Tom pictured an incident that had confounded him last week, then said, “I gave her a picture I had of Lesley. In a frame. Put it on her dresser. The next day it was gone. She’d put it in the drawer. When I asked her how come, she just shrugged and said, ‘I don’t know.”’
Abby withdrew a limp tissue from the pocket of her wrinkled silk jacket. “Angel and I kept talking to her, trying to get through. Finally, she just played out. She fell asleep sobbing, ‘Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.’ It broke my heart. There wasn’t anything I could do.”
Donna pushed the brandy closer and made her take another sip. “You were with her—that’s all anyone can do. This is something she needed to face.”
“What do you suppose set her off?” Tom asked.
“The perfume,” Donna and Abby said together.
“How? Why?”
“Angel said that brand is the kind their mother wore,” Donna said. “So Heather associates it with Lesley. Maybe the shattered bottle signifies death in a way a five-year-old can understand.” She rose, and put a hand on Tom’s shoulder. “Call me if she wakes up before morning, but I think she’ll make it through the night. I’d like to see them both tomorrow. Any time.”
“Tomorrow is Saturday.”
She shrugged. “Healing happens when it happens—days, months, years later.” The last she seemed to direct toward Abby, who looked away. “I’d like to follow through while it’s still fresh and a little scary.”
She pointed a finger at Abby. “Stay here. This is where you belong. Okay?”
When Abby hesitated, Tom stepped in. “She’ll stay. I promise.”
After Donna was gone, Tom wedged an old Zane Grey novel, one of his father’s favorite authors, under the door to keep it open and turned off the air conditioner. The little window unit did its best, but the two-week heat wave taxed it to the max. He walked to the window above the kitchen sink. “More brandy?” he asked, slamming the heels of both hands against the frame of the window above the kitchen sink. The sticky sash inched upward.
“No thanks. My stomach’s on fire the way it is.”
“Are you hungry? Maybe you should eat—”
“I couldn’t. Thanks.” She let out a little sigh. “You’re being awfully nice about this.”
He propped open the back door and turned off the porch light so the bugs wouldn’t congregate. “Abby, this wasn’t your fault,” he said, walking toward the table.
She rose and stretched, one hand massaging her lower back. Tom remembered her saying she’d carried Heather all the way to the car. He sped up. “Let me.”
She jumped, as if poked with a stick. “No. I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You just went through hell and back. Heck, shopping itself is my idea of hell. Notice I wasn’t brave enough to go with you.” His humor seemed to loosen her up a little. She let him guide her to the couch. “Sit sideways. I’ll just give your neck and shoulders a quick rub. I learned a lot about muscle pain when I was on the circuit.”
She sat stiffly at first, but gradually he felt her muscles unwind. Being able to touch her, even through layers of silk jacket and blouse, was a gift. The soft material offered little barrier, and the warmth of her skin radiated to his fingers. Her scent, not the cloying expensive perfume he pictured Lesley wearing, teased his nose. Her hair brushed the tops of his hands like gossamer threads.
“Angel said you rode in the rodeo.”
“I was a team roper. Different breed of cat.”
“Really? Don’t they have steer roping in rodeos?”
“Rodeos have a bunch of events. Bronco busting, bull riding, steer wrestling and roping. Team roping has its own circuit. Sometimes ropers’ll do rodeos, but if you’re roping professionally, you don’t have a lot of time to earn the points you need to qualify for the finals. Part of the trick is picking the right events.
“Some ropings, like the BFI—the Bob Feist Invitational up in Reno—take place right after or just before a big rodeo so cowboys can do both and earn a few extra bucks.”
She rolled her neck, making her hair whisper across his fingers. “What do you mean by team? A whole bunch of you…”
He chuckled at the image. Few people outside the sport understood it, even though roping had been around for years. “There’s two on a team. A header and a heeler. The header tries to get a rope around the steer’s horns then turn him so the heeler can catch his back legs. All in about six seconds.”
“Wow. Sounds difficult.”
“Takes practice. And teamwork and a good horse. The circuit wasn’t as big when I was roping, but now it runs from the East Coast to Hawaii. You ante up your entrance fee, and if you’re lucky you can win enough prize money to pay your way to the next one.”
“Angel said you were one of the best.”
He shrugged. “I had a good horse.”
She snorted at his humility.
“No, I mean it. Goldy—Hall’s Golden Boy—was one of the best. He took the American Quarter Horse Association’s Horse of the Year award twice.”
She rolled her shoulders at his deepening touch. A little sigh escaped her lips. “Which were you? Head or heels?”
“Heeler. I made it to the Nationals the year before I quit.” The year Lesley found out she was pregnant with Angel.
“Did you win?”
He ran his thumb alongside the ridge of her spine; her shiver made his heart skip a beat. “We had it nailed then my steer slipped a hoof—that’s a five-second penalty. It wound up being about a fourteen-thousand-dollar mistake.”
She made a choking sound.
“It’s a tough business. Ask the losing quarterback the day after Super Bowl and he’ll tell you the same thing.”
“Why’d you quit?”
“I got hurt.”
She turned. His hand accidentally grazed her breast. “Badly?”
A sudden surge of longing made him rise and walk a few steps away. “I broke my arm. Nothing big. I could still work, I just couldn’t throw worth beans. I missed the rest of the season, and when it came time to start training for the next year…it just wasn’t there.”
“What wasn’t there?”
How could he explain the depth of energy, drive and determination it took to propel a person into the competitive world of professional sports? His disillusionment had been a long time coming; the injury just sealed it. “I don’t know. The drive, I guess. Lesley said it’s like getting back on a horse after he tosses you, but it wasn’t like that. I still rope for fun, but back then I was—”
She had a thoughtful look on her face. “Burned out?”
“Yeah, I guess. I knew I wanted something else. Put down roots. Stop living out of a horse trailer. I sold Goldy to buy the little house where Miguel and Maria used to live.”
“Used to? They’ve moved already?”
Tom sighed. Fatigue was catching up with him, and it hadn’t been easy saying goodbye to the friends he’d grown so close to over the past couple of years. “That’s where I was today. I helped them load everything up in Ed’s horse trailer. They didn’t want the girls to see them leave. They’re planning a big housewarming party in a couple of weeks, and I’ll take the girls up then.”
Abby sat back on the couch and closed her eyes. “So many changes.”
He snapped off the overhead light. The new exterior floodlights added a soft shadowy quality to the room. A night-light in the bathroom illuminated the way to the hall. He walked to the couch and held out his hand. “Come on. You’re exhausted.”
She shrunk back. “I can sleep right here.”
He shook his head. “Not if you want to be able to straighten up in the morning. Trust me, it’s a lousy bed.”
When she opened her mouth to protest, he dropped to one knee in front of her. Her eyes were shadowed, but he didn’t need to see them to know her fear. “Abby, it’s been a lousy day for all of us. I could really use the company. We won’t do anything. We don’t even need to get undressed. Come on.”
/> He held out his hand. Two heartbeats later, she put her hand in his.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ABBY’S FIRST WAKING thought was: home.
She came to full consciousness by tracking the individual elements of her languor. Tom’s arm heavy and secure around her body, his hand tucked innocently below her breast. His warm, even breath tickled the back of her neck in a soothing way. Her buttocks nested against the curve of his pelvis—spoon-fashion, something she couldn’t have pictured herself enjoying. She and Landon were individual sleepers who jealously guarded their territory on the bed. Cover thievery and bed hogging were grounds for reprisal in the morning.
Keeping her eyes closed, she savored his scent, picturing it as a magic shell protecting her from the encroaching day. She could drift back to sleep, or turn ever so slightly and start something she was pretty sure Tom wouldn’t be anxious to stop. But that wouldn’t be fair to him. He deserved more. The truth, at the very least.
Carefully, she shifted to her back. Traces of pink peeked through the curtainless window. She recalled her mother’s anguish over not having time to do something about Tom’s bedroom. “He doesn’t even have curtains,” Grace had wailed, as if the idea violated some canon of design law.
Tom awakened. Abby felt a slight tensing of his arm. She turned her head and was rewarded with a smile. Her heart swelled painfully.
It would be so easy to stay here forever.
“Are you okay?”
His first concern was for her. “I’m fine. I didn’t expect to sleep, but I was dead to the world. Did Heather wake up?”
He shook his head slightly. “I checked on her a couple of times, but she was fine.” A lock of hair fell across his forehead. She brushed it back. She loved the springy texture.
“What time it is?” Out of habit, she’d removed her jewelry before washing her face and brushing her teeth with the cellophane-wrapped toothbrush he’d given her last night. “I buy ’em by the gross.”
“O-dark-thirty,” he said, his voice husky and full of portent. “Too early to get up, but not too early to be up.”
He kissed her, igniting feelings too close to the surface. Her body cried out to respond, but she gently pushed her hand against his chest. His heart pulsed beneath her fingers. She stifled a cry of regret.
He broke off the kiss, cradling her jaw in his work-roughened hand. “Wishful thinking on my part. The girls will be up soon. Go back to sleep.”
“No. I have to tell you something.”
He stiffened. “Can it wait?”
She shook her head. Now, before she lost her nerve.
He moved away and sat up. He glanced toward the window then back to her. “I’ll put on some coffee. I don’t know about you, but my brain needs a little kick-start in the morning.”
Abby made a quick trip to the bathroom. Her shorts and shell were a mass of wrinkles; she smoothed them as best she could. Fortunately, she’d hung her jacket over the back of a chair and it covered a multitude of flaws. She patted a cold washcloth to the puffy bags beneath her eyes and brushed her teeth. By the time she walked into the kitchen, she could smell the aroma of coffee.
Tom was waiting for her with a red plaid stadium blanket and two steaming cups. “Follow me,” he said, leading the way to the back door.
Puzzled, she wedged her feet into her deck shoes and followed. Dew tempered the morning, making it cooler than seemed possible since the afternoon would undoubtedly repeat yesterday’s century mark. She smiled as she passed the neatly enclosed washer and dryer room that Al Carroll had salvaged from the former lean-to.
“You haven’t seen this, have you?” Tom asked, drawing her attention to a small, redwood arbor. A simple nook, just four posts with two-by-four joists and one-inch-square redwood crosspieces, housed a sturdy redwood glider.
“Wow. Where’d this come from?”
“Ed and Janey bought the glider. Al helped me build the rest.”
“It’s fabulous. I bet you see the most wonderful sunsets.”
“Sunrises, too.”
He used a towel to wipe the dew from the glider then spread out the blanket. As soon as she sat down, holding the two mugs he’d handed her, Tom joined her and pulled the edges of the blanket around them. “Snug as two bugs in a rug,” he said, taking his mug.
They drank in silence, watching the pink glow on the horizon intensify. Meadowlarks trilled their happy greeting. The air smelled of earth, animals and butterscotch, from the coffee. If not for her nervousness, Abby would have enjoyed the peaceful moment.
Finally, she said, “Tom, when I told you about Billy, I left out some parts.”
He waited, his gaze on her now. In a way, his silence felt like a safety net. He would listen. He wouldn’t be able to understand, but she knew he’d try.
“Billy was in a lot of pain. Some mental, some physical. While he was in the hospital, he became addicted to painkillers. When he got out, he bought a bar in Hawaii with some friends and basically stayed stoned or drunk the whole time he lived there.
“When we got together, he wanted to change his life around. I truly believe that, but…” She sighed, remembering the handsome young man with so much potential. “It just didn’t work out. Emotionally, he had good days and bad. The worst involved alcohol and drugs.”
She rolled her shoulders to loosen up the tension and took another sip of the now-cold coffee. “Remember I told you I left for three days?”
She felt him nod.
“I left because that night he beat me up so badly I barely made it to the hospital before I passed out.”
Tom let out a harsh groan. “Oh, Abby.”
She gnawed at her bottom lip. “He was a proud man, but he felt so diminished. Not just his leg, but the circumstances of his accident. He told me he felt his whole life was a lie.” She pictured herself at that moment—straight home from her psychology class, full of “fixit” tips, ready to make him all better. “I tried to mother him, I guess. I only made things worse. He grabbed me and threw me against the coffee table. He was very strong. I didn’t know how to fight back.” She flinched when Tom moved closer. “I think I blacked out from pain.”
She forced herself not to double over. “The X rays showed four cracked ribs and a concussion.”
“Abby,” Tom said, looping his arm round her shoulder. “Oh, sweetheart.”
She held up her hand, but its jittery shaking made her curl her fingers into a fist and bury her hand in her lap. They’d stopped gliding. “Somehow, I got to my car. I don’t remember driving, but somehow I made it to the hospital.
“When I woke up, my parents and brothers were there. Everybody looked so serious, they told me the police were looking for Billy, but he’d disappeared.”
She took a deep breath. “My brothers left when the doctor came in. He told me about my ribs and said I had a concussion and some kidney damage. Then he told me that the baby I was carrying was dead.”
She felt a shudder pass through him. “I didn’t even know I was pregnant.”
He tightened his grip, for which she was grateful. It helped her say the rest. “They told me it would probably self-abort, but they recommended—given my physical and emotional trauma—a therapeutic procedure, they called it. Basically it boils down to an abortion.”
She fought to keep her coffee in her stomach.
“None of it was your fault, Abby.” His eyes were full of sorrow and sympathy.
“I could have left Billy. I knew how he got. He’d slapped me once before and squeezed my arm so hard he left bruises, but I chose to stay.”
“You’re a caring person. You were trying to help him.”
She made a snorting sound. “That’s right. Abby the Magnificent to the rescue.” At his look of confusion, she said, “That’s what my grandmother used to call me. She told me I could do anything I set my heart on. And I believed her. I wanted Billy—the hero I’d created—to be real. To be well.” Sorrowfully, she turned to Tom. “It was ego. Pure ego. I
was positive I knew best.”
“You were young.”
“But I wasn’t dumb. I was in college. Spousal abuse wasn’t kept behind closed doors anymore. I knew my relationship with Billy wasn’t healthy. I did everything in my power to make him happy. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. When it didn’t, he blamed me. I was too loud, too young, too dumb, a bitch, a nag.” She smiled ruefully. “It wasn’t until I started working at VOCAP that I learned how powerful a weapon words can be. They can slice to the bone and shred every ounce of self-confidence a person possesses.”
“Even knowing that doesn’t keep you from blaming yourself. Right?” he asked, his voice low and hard.
“I knew Billy was sick. He needed help. If I’d called the police the first time it happened…”
“If, Abby. If. Isn’t that one of Donna’s trouble words? I read those pamphlets you sent about victims’ rights. The one on spousal abuse said, in the past the police stayed out of domestic issues, unless the woman got killed.”
“I should have tried.”
“Why do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Beat yourself up about something that happened ten years ago.” His eyes narrowed shrewdly. “Is this why you think we can’t be together? You think I’d somehow think less of you for this?”
Abby’s stomach turned over. “It’s part of the reason.”
He waited.
Unconsciously, she moved her hands to her abdomen. No visible scars, but…the wounds were still affecting her life. “The abor…procedure was quick and fairly painless. I had some bleeding for a few days but nothing serious. I didn’t start having problems—female problems—until two years later. Heavy bleeding. Bad pain. My doctor did a laparoscopy. He said there was some scarring and my fallopian tubes were damaged. He couldn’t say for sure why, but he said there was a seventy percent chance I’d never have children.”
Tom’s arm pulled her close, supportively. He pressed her head to his chest and lowered his chin to the top of her head. “I’m so sorry, Abby. I know how much you love kids.”
That Cowboy's Kids Page 22