WILD BLOOD

by Naomi Horton

  Kathy was so silent for so long that Jett wondered if she'd fallen asleep. He eased himself out of her arms and turned to look at her, but she was just staring into the fire, a frown pulling her brows together.

  She seemed to collect her thoughts, giving herself a little shake. "What are we going to do, Jett? This is all such a mess—how are we ever going to get through it?"

  "We'll work it out." He smiled and brushed a strand of hair from her cheek. "It'll be all right, Kathy. You can see him whenever you want. And let's face it, he's going to pretty much do as he pleases, anyway." He gave a snort. "Darn kid's as obstinate and hardheaded as you are."

  "Excuse me? If he's obstinate, he gets it from his Kendrick side, not mine. And I am not hardheaded."

  "Yeah, right."

  She smiled, then looked at him for a long, thoughtful while. "You shouldn't be talking to me about this without a lawyer, you know. And you're not obligated to allow me visitation rights or anything else. You're being very … decent."

  Because I don't want to lose you, Jett nearly said. But he caught the treacherous words before they slipped out, knowing she would never believe him. Not sure he could believe them himself.

  "I don't want a lawyer," he said evenly, knowing this was the truth. "I don't want to fight with you over this, Kathy. Jody's our son. We'll find a way to work it out."

  "Just like a real family."

  "Yeah." Smiling, he pretended to brush another strand of hair off her cheek again just for the excuse to touch her. He wanted to ask her to stay the night but had no idea how.

  She smiled suddenly and rocked forward to cup his face with her hands and kiss him with satisfying thoroughness. "Thank you."

  Then, before he could collect his wits enough to grab her and return the favor, the back door banged open.

  "Hey, Dad? You around?"

  "In here," Jett called in resignation. Another one of the unsung joys of parenthood Kathy had yet to learn—a kid's uncanny ability to know exactly when to interrupt.

  "Angel says we should buy all them cattle and—" Jody hit the door to the living room in full stride and careened to a stop when he saw Kathy. "Sell what we don't want," he finished lamely.

  He snatched his hat off, blushing furiously, and nearly fell over his feet. "Ma'am. Er, that is—I mean…" He stopped in an agony of indecision.

  "Kathleen," she said gently. "I think, for a while at least, you should just call me Kathleen."

  He nodded quickly, looking relieved at not having to call her Mom, and guilty at feeling relieved. He stood there, hat clutched in his hands, obviously not having a clue what he should be saying next. "You, uh, stayin' for supper?"

  "You mean you hope she'll stay and make supper," Jett drawled. "Isn't it your turn to cook tonight?"

  Jody gave Kathy a shy smile. "I do spaghetti pretty good, if you want to stay…"

  "I'd like that," Kathy said, almost as shyly. "If you're sure it's no trouble."

  "Oh, it ain't no trouble." He grinned with delight. "It ain't no trouble, is it, Dad?"

  "Nope." Jett found himself releasing a breath he hadn't even been aware of holding. It was going to be all right, he thought. Everything was going to work out just fine. "No trouble at all. And maybe I can give you a hand tossing a saddle on that paint of yours later, and you can show your mother what a hell of a bronc rider you are."

  He didn't know which of the two of them looked more pleased.

  * * *

  "You know, I'm finally starting to think things might work out after all." Kathleen gazed happily around the freshly painted kitchen of her new home, then glanced around at Sherry. "I know you think I'm nuts to rent this place when all my furniture and stuff's still in Baltimore, but it is perfect, admit it."

  Sherry rinsed off the glass she'd been washing and set it on a towel to dry. "I never said it wasn't perfect. I just said I don't know why you rented a house when we have wads of room at The Oaks. You know you're welcome to stay with us for as long as you want. Technically, the place is still half yours, anyway."

  "I don't want it. And if I'm going to live in Burnt River, I need to start a real life, Sherry, not just camp out with you and Gord." A crash of thunder made her wince, and she walked across to check the catch on the window as a gust of rain hit the glass. The storm had been flirting along the edge of the mountains all day and now seemed to have settled in to stay. "Besides, you two need your privacy. Gordo told me you have plans for another baby."

  Sherry grinned. "Just another addition to the dynasty." Her grin widened. "You've got some catching up to do, girl!"

  "I think I'll leave the dynasty building to you and Gord and concentrate on figuring out how to be a mother to the one offspring I already have."

  "I thought you two were getting along great."

  "We are. But Jett and I had another wrangle this morning." She sighed and took another pot out of the box of kitchen things they'd brought over from The Oaks. "Do you and Gord argue over how to raise your kids?"

  "All the time. But remember, we're raising ours together, and from scratch. We've spent a lot of time getting the ground rules worked out. It's going to take time with you and Jett."

  "He's so damned stubborn!"

  "And you're not, of course." Sherry smiled and set a box of dishes on the table, then started unpacking them. "I'm glad you have a use for all these extra dishes. I felt guilty every time I saw them sitting in the attic."

  "You were supposed to be using them," Kathleen said dryly.

  "Yeah, right, like I'm going to serve cornflakes to a two-year-old in a china bowl that probably cost fifty bucks. Your mother had exquisite taste, Kathy, but plastic is more my style."

  Watching her, Kathleen smiled. Then she sighed and started unpacking the rest of the pots. She should just tell Sherry the truth, she thought irritably. She should just stop kidding herself and admit that this whole thing with Jett wasn't working.

  She'd thought after that day at his ranch that things really were going to be okay. Not easy, necessarily—she didn't expect easy—but okay. It had been almost two weeks now, and on the surface, things weren't that bad. Not between her and Jody, anyway.

  He'd taken to dropping by practically every afternoon after school so she could help him with his homework, although more often than not they just kicked back and ate cookies and talked until it was time for her to drive him home. They went riding together now and again, and watched video movies, and even went shopping in Indian Springs.

  But Jett. Well, Jett was a whole other matter.

  They hardly ever talked anymore except to argue, and then it was over the stupidest things. Like the time she bought Jody a new shirt and Jett told her angrily that he didn't want her spending Patterson money on his son. His son. As though she didn't really count. Or the time she'd stopped by the ranch to drop off a video Jody had wanted to borrow, and she and Jett had wound up arguing over which Jody liked best, orange juice or apple juice.

  As though it mattered. And then there was the time she and Jody were having a hay fight in the barn and Jett had walked in. She'd tossed a handful of hay at him without even thinking, and he'd grinned and come after her, tackling her around the waist, and they'd gone tumbling into a pile of hay together, breathless with laughter.

  She'd lain there in his arms, her mouth mere inches from his, feeling his breath on her cheek, the weight and heat of his body on hers, and for one moment it had been like old times. His eyes had held hers, as warm as toast and filled with memories, and then, in an eye blink, it was gone.

  His face had gone all closed and cool, and he'd been on his feet in the next instant, brushing himself off and telling them in a surly voice that they were making a hell of a mess and had better get it cleaned up.

  It had nothing to do with Jody, of course. It had to do with her. The fact that she was in Burnt River, in his life, in Jody's life. He was scared. She'd figured that out finally, although she still wasn't sure what he was scared of: her or himself.
<
br />   "Want to talk about it?"

  Kathleen looked up to find Sherry watching her with a thoughtful expression. She smiled. "It's nothing."

  "Hah! Look, I know it's none of my business, but—"

  To Kathleen's relief, the doorbell rang just then. "That'll be the pizza." Grabbing a handful of money from her wallet, she walked down the long hallway to the front door and pulled it open.

  Jody was standing in the shelter of the overhang, the collar of his sheepskin jacket turned up against the pelting rain. He had a duffel bag in his hand, and he looked mad enough to char timber.

  "Can I stay with you?" he blurted. "Me and Dad had a fight."

  "Oh, Jody, I'm not sure that's a—"

  "Please?" He looked at her pleadingly, teeth chattering. "Please, Kathleen? I ain't got no other place to go, 'cept a friend over in Indian Springs."

  "Get in here!" Shaking her head at him, she pushed the screen door open. "How did you get into town?"

  "Caught a ride with one of the ranch hands who was comin' in to see his girl." He edged past her in the narrow hallway, rainwater cascading off him and onto her newly waxed hardwood floor, mixing with the mud off his boots.

  "Does your dad know you're here?"

  "No." Jody's face was sullen.

  "I'll give him a call and—"

  "I ain't goin' back there!" Jody threw the bag down. "No way! He can do all his dang chores himself and see how he likes it."

  "Hi, Jody!" Sherry appeared in the hallway just then, smiling brightly as she pulled on her rain slicker. "Kathy, I'm going to leave before this storm gets any worse."

  "It's already startin' to clear in the west, ma'am."

  "Well, Jody, that's not the storm I'm talking about. A truck just drove in that looks a lot like—"

  A crash of thunder made Kathleen swear breathlessly, and she reached past Jody to push the door shut. It caught on something, and she gave it a shove, then gasped as it shoved back.

  A gloved hand settled around its upper edge and pushed it inward, and in the next heartbeat something tall and wide stepped into the house, looking like part of the storm itself. Jett's face glowered down at her, as hard as stone.

  "Where the hell is my son?"

  * * *

  Chapter 12

  « ^ »

  "Hi, Jett. 'Bye, Jett." Sherry smiled and edged past all of them the way she might a pack of rabid dogs. "'Bye, Jody. 'Bye, Kath."

  "Sherry!" Kathleen looked at her sister-in-law helplessly. "You can't just leave me alone with this mess!"

  "I'll drop by tomorrow and help you finish unpacking."

  "I wasn't talking about the unpacking!"

  Sherry waved a merry farewell, then scooted out the door before Kathleen could give a yelp of protest. Telling herself to stay calm, she turned to glare up at Jett, who was busy dripping rainwater over what remained of her clean floor. "Come in, Jett. Make yourself at home."

  "What do you think you're doing, telling Jody he can stay with you any time he feels like—"

  "It wasn't her idea," Jody cut in with a guilty glance at Kathleen. "She didn't know nothin' about it till I got here."

  "Hey! This is my house! I get to ask the questions!" Kathleen looked from one to the other, hands on hips. "Okay, what's this about?"

  "There's a PRCA-sanctioned amateur rodeo over in Indian Springs this weekend," Jody said angrily. "And I'm ridin' in it."

  "The hell you are," Jett assured him just as angrily. "I've got a stock truck and driver headin' down to Butte on Saturday to pick up that herd of cattle, and I need your help loadin' and unloadin'. It's going to take all day—two trips, at least. You want to rodeo, that's fine. But you do it on your own time."

  Jody's chin jutted out. "I'm goin' to that rodeo. Everybody worth competin' against is gonna be there, and the money's real good. You got hired hands to move those cattle!"

  "They're going to be chasing down those cows and their calves that got out through that fence you never got around to fixing."

  "I strung three miles of barbed wire last week. If those cows got through that fence, they done it someplace else!"

  "Stop it!" Kathleen put a hand in the center of each male chest and shoved.

  Jett stepped back, breathing heavily. "We'll finish this at home. Get your stuff and get in the truck."

  "I ain't goin' home."

  "Jett!" Kathleen put her hand on his arm as he took a step forward. "Let him stay the night. You could both use the time to cool off."

  "Stay out of this, Kathy!" Jett wrenched his arm out of her grasp.

  "Don't you talk to my mother like that!"

  "Get in the truck." Jett's voice dropped dangerously. "Now."

  Jody faced him belligerently; then he grabbed his duffel bag, shoved past Jett roughly and stormed back outside.

  Jett watched him go, nostrils flared; then he pulled the door closed with a bang and angrily turned on Kathleen. "I got just about enough trouble with that boy without you butting in with all sorts of advice I don't need!"

  "Jody didn't wind up on my doorstep tonight because of anything I did!" She caught her anger and turned away, heading down the hallway to the living room. "I'm not going to argue with you, Jett. It's all we do anymore, and I'm sick of it. If you have some issue with how I'm handling things, we can discuss it some other time, because I am not going to get into a brawl over child-rearing philosophies at ten o'clock at night."

  "The only issue I have is him running to you every time I tell him something he doesn't want to hear."

  "Maybe he comes to me because I talk with him instead of just barking orders." She looked at him impatiently. "And I listen. When was the last time you really listened to him? Do you ever ask him what his plans are? Do you know he has a girlfriend? Her name's Emily Pritchard, and she dreams of being a world champion barrel racer, and they met at a rodeo in Bear Falls last year. I'll bet you never knew that."

  She could tell by his expression that he didn't. And that he wasn't too happy about the fact.

  "When was the last time you told him you love him, Jett? Or the last time you took some time off to watch him ride rodeo and told him how good he is, how proud you are of him?"

  Jett still didn't say anything, just watched her with that hot, angry expression in his eyes.

  "He's still just a kid, Jett. He needs you to tell him how special he is."

  "You don't know a damned thing about what he needs," he said in a tight voice. "I've been raising that boy for fifteen years, and I never had a problem with him until you turned up."

  Kathleen drew a quick little breath, feeling as though he'd just slapped her. "That's not fair," she whispered.

  Jett flushed slightly. "Kathy, damn it, this isn't—" He made an abrupt, angry gesture, as though not even knowing what he wanted to say.

  "You're driving him away, Jett," she said quietly. "When he talks about rodeo, he has the same look on his face I used to see on yours. Keep fighting him and you're going to lose more than you win."

  "Do you have any idea how hard the rodeo life is? For every cowboy who makes a living at it, there are a thousand who don't. You're on the road all the time, traveling from one event to the next, living in cheap motel rooms with three or four other guys, trying to make ends meet. You've got no time to build a proper life. And there's never a day when something doesn't hurt. You live with pain—pulled groin muscles, busted ribs, cracked collarbones, dislocated shoulders … you name it, you'll bust it."

  "You loved it once."

  Something crossed his face, a wistfulness, a memory, gone in an instant. "Once," he said hoarsely.

  "I know you're doing this for all the right reasons, Jett, but you should know better than any man that you can't kill a boy's dreams."

  "I'm not trying to kill his dreams! I'm just tryin' to—"

  "Then back off and let him take his best shot. If it doesn't work out for him, he's got the rest of his life to be a rancher. But if it does, if he grabs that brass ring and makes the dr
eam come true…" She smiled. "My God, Jett, you were there. I've seen all those trophies and championship buckles of yours that he keeps in his room. You had the dream right in your hand before you walked away from it. You knew how good you were. How can you possibly deny him the chance to prove just how good he can be?"

  "This isn't any of your business," he said in a quiet, angry voice. "What gives you the right to turn up after fifteen years and tell me how to raise my son?"

  "Your son. It always comes down to that, doesn't it? You'll let me play at being a parent, but he'll always be your son. I'll always be just the outsider."

  "You are an outsider, damn it!" Then he swore and took a deep breath. "Look, I didn't mean that."

  "Yes, you did." Kathleen clenched her fists at her sides, refusing to let him see how deeply those few words had hurt. "I was a fool to think you'd let me be anything else."

  "Kathy—"

  "Just stop, Jett. Just … don't say any more, all right?" She crossed her arms over her chest, chilled to the bone. So that was it. It hadn't been about her at all, but about Jody.

  He was scared of losing Jody. One more loss, one more betrayal, in a lifetime of them. "It's late. You'd better take your son home."

  She turned and walked across the room to stare out the window, her back stiff with hurt, and Jett cursed silently.

  What had happened between them, anyway? He'd been halfway in love with her once. More than halfway, if he was honest. And for a while there, he'd found himself thinking things he'd pretty much given up on. Things like a home. Family. Forever.

  Then … well, then things had changed. It was his own fault, of course. He'd destroyed anything she might have felt for him. He saw the way she looked at him now, her eyes filled with wariness, as though she would never really believe anything he told her again.

  And he didn't want it like this between them, damn it! Problem was, he didn't know what he wanted.

  Thinking about this, he walked across to where she was standing, then bent and kissed her on the cheek. She turned her face away, and he swallowed a sigh of frustration, annoyed by his inability to do anything right these days.