Hell, if he could do that, he wouldn't be here at all. He twisted the brim of his hat harder.
"Do you take milk or sugar?"
"Black. Please," he added when the one word sounded too abrupt.
Maggie got up and handed him one of the mugs, then added a dollop of milk to her own, stirring it in. She settled back into Abigail's chair and lifted the mug to her lips. She sipped, swallowed, then smiled at him. He tried not to notice.
"I'm so glad to talk to you at last. I know we haven't met, but I feel like we have. Abby told me so much about you."
"She did?" Swell. He wished Abby had told him anything at all about her. Then maybe he wouldn't be feeling quite so much as if he was walking on quicksand right now.
He wanted to be able to plunge right into his arguments for her staying in Casper. But while he could envision saying them firmly and forcefully to a battle-ax like old Farragut, somehow with Maggie his mouth felt dry and the words wouldn't form.
He took a swallow of coffee and studied Maggie MacLeod the way he sized up an unknown, untried horse.
But the ebony mare was a lot easier to figure out than Maggie was.
She wasn't what he'd expected. Some ancient, do-gooding loony wouldn't have surprised him. Hell, it was what he'd hoped for. Maybe Maggie was a do-gooding loony. He'd just never met one who looked quite like her before.
He wondered for the first time just what Abigail had had in mind when she left Maggie the ranch. The old lady had always been a doer, a manipulator, a campaigner with a million causes.
Just because she was only one woman didn't mean Maggie wasn't one of them, Tanner realized. What sort of cause was Maggie MacLeod?
But studying her more closely didn't provide any answers. All it did was make him aware of how damned attractive she was and how, even now, his body responded to her.
For years Tanner had been able to take women or leave them. Mostly he did the first, then the second.
Except if they looked like gentle, love-you-forever types like Maggie MacLeod—then he took off running and never looked back.
Which is what he ought to be doing right now, he thought grimly. Except he couldn't. He'd promised Abby he'd stay for awhile and help the new owner make the transition.
He hadn't thought anything of it when he'd made the promise. And if it made Abby rest easier, what was the problem?
Trust Abby.
"What'd she say about me?" he asked at last. He didn't know where else to start, and it might help if he knew what sort of nonsense Abby had filled her head with.
"How much she depended on you," Maggie replied. She leaned back in the rocker and set it in motion gently, still smiling at him. "She said you were the reason she was able to keep the ranch going, that if you hadn't been here over the last few years, she would have had to move to town. She said you worked day and night, that you helped Mr. Warren keep the house repaired, the truck running and the cattle fed. She said you were a good horseman." Her smiled widened slightly. "She said you were a wonderful influence on Billy. The kindest, most thoughtful, most responsible man she'd ever known."
Tanner ducked his head, discomfited by the praise. "Yeah, well, I guess I'm a regular paragon, aren't I?" he muttered gruffly.
Maggie laughed. "Abigail certainly seemed to think so."
"She was prejudiced," Tanner said flatly. "Any good hand would do what I do."
"Including almost getting yourself killed on a horse this afternoon?"
"I survived."
"You're still limping."
So he hadn't managed to hide it from her. "No big deal."
"Maybe not. But your survival is a big deal. You die and this place falls apart. I don't know a thing about ranching. Without you, the Three Bar C would be chaos."
"You could find somebody."
"But Abby promised me you."
The simple words hit like a fist in the gut. Maggie herself seemed to realize they might be taken another way, too, for her cheeks took on a deeper hue, and she looked down at her coffee cup. God, she was even more gorgeous when she was embarrassed.
And God help him if he didn't stop thinking that way! "I'm a hired man, not a slave. I can leave whenever I want."
His terseness seemed to take her aback. She looked at him warily. "Is that a threat?"
A promise, he wanted to say. "It's got nothing to do with you. It's me. I don't like bein' tied down."
Auburn brows lifted. "Really? Why not?"
He shrugged, surprised at the directness of her question, unwilling to answer it. "I like my freedom," he said after a moment. "And I'll take it when I'm ready. Meantime I promised Abby I'd hang around for a while to make sure things are running smooth."
"Thank you," she said gravely.
He nodded. "They will, you know. You don't have to supervise. I mean," he went on pressing his point, "you don't have to hang around here, move in. Ev says you've got a place in Casper. Feel free to stay there."
"I don't want to stay there. I like it here. No," she corrected herself, "I love it here."
Tanner stared at her. "It's bleak and cold and lonely as hell."
"It's an hour from Casper."
"The hub of the western cultural world."
"It's a nice town. I've lived in plenty of worse places, believe me."
"You have?" That surprised him.
"My parents are missionaries."
It figured. He groaned inwardly.
"We spent a lot of time living in huts in the middle of nowhere."
"Well, then, you probably want a bit of civilization."
"I want a home."
Her words rocked him. It was as if some long ago bell echoed in his mind. And at the very moment he heard it, he tuned it out.
"You got a home in Casper."
"I have an apartment in Casper. I can make the Three Bar C a home. It was Abigail's home," she went on. "That's why she left it to me."
"Huh?" Tanner wasn't following and he was sure he needed to. Things were happening that he didn't like.
"Abigail knew 1 wanted a home. I've never had one. I've moved all my life."
"So've I," Tanner said. "Nothin' wrong with moving."
"No. Not for some people. But I've done all I want. Now I want someplace to put down roots. To stay. To have a family."
"Casper," Tanner muttered desperately.
Maggie gave him a patient smile. "No. Here. My parents are still abroad, but I have two brothers, one in Colorado and one in Nebraska, and I want to make a home—-for myself and for them. Abigail said you had brothers. You must know what I mean." She was looking at him intently.
He knew what she meant, all right. "You don't always get what you want," he said.
"No. But it's no excuse for not trying, is it?" She bit off a piece of cookie and looked right at him.
Tanner's gaze slid away. He shrugged. Stalemate.
"Why do I get the feeling you're trying to get rid of me?"
Because he was, of course. "I'm only trying to do you a favor. The Three Bar C isn't all warm and cheery and fireplaces and stuff. It's muddy and windy and wild and cold, and most times there's not a soul for miles around. There's no people here. Nobody to talk to."
"There's you. And Mr. Warren and Billy."
"We don't count. We're not—not..." he groped for the word "...conversationalists."
"I don't mind."
I do, Tanner wanted to shout at her. He gulped his coffee, scalded his throat and began coughing. He jumped up and limped around the room. Maggie got up to come after him and pat him on the back.
He brushed her away. "People will talk," he said finally, desperately, when he could speak at last.
"Talk? About what?"
"Us. You. Me." Even saying it made hot blood course into his face, and the amused look on her face when she realized what he meant made it ten times worse. "A single woman doesn't live with a bunch of bachelors! It isn't done."
"Well, Abigail certainly didn't tell me everything about y
ou," Maggie said, grinning. "She never once mentioned you were a puritan."
"I'm not a puritan, damn it!"
"Chivalrous, then?"
"I'm not being chivalrous, either! It's common sense. You're a schoolteacher! Schoolteachers got to set a good example, don't they?"
"Yes."
"Well, then—" he took a deep breath "—you'll set a lot better example staying in Casper."
"But I'm not staying in Casper. I believe there's a bunkhouse." She glanced pointedly out the window toward the log building just this side of the barn.
"So? You want us to move out there?"
"Not necessarily. I will."
"You can't do that!"
"Why not? Is that likely to create a scandal, too? Or is someone already living there? A tall, dark, handsome, single ravisher of young women, perhaps?"
Tanner felt as if he was losing his grip. The ebony filly had been a piece of cake compared to Maggie MacLeod. "Of course not. It isn't used now except during roundups."
"Then what's the problem?"
"You can't let us live here while you move into the bunkhouse! You're the boss, damn it."
"For all the good it seems to be doing me." Maggie laughed, then shrugged. "Well, then, I'll leave where I stay up to you, since you know how things are done in these parts. But try to figure out what to do with me soon, will you, Robert? I'll be moving in on Saturday."
So Tanner moved out.
What the hell else could he do?
He didn't move off the ranch. He didn't hand in his resignation and take off for another state, which is what he'd have preferred. He still had his promise to Abby to consider.
But the very night Maggie announced her intention of moving in, he spent his time, between checks on the cattle, moving into the godforsaken bunkhouse.
It leaked. It was drafty. Ev and Billy thought he was nuts.
"You'll die of pneumonia," Ev told him.
"You'll drown," Billy said.
But Tanner knew better than they did what the dangers in his life were. And he was in greater risk from constant exposure to Maggie MacLeod.
Ev told him he was overreacting. But Ev didn't understand, and Tanner wasn't explaining or even admitting what the problem was.
It was hard enough even admitting the problem to himself.
Maggie reminded him of Clare.
Well, not of Clare herself, really, for Clare had been small and blond and fragile-looking. But of the way he'd felt about Clare.
He'd thought it was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, a product of adolescent hormones, that bolt of instant attraction that could come along and knock a guy on his butt. He wished to God it had been.
There was no way he was going to go through that again.
But if he'd said as much, Ev wouldn't know what he meant. Ev had never heard of Clare. Nor had Bates. Nor Billy. Nor anyone else hereabouts. Not even Abby.
Clare was the part of Tanner's past he tried not to think about. His biggest risk. His greatest failure.
His ex-wife.
Ex-wife. They'd been married such a short time it was hard to even think of her as his wife, let alone his ex. Especially since, for the last fourteen years, he'd tried not to think of her at all.
But for ten months, when she was nineteen and he was barely twenty, he'd been married to her.
And he'd failed her.
She'd been nice about it. She hadn't even blamed him, though God knew she should have. If he'd had a dollar's worth of sense, none of it ever would have happened. It wasn't the dollar's worth of sense he'd needed, he reflected not for the first time, it was a condom.
If he hadn't been such a green kid, if he hadn't been in such an almighty hurry to satisfy his carnal urges, Clare would never have become pregnant. He could remember with absolute clarity the feelings that had hit him the day she told him.
"Pregnant?" He'd almost choked on his disbelief.
Clare nodded, huddled against the door of his pickup. Ordinarily she was pert and pretty, always smiling. Now she looked small and cold and scared.
No colder or more,,scared than he.
He wanted to ask if she was sure it was his, but one look at her and he knew he couldn't do it. Besides, he thought savagely, if there was the remotest possibility that he wasn't the father, surely Clare would have grasped at it. Damn near anyone would be a better catch than him!
God knew he had enough responsibilities without even thinking about taking on another one. Or two!
His mother had died when he was seven. His father had kept them together just barely, but he'd been killed in a riding accident a year and a half ago. At eighteen, Tanner had gone to work full-time, cowboying on a medium-sized southern Colorado spread while at the same time trying to keep his two hot-headed younger brothers, Luke and Noah, on the straight and narrow.
He wondered for a moment what they'd say when they found out he'd fallen off the straight and narrow himself.
He glanced over at Clare and saw that she was crying now. He felt like crying himself. But cowboys didn't cry. He hadn't, not even at his father's funeral. "Hey," he said softly. "Clare. Hey, don't. Don't. It'll be all right."
She'd looked up, her blue eyes still brimming as they met his. "What do you mean, all right?"
"We'll—" he cast about desperately for an answer, one that would make her tears dry up, that would make things okay, that would make her smile "—get married," he said.
Clare swiped a hand across her eyes. "Do you mean it?" She sniffled and rubbed her nose against her jacket.
"Sure. Why not?" He tried to sound more confident than he felt.
"But I thought—since you've got Luke and Noah—I mean—"
"Luke and Noah will like it,",he said. "Somebody littler to tell what to do. They'll be uncles." And he was going to be a father? The thought still rocked him. It didn't seem real.
"You're sure?" Clare was blinking now, looking brighter.
"Of course." It might actually be the best thing that could happen, he told himself. Luke and Noah needed more stability than he'd been able to give them. Maybe he and Clare together... "We'll be fine. All of us. We'll have a home."
It was like a dream, airy and insubstantial, but it was all all he had to hang his hopes on. A home. Sometime, back before his mother had died, he'd had a home. Warmth. Comfort. Love. A place to come back to, to look forward to.
He smiled at Clare suddenly and leaned over and kissed her. "Yeah. A home."
So they'd married. He'd scraped together enough money to buy a five-times-used old trailer, which his boss let him put out on the land. But there wasn't room enough for the four of them, so he and Clare lived there while Luke and Noah stayed in the bunkhouse up the road, another kindness on McGillvray's part, since both of the boys were in school all day and he didn't need to give them room and board at all.
Tanner had been grateful. He'd actually been glad to have Clare to himself. He'd been smitten with her the first moment he'd seen her, pert and pretty, smiling at customers in Harrison's Hardware Store. She had dreams, plans, hopes, and she shared them all with him. She wanted to go to college, wanted to be a nurse, wanted to see the ocean, to fly in a plane. He'd listened, nodded, smiled, kissed her, kissed her again.
Now that they were married, he wondered if she wanted to be a mother.
The Clare whom Tanner ended up married to wasn't the Clare he'd lusted after since the day they'd met. That one had smiled shyly and clung to his arm when he'd taken her out. That one had kissed him and told him he was her man. This one was sick every morning, cried at the drop of a hat, woke him nightly with her restless turning and insomnia and screamed at him that he was never there when she needed him. He knew a woman's body changed during pregnancy. He knew her moods swung and her desires did, too. But knowing that in theory and understanding in practice were two different things.
He'd tried. God knew he'd tried. But he couldn't be there all the time, could he? He had a job. Money was tight. McGillvray had let seve
ral men go. He'd sympathized with Tanner's plight, had praised him for his willingness to accept his responsibilities. He'd kept Tanner on, and now he was depending on him. Hours were long and those sure weren't the days when a cowboy could carry a cellular phone.
As if Tanner's job didn't put enough pressure on his fledgling marriage, Noah was cutting classes to ride broncs. He was only a sophomore, too young by far to drop out of school, and the principal was calling Tanner, the closest thing to a parent Noah had, to convince his brother to shape up.
He could hardly have called on Luke. Luke, who'd always been the closest to their father, was taking Bob Tanner's death hard. "Who gives a damn!" he'd shout whenever Tanner tried to talk to him. He spent most of his nights drinking and fighting and pulling boneheaded stunts on a dare. Five times in their brief marriage Tanner had had to get up in the middle of the night and drive into town to bail Luke out of jail.
No, he wasn't there when Clare needed him.
He wasn't there the day the baby was born.
He couldn't recall now exactly where he'd been. All he could remember was coming back late one April evening, having missed supper by several hours and dreading the tongue-lashing he knew he was going to get the minute he opened the trailer door. Clare wasn't there.
Nor was there any supper waiting, hot or cold. Just silence.
Blessed silence, Tanner had thought at the time.
He remembered guiltily now how he'd basked in it, albeit briefly, before wondering where she'd gone. After a time he'd looked around outside, called her name, then shrugged and put her absence down to the vagaries of pregnancy. Maybe she'd gone for a walk or up to the ranch house to talk to McGillvray's cook.
Tanner went back inside and helped himself to some pork and beans cold, right out of the can. He was just finishing them when there'd come a pounding on the door.
It was Ned Carter, the foreman. Clare had taken sick, he said. McGillvray had driven her to the hospital.
Even then Tanner hadn't thought about her losing the baby. All he'd thought was he hoped she was good and sick if she was bothering McGillvray about it. He owed his boss enough without his wife crying wolf over the least little thing. But he didn't want McGillvray to have to haul her back, too, so he'd borrowed Ned's pickup and driven the thirty miles to the closest hospital.
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