Rodeo Father

by Mary Sullivan

  Rachel stood on the shoulder, putting out a bag of yard waste.

  Travis sauntered over. “Hey.”

  “Travis! You came to visit!”

  Tori jumped down the steps of the porch and fell, landing on her hands and knees in the dirt. She let out a hurt wail.

  Rachel started toward her, but Travis was faster. He picked her up and brushed dirt from her pants.

  “I hate this place!”

  Startled by the vehemence of Rachel’s tone, he spun around to stare at her. She looked undone. Defeated.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, her lips pressed into a thin line. “I shouldn’t have said that. It just sure would be nice to live somewhere with a lawn.” Her voice took on a wistful note. “And flowers.”

  Yeah, he guessed maybe this wasn’t the ideal place to raise a kid.

  “Travis, look.” Tori held out her hands with a little sob. The palms were scraped. Gently, he smoothed off the dirt.

  When she rested her head on his shoulder with a weary hiccup, his heart just about broke. He thought of those tiny boots. Now was as good a time as any, he guessed.

  “Listen,” he said to Rachel, “do you have time before you head into work?”

  Don’t do this, he warned himself, but his heart refused to listen.

  “A few hours.” Rachel watched him with a furrowed brow.

  “Come to the ranch with me,” he blurted because, apparently, he didn’t have a speck of prudence left. “Let me take Tori for a ride.”

  “Ride?” He’d caught Tori’s attention. Her head shot up. “What kind of ride?”

  “On my horse.”

  Both Rachel’s and Tori’s eyes widened as though he’d handed them a bouquet of stars. His five-eleven grew to ten feet tall. It warmed him head to toe.

  “Do you mean it?” Rachel asked.

  “Yeah, I do. Just a gentle ride in the paddock up on Dusty. It won’t be dangerous.”

  “Yes,” Rachel answered lickety-split. Maybe she was afraid he’d change his mind.

  “Come over to my place. We’ll take the truck.”

  “No, I need to put Tori in her car seat.”

  Oh, yeah. He should have remembered that himself.

  Her husband had died on the road.

  He raised his shoulders, thinking. “I guess we could all go in your car?”

  Rachel smiled. “Yes. Let’s.”

  He lifted one finger. “Can you give me a minute?”

  Returning to his house, he snagged the pink boots and stared down at them, so small in his callused hands. He missed his nephews. The house was too quiet, too empty. He needed to fill his day.

  Justifications for his impulsive actions complete, he went back outside.

  He crossed back over the road and Tori squealed. “Mommy, look what Travis got!”

  A grin split his face, cracking muscles he hadn’t used in a good, long while.

  “You want to sit down on the step and we’ll get these on you?”

  Tori rushed to the porch and yanked off her rubber boots. Travis squatted in front of her and helped her on with the cowboy boots, her feet tinier than he ever remembered his nephews’ feet being.

  “She’ll need thicker socks if she’s going to walk far in these. They’re still a bit big.”

  Rachel didn’t respond. He glanced over his shoulder. She stared at him like she didn’t know what to make of all this, or maybe she just didn’t trust him.

  Yeah, he understood. Why would she?

  They’d met...what?...thirty hours ago? She didn’t know him from Adam.

  He set the little one upright and stood. Tori ran around the yard, taking the boots for a test drive.

  Travis shuffled his feet. He didn’t know how to talk about anything personal. “Yesterday morning? That carousel ride?”

  She nodded.

  “It was a gift.” Lord, he felt foolish and awkward saying that.

  Her shoulders rose. “It was only a ride, Travis.”

  “These are only a pair of boots, Rachel,” he responded. “I know you have trouble taking stuff, but I want to thank you.”

  He rested his hand on the roof of her car. “I know you don’t like owing people anything. I already figured out that much about you. I’m the same. The boots and the ride are my way of balancing the scales.”

  She seemed to understand that. She relaxed, a bit, and buckled the child into her car seat then climbed into the driver’s side.

  Travis folded himself into the passenger seat. Rachel, looking thoughtful, switched on the radio before backing out of the driveway.

  At the Double U, they found both Udall and Uma in their front yard, Uma as compact and weathered as her husband.

  “You mind if I take Dusty out in a corral to give Tori a ride?”

  Uma grinned, sending one set of wrinkles on a collision course with another. “Of course not. Make yourselves at home. Hey, Rachel, how’s the pregnancy going?”

  “This baby can’t come soon enough.” Despite the sentiment, Rachel laughed.

  A man would never tire of that laugh.

  Travis took them to the stable and introduced them to Dusty.

  Tori grasped his pant leg at the knee and sidled against him. “He’s big, Travis.”

  Dusty wasn’t some cute pony from a book. Travis picked her up. “Not when you’re way up high like this. That better?”

  She nodded, but still looked trepidatious, if that was a word.

  “Here.” Uma’s arm appeared from behind him holding a carrot. “Give him this.”

  Tori took it and held it out in her tiny hand. Dusty, perhaps sensing how scared she was, took it as gently as Travis had ever seen.

  “His chewing is loud.” Tori seemed to be coming around.

  Travis turned to Rachel. “Take her outside, and I’ll saddle Dusty and bring him out through the far doors to the corral. I’ll get in the saddle, and you hand her to me, okay?”

  Once Dusty was ready to go, Travis walked him out and mounted.

  Tori sat on top of the fence, with Uma keeping her steady. Travis reached down and took her into his arms, turning her to face forward. He locked his arm across her small waist and scooted her back against him so she’d feel safe, those ridiculous miniature pink cowboy boots sticking out from her splayed legs.

  “Okay? You ready to ride, Little Miss Cowgirl?”

  She giggled. “Yeah. Just a bit, Travis. Not fast, ’kay?”

  “You got it.” He urged Dusty into the most sedate walk imaginable. The horse looked back over his shoulder as if to ask what the heck was going on.

  “Easy, Dusty, we got precious cargo.” Dusty plodded around the corral.

  Tori clapped her hands. “Mommy, look, I’m riding a horse. I’m a cowgirl!”

  When Travis glanced at Rachel, her full-fledged happiness knocked his socks off. Her eyes looked suspiciously damp. Thank you, she mouthed. Apparently, anything was all right with her as long as it made her daughter happy.

  He smiled back because this was one spectacular ride. He and Dusty loved to burn up the prairie, loved to ride to race the wind, but even his horse seemed to sense how important this moment was.

  The happy bundle in his arms and the grateful woman on the other side of the fence sent his pleasure through the stratosphere.

  God, he’d been lonely.

  * * *

  LATE THAT NIGHT, Travis had no idea why he couldn’t sleep. His shoulders and biceps ached from the renovations he’d started today after returning Tori and Rachel to their trailer. He should be exhausted from washing the walls and prepping them to be painted. He was, but damned if he could get to sleep.

  No sense lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. He got up and went downstairs.
>
  He’d seen the white cat hanging around the front yard. Poor creature was going to get herself killed if she wasn’t careful. He wondered what she was living on. Field mice?

  In the kitchen, he opened a tin of tuna and put it on one of the saucers from the old set of dishes he’d found in the cabinets he’d scrubbed down today. He grabbed a cold beer from the fridge and the bag of licorice whips he’d picked up at the general store and headed for the front porch.

  Snagging a thick, fleece-lined flannel jacket, he donned it before sitting on the veranda steps. He deposited the tuna at the foot of the stairs. Quietly he waited, taking an occasional sip from the bottle and chewing on licorice.

  Eventually, Ghost appeared, as pale in the moonlight as her namesake. She sniffed the tuna. With a low growl, she tucked in.

  The rough sputter of an engine approached and the Focus pulled into Cindy’s driveway. Home from work, Rachel stepped out with her purse and a thermal lunch bag.

  She glanced around, doing a double take when she noticed him sitting on the steps and Ghost eating at his feet.

  She crossed the road and walked up his driveway. “How’d you get her to come out?”

  “I opened a tin of tuna.”

  The blond highlights in her caramel hair shone in the dim moonlight. “Her favorite,” she said. “Abigail used to feed it to her instead of cat food.”

  “It was the only thing I could think to give her. Got lucky, I guess.”

  “You sure did.”

  Travis held out the bag of licorice. “Whip?”

  “Red! My favorite.”

  His, too. She took one and bit into it. He scooted over so she could sit down.

  “How was work?” he asked, voice low and soft. Not that he would wake anyone out here in the back of beyond, but it seemed a shame to disturb the peaceful night.

  “Busy! Whew.” Rachel whuffed out a breath of air that stirred wisps of hair. “You’d think the state was about to put a ban on beer. Honey’s was packed.”

  “Good for tips.”

  “Yeah,” she said, her voice as quiet as his own. “Good for tips.”

  Suddenly, she leaned forward and peered at the saucer Ghost was licking clean. She yelped. “You used Abigail’s Royal Doulton for the cat?”

  “Her what?”

  “Her Lady Carlisle china?”

  Lady who? He shrugged. It was a saucer with flowers on it. “So what?”

  “So...it’s worth a fortune. It’s one of the prettiest patterns ever made.”

  It was too fussy for him. “I’ve got a whole set inside.”

  Rachel pressed a hand to her chest, drawing his eyes to her round bosom. Hard to tell what her natural bust would look like. Must be bigger than usual because of the baby. He shook his head. Why was he thinking about that? Why was he even looking?

  “You’ve got the whole set?” She sounded breathless.

  “Yep. It came with the house.”

  “Don’t ever throw it out or give it away. Ever. I’ll save from now until Doomsday and buy it from you.”

  “Okay. I need to use it for now, though. I have nothing else. I’ll buy a plastic bowl for the cat.”

  After that, they said nothing, just chewed on their licorice and watched Ghost.

  Rachel’s silence was restful. From the moment his sister became a teenager, Samantha had started to talk nonstop, big on air and slim on depth. She could talk the ears off a field of corn. Travis loved his sister, but it bordered on too much.

  Finished with her meal, Ghost mounted the steps and sat beside Travis to lick her paws.

  “You’ve made a conquest.” Humor hummed in Rachel’s voice. “All these months I’ve been trying to feed her, I made the mistake of buying cat food instead of people food. What was I thinking?”

  Travis chuckled. For a while, they settled into silence, and he felt himself relax, Rachel being an easy woman to spend time with.

  Sammy and the boys would do well here. They would be safe. No worries.

  His curiosity got the better of him, and he broke the silence.

  “Why is this house so important to you?”

  He sensed her stiffen beside him. Damn. He hadn’t meant to make her uncomfortable.

  “I...um...didn’t always have the happiest childhood.” A sigh that sounded like it came up from the soles of her worn cowboy boots gusted out of her. “My mom and my grandparents fought a lot.”

  “Why?”

  “They were all the same. Stubborn. Not one of them would ever give an inch.” She squeezed one hand inside the other. “Mostly, it was about me. My mom had me when she was only fifteen. Her parents never let her live it down.”

  “And your dad?”

  “Gone before I was born. I never knew him.”

  “I’m sorry.” He knew it wasn’t enough, but he wasn’t used to giving solace. Didn’t know how.

  She shrugged. “I’ve learned to live with it.”

  Sounded to Travis like maybe she still carried that loss inside her.

  “The trailer is small. Even with only four of us, it felt crowded. When the fighting got bad,” she went on, “I would come over here to visit Abigail. She was sweet and loving. She would make me tea and homemade cookies. Only time in my life I had homemade baked goods.”

  At least she had some good memories.

  “I grew to love the house as well as Abigail. It was big, without a bunch of people crammed into two bedrooms in a trailer surrounded by dirt. It was always calm here. I loved the romance of the refined Victorian design on the rugged prairie.”

  They were quiet for a while, settling back into the earlier easiness.

  Finally, she said, “It’s time for me to head home. Thanks again for your help today with the car, and for taking Tori out on your horse. She was still chattering about it when I left for work.”

  Good. Favors and gifts balanced and reciprocated. He’d given her something in return for that magical carousel ride.

  With the scales balanced and the slate wiped clean, he owed no one a single thing.

  She stood to leave. “You’ve made yourself a friend in Ghost. Enjoy.”

  “Good night,” he said, while the cat deigned to allow him to pet her.

  Travis watched Rachel take her time crossing to her own house with the slightest waddle. Not a pretty term, but that’s what it was. What was most surprising to Travis was that he’d never noticed before that a pregnant woman’s walk could be so feminine.

  For several minutes after Rachel silently entered her own house, Travis remained on his dark porch, running his fingers along Ghost’s knobby spine, pondering womanhood and the many attractive forms it could take.

  “She’s home,” he whispered to the purring cat. “Safe.”

  Travis picked up the Royal Lady Somebody china saucer and entered his house, thinking that he’d better head into town tomorrow to pick up a flea collar for the cat. He had the feeling they were going to be buddies, but no way was she bringing pests into the house he was getting ready for his boys. He closed the door behind himself, leaving the cat outside complaining.

  He lay on his bed and, moments later, the nervous energy that had dogged him earlier was history...and that was a bad sign.

  Sure, through years of ingrained habit, he was used to helping women who needed help, but this thing with Rachel, whatever it was, was dangerous.

  He didn’t want her making him feel better about himself. He didn’t want her making him feel restful instead of restless.

  He didn’t want to be lured, seduced, lulled into taking on more than he wanted in life.

  Starting tomorrow morning, he would guard his heart better and keep his distance.

  He owed the woman nothing.

  * * *

 
; SUNDAY MORNING FOUND Rachel behind the back of the trailer clearing out the rest of the old plants she hadn’t managed to finish pulling from the garden yesterday.

  It should have been done in late September. With November breathing down her neck, Rachel still hadn’t finished.

  Tori sat at the small plastic picnic table Rachel had bought for her that summer. She drew pictures of animals and colored them in, currently working on a purple-and-black tiger. Or what she said was a tiger. It looked like a blob on legs with stripes, sort of like Rachel herself these days. Without the stripes.

  Despite the coolness of the day, she wiped sweat from her forehead with her sleeve.

  Cindy came out of the house with a jug of iced tea and three plastic glasses.

  “You going to finish cleaning out your vegetable garden today?”

  “I should be able to, yes.”

  “Why?” Cindy put the items she carried onto Tori’s table. “We can buy all the vegetables we want from the grocery store.”

  “I know, but I like organic and can’t afford to buy it, so I grow veggies. Besides, the cost is a lot cheaper than even the regular vegetables at the store.”

  Rachel raked out the portion of the garden she’d already cleared. Economizing was important to her. She paid Cindy rent and bought all of the groceries for herself and Tori. No one, least of all her mother, could ever accuse her of being a freeloader.

  And then there were those boxes of Mason jars hidden in her closet into which she put every penny she could spare.

  “It’s a lot of work, Rachel. You should be keeping the weight off your feet today. Relax. Take care of that baby.”

  “The baby’s fine.” Sometimes she got tired of people fussing about the baby. For once, she would like people to see her, just her, and not her pregnant belly. Like Travis often did, looking past the baby to her.

  Oh, stop that, Rachel. He sees your pregnant belly as much as anyone does. Doesn’t he?

  “If we want vegetables planted come spring,” she said, “I need to get this year’s plants out. I can’t leave them to rot over the winter.”

  With another mouth to feed, next year’s garden would be even more essential. She planned to make her own baby food for Beth, just as she had for Tori.

  “It’s your funeral.” Cindy filled a plastic tumbler with iced tea. “Here, have some of this while I finish up.”