.”

  “Come on, you’ve been playing ever since we got in here.” Jarvis reached for the controller, crowding his space as Cody jerked it away once again.

  Uh-oh. Max felt Emma’s eyes bore into the side of his face, gauging, judging, waiting for him to intervene. But he wouldn’t, not yet. In the real world, he wouldn’t be there to run interference for these kids. They had to learn to handle opposition and conflict in a healthy way, and after the talk he’d had with Cody the other day by his truck, he was confident Cody could make the right decision.

  He crossed his arms and waited, believing. Come on, Cody. Make good choices.

  Jarvis sneered and used muscle this time, elbowing Cody in the side and snatching the controller for himself. “Time for little boys to share.”

  Cody lunged, like a bull from a chute, straight at Jarvis’s barrel chest. Jarvis yelled in surprise, and, with his hands full of the game controller, couldn’t dodge the scrawny fist Cody shot right at his nose.

  Apparently Max had been wrong.

  Emma sucked in her breath, hands covering her mouth. Blood dripped from Jarvis’s nose, and with a growl, he threw down the controller. The room stilled, and Katie gasped. Several of the other guys stood up, whether to jump in to help or make it worse, Max wasn’t certain. To Cody’s credit, he only lifted his chin and met Jarvis’s gaze head-on as they glared at each other in front of the TV.

  This would be the time to intervene.

  Max covered the distance between him and the boys in three long strides. “That’s enough, guys. Game over.” He took the controller and tossed it out of reach on the floor.

  “He punched me.” Jarvis wiped his face, red streaking across his cheek, and his eyes narrowed to slits.

  Cody scoffed. “Because you deserved it.”

  “I saw what happened.” Max raised his voice over the sound of Jarvis’s high-pitched protests. “Stacy, could you throw me those tissues, ple
ase?”

  She tossed the box at him from across the room. Max caught it deftly in one hand and plucked several for Jarvis, who pressed the thin tissues against his face.

  Max could almost feel the trembles racking Cody’s body, whether from adrenaline or shame he couldn’t be sure. But these boys needed separation, quick.

  He hooked his arm through Cody’s elbow and tugged the boy to one side, halfway behind him. Jarvis could still retaliate, and from the looks in both boys’ eyes, he wouldn’t be surprised if they acted first and gladly accepted punishment later. He couldn’t risk any more blood.

  He nodded at Emma, who stepped uncertainly into the room, eyes glued to Cody as if she weren’t sure if she could go to him or not.

  She couldn’t.

  Max coughed intentionally, drawing her gaze. “Please take Jarvis to Chaplain Tim in the dorms.” Away from here. Away from Cody, before the older teen realized he’d just been bested by a thirteen-year-old and tried to outmuscle them all. The last thing Max needed was a dog pile, and some of the other boys in the room still pressed in closer than he liked, the excitement of a fight lighting their eyes.

  Emma’s lips pursed into a line, but just like he knew she would, she snapped out of mama-mode and into counselor-mode. “Sure.” Her tone grew firm and impossible to argue with. “Come on, Jarvis.” She held out a steady hand, ushering him toward the door.

  “I get punched in the face, and I have to see the preacher man?” The bigger boy’s voice rose to a crescendo, but he didn’t argue further as he tossed crimson tissues in the trash can they walked past. “Totally unfair.”

  “We’ll talk soon. Don’t worry.” Max waited until they left the room, keeping one hand on Cody’s shoulder, and met the gaze of the other boys in the room. “Back to your games. Or you can all peel potatoes.”

  The group instantly broke up and went back to their activities. Max couldn’t leave with Cody, though, not until Emma got back or Faith or the other part-timers came on duty. With this much tension in the air, no way was he leaving any of the teens unsupervised. He’d seen it plenty of times—one broke a rule, and the others were tempted to follow close behind. It was that carnal temptation to push the limits. Sort of like how Max had been the majority of his life until the Lord wrangled it out of him.