The Love of a Cowboy

by Anna Jeffrey

  He scooted into the driver’s seat and twisted to face her, laying one arm across the back of the bench seat and resting the other elbow on the steering wheel. His straw hat lay between them, a barrier to her moving closer. In a flicker of paranoia, she wondered if he had purposely placed it between them. She managed to paste on a smile. “What’s up?”

  “I, uh, wanted to talk to you, Dahlia.”

  His tone was low, his eyes solemn and unfathomable. She scrunched up her shoulders. “I like talk. Let’s talk.”

  “I’ve been thinking about what’s going on between us, Dal.”

  The happiness from a few minutes earlier resurged. No wonder he was so serious. He wanted to discuss their relationship. “Oh, Luke, I’ve thought about it, too, and—”

  “Aw, hell, Dahlia…” He turned and faced the windshield, hunched his shoulders and tucked his hands between his knees. “I’ve got some problems, sugar.”

  Premonition flew into her mind. Please. I don’t want to hear this. Her heart began a rapid rhythm. She, too, jerked her head to stare at the windshield.

  “Janet found out about the cabin.”

  For an instant, Dahlia was consoled. He and his ex-wife had been divorced a long time. Why should it be a concern of hers if Luke had an affair? “And that’s a problem?”

  “It’s the girls. The kids live with me, but Janet’s the one with legal custody. She sicced her lawyer on me. Wants those kids brought back to her house. I gotta take ‘em to Boise tomorrow.”

  Dahlia winced inside, hating the idea of causing trouble for his children. And at the same time, she quelled the urge to scream curses on empty-headed Dave Adams and malicious Beauty-Shop-Tami. “I see.”

  “It’s a damn mess. Not something I can’t get handled in time, but knowing my ex-wife like I do, if I don’t put the kibosh on it right now, it could turn into a regular rodeo.”

  “Exactly what are you, uh, putting the kibosh on?”

  “Well . . . they’re saying I’m immoral and some other stuff . . .”

  They? Other stuff? The odd catch in his voice caused her to glance back at him. For an absurd instant, she was distracted from the catastrophe evolving in her own life by worrying what could be upsetting him so much.

  “. . . school starts next week,” he was saying. “If the girls enroll down in Boise, it’ll be just that much harder later to get ‘em back up here. Those kids have been through a lot. Been shuffled back and forth between houses. Seen stuff kids don’t need to see. They’re my flesh and blood, Dahlia. My responsibility. I can’t let anything compete for my attention to ’em. They need me too much.”

  And I don’t? My only living relative is lying in a hospital. Dahlia wanted badly say it, but she couldn’t risk his pity. “N—no, I suppose you can’t.”

  “But it’s more than that. I’ve got a lot to do right now. Morgan got a job in Boise. Him and Brenna are leaving the ranch, moving Labor Day weekend. Winter’s coming on. It takes all of us to get ready and I’ve been wasting so much time, I haven’t been holding up my end. All of a sudden, my back’s against the wall and we’re gonna be going into cold weather short-handed.”

  Dahlia knew Luke’s brother-in-law was a lawyer who had political aspirations and she knew Luke’s sisters helped with the ranch work. “Morgan got a job? Practicing law?”

  Luke went on as if he hadn’t heard her question, spilling more words than she had ever heard from him at one time. “Coming from Texas and all, I know you don’t understand it, but up here, if a cowman gets caught by the weather, he could lose everything. Mother Nature doesn’t give two hoots about my silly social life.”

  Silly social life? Wasting time? Dahlia felt as if he had punched her with his fist. Bitterness boiled up. “Could we get to the point, Luke? You aren’t the only person in the world with problems.”

  Her truculent words hit home. Hurt clouded his eyes. “Well, yeah. I just think we oughtta, well . . . take a look at what we’re doing. This whole thing got a little hotter than I ever expected it to. The way things are in Callister, if we keep this up, it’ll wind up hurting my kids and my family. And I have to ask myself if having a good time’s worth it. I mean, that’s about all either one of us was after, wasn’t it? We both knew you were in town just for the summer, right?”

  “Well, I . . .”

  She couldn’t finish. Her throat had closed. What was left to be said anyway? How could what she meant to him be any plainer? She had been naïve, convincing herself he loved her. In truth, she was but one more in a long line of women he took and discarded to suit his convenience, just another Moscow-to- Winnemucca groupie after all. She felt the snap in her chest as her heart broke.

  Her survival instinct, that salving discipline life had forced her to hone, switched on. She began to pretend she was an observer in this drama rather than a participant. “Actually, it’s just as well. It’s time I got back to Texas anyway.” She was proud of her self-control and cool delivery when her every body part wanted to shrivel.

  “And I think that’s what you should do. Maybe let things cool down, clear our heads a little.”

  She heard relief in his matter-of-fact reply and why not? She was giving him a free ride—making a convenient, peaceful exit. No big scene, no demands, no shootout in the street.

  “But we can stay in touch,” he added hastily. “You’ll be here little while longer. I thought we’d—”

  Thought we’d what? Meet in some alley and knock off a quickie? “I, uh, I don’t know if I’ll have time. I may go back sooner, Luke. The surveying is practically finished. There’s, uh, really no reason for Piggy and me to hang around after the work’s done.” She took a fortifying breath. “Like you said, we’ve had a good time. And you’re right, winter is coming and silly me—I left my ski clothes in Texas.”

  “Speaking of skiing, if I can get things calmed down with Janet and get these lawyers off my ass, maybe we can get together up at the ski lodge before you go.”

  So it wouldn’t be in an alley; it would be in an expensive room in a nice hotel. “Sure.” She swallowed the mushy bubble growing in her throat. “Just call when you can work it into your schedule.”

  Luke winced at the icy retort. She was mad. And hurt. Or both. He didn’t want that any more than he wanted to hurt his family. But he was in no position to make her any promises, had been careful not to. None had been expected from her either. So why did he feel this sensation like panic?

  He wished he could call back the past few minutes and start over. Practicing this speech all the way into town hadn’t kept him from bungling it. He had whined like an orphan calf, sounded like a pompous asshole.

  His gaze traveled over her. Even with dirty jeans, a torn tee shirt and no make-up, she looked pretty. He liked her hair pulled back and braided. He could see the rise and fall of the delectable, full bosom he had kissed all over just Saturday. The hot springs pool leapt into his memory—their hands gliding over each others’ bodies, his tongue catching water droplets off the dark tips of her breasts…He felt a twitch in his shorts. He wanted to take her in his arms and . . .

  He shoved those thoughts from his mind. Jesus. This was no time—

  “Look, Luke. I’m in sort of a hurry. I need to get home. I’ve got…laundry to do.”

  “Dahlia, I—

  Her raised palm stopped him. An ache in his chest displaced the one in his groin. Her head shook sharply one time. “Let’s don’t do this,” she said. “You’ve been very clear.”

  She pulled on the door latch and slid one leg outside, turning back to face him. Her eyes glistened. Tears. Jesus. He cussed himself again.

  “Why do I feel like I’ll never see you again?” she said softly.

  His mouth went dry as a gravel road in August. “One of these days, I’ll get it all straightened out, Dalhlia.”

  “Are you asking me to wait?”

  Yes. No. Jesus. He snapped his gaze back to the windshield. “No. I guess I don’t have a right to ask anything o
f you.”

  She nodded and slid the rest of the way out. The door closed with a soft click. He watched her cross in front of his truck, her chin level. She went to Piggy Murphy’s rig, dug into her pocket, pulled out keys. Blood swished inside his ears.

  Stop her, you dumb bastard.

  But he had to let her go. He had come to town to do just that. Allowing a woman to become a disruption to life at the Double Deuce was lunacy. What he felt for her was lust, juvenile obsession, nothing more. In time, it would wear itself out.

  The Blazer backed out and moved down the street. Not once did its driver look back. “Goddammit,” he muttered, kneading his lower lip between his fingers and thumb as he watched it disappear.

  Women. A diabolical joke Nature had played on men. He wished he could live without them, wished he wasn’t lured by that Lorelei between their legs. But he was weak and it was sweet, as hard to resist as a bear trap baited with honey. And just as treacherous. Once a man gave in and chased it, anything could happen. Wasn’t that what had gotten him into nine years of pure hell in the first place?

  And hadn’t what happened this morning underlined that point?

  After he had spent all day yesterday horseback, Mom had cornered him in the barn the minute he returned. She hadn’t even waited ’til he unsaddled Roanie before she landed on him. Apparently, Annabeth had told her what went on all summer at Janet’s house and set Mom off again. Then there had been an ominous message from Brad, the family lawyer, telling him Janet wanted their daughters returned to her immediately.

  Puzzled as much as angry, Luke had called Brad back at once and learned the rest of the story. Somebody had told Janet he had been found in bed in the cabin with a Chinese prostitute. The lawyer couldn’t guess the origin of such an outrageous tale, but Luke knew the pattern. The story had passed from his own sister to her husband, then to the beauty shop where it had been altered and embellished and handed over to Janet.

  Mom’s rant could never have motivated him to end things with Dahlia, but Janet’s threat to prevent their daughters from starting school in Callister was a horse of a different color. It seemed that saying good-bye to a fling going nowhere anyway wasn’t just the easiest thing, it was only thing. But this afternoon, he wasn’t as certain as he had been this morning. This flap with Janet wouldn’t last forever. A few dollars and she would probably crawl back into a Boise bar. Maybe he should follow Dahlia home…

  A bang jerked his mind back. The range manager’s assistant had slapped the Ford’s front fender as he passed. “Hey, Luke. How’s it going?”

  “Good, Carl. Real good.”

  More employees dribbled out of the Forest Service offices. If he didn’t get out of this parking lot, somebody would be asking him why he was here and he would have to make up a lie. He plopped the Resistol on his head and fired the engine. The old diesel clattered to life, sounding like a thrashing machine in the silence of Dahlia’s absence.

  A sense of loss gripped him. He had felt it before—the day he had hung back after his brother’s funeral service and watched his coffin lowered into the ground. And the morning Janet had left the Double Deuce for good and taken his girls with her.

  On a sigh, he shifted into gear and eased out onto the main street. He crept through town, barely missed a pedestrian. Somebody he knew, of course. Hell, there was nobody in Callister he didn’t know or who didn’t know him. The near-victim and he exchanged hellos and laughed about his absent-mindedness.

  Ten miles out, entering the climb up the canyon, the ache in his chest had only deepened. He cranked down the window and let the late afternoon cool into the truck cab.

  This part of the winding trip to the ranch always made him think of Matt. As boys, on their way home from town, many times they had stopped and looked down into the canyon that plunged a thousand feet. They would scootch the toes of their boots right to the edge and stare down at the Snake River that lay like a molten silver ribbon along the canyon floor. They would yell into the maw, listening to the multiple echoes. Life had been simple then, full of girls and horses and freedom. And plans for rosy futures. Back then, they hadn’t thought about a crazy, wild mustang or an alcoholic wife. And they had never heard of FAS.

  Lost in his thoughts, he took a curve too fast and had to skid into the barrow ditch to keep from careening over the canyon rim. Cussing himself, he shifted into low gear and plowed back onto the road. Lord, he was a mess.

  On up a ways he reached the fancy scenic overlook the government had built for tourists. He pulled into its gravel parking area to gather himself. They had put up a concrete barrier and a fence with a steel rail on top and a rock monument with a bronze plaque saying some stuff about history and geology.

  “Waste,” he mumbled as he slid out of the truck. Ten tourists hadn’t traveled from Callister to Sterling Valley in the past year and people nowadays couldn’t even spell geology.

  Leaning on the rail, he looked out to the canyon’s opposite side. A chevron of unidentifiable birds silently moved south across the distant, gray-green backdrop of mountains. The solitude and the magnificence of his surroundings began to calm him and he could think.

  Dahlia. How had it all gotten so out of hand? How had this one woman sneaked under his guard? Why hadn’t the dancing and the movies and the fishing, the weekends rolling around in bed remained just a good time?

  The answer was Dahlia herself. He had never known a woman of so many intriguing parts—vulnerable, but strong; naïve, yet sophisticated; beautiful, but unaware of it.

  Since his divorce, his involvement with the fairer sex had amounted to nothing more than physical indulgence. Most of the time, he didn’t trust a woman as far as he could throw her, but he would trust Dahlia with anything he had. She was too loyal and honest to betray a friend. Her good-natured wit and warmth charmed everybody who met her. Even his sisters had succumbed. Just a few nights ago, hadn’t Kathleen told him so? And Jimmy. Who could ignore how the little guy responded to her gentleness?

  Conscience pushed into his thoughts. He had spent the summer learning her in the sweetest of lessons, had pursued and seduced her with little regard for the outcome, his only goal to satisfy his own appetite. Well, he guessed he had gotten more than he bargained for—he had stumbled into a hole damned hard to climb out of.

  He glanced down and to the left, looking for comfort in an old friend. And there it stood, half way down the decline. In the middle of thousands of acres of dark green evergreens, as vivid as a neon sign, grew a single, golden, tamarack tree. He couldn’t remember how many autumns had come and gone since he had first seen it, but he checked often to be sure it was still there.

  A phenomenon of such immensity was nothing short of a miracle. The scientist in him knew the perfectly timed, precisely executed chain of events that produced it. So complicated, yet so simple—one bird, one seed, a fistful of dirt in a crevice. Pondering the process never failed to remind him of man’s feeble place in the scheme of things or that nothing humankind had ever done made so much as a sound in the universe.

  And suddenly, in his humbled heart, he identified the reason for his torment. Part of him was missing. Dahlia had taken it when she left him in the Forest Service parking lot.

  Back in his rig, he pulled a one-eighty, spewing gravel. He tore back to town, back up the main street, back to Baker’s rental. No Blazer in the driveway, no sign of life. He drove like a runaway to the laundry, found only a building empty of people. He thought of checking the bar where he had seen Piggy go, but Dahlia wouldn’t be there. She didn’t like the bar.

  In front of the laundry, he halted, reining in his emotions, remembering Dahlia’s words.

  Actually, it’s just as well. It’s time I got back to Texas anyway. . . . There’s really no reason for Piggy and me to hang around now that the work’s done.

  Don’t be a damn fool, he told himself. Dahlia was sharp and well-educated. She didn’t need him. A woman like her would go home and start the company she talked ab
out or hook up with some dude in a suit and get married and live in Dallas, like she had done before. She wouldn’t follow some hard-ass cowboy with three half-grown kids and a willful mother out to a mountainside forty miles from the nearest town.

  It had been a schoolboy’s notion, chasing back to town after her, a waste of valuable time he couldn’t afford to squander. He had to get home and try to get a good night’s sleep. Before daylight tomorrow, he and his girls would be on their way to a nine o’clock appointment in his lawyer’s office in Boise.

  Heading north again, he knew one thing for certain. He was finished dancing to Janet’s tune. This time, she had gone too far. In dealing with her in the past, he had wondered what his limit was. Now he knew. This time, he wouldn’t be satisfied with winning a battle. This time, he wouldn’t leave the field until he had won the war.

  But maybe, when he got back from Boise tomorrow evening, if it wasn’t too late, he would drop by Dahlia’s house before he went on out to the ranch. Just to talk a little . . .

  Chapter 18

  Dahlia stood before the bathroom shocked by her appearance under the dull light over the medicine cabinet. Her face was puffy, her eyes red and swollen. Her nose was so plugged she had to breathe through her mouth.

  She knew the pain of spousal betrayal. She knew the finality of death, the paralysis of bereavement. Twice in her short life she had stared into the graves of the people closest to her. Rejection by a lover was worse.

  Last night, after making flight reservations and arranging for Chuck to pick her up at DFW airport, she had thrown her laundry into a washer, then driven the backroads until late, stopping often and surrendering to bursts of tears. When the gas gauge showed near empty, she had been forced back to town.

  Somehow, true to her standard of doing what needed doing even if the earth crumbled beneath her feet, she had sat through drying her clothes, thankful the late hour gave her the coin-op laundry all to herself. Then she had gone back to the cottage, packed some things to take on the plane and organized what was left for Piggy to take home in the Blazer.