Expecting...in Texas

by Ferrarella, Marie

  It was all still jumbled in her head, but bits and pieces were becoming clearer. A feeling of urgency filled her, although she didn’t know why. “I dreamed that Lily was nursing a baby.”

  “What baby?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Ruben turned on his side. His arm under his pillow, he snuggled against it. He was anxious to get a little more sleep before dawn and hard work met him. “That’s nice.”

  Upset by his reaction, Rosita leaned over her husband, talking directly into his ear. “Don’t you want to hear the rest of the dream?”

  Ruben struggled against irritation and tried to maintain his hold on sleep. “Why would I want to hear what indigestion has made you dream of?”

  He was always blaming her visions on indigestion. But he was a man and knew little about things like visions. “Not indigestion.” She shook his shoulder again. “Listen to me, old man.”

  He sighed, knowing that he was waging a losing battle. But he was bound to try anyway.

  “The middle of the night is the time for sleeping, not listening.” His eyes shut, he willed her into silence—as if that ever worked. “I will listen in the morning.” When he fervently hoped all this nonsense of hers would be forgotten. He supposed that made him a bit of a dreamer, too.

  But Rosita was determined to talk about her dream now, while the pieces were all still fresh in her mind. “I was watching Maria with the baby at the wedding today.”

  More awake than asleep now, Ruben sighed again. “You had nothing better to occupy yourself with?” he mumbled into his pillow.

  She ignored the question. “The baby seemed to recognize Maria.”

  Ruben turned toward her. This had to stop. He couldn’t sleep if she insisted on talking. “How could he recognize anyone? He is only, what? Three months old perhaps? And besides, he has been here for only a few weeks.”

  Vindicated, Rosita held up a finger for emphasis. “That is my point.”

  She had lost him. It was nothing new. Ruben had learned a long time ago not to try to keep up with the way his wife’s mind worked. It only led to frustration in the end.

  “Your point is dull, my love. Now, please, for the love of our children, let me get some sleep before I fall off my horse tomorrow.”

  He was turning away from her. In a moment, she knew he would be asleep. The man was infuriating. “But you haven’t heard my dream yet.”

  Ruben sighed again, louder this time. It was a sigh of resignation, if not surrender. There was no talking her out of it.

  “All right.” Turning, he faced her squarely, his eyes wide open—the way they probably would remain for the rest of what was left of the night, he thought mournfully. “Tell me your dream and then maybe we’ll both get some sleep.” Although he sincerely doubted it.

  Victorious, Rosita proceeded slowly now, for effect and drama. “I dreamed that Lily was nursing a baby.” She paused significantly. “Suddenly, the baby transformed into a scorpion and stung her!”

  “Definitely indigestion,” Ruben pronounced. Having done his duty, he turned away from her again. “All right, you have told me. Now let’s get some sleep.”

  Disappointed, Rosita glared at him. What did she expect? He was a man and didn’t understand these things. “You are impossible.”

  “No, only tired.”

  The sentence came out in a soft sigh. Ruben was asleep before the last word was out of his mouth, leaving Rosita to lie beside him, upset and fuming.

  And convinced that her vision contained more than an ounce of truth….

  “Are you sure?” Cruz looked at his sister, surprised and maybe just a little more pleased than he wanted to let on, even to himself. Maggie had come knocking on his door this morning with the news just as he was about to head toward the stable.

  It had stopped him in his tracks.

  Maggie grinned at her older brother. So, she’d been right. There was something going on between Cruz and Vanessa’s friend. Watching him last night, she’d sensed that something was up, but she hadn’t been sure until just this moment.

  “Of course I’m sure.” She fell into step with him as he went to get his horse.

  “Do you know how long she’ll be staying?”

  Cruz’s curiosity tickled her. He’d always been so very fickle before, going through women like a man leafing slowly through the pages of a magazine. This time, it looked as if he’d stopped to read the story that went along with the pictures.

  About time, Maggie thought.

  Cruz had spent the better part of the reception in Savannah Clark’s company. That had to mean something since he normally divided his time with no less than five women during the course of one of these parties.

  But to say so, Maggie knew, would be to annoy him. She decided to save that little observation as ammunition for some future time. She never knew when she might need it.

  “Indefinitely.” Maggie watched Cruz saddle his horse, his face impassive. She knew him better than that. He wouldn’t be asking questions if he wasn’t interested. He wasn’t one for idle gossip. “It seems the school where she was teaching had to let some of their staff go. She needed a job and Vanessa offered her one. She’d going to be the ranch’s new bookkeeper.”

  So, she’d be working for the Fortunes. That put her on the same level as he was. Cruz wondered if Savannah thought of that as a step down. He knew from experience that the Fortune family and their hired help did not readily mix, no matter what magnanimous words might be said to the contrary or what invitations were extended. The bottom line was that the Fortunes were above them and would always continue that way.

  Tightening the saddle cinch, he looked at his sister. “So she’ll be staying on.”

  Maggie nodded. “Looks that way.” Maggie made no attempt to hide the fact that she was taken with his reaction. “Are you interested?”

  Yes, he thought, he was interested. For all her shyness, Savannah had been a very satisfying lover and he wanted to lure her back to his bed. Just to assure himself that he’d over-glorified the night in his mind.

  But he’d missed his chance to find out last night. After Dallas had cut in on them, other members of the Fortune family had followed and gone on to monopolize Savannah’s time. So he had distracted himself with the woman he’d been with.

  Or tried to. But his heart hadn’t been in it and he’d gone back to his cabin alone, to fall into a restless sleep that had left him more tired than refreshed when he woke up this morning.

  The tangle of dreams he’d had had faded the moment he’d woken up, but they had left him weary. And more restless.

  “Are you interested?” Maggie repeated, peering at his face.

  Cruz shrugged, absently looking over toward the house. “No more than usual,” he finally said.

  But Maggie had her doubts about that.

  Four

  Vanessa and Devin left on their honeymoon immediately after the reception, and life on the sprawling ranch went back to normal.

  But normal did not really include her, Savannah thought as she sat the next morning in the dining room, pretending to eat breakfast. She’d gone from being Vanessa’s best friend to being a ranch employee, and wasn’t really sure anymore how to behave.

  Dallas was at the table with her, as was Ryan. After murmuring a preoccupied hello in her direction, Ryan had been prodded by his son to give the final okay on Savannah’s hiring.

  “Hmm? Oh yes, of course. I’m sure you’ll be fine.” Picking up the cup of coffee at his place, he began walking away with it, heading for the front door. “But there’s no need to rush into anything,” he tossed back at her in his wake, still preoccupied. “Why don’t you wait until Vanessa returns before you get started? Just consider this an extended vacation for now.”

  Translation: I’m being retained as a favor, Savannah thought. There was no reason to wait for Vanessa. Vanessa was a psychologist, not the manager of the ranch. That position belonged to Ryan, and to Dallas in part because Dallas wou
ld be the one who’d be taking over the ranch when his father retired.

  A sour taste formed in Savannah’s mouth. She’d told Vanessa that she didn’t like the idea of being anyone’s charity case.

  Dallas waited until he heard the front door close before saying anything to Savannah. “It’s not what you think.”

  Savannah stopped toying with the breakfast pastry on her plate. There was just no way she could bring it to her mouth. She’d spent the first half hour of her day being miserably ill with morning sickness. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that Vanessa didn’t make up the bookkeeping job. We really do need someone to keep the books around here.” He looked toward the front of the house. “It’s just that lately, Dad’s been kind of preoccupied. What with the divorce, and Sophia trying to take him for all he’s worth.”

  Savannah knew all about the bitter battle Ryan Fortune was embroiled in. “You read minds?”

  Dallas laughed, shaking his head. “Your face is an open book. Consider yourself on salary as of this morning.” He pushed back from the table. “As for the books, I’ll show them to you myself later this week. I work at the Fortune TX offices in town, but I also have a hand in the ranch management. For now, why don’t you do what Dad said? Just enjoy our hospitality. Go for a ride. I’ll even join you, if you like.”

  Savannah gave the pastry one last look and then rose from the table. “No, you’ve been kind enough already. I think I could use a little time to myself right now, if you don’t mind.”

  He understood very well about wanting to be alone. Ever since his wife had died, Dallas had carved out huge chunks of solitude for himself.

  “Understood.” Finished, Dallas dropped his napkin beside his plate and rose. “Tell one of the hands to saddle a horse for you. Help yourself to any one, although I’d recommend Pixie Dust. She’d got a disposition like an angel.” He smiled at Savannah before leaving. “Like you.”

  Dallas really was very sweet, Savannah thought as she walked to the stables. It was such a shame that he didn’t smile more often. A man like that deserved to be happy. She fervently hoped that he would find someone someday to make him as happy as his late wife had.

  As she walked, Savannah kept one eye out for Cruz. It wasn’t to try to get his attention if she saw him, but to avoid it. She really did want to be alone with her thoughts right now, to try to sort them out.

  “Can I help you with anything, señorita?” Cruz was just walking out of the stables as she hurried in.

  So much for trying to avoid him. “No, I just want to get a horse.”

  “Choose one, I’ll saddle it for you.” Cruz gestured into the stable.

  Savannah wanted to do it herself. She’d never gotten the knack of being pampered. And she certainly didn’t want to be waited on by him. “That’s all right. I’m sure you’re busy. I know how to saddle a horse.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were staying on at the ranch?”

  Startled, Savannah’s hands froze on the saddle horn. She’d just placed the saddle on a strawberry mare and was about to tighten the cinch under the horse’s belly. Well, gossip sure did travel fast, she supposed. She tried to look nonchalant as she glanced at Cruz over her shoulder.

  “I didn’t think you’d be interested.” It was an honest answer, if not the complete truth.

  Nudging her gently aside, Cruz took over tightening the cinch. “I’m interested in everything about you, don’t you know that?”

  The man could melt steel at thirty paces with that look, Savannah thought. And she wasn’t steel.

  Savannah shook her head. “It’s all right— I relieve you of it.”

  He looked completely lost. “Of what?”

  “Of the need to be charming around me.” She tried to look serious, and only partially succeeded. “Cruz, if we’re going to keep running into each other like this, you’re going to grow very tired of being so devastatingly charming to me.”

  His eyes slid over her in a look that could only be called possessive. His smile was wide. “Never.”

  Savannah sighed. “Why don’t you just treat me the way you treat Vanessa? It might make it easier on both of us.”

  Especially on her, she thought. She didn’t know just how much longer she could keep resisting him. It was important to stop the game now, before she became too addicted to what he might offer. And too devastated when he didn’t offer it any longer.

  Picking up the reins, Cruz led the mare out for her. “Well, for one thing, I never made love with Vanessa.”

  Savannah had never even considered that possibility. Now that Cruz mentioned it, she realized that Vanessa and him making love was something that very well could have happened—growing up on the ranch together and being so close.

  But she believed him when he said they hadn’t. Words slid effortlessly from his tongue like golden honey pouring from a pitcher, but somehow she believed him. Besides, surely if Vanessa had ever been romantically involved with him, she would have said something when Savannah confessed about being pregnant with Cruz’s baby.

  Still, Vanessa was one of the most beautiful people, inside and out, that Savannah had ever known. She couldn’t understand Cruz not making a play for her friend. “Why didn’t you?”

  His smile grew a little less lethal. “Because she’s like a sister to me.”

  For some men, that wouldn’t have meant much. But Savannah knew what a high regard Cruz had for his family. It hadn’t taken long to discover. She could tell by the way she’d seen him kiss his mother on the cheek at the reception, the way he’d looked at his sister Maggie when she’d talked to some of the male guests. There was affection and an air of the protector about Cruz when it came to his family.

  All the things, she thought, that had been missing from her own life, her own family. They had been three polite, well-educated people forced to live with one another for a time—all because of one mistake.

  The same mistake she’d made, but wasn’t going to compound, even though a part of her ached to have Cruz in her life any way she could. Each time she was around him, she found herself more drawn, more attracted. More wistful. And more resolved not to make her parents’ misjudgment. Love did not bloom under adversity. Only hostility did.

  “I don’t know if that makes Vanessa lucky, or not,” Savannah commented.

  The remark started Cruz wondering about her again. Was she as genuine as she seemed? Or was it all just a very clever act? When he was with her, he could swear that she was completely sweet, completely innocent. Yet away from Savannah, when thoughts had time to ferment and impressions faded, Cruz found himself thinking she had to be like the rest.

  Didn’t she?

  He glanced toward his own horse. Hellfire stood in the corral, jealously watching him work with the other horse. A thought began to form, created by impulse.

  “That would be for you to judge,” he told her, “not me.”

  The conversation was headed toward hotter ground than she wanted to tread on. Savannah took the reins from him.

  “If I’m going to be working for the Fortunes, you and I are going to have to come to some sort of mutual agreement.”

  His eyes sparkled. She was playing hard to get, he realized. Nothing he loved better than a challenge. It made him want her that much more. The fact that he’d already had her didn’t really enter into the picture.

  His eyes cut the distance between them until there was nothing. “I’m all for that.”

  Savannah tried to pull her wits together. Cruz was making it very hard to think. “We’re going to have to have a working arrangement.”

  Just what he had in mind. He ran his hand up along her elbow and had the pleasure of seeing a spark of desire enter her eyes. “You know what they say. All work and no play…”

  She thought of everything Vanessa had told her after she’d made her confession. Cruz’s conquests were legion. “No one can accuse you of that.”

  “No,” he agreed. “They can’t.” His br
own eyes darkened a shade. “But I work hard for my keep. No one can say any less than that, either.”

  Had she offended him? There was so much pride in Cruz, so much in the way for her to wade through. She knew she didn’t want to inadvertently put him down. Even if she never wanted to tell him that the child she carried was his, she still wanted to get to know him. For her baby’s sake, as well as her own. To get to know him and to perhaps become his friend, at least for a little while. Her parents had been lovers, but never friends—and in the end, Savannah knew it was friendship that kept love alive.

  He held the reins for her as she mounted the horse. “So, where are you going?”

  She looked toward the wide, open spaces that beckoned to her. “Just for a ride. To clear my head a little.”

  He still held on to the reins, even though she reached for them. “Alone?”

  Firmly, she leaned over and took the reins from his hand. “I don’t mind being alone. Dallas offered to come with me, but—”

  At the mention of the other man, she saw Cruz’s mouth harden just a fraction.

  Dallas again. Was there something serious going on between them? Dallas had his own house on the ranch, yet Cruz knew that last night, the other man had slept in the big house.

  As had Savannah.

  He raised his chin, his eyes cool. “And you turned him down?”

  Why was he looking at her that way? What had she said? “I didn’t want to take him away from anything.”

  “That’s very kind of you.” The smile returned, as if nothing at all had crossed his mind except to enjoy the day as it unfolded. “But we can’t have you riding around and getting lost. I’ll come with you.”

  She looked toward the corral. It was where Cruz worked to train each horse individually. There was one in there now. “Aren’t you working?”

  Taking hold of the mare’s bit to keep Savannah from suddenly riding off, he led her horse over to his own horse. Releasing Pixie Dust, Cruz easily slid onto Hellfire. He needed no saddle, no reins—just his skill.

  “Even employees get to have a lunch break. I’m just taking mine a little early.” Cruz gestured for her to lead the way. “I was about to go for a ride anyway.”