by S A Monk
“Jenny, this is Brad and Cindy Caldwell,” Peter announced eagerly. “They own the ranch next door to yours. They’re your neighbors.”
The black clad arm around her shoulders fell to her waist and tightened. The very clearly communicated tension radiating through the man beside her told her that he was not happy about this interruption.
Brad Caldwell was in his mid-thirties, nearly as tall as Hawk and attractive. His dark blond hair was precisely cut and styled, and he wore an expensive three piece gray suit and very fancy gray boots. His dark blue eyes missed nothing. The smile he bestowed on her oozed charm and male appreciation. No doubt, this man got a lot of mileage out of his polished manners and million dollar smile.
He took her hand and offered condolences in a smooth baritone. “Tom was a good neighbor. My family shared a fence line with your dad for years. He and my father, the judge, were long-time friends. I’ll miss Tom.” After finally releasing her hand, he turned his attention briefly to the man beside her.
“Hawk.” The greeting was terse, an exercise in minimal civility. No love lost there, Jenny surmised. Brad Caldwell then introduced her to the woman standing between Peter and himself. “This is my sister, Cindy.”
Well, if looks could kill, she’d just been slain.
Cindy Caldwell was a bit older than Jenny. She was also very beautiful, very high maintenance. Her platinum blonde hair was thick and straight and fell to her shoulders in an expensively styled cut. She was wearing a designer label dress that Jenny recognized. It was cut narrowly to highlight her long willowy figure, and fit snugly across the bodice to accentuate her voluptuous bust line. Jenny had seen enough breast enlargements to recognize them on Cindy Caldwell. In her very high heels, the blonde was nearly as tall as her brother. She barely managed a nod to Jenny before her eyes slashed to the arm Mr. Larson still had hooked around Jenny’s waist.
“Hawk.” Verbally, she greeted him the way her brother had, but the annoyance in her gaze immediately softened as her eyes rose to his face. “Are you okay?
“I’m managing.”
“That was a beautiful eulogy you gave Tom.” By this point, it was obvious the woman had feelings for Mr. Larson.
Whatever they were, though, they did nothing to ease his tension. “Thank you.”
Jenny had also been going to thank him for his moving tribute to her dad. Now she found herself sharply irritated that this woman had thanked him first.
She sighed. “Peter, I really need to get home. It’s been a long day.”
He didn’t look as if he wanted to be hurried. He’d been talking to Brad Caldwell like he’d known him for years, instead of just a few minutes. Jenny knew Peter could be like that. He knew how to spot money and influence. It made him a good businessman, but an obnoxious companion at times.
“The Caldwells would like us to come over to dinner before we go back,” he informed her exuberantly. “They’d like to hear more about our design firm.”
“And to get to know you better,” Brad Caldwell quickly clarified with another charming smile.
There was a distinct grunt of disgust from the man beside her. “I don’t know what my plans are, at the moment, Mr. Caldwell,” she demurred politely.
“Of course not,” he sympathized. “You need some time. We’ll wait a week or so to have dinner. You’ll be here that long, won’t you? If I can be of any assistance....”
“Ah, hell and damnation! Give it a rest, Caldwell!” Hawk swore, cutting him off brusquely. All eyes shifted to him. He simply tightened his arm around Jenny and scowled. “We need to get home.” After stepping around the Caldwells with her, he cast a look over his shoulder at Peter. “You coming with us, Mason?”
“In a minute.”
“Hurry up!” he ordered through his teeth.
Brad Caldwell moved to partially block their retreat. “Again, my deepest sympathy, Miss Fletcher.”
Mr. Larson glared at the rancher and moved Jenny easily around him.
When they got to his truck, he set both hands on her waist and lifted her onto the bench seat. This time she wasn’t as startled as when he’d done it for her at the house earlier. Between the height of his 4x4 truck and the narrowness of her skirt, there was no way she could have climbed into the vehicle without exposing everything. While he went around to the driver’s side, she scooted to the middle of the seat to leave room for Peter, who unfortunately, didn’t appear to be in any hurry to leave his new-found friends.
Once he’d settled his long frame behind the steering wheel, Hawk slid his arm behind her to rest it on the back of the seat. His dark face expressed his aggravation as he stared through the windshield. In the next moment, he hit the horn with the heel of his hand.
Jenny winced at Peter’s glowering response. “I’m sorry about the delay. I know you want to get home.”
With the extraction of a long pearl-tipped pin, she removed her hat and set it on her lap. From hip to knee, her leg was pressed against the man’s beside her. She considered putting some space between them while they waited, but discovered she really didn’t want to. She was still chilled, and his body was generating a lot of very nice heat.
“I gather you weren’t too pleased to stop and greet the Caldwells.” She tried to read his reaction and wondered if she had interpreted their interaction correctly. “You’re fence-hugging neighbors?”
Hawk snorted derisively. “Never have been. Neither was Tom.”
Her hair was swept up loosely into a top knot. Tendrils had come free to curl against her neck. She felt him absently finger one between his thumb and forefinger. His fingertips were work-roughened, and when they came in contact with the sensitive skin of her neck, they sent little shivers down her spine; nice shivers, she decided.
“The Caldwells and I go way back,” he elaborated after a long moment of staring out the window at Peter and the couple. “A long history and a lot of trouble.”
Maybe, but that woman, the sister, didn’t look like she had problems with him. Feminine intuition told Jenny there was something besides trouble between him and Cindy Caldwell. His statement sounded like the only explanation she was going to get for the moment, though, so she let the matter drop. “You did a nice job with the services, Mr. Larson,” she told him sincerely. “Thank you. Your memories of Daddy were very touching.”
“Hawk,” he reminded her with his first true smile of the afternoon as he turned to really look at her. “And I’m glad you approved. I wanted to do it right.”
“You did,” she said, her voice cracking with unshed tears.
Immediately, Hawk covered the hand in her lap with his larger warmer one, while his arm dropped down from the back of the seat to curl reassuringly around her shoulders.
Peter talked non-stop all the way back to the ranch, but he didn’t seem to care that neither of them gave him little or no reply. Jenny simply let herself rest against the man behind the steering wheel, letting his body heat chase away her chills.
CHAPTER 3
By eleven o’clock that evening, Hawk was at the end of his forbearance. He tossed in his poker hand and walked tiredly across the yard to the main house. An overhead vapor light illuminated his path, but he could have crossed the distance blindfolded. It had finally begun to rain, and he was half wet by the time he reached the covered front porch of the big house. Foregoing a shower, he changed into a t-shirt and a pair of cotton pajama bottoms in his room, absently staring at his pile of laundry on the floor. Maybe tomorrow he’d do something about it.
Trivial thoughts and plans scrolled through his brain. He recognized them for what they were— an attempt to keep the pain at bay. God, he was tired, bone-tired! For the past week, he’d felt like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. He really needed a good night’s sleep, something he hadn’t come close to since Tom’s heart attack. After tightening the drawstring on his pajamas, he sat down on his bed and turned off the lamp on the table beside him. His pine log bed groaned beneath the
collapse of his exhausted body. Once his head hit the pillows, he flung an arm over his face. Moonlight filtered weakly into the dormer window over his bed and trickled beneath his bent elbow.
As a distraction, the poker game at the bunkhouse after dinner had done little to take his mind off the day’s events. Peter Mason was the only one who had been having a good time tonight. Since he was also the only one who seemed able to concentrate enough to win, he was still at the bunkhouse. More than likely Eli and Hank were keeping him entertained a little while longer to give Hawk a break. It had taken a hell of a lot of patience to be courteous to the guy. Mason was a pompous pain in the ass. What Tom’s daughter saw in him was beyond Hawk’s comprehension. He definitely wasn’t looking forward to having him around for very long.
The only things he seemed to enjoy talking about were his business acumen and his new friends, the Caldwells. Hawk wasn’t sure what to make of the guy’s interest in them, but he was going to keep an eye on it. He sure as hell didn’t need Brad Caldwell interfering with his life any more than he already had. And he wasn’t going to tolerate someone under this roof carrying information back to Caldwell.
His body started to relax and his mind began to finally drift toward oblivion, when he was jolted out of his half-sleep by a muffled scream. It was quickly followed by the sound of breaking glass. Hawk jack-knifed out of bed and dashed across the hall. He’d been worried about Tom’s daughter all evening. She’d gone to her room after the burial service, and hadn’t come out since. He understood the need to be alone, but he’d still worried about her. She’d looked so emotionally fragile all day.
The room was dark when he pushed open the door, but he was able to make out her silhouette propped up against the mound of pillows bunched together at the headboard. Her knees were drawn up to her chest, tucked under her chin, her arms locked tightly around them. Hawk reached over to turn on the hurricane lamp by the bed. There was water dripping off the top of the dresser and broken glass on the floor. Luckily, he was wearing his slip-ons. His feet were protected, but hers weren’t. Her bare, painted toes were peeking out from beneath the hem of her pajama bottoms.
Now that he could see her better, he studied her closer. Her forehead was pressed hard to her kneecaps. Clad in a pair of sleeveless black silk pajamas, she looked very small and miserable. Her hair was a dark red curtain of disheveled curls, cascading to her shins, hiding her face from him.
Hawk bent down to pick up the pieces of broken glass. He was fortunate there were no slivery shards, only large pieces. He scooped them onto a magazine and dumped the pieces into a small trashcan near the bed. Once he was satisfied she wouldn’t cut her bare feet when she got up, he mopped up the water on the night stand with some tissue, then slid it over the bare wood floor just in case.
Another look at her told him she might need something stronger than water to drink. She hadn’t moved to acknowledge his presence since he had entered.
“I’ll be right back,” he informed her, receiving no reply.
She was in the same upright fetal position when he returned.
This time he sat down on the edge of the bed. Even the dip of the mattress didn’t budge her from her position.
“Jenny.” He reached for her bare arm and stroked it, rubbing his open hand back and forth, from shoulder to wrist. When he got nothing more than a muted whimper, he held out a large brandy snifter. Three fingers of warm amber liquid swirled inside the thinly blown glass. “Drink this,” he urged her. Her skin was as cold as marble. “Come on, honey. Take a drink.”
By slow degrees, her head began to turn toward him. She didn’t lift it, just rested one cheek on her knees. She stared limpidly at the glass. He stroked her hair back from her face. He was no doctor, but she looked dazed and totally traumatized. Gently, he slipped the tips of his fingers under her chin and lifted her head off her knees.
Without protest, she let him put the glass to her lips. Holding the back of her head, he tipped it and urged her to drink. “You’re not doing so well, are you?” They were just words spoken to encourage her out of her paralysis. He already knew the answer to his question. Obviously, it hadn’t been such a good idea to leave her alone all night.
After taking a long drink of the warm brandy, she shivered and began to rub her bare arms. She wasn’t looking at Hawk, just through him or beyond him. He wasn’t sure which. If she had gotten any sleep, it didn’t look as if it had been easy or restful. The bed was a mess; a wild tangle of sheets, pillows and blankets.
“I heard you cry out,” he stated in a calm matter-of-fact voice meant to soothe and relax her. “Did you have a bad dream?”
She dropped her head back onto her knees and began to rock back and forth. This time, Hawk heard the choked sobs.
“I was dreaming.... The open coffin.... Daddy in pain.... He was struggling.... My grandfather was there, laughing, sneering....My fault! Ohhh, God! My fault!”
A broken recollection of scenes from a terrible dream tumbled from her haltingly.
“You shouldn’t have had them open the casket.”
“I had to know it was... not a nightmare... that it was… real.” Her voice was so small and reedy, he barely heard her reply.
“Jenny, let me help.” He lifted her head and used thumb and forefinger to gently turn it to him once again. “Honey, look at me.”
When she finally raised her eyes to his, he was taken aback by the ravages of grief he saw on her beautiful face. Her deep brown eyes were red rimmed and swollen. Tears were streaking down her face, which was blotchy and pale. Her lips were wet and quivering, and almost immediately, she bit down on her lower lip in an attempt to hold back more tears. She still wouldn’t look directly at him. He put the glass to her lips one more time and made her take another drink, a longer one this time. When she pushed it away, he finished the rest himself. The starkness of her anguish hit him hard. Beside him, she started to rock back and forth once more, her head back on her knees. He felt every ounce of her pain. He simply hadn’t expressed his own in quite the same way.
Unable to see her curled so tightly in on herself, he swung his legs up onto the bed, sat back against the multitude of pillows, and unwound her rigid limbs. She didn’t like it, fought him a little, so he folded her in his arms, angling himself so she was tucked snugly along his side, turned toward his chest. With his hand between her shoulder blades, he held her securely and rocked her gently, sharing his body heat with her. Her skin, her whole body felt like ice.
Immediately, she unleashed another torrent of grief. “I loved him so much!” Deep sobs broke her speech. “I can’t believe he’s gone. Too fast. I should have seen it. I should have been here. It hurts. Oh God, it hurts... so bad! I should have come home years ago! I’ll never forgive myself!”
Hawk continued to rock her in his arms. “You can’t do this to yourself. I know because I’ve been blaming myself since it happened, but it does no good. Tom wouldn’t want this guilt from either of us. He probably knew he had a bad heart, but decided not to worry us about it. Shit! We didn’t have medical insurance! Not a big enough operation to afford it. He wouldn’t have wanted to burden either of us with the …. God, I don’t know! But I do know it damn sure hurts!” His jaw rested on top of her head. Their grief over Tom’s death was mutual and binding.
“I lost so many years with him!” Jenny cried in abject misery, her long silk clad body curling into his like water seeking the shoreline. “You were so lucky to have so much time with him. God, I can’t stop crying….” She couldn’t finish her thoughts amid the sobs that tore through her.
“It’s okay to cry. I could shed a few with you.” Hawk was surprised he’d said that aloud. But it was the truth.
He had wonderful memories of his years with Tom Fletcher. After she had been taken away from him, Tom had been depressed, lonely, and miserable. By then, Hawk had become close enough to the man to want to help. At sixteen, he’d been old enough to declare himself emancipated. He’d wanted to move
in with Tom and work on the Bar F. By that point, Tom knew how much his young friend had hated living under Judge Caldwell’s roof, involved in the so-called ‘work program’ on the man’s ranch. Within two months of his daughter’s departure, Tom negotiated a deal with the judge that released Hawk from Caldwell’s guardianship and allowed him to move in with Tom. The arrangement had benefitted both men. Tom’s grief over losing his daughter was eased, and Hawk finally found a home he didn’t want to run away from. In every way that mattered, Tom became the father Hawk had never really known. But his daughter was correct. She and Tom had had half a lifetime stolen from them, and now there was no way to replace it.
“Do you resent me for the time I had with your dad?”
He’d always wondered about that. He could understand that she might believe he had stolen her dream. He hadn’t ever intended to, but he’d been here with Tom, working by his side, and she hadn’t. He’d always assumed she hadn’t come home because she had such an exciting, demanding career. According to Tom, she’d worked on one movie after another. She was a very renowned and successful costume designer. He didn’t go to many movies himself, but her dad had been able to name every one that she’d worked on.
“I guess I did resent you, at least a little,” she admitted after a prolonged silence, choking back a sob. “But I’m glad you were there for Daddy after I left. I know how much he cared about you. Of all the boys he helped, you meant the most to him.”
That she could say that in the midst of her grief touched him. But he wondered who had been there for her after her tragic separation from Tom. Probably no one. Hawk remembered her mother as being cold and intolerant, vainly selfish. He doubted the woman had given much love and guidance to the daughter who had only been a pawn. It said a lot about Miss Fletcher’s character that she had managed to be strong enough to endure the ordeal.