Chapter Two
The scream sounded again, loud and haunting. As soon as Ray’s heartbeat returned to somewhere near normal, he started for the house.
Drew and Erica did as well, but they stayed behind him. Drew looked worried, Erica torn between fear and morbid curiosity.
While most of the county thought the old Paresky place was haunted, Ray didn’t believe in ghosts. He had, for a split second when they heard the wail, but then realized logically it must be an animal trapped.
He carefully went up the porch steps, putting his weight where he figured the joists that held up the porch floor lay. No way did he want to plunge through rotted boards into whatever was underneath the house.
Drew followed him, admonishing Erica to stay put, and stepping where he did.
The front door came off the hinges when Ray pushed on it. The door had been locked with a dead bolt, but that didn’t matter because the bolt tore right out of the wall as the door fell inward.
The howls increased as Ray cautiously stepped inside the house. The front hall ran from front to back, with a staircase missing half its stairs on one side. Doors to the right and left led to rooms, big ones in front, light flooding through the windows.
Ray moved carefully into the room that had once been a living room, and sneezed. Dust coated everything, that special Texas dust that drifted back down as soon as the furniture was wiped. The floor was thick with it, except for a small set of paw prints leading to the fireplace.
Drew was going to have a hell of a time cleaning this place up. Ray wanted to tell her to bulldoze the house to the ground and start again, but he knew she didn’t want to hear that.
She was cute too, with brown hair and blue eyes behind dark lashes, a roundish face that scrunched up too much in concern. Ray would love to smooth the worry lines away with his fingers, tell her everything would be all right.
He wasn’t sure why he reacted that way to her, but he didn’t have the time or inclination to analyze his feelings. Ray wasn’t the rescue-the-damsel type, but something about her had made him want to carry her supplies home and now rush in to find out what kind of animal had gotten itself stuck in her house.
Ray reached the fireplace and knelt down. The hearth was as filthy as the rest of the room, but he was already coated with drywall powder, so what the hell?
The cries escalated, whatever it was wanting out.
“I think it’s up in the chimney.” Ray stuck his head inside and found he couldn’t see much. “Got a flashlight?”
One tapped him, held by Erica, who obviously hadn’t obeyed her mom. Drew said nothing, only held Erica gently back while Ray flashed the light up into the chimney again.
He saw no animal, only soot-covered brick and the damper, closed. He reached up, finding the chain that held it shut.
“Okay, I’m going to open this. You might want to wait in the hall, in case half the chimney comes down with it.”
Drew retreated across the room. Erica, though she gazed longingly at the fireplace as though she’d like to see that disaster, went with her.
Mother and daughter hovered in the doorway, Erica a smaller version of Drew, though Erica had a narrower face and a set of shoulders that likely came from her father.
Who was her dad anyway? And why wasn’t he here, looking up chimneys and repairing drywall?
Ray turned his face from the fireplace and closed his eyes as he tugged at the chains that held the damper closed. At home, he’d have spread newspaper or plastic all over the floor, but there wasn’t much point in this wreck of a living room.
The panel inside the chimney gave. Soot, twigs, bits of brick, and who the hell knew what else tumbled down into the fireplace. Ray held his breath, ducking swiftly away.
The cries only worsened. Whatever had been on top of the damper was still inside, terrified now that its platform was gone.
Ray switched on the flashlight again and looked up. He saw the gleam of eyes and teeth in the saddest and scrawniest looking feline he’d ever seen.
“It’s a cat,” he announced.
“Oh,” Erica crooned. “Oh, poor thing. Can you get it out?”
Ray reached up, but the cat was too far away, clinging with claws to the bricks it was afraid to climb down.
He wasn’t certain he could rescue it. But with Drew watching him, and Erica, her lip trembling, Ray couldn’t say no. He’d get that cat out, even if he had to tear down the chimney to do so.
Ray calculated that if he stood up straight in the chimney, he might just about reach the cat, if it didn’t start crawling up the bricks away from him.
He ducked out of the fireplace. “You got anything I can stand on? The fireplace is huge. A stool or chair will fit.”
Drew’s eyes had gone wide, but not with fear. She pressed her hand to her mouth, stifling a choke of laughter. Erica was already squealing with it.
“Sorry,” Drew said. “But you should see yourself.”
Ray gazed down at his soot-streaked and white dusted shirt. He was a mess, and his face must be covered with dirt and muck. “Oh well. I’m not going anywhere fancy.”
“Stay right there.” Drew steered Erica out, Erica’s peals of laughter escalating as they went out the front door.
Ray watched through the broken window as they jogged to the garage, mother and daughter side-by-side, voices fresh and clear.
The house was a wreck, but as Ray glanced around, he could see it had a solidness to it. The interior needed a lot of work, including fumigation and mold blasting, but the structure of the house was sturdily built. They’d made houses to last in the old days. The fireplace and chimney, by the look of them, would probably stand until the end of time.
Drew returned with a stepladder, which Erica helped guide through the door. The cat’s howls had quieted a bit, winding down to a pathetic mewling.
Ray slid the ladder into the chimney and began his ascent. He had to hold on to the walls, which meant more soot on his hands. The cat regarded him with deep suspicion.
“It’s okay,” he said to it in the tone he used on foals, calves, or puppies. “I’m here to help you.”
The cat tried to scramble away from him, but gravity started to win. Claws latched into the brick, the cat amazingly strong. When Ray put his hand up, ready to grab the cat by the scruff, one set of claws transferred itself to his wrist. Ray suppressed a yelp and closed the other hand on the cat, but it squirmed out of his grasp.
Ray reached again. All at once, the cat, who either decided Ray was its rescuer or a convenient ladder, dropped onto his head.
Quickly Ray closed his grip around the cat’s body, pulling it from him as he stepped back down the ladder.
The cat was a limp ball by the time he ducked out of the fireplace again. Blood trickled down his forehead to sting his eyes and blur his vision.
A pair of cool hands took the cat from him. Ray wiped his face with his sleeve and opened his eyes to see the cat snuggled against Drew’s chest. It began to purr.
“Aw,” Erica crooned. “What a sweetie. Can we keep it? Mom, say we can keep it.”
“Well, I’m not throwing it out to fend for itself.” Drew stroked the filthy cat’s head with her thumb. “But we should have it checked it out and make sure it’s all right.”
“By the lady vet?” Erica gently pet the cat with one finger—Ray noted that she was careful not to startle it.
“Sure, Dr. Anna will take a look,” Ray said. “Want me to call her?”
“It’s no bother,” Drew said quickly. “I can make an appointment. Where is the vet clinic?”
“Out the other side of town a ways. But she can drop by on her rounds.” Ray slid his phone, which thankfully had remained somewhat clean, out of his pocket. He thumbed through his contacts until he found Anna’s number and punched it.
“Dr. Anna!” she sang out, her voice sounding distant. Must be on her car phone.
Ray explained the situation, and Anna said, “No problem. I just finished
at the Jones’s, so I’m close. See you in a few.”
Drew blinked when Anna hung up. “That’s nice of her. You sure she doesn’t mind?”
Ray grinned. “Dr. Anna loves animals better than people. She’s happy to help out an animal in need, large or small.”
“I want to be a vet,” Erica declared.
“Yesterday you wanted to be a horseback rider,” Drew countered, as though this was an ongoing discussion.
“I can be both. Horses need vets. Ray, I want to have ten horses, and their names will be …”
“It can wait,” Drew said hastily. She transferred her gaze to Ray. “You look horrible. Come inside and wash up.” She cuddled the cat closer. “And I bet this one would like a can of tuna.”
Ray suppressed a grin as he nodded. He’d get himself stuck in a fireplace and covered with soot and drywall powder more often if it made a pretty woman ask him over.
* * *
After Ray set the broken front door back in its opening, Drew led them all across the drive to the garage. Ray was truly filthy, his face coated in black and white, like bizarre clown makeup.
He’d gone above and beyond crawling up the chimney after a stray cat, which was almost as grimy as Ray.
Erica was already taken with the cat. She’d always wanted a pet, but living in a small apartment in a building that didn’t take pets, and before that with a man who didn’t like animals, she’d never had a chance. Drew had seen moving to Riverbend as a chance to give Erica pets, friends, a town she wasn’t afraid to walk in.
Drew hadn’t planned on a pet so quickly, but the cat, a young one by the look of it, settled against Drew and announced it wasn’t leaving.
Erica skipped ahead, eagerly opening the door to admit Ray. She led the way upstairs to the garage apartment, which had a living room with tiny kitchen in front, a large bedroom and a smaller one in back, and a decent-sized bathroom.
Grandfather Paresky’s furniture, which was about forty years old, filled the apartment, from his sagging bed to his old lounge chair which he’d obviously loved. Drew had brought her own sheets and towels with her to replace the threadbare ones, but she’d left most of her things in storage, as the lawyer who’d communicated with her about the B&B had said it was furnished. He just hadn’t said “furnished with things about to fall apart.”
Ray glanced around with the same assessing look he’d given the main house. His gaze went to the holes in the drywall, the single-paned windows that creaked in the slight breeze, the water stains on the ceiling.
“Bathroom’s through here,” Drew said. “Hot water works at least.”
She doubted washing off in the sink would help Ray much. He needed to strip down and take a full shower. The idea of a man as good looking as Ray naked in her shower—even with the door closed and locked behind him—made a new fire begin in her belly, one she hadn’t felt in a long, long time.
“It’s okay,” Ray said in his slow drawl. Drew already loved the Texas accent, something her grandmother had slaked long ago. “I’ll rinse off with your spigot outside and be on my way.”
He must have seen something in her eyes, a reluctance to let him linger. Her reluctance had to do with her own history and pain, not him. He’d been so nice, and now he offered to clear out when he was a mess because of her.
Drew impulsively put a hand on his arm. She instantly snatched it away, the strength she’d felt under his skin making her shake. “It’s no bother. You go in there and use real soap and water. I’ll grab you some clean towels.”
“They won’t be clean for long,” Ray warned. His green eyes twinkled from the soot and powder coating his face.
“It’s okay,” Erica said around Drew. “They’re old. We never get anything new.”
“Get the towels out of the box, Erica,” Drew said firmly. “Ray, you wash up, and I’ll feed the cat.”
She turned away before she could stare at Ray any longer, and marched into the kitchen. She and Erica had plenty of canned food to eat, because she’d stocked up at a supermarket in Austin, not knowing what grocery stores, if any, she’d find in Riverbend. She’d since learned that there was a nice, locally owned grocery near the diner, though she’d been subject to many curious gazes the sole time she’d entered it.
The cat tried to climb Drew’s leg as soon as she set it down, small claws piercing her jeans. Drew took out a can of tuna with a pull-off top and opened it. She found a glass bowl and dumped the contents into it, not wanting the cat to cut itself on the can.
The cat ceased trying to climb her once the bowl was on the floor. It dove in, jaws working to eat the tuna, devouring half of it in about ten seconds.
Drew heard Erica’s laughter and then running water, and ducked back through the Drew’s bedroom to the bathroom.
Ray, sleeves rolled up, splashed in the sink, the water and the sink’s bowl already dirty. Erica stood in the doorway, chattering nonstop, her arms full of every clean towel they’d brought from Chicago.
“… And my friend Rachel, she bets I’ll never ride horses, but I can, right? I just need to find a horse.”
Drew waited for Ray to growl at her to go away, or ignore her completely, but Ray sluiced water over his face and answered, “My sister’s stepdaughter gives riding lessons. She could teach you. Her name’s Faith.”
“Sweet. Can I meet her?”
“Erica, let him dry himself off before you bombard him with questions,” Drew said in exasperation.
Erica gave her mom an impatient look, but she closed her mouth. Made a show of it, pressing her lips together.
Ray grabbed the top towel from Erica’s pile. “I don’t mind. I’ll ask Faith. Bet she’d love to show you how to ride. She’s about the same age as Erica,” he told Drew.
For the first time since Erica had learned she had to leave everything she’d ever known and relocate to Texas, she looked excited. Ray kept doing Drew favors.
He toweled off his face then looked at the cloth, which came away gray. “Sorry about that.”
“It’ll wash,” Drew said quickly. “That is, if we had a washing machine that worked.”
“There’s a washer and dryer in the garage downstairs,” Erica said. “But they’re old. Probably haven’t been run in ages. Great-grandpa must never have washed his clothes.”
“He had a housekeeper,” Ray said. He continued to dry his hands, smearing the towel more, but not his fault. “Kept the place up the best she could and took his laundry home with her to do.”
“Is she dead too?” Erica asked.
Ray chuckled, a warm rumble. “No, she lives in town and works for Mrs. Ward now. Mrs. Ward owns the diner.”
“We have diners in Chicago. I never go there.” Erica wrinkled her nose. She preferred fast food with her friends, though Drew had already explained Riverbend didn’t have her favorite chains.
“You’d like Mrs. Ward’s. I already told you about her pie.”
Erica looked marginally interested. “Well, maybe we could try the pie.”
“Sure.” Ray turned to Drew as he continued to wipe his hands. “Maybe you two would come with me one night. I’m kind of a mess right now …”
Drew met his green eyes for a brief moment before she flushed and looked away. Was he asking her out?
No, just being nice. He’d included Erica. Had it been so long since she’d gone on a date that she couldn’t tell if a man was asking her out?
Yes.
She wet her lips, but before she could answer, the sound of a truck pulling in outside interrupted them. Drew hurried to the front window and saw a pickup with a small trailer park behind Ray’s truck.
A small young woman emerged from the driver’s side of the tall truck, sliding a long way down before she landed on her feet. She wore jeans, boots, and a polo top, her blond hair in a neat braid coiled around her head. She took a bag from the truck and then scanned the garage, probably looking for signs of life.
Drew waved at her out the window then returne
d to the kitchen to scoop up the cat, who was licking the long-empty bowl of tuna. Savoring every drop.
She carried the cat down the stairs with her and opened the door at the bottom just as the young woman poised her hand to knock.
“Hello,” the woman said in a pleasant voice. “I’m Dr. Anna. This is the patient?”
Chapter Three
Damn. Ray finished drying his hands and face, embarrassed at the amount of dirt that transferred to the towel.
Dr. Anna had arrived too quickly—Drew’d turned abruptly away before she could answer Ray’s question, as though relieved she didn’t have to.
Erica abandoned Ray instantly to run down the stairs after her mother. She was cute, and restless in a pre-teen way. Be good for her and Faith to meet.
Her mom, now. Ray scrunched the towel as he thought about Drew’s dark hair in unruly waves, blue eyes like a twilight sky. Nice body too, plenty of curves under her shapeless top and baggy jeans. Drew had put on those clothes to work, but Ray couldn’t help picturing her in a form-hugging dress or slim pants, showing off all she had.
His invitation to the diner hadn’t come out right, and he’d included Erica, in case Drew got the wrong idea.
Or rather, the right idea. Ray wanted to take this woman out, get to know her, find out what she was like under the sloppy work clothes. Who she was, what had happened in her previous life, was she still single, and would she be interested in a cowboy like Ray?
Dr. Anna’s arrival had cut off her answer. Hell.
Ray started to discard the towel in the bathroom’s hamper but balked. He couldn’t leave this disgusting thing for Drew to take care of. He’d take it home and wash it for her.
He tucked the towel under his arm and went downstairs and out the door to where the three women were cooing over the cat.
Anna tickled it under the chin, making friends as she did with all animals. “It’s a little girl cat,” she told Erica. “What’s her name?”
“We don’t know yet,” Drew began.
Erica broke in. “What about Cinders? Like Cinderella? Because we found her in the fireplace.”
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