“I’m not. At him anyway.” Her voice was tart, but the look she gave him held more exhaustion than anger. The delicate skin under her eyes was smudged purple, a clear sign he wasn’t the only one who hadn’t had much sleep.
David’s stomach rumbled. Before he could think twice, he asked, “Can I make it up to you?”
She frowned, instantly suspicious. “How?”
“I could really go for another piece of that huckleberry pie, since I didn’t get to finish the first one.” He tried a cautious smile. “Come with me. I’ll buy you dinner.”
She hesitated, long enough that he guessed she wanted to agree and was lining up all the reasons she shouldn’t.
“Just sandwiches and pie, Mary. Maybe some ice cream on top, if we really want to get crazy.”
“I won’t be very good company.”
“You don’t have to be anything. Just relax and come along for the ride.” He put a little more warmth into his smile, coaxing. “And the pie.”
Chapter 20
While Mary went inside to change out of her work clothes, David unloaded the horses and watered them at the tank behind the barn, smacking Muddy on the neck when he nipped at Frosty. “Play nice. The two of you are gonna be spending a lot of time together.”
He put Frosty in the extra stall in the barn, fed both horses and unhooked his trailer. Maybe it wasn’t exactly a date, but it seemed like he should drive since he’d done the asking. He hopped into the living quarters, stuck his dented cowboy hat on the rack, scrubbed off today’s layer of grit and dust and changed into the semiclean clothes he’d worn for the previous evening’s trip to the mountains, once again pulling his Finals jacket on over the gray Henley to ward off the cool edge of the breeze.
Mary was standing beside his pickup when he stepped outside. She’d swapped the khakis, blouse, and jacket she’d worn to the seminar for jeans and a soft green fleece pullover. Her sunglasses were firmly in place, hiding her eyes. She stared at him for a beat, and one corner of her mouth curled into an off-kilter smile.
“What?” he asked.
She shook her head and climbed into the pickup. David followed suit. When they were rolling over the hills toward East Glacier, he asked, “How are JoJo and Kylan related?”
“Kylan’s dad and JoJo’s sister were together for a few years when Kylan was little.”
David had to think about that for a minute. “So they’re not really cousins.”
“Technically, no, but JoJo’s sister treated Kylan like he belonged to her. Even when she wasn’t with his dad anymore, she’d look after him when his mother didn’t. If I hadn’t taken custody of him, she would’ve.” Mary’s mouth curved into a soft smile. “JoJo gets carried away, but he’s got a good heart and we can always count on him.”
“What about Kylan’s dad?” David asked. “Where is he?”
“Last I heard, down east at Fort Belknap. That’s where he’s from.”
“Does Kylan ever see him?”
“Once in a while. He’s not the kind to provide a kid with a stable home, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“Actually, I was surprised when you mentioned him,” David admitted. “I thought maybe Kylan didn’t know his dad.”
Mary snorted. “A fair assumption where my sister is concerned. She only insisted on a paternity test because his dad is Assiniboine, so Kylan gets benefits from both tribes if there’s any money being handed out.”
“Does that happen often?”
“Now and then. We get a few bucks at Christmas, and a couple of years ago there was a big oil-rights settlement and everybody on the Fort Belknap rez got a thousand bucks.” Mary tilted her head back against the seat and rolled it sideways to look at him. “I should warn you, I had a killer headache so I took one of my migraine pills. They make me kind of loopy.”
“I’ll watch so you don’t end up facedown in the pie.”
She laughed, and it eased his mind to see her relax a little. If these past two days had been rough on him, he could only imagine what they’d been like for Mary.
They opted out of the ice cream because Mary suggested they get their sandwiches and pie to go and take them to the hotel. She swayed when she stepped out of the pickup, and she didn’t seem to be tracking quite right for the first few steps. Must be the medication. David kept a hand ready to catch her, but she got lined out all right as they crossed the gravel parking lot.
Inside, David gazed in awe at massive lodgepole pine pillars, three feet in diameter and three stories tall, soaring clear to the wood-beamed ceiling of the huge open space at the heart of the hotel. Mary led him through a doorway in the corner and out onto a veranda that overlooked the pool, bringing them face-to-face with a mountain.
They found a pair of vacant patio lounge chairs sheltered from the breeze and warmed by the sun. David shrugged out of his coat and hung it on the back of his chair. As he made himself comfortable, he caught Mary watching him with that same inscrutable half smile. He raised his eyebrows.
“Oops. Busted.” She gave a sigh that might’ve qualified as dreamy. “That shirt fits you really well. But I’m sure you already knew.”
He glanced down at the too-snug waffle knit and then back at her. “I knew it was clean.”
“Sure you weren’t showing off?”
Showing off? Looking good? This was not the Mary he’d known over the past two days. He leaned over and pushed up her sunglasses. Her eyes were slightly glassy. “You’re stoned.”
“Nah. Just really, really relaxed.” She swatted his hand away and slouched into her chair, unwrapping her sandwich to nibble at one corner. David watched her for a moment and then glanced down at his chest, stifling a grin. It was a start, wasn’t it, even if she’d only admitted it under the influence?
A start toward what, he couldn’t say.
And he didn’t intend to figure it out on an empty stomach. He ate his sandwich, half of hers, and his slice of pie in record time, making damn sure he didn’t have to share any of it with the local wildlife. After gathering up the wrappers and dumping them in the nearest trash can, he returned to find Mary slumped forward, kneading the muscles of her neck.
“Stiff?” he asked.
She rolled her head to one side, grimacing. “Some people carry their worries on their shoulders. According to my chiropractor, mine are a pain in the neck.”
David hesitated, but really, it was only good manners. Since he’d been the biggest pain in her neck today, the least he could do was offer some relief. He leaned over, grabbed Mary around the waist, and slid her forward on the chair.
“What are you doing?” she protested.
“Offering my expert services.” Which sounded vaguely obscene if you were prone to thinking that way. He stepped over the chair, sat down, and rested his palms on her shoulders. “Relax. I’m not going to molest you.”
But having that firm little butt cradled between his thighs was giving him all kinds of ideas. “David—”
“Shhh. I know what I’m doing. Emily—my former fiancée—was a nursing student, and she had a lot of trouble with trigger points in her neck. She taught me how to do acupressure.” He probed with his thumb, found a knot just below the base of her skull. “There?”
“Yeah.”
He pushed.
“Ow!” Mary squirmed, hissed out a curse word. “That hurts.”
David clamped his hands down on her shoulders. “Hold still. And tell me when it doesn’t hurt so much.”
She muttered another curse but stayed put. After a few seconds, she said, “Okay. Not so bad.”
He pushed harder.
She cursed some more. “Damn. And here I thought I was getting a nice, relaxing neck rub.”
“This will make you feel better in the morning.”
“Like I’ve never heard that before,” she grumbled.
She tipped her head forward, then sideways, then back. The spiky tips of her hair brushed his jaw, sending a prickle of awareness over his skin that heated as it spread, exploding into miniature fireworks at every point of contact between their bodies.
She angled a look over her shoulder. “Feels better. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” That should’ve been his cue to get up, move away, but his body and his brain were not in agreement. She felt too good nestled so close to him. Smelled good, too—a tart, citrusy scent with a touch of sweetness underneath. So very Mary. From this angle, he could see behind the sunglasses to the lines of fatigue around her eyes and a vulnerability she would never admit. David’s heart pinged again, and it was more than guilt that had him lifting his arms, wrapping them around her.
She stiffened. “David—”
“Shhh.” He whispered it into her hair, ruffling the gold-tipped spikes.
“But we can’t—”
“For the treatment to work, you need to lean back and relax. Let the muscles unwind.” Total bullshit, of course, which she’d know if she felt his heart thumping. “Don’t worry. We’re in a public place.”
She was still for a painfully long count of five. Then she sighed, tilted her head back against his shoulder, and closed her eyes. “Just so you realize, I wouldn’t be doing this if it weren’t for the drugs.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” He pulled her more snugly into his arms, marveling at how well she fit there. As if the space had been waiting for someone exactly her size and shape. But that thought was a scary sort of crazy, so he tried to distract himself. “There’s more to the story with Kylan, isn’t there?”
She stiffened again. “What do you mean?”
He closed one hand around her upper arm, massaged the muscle gently. “You’re a teacher who’s used to dealing with tough kids. You’ve been to war. You wouldn’t have reacted the way you did today without reason.”
He waited, but she only stared off at the top of the nearest mountain, impenetrable as the rocky crags.
Fine. If she was gonna be that way, he’d forget about being tactful. “How many times has he run away, Mary?”
She was silent for a very long moment. Then she shook her head with a tired sigh. “I couldn’t even tell you. The first time I heard about was when he was four. He got out of the yard while Lori was in the bathroom, went next door, and hid in the neighbor’s doghouse. Didn’t come out for hours. And once, when he was seven, he crawled in the back of a stranger’s car at a rodeo and ended up clear over in Box Elder.”
David rubbed her arm with slow, soothing strokes. “Why does he do it?”
“It’s like an anxiety attack, or claustrophobia. Sometimes, everything is just so hard for him. He gets wound tighter and tighter until he comes undone and has to get away.” Her voice faltered, and she swallowed before going on. “The worst was a couple of years ago. We had a fight because he came home drunk. He climbed out of his bedroom window in the middle of the night and walked to town. JoJo found him two days later, passed out in an abandoned building down by the tribal offices with some of the street people. I just can’t…” She swallowed again, squeezed her eyes shut, her voice fading to a whisper. “I’m so afraid we’re going to lose him for good one of these times.”
David folded his arms close around her, an ache settling in his chest as if he’d absorbed it from her. “I’m sorry. All the times I imagined finding Muddy, I never dreamed it would cause so much pain.”
“It would be easier if you were an asshole,” she said softly. “Big and mean and scary like you looked in Kalispell.”
“Big I can do, but mean… I can’t fool anybody for very long. I can manage scary, though, if you catch me first thing in the morning.”
Her laugh verged on a sob.
He fought the temptation to press his cheek against her hair. “When everything was going to hell and I couldn’t rope to save my life, somebody told me I needed Muddy back in the worst way. As if I didn’t know. All I could think was that’s the stupidest saying I’d ever heard. There couldn’t be a bad way to get Muddy back.” He puffed out a sigh. “I was wrong.”
Mary put her hand over his, tracing her thumb in a line across his knuckles. “Why did you come back today?”
He could’ve explained about the promise to Kylan, but the truth was even simpler. “I had to.”
“Because?”
“The usual.” He tried for a casual tone that wouldn’t make him sound like a total sap. “You reap what you sow, what goes around comes around, that sort of thing.”
She cocked her head to squint at him from under her lashes. “You were afraid stealing Muddy back would give you bad karma?”
“Dunno. Maybe.” He shrugged, embarrassed. “My sister says I take that stuff too seriously. Karma, superstition, whatever you call it.”
“Me? I call it being Catholic.”
He tipped his head to look at her face. “Really?”
“Yeah. Why does that surprise you?”
“I thought the Blackfeet had their own religion. Drums, dancing, sweat lodges, and stuff.”
“That too, but the Catholic missions educated most of the Indians around here in the early days, and for most of the families, it stuck. We do a little of this, a little of that, but both are pretty heavy on the ‘do unto others.’” Her smile was edged in disbelief. “You’re serious? You and Muddy could be halfway to Colorado by now, but your conscience wouldn’t let you?”
“Guilt is a powerful force.”
She was so close he could feel her breath against his cheek and see the doubt stamped as clearly on her face as the scatter of freckles. Her eyes searched his for an ulterior motive she seemed determined to find. As if that was easier than believing him. Maybe it was for Mary. Someone—or a lifetime of someones—had done a number on her. Were the effects irreversible? Was she capable of trusting anyone?
Then again, who was he to talk? It’d been four years since Emily had dumped him, but he was still alone, and the absence of a woman in his life wasn’t an accident. He was in no rush to play the fool again, to stick his heart out there for someone else to drop-kick into the nearest trash bin.
Especially a woman who was looking for an excuse.
Mary jerked her gaze away, braced her hands on his thighs, and pushed free of his arms. The cool evening air rushed in to take her place. He shivered. She stood and looked down at him.
“I think I had it right the first time I saw you.” This time, the off-center smile had a sharper edge, but it was turned inward. “You are a dangerous man, David Parsons.”
Chapter 21
Mary was quiet until they were in the pickup headed toward Browning. She stared resolutely out her side window as she spoke. “You’re taking Muddy when you go.”
“I have to.”
She nodded once, abruptly. “Yeah. I suppose you do.”
The silence hummed between them for another couple of miles. David stared at the white center line flickering past—zip, zip, zip—marking the distance between being with her and being alone. Mary stared south, toward the mountains that marched off to meet the horizon, no end in sight.
“What about the reward?” she asked.
Yeah. What about it? He hadn’t called the bank again to try to change Byron’s mind, and he hadn’t asked his dad to cosign on a loan. How did he figure on leaving day after tomorrow with Muddy in the trailer?
“I’m having a problem with the reward.”
Mary finally looked at him, poker-faced behind her sunglasses. “What kind of problem?”
“Well, first off, I don’t h
ave that much money sitting around. Neither does anyone else in my family.” He flexed his fingers on the steering wheel, like he could get a handle on the words he needed. “The thing is, if I fight you, I’ll win.”
She flinched, and her mouth trembled for an instant before she pressed it flat. “You’re sure of that?”
“Yes.” He drew in a breath, lining up the rest of what he had to say. “The reward was intended for someone who helped me find Muddy. If you’d seen an old picture, recognized him, and called to say, ‘Hey, we have your horse,’ there would be a check in your hand tomorrow.”
Her chin came up a notch. “You’re splitting hairs.”
“Am I?” He took his eyes off the road long enough to give her a hard stare. “You think you’ve been helpful?”
Her gaze dodged his, going back to the vast spread of prairie that now rolled out to the south, uninterrupted.
David couldn’t let her off the hook. “It’s up to you, Mary. You can force me to miss the next few rodeos, hire a lawyer, and camp on your doorstep until it’s settled. If you think that’s what’s right.”
Because he would. He hadn’t known it for sure until this very moment, but the hard kernel of resistance had been there from the beginning. It had sprouted when Rusty had shared his lawyer’s opinion and grown stronger every moment since, the roots winding deeper into his gut. Not logical. Not even smart. But there it was.
“And what do I tell Kylan?” Mary asked, her voice shaking. “Sorry, kid, you get the short end of the stick. Again. How does your conscience feel about that?”
Like shit.
If she hadn’t been on the verge of tears, he might’ve snapped back at her, but he knew her anger came from guilt, failure, frustration. She was hurting for Kylan, beating herself up for letting him down. She needed to lash out, and he was a big target. Fine. He could take it.
Mary’s phone rang. She had to clear her throat, take a steadying breath before she answered. David heard Starr’s agitated voice on the other end, saw Mary’s expression shift into alarm.
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