A Ranger for the Holidays (Lone Star Cowboy League)

by Allie Pleiter

  “Why don’t you and Boone come for dinner tomorrow night. We can all talk about it then.”

  “Maybe.” Amelia was glad Lizzie at least considered it. All too often, she dismissed a diner invitation right off, especially if Boone was involved. Boone never did seem to have much time for family—he was too much like Rafe in that way. “Is that amnesia guy still staying with you and Gramps?”

  “Finn?” Amelia was glad to be able to give him a full name now. “His name is Finn Brannigan. Well, Frank Brannigan, technically—Finn’s just a nickname. That much came back to him Friday night. He’s with Dr. Searle talking about it right now.”

  Lizzie’s eyes grew wide. “So who is he? It’s like a grown-up version of baby Cody Stillwater. Finn wasn’t some baby left on your doorstep, but still, it’s a mystery right out of a movie.”

  Tiny Cody Stillwater had indeed been left on Grady Stillwater’s doorstep with nothing more than a cryptic note, but Amelia didn’t think the comparison made any sense. “No, it’s not. It’s a medical condition from his accident. One from which he expects to make a full recovery.”

  “Still, now that you know his name, you must be able to find out more, right?

  “I think that’s between Finn and Dr. Searle, Lizzie.” The waitress set their menus down in front of them. “The man has a right to some privacy.”

  “He’s staying in your house. Don’t you want to look him up on the internet or something? Don’t you know anything else about him?”

  Finn had groused loud and hard about Dr. Searle’s request to hold off on internet searches, and Amelia didn’t think it fair to go behind Finn’s back and look herself. “I think Finn’s identity should be Finn’s business, not mine.”

  Lizzie ordered a ham-and-cheese omelette. “He’s handsome, that’s for sure. Great eyes. Tall, too. You like tall men.”

  Amelia ordered banana cream pie and raisin toast. “Yes, he’s a very nice-looking man. And most likely taken, so stop that line of thinking right now. He was carrying a watch that said ‘all my love, B.’”

  “How mysterious and romantic.”

  You were once a smitten young woman who saw the whole world as romantic, Amelia reminded herself. She felt much older—and perhaps too much wiser—now. “I doubt Finn would share your opinion. It’s torturing him that he cannot remember his wife or even if he has one.”

  “What do you mean, ‘if’?” Lizzie cut her toast in neat triangles, the same way their mother had done. It always warmed Amelia’s heart to know both she and her sister kept such details of Mama alive. “I thought you were sure he was hitched.”

  Hitched was Amelia’s least favorite term for the sacrament of marriage. “I think he is, yes, from the inscription and the way he talks.”

  “The way he talks?”

  “A man who has loved sees the world differently. It’s something in the eyes, in the way he describes the world.” She looked at her sister. “Didn’t Boone change when he fell in love with you?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Lizzie said with dreamy eyes.

  Lizzie and Boone clearly loved each other. Only Amelia had learned that love wasn’t always enough to make things work. It was the best start of all, but it was still only a start. Finn was a man who had loved. Amelia just wasn’t yet sure he was a man who had loved and lost, or just loved and been lost. It was why she had to guard her heart so carefully here. “Maybe now that he’s remembered his name, it won’t be long before everything else comes back to him.” She made herself add, “And he can go home to the life he has waiting for him.”

  They ate for a bit in silence, each woman sorting through her own thoughts, until Amelia’s cell phone rang. “I’m sorry, Lizzie, I thought Finn was going to walk home when he was done,” Amelia said as she fished through her handbag for the phone. “I’ll just tell him it’ll be a few minutes more.”

  Amelia was surprised to see Lucy’s name come up on the phone screen. “Amelia?”

  “Hi, Lucy.”

  “Where’s Finn?”

  Maybe Lucy had uncovered some new details. “With Dr. Searle.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Amelia didn’t like the sound of that. “That’s where I dropped him off.”

  “Is he wearing that red plaid coat you gave Gramps last Christmas?”

  She had to think for a minute before she realized Gramps had lent it to Finn because the coat he’d bought himself wasn’t quite warm enough for the chilly day. “As a matter of fact, he is.”

  “Well, then, Finn isn’t with Dr. Searle.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I just drove past McKay Park and Finn is sitting on the ground in the middle of it with his head in his hands.”

  “He’s what? Did he fall? Does he look ill?”

  “I can’t say for sure. I think you’d better get over here.”

  Amelia pulled a $20 bill out and tossed it on the counter. “Something’s wrong with Finn. I’ve got to go. I’ll call you later about dinner, okay?” She raced out the door, her heart twisted tight in worry.

  Chapter Ten

  Amelia had never driven so fast through town. She swerved her SUV into the parking space beside Lucy’s truck and felt her heart drop to her boots when she followed Lucy’s silent point to a figure slouched in the middle of the park. Not even on a bench, just slumped on the ground as if the brown winter grass had reached up and yanked him down. If a man’s pain could be seen by the set of his shoulders, this was a desperately unhappy man.

  Lucy rolled down the truck window. “You want me to go with you?”

  Dr. Searle had told Finn something upsetting—that was easy to see. Amelia knew enough of Finn’s nature to know he didn’t need a crowd around him now. He’d taken himself out here in the wide open for a reason, but even she knew his urge to be alone could be his worst enemy right now. Hadn’t she taken him in just to prevent something like this? “I knew I should have gone to that appointment with him.” She’d tried, but Finn had refused, and she had no right to impose no matter how many warning bells her intuition set off.

  “Don’t come with me, but don’t leave. Just stay and pray, okay?” Amelia grabbed the wool blanket out of her backseat and began walking toward Finn. Normally so large, he looked small and beaten out there in the wide-open lawn of McKay Park. Lord, she prayed as her boots crunched across the winter grass, he looks like a time bomb about to go off. Help me help him.

  He didn’t notice her approach—something out of character for him; Finn was always keenly aware of his surroundings. Keeping some distance, Amelia circled around until she stood in front of him. “Finn,” she said as softly as she could given the twenty or so feet between them. “What’s wrong?”

  He looked up at her with eyes that were ice-cold. She’d seen anger, frustration and even annoyance in his eyes before, but the frigid distance she saw now sent a chill skittering down her spine. “Nothing.” His clipped, empty tone didn’t even bother trying to gloss over the denial of that statement.

  Amelia spread the blanket out between them in an invitation to come off the cold damp grass, but he ignored it. She sat down on the corner farthest from him. “Something is definitely wrong.”

  He neither replied nor met her gaze.

  “You don’t have to tell me what it is. Come home and sort it out on your own there, not in the middle of the park like this.” The pain was radiating off him, making the air feel twice as cold as it already was.

  “So Searle called you even though I told him not to. Nice to know the amnesiac’s wishes don’t count for much.” He gave the medical term an edge of disgust.

  “Dr. Searle wouldn’t go against your wishes. Lucy called me. She saw you sitting in the middle of the park and was worried.”

  That made him look up at her. “Worried I’d gone off my rocker?”

  “Worried you were ill or hurt.” After a moment, she added softly, “Why is it so hard for you to get that people here care about what happens to you?”

  He
shook his head. “I’m just some guy you found in the woods.” He didn’t say the word worthless, but it colored his tone nonetheless.

  “Finn Brannigan, if you don’t know that you’re more than that, then more than your memory is messed up.” She hadn’t meant to say that much. This was hardly the time to admit what she was coming to feel for him, but his eyes did that to her—pulled things out of her she wasn’t ready to reveal. She had an urge to touch him, to give him any kind of solace she could, but she could see that wouldn’t be welcome. “Why did you come out here?” It seemed like the only safe question to ask.

  “I needed space. I needed to be alone.”

  “Did Dr. Searle tell you something?” That seemed obvious, but it might at least uncover some hint as to what had hit him so hard.

  He didn’t answer, and the way his spine stiffened, she half expected Finn to get up and walk away.

  “I’ve no business prying—I get that. But I’ve never seen you so upset and I want to help. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

  “That’s right,” he shot back. “You can’t.”

  Amelia didn’t have a reply for that. What was there to say to a situation as drastic as Finn’s? “Can you tell me anything? Anything at all?”

  He didn’t reply, and Amelia decided to wait him out. She pulled the blanket up around her, determined to stay until he opened up or sent her away. He was at a dangerous crossroads—anyone could see that—and she would not leave him alone.

  It seemed like half an hour before he looked up at her. At least this time his eyes were storm clouds rather than daggers. “Do you remember when I said I don’t think I was a happy man?”

  “Yes.”

  “Now I know why. Only it’s worse than that. I know, but I don’t remember.”

  Amelia wasn’t quite sure what that meant. “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “Dr. Searle found some facts about me. Some awful things, really. But it’s like they happened to someone else. I can’t remember the people or what happened.”

  “You will, just not yet. Your name came back, didn’t it?”

  Finn sunk his forehead into his hand. “That’s just it...it’s coming after me, the memory. I should remember it, I need to remember it, it’d be wrong to forget it...only it’ll be ten times worse than it already is when I do.”

  He rubbed his head as if the lack of memory hurt, and his anguish jabbed under Amelia’s ribs. He wasn’t making total sense, and he looked as if he’d topple over any second from sheer exhaustion.

  “Why don’t you just tell me what Dr. Searle said? Maybe I can help.”

  “No.” The word was sharp and determined.

  “It can’t be as bad as your thinking, Finn.”

  “Oh, there’s where you’re wrong. It’s worse. And it will only get worse from here. You should have just kept right on walking in those woods, Amelia. I’m no rescue for the likes of you.”

  Now he was scaring her. “Don’t talk like that. Everyone’s worth rescuing. You’ve just hit a bad patch, that’s all.”

  The moment she spoke the platitude, Finn shot her such a hopeless, angry glare that she regretted it. No one should call whatever torment was pressing down on Finn “a bad patch.” It was terrible and massive, and Amelia didn’t know what to do. She only knew leaving Finn to his solitude would not only be cruel, but downright dangerous. Honestly, he looked like a man who would do anything, save for the exhaustion she could see pulling him down.

  “Please, Finn, come home. We’ll find a way through it.”

  He looked off toward the edge of the park, but his unfocused eyes told Amelia he wasn’t really seeing anything except the black cloud he was so sure was hunting him down. “I’m so tired.”

  “So come home and rest. You’ve been through too much to do anything else, and you can’t sit here in the middle of the park forever. You don’t have to tell me a thing until you’re ready, however long that takes.” Amelia hadn’t realized it until just this moment when she stretched out her hand, but she meant exactly that. Some part of her had become bonded to Finn and his journey back to himself. She had to see this thing through, even though she suspected it might cost her a large piece of her heart.

  She kept her hand outstretched until, very slowly, Finn took it. “It’s bad,” he warned her.

  She said the only thing she could. “I know.”

  * * *

  Finn tried to remember. He locked himself in his room the entire day, going over every inch of the file. He stared at the photos of the mangled car, he read the horrible account of what had happened to his wife and child, he tried everything he could think of to bring their faces out of the black void. Nothing worked. The effort only made him dizzy, angry and sick to his stomach.

  Finn glared up at the bedroom ceiling, up at the God Amelia claimed sent her to find him in the woods, and scowled in defiance. This is cruel. I’d rather be dead than keep on this way.

  That seemed a dangerous statement to make to God, but Finn figured if He really did know everything the way everyone claimed, then his own black heart was no surprise to the Almighty. So what are You gonna do about it?

  That really is my own question, isn’t it? Finn had no idea what to do about the past he’d just discovered. Obviously, he hadn’t handled it well before the accident—only, who could handle anything like that well at all? Sheriff Benson was investigating his accident site, but no one yet knew who had knocked him out. Were they still out there? If Finn gave in to his natural instincts to go crawl under a rock somewhere and hide, would his attacker come back and finish the job? Would he end up knocked out on some other ridge with no sweet, compassionately pushy Amelia to save him?

  An hour ago she’d set a sandwich and lemonade outside his door and knocked gently. When he heard her go back downstairs, he retrieved the food but found he had no appetite. He was too stuffed full of emptiness to eat.

  The hard, heartless truth was that right now there was nowhere to go. Searle had him file for the paperwork to replace his driver’s license, but that wouldn’t come until tomorrow. He could just get up and walk out of town, but that seemed pointless. He was still dizzy now and then, and a part of him worried he hadn’t quite healed—at least in the medical sense. There was no hope of him healing in any other sense.

  For the next twenty-four hours, Finn was stuck. Exhausted, miserable and stuck. So stuck he pondered going downstairs to fetch Bug so he could just sit here and listen to the dog snore beside him. He couldn’t face Amelia and Luther, though, and Bug couldn’t manage the stairs.

  The dog couldn’t get up, he wouldn’t go down. We’re both stuck, buddy. Finn rolled over on the bed and quietly asked God to make him sleep for a week. Tomorrow seemed too near and way too hard.

  Chapter Eleven

  Worries over Finn stole Amelia’s sleep, making it hard to paste a smile on her face when she saw Byron McKay through her front door window early Tuesday morning. He’d pressed the bell three times and was pacing her front steps by the time she got the latch open to greet his scowl. Thankfully, his persistence hadn’t woken Finn—she wasn’t ready to face Finn and Byron at the same time.

  “Good morning, Byron.”

  “It’s not,” he growled. Gracious, didn’t that man ever smile?

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Won’t you come in? Coffee’s on.” She’d made this morning’s pot doubly strong in hopes of getting herself in gear, but even that and an extra-large serving of apple cobbler hadn’t done the trick. Gramps hobbled in from the den and then wisely turned right around when he saw Byron. If only she could do the same. “What can I do for you?”

  “You could do your job, Amelia. That’d be a fine start.”

  Amelia would liked to have said, But I don’t work for you, but she knew better than to quibble about League volunteer loyalties with the likes of Byron McKay. The League was important to everyone, but it was absolutely the center of Byron’s life—as much as anything but Byron could be the c
enter of his life. “What’s wrong?”

  “The final timeline for the holiday party was supposed to be on my desk yesterday afternoon. It’s not.”

  As if any party truly needed a minute-by-minute timeline. Byron expected everyone in the League to RSVP on time, arrive on time, dine on time and probably even leave on time. It had become the hardest part of planning League events, even the supposedly casual ones. The Christmas party was supposed to be all about the children’s happiness, not timetables.

  “I had something come up yesterday and I didn’t get it finished. I’ve got a draft that we can look at together.” She poured more coffee into her cup and set a second cup down in front of her guest. “Honestly, Byron, you’ve changed every timeline I’ve ever given you—I don’t know why you don’t just set it all yourself.” Fatigue made that come out a bit harsher than was wise, so she amended, “That way you can have it exactly the way you want it from the start.”

  “The League Christmas party is a team effort. Everyone has to do their part for it to work.”

  Amelia grabbed her League file and sat down. Byron was always extolling the virtues of “team effort.” Only trouble was, Byron’s concept of a “team” was a lot of people obeying his commands. “I’m sorry I didn’t meet your deadline. It was a bit of an emergency and quite unexpected.” She slid the half-done listing of activities over to Byron’s side of the table.

  Byron shook his head as he scanned the paper. “Why are you always wasting your time getting tangled up in other people’s problems?”

  Byron, his wife, Eleanor, and their boys sat in the pews at Little Horn Community Church every Sunday. How could a man visit God’s house every week and still not understand the virtues of charity and compassion? No matter how many times she explained the concept of Here to Help and its mission to Byron, he could never fathom why Amelia would spend so much time helping “folks who got themselves into fixes and ought to get their own selves out.”