“Uh . . . yeah,” she said, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes.
For the first time in over a week, again he felt the niggling sense that something wasn’t right. The ingredients she’d left on the counter only confirmed it—flour, lard, salt, and baking soda. “You know that this is soda . . . not powder, right?”
She frowned and took in the container in his hand. “Oh, wow. Yeah. I’m just tired.”
“You’ve been holed up in here for two days, like some sort of outlaw. What’s going on?”
She’d pushed her bangs back with her forearm, leaving a fresh trail of flour. She didn’t comment as she went back to prying the flattened disks from the pan. Three broke off with a whoosh, and one hit him in the chest. She looked up, wide eyed.
“Hey, look out. Those things are lethal.”
Her expression darkened.
Uh-oh, he’d made George mad. Hiding a grin, he scooped one off the floor and winged it back at her.
She ducked, but a small smile creased her face. Before Nick knew it, she’d gathered the pile of black bullets into her arms, shielded herself behind the counter, and begun to pick him off.
He held his arms over his face and took cover behind the other end of the counter. “Piper!”
“Get out of my kitchen, Nick!”
“Okay, okay!” He hit his knees, slinking out, then ran out the door. But he wore a silly grin on his face all day.
Now, as CJ lit out after another calf, Nick couldn’t help but let his thoughts roam. Like . . . what if he had a son, one with chocolate brown eyes and unruly blond hair, with Piper’s freckles and her devastating smile? Or a little girl, who would climb into his lap to hear his stories and learn to cook like her mother?
The thought so took him, he didn’t notice as CJ roped the calf. “What did you think of that, Nick?”
Nick rounded up his thoughts, tried to find his footing in reality. “Uh, great.”
CJ grinned as he rewound his rope.
“CJ, I have to ask you—your horse is great, but he’s still a little scared of the rope. Why haven’t you tried Pecos?” He kept his voice light, but seeing Pecos had shaken him, and his insides burned every time he thought of his father giving his paint away. If his father had been trying to hurt him, he’d done a stellar job.
“Well, I’m not supposed to ride Pecos,” CJ said, bringing his horse around and backing him into the chute. “Mom told me I couldn’t. The day Uncle Dutch brought him over, she sat on the porch and cried. I don’t know why, but she doesn’t want anyone to ride him.”
“Then why did Bishop give him to her?”
CJ straightened the coils in his rope. “She said it was a gift of love.”
Oh. Nick let that thought simmer. Bishop had always liked Maggy, but the gift seemed extreme for a caretaker. He had a feeling Bishop was trying to apologize in his stead.
What if, in fact, the gift wasn’t meant to hurt so much as to heal?
Nick locked the calf into the gate, got her straightened around while CJ measured out the loop of his rope and fixed it in his grip. “Try and send it on the second loop this time,” he instructed.
The kid would nail the prize at the Custer County rodeo. But Nick suddenly wanted more for him. He wanted the championship. He wanted to see the hard-earned smile of victory in CJ’s dark brown eyes.
CJ absorbed Nick’s instruction, determination on his suntanned face. Thata boy.
“Ready?”
The boy leaned forward in his saddle, watching the gate.
Nick popped it open, and the calf shot out. A second later, CJ followed. He threw on his second go-round and tagged the calf dead-on. The rope broke at 8.25 seconds.
“Good job, kid.”
CJ grinned at him, again winding up his rope. “I gotta get home. Mom needs help. The bulls dug up a hose, and it’s draining the water tanks. We don’t want any more cows dying.”
“You had a cow die?”
CJ worked to move the calf into a holding corral. “Five of them near the south end. My dad rented the land this winter, and when we went for roundup, we found them and the tank mostly dry.”
“That land bumps up to Hatcher’s Table on Silver Buckle land,” Nick said, mostly to himself.
CJ closed the cattle gate. “I cut through there sometimes on my way to Mr. Lovell’s land. He lets me do some hand work.”
Like mother, like son, apparently. How did this kid find time to practice, homeschool, help his mother, and do odd jobs? Nick wondered if CJ’s workload had anything to do with Cole’s cast and the comments he’d picked up from Stefanie alluding to Cole’s health problems.
To see Cole hurting had bothered Nick more than he wanted to admit. Cole had always worked ten times harder than Nick, and Nick knew it must be sheer torture for Cole to watch Maggy and CJ run the ranch on their own. Cole had set the bar when it came to cowboying.
“Let it go, Nick.” Cole’s words had latched on, dogged him like a hungry coyote. “Let it go.”
And then what? Nick had returned to make sure the Silver Buckle stayed in Noble hands. Letting go would mean giving up. It might even mean selling out. Perhaps to that buyer Saul had rustled up.
No. He’d never surrender the family legacy.
“You and your mom need any help?” Nick wasn’t sure why he asked, but suddenly he couldn’t stop himself. Maybe helping Maggy would give him a peek at their side of the fence. He’d discover why Cole had been so important to Bishop.
“Thanks, Mr. Noble, but we just hired on a man—Jay. He’s working with my mom.”
An old flare of protectiveness—probably left over from his cop days—burst to life inside him. “Jay who?”
“He’s just Jay. He answered an ad my mom put up in Lolly’s. He said he’d been in Wyoming, rodeoing.” CJ climbed down from his horse, led the animal through the fence as Nick closed it.
Nick stood there, rolling that information through his head. Hiring temporary hands was a way of life out here. Still, his past experience with drifters in Wellesley had his instincts buzzing. “You watch over your mom, okay?”
CJ gave him a curious look, then nodded. “You comin’ to the rodeo on Saturday?”
“Wild horses couldn’t keep me away.” He grinned at CJ, then slapped the horse’s hindquarters. “Remember to angle your rope!”
CJ lifted his hat without looking back as he trotted across the field toward the St. John spread.
Nick chuckled, remembering the days when he rode the Silver Buckle as if he already owned it—cocky, young, brash.
Stupid.
“The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. He will not constantly accuse us, nor remain angry forever. He does not punish us for all our sins; he does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve.” The words from Psalm 103 filled his thoughts, a replay from what he’d read last night. Since the roundup and Dutch’s comments, he’d dug out his father’s old, marked-up Bible. Seeing Bishop’s comments written in the margins stirred up memories of his father’s voice: “The love of the Lord remains forever with those who fear him. His salvation extends to the children’s children of those who are faithful to his covenant, of those who obey his commandments!”
Nick hadn’t exactly kept God’s precepts. He’d thrown them out like every other remnant of his upbringing. But without a compass to guide him, he had been left lonely and wandering. And harboring an anger that only festered.
Certainly not the future his father had hoped for him.
His father probably hadn’t hoped for a future in which his children lost the Silver Buckle either. Nick had spent the better part of three days clearing the last of the carcasses from the field and meeting with the Custer County sheriff again over the circumstances of the stampede. He bristled when the sheriff asked if he thought anyone might be out to cause trouble for the Silver Buckle. Neither he nor Stefanie had mentioned Cole or Pecos.
Stefanie didn’t out of loyalty. Nick didn’
t because he wanted to solve this on his own terms.
Everything inside him said Cole wouldn’t start a stampede. And certainly Cole wasn’t responsible for the sick, dehydrated cattle out at Hatcher’s Table. Yes, Cole most likely hated Nick, but could a man change that much? Cole had always been the peacemaker.
Pecos had probably escaped his corral and set out for the home he’d known all his life—the Silver Buckle. An instinct Nick should have followed long ago.
Last night, long after the sun slid behind the Bighorns, Nick had sat in darkness on the porch, watching the light from Piper’s window and wondering how long forgiveness took to incubate and what it might look like when it was birthed.
He was starting to believe that Cole would get everything Bishop had promised him.
And Nick couldn’t do a thing about it.
To Piper, the smell of baking bread—without the added scent of char—felt like the applause of thousands. She sat on the stainless-steel counter, her attention on the little brown-stained oven window.
Carter would be so impressed. She was so impressed. Four days of devouring the how-to sections in Chet’s cookbooks, experimenting with ingredients, learning the difference between biscuit batter and bread dough, and she’d finally managed to cook something that might have Nick’s mouth watering.
She no longer tried to dodge the truth—Nick had camped out at the edge of her heart and was fast sneaking his way inside. She felt the fool for how often she listened for his boots, hoping he’d call her George in that deep, husky voice.
To say that she’d fully immersed herself in this alias seemed a bit understated. She was Piper Sullivan, cookie of the Silver Buckle. The thought made her smile.
The screen door whined, and footsteps crossed the planks of the dining hall.
She jumped off the counter as Nick entered.
“I am under your command, O Bread Queen,” he said as he pulled off his hat.
Piper quirked an eyebrow at him.
“The smell. It’s not part of your magical powers?”
She smirked. “As a matter of fact, it is. . . .” Only, what would she command him to do first? The timer dinged before she could finish her thought, and she grabbed a set of pot holders. Nick opened the oven, and Piper nearly cheered at the two light brown loaves of white bread. She took them out of the oven as if they were freshly blown glass.
She set the bread on the counter, then flipped the loaves onto a baking rack to cool. “I think that’s going to turn out.”
He smiled. “Of course it will.”
She tossed the hot pads onto the counter, put her hands on her hips, and stared at her creation, satisfaction full and deep within her. Take that, Carter.
She looked at Nick. He was staring at her with an odd look.
“What?”
He shrugged. “It’s just nice to see you taking such pride in your work. Like it’s a new creation every day. Makes me rethink the simple tasks that seem so mundane.”
Oh. Right. She nodded, unable to contain her emotions. “This is going to work out, Nick.”
He looked at her so sweetly, so oddly delighted, that something burst inside her. She liked the Piper she saw in his eyes—capable, nurturing, even a part of this project to turn the Noble ranch into a getaway for families. A place where she might find a family too.
That thought swept through her, wiping the smile right off her face. She turned away before he saw regret cut through her expression.
“Cookie,” he said shaking his head, “you make anything taste great.”
She did? Wow, did she have him fooled.
“Hey . . . while we wait for the bread to cool . . . you wanna go for a ride?”
She turned back, considering what that might mean in her state of mind. Perhaps some fresh air to cool off the longing that seemed to burn through her. “All right.” She took off her apron as she followed him out of the dining hall.
He ran his hands through his hair just before he put his hat back on. The gesture made her want to do the same—twirl her fingers around his curls.
So maybe Carter had been right. She was falling—just a little—for a cowboy. The sudden memory of being in Nick’s arms broadsided her—his strength, his response to her kiss . . . he hadn’t even hinted at kissing her again, a gesture that, up until now, she’d pegged as gentlemanly. Now she wondered if she should suggest they ride together, like they had on the first day.
No, bad idea. Instead, “When does the first guest arrive?”
“Next week, after Memorial Day.”
“I’ll be ready,” she said, realizing that she meant it. Pull yourself together, Piper! She gazed out across the range, smelling the wildflowers, the loamy smell of earth and animal. It seemed such a natural, even fragrant part of the ranch.
“I know you will, George. You’re going to be a hit.”
A strange joy engulfed her as they entered the barn.
He saddled a horse for her, then swung up on his own.
The late-afternoon sun warmed her neck as they headed out of the driveway and across the winter pasture. Piper felt comfortable in the saddle, especially with Nick close enough to grab the reins should her horse startle. The squeak of the saddle, the smell of leather, the sound of cattle. It almost felt like a date.
A date. She hadn’t had a date since . . . well, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d let a man near enough to know her. But Nick didn’t really know her, did he? He knew Piper Sullivan, the chef with a Curious George streak. He hadn’t the foggiest idea that she might be an ace—or former ace—reporter with an agenda.
What exactly was that agenda again?
They climbed a rocky bluff littered with limestone and boulders, cut with jack pine and scrub brush. The wind stirred the leaves, and the horses snorted.
“Go easy here,” Nick shouted over his shoulder. “It’s not a hard climb.” He glanced behind him to ensure she followed him.
How sweet, her protector. She smiled at him.
Nick reined in his horse at the top of the hill. Climbing off, he tethered the animal to a downed log, held Piper’s reins as she dismounted, then tied her horse with his.
“This place is called the Cathedral,” he said, starting up the rocky incline.
She followed him along a dirt path dissecting the rocky hillside. A grove of trees shaded a fire pit flanked by two rough-hewn benches. In every direction, the land rolled out over bluff and wash, covered by a carpet of white yarrow and purple kittentail. The Bighorn Mountains, hazy and magenta on the horizon, rimmed the western view. To the east, only hills and endless blue sky.
“Wow,” Piper said when they entered the clearing. A fresh feeling of awe washed through her, taking with it her breath.
“‘He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.’” The words emerged from Nick in a mumble.
But she felt them like a warm breath, drawing through her, invading her pores. Nudging something that felt hidden and barren. Her soul perhaps. “What is that?”
“It’s a verse from Psalms. My dad quoted it sometimes when we’d come here. We’d come on the Sundays when we didn’t make it to church. He’d open his Bible, which he almost always carried with him, and read Psalm 103.”
Nick seemed to be back in time, listening to his father, as he quoted: “‘The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him. For he knows how weak we are; he remembers we are only dust.’”
Father . . . compassionate? Piper issued an involuntary harrumph, and she instantly wanted to take it back. The last thing she wanted to do was let Nick close enough to see her scars. To pity her.
Nick obviously heard it, however, because he frowned. “What’s the matter?”
What was the matter? She had one formerly broken bone and a scar on her arm to illustrate what a father’s compassion meant to her. She yanked her shirtsleeves down over her thumbs, crossed her arms over her chest.
“Piper?”
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No, Nick . . . Only, her mouth wasn’t listening to the warning sound her brain emitted. “I don’t like thinking about God in terms of father. Not all fathers have compassion on their children.”
As expected, a sick look came over him. She replayed his reaction to her nightmare: “If it wasn’t a nightmare, then it was a memory, and I’m going to kill the person who left you with that.”
Nick also seemed to remember that moment because he said, “Were your nightmares about your dad?”
She didn’t mean to, but she reacted as if he’d hit her. Cringing and turning so he couldn’t see her.
“Oh no.” The softness in his tone made Piper close her eyes. Sometimes he reminded her so much of Jimmy. Jimmy, who hadn’t hesitated when he’d stepped between her and Russell over and over . . . until it had nearly gotten him killed.
She almost jumped from her skin when Nick put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Piper. I . . . shouldn’t have asked.”
She closed her eyes, horrified that she’d let him inside but burning with the sudden need to tell him. To let him care, and, if only for a moment, not face her demons alone.
“My mother always said she shouldn’t have married him. She was young and stupid, and he was a dashing cowboy with devastating charm. He’d been married before—his wife had died in childbirth, and he needed a mom for his five-year-old son.”
Piper stepped away from Nick, her back stiff, and took a deep breath. “Mom said that he didn’t start hitting her—hitting us—until he broke his leg rodeoing one winter. After that, they fell on hard times, and he started drinking. My earliest memory is hiding under the bed while he tore the trailer apart. He even broke my arm once.”
She felt Nick’s presence beside her, felt the way he held his breath, felt even the anger that radiated from him. She couldn’t look at him. Instead, she faced the breathtaking scenery. “My mother was a Christian. Whenever she prayed, I remember wondering why God, if He loved me or my mother, would let those things happen. I mean, weren’t fathers supposed to protect their children? Instead, Russell . . . well, most of the time, I wished he were dead.”
Reclaiming Nick Page 20