“We’ll see.”
———
“She’s gorgeous, Mackenzie.” Zan held the baby girl in her arms. Tears wet the corners of her eyes. “You’re a pretty girl, aren’t you?”
“Thank you. I take all the credit,” Bill Brown said as he sat next to Zan on the sofa. He draped his arm over her shoulder and cooed down at his daughter.
“I think you had help,” Zan teased.
Rose squirmed in Zan’s arms. Her face scrunched up and turned red. The loudest wail Zan had ever heard came from the tiny creature. The girl had a mighty set of lungs on her.
“Nap time, angel.” Bill took his daughter from Zan and headed to the back of the house.
Zan watched the man cuddle his daughter and a fierce pang of jealousy ripped through her. She wanted what Mackenzie and Bill had. She wanted it all. She had never before cared whether she and Charles had children. She thought they probably would—that was what was expected of them, but her heart hadn’t been in it. Now though, she wanted desperately to hold a child in her arms, her child—and Jacob’s, a baby with his dark hair and her gray eyes. The clarity of her vision tightened her chest and frankly scared the bejesus out of her.
She gripped her hands in her lap, her arms aching to hold the baby more. To bury her face in the soft neck and breathe in the wonderful sweet scent.
“You okay, hon?” Mackenzie reached over from her seat in a club chair and laid her hand on Zan’s.
“I’m fine.”
“You sure? You look a little flushed.”
“Nope, fit as a fiddle.” Zan’s smile was only a little forced.
“So tell me…” Mackenzie picked up her glass from the coffee table. She grimaced as she drank down half of the milk. “What’s he like?”
“W…who?”
“Uh-uh. Don’t play dumb now. You told me you were seeing someone. I want to know all about him.”
Jacob flashed in her mind and she couldn’t help but smile. She described him to Mackenzie and the woman was fanning herself by the time she was finished. The two giggled like they had in high school.
“But what is he like?” Mackenzie stilled her hand. “You’ve told me he’s hot, but is he nice?”
“Most definitely. I’ve never met anyone like him before.” Her smile widened before she could stop herself.
“Why didn’t you bring him down with you?”
“I thought about it.” Zan shifted on the couch as Mackenzie’s stare bore into her. “But his grandfather is in a nursing home in Sheridan and I didn’t think he’d want to leave him.”
“They could have come down together.”
Zan snorted again. “Not likely. He made a big enough stink having Thanksgiving with Aunt Bonnie, although I know he had a good time.”
“Whoa. This guy, what’s his name again?”
“Jacob.”
“Jacob and his grandfather had Thanksgiving with your aunt? That’s a pretty big step don’t you think? I mean a family get-together.” Mackenzie snapped her fingers. “And Quint was there, too. That’s a boyfriend test for you. How does he feel about Jacob?”
“Fine, I guess. Jacob’s his boss.”
“What?” Zan’s friend laughed with an incredulous look on her face.
“Didn’t I tell you I got Quint a job at the ranch?”
“Yeah.”
“Didn’t I mention Jacob is the ranch manager?”
“No. I do believe you left out some of the details.”
“Does it matter?”
“Does it matter, she asks,” Mackenzie said as Bill came back into the room. “She gets her nephew a job working with her boyfriend and she asks if that matters.”
“I didn’t say he was my boyfriend.”
“Puh-lease. Have you slept with him yet?”
“Wh…what?” Zan’s face burned. Even her ears heated. She looked back and forth between her friends. Then she looked down at her hands in her lap.
“That’s what I thought. You wouldn’t have slept with him if there wasn’t something major going on.” Mackenzie persisted.
“Can’t you control your wife?” Zan looked at Bill.
“Wouldn’t dream of trying. Could get me in trouble.” He winked at her.
Maybe her friend would stop the interrogation if she didn’t comment further. She pressed his lips together and hoped for an end to the “Jacob talk”.
“Now, Zan.”
No such luck.
“I’ve known you for many years and you don’t take anything lightly.” Mackenzie paused and seemed to be considering something. “So when’s the wedding?”
Her mouth hung open. “There’s not… We haven’t… Mackenzie will you quit?”
“You’re in love with him.” Mackenzie’s voice was direct, stating a fact, not asking a question.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to. I can tell by the look on your face. You’ve never looked that bright. Not once when you were with Charles.” Mackenzie stood and pulled Zan to her feet then wrapped her arms around her friend. “I am so happy for you. And it’s about damn time.”
Zan snorted on her friend’s shoulder. “You know. I think I agree with you.”
Chapter Eighteen
Jacob dashed for the phone. One more ring and the machine would pick up. He’d been coming through the front door, his arms loaded down with gift boxes when the danged thing started. Why he put off the rest of his shopping until the morning before Christmas, he would never know. He’d been distracted lately, he thought with a smile. Luckily, the small mercantile shop in town had everything he needed for his Christmas.
He sighed. His Christmas without Zan.
He deposited the boxes on the kitchen table and scooped up the receiver.
“Merry Christmas Eve morning,” the voice on the other end answered after his rushed hello.
A smile spread across his face so quick his cheeks hurt. “That’s quite a mouthful.”
“Uh, yeah. It sounded better when I was waiting for you to pick up the phone.”
He chuckled. “Merry Christmas Eve morning to you too, Zan. How are ya?”
“Good. Well, that’s not entirely true.” There was a pause and for a moment Jacob’s smile slipped. “I miss you.”
He released a heavy breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Same here.”
“You miss you, too? That’s a bit odd don’t you think. You know they have people you can see for that.” Zan’s laughter filled the line.
“Yuck, yuck. You’re quite the comedian.”
Zan’s good-natured ribbing eased the pressure that had been building in his chest since she left.
“So what have you been up to?” Jacob sat on the coach and propped his feet up.
“Doing the family thing. My uncle and his family brought my granddad up, so I’ve spent a lot of time with him. He didn’t believe me when I told him I’d been out riding on a horse named Applesauce.”
He laughed. Damn, he didn’t think it was possible to miss someone so much. He ached to touch her again.
“He acted like it was an abomination to call a horse such a thing.” Her words broke into his thoughts.
“Why is that? What did he name his horses?”
Zan snickered. “Well there was Red, the big red horse and Red. And then there was Red.”
“I sense a theme here.”
“Yep. Oh, we did have some with different names. There was Rusty, Rusty and Rusty.”
They laughed.
“My granddad wasn’t much for originality.”
“Well you got to give him something for consistency.”
“I guess. When are you going over to see Oscar?”
“This afternoon. Your aunt called and insisted we come over for dinner.”
“You’re kidding me.” He could hear the smile in her voice. “And you agreed to go?” She sounded surprised.
No more surprised than he’d been when first, Bonnie called and then, he’d agreed to go. Just like Thanks
giving. The Walters women had a way with him. “She’s very persistent.”
“That she is,” Zan agreed.
“What’re your plans for today?”
“My friend De Marco, I told you about him, right?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“We’re getting together for some last minute shopping and he’s going to give me a trim.”
Jacob imagined her spiky strawberry-blond hair. How the soft locks slid through his fingers. Her sweet scent. He shifted on the sofa as his pants tightened.
He cleared his throat. “Have fun.”
“I will. And don’t let Aunt Bonnie boss you around.”
“Too late for that, I’m afraid. The women in your family are a force to be reckoned with.”
“And don’t you forget it.”
“Never.”
———
“Why didn’t you tell me you were moving to—” a dramatic pause followed by a hearty sigh broke the question, “—Wyoming?”
The voice from Zan’s past made her cringe. She and De Marco were having a cup of coffee around the corner from his salon after several hours of Christmas shopping. Unfortunately, Zan hadn’t stopped to think it was also around the corner from Charles’s office.
“Wyoming?” He said the name as if it were another planet, not just a state several hundred miles away. Without any invitation, he pulled out the chair next to her and sat.
“It was none of your business. Still isn’t.”
“Come on, Zan. We’ve been together for more than three years. You should have told me.”
“Were—past tense. We broke it off remember.”
“You broke it off. I didn’t say I agreed.”
“As I recall you didn’t say much of anything. Seems to me you were too busy dismounting your secretary and trying to pull your pants up.” Zan could hear De Marco’s snickers. She kicked his shin under the table.
She narrowed her eyes at Charles and studied her former fiancé. His blond hair hung longer than she thought she had ever seen it before, curling at the ends. His fake-tanned skin clung tightly to his bones. Had he had something done? He had often talked about wanting a facelift, but at thirty-six Zan had thought he meant in the future—far down the line in the future. He was thin, not scrawny, but not built like… Oh, boy—she was comparing him to Jacob.
To her amazement, he didn’t come close to her man. Her man, Jacob Bowman. More to her amazement, she felt absolutely nothing for Charles. She couldn’t even remember what had drawn her to the man in the first place. Not a single spark of…of anything. A smile crossed her lips.
“You cut your hair. Looks good. I always thought you wore it too long.”
That S.O.B. had all but forbidden her to cut her hair. He complained for a month when she got a mere two inches cut. Not like the eighteen inches she shed when she moved to Wyoming.
“Why you…”
De Marco grabbed her hand and squeezed it until she looked at him. His eyes warned her to hold her tongue. She plastered a fake smile on her face. “Thank you. I like it much better this way. Lifted loads off of me.” She winked at her friend.
“How long will you be in town?”
“Until the twenty-ninth.”
“Do you think we could get together?”
“I doubt that would be a very good idea, Charles.”
He leaned closer and appeared to study her. “Is there… Have you found someone else?”
Zan opened her mouth to say…something, she didn’t know what, but Charles cut her off, as he had so many times before.
“You have found someone.” A sneer transformed his smooth, even face. “Let me guess, you’re slumming it with a farm boy. Making time in a barn?”
Never in a barn and definitely not slumming it. But her “farm boy” was far too good to discuss with Charles “I’m God’s gift to women” Stratford.
He snorted and shook his head.
“For the love of God, would you grow up and get a life?”
“Ha—you are. Otherwise you wouldn’t be so defensive.” He crossed his arms over his chest and held an air of superiority.
“What difference does it make? I could be boffing the entire cattlemen’s club and it wouldn’t be any concern of yours.” Zan stood and tossed a few bills on the table. She looked at De Marco who must have been biting the inside of his mouth to keep from laughing. The man looked like he was about to explode.
So did Charles for that matter.
De Marco stood and linked his arm through Zan’s. Zan blew Charles a kiss and walked out of the coffee shop.
Good-bye and good riddance.
Chapter Nineteen
With a hip pressed into the side panel of his old, worn pickup truck, Jacob waited outside the airport terminal in Billings for Zan. His gut hadn’t stopped churning since her phone call the night before. He missed his woman so damn much.
His woman.
A crowd of people exiting the terminal tore his thoughts back to the moment. Near the back of the group, he spotted Quint, a head taller than most around him. Beside him, Jacob could see the bob of strawberry blonde spikes coming his way.
The crowd parted and Jacob straightened away from the truck. She wore a tight red sweater, a sweeping floral skirt and no coat despite the freezing wind, and she looked more beautiful than he’d ever seen her before. The rapid beat of his heart sped even faster. Seeing her again, a missing piece of his heart returned. Made him whole. It almost scared him how much he loved her. It swept through him harder than anything ever had before.
Even more startling than this new emotion, he wanted to make her his wife. He wanted the house, the home, the children.
Without a word, she walked into his embrace and held tight to him. Jacob breathed in her scent. He missed the vanilla and sugar. Twice over Christmas, he found the shirt she had worn before Thanksgiving. The scent had washed out, but if he closed his eyes tight enough he could almost remember it. Now he had the real thing in his arms. And the real thing trembled.
He pushed her at arms’ length to look at her. Her freckles stood out against her paler than normal skin. Deep purple circles darkened the skin under her bloodshot eyes. If she’d gotten more than a couple hours of sleep, he would be surprised. He cupped her face, his thumb traced her cheekbone “You okay?”
She nodded with a weak smile. “I’m just glad to be home.”
Home.
Wyoming was her home. Jacob’s heart thudded with hope and possibilities.
“Well, we still have a three-hour drive ahead of us.” He leaned in to give her a quick kiss, but once her lips softened under his, he lost all will. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her up against him. His other hand moved to her hair, his fingers twined with the short, spiky locks. Zan’s hands slid up his back.
Heat and passion burned through him. He never wanted to let her go again. This was his woman, his mate.
“Hmm-hmm.” Someone next to Jacob cleared his throat.
The world flashed back to him. He and Zan still stood in front of the airport.
When he pulled from the kiss, Zan moaned and he almost said “to hell with it” and kept on kissing her, but good sense prevailed.
Zan’s eyes fluttered open. Desire burned hot for the briefest moment. Jacob could see when reality set in. The desire fled, replaced by a guarded emotion. He guessed embarrassment, as a flush pinkened her cheeks.
Jacob gave her a quick wink then turned to Quint, who looked like he had to fight to keep a grin off his face as he leaned against the truck, his arms crossed over his chest. Jacob had forgotten about Zan’s nephew. His eyes narrowed and dared the younger man to comment.
Quint’s smile broke and he grinned like a danged idiot, but he had enough sense not to speak.
Zan volleyed her gaze from one man to the other then shook her head. She threw her bag in the back where Quint had loaded the other suitcases.
“Get in the truck,” Jacob growled.
Quint saluted the
n opened the door for Zan. A little ball of fur tumbled out of the seat. Jacob had forgotten all about the pup he’d picked up from Bonnie, adding an extra two hours to his drive to the airport. The look of shear delight on Zan’s face made the extra trip worth it.
“Clyde!” Zan shrieked and grabbed the pup before he could dash out into the street. Her smile lit up her whole face. She hugged the mutt to her chest. “I missed you,” she said in a syrupy voice. “Did you miss me?”
The little dog’s entire body shook in her arms. His tongue wetted her chin double-time.
Quint looked at Jacob. The disgusted frown made him want to laugh. Quint shook his head and prodded Zan to get in. Then he followed suit.
Jacob paced his steps, slow to get to the other side of the truck to let the tension ease from his chest. All the pressure that kiss had managed to release built up to monumental proportions on the long ride back to Paintbrush. Zan’s scent filled the cab. Her thigh brushed his with every bump in the road and every slight turn of a corner.
The little fur ball slept on Zan’s lap and she cooed over him from time to time when he’d stir. The soft, gentle whispers of affection reminded Jacob of their times in bed, boiling his blood more.
Jacob tried to focus on baseball statistics, farm chores, anything to keep his blood from pooling in his loins, but even baseball brought her to his thoughts. He didn’t want to embarrass her—or himself—with her nephew riding in the cab with them, but he was afraid he would explode from her nearness.
At the Montana-Wyoming border, Jacob stopped at a rest area to let Clyde out to walk around. Getting away from Zan for a moment didn’t help because as soon as they were back in the confines of the pickup the slow torture built again.
When he crossed through the front gate of the ranch, just as the sun dropped out of sight, his knuckles ached and whitened from his death grip on the steering wheel. He debated his actions from the moment he saw Zan, and after a three-hour drive, he knew what he must do. He pulled up in front of his house and shut off the engine.
Quint started to get out, but Jacob stopped him. “Take the dog. Leave the bags. We’ll take care of it in the morning.”
Zan opened her mouth to protest but the look Jacob gave silenced her and made Quint squirm. The younger man raised an eyebrow, but again had the sense to keep his mouth shut. He picked up the struggling dog and headed to the bunkhouse where he stayed. He looked back once and Jacob could see the smirk on his face before he disappeared into the darkening night.
Second Chances Page 16