Then she allowed her shaky legs to fold and sat with her back to the wall. Rowdy sniffed her face, then licked her chin.
Callum Stewart.
Seeing him again had shaken her more than she wanted to admit. She was still trembling all over, short of breath. His dark hair and fathomless clear blue eyes were the same as she remembered, but the breadth of his shoulders had seemed wider beneath the faded T-shirt.
"At least it's over," she whispered, pressing her shaking hands to her eyes. At least their first time to see each other since he'd left had been in a private setting and not in town. In a small place like Redbud Trails, if they met in public and there were a scene, gossip would spread faster than wildfire during a drought.
And the gossipy townsfolk didn't know everything. Five years ago, she and Callum hadn't made a secret of their romance, but the town didn't know about the ring buried in a shoebox in the back of her closet.
Even Jilly only knew parts of it.
And that was a good thing. If her nosy sister or the town got wind of how deeply her heart had been broken back then, things could get mighty uncomfortable.
She'd thought to never see him again. How would she face him around town, at the grocery store, in church?
His ignorance of her uncle's passing and his obvious grief had brought her own sense of loss back to the forefront. It had seemed more poignant seeing the corresponding loss in his eyes.
How in the world was she going to pretend indifference around him? Then another terrible thought snuck in.
What if he had a girlfriend? Or worse, a wife? Her stomach roiled.
She was over him. It didn't matter if he was with someone, did it?
But his presence here threatened the careful world she'd crafted, managing the ranch and caring for Jilly.
She had to be over him.
She just had to.
2
For a week, Iris let the red truck's presence around town derail her plans. If she saw it in the grocery store parking lot, she drove on past. Post office? She could run that errand later. She'd even missed her Thursday-evening book club meeting because it had been parked at the library.
Things came to a head on the eighth day after she'd faced Callum on her front porch.
After picking up a salt lick and some glucosamine tablets for Jilly's favorite mare, that now suffered from arthritis, she was on her way to pick up lunch for Jilly at the local cafe—a rare treat because of Jilly's dietary needs. Walking past the town square, there was nowhere to hide when Callum's red truck came tooling down Main Street.
She had already ducked beneath an awning of one of the downtown dry cleaners to dodge a burst of rain from the summer shower, and she strongly considered bolting down the street to slip into the library, but not this time. She couldn't hide from him forever. She hiked her chin and prepared for the worst.
Hopefully he was driving through town and not stopping.
The training she'd received to become a paramedic had her assessing road conditions and noticing how the street glistened with moisture. Surprisingly, he drove the twenty-five-mile-an hour-speed limit, something she remembered he'd complained about often as a teenage boy. His window was open, and when he passed her, he lifted one hand from the steering wheel in a casual wave.
Her hands were full with the feed store bags, but she forced herself to nod a greeting—mostly because Mrs. Timmon was peering out the library's front window up ahead and would know something was up if Iris hadn't.
With a prickling awareness on the back of her neck, Iris couldn't help but follow the truck's progress down the street. Redbud Trails was a one-stoplight town, and he had a green light. A few moments, and he would be gone.
But then as she watched in horror, a tricked out newer model version with too-big wheels ran through the stoplight—speeding—and crashed into Callum's truck.
Time seemed to slow as she heard the squeal of brakes. She saw the front end of Callum's truck crush beneath the larger black one, and then it spun out. The momentum of the black truck pushed Callum's over the curb. It crashed through the window of the historical building that housed the Town Hall and the Police Department.
There was a moment of stillness and the echo of tinkling glass, where she drew a rain-soaked breath that sawed against the inside of her throat. Callum!
And then the black truck backed up with a screech of metal and drove off with another squeal of tires. She squinted, trying to see a tag, but only got a blur of white and the bright metallic bumper.
Her adrenaline spiked, her training kicked in and focused her movements. She dropped the ranch goods and bolted toward the wrecked red truck. She dug through her purse until her nerveless fingers wrapped around her cell phone. She mashed the number for dispatch and connected as she ran across the four-way intersection. Looking both ways, there wasn't another car in sight. The black truck was already gone.
Callum's window was still down, and she got a glimpse of blood tracking down his face from a cut at his hairline.
The phone connection clicked on. "Dispatch."
"Andi? It's Iris. There's been an accident at Main Street and Elm."
She forced herself to push aside the choking fear and allowed her training to take over. Head, back, internal injuries. In an accident like this, those were the main worry areas.
Andi's voice rang in her ear through the tinny cell connection. Was he conscious?
Callum groaned. His eyes opened. They were glassy and unfocused as he squinted at her.
"Yes, he's conscious, but he may be concussed."
She attempted the handle, intending to pry the door open, but the impact had crushed the front fender and driver's door. It wouldn't budge.
She knew the arrival time for their volunteer fire department was under six minutes. The fire station was five buildings down. She was off-duty. But her training and the sense of duty that infused her wouldn't let her walk away.
Callum's head rolled on the headrest.
"Stay still," she ordered.
He mumbled something incoherent.
She scrabbled for a hold, some way to boost herself up on the side of his truck, but there was no running board, and she was too petite to get a good look inside.
She ran around the back of the truck, noticing the crowd gathering around, huddling beneath awnings to avoid the rain pattering around them. She didn't even feel it.
The truck was wedged against the building, bricks at the corner crumpled, red dust raining down. Glass crunched underfoot as she sidled up to the passenger door and yanked it open. She had to suck in her stomach to fit between the door and frame.
Inside, the smell of gas was nearly overpowering, and her nose wrinkled in protest. There was glass everywhere inside the truck, and she was careful not to stick herself as she knelt on the seat.
Callum struggled with his seatbelt. She wished she had a neck brace but settled for holding both sides of his jaw between her palms. From her position, she could see that his left leg was caught in the twisted metal.
"Be still," she ordered.
His eyes were focused on her, his pupils a normal size and not the pinpricks she'd see if he'd suffered a concussion.
"The boys," he mumbled. But his words weren't making any sense to her.
"What?"
There was a whimper from the backseat, and she startled. She twisted in the seat and found three matching pairs of Callum's brown eyes staring wide-eyed at her.
Triplets. They looked so alike that they must be.
"Hello," she said dumbly. Callum had children? Her insides twisted like the metal of his truck, crumpling the foundations of her heart.
Forgoing Callum's possible injuries momentarily, guessing that he wouldn't settle until she'd checked over his kids, she leaned over the back seat. She used precious moments to touch each of their little legs. She knew better than to ask if they were scared or hurt—if they were hurt, they'd be screaming. And their wide-eyes told her they were scared. She did a
visual check. Their car seats were intact, there was no glass on them. They didn't appear to have even been scratched.
"They're all right," she said to Callum. "Their car seats kept them safe."
"Are you sure?" His voice was rough with desperation.
Sirens blew, loud because they were close.
Her stomach dipped at the fear in his eyes. He loved his sons completely, the way he used to love her. A responding pang of long-dormant emotion rang inside her like a distant gong—unhelpful.
"You know you can trust me," she said quietly. "They're fine."
He held her gaze for a long silent moment, dark anguish behind his eyes. Was he letting her see because of the insanity of this moment? He blinked, and it was gone.
He levered his hand against the steering wheel, apparently trying to pull his leg out of the metal.
"You need to be still," she said as she popped the glove box. A wide belt buckle thunked to the floorboards, followed by a cascade of fast food napkins. Jackpot. "If you have internal injuries, you could be aggravating them—"
"I don't have internal injuries," he muttered.
"Are you a paramedic?" she asked tartly, attempting to press the napkins against the blood pouring from his temple.
"Are you?" he returned, giving his leg another jerk. The napkin slipped out of place.
"Yes." She pressed against his shoulder, trying to hold him still.
She sensed that she'd surprised him when he stilled beneath her hand. "I can't see from here, but if your leg is bleeding, you'll make it worse with your struggling. The team is almost here."
As if her mention had made them materialize, the rig drew up right in the intersection, and the volunteer firefighter crew jumped off, dressed in full gear.
"I'm going to take the boys out," she told Callum. "Won't they be scared if you have to get pried out of here?"
"Good idea," he said.
"What are their names?"
She started unbuckling the closest boy, leaning halfway over the seatback so she could reach. He had his thumb stuck in his mouth, and she had to wrestle him to get his arms through the seatbelt loops.
"Brandt, Tyler, and Levi. They're three."
All three boys had been nearly silent until now, but as she reached for the middle one who clutched a worn teddy bear, he started to cry. And of course his brothers echoed him as she struggled with the buckle.
"Hey, hey," she said, in a soothing tone she'd taken with other children who'd been shaken up by wrecks. "My name is Miss Iris. I'm a friend of your daddy's."
The white lie burned her throat nearly as badly as the tears she was holding back—the product of her roiling emotions and seeing these little carbon copies of their father up close.
She would hold it all inside until she was alone. She had enough practice. She could do this.
And the little boys needed whatever comfort they could get.
She handed the first one out to a suited-up firefighter, and the boy kicked and squirmed, shrieking.
She wrestled the next one out of his car seat, getting a small shoe to the jaw as he struggled against her. "It's all right, it's all right."
Out Callum's window she could see they'd unloaded the extraction tool, jokingly called the jaws of life. She knew how noisy it would be as they cut Callum loose, and she redoubled her efforts to get the third child out.
She'd handed him to the firefighter and was attempting to follow when Callum caught her elbow in his hand.
"Take them to the hospital, just in case?"
She nodded. "It's protocol."
He gritted his teeth. Either he was in a lot of pain—undoubtedly—or he was getting ready to say something painful. She waited, anticipating the blow.
"Stay with them?" he asked. "Please?"
She closed her eyes as the tears she'd swallowed back earlier burned her eyes. She wouldn't cry in front of him.
She opened her eyes, extra wide so the tears wouldn't fall. "Okay."
* * *
Callum blinked hard and struggled to focus on the image before him in the dim fluorescent light.
Those weren't his boots.
His head hurt. He was woozy and nauseated, and his left leg pulsed with pain. What had happened?
Something hummed in his ears. The slender tan boots with pink stitching knocked to one side, and he got his eyes to working and trailed the boot shaft up a shapely denim-covered calf which seemed to be attached to an attractive set of slender hips, which belonged to...
Iris Tatum slumbered in the chair next to his bedside, one leg propped on his mattress, her cheek pillowed on her elbow on the chair's arm. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail and her lashes made shadows against her cheeks.
He knew something wasn't right. She wasn't supposed to be here, at his side, but for one moment he let himself believe, let himself remember what it was like to have her love...
Antiseptic smells burned his nostrils as emotion welled in his chest, filling up all the cracks that a lifetime of neglect and abandonment had left inside him.
His missing memories came back to him in a rush. The accident. His truck.
The boys.
"Iris." The word stuck in his throat. He tried to clear his throat.
There was a pitcher and cup on a rolling table nearby, but it was too far too reach. He felt like a two thousand pound bull sat on his chest. His limbs were heavy, immovable. Several machines droned nearby, and it was full dark around the edges of the curtain at the window.
She stirred. Hummed a little bit, deep in her throat, and the noise hit him down deep in his belly.
He frowned, knowing he shouldn't be feeling anything for her, not even attraction. He'd never thought to see her again, thought she'd be long gone and good riddance to Redbud Trails.
It had been both of their dreams to get as far away as they could.
She sat up with a start, rubbing one hand over her face. When she straightened, he saw a red crease across her cheek and a messy, hot feeling expanded in his chest. He'd dreamed of seeing her like this, every morning, as his wife.
"I didn't mean to fall asleep." She turned her back to him, rubbing both hands over her face again. Hiding from him?
He hadn't expected her to stay, not this long. But instead of thank you, what emerged from his mouth was, "Where are my boys?" His voice was loaded with gravel, and she stood up to fetch the water without him asking.
Water sluiced from the pitcher into the cup, and he swallowed reflexively.
"They're fine," she said, pressing the cup into his hand. "They're sleeping in a room down the hall."
Just the slide of her fingers against his palm sent goosebumps cascading up his arm and down his back. He frowned, focusing on getting the cup to his mouth without spilling the water all over his chest. His sluggish brain conjured an image of her snuggled up with the three boys, and he blinked—hard—to clear it. Even after he'd slugged the water, a metallic taste remained.
He glanced at the clock. "It's the middle of the night. What are you still doing here?"
After he'd weathered the forty-five minute ride in the back of an ambulance to the next biggest town that had a hospital, there had been a flurry of x-rays and an examination before they'd taken him into surgery, late in the afternoon. The orthopedic surgeon wasn't local, and it was today or wait a week. He'd opted for today.
After surgery, he'd woken once earlier in the recovery room, but this room appeared to be a private affair. They must've moved him.
She couldn't know how much hope—pointless hope—her presence gave him. He tried to steel himself against it.
"You asked me to stay with the boys...the doctor said he would release them, since there's nothing wrong with them, but he couldn't release them to you because you're in here, and no one could find contact information for your wife..."
She flushed, glancing at a shelf on the wall where someone had folded his clothes. Beside them sat his cell phone. It didn't take much of an ima
gination to guess that either she or someone else had flipped through his contacts on the device. Maybe even looked at the pictures, looking for evidence of someone who didn't exist. Strangers, these doctors, nurses, firefighters...
He scowled as he imagined the town that had rejected him so completely talking about him again. And his sons. Sam, the only friend he'd kept in touch with over the years, had said it would be different now, but Callum couldn't believe, not yet. "Grapevine must be going nuts," he muttered, unable to stop the tinge of bitterness in his voice.
Her nose wrinkled, an expression he remembering poignantly, one that meant she thought he was being unreasonable.
"I'm not married." He said it simply, made it a statement in hopes that she wouldn't press for details, not now.
"Oh."
Back before he'd left, he'd always been able to read her. Not this time. She had ahold of both elbows, her arms crossed over her middle like she was cold, and kept her eyes on the wall, not on him. He didn't want to hurt her—never had, even though it had been inevitable—but hated that he couldn't tell if his revelation had any effect on her.
"Well, I can...I guess I can stay with the boys until the morning. Do you have someone who can come take them?"
He shifted in the bed, the movement jarring his leg. He winced, and she looked worriedly toward the door.
There was no one else.
"I'll talk to the doctor in the morning. If I can get a ride out to my place, we can all go home together." It wasn't ideal, but then, what about his life was? Except for the boys, he'd had to fight tooth and nail for everything.
Her brows had folded together in an expression of skepticism. "They won't release you tomorrow—not when you've just had surgery."
She looked like she wanted to say more, but then she frowned too, and took a step away from the bed. Like maybe she was remembering that it wasn't her business, that they weren't even friends, no matter what she'd said to his sons in the truck.
He shrugged, forcing his face into a casual expression, like this was just another day. "They'll have to."
Secondhand Cowboy Page 2