A Cowboy's Tears

by Anne McAllister

  Tuck slanted her a glance. "I'd've thought you'd be all for it."

  "What do you mean by that?"

  He grinned. "You were always followin' Mace around."

  Becky felt her face burn. She picked up a rock and flung it hard. "I didn't follow Mace around."

  Tuck's brows lifted. He looked at her for a long moments unblinking, until she was the one who looked away.

  "Much," Becky muttered, head down.

  Tuck grunted. He looked over at her rocks again, hopefully this time.

  She sighed. "Go ahead."

  He selected one and, taking careful aim, he sidearmed it across the water. They both watched it skip, skip, skip, skip, then sink.

  Then they sat silently.

  "You don't think I caused it, do you?" she asked finally.

  Tuck cocked his head, his hazel eyes meeting hers. "Them gettin' a divorce?"

  Becky nodded gravely, then drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. "I sorta used to ask God for, um, Mace."

  She heard Tuck suck in his breath.

  "I was little," she said quickly. "I didn't know any better. But I wondered. What if—"

  "Naw."

  "Naw?" she said hopefully.

  "Naw," Tuck repeated firmly. "God don't work like that."

  "How do you know?"

  "'Cause I used to pray sometimes that Scotty Lindstrom would break his arm."

  Becky's eyes widened. She thought Scotty had been Tuck's friend. "You did? Why?"

  Tuck tossed her a scornful look. "So's I could be the best pitcher. Why d'you think?"

  "Ah." She nodded, understanding. Besides his drawing, Tuck liked baseball best.

  "It never happened, you notice," Tuck said gruffly.

  "No." She paused. "He's pretty good."

  Tuck snorted. "Just gets better 'n' better."

  "Yeah." She tried not to sound too admiring for fear Tuck would think she didn't respect his pitching. "So, prayin' for bad stuff to happen to other people doesn't work? Ever?" Becky pressed, just to be sure.

  "Nope. Jed says God don't play favorites."

  Becky loosed her knees and took a deep breath. She stretched out her legs and tipped her head back and looked up at the deep blue Montana sky. Something that had been tight and knotted inside her eased a little. She took another breath and felt it shudder out of her.

  "You gonna use all those rocks?" Tuck asked.

  She smiled. "You go ahead."

  Jenny should have said no. She should have said she was busy, that her life was too full, too complicated, too … too anything.

  She should never have said she would take Jed and Brenna's baby!

  "For the weekend," Brenna said apologetically. "We want to go to Jackson. Just the two of us." She blushed a little, then hurried on. "We could take the kids, but—"

  But they didn't want to. They wanted each other. Jenny had no trouble seeing that. She understood it, all too well.

  "And we thought maybe you'd like—I mean, I suppose you might not—but if you're not too busy…"

  And Jenny couldn't lie and say she was.

  Everyone knew she wasn't busy now that school was out. She was going crazy on her own.

  They felt sorry for her. They wanted to distract her. Make her look outside herself, take an interest in life. And they knew she loved kids.

  It was natural.

  They didn't know why Mace had left. She didn't tell them. She just said, "Yes." And so she had Neile.

  She'd never had a baby before. Had wished. Had dreamed. But never…

  She and Mace had taken care of Becky occasionally, before Taggart remarried. They would invite her out to spend the occasional weekend with them, realizing that Taggart needed a break and that his parents couldn't be counted on to do it all. Plus, they genuinely liked having her around.

  Jenny thought the little girl could use a mother's touch now and then. A steady diet of rodeo cowboys could leave a girl a little unbalanced.

  So she and Becky baked cookies. They did jigsaw puzzles. They'd planted a garden and picked wildflowers. Becky lapped it up, enjoying every moment Jenny spent with her.

  But Jenny had never kidded herself: the person Becky adored was Mace.

  "You're her hero," Jenny had said to her husband more than once after one of Becky's weekends with them. "If she was a little older, I'd have some real competition."

  Mace had grinned the "aw shucks" grin that had melted

  Jenny's knees back in junior high, the grin she was equally sure was melting Becky's.

  "You think so?" he said, as pleased as he was embarrassed.

  Becky, of course, never said so. For a little kid, she had admirable restraint, Jenny thought. She'd just followed Mace wherever he went.

  Jenny didn't mind. It showed that the little girl had good taste.

  Besides, she'd always told herself, it was good for Mace. It gave him experience with kids. Experience they'd need when they had their own.

  At least that was what she'd hoped.

  The feelings were bittersweet when Brenna and Jed brought the baby Friday afternoon.

  "I don't want to impose," Brenna said for the thirtieth time, lingering on the doorstep to adjust Neile's playsuit. "But I couldn't ask Taggart and Felicity. They've got their hands full. And Tess really doesn't have time with her brood. So I thought, you know…"

  "Did Jenny say yes when you asked her?" Jed asked his wife.

  "Of course," Brenna replied indignantly.

  "Then trust her. She knows what she's doing. Come on." He steered Brenna toward the car, then looked back to give Jenny a wink. "See you Sunday. Have fun."

  Jenny smiled gamely and snuggled the little girl against her shoulder to wave goodbye. Fortunately it wasn't until they had disappeared around the bend that she felt the first renegade tear fall.

  She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and sniffled. "Sorry about that," she said to the baby as briskly as she could. Her voice only broke a little. Neile looked at her curiously, her lower lip trembled.

  "Oh, now," Jenny whispered. "Don't you cry, too." She took a deep breath. "Come on, young lady. I'll show you around."

  Jed had set up a portable crib in "the spare room," before he and Brenna had left. Now Jenny carried the baby into the room, aware that she'd almost never set foot in here since Mace had left. It was stupid, she knew, to avoid a room. But she couldn't help it. She tried to sound cheery now.

  "This is where you're going to sleep," she told Neile, "in that snug little bed your daddy brought. And I'll be right next door."

  She carried the little girl out of one room and into the other. "See? Not far at all. And if you want anything, all you have to do is cry." She dropped a kiss on the baby's fair hair. "Which I'm sure you will."

  At least the lip had retracted. Now Neile gummed her fist and looked up curiously into Jenny's eyes as if to say, "Who are you and why are you talking a thousand words a minute?"

  "It's just that I'm nervous," Jenny explained.

  Being the sole person responsible for a child who couldn't even say, "I'm hungry" or "I need to go to the bathroom," was a daunting prospect.

  Neile screwed up her face and started to whimper.

  "Shh, now. Shh. It's all right." Jenny hoped, even as she said the words, that they weren't a lie. After all her desperation for a family, what if she wasn't cut out for motherhood?

  What if she had put Mace through all that for nothing?

  Had she destroyed her marriage over a desire to be something for which she had no talent?

  She hadn't destroyed their marriage, she reminded herself. It was Mace who had walked out.

  She could have learned to live without having children.

  But she did love the warm weight of Jed and Brenna's baby snug against her breasts. She did relish the fresh laundry smell and soft, rosy cheeks of little Neile McCall.

  And she knew Mace would have, too.

  "Oh, Mace." She buried the words in Neile's silky hair. Then, be
cause the little girl whimpered, Jenny did a desperate little two-step into the hallway, dancing the baby in a circle, humming softly.

  "Shh, Neile. Shh, little baby." She nuzzled the baby's soft hair, nibbled the side of her neck, then blew lightly against her cheek.

  Neile pulled back and blinked. Her whimper died. Her eyes widened. She looked at Jenny.

  Jenny touched the petal-soft cheek with one finger. "Like that?" she asked, and blew again.

  A sound came out. A gurgle? A chuckle?

  Then Neile smiled. It was a tentative smile, a wary smile. But still—a smile.

  And for the first time in weeks Jenny felt a smile touch her face, too.

  On Sunday mornings Jenny went to church.

  She fully intended to go this morning, except she didn't realize how long it would take to get a baby ready.

  Saturday morning she'd awakened at five and lain there in anxious anticipation of Neile's first murmur. This morning, however, she was experienced enough—or tired enough—that Neile was in full-throated roar by the time Jenny managed to pry open her eyes.

  "Coming," she called, stumbling out of bed and groping her way into her robe. "I'll be right there."

  She fed Neile and bathed and changed her, then deposited her on a blanket in the middle of the living room while she got herself fed and dressed. By the time she was done, it was late, but they still could make it. She scooped the baby up off the rug and heard a faint squishing sound. There was a definite feel of dampness against her fingers.

  "Uh-oh."

  Neile gurgled.

  Jenny carried her into the bedroom. By the time the second change had been accomplished, Neile was gnawing her fist and looking around hopefully.

  "You're hungry?" Jenny had figured out the meaning of that particular look the day before when it had been followed almost immediately by a much more demanding cry.

  She supposed she could take the baby and a bottle and hope that Neile cooperated during the thirty-minute drive into Elmer.

  But then Neile yawned and jammed her fist into her mouth and began to gnaw. Her brow puckered. Her hopeful look faded. A sniffle was fast turning into a sob.

  "I guess we're not going today," Jenny said to her charge. She yawned and carried the baby to the kitchen.

  With luck, she thought, after Neile had her bottle, she would go down for a morning nap. Perhaps she could get one as well.

  She was beginning to understand those dark circles under Jed's and Brenna's eyes. She wondered how, with two babies, Taggart and Felicity ever managed to cope.

  Neile was frantic by the time Jenny got the bottle ready and carried the little girl to the rocking chair. Neile glommed on at once, wrapping fat fists around the bottle and staring up at Jenny unblinkingly.

  Jenny trailed a finger along the baby's cheek. "Better?"

  At first Neile's sucking came hard and fast. But gradually the tension in her small limbs lessened. The rhythm of Jenny's rocking soothed her. Her grip on the bottle loosened. She blinked. Her eyelids drooped.

  Jenny smiled. With one finger she touched Neile's small hand.

  It let go of the bottle and latched on to Jenny's finger with a strong grip. Jenny rubbed her thumb lightly over the baby's tiny fingers … and wished…

  For Mace. For the love they'd lost, for the children they'd never have, for the hopes and dreams that had once seemed so possible and which were forever out of her grasp.

  It wasn't only Mace who could have a pity party, she thought wryly.

  But even as she thought it, her eyes blurred, and she had to tip her head back and close them against sudden tears.

  The door opened.

  Jenny's head jerked up.

  Her eyes flew open—to see Mace standing there.

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  « ^ »

  "Mace." Jenny's bare whisper sounded shocked.

  No more than he was. Mace stood rooted to the floor, one hand on the doorknob, staring at her. He could almost feel the blood draining out of his darkly tanned face at the sight of Jenny sitting in the rocker holding a child!

  He began to back out the door.

  She started to get up, but the baby made a sound of protest, and she sank back to rock it some more.

  Mace felt a muscle tick in his cheek.

  This was not something he wanted to see. He had come now because he was sure she wouldn't be here! He had come because he was sure he could get in, gather up the rest of his gear, get the book work he needed and be gone before she got home from church.

  He'd been counting on it.

  The certainty of her absence was the only thing that had got him out of his truck and up the steps.

  And now here she was—with a baby in her arms. Abruptly he turned away. "Mace! Wait!"

  The rocker creaked again as Jenny half rose, then, at the child's whimper, sank back once more. "Mace! Come back here. If I get up, I'll wake her. Please!"

  He didn't want to stop. He didn't want to go back. He didn't want to think about Jenny with a baby in her arms.

  "Mace!"

  The baby was crying now, and Jenny was following him.

  He turned and glared at her. "What, damn it?" His voice was harsh, ragged. "For God's sake, sit down. You're making it cry."

  Jenny eased back and sat down in the chair and began rocking again. The wailing stopped. "Her," she corrected. "It's Neile. I'm baby-sitting Neile for the weekend."

  "Good for you." His voice was still harsh.

  It didn't matter whose child it was; it wasn't theirs.

  He'd thought he would be over it by now. He'd thought the steady normal everyday ranch work that had sustained him his whole life would sustain him now.

  Think again, he told himself savagely.

  In the three weeks since he'd walked out, things had gone from bad to worse. He'd had too much time to think, too much time alone.

  Too little Jenny.

  He'd hoped that talking to Anthony would settle things. Once the legal proceedings were underway, he had told himself, there would be no changing his mind. No going back.

  Great theory. He just wished his head—and his heart—would get with the plan.

  They hadn't. They wanted Jenny.

  So badly that he'd finally made himself an appointment in Billings with another doctor. Maybe the local one had spermicide in his stupid little cups. Maybe he was a quack. Maybe, Mace desperately hoped, he was wrong.

  Friday he'd found out that the second opinion confirmed the first.

  "No sperm," the doctor had told him, shaking his head sympathetically. "I'm sorry."

  Mace didn't need—or want—sympathy. He wanted sperm.

  "Can't you do something? Isn't there some way? What are we putting all this money into medical research for?"

  "Perhaps a donor?" the doctor suggested.

  "No." He wasn't having some other guy's sperm swimming around inside Jenny!

  "I'm sorry," the doctor said again. "We can often help if the count is simply low. But when there are none…" He spread his hands helplessly.

  And Mace had driven home feeling, if possible, even worse than he had three weeks before. On the drive down he'd dared to entertain the faint hope that he could drive back to the ranch tonight and take Jenny in his arms and tell her that the nightmare was over.

  It seemed to him now that the nightmare had just begun.

  "Jed and Brenna went down to Jackson," Jenny was explaining. "She's opening a show there. More cowboy hero paintings and a new series on children of the West. That was the official excuse." She smiled a little nervously as she talked, as if Mace were some sort of wild animal that she might spook at any moment. It wasn't far from the truth. "I think they wanted a second honeymoon."

  "They had their first less than a year ago," Mace muttered.

  But he understood. He remembered that desire. He remembered weeks—months—when he didn't think he could take Jenny to bed often enough.

  He still felt that way,
God help him.

  "Yes, but they haven't had much time to themselves," Jenny reminded him. "They've had a houseful, with Tuck and the baby and Brenna's dad."

  "I know what their problem is," Mace said tightly. It was nothing compared to his own—the big unsolvable one and the smaller more immediate one: how was he going to get out of here with Jenny smiling at him like that?

  "I'm glad you're back."

  "I'm not back," he said. "I just came to get some stuff. I didn't think you'd be here," he added bluntly.

  As he hoped, her smile faded. His last words had been cruel and unnecessary, and he knew it. He watched as the hurt flickered across her face.

  He expected it—hell, he'd caused it—but still he had to steel himself against it. Hurting Jenny was like hurting himself. And even being prepared for it didn't help.

  He shoved himself away from the door. "I'll come back another time."

  "No!" She leaped up this time, not caring whether she woke Neile or not. "You're not going to walk out on me again, Mace Nichols!"

  He tried. She came after him, bouncing the baby as she hurried across the room and onto the porch. Neile, obviously unused to such treatment, dropped her bottle and began to wail. Jenny kept coming.

  Mace made it all the way to his truck, feeling as if all the devils in hell were on his tail. He had the door open when she caught up to him and grabbed it to stop him from getting in and closing it. She almost dropped the child.

  Mace saved the baby—and ended up holding her himself. "Here." He tried to thrust Neile back into Jenny's arms.

  But Jenny was having none of it. She folded her arms across her chest and shook her head. "You hold her, and we'll talk."

  "We have nothing to talk about."

  "What about the little matter of that petition to dissolve our marriage?"

  "What about it?"

  "I don't want to dissolve our marriage."

  "Maybe not now. You will."

  The stubborn Jenny Fitzpatrick chin he remembered from childhood lifted now. "You think so, do you?" she challenged.

  "Yes." The word came through his teeth as a hiss. Neile wailed in his arms. "Damn it, Jenny!"

  He couldn't take this! Jenny kept her arms folded as he fumbled with the crying child. "Shh," he muttered to her, jiggling her against his chest. "Hey now, shh. Jenny," he pleaded. "Take her. She's your responsibility."