Dana owlishly eyed the back of John’s head before she exchanged droll glances with Kay Hackman, who sat on the other side of J.J.’s car seat. “Do you believe this?” she whispered, not certain whether to slip on some sunglasses or cover her ears.
“Next to a wedding and childbirth, christenings give men the most stress,” the redhead said with a patient smile. A year younger than her husband and John, the fair-skinned beauty had known the duo several years longer than Dana, and had been relating anecdotes about the men since they’d left Dusty Flats in Bud’s patrol car. “Try to relax, John. Bud put on the new winter tires the minute we heard of the threat of deteriorating weather. We’ll make it. Remember, they can’t do much without us.”
“I’ve had root canals that were less of a pain than he is,” Bud grumbled, adjusting the windshield wipers for the truck that passed them.
The fine drizzle had begun minutes before they’d left Dusty Flats, and now that they were halfway to Abilene a bit of sleet could be seen on the windows. John was right about the bridges and overpasses becoming dangerous first, but he’d forgotten that traffic would slow them down, as well.
Besides, Kay was right, too. Father Patrick, with whom she’d made arrangements ten days ago when she’d agreed to help John with the christening, would wait for them. What’s more, Bud was a responsible driver. More importantly, he was far calmer than John. They couldn’t be in more competent hands.
“Look at your son,” she said, to get his attention off the road and give Bud some relief.
The baby seemed determined to pull all the ribbons out of his hat. He energetically applied himself to tugging at the bow beneath his chin and trying to shove one loop into his mouth.
His father’s handsome, masculine features softened as he eyed J.J. “Hey, pal, don’t do that to your godmother’s present, even if you do think ribbons make you look like a sissy. I’ll get you a real hat as soon as your head grows big enough to wear one.”
“That shouldn’t take long, considering he’s a Paladin,” Bud drawled.
Everyone laughed, but Dana’s voice caught as she met John’s smiling, but intense look. For a moment there might as well have been only the two of them in the car. This means so much to him, she thought, the blockage in her throat becoming a lump the size of her heart.
Of course, she’d begun to figure that out for herself days ago. Ever since she’d started taking care of J.J. again. For the past several days he’d been working overtime to be the model parent, attentive and accommodating, even while under a mounting number of other pressures.
Celene had proved to be the worst headache. She’d phoned early in the week with complaints about roadblocks and time delays in obtaining their divorce. On the advice of his attorney, John had actually dropped everything, and he and his lawyer had flown up to Atlantic City to pick her up. The trio had then rushed down to Mexico for a quick dissolution of their marriage.
Next came the difficulty in finding a church that would perform the christening despite John and Celene’s unorthodox situation. It had been painful to watch John’s mounting frustration with Dusty Flats’s ultraconservative parish priest questioning John’s ability to take care of his son’s religious education. Things had begun to look hopeless until she’d contacted the young, progressive Father Patrick in Abilene, who’d proved not only sympathetic, but supportive, by offering his assistance and assuring them he could perform the service around their schedule.
Still, the miles and stress showed on John.
As handsome as he looked in his dark gray wool suit, she knew he had to be exhausted and worried about the amount of work piling up at the ranch with winter approaching faster than usual. The lines around his eyes were deepening, and he looked as though he’d lost a few pounds. But all he seemed to care about at the moment was his baby’s christening service. It underscored how committed he seemed to be to his promise, and she couldn’t help feeling a rush of pride for him. And gratitude for his patience with her, she added, feeling poignantly bereft when he turned back to face front.
“I remember when our first was christened,” Kay said, breaking into Dana’s thoughts. She met her husband’s fleeting gaze in the rearview mirror. “Bud’s staff was all down with the flu and he nearly collapsed from exhaustion trying to keep the station manned and still make it to the church. Remember, dear?”
“Guess this isn’t the time to tell her that we were really at a marathon poker game, huh?” John drawled.
Bud grunted. “I wish we had been. You know I’ve always been lucky at cards, and you’ll remember the extra money would have been welcome at the time what with the new house costs, expanding family and everything. Instead, all I cared about was getting home to my wife and son. Nothing like a woman’s arms to give a man his sanity and sense of balance back.”
It was a heartwarming response, and yet Dana watched John turn to look out the passenger window. What he was thinking? Was he worried that Bud had taken offense at his subtle teasing, or envying his friend’s happiness? Heaven knows she’d felt a tug of that green monster herself—a startling revelation, considering how long she’d been fighting over letting her heart have too much control in her life.
Could he be disappointed that things between them weren’t changing faster? Admittedly, her first week back at the Long J had been a tough one for both of them. She’d had odd moments of utter shyness, moments when she’d felt absolutely naked under his watchful gaze. That required time to work through, time to keep herself from crawling back into her shell. Added to his absences from the ranch, it might seem to him that nothing had changed at all.
But things were different. She wished she could lean forward and touch his shoulder this minute and tell him so. Maybe she still believed she wasn’t good wife material—her wariness of men, her fear of being legally tied to one man, of feeling trapped, continued to trouble her and nurture her doubts. But—
“I just love this quilted robe outfit you found J.J.,” Kay said, breaking into her brooding. “Is this local? I thought I knew everyone who does custom work in our area, but I haven’t seen anything like this.”
“No, it’s not local. I found it in a specialty catalog from Dallas.” Dana caressed the satiny sleeve until she found the baby’s exquisite fingers and watched them close around hers. Then J.J. spit his pacifier out and tried to bring her finger to his mouth. “Oh, no, you don’t. What is it about these little guys that makes them want what they’re not supposed to have?”
“That’s not necessarily a condition exclusive to babies,” Kay said dryly.
“I heard that,” Bud murmured over his shoulder. “Just remember who loves you best.”
It was sweet to hear such banter between two people who genuinely cared for one another. Compatibility must be the key, Dana thought. “You and Bud are fortunate that you two have so much in common,” she said, deciding to get it confirmed.
Bud hooted and slapped his thigh. “Say that again?”
It wasn’t the response Dana had been expecting. “Am I that far off?”
“Off is an understatement,” Kay injected, reaching over to pat her hand. “In school we were elected the couple least likely to make it to graduation. They thought I’d ditch him and go to New York and become a cover model, and that he would end up managing a convenience store on the freeway, and spending his summers coaching Little League baseball. It just goes to show you that you should never assume anything.”
“Yeah,” Bud seconded, “never say never.”
Dana stared from Kay to Bud, starkly aware of the message in their story. She’d known of them ever since moving to Dusty Flats, but since they were a few years older, and her father had been strict about her contact with other young people, she hadn’t gotten to know many of her schoolmates. This was a revelation that shook her more than she would have expected.
Still somewhat bemused when Bud pulled up the patrol car before the modest brick church, she watched the couple as he hurried to help his wi
fe from the car and kiss her with a newlywed’s eagerness. Then her view was blocked by John, who ducked inside to help her with J.J.
“Okay?” he asked, his gaze concerned as it sped over her face.
“Sure. Why shouldn’t I be?” she asked quickly.
Only when she saw the disappointment in his eyes did she realize she’d reacted just like old times, and that he’d been hurt by her briskness, her preference to hide behind the mask that was her smile. She wanted to take it back, to apologize, but by then he’d already lifted his son into his arms and was retreating from the car. In the end it was Bud who reached inside to assist her.
“C’mon, pretty lady, grab this other arm. It’s always been my life’s ambition to be surrounded by gorgeous women.”
Dana did so with a grateful smile, but her gaze remained on John’s back all the way up the walk and into the church.
Though intimate and relatively brief, the ceremony was lovely, thanks to the prematurely gray-haired Father Patrick, whose eloquence came only second to the compassion in his soft gray eyes. Dana found her throat tightening several times, and she could hear Kay sniff behind her. It was John, however, who stunned her. When the first opportunity came to risk a glance over her shoulder at him, she thought he had his head bowed in prayer. But the next time, she caught him pinching the bridge of his nose and she realized he was fighting back his own emotions.
Ever gracious and discreet, Kay came to his rescue, stepping beside him and handing him a tissue. But the image was imbedded in Dana’s mind, and even as she gazed down at J.J., whose scowl was apparently meant to relay that the whole situation—and particularly the ominously dark church—was not on his roster of favorite experiences, she couldn’t stop seeing the damp streaks on John’s face. In the end Bud had to touch her elbow to remind her that she had yet to respond, “I will,” to Father Patrick’s soft inquiry of commitment to J.J.
Like most big moments, it seemed that it was over too soon for all the planning and hard work that had gone into it. While John and Bud visited with Father Patrick for a few moments, Dana and Kay retreated to one of the back rooms to change J.J.
“You were a darling,” Kay crooned to the baby to entertain him as Dana worked.
“He was a good boy, wasn’t he?” she murmured, as proud as any mother could ever be. “Do you think, um, John was pleased with the way things went?”
“You saw.”
It wasn’t a question and the woman’s look was direct. Dana had to be as honest. She nodded.
“John Paladin is one of the most complicated and misunderstood men I’ve ever met,” Kay said with a sad smile.
Dana couldn’t have been more stunned if she’d announced she and Bud were going to divorce. “He’s a contradiction in some ways, I suppose, but…misunderstood?”
“What do you see when you look at him?”
It didn’t seem right to say, “A big silhouette shutting out the sun,” even if that’s the first impression she was often left with. That meant digging deeper.
“Powerful. Indomitable.”
Kay shook her head. “He’s not a mountain of granite, Dana. Regardless of what he looks like, cut him and he bleeds like the rest of us. That’s what you saw today. It takes a very special man to take an unfortunate situation and see the jewel at the center. That’s what John’s been able to do with J.J. And yet he remains one of the most lonely men I’ve ever known.”
Lonely? Were they speaking of the same person? No door, except maybe hers, had ever been closed to Big John Paladin. “If you ask me, he seems almost too busy for his own good.”
“He lets the ranch eat up his time,” Kay amended, leaning against the wall and crossing her arms. “But he’s got a devoted and talented group of men working for him. He could easily take more time for himself, but he won’t because there’s nothing else to fill it.”
“There’s J.J.,” Dana reminded her, not liking the picture she was being drawn.
“That’s recent, and it helps. But it’s not everything. It’s not enough for someone with as much love to give as John has.”
It was an intriguing thought, she had to admit. Dana was, however, plagued by ghosts. “Was Celene beautiful?”
Kay tilted her head and eyed the tile wall. “She was flashy, and she made the most of what she had. If she’d have washed off half the war paint she wore, you might have called her girlishly pretty. She had that baby-doll kind of attractiveness.”
Dana wanted to groan.
“Do you think John’s so superficial that he was drawn to that?”
“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Dana countered bitterly, as she tried to steady her hands enough to secure J.J.’s fresh diaper.
“What’s obvious is that you’ve never looked beyond your own problems to see anyone else’s.”
Stunned, Dana stared at Kay. The redheaded woman smiled knowingly.
“Good. I’m glad that got your attention.” She reached over and touched her shoulder. “Dana, I like you. But I love John, and I’m going to say this because I worry that he’s not going to get what he deserves out of life. Stop being blind to the things you two have in common. You should be able to help each other. Instead you’re too wrapped up in your own hurt to see his. If you’re not careful, you’re going to wake up and realize the best thing in your life slipped right through your fingers. Not once, but twice.”
The degenerating weather forced them to forgo the plan to have a celebratory meal in town, and Bud drove them back to Dusty Flats. Dana didn’t mind, even though the drive back became more like a funeral procession than a celebration. It wasn’t because anyone was really upset with anyone else; it was more a result of all their preoccupation and reflection.
At the Hackman residence, John kissed Kay and shook hands with Bud, thanking them once again for the ride as well as their friendship. Bud offered to drive Dana home, but she reminded him that she’d left her car at John’s.
“I’ll be fine if I don’t take too long to get home.” She was, however, very glad for John’s bracing arm on the increasingly slick walkway.
Once in his truck, she caught John’s worried look through the windshield as she checked on J.J., still asleep in the car seat. “You’re wondering about your stock, aren’t you?” she asked, as he slipped in behind the steering wheel.
“This looks like a brutal storm for this early in the season and we don’t have all the cattle driven in where we can easily feed them.”
“You’ll have to go out as soon as you get back to the ranch.” Just like Kay’s comment to her earlier, it wasn’t a question. She knew the answer.
“I should, but I can’t leave J.J. Maybe the men—”
“I’ll stay with him.”
John shot her a brief look before shifting into gear. She didn’t blame him for his surprise; she was slightly amazed herself. The way things looked, if she did stay, it would be a full day or more before she could negotiate the roads again with her vehicle.
“You’ve done too much already,” he told her, gratitude faintly warming his eyes. “I have no right to ask you for another favor.”
“You’re not asking. I’m offering.”
He was silent for perhaps a full quarter of a mile, then he said, “I really appreciate this.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I guess I’m a bit surprised that you’re offering.”
“You’re not the only one.”
It would mean sleeping under the same roof, in one of his beds, and having little place to hide either physically or emotionally—all concerns that would have made her panic only a few months or even weeks ago.
The ride to the ranch took nearly fifteen minutes longer than usual, and J.J. grew cranky by the time they pulled up to the house. Since John had been careful to keep the truck toasty warm, Dana told him it was probably nothing more than the baby being overtired. But once they were inside, even after she’d changed him again and put him in a more comfortable sleeper, he remained whiny.
>
“Don’t worry,” she told John, when he came downstairs after changing into work clothes. “Once he has his bottle, he’ll drift right off to sleep. Go on…and be careful.”
It was only minutes after two in the afternoon, and as they both glanced toward the hallway clock, John shook his head apologetically. “I’ll try to be back as soon as I can. Durango’s coming with us, so if you need anything, you’ll have to call Bud.”
That told her how worried he was. Durango’s old injuries wouldn’t let him move as quickly as the others, and that would be a detriment if conditions got any worse.
“Do you need some food? I could hurry and make some sandwiches and coffee or—”
“Durango’s taken care of that. I checked with him while you were up with J.J. We’re as set as we can be.” He slapped his gloves against the palm of his left hand. “This isn’t the way things were supposed to go.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
His gaze drifted over her new green suit. “You looked so pretty, though. You deserved at least a lunch out somewhere nice.”
“It doesn’t matter. Really.”
She could tell he wanted to say more, that he wanted to kiss her. Badly. Dana was so wound up in knots and uncertain about what her reaction would be that she couldn’t breathe and had to step back to gain some air. Some space. She didn’t think about how John would take that. A moment later it was out of her hands. He abruptly pulled on his hat and left without another word.
The weather grew worse by the hour. So did her guilt over how she’d evaded John again. By nightfall the precipitation had turned to sleet. Inevitably the electricity went off and because she didn’t know how to operate the generator John had recently purchased, she carried an exhausted J.J. to the living room to stoke the fire she’d been keeping going just in case. Now it looked as if they were going to need its warmth, after all.
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