Mary Beth sat down, dumbfounded. Finally, her mouth moved. “Well then, there you go.”
“Yup. There I go.” He stood and grabbed the comforter off her bed, careful to miss her entirely. “Goodnight, Mary Beth.” And he was gone, the door shutting silently behind him.
“Yeah,” she muttered to herself. “Goodnight.”
Somehow, she didn’t think they’d be there when she woke up.
And they weren’t. He didn’t even leave a note this time.
Gone.
Again.
Only five months and one day until May 1st.
Then she might get a date.
Chapter Thirteen
This time, when Mary Beth rolled up at the ranch, Jacob was ready for her. Or thought he was anyway. He was ready for her to be pissed and mad and probably a few other kinds of angry with him. She’d mouth off and try to kill him with a look.
Unfortunately, that’s not what he got. When she got out of her truck, she seemed…quiet. He’d never seen her quiet before. All of that sparking energy that he found so attractive was sort of drained from her. Hell, she didn’t even look at him.
He decided he liked this much less than her calling him names in Vietnamese. In fact, he didn’t like it at all. “Morning.”
Her back tensed, but she didn’t respond. She just kept organizing her saddlebags of medical supplies.
Shit. This was bad. Getting worse by the second. All of his smooth talk at asking her out on something that might have past for a date abandoned him in his panic. “I got Kip a doctor’s appointment,” he blurted out, knowing it was his only shot in hell of getting her to acknowledge him.
“Did you now?” She still didn’t look at him, but at least she was talking. Quietly.
“It’s at the clinic on the rez. The appointment is Friday afternoon. Tomorrow.”
This wasn’t coming out the way he wanted it to, not even close. He wanted to say, real smooth-like, “and we could get some dinner afterwards. A little night out. An almost-date.”
“That’s good.” Boy, she was giving him nothing to go on. Not even hope.
“I—” I want you to come with me. The words were right there, but his tongue got mixed up with his teeth and nothing came out.
She sighed, a weary thing that only made her look more tired. “What do you want from me, Jacob?”
You. That was what he wanted to say. Hell, it was probably what he should say. He’d wanted her last night and screwed it up. Every time she got under his skin, he stuck his foot so far in his mouth that he about choked on his ankle.
At least he was consistent.
“Because last night,” she went on when he couldn’t come up with anything brilliant to say, “you seemed to make your position pretty clear.”
It didn’t come out right. I messed up. That’s what he should say—what he needed to say—but he couldn’t. His mouth, in a state of panic, had completely shut down on him.
“I…”Mary Beth’s shoulders sagged, “…I’m not trying to screw up your plans. Hell, I don’t even know what’s going on.”
His mouth didn’t have a freaking clue what it was supposed to be saying right now. But the rest of him had a better idea.
He closed the distance between them in seconds, roughly pulling her into his arms and kissing her. Hard. Her teeth clipped his lip, but he didn’t care. This was what he needed, more than anything else. Her. He didn’t care if anyone saw them. What mattered more was that she knew the truth, even if he couldn’t tell her what it was in so many words. He’d always been a man of action anyway.
She was all steel in his arms for a terrifying few seconds, but then she melted into him, tasting of sun-ripened strawberries. The taste of forgiveness.
She pulled away from him, her eyes closed. “You confuse the hell out of me.”
He kissed her again—not as hard, but this time, she let her tongue tangle with his. “I don’t know how to be around you. Every time I try, I mess it up.” She nodded in complete agreement. For some reason, it made him want to smile. So he did. “I do trust you, Mary Beth. Kip trusts you—and that’s saying something. I wasn’t wrong in that. I was wrong in getting my feelings for you mixed up with…everything else that’s going on. They’re not the same, and I’m going to do a hell of a lot better remembering that from here on out.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment, but it didn’t matter. He took the chance to kiss her sweet lips again.
Eventually, she pushed him back. “That was a pretty damn good apology, for you.”
“Been practicing that whole apology thing recently.”
That got him a smart-ass look. “So we’re even then.”
“Even,” he agreed, relieved as hell to see the corners of her mouth curve up into a small, kissable smile. “Come to the clinic with me. With us. I’ll buy you dinner on the way home.”
She arched an eyebrow at him. “And after?”
His temperature spiked. What color was her bra today? But, even though Jacob didn’t always know what to say, he did have an idea that asking would be the wrong thing. “I leave that up to you.” He’d prefer to take the comfort of her bed again—perhaps several times—but she’d made it blisteringly clear that one of his many screw-ups last night had been to assume that she’d want to sleep with him. So this was him, assuming nothing.
“We’ll see,” was all she said.
Damn, she was going to leave him hanging—again.
He deserved nothing less.
On the way back to the ranch after a day’s worth of tagging, they made arrangements. Kip’s appointment was at four, the last appointment of the day. Since Friday was her day in the clinic and Mike Nolan hadn’t scheduled any ferret appointments, Mary Beth could leave early and pick Kip up from school. Jacob would meet them at her house. They’d drive to the White Sandy Clinic, talk to a medical professional and then swing up to the highway north of the rez and hit a restaurant in Wall, South Dakota, for dinner.
Something about the plan felt…cozy. Like something normal people did every day. Mary Beth snorted to herself. Assuming, of course, that normal people had albino children or wore a mask. Hell, she was the most normal one in the bunch—and that wasn’t saying much.
“Is it okay if we take your truck?” he asked.
She shot him a scolding look that he couldn’t see. She was on the wrong side, dang it. “I don’t know where we’re going.”
“I can drive.”
Mary Beth shot him a doubtful look.
“No, really, I can.” He pulled Mick to a stop and fished his wallet out of his back pocket. She snatched his license out of his hand, hoping that it had a pre-mask picture, but no such luck. Just Jacob’s normal unreadable scowl. The image could have been a mug shot, more or less a license picture. “I passed the driver’s test two years ago. I’m street legal.”
“I’ve never seen you behind a wheel. That’s a brand-newish truck. You crash it, you buy me a new one.”
Jacob stuck out his hand and Mary Beth shook it. Then, because the man did not fight fair, he kept his grip on her and hauled her halfway out of her saddle to give her one of those searing, possessive kisses that tended to end whatever conversation they’d been having.
“Decided what we’re doing after dinner yet?” he asked when he finally let go of her.
Mary unceremoniously plopped back in her saddle, causing Sue to skitter sideways. “I’m still weighing my options.”
That got a lopsided grin out of him. “I’ll plan for any contingency then.”
So last night had been a bust. So he wasn’t convenient. So nothing about this was normal.
That didn’t make it bad.
Mary Beth picked Kip up at 2:30, which allowed her to see the rest of the children Mrs. Browne taught. A mix of kids—including Lisa, Alex and Gary—paused whatever they were working on to stare at her as she gathered Kip’s things. Mrs. Browne was overjoyed that Jacob was finally taking Kip to a doctor. It was the most excited tha
t Mary Beth had seen the stern woman. “And be sure to ask about that school in Rapid City,” was Mrs. Browne’s parting order.
“Will do,” Mary Beth called over her shoulder.
She walked Kip home and wrapped up a couple of cookies for the drive. Jacob showed up a little before three, and they bundled into the truck.
“I still don’t like this,” Mary Beth grumbled as Jacob pumped the brakes and gas a little too enthusiastically.
“You can drive on the way home,” he said, not bothered by her doubt in the least. “We’ll cut straight up to the highway. I don’t do so good in the dark anyway.”
“Is that supposed to be comforting?” she asked through gritted teeth as he took a corner at an unnecessarily high rate of speed. “Jesus, Jacob! Are you sure you can drive this thing?” She clung to the oh-shit bar for dear life. “I mean, not to criticize or anything, but she’s supposed to be in a car seat for when you kill us all by driving off the edge of the bluffs.”
“Really?” Jacob asked, completely at ease as the truck whipped around another tight curve.
“Yes,” Mary Beth snapped through gritted teeth. “Children up to sixty-five pounds need to be in a booster seat and she’s not there yet.”
“Oh,” he said. Mary Beth couldn’t tell which part of that quiet little oh she liked better—the part that said she was right, or the part that made him sound all vulnerable.
“How do you know all this stuff?” he asked as the tires squealed onto Beech.
“I’ve got two nieces and one nephew, all under ten. I do this amazing thing—you should try it sometime—called paying attention. Works great.”
“Thanks for the tip.”
“Honey, does he always drive like this? No wonder you all ride horses instead,” she asked the small white figure in back. No response.
“Sorry,” he said, sounding anything but. “I’d forgotten how much I like driving.”
“Wonderful. Just try not to kill us all, okay?”
“Decided what we’re doing after dinner yet?”
She wanted to punch him in the shoulder, but she also didn’t want to crash and burn. “Depends on if we make it to dinner, doesn’t it?”
Instantly, the speed of the truck dropped down to reasonable levels. Of course, that could have had something to do with the fact that they were suddenly on gravel roads that appeared to veer south into prairie. “Trust me, I’m not going to do anything to jeopardize dinner.”
“One thing at a time. Just drive, Jacob.”
So he drove.
The ride was eye-opening. Mary Beth realized she’d only ever been on the edges of the reservation, on open range and at barns. But Jacob was driving past houses that were little more than shacks, with rusted-out cars scattered around them. It didn’t look like America. It looked like a third-world country, only thirty miles from where she lived.
“This is the rez?” she asked in awe.
“A little different from Faith Ridge, isn’t it?” He snuck a sideways glance at her. “You really haven’t come in this far?”
Ashamed of her ignorance, Mary Beth shook her head.
“I thought Robin might have brought you.”
A small child without pants on darted in front of the truck. Jacob slammed on the brakes as both he and Mary Beth threw their arms out to brace each other.
“Wahtéšni šíče,” Jacob muttered. “You okay?”
Mary Beth was already checking on Kip. If possible, she didn’t look like the jolting stop had moved even a hair. “What?” Mary Beth asked.
“Kid,” Jacob explained. “Just a kid.”
“Without pants? It’s the middle of winter!”
“Mary Beth,” he scolded her, “this is the rez. The kid may not have any pants.”
Shame flooded her again. “It’s really that bad here?”
He turned to look her in the face. “Worse.” He slowed as they drove past a hovel of a trailer with a blanket for a door and plywood over the windows. The roof was curled up, looking like one strong puff would pull it free of its moorings. “That? That’s where Tommy lives.”
“But you pay him!”
“And he gives most of his money to his girlfriend so she can buy food for her kids,” Jacob patiently explained. “On the cold nights, he stays with her. She’s got a nice cob house, but there’s at least ten of them living there.”
“I had no idea,” was all Mary Beth could say. She just couldn’t reconcile Tommy with a hovel like that.
“They haven’t gotten rid of us yet,” Jacob said, almost to himself, “but they have tried.”
They. Mary Beth knew who they were. And she was one of them.
“Jacob—”
“We have a nicer trailer,” he blurted out, his cheek fire-engine red. “All the doors, all the windows, heat in the winter.”
A nicer trailer? Compared to Tommy’s scrap heap? Anything had to be nicer than that, but that left a lot of room in shack territory. Mary Beth shuddered at the thought of Kip not being warm enough, but she knew that pity would be misplaced. “Oh,” she finally choked out. “That’s good.”
“I’m working on it,” he continued as the Ram picked up speed. “We’re almost there. You ready?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she muttered, but suddenly she didn’t feel ready at all. It was like she’d studied for a history test only to find herself in an algebra final, the entire semester resting on this one event that she was completely unprepared for.
The truck crested a low hill. At the bottom sat an ugly building, but at least it appeared to have windows and an intact roof.
“That’s the clinic,” Jacob said.
“You been here before?”
“Once.” The way he said it—like it hurt—caught her attention.
She looked at him, at the hard lines on his face. He stared straight ahead, parking the truck without comment. Had he been here the night of the attack? “Jacob…”
He shook her off. “It’s time for her appointment.” He got out of the truck, not giving her a chance to ask.
Fine. Be that way. As she unbuckled Kip, the door to the clinic opened and out came a huge man wearing medical scrubs.
The man whistled. “Jacob? That you?”
“Hiya, Clarence.” He pointed to the side of the clinic that looked like it was half built. “You expanding?”
Whoa, what had happened to Jacob’s voice? Suddenly, his accent was twenty times stronger. And sexier, dang it.
She went to lift Kip up and was surprised when the girl’s arms went around her neck. “It’s okay, honey,” Mary Beth said in a soothing tone. “You know Jacob will keep you safe. Me too.” But Kip’s arms stayed around her neck, so Mary Beth hefted her up.
“The new doc decided we needed a day care. Building it with her own money. Think her sister’s supposed to come out and run it or something.” He shrugged. “I can’t keep up with the plans. All I know is, she’s a hell of a good doc, and it’s best not to piss her off on a regular basis.”
“Good to know.”
The big man—Clarence—was staring at Jacob’s face. “Nice mask.” It could have come out as mocking, but he sounded sincere. “I thought they saved your nose?”
Mary Beth could see the tension rippling across Jacob’s shoulders. Kip’s grip tightened, just a little. “They did.”
So he did have a nose under that mask? But if he did, why did he wear it? And how did this guy know about it when no one else did?
Clarence noticed her—or, more specifically, the girl in her arms. “Is that Kip?”
Mary Beth could tell that this whole conversation was exceedingly painful for Jacob. Actually, she was surprised he was even talking.
“Yes.”
Clarence took a step toward Kip. Jacob took a corresponding step backward, keeping his body between the big man and the small girl in Mary Beth’s arms. “Man, I was so worried about her. When they wouldn’t let her in the ambulance with you? Man.” He let out another long,
low whistle that told Mary Beth more than any words could. “I held onto her for as long as I could, but Tim said it was a matter for the law. Broke my heart when social services took her. But you got her back.”
“As soon as I got out of the hospital.” Each word sounded like a knife in Jacob’s mouth, cutting its way free.
“That’s good.” Clarence looked like he wanted to pat Kip’s head, but Jacob’s body language made it clear that would be a very bad idea. Then, for the first time, the big man seemed to notice Mary Beth. “Oh, hey.”
“Hi.” Mary Beth couldn’t offer to shake his hand without dropping Kip, so she sort of waved. “Mary Beth Hofstetter, the new vet in Faith Ridge.”
Clarence’s mouth quirked up into a smile as his gaze darted from Mary Beth to Jacob. “That so? Well, welcome to the rez, Doc.”
“Thanks.” What else was she supposed to say? She was afraid if she opened her mouth any further, she’d accidentally wind up grilling this guy for everything he knew about Jacob and Kip and the night of the attack, and if she did that, it was a hell of a long walk back to Faith Ridge.
Because one thing was pretty clear. Jacob and Kip had wound up here at the clinic the night of the attack, and this man had played a big part in saving Jacob’s life.
“Man,” Clarence said, turning his attention back to Jacob, “you should count yourself lucky the new doc wasn’t here when that all went down. She’d have hunted your ass down if you hadn’t shown up for your follow-up appointment.”
Jacob didn’t say anything. Not that it stopped Clarence. He grinned and shook his head. “You be careful in there. Even Nobody’s afraid of her.”
Two things happened at the same time. Mary Beth thought, Nobody? And Jacob’s face moved for the first time since the clinic had come into view. He looked positively shocked. “That a fact?”
“That’s a fact. She don’t like to take no for an answer.”
Jacob seemed to mull over this new information while Mary Beth’s mind kept going, Nobody? Who the hell was Nobody?
“I’ll keep to the straight and narrow then.” He held out his hand. “Good seeing you, Clarence.”
“Good luck, man. And nice meeting you, Doc.”
Masked Cowboy (Men of the White Sandy) Page 16