The Horseman's Bride

by Marilyn Pappano

  He descended the steps, got his hat from the truck, then started walking. He had no destination in mind. He just wanted to go somewhere, to be somewhere besides there. Following the driveway, he counted his progress by sections of broken fence. By the time he reached the road, he’d counted eleven, and he’d uncovered a faint desire, buried deep inside, to fix them, to see the fence the way it had always looked before. He wanted to see the pastures filled with grass, not overgrown with weeds, and the barn standing straight and the yard as neat as his mother had once kept it.

  Hell, he wanted his dream, with a few important omissions—no horses, no kids, no Shay. But without them, what was the point?

  He looked down the empty road to the right, where it ran a half mile before disappearing into trees and hills. To the left it ran straight, too, almost all the way to Shay’s little house—and to the left, it wasn’t empty.

  The three riders stayed together, though one’s mount was capable of leaving the other two in the dust. He thought about turning and beginning the long journey back to the house, but one of the smaller figures chose that moment to stand in the stirrups and wave a red-and-white cowboy hat high above her head in greeting. Since it would be rude to walk away after a greeting like that and since they could catch him in no time, he leaned against the sturdiest of the fence posts and waited.

  Elly and her sister urged their ponies into a trot and reached him a minute before their mother. “Hey, Mr. Easy,” Elly said breathlessly. “Whatcha doing?”

  “Taking a walk. I figured you’d be locked up in jail somewhere.” And closer to twenty-one than five the next time he saw her. “Did you escape, or were you reprieved?”

  She grinned ear to ear. “They don’t lock little girls in jail. Hey, this is Emma. Don’t she look just like me?”

  He looked from one girl to the other. They might have been identical twins, but there were enough differences to easily tell them apart. Elly, he suspected, had never known a shy day in her life, while Emma was timid. Elly’s hair stood on end, her clothes were mismatched and her face was dirty. Emma’s outfit was color coordinated, her hair neatly braided like her mother’s, and she could go straight from the pony’s back to a birthday party without pause. Elly was a loud, bold tomboy, and Emma was a quiet, demure china doll.

  “Say hello, Emma,” Elly commanded. When her sister didn’t obey, she leaned across and poked her.

  “Hey, no playing until your feet are on the ground,” Olivia warned as she reined in Buck beside them.

  Easy shifted his gaze from the girls to their mother. “Are you lost?”

  “Of course not,” Elly exclaimed. “We just live right down there. And that land across the road is my daddy‘s—well, actually, it’s my mom’s—or maybe it’s my uncle Ethan’s. I don’t exactly know.”

  “Elly.” Olivia waited until her daughter looked at her, then politely, gently said, “Hush. Why don’t you girls take this—” she offered a backpack she’d slung over her shoulder “—and ride up and leave it on Mr. Rafferty’s porch?”

  Once they’d started away, he asked, “What is it you’re leaving on my porch?”

  “Apple butter, applesauce, apple pie filling We had an abundant crop this year.”

  He understood abundant crops. Even with only two trees out back, there’d been years when his mother had despaired of ever making it through their apples. She’d canned what she could, served them in some fashion at every meal and given them to the horses by the bushel. He also understood the work that went into canning apple butter, applesauce and apple pie filling. “Thanks. I appreciate it ”

  She nodded in response. After an awkward moment, he said, “I was under the impression that I wouldn’t see any of you again for—oh, I don’t know, fifteen or twenty years.”

  “You were mistaken. Guthrie doesn’t pick my friends.”

  He smiled faintly. “And he also doesn’t know you’re here, does he?”

  Her answering smile was brighter, more genuine. “I’ll tell him when he gets in tonight. I thought I might tell him something else, too. In fact, that’s really why I’m here.”

  “So it’s not just the abundance of apple products.”

  She dismounted and held Buck’s reins loosely in one hand. “I wanted to invite you to dinner.”

  Rather than push his hat back so he could see her more clearly, he tilted his chin up and studied her from under the brim. Her face colored delicately under the intensity of his stare. “To dinner.”

  She nodded.

  “With Guthrie.”

  Another nod. “I would invite Shay, too. And maybe Mary and Jim. And Reese and—”

  “How many people do you think you can get in that house?”

  Her blue gaze became steady, serene...and determined. “As many as it takes.”

  To do what? That was the next natural question, but he didn’t ask. She would invite as many people as proved necessary to pressure Guthrie into behaving civilly toward him. And that, he suspected, was far more than the Harris house—hell, than the whole damn town of Heartbreak—could accommodate.

  “I appreciate the gesture,” he said quietly. “But forcing him to be around me isn’t going to settle anything. You can’t make him get over hating me.”

  “He doesn’t—”

  “Yes, he does. And I don’t blame him. If he’d stolen Shay from me, I’d feel the same way.”

  Now it was her turn to raise her chin. “He doesn’t still love Shay.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply that he does.”

  “Or, I suspect, to imply that you do,” she said with a gentle smile.

  Love Shay? Only for the best, and the worst, times of his life. But how he felt about her now didn’t matter. It didn’t change the fact that he had nothing to offer her or anyone else. It didn’t change the fact that life as he knew it was over, that he hadn’t yet found another life he could live.

  Scowling, he tucked his chin so he couldn’t see her face and she couldn’t see his. “We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about Guthrie.”

  “You two were so close and had such an impact on each other’s lives that I’m not sure it’s possible to talk about one without the other. So...dinner at my house Saturday night. We’ll make it a party.”

  “I don’t do parties. I don’t do people. And I don’t force someone who’s made his feelings about me very clear to deal with me in his own house.”

  “As I understand, in those fourteen years you were gone, you did an awful lot of partying. You took an awful lot of chances.”

  “And look at me now.” Better yet, don’t look.

  She led Buck to the nearest fence post and looped the reins around it. Finding the animal uncomfortably near, Easy moved to the next section of fence to lean.

  Pushing her hands into her pockets, she followed him. “Whenever people in Heartbreak talk about you, the words they use most often are brash, reckless, cocky. When did you become afraid?”

  Unconsciously his breathing had turned shallow. He deepened it, forced one long breath, then another. “Accepting someone else’s opinion doesn’t make me afraid.”

  “What does it make you?”

  “An intelligent adult?” he asked dryly.

  “Don’t you want this resolved?”

  Of course he did. Shay and Guthrie had always been the two people he loved best, and the years without them had been miserable. But some things were impossible to forgive. If he couldn’t forgive himself, how in the hell could he expect Guthrie—the real victim in this mess—to ever manage?

  It was with relief that he watched the twins approach on their ponies. “Look, Olivia, I appreciate the thought, but this isn’t going to be resolved. Guthrie’s not going to forgive and forget. He’s not going to trust me or be friends with me again. He’s a smarter man than that. And I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t come back here again. It’s not fair to him.”

  She untied Buck and led him into the driveway again before gracefully swingin
g onto his back Then she gazed down at him. “You’re a stubborn man.”

  “These days that’s about all I’ve got.”

  “No, it’s not. Play your cards right, and you can have Shay.”

  He thought about last night, those kisses and her husky suggestion. I could just stay here. In his house, in his bed. She hadn’t known how badly he’d wanted to say yes, hadn’t known that he’d wanted her more than he’d ever wanted. Even now he could feel her skin, so soft against his. He could hear her plea, taste her mouth, feel the heat.

  Olivia was right. He could have Shay—at least for a night, maybe longer.

  She was also right that he’d become afraid.

  She gave a delighted laugh that drew him back into the moment. “Judging from that look you’re wearing, Shay’s been holding out on me. And here I tell her everything.”

  “We lefted the apple stuff on the porch, Mama,” Emma said as she brought her pony to a stop. She shifted her gaze from Olivia to him, quickly away, then back again for another instant.

  He wondered if it was the scar that made it impossible for her to hold a steady gaze, then reluctantly admitted that it was more likely his scowl. He’d managed to intimidate plenty of adults with it. What chance did a shy little girl have against it?

  “Thank you, Emma. Mr. Rafferty, think about my invitation, will you?”

  “You can call me Easy...and thinking about it won’t change my answer.”

  She smiled a pretty, womanly smile that reminded him of Shay. “I don’t believe I’ve ever called a man Easy before. At least, not to his face.”

  “It’s a nickname for ’Zekiel,” Elly volunteered. “See, Mom? E-Z-kiel. Easy.”

  “I see, babe. Let’s go, girls.” She waited until the twins had moved on, then urged Buck forward. As she passed him, though, she got in the last word. “Maybe thinking won’t change your answer. But maybe Shay will.”

  The café closed at eight o’clock. By 8:03 Shay was out the door. Her first purchase of supplies for Easy’s house waited in her car, along with a change of clothes. Manuel’s last order for the day, a large pizza loaded with everything, was tucked under her arm, the cardboard box braced between her wrist and hip. She quickly covered the distance to her car and was about to climb into the driver’s seat when an old station wagon pulled in beside her.

  Joelle Barefoot leaned across to roll down the passenger window. Shay bent down, arms resting on the door so she could see her. “How’s it going, Joelle?”

  “I can’t complain. Are you, by chance, going to see Easy?”

  “Yes, I am.” She intended to have dinner with him, work on his kitchen awhile, see if he would kiss her again. She hoped he would, but she wouldn’t be surprised if he refused. He was so damn stubborn.

  But so was she.

  “Can you take some stuff to him?” Joelle gestured toward the back seat, where a small square basket and three grocery bags leaned together. “I was planning to, but something came up.”

  Judging by the faintly embarrassed, faintly flustered look the normally unflappable Joelle wore, it was something involving Vince Haskell, Shay suspected. “I’d be happy to.” She transferred the items from car to car, then bent at the window again. “Whatever came up, I hope it turns out well.”

  Joelle’s smile was nervous and quickly faded. “I don’t know. I guess we’ll see. Thanks, Shay.”

  After she drove away, Shay slid behind the wheel, started the engine, then glanced at the items. There were groceries in the bags, clean laundry in the basket. She rubbed one hand over the jeans on top—faded, soft enough to mold perfectly to long legs, narrow hips, slender waist. In the first years they were together, she had liked doing his laundry. There had been something so intimate about their clothing being in as close contact as their bodies often were. At some point, though, the romantic foolishness had disappeared and laundry had become just a chore that had to be done every week or so, always in a different town, often in a different state.

  Evidently the foolishness was back, because doing his laundry held a certain romantic appeal again.

  Smirking at her own thoughts, she drew her hand back and heard the rustle of paper. She lifted the jeans and found a small stack of letters. Placed under the jeans for safekeeping, to keep them from possibly falling out or blowing away? Or hidden from a nosy delivery girl?

  There were two letters addressed to him in care of Joelle, both bearing Betsey’s return address in the left corner. The other items had been forwarded from the Raffertys’ Houston address—a bank statement and a flat pink envelope of the sort greeting cards came in. Shay fingered the edge of the card. The writing was definitely feminine—lots of swirls and loops—and the return address was South Dakota. Hermosa.

  Clarissa was from Hermosa.

  Of course, she chided herself in all fairness, there were a lot of cowboys from the Dakotas, and they’d known a lot of them, just as they’d known plenty over the years from Oklahoma. The rodeo circuit was a pretty small community. If you spent enough time there, you met everyone. And even if Clarissa had sent the card, it was none of Shay’s business. Even if he’d chosen to give her his address, while Shay had scrambled like mad and never uncovered it.

  She carefully returned the mail to the basket, tucking it between the woven side and the clothes, then backed out of the parking space. She wasn’t going to be jealous, she counseled herself. After last night’s conversation about Clarissa, Hank and Tracy, she’d assumed that Easy had never had a relationship with Clarissa, but all he’d actually said was that he hadn’t taken her with him the day he left her. That didn’t mean they hadn’t hooked up later—and he would have been perfectly within his rights to do so. He’d been a free man, unattached and uncommitted to anyone. She couldn’t be jealous, not under the circumstances, certainly not with her track record.

  And, truthfully, it wasn’t jealousy curling inside her. It was hurt that he’d been reachable for other people, but not for her. He’d gone through a horrible, life-altering experience, and of all the people he hadn’t wanted contact with, she had topped his list.

  By the time she parked beside his truck, she was feeling more than a little blue. Still, she pasted on a smile as she carried the basket and the pizza to the door, where he met her. “Why don’t you get some napkins and pop and we’ll eat before we work,” she said, handing over the load. “Oh, by the way, you’ve got mail in the basket.”

  She unloaded the groceries and supplies, put away the perishable food, then sat down at the table. The letters lay beside his plate, his mother’s unopened, the other two neatly slit. While she chatted about her day and the customers she’d served that he knew, her gaze kept slipping to the pink envelope. She didn’t mention it, tried to avoid even noticing it, but it commander her attention, seconds at a time.

  Finally, when the pizza was gone, he pulled the card from its envelope and handed it to her. Embarrassed that he’d noticed her interest, at first she couldn’t bring herself to take it. “What—?” She tried to feign curiosity at his action, nothing more, but failed.

  “It’s a nice card. Look at it.”

  Slowly she took it. It was a very pretty card—pink flowers, crystal vase, lace tablecloth, with the sentiment, “Hope you’re feeling better,” in flowing script across the bottom. Inside was a poem better suited for a grandmother than a thirty-something cowboy, and it was signed in that same feminine hand. “Leo and Mamie.”

  She didn’t know whether to feel relieved or embarrassed. She settled for both. “Who are Leo and Mamie?”

  “A couple I met a few years ago. He’s a bull rider. She’s a rich kid from back East. They met when she was visiting a friend in Dallas who dragged her to Mesquite. They got married about three weeks later and have been traveling together ever since.”

  Closing the too-frilly card, she laid it carefully on the table. “I thought—”

  “I know what you thought. You come in here babbling about everything in the world except the card
you can’t keep your eyes off. You thought it might be from Clarissa.” Twining the fingers of his left hand around her right hand, he gave them a squeeze. “Apparently, I didn’t make myself clear last night. I never had an affair with Clarissa. I never wanted one. I can’t even remember the last time I saw her because it wasn’t important. She wasn’t important. Understand?”

  She nodded, grateful for the assurance. Then, to cover her gratitude, she defended herself. “I don’t babble.”

  “You always babble when you’re nervous or upset.”

  And he knew exactly how to calm her. But there was no offer of kisses tonight. No gentle seduction. No giving her some other way to burn that energy. At least, not yet.

  Tugging her hand free, she busied herself gathering napkins and emptying bits of crust into the empty box. “Even if it were from Clarissa, it wouldn’t be any of my business. None of your affairs after I came home are my business.”

  “None of my affairs?” he echoed. “You make it sound as if I’d been as busy as you were.”

  She stilled, her hand hovering in midair over the table, the lingering echo of his words slicing through her, leaving hurt and shame in its wake. He muttered a curse, but it barely registered as she forced herself to think, to function.

  “Jeez, I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.”

  Was it? she wondered as she carefully crushed the pizza box in half to fit into the wastebasket under the sink. Or was it nothing more than truth? She had been busy the last six years and had told him so herself. Busy trying to forget him. Trying to ease the pain. Trying to convince herself that somebody wanted her, even if he didn’t.

  When she faced him again, she gave him a tight smile. “It’s okay. I chose to be less than discreet in my relationships. I can’t complain when someone brings them up.”

  “Yes, you can. Shay—”

  Faking a casual tone, she interrupted him as she began removing dishes from the cabinet. “I talked to Olivia today. She invited us to dinner Saturday.”

  His remorse faded under a fierce scowl. “I’m not going. I’ve already told her.”