A Cowboy's Tears

by Anne McAllister

So what else was new? Becky thought.

  But even if she had known, Felicity wasn't exactly a disinterested bystander. As Uncle Tom's sister, she might very well think it was better to have Jenny married to her brother than to Mace.

  Becky knew better than to ask her dad.

  Taggart would tell her to mind her own business—in no uncertain terms—and that would be that!

  But Taggart hadn't talked to Mace that day at the bull-riding school. No one had. They'd all ignored him, turned their backs on him.

  Only Becky had talked to him, had heard the pain in his voice and had seen the lonely look in his eyes.

  She was almost certain he still loved Jenny—even if he was asking her for a divorce—and so she'd stuck her nose in—tried to help.

  For all the good it had done…

  Now she had Mace mad at her, too.

  But this dating business wasn't just a one-off.

  Becky wouldn't have gone running to tell Mace if she'd only seen them together once. The night that Jenny had come over for dinner, well, even if she did spend most of it listening to Uncle Tom and hanging on his every word, it was no big deal.

  But then two days later they'd gone to Bozeman together. Uncle Tom had taken Jenny to talk to someone at the university, Felicity said.

  "So she'll feel more comfortable when she signs up for a class."

  "A class?" Becky couldn't imagine anyone Jenny's age voluntarily taking classes. She personally could hardly wait to stop.

  "Mmm-hmm." Felicity sounded pleased. She was humming as she mashed a banana for Willy who was over his earache. "It will be good for her, going back to school. Give her something positive to think about."

  Becky said, "I guess."

  She seemed to think about it and talk about it—to Uncle Tom—a lot. Becky didn't tell Mace that just two days ago she'd seen them having coffee together at the Busy Bee. And that last Sunday after church Jenny had borrowed one of their horses and she and Uncle Tom had gone out riding.

  He'd wanted to see a small mountain lake Taggart had been telling him about, and Felicity had suggested Jenny show it to him.

  None of those were really "dates," technically, Becky didn't suppose. But she thought the line was getting pretty blurred.

  The one coming up on Saturday night, though, was perfectly clear.

  It was a date. She'd even heard Felicity call it that.

  "I'm glad you're taking Jenny out on a date," Felicity had said to Uncle Tom last night when they were sitting in the kitchen after dinner. Taggart was out feeding stock, and the twins were, for once, both asleep at the same time.

  Becky was on the porch, brushing burrs out of Digger's coat and, though they couldn't see her, and she didn't really mean to be spying, she could hear every word.

  "She needs a little bit of fun," her stepmother continued. "And so do you."

  "Matchmaking?" Uncle Tom had asked.

  Becky stopped brushing the dog and edged closer to the window. Digger turned his head and nosed at the brush in her hand.

  "What if I am?" Felicity replied. "People did it to me. After Dirk died."

  Dirk had been Felicity's first husband. Becky had seen his picture. She didn't think he was nearly as handsome as her dad, but he looked nice enough, and she knew Felicity had loved him.

  "Her husband is alive and well," Uncle Tom reminded her.

  "And divorcing her, the idiot." Felicity thumped something on the table.

  "Why?"

  "God only knows," she grumbled. "Midlife crisis, no doubt. They've been married forever. Since they just got out of high school. Never dated anyone else. Maybe now he wants to sow his wild oats. Well, Jenny's too nice to have to put up with that."

  "Yeah, but—"

  "And she wants a family. She's always wanted a family, and obviously Mace doesn't."

  Becky moved a little closer to the window.

  "And you've got a family," Felicity continued.

  "I have Katie," Uncle Tom qualified. "Sometimes."

  "Well, if you had a wife you might be able to convince Lottie to share her more often. And you and Jenny could have kids, too. You wouldn't mind more, I daresay."

  "No, but—"

  "There. See. It'd be perfect. Don't you think?"

  "I think you have my life all figured out," Uncle Tom said with a laugh. But he didn't sound discouraging.

  He actually had sounded pretty interested—as if he thought Jenny might be right for him, too.

  And that was why Becky had gone up the mountain to tell Mace.

  This one really was a date.

  Jenny had called the other times she'd been places with Tom "dates" because saying the word made her feel a little daring and alive. And, to be honest, because if she thought of them that way, perhaps Mace would, too, and then he'd come roaring down the mountain to reclaim her.

  But he didn't.

  And now, after a pleasant evening with Tom at Felicity and Taggart's house, an afternoon spent checking out classes in Bozeman, a cup of coffee at the Busy Bee and a Sunday afternoon horseback ride, she was going out with Tom, not just because she was feeling reckless and hoping to goad Mace, but because she found him interesting and entertaining and likable.

  So it was a date.

  And she was nervous.

  She'd never been on a date before. Not with anyone besides Mace, at least. Unless, of course, you counted their senior year, when Taggart had taken her to the homecoming dance after she and Mace had briefly broken up. Taggart had got a black eye for his trouble, and she and Mace had made up the next week.

  But clearly Mace wasn't interested in giving her other suitors black eyes these days.

  In fact, he seemed infuriatingly willing to pass her on to another man. Wasn't that the reason he was divorcing her?

  She tried not to think about him. She focused instead on Tom. But thinking about Tom—and his expectations—simply increased her nervousness.

  She had paced a rut in the living room by the time Tom's car came over the hill, and she didn't wait for him to knock on the door so she could be demure and proper. She went out to meet him.

  He was as easy to talk to and listen to as he had been on the other occasions. As they drove over the pass toward Bozeman to the movie they had chosen to see, he told her about helping Taggart move some bulls to another pasture that afternoon, emphasizing his own lack of experience with cowboy skills and making her laugh.

  But even to her ears, her laugh sounded strained. She knotted her fingers in her lap.

  "Nervous?" Tom asked, slanting a smile in her direction.

  "No," Jenny lied. Then, "Yes," she admitted. "I haven't done this in years. And never with anyone but my—but Mace."

  "Takes some getting used to," Tom said easily. He flexed his fingers on the steering wheel. Jenny watched them with some apprehension, wondering if he would take one of them off and reach down to take her hand.

  Should she let him?

  Oh, Jenny, she thought, smothering an inward groan. You are a moron. An idiot. Grow up, for heaven's sake. Holding your hand can hardly be considered "making an advance."

  All the same, she was glad when his fingers settled lightly once more against the wheel, and she felt free to breathe again.

  They arrived just as the movie was going to start. And as it was an arty British film, based on one of the books he was teaching this coming fall, she imagined he'd be too engrossed in it to pay any attention to her.

  Maybe he was. He laughed a lot and once or twice looked her way to see if she was enjoying it.

  She tried to. It was full of witty dialogue and meaningful glances, and she knew she wouldn't have been able to drag Mace to it in a hundred years. Mostly, though, she ended up trying not to notice every time Tom's shoulder or elbow touched hers.

  They were accidental touches, after all. They meant nothing. She was just being hypersensitive.

  And if her shoulders felt cool, it was because she was used to going to movies with Mace. He'd have
had his arm around her. He'd have pulled her as close as their separate seats would allow, and when the hero was kissing the heroine, there was a good chance that Mace, even after fourteen years of marriage, would have been stealing a kiss from her.

  Jenny felt a hollow, desperate ache expand somewhere deep inside her—the same hollow, desperate ache she felt every time she let herself think about Mace. A shudder ran through her.

  Warm fingers closed quite suddenly over her own. She looked over at Tom, startled.

  In the light from the screen she could see him looking back at her, his mouth touched by a gentle smile—as if he knew.

  Did he?

  As if in answer, his fingers squeezed hers lightly. Then, leaving his hand where it was, Tom turned back to watch the film.

  Jenny turned her head and tried to watch it, too. But she didn't see anything at all—only felt her fingers curved inside his.

  For the first time in her life she was holding hands with a man other than Mace.

  She was out on a date. And all she wanted to do was cry.

  "So, what'd you think?" Tom asked her as they left the theater. His fingers were still wrapped around hers as they walked to the car, a casual, but deliberate connection.

  Jenny considered breaking it, then decided not to. He wasn't overstepping any bounds. He had a right to this much. It was something she would have to get used to. If not from Tom, then from someone else.

  Somehow. Someday.

  "I liked it," she said with as much heartiness as she could manage. "A lot."

  "They weren't as faithful to the book as I'd have liked." Tom opened the door for her and closed it after she got in, then went around and got behind the wheel. "But I suppose if they were going to be absolutely faithful, we'd have been sitting there a few more hours."

  "I haven't read the book," Jenny admitted. "I'm afraid my education is pretty dismal."

  "They might use it in that lit survey class you're signing up for."

  He had gone with her last week down to Bozeman where she'd met with an academic advisor. She'd been reluctant, convinced that she would be biting off more than she could chew. But Tom hadn't seen it that way at all.

  "Most professors love to have nontraditional students," he assured her. "They bring a lot of experience to the class, and they're serious about learning."

  Jenny was serious, but she was also scared. She hadn't been in school for fifteen years. A few years back she had all but given up the idea of ever getting a college education. There seemed to be no point—and no time. Her life was taken up with Mace and her job and the ranch and—she hoped, someday a family.

  She still had her job as a school aide, of course. But it was a mere shadow of the job she'd once wished to have.

  And there would be no family now. There wouldn't even be Mace. He had walked out, taking her hopes and dreams with him.

  So she let herself be persuaded to sign up for two courses—a survey of British literature and an introductory psychology, class.

  "Good choices." Tom had approved.

  Back in high school, English had been her favorite class, and once she'd committed herself to doing it, this course seemed like a good place to start. The psych class was a general education requirement.

  "A good thing to have if you go on for your degree," Tom said.

  "I can't get a degree. That would take years," Jenny protested.

  "So?"

  It was a fair question. She signed up for the psych class.

  It would be one requirement out of the way. It also—she hoped, though she didn't tell Tom—might give her some insight into what made Mace tick.

  If they had offered a course called Introduction to the Intricacies of the Minds of Stupid Men, she would have taken that in a minute!

  "I'm glad we went," she said now. "Even if it doesn't end up being on my reading list. I'm glad I saw it." She turned and gave Tom a determined smile. She wouldn't let herself think about Mace anymore tonight.

  He wasn't thinking about her.

  "Me, too." Tom reached over and took one of her hands in his, wrapping warm fingers around hers and giving a gentle squeeze.

  Jenny squeezed back.

  "Feeling better?"

  Jenny nodded. "Yes."

  It was almost the truth.

  It was all right that Jenny went out on a date. It was only to be expected.

  That was the idea, wasn't it? Mace asked himself. She was supposed to meet someone else, marry someone else.

  She couldn't do that if she didn't go out with him first.

  All the same, the very notion drove him nuts.

  What did Jenny know about dating, for heaven's sake? She hadn't dated in years! She hadn't dated anyone—ever—except him! Unless you counted the time she went to homecoming with Taggart.

  Mace rubbed his fingers over his fist, remembering that incident.

  Then he took a deep breath and told himself he wasn't about to do anything that stupid anymore. He was grown up now.

  And this wasn't Taggart, who'd taken Jenny out just to rile him.

  Besides, like he'd told Becky … who Jenny dated wasn't his business. He wasn't very convincing.

  Who the hell was this uncle Tom, anyway? The very sound of the name set his teeth on edge. What would a college professor want with a salt-of-the-earth woman like Jenny?

  And what—besides sperm—would she see in him?

  Mace wore a rut in the pine plank floorboards of the cabin before he took his fretting outside. There, without really thinking about what he was doing, he saddled Chug.

  He'd ride off his frustration and his concern. It wouldn't be the first time. And he could check on the cattle down the valley while he was at it. And if he had to pass the ranch house to check on those particular cows, and it just happened to be getting close to suppertime on Saturday night, well, too damn bad.

  He kept to the tree line when he came within sight of the house. The last thing he wanted was Jenny to see him and think he was checking up on her. He wasn't, damn it.

  But he couldn't deny that he felt an odd sort of relief wash over him when he saw that her car was there.

  He settled more easily in the saddle then, breathing deeply, glad that she'd come to her senses.

  There would be time for all that dating business. Later. After the divorce was final.

  Well after.

  She wasn't over him yet. Was she?

  His brows drew down. No, of course not. She was the one who'd run after him when he'd come down to the house and she'd had Neile there.

  He'd been the one to walk out!

  So maybe she got the message that he meant it.

  The thought wasn't as satisfying as it ought to have been. But she was there. Or was she?

  Maybe only her car was there. Maybe Tom had come and picked her up. That was the way it was supposed to happen, wasn't it?

  He wasn't exactly familiar with the ins and outs of proper dating behavior. When he and Jenny had been dating, he hadn't had a truck of his own, so they'd had to double with Taggart or Jed, or sometimes, he remembered with chagrin, Jenny had borrowed her dad's truck and had come to get him!

  He edged a little closer to the house, hoping to tell if she was there or not by the way the shades were hanging. He touched his spurs lightly to his horse's sides, moving farther down.

  The place was totally quiet. Door closed. Lights off.

  But it wasn't really early enough for her to turn the lights on yet. She might be in the kitchen cooking.

  And all she'd have to do was look out the window and she'd see him lurking there.

  Quickly he urged Chug back up into the trees and headed toward the pasture. On his way back he stopped to clean out an irrigation ditch he'd just cleaned out last week. Then, because it was still a little bit light, he moseyed along the fence line. No sense in heading back to the cabin yet, he thought righteously. Not when he could get all this work done down here.

  He checked fence until it was too dark
to see his hand in front of his face. Then he rode back toward their house. He could, of course, have gone over the hill. It would have been closer to the cabin to take that route. But the trail was easier along the trees. No sense in putting Chug in a situation where he might stumble in the dark.

  There wasn't a single light on in the house.

  "Damn it," Mace muttered under his breath.

  The horse, picking up on his tension, sidestepped, and he rubbed his hand along its neck.

  "'S all right," he said in a low tone. "'S okay." But it wasn't all right at all.

  What the hell did Jenny think she was doing, going off and not even leaving a lamp on? Didn't she know better than to come home to a dark house?

  Of course she did, unless…

  Unless she didn't intend to come home that night.

  Visions of his wife naked in some hotel room bed with—

  Mace inhaled sharply. No! He wasn't even going to let himself think about that.

  He rode all the way into the yard this time. Since she wasn't home, it didn't matter. He dismounted, then left his horse by the barn and crossed the yard to the house, clumping up the steps and rattling the door handle.

  At least she'd had the brains to lock it.

  They had rarely locked their doors when they were here together. But it was different for a woman alone. He was glad she wasn't taking any chances since he'd left.

  He stared at the door, wondering if he ought to go in and put on a light. Or if she'd be spooked to come home and find a light that she hadn't turned on.

  Serve her right if she was.

  If she did come home tonight, perhaps it would spook her enough to make her leave "Uncle Tom" on the front porch—especially if she thought Mace was waiting inside.

  With a grim smile, he got out his key and unlocked the door.

  He put on a light in the kitchen and another small one in the living room. While he was there, he picked up the book work he had intended to get that Sunday, and then went to get the rest of his things out of the bedroom.

  He crossed the room quickly, not letting himself look at the bed. He worked quickly and efficiently, gathering odds and ends, tossing them in the old duffel bag that was on the shelf. If Jenny and her date came back, he could say he'd just come to clean things out. He could brush past them without a word.