“Time off? You mean a vacation?”
“Something like that.”
“Well… This is great. I mean, we didn’t expect you.”
“I should have called.”
But Callie shook her head. Still, she was staring at him, puzzled, disbelieving. “No, this is fine,” she finally said. “And to tell the truth, Dad and Jarod could sure use the extra hand. There’s a ton of stuff to be loaded in the pickups and hauled out to the campsite. You don’t mind…?”
Mase was delighted to help out. Nevertheless, when he left to find Tom and Jarod, he was aware of the assessing look Callie gave him.
I should have told her, Mase thought, his stomach knotting. It was too late, though, the damage was already done. But, oh man, was she going to hate him when the truth came to light. She’d probably never speak to him again.
Mase strode up to Tom, who was moving bales of hay to be loaded into the back of their pickup, and he thought about how Callie might very well tell him to get lost, and his guilt was replaced by a sudden stab of regret. He didn’t know what direction his life was going to take now. He couldn’t see the future beyond getting through the trial and keeping Joey safe. But the thought of losing Callie… When had that happened? When had she come to mean so much in his life?
Tom was as surprised to see Mase as anyone. He took the red-and-white kerchief off his neck, mopped his face and stared at him. “Callie didn’t say anything about you coming. I had the impression Joey was going to be here for a while longer.”
Mase met Tom Thorne’s eyes, and another dagger of guilt plunged into his belly. How many people was he going to deceive? He’d told Reese Hatcher the truth. Why didn’t he trust this honest, hardworking rancher?
“Joey is staying, if that’s all right,” he began. He kept meeting Tom’s questioning gaze. The dagger was still in his gut, twisting. “I’d like to stay for a while myself,” he said.
“Hmm,” Tom replied. “Why is it I get this feeling you’re in some kind of a fix, son?”
A long moment passed, and finally Mase whistled between his teeth and absently rubbed his mustache with a hand. “I am in a bit of a mess,” he said.
“I see.” Tom was waiting.
Mase nodded, as if to say he wanted to take a walk, get out of Jarod’s earshot. “You got a minute?”
“I’ve got all the time you need,” Tom replied.
They walked together toward the riding ring, past stacks of ice chests and coolers and folded tents and tables and chairs awaiting transport. Mase knew he couldn’t tell Tom everything. He could, however, stop lying. “I quit the police force,” he stated, hands in his jeans pockets, his muscles tense.
“You quit?”
“Yes,” Mase said, “and I’d like to tell you more, Tom, but I just can’t right now. There were some problems. Still are. That’s all I can say.”
“I see,” Tom said, leaning his sun-browned forearms on the top rail of the fence. “I guess if you could say more you would.”
Mase nodded slowly.
“But I’d like to know if you quit under some sort of a cloud, son. I’m only prying because of my daughter,” Tom continued carefully. “You understand?”
“Yes, I do,” Mase said. “And I assure you, Tom, my quitting isn’t because of anything I did wrong. I can return to the job if I want. The thing is, I don’t want to. This has been coming for a while. I guess I just didn’t see it. I’ll tell you, I’m damn relieved to be out of it.”
“I see,” Tom said. “But I still get this feeling it’s not entirely over. I mean, that there’s something else…”
“There is, and I’m sorry, but I can’t involve you.”
Tom turned and gave Mase a long look. “Okay,” he said, “I’ll accept that. I just don’t want Callie hurt. I take it she doesn’t know what’s going on?”
“She doesn’t know a thing, Tom. Not even that I quit. I’d like to keep it that way, too.”
“Bad idea,” Tom said under his breath.
And Mase had to concur. “It might be the worst idea I’ve ever had.”
It was a long afternoon of hard work. Mase, Tom, Jarod and several neighboring ranchers made a dozen trips to the campsite, unloading, driving back to the barn, loading up again. And it was unusually hot out. The kids didn’t seem to mind, though. They ran around underfoot, excited. Supplies kept coming from town, and inside the main house, neighboring women pitched in, cooking and baking and marinating the chilled meats. Even the ranch’s guests were put to work. James gathered tack in the barn, and Hal took inventory of everything that was driven to the campsite. Marianne and Linda helped Hal, making labels for the coolers, sleeping bags and tents. Even the horses, who had the day off, hung their heads over the fences, watching the whole affair with equine curiosity. Tomorrow they’d all get a good workout during the games. Beavis and Butt-Head simply hung around waiting for a bag of potato chips to get broken and spill in the dust. It was too much to hope for a cooler full of hamburger patties to topple.
At one point, led by Peter, of course, the kids became so rambunctious that Mase stepped in to quiet them down. Evidently, Peter had gotten hold of Liz’s garden hose behind the house and was spraying Joey and Rebecca. Joey was having the time of his life, but Rebecca had put her hands over her face and gone rigid.
“Peter,” Mase said sternly, “turn the hose off now.”
“Daddy, no,” Joey cried, “we’re having fun. Mrs. Thorne doesn’t mind.”
“Maybe not,” Mase said, taking the nozzle from Peter, “but Rebecca is a little girl, and she doesn’t want to roughhouse like this.”
“She doesn’t mind,” Peter insisted.
“Now, Peter,” Mase said, crouching down to meet him eye to eye, “she can’t really tell us if she minds, can she?”
“Rebecca’s going to talk,” Peter said suddenly, his face expressionless, his body utterly still.
Mase frowned. “I’m sure you’re right, son, but right now she can’t.”
Peter appeared to come out of his spell and he only shrugged, as if Mase were speaking a foreign language.
The children finally found a new game, throwing an old, chewed-up tennis ball for the dogs, and Mase rewound the hose, placing it back on its holder against the house. He straightened and dusted himself off, and that was when he noticed Callie standing behind the screen door leading to the pantry. She was watching him.
He nodded to her. “The kids were getting too wild, soaking themselves.”
She smiled a little. “No big deal. Those kids…” Her voice trailed off.
There was something in her expression, Mase thought. Curiosity? he wondered. And then he had it. It was disappointment. Callie knew he was lying to her, using her, and she was disappointed in him.
Mase flinched and turned away. There it was again, that knife digging in his gut, going deeper and deeper, as if his very soul were being cut away.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE GYMKHANA WEEKEND was Callie’s favorite occasion—better than Christmas and New Year’s and the Fourth of July all rolled into one. She got to show off what her patients could do, what they had learned and how much they’d improved. The townsfolk came for the outing, as did many of the patients’ family members.
It was always crazy. Lots of hard work and logistical problems. And Callie crossed her fingers each year for dry weather.
But this year, she thought, this year was special. Mase was there.
>
She wasn’t positive how she felt about his sudden appearance yesterday. She was thrilled. But she was suspicious, too. That story he’d told her about a vacation… She didn’t believe it for an instant. Yet he was there. And she hadn’t stopped thinking about him. She couldn’t. He worried her and made her furious, and she was dying to find out what secrets he was keeping from her. But there was no time. It was Saturday morning. She was simply too busy. If she got a moment, though, just one stolen moment to be alone with him, she’d pry the truth from him.
The scene flew into her mind, complete in every detail, right in the middle of the turmoil of setting up camp.
There was Mase, lying on a rack in a dark, damp dungeon, and she was standing over him. She was dressed in some kind of long flowing medieval dress and she commanded him to confess. “No,” he said bravely, and then Callie raised her hand and the hooded torturer started turning the crank, stretching Mase on the rack. “I’ll tell. Stop, stop! I’ll tell,” Mase gasped, writhing in agony.
She was going to find out his secret. He was going to tell her! She gestured to the torturer to let up on the rack so Mase could talk. She watched him, saw his naked, sweaty chest heaving. She was waiting for his confession, he was opening his mouth, he was going to tell her…
Her fantasy ended with the crash of a pickup truck backing into a table piled high with kitchen supplies. The dank dungeon disappeared, and in a moment Callie was running around like a chicken with its head cut off, directing the games, setting up barrels for barrel racing, trying to figure out where half the tack was. Where was that list Hal had made?
Even as she raced around, gave orders, timed the barrel races and began the egg-on-the-spoon game, Callie was always aware of Mase. He was watching the race. He was sitting in the shade talking to the Browns, Rebecca’s parents. But he was there, and no matter how preoccupied she was, their gazes kept meeting across the riding ring or the tables set up for lunch.
She couldn’t escape his presence. She didn’t want to. She couldn’t even imagine the gymkhana without Mase. If was as if he’d always been there with her, a part of the ranch, the family, a part of the magic. Even when she spotted him talking rather intently to Sheriff Hatcher, she couldn’t be too upset. A little hurt. But never angry at Mase. This was love. She knew it. It was love flitting inside her belly on butterfly wings, love that kept her sleepless. Was he really the wrong man? Could she be that stupid?
Mase was there, too, when Hal became the biggest success of the weekend. Hal wheeled his chair to the mounting block, was helped onto Milky Way, and competed in the egg-on-the-spoon contest. The riders held an egg on a spoon and walked around the ring, then trotted their mounts and then cantered, if anyone got that far without dropping the egg. Laughter and squeals of dismay rose in the air as the eggs dropped and splattered on the ground. The close contest between Marianne and Hal, the last two left, had Callie beaming. Hal was riding well, his balance so stable he trotted his horse, holding the spoon in one hand, the egg sitting on it precariously. Marianne finally dropped hers, and Hal was the winner. He grinned, he bowed to the crowd, then he began to dismount without help. What? Callie thought.
Everyone stopped applauding and turned silent. Jarod ran into the ring to help, but Hal waved him away. Milky Way stood still as a statue as Hal slid off, touching his feet to the ground. The crowd drew in a collective breath as he sagged, his knees giving way, then pulled himself up by the saddle horn and stood, actually stood by himself.
Callie felt tears prick her eyes as Hal held on to the saddle horn and clucked to the brown-and-white pinto. Milky Way took a step, slowly, carefully, and so did Hal, holding on for support but walking on his own two feet.
“Oh, my Lord,” Callie whispered to herself, and she began clapping for Hal as he made his way slowly across the ring. She heard someone else start clapping—Marianne—then others. Soon everyone was applauding, and the whistles and shouts of congratulation were almost deafening.
Sweat stood out on Hal’s forehead as he reached his wheelchair and sank down into it. He was exhausted but proud, so proud. His mother, who’d come all the way from Kansas City, went over and hugged him, laughing through her tears.
Callie walked up to Hal, but for a minute she couldn’t say anything past the lump in her throat.
“How’d I do, coach?” he asked.
“Not bad,” Callie finally managed to say.
Then Marianne came over. She leaned down and kissed Hal on the lips. It looked as if it were a pretty familiar habit, too, and Callie wondered what had been going on these past few weeks after lights-out.
But she couldn’t stay there and scold Hal and find out just when and how he’d accomplished this marvel. She had a hundred things to do. Someone wanted to know if another ice-run into town was needed, someone else asked if it was time to hide the items for the scavenger hunt. Kahlua had thrown a shoe, Francine needed more paper plates for dinner, and Sylvia was nowhere to be found. Liz was helping two of the town ladies set bait on fishing hooks near the trout stream, and Tom was… Callie spotted her dad. He was talking to Mase, nodding, and Mase was doing that thing with his mustache, slowly smoothing it, and Callie knew he was deep in thought. She guessed she’d have to take care of Kahlua’s shoe herself. But, darn it, was Mase confiding something to her dad? Not knowing made her crazy.
Lindsay Duncan and Rex Trowbridge were there, representing the Lost Springs Ranch. They’d come in Lindsay’s truck, hauling a horse for Lindsay to ride the next day in the games. Callie waved and called out a greeting to them, but Liz asked her a question just then and she had to figure out into what black hole the Thornes’ sleeping bags had disappeared.
At dinner Callie got a chance to sit down and relax at last. Her duties were mostly over, and everything had gone pretty well so far. It hadn’t rained, nor was it threatening to. She took a deep breath and got in line for barbecue.
When she sat down at the long table, Mase materialized beside her, a plate in hand.
“Mind if I join you?” he asked.
“My pleasure,” she said.
“It’s been quite a day.”
“It always is.” Callie picked up a succulent rib and began to nibble.
“That was really something with Hal.”
“That kid,” Callie said, shaking her head, “keeping it secret, pretending he couldn’t feel anything.”
“It was mostly you he wanted to do it for,” Mase said.
She looked up at him in surprise. “You think so?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“I kind of thought Marianne might have inspired him, if you know what I mean.”
“I think you’re selling yourself short.”
His voice seemed to go through her and touch something deep inside. Those questions she wanted to ask, those answers she was going to pry out of him, everything flew from her brain, and all that was left was mush. Come on, Thorne, she thought, you’re acting like an airhead. The guy is deceiving you. But he was so close to her, his arm practically brushing hers, the crisp golden hairs, the warmth— Despite herself, a sigh trembled along her limbs and settled deep in her stomach. She was lost. She tried to lick the barbecue sauce off her fingers but her lips wouldn’t even work right.
“You’re doing wonderful work,” Mase said then.
“Oh, thanks,” she managed to reply, and somehow she got through dinner.
After everyone had eaten and all the chores were done, the campfires were built
up. The crowds gathered around, beers or sodas in hand, marshmallows stuck on sticks, and gradually the din settled. As hot as the day had been, jackets and down vests now appeared. This was Wyoming, after all, and the evenings cooled quickly. A few songs were sung, and more than a few stories told.
Each of Callie’s patients stood and made a little speech about what they’d learned and how much Callie and Jarod had helped them. There were tears and laughter and everyone clapped, and Callie blushed crimson.
James presented both Callie and Jarod with gift certificates from all the patients. Although it was only mid-July, a few of the guests would soon be leaving. In six short weeks Jarod would go back to school, and everything would wind down. She always felt kind of nostalgic on this weekend, though she tried to think of the summer as a glass that was still half-full, not half-empty. Joey would be leaving at some point, too. Back to Denver. That fall he’d be in first grade, he’d told her proudly. For some reason, Callie felt terribly sad. What would Rebecca do without him?
She frowned and pondered the kids’ relationship. Rebecca lived only ten miles from Lightning Creek, but Joey…Denver was so far away. If only Joey were in school here. If only, by some miracle, Mase would…
But she had no time to indulge in a fantasy right now, because she had to stand up by the campfire and give her own speech.
She slowly turned and looked at the circle of faces touched by firelight. “It’s not me,” she said, “it’s you who do all the hard work. And the horses. I just talk, that’s all, give you directions. I’ll miss all of you who’ll soon have to leave, but I hope you come back to visit or to work some more. I’ll be here. I’ll always be here.
“You’ve been wonderful. You’ve all come a long way. And thank you so much for the present and for the honor of working with you.”
More applause. A few tears. Embarrassed, Callie wiped the moisture from her own eyes. Her heart was full as she returned to her place on the circle and sank down cross-legged on the ground.
Courting Callie Page 14