She stared at him, running forgotten. “True?”
“I have trusted him with my life. He never, ever let me down.”
Hope couldn’t speak. Her throat was so tight, she could barely breathe. She’d known this, but to have this man say it, in such a way, nearly shut her down completely. To think that the simple fact that True had trusted her enough to hire her had made her acceptable in this place. . .
For the first time in a very long time, the urge to run was almost matched by the desire to stay.
Chapter Twelve
Kelsey left the horse and walked over to the fence. She crossed her arms on the top rail and after a glance at Declan that was almost palpably warm, she looked at Hope. But Hope noticed she was also angled so that she could see the horse out of the corner of her eye. The animal took a couple of tentative steps toward them.
“Just keep talking,” Kelsey said in a conversational tone.
“I. . .um. . .when’s the wedding?” she blurted out, unable to think of anything else.
“May,” Kelsey said.
“Too far away,” Deck muttered.
Kelsey laughed, and the horse took a few more cautious steps. “You’re the one who wanted the big deal, or we could have eloped.”
Declan flushed slightly, but there was nothing but love in his gray eyes as he looked at his fiancée. “Haven’t quite discarded that possibility. We could do it again in the spring.”
“Uh-uh. You got Mom involved now. And you know how she is.”
Declan grinned suddenly. “A force of nature.”
He said that with love as well. There obviously weren’t going to be any in-law problems in this marriage.
And then the horse was there, nudging Kelsey’s arm, still keeping a wary eye on Hope. Hope couldn’t help smiling. “He wants more of your rubdown.”
“I know just how he feels,” Declan said, and it was Kelsey’s turn to blush.
“Try the sugar now,” she told Hope. “Just move slowly.”
She’d never done this before, was a little frightened at the prospect of holding her hand out to the horse who suddenly seemed a lot bigger than she’d thought.
“Just put it on your palm, keep your hand flat and hold it out,” Declan said.
She did so, moving so slowly she had time to realize she was unconsciously holding her breath. The horse’s ears flicked, nearly making her jump.
“And keep talking,” Kelsey said, “because he needs to know there’s nothing wrong.”
Hope had no idea what to say. But then she looked at the horse, and something about his guarded demeanor registered. He was just scared. And she knew what that was like.
“It’s all right,” she said softly, raising her hand slowly. “Shadow, isn’t it? Well, Shadow, I would never hurt you. I know you don’t know that, but it’s true. Your trust won’t be misplaced this time. You’re safe here, they can’t reach you, can’t get to you.”
The horse stretched his neck, sniffing. Instinctively she stopped moving, letting him make the next move.
“That’s it. Yes, there’s a bribe involved, but it’s not a lure with a hook, just a gift, no strings. And I’ll bet you can smell your friend Declan on it, can’t you? So you know it must be all right, and—”
She stopped as she felt a soft, tickling swipe across her palm. No teeth, not even a touch of them, just the gentle brush of lips and the sugar was gone.
It was all she could do not to laugh out loud. “That didn’t feel anything like I expected!”
Kelsey and Declan were looking at her, Kelsey with warmth and approval, Declan with a knowledge and understanding that hit her low and deep. Whatever his life had been, he hadn’t been kidding when he’d said he’d been in hell. And he’d seen it in her, too, a sort of like recognizing like that shook her.
And she suddenly realized how much she had betrayed in her words to the horse, although she doubted anyone who hadn’t been through something like that would have picked up on it. But Declan obviously had.
Embarrassed now, she focused on the horse, who was nudging her hand. Not having any more of the treats, she glanced at Kelsey.
“I think you can pet him now, if you want. Start with his neck, though, and work your way to his head. And keep talking, he’s very responsive to a gentle tone, as you saw.”
She did as instructed, amazed at the feelings bubbling up within her at the animal’s acceptance of her touch. She stroked his neck, then his strong jaw, then down to his soft, velvety nose.
“Thank you,” she said to him, not even caring that she was crooning now. Or that what she was saying would only verify what Declan had already guessed. “Thank you for trusting me, sweet boy, enough to get even this close. I know how hard it is, when trust has been betrayed, to give it again. You’re wonderful, so strong to be able to do it.”
She lowered her head, afraid the moisture building in her eyes was going to spill over. And when Shadow nudged her with that soft, velvet nose, as if he were returning the caress, it did.
*
True walked slowly, carefully, taking in the scene before him. Kelsey, Deck, the new rescue horse. . .and Hope. She’d told him she knew nothing about horses, but she was nose to nose with this one.
He’d slowed the truck when he’d seen Zee’s green sedan parked between the road and the corral, then pulled in when he saw Kelsey in the corral. He hadn’t been surprised to see Deck there; the guy stuck to his writing schedule like glue, but whatever breaks he took were spent with Kelsey.
But Hope. . .he hadn’t expected her.
Deck spotted him, and started his way. They met about twenty feet from the fence.
“What’s that all about?” he asked with a nod toward Hope.
“Getting over being scared?” Deck suggested.
“Shadow looks like he’s much better already.”
“I wasn’t,” Deck said, “talking about the horse.”
True’s gaze shot back to his friend’s face. Eyes that had once been as dark, as haunted as Hope’s but were now alive and bright looked back at him.
“She’s been through some hell,” Deck said.
“I. . .thought so.”
“Good thing you’re very good at handling that.”
“Not so good in this case.”
Deck lifted a brow at him. “Why?”
“I don’t know. She won’t. . .she just. . .she’s. . .” He gave up flailing for words he didn’t have.
“Yeah,” Deck said solemnly. “She is.” Then he glanced over his shoulder. “What’s her trouble?”
True’s gaze shifted to Hope as well. She’d turned her head slightly to lay a cheek to the horse’s head.
A cheek that was damp. She’d been crying. She wasn’t now, but she had been. He tried not to think about that night when she’d wept half the night. Tried to focus on answering Deck.
“I don’t know. Except that a friend died, and she had to leave people she loved behind. And I’m only inferring that from a couple of things she said.”
Deck looked thoughtful. After a moment he said, “Trying to think of anything that could get me to leave Kels.”
“Nuclear obliteration?” True suggested, only half kidding.
“Nope, not enough.” And Deck wasn’t kidding at all. “Only one thing could make me even think about it. If it was to protect her.”
True’s gaze shifted to Hope, who was now rubbing Shadow under his jaw, in that spot so many horses seemed to like. The animal had clearly surrendered. Can’t blame him.
He gave himself a mental shake. He had to stop thinking like that. “She said she hadn’t broken the law. She was foolish and in the wrong place at the wrong time. That’s all I know for sure.”
“You do a search on her?”
“Zee did,” True answered, a little too embarrassed to admit that it hadn’t even occurred to him. “Got a few hits but nothing she could verify was this Hope Larson. And nothing bad.”
“Maybe you ought to call Ducane.�
�
True blinked. That hadn’t occurred to him either. Jack Ducane was the brother of True’s childhood friend who had lived across the street. He was also a Texas Ranger, and True had once hooked Deck up with him for some book research. True knew he’d gone back to work a couple of weeks ago, albeit only light duty at a desk, after a gunshot wound he’d acquired taking down a kidnapper who had grabbed and terrorized a little boy.
“I’m not sure she’d like that much,” True said.
“I didn’t like it much when he dug into me, either.”
True’s gaze snapped back to Deck. “You knew?”
He nodded. “He told me. But I got over it, once I realized he was doing it for your sake, to make sure you weren’t signing on to work for a serial killer or something. He also said you suddenly told him to stop.” Deck cocked his head slightly. “I always wondered why.”
“Because by then I’d read your first book.”
Deck looked startled. Then, slowly, he nodded in understanding. “Thanks.” His mouth quirked up at one corner. “For all of it.”
It wasn’t until he was headed home, Hope following him in Zee’s car, that he replayed Deck’s words in his head.
But I got over it.
Would Hope, if he started digging into her past?
He left his truck in front of the house, since he’d be heading back out as soon as he grabbed some lunch. Hope pulled Zee’s car carefully into the house’s other driveway. Before he even realized what he was doing he was walking toward her. He got there just as she was getting out of the little coupe.
“Why were you crying?” he asked bluntly. He hadn’t asked her after the night she’d spent weeping, he’d been too raw himself with awful memories.
She stared at him. “What?”
“Out at Kelsey’s, with the horse, you’d been crying. Why?”
For a moment he thought she wasn’t going to answer. And when she finally did, her voice was a harsh, bitter thing.
“Because it was hard to realize that even a horse, a poor, abused animal, is braver than I am.”
She turned on her heel and walked away, up onto the porch, and went into Zee’s office and shutting—not slamming, but shutting carefully and quietly—the door behind her.
Of all the things he’d thought she might say, that hadn’t even been on the list.
Chapter Thirteen
She heard the shower start. Tried to rein in her riotous thoughts. What was she doing, just sitting here letting her imagination run? It was bad enough she practically hyperventilated every time she saw him, did she have to start picturing him naked in the shower?
Whatever he’d done the rest of the day, he obviously hadn’t left the hard work to others. He’d come home late, dirty, still a bit sweaty, and obviously tired. And looking sexy as hell, with his shirt sleeves rolled up over muscled forearms, and the top three snaps—she’d noticed that earlier, that it was snaps instead of buttons for this Texan—undone, baring a narrow V of his broad chest.
And suddenly two weeks seemed like a lifetime.
He’d stopped dead in the entryway, staring at her as she sat on the couch, Declan Bolt’s first book in her lap. She’d just found it on the shelf above where the new, autographed one sat.
“I hope you don’t mind,” she’d said with a gesture at the book, “but after meeting him I wanted to read it.”
“Fine.”
It was short, clipped, and matched his expression. And without another word he had vanished up the stairs. And only then did it occur to her that perhaps he’d been shocked to find her making herself at home in his living room. They had never discussed the parameters of her staying here, perhaps he’d expected her to just stay up in the guest room while she was here.
She thought about retreating there now, but the sound of the shower would only be louder, more taunting up there than here, so she stayed.
She turned to the book, looking first not at the dramatic cover with the title Escape in a bold font, but rather the back flap and the very short, uninformative author bio. Interesting, she thought, that the word “escape” was there, too. She opened the front cover then, paged through to the title page, then beyond. When she reached chapter one, she started to read.
*
“Sorry to interrupt, but dinner’s almost ready.”
She never even lifted her eyes from the page. She’d gotten about halfway through in the time it had taken him to clean himself up and get the meal organized, so she read fast.
For a moment he just stood there, looking at her. Something about the way she was so intent, the way she’d curled her legs up on the couch, the shine of her long, cinnamon colored hair in the light from the reading lamp. . .he liked the scene before him.
Something hot kicked through him, low and deep. Something he hadn’t felt in so long it took him a moment to recognize it. A sudden, sharp reaction to the curve of her hips as she sat there, the way that shirt licked over her breasts. Something much hotter than that vague sense of awareness and response he’d felt at first.
Damn.
He fought it down. Something he hadn’t had to do in so long he’d almost forgotten how. On some level his mind was wondering why her, and why now, but he knew it was only to keep from acting on the sudden, fierce response.
It was a moment longer before he trusted his voice to speak. “Hope?”
“Hmm?”
She said it vaguely, still clearly rapt. And it made him smile, even as an echo of that unexpected heat lingered. He walked over and picked up the bookmark she’d set aside on the adjacent couch cushion. She still didn’t look up. He leaned over and stuck the bookmark between the pages. She jumped.
“Oh!” She stared up at him, clearly completely startled.
“Haven’t heard a thing, have you?”
Color flooded her cheeks. “I. . .no. I’m sorry. Were you talking?”
He laughed, he couldn’t help it. “Don’t apologize. I was the same way, reading those.”
She smiled. “May I ask. . .why did you?”
“Because they’re supposedly children’s books?”
She nodded. He hesitated, then gave her an honest but incomplete answer. “Zee made me read that one, the first one. As a distraction from. . .things. After that I was hooked. He’s a hell of a writer.”
“Yes. It’s amazing. Even the awful parts that make you want to cry for Sam. He makes it all so. . .real.”
He sat down on the coffee table before the couch. “That’s because it was.”
She blinked. “What?”
“I doubt anyone but Kelsey knows the whole truth, but he lived a lot of that crap.”
She stared down at the book in her hands. “How could anyone live through that and. . .keep going? Especially a child?”
“Sam’s a tough kid,” he said. “And so was Deck. Scarred, closed off, and spookier than any horse Kelsey ever came across, but tough as he had to be to survive.”
Her expression changed, and even though she wasn’t looking at him he had the strongest feeling she was comparing herself to both Deck and his creation, and finding herself lacking. He saw her jaw tighten, sensed she was fighting for. . .something. He wasn’t sure what. And when she spoke again, still staring at the book, he wasn’t sure if she’d won that inner battle, or lost it.
“So. . .Declan Bolt helped you just as you helped him.”
He drew back slightly. Pondered. “I never thought of it that way. But you’re right. He did. I’ll have to tell him.”
“Do. It will mean a lot to him.”
He wondered how she could be so sure of that, having only met the man this afternoon. And then she answered without him having to ask.
“Just ask Sam. It means a lot to anyone who’s felt helpless to know they somehow managed to help someone else.”
His gut was telling him she was speaking from experience. And he had the feeling she remembered the helpless feeling a lot better than the good feeling of helping.
A ti
mer dinged from the kitchen. He welcomed the interruption.
“Come on. It’s some of Zee’s lasagna, so you’re in for a treat.”
She rose, putting the book down on the couch with great care. “Zee cooks, too?”
“Too?”
“In addition to running a business, being razor sharp, and beautiful.”
He smiled as they headed for the kitchen. “She is all that, isn’t she?”
“Seems to run in the family.”
“That,” he said, lifting an eyebrow at her, “was perilously close to a compliment, Ms. Larson.”
She stopped in the doorway. “Have I ever said anything to indicate I didn’t admire both of you, for your looks least of all, mostly for what you’ve survived, and what you’ve built?”
“Uh. . .” He swallowed, he hadn’t expected that powerful response to his simple teasing.
She gave him a wry smile. “But I guess I’ve not said it, either. But I do. Admire you, I mean. Both of you,” she added hastily.
Had she been afraid he’d think she admired him, personally? That niggled at him, and he was glad when she busied herself getting plates and silverware; he’d shown her where things were yesterday and told her to use what she needed.
He cut into the steaming pasta dish while she opened the foil-wrapped loaf of garlic bread. Steam rose from it, sending the luscious smell into the room. Their stomachs growled in unison. Loudly. Both startled, their gazes locked. Then he grinned. She grinned back, and it was like a slam into that protesting stomach. For the first time he’d had a glimpse of what a happy, carefree Hope would look like, and he couldn’t beat down the urge to see her that way all the time.
They had eaten enough to quiet the growling before she spoke again. “Thank you for the advance. I’ll buy some things so Zee can have hers back.”
He just nodded. “Zee said you’ll earn it, you’re making good headway. And you’re quiet.”
She smiled as if pleased. “She’s really into the music playing in the office, so I try not to bother her too much with questions while she’s working. I save them up till the end of the day.”
Whiskey River Runaway (Whiskey River Series Book 2) Page 8