Husband for Hire

by Susan Wiggs

  She twisted her wrist, extracting her hand from his. “Just because I grew up in Wyoming doesn’t mean I know how to ride.”

  “You don’t have to know. Mabel knows what to do.”

  Twyla eyed the big horse dubiously. “A horse that’s smarter than me. I’m so flattered.”

  He laughed and held out his hand. “I’ll work on my manners before tonight.”

  TWYLA COULDN’T TELL if the swish and swirl of blood in her ears stemmed from terror or excitement. She had gone to bed last night thinking of Rob’s kiss, and she’d woken up this morning still dreaming about it.

  She’d tried and tried to tell herself it didn’t matter, it meant nothing, they were only faking it, but her heart wouldn’t listen. Now she hesitated, studying Rob’s face. He didn’t laugh often, she realized, and his smile was rare, too. The sight of him laughing and reaching out for her made her skin tingle. It also made her reckless, and like a starstruck teenager, she took his hand.

  “All right,” she said. “I’m trusting you.”

  “You won’t be sorry.” His hand felt large and sturdy as his fingers closed around hers. He brought her over next to the horse and rested his palm at the small of her back.

  And just for a moment Twyla fell utterly still. She closed her eyes. Everything inside her seemed to heat and gather at the two places where he was touching her—hand and back. Dear heaven, it was more intense than last night. She had forgotten. She had completely forgotten what it was like to feel a man’s touch. She had forgotten the sensation of holding a hand bigger than hers, sensing a protection from things no more scary than everyday living.

  Which, when you really thought about it, was the scariest thing of all.

  “Hey, you don’t have to do this,” Rob said.

  Without even opening her eyes, she knew his smile was gone. She wanted it back. “Are you kidding? You talked me into it. Now I’m committed.” And when she opened her eyes, the smile was back, though tinged at the edges with curiosity.

  “I thought I’d lost you for a minute,” he said. “You looked a million miles away.”

  “Oh, I wasn’t.” She realized she had better get busy or she’d lose her mind, fantasizing about this guy. “Show me what to do, kimosabe.”

  His expression grew warm with approval, and she knew she had said something to please him. He brought the horse to the steps and positioned her at its side.

  “Put your foot in the stirrup.” He held it. “Grab the saddle horn, like this, and swing your other leg up and over. I’ll help you. Don’t worry. I won’t let you go.”

  She prayed the seams of her blue jeans would hold as she fitted her foot into the stirrup. She prayed he wouldn’t grunt from the strain as he boosted her by the upper thigh to help her on the horse.

  He didn’t. The sound that came from him sounded more like a low-throated moan. A sound of pain?

  She landed in the saddle with a solid thump and looked down at him. “Are you all right?”

  His grin widened. “You have a nice butt, Twyla.”

  She clutched the saddle horn with both hands, letting her hair fall forward to hide her flushed face. She shouldn’t feel flattered by the crude remark, but Lord help her, she did.

  Then she realized how she must look with her death grip on the saddle horn and its proximity to her—

  She shook her hair out of her face. “Okay, so I’m on. Now what? Oh, God.” She made the mistake of looking at the ground. “Holy cow,” she whispered.

  “What?”

  “This horse is three stories high.”

  He laughed. She was getting used to the pleasant, evocative sound of a man’s laughter, though this time it failed to ease her terror. “A horse always looks taller from the perspective of the saddle,” he explained.

  “The air is too thin up here. I need an oxygen mask. I’m getting vertigo.”

  “You’re fine.” He showed her the basics. “Take the reins in your right hand. Mabel’s probably used to beginners, so don’t worry about making a mistake.”

  He made a kissing sound with his mouth. Apparently his appeal wasn’t limited to the human species, because the horse walked forward. The mare’s gait felt clumsy and off balance, and Twyla hung on for dear life.

  “Pull this way to turn. See how she feels it on her neck?” He demonstrated left and right. “This’ll make her back up.”

  Twyla stifled a scream as the horse took three giant steps back. She felt as wobbly and vulnerable as a wedding cake bride about to plunge into the champagne punch.

  “And this is stop,” Rob explained. “Whoa. Say ‘whoa.”’

  “Whoa, damn it.” The horse obeyed. “Get me down,” Twyla said. “My life insurance policy is inadequate.”

  “You’ll be fine,” he said a second time, swinging himself up into the saddle of the other horse. “Mabel will follow me. I’m irresistible to females.”

  True. She didn’t say it aloud, but as she watched him adjust his funny old baseball hat and noted his easy posture in the saddle, she knew he was right.

  “Okay, remember what I told you. We’ll take this little trail. The kid at the stables said it’s a nice, easy ride.” He made a smooching sound with his mouth.

  By the time Twyla realized the sound was for the horses, both animals had turned away from the lodge and headed along the poplar-lined path.

  Mabel immediately surged ahead of the other horse.

  Twyla gave a shriek and clutched the saddle horn. “Hey, you said she’d follow you.”

  He angled his horse across the path and moved in front of her. “Guess she’s got a mind of her own. It’s all about control, Twyla. Half the work of riding a horse is here.” He touched his temple.

  “The other half is getting saddle sore already,” she grumbled.

  Yet to her surprise, she found, after a few false starts, that he was right. The connection between her and the mare was primal and governed by the slightest nuance of touch—her legs against the mare’s side, her pressure on the reins, even the way she leaned slightly forward. Each movement meant something to the big animal. After a while, she discovered an unexpected and heady satisfaction in being able to control a twelve-hundred-pound horse.

  Rob gave her pointers, one at a time so she wouldn’t try to remember everything at once. Chin up, heels down, back straight. It all came surprisingly naturally to her. Before long she was able to relax and enjoy the scenery, welcoming the sights after a seven-year absence. The mountains surrounded the valley like a broken-edged bowl, the highest peaks searing white against the blue summer sky. Meadowlarks and red-winged blackbirds swooped across the expanse of wind-stirred wildflowers, and the sun was warm and welcome on her face.

  “Like it?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said, amazed as the dirt path converged with a larger, tree-lined lane leading to town. “I used to know every blade of grass around here.”

  “And now?”

  “I guess I still do.”

  “So how about giving me a tour?”

  Her hand tightened on the reins. She looked out across the vast field of rippling grass, then lifted her gaze to the saw-toothed mountains that rose like a fortress between earth and sky. “I grew up within sight of those mountains. I used to think God lived up there.” Chagrined, she admitted, “I went looking for him once, but all I found was a possum and a case of poison ivy.”

  Lord, Twyla. Keep rambling on. He’ll be asleep in no time.

  Instead, he watched her with such rapt fascination that she smiled. “You must be a good doctor.”

  “It wouldn’t be right to be a doctor otherwise,” he said simply.

  “It’s none of my business, but I have an observation to make.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You seem to be so good with people. I wonder why you confine your medical practice to a lab.”

  “I’m not good with people,” he said. “Just good with you.” As soon as the words were out, he looked away and added hastily, “I mean,
I’m not good with sick people, only with their labs. I’m a loner, Twyla. Always have been and probably always will be.”

  She was afraid to dig deeper. She sensed there was so much more to him than she knew. Each time she saw a new facet of him, she liked him better.

  They crossed a fallow pasture that abutted the old Jensen place. Once they cleared the pasture, they’d be on the main street of the town.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked.

  “Oh, yeah. A trip down memory lane. It’s your turn, Twyla.”

  He didn’t know what he was asking.

  “I can’t promise you’ll find it riveting,” she said uncomfortably.

  “I didn’t ask you to be riveting,” he said. “Just honest.”

  “Why?”

  “Because honesty is the only reason to do anything.”

  What a strange thing to say, she thought. Apprehension spread over her like a heat rash as they drew nearer and nearer to the town. She saw things that tugged her back into the past, awakening memories, like the Munchkins of Oz coming out of hiding.

  It was just an ordinary western town, she realized with some surprise, smaller than she remembered, but not quite so drab, either. People went about their business, but she didn’t recognize anyone. There was the bridal shop where she had worked, spending every free moment poring over travel brochures, dreaming of the places she would go one day. And there was the Twisted Scissors Salon and Beauty School where she had cheerfully learned her trade because it was a good way to bring money in while Jake went to school.

  Then it would be her turn.

  She had been unbelievably trusting back then. She was more than making up for that mistake now. She trusted no one—yet she had allowed Rob Carter to coax her onto a horse. That was something, at least.

  Each chair in the Twisted Scissors was occupied, but from a distance she couldn’t see any faces. Some of the women were probably getting ready for the reunion tonight.

  Twyla kept looking around, wondering if a passer-by would recognize her. But the young mothers pushing strollers, the guys on the sidewalk in front of the feed store, and the bank teller smoking a cigarette outside the bank hardly gave her and Rob a second glance.

  Funny, she had felt like a bug under a magnifying glass seven years ago when everything had fallen apart. Now she was just some woman passing through.

  Hell Creek High School was at the edge of town. An ordinary place of brick and mortar, marred by the scars and scuff marks of teenage exuberance. Shreds of crepe paper draped the entrance to the ball field, and a sign, already fading in the strong sunlight, proclaimed Congratulations 1999 Grads.

  She pulled up on the reins, just as Rob had shown her. Mabel lurched to a halt beneath a shade tree, dropped her head and tugged indolently at a clump of grass.

  “There it is,” she said. “My alma mater.” She regarded the concrete footpaths in a wagon-wheel array, the park benches lining the walk. Somewhere her initials were carved in the seat of a bench. TM + JB = 4-EVER. Hard to imagine that she had once believed in forever.

  “I recall every detail,” she said wonderingly. “The way the hallways smelled of disinfectant, the scratching of chalk on a blackboard, the sound of kids stampeding to the lunchroom, everything.” She stared across ten years at the girl she had been. “I thought I was something back then. Really something.”

  “You were,” Rob said. “Still are.”

  “Oh, yeah.” She spoke lightly, but a strange sadness swept through her. She missed that girl, that laughing, eager girl who believed anything was possible and who was limited only by the boundaries of her dreams. There was something magical about holding an unshakable belief in oneself.

  She wondered if anyone actually retained that belief long into adulthood. Thinking of her father, she thought, yes. It was possible, but was it wise?

  “Seen enough?” she called to Rob.

  He sat on his horse some distance away, a far-off expression on his face. She wondered what he saw when he looked at the past. Part of her wished she knew him well enough to ask.

  He swung to face her, tipping back his hat. And said the one thing she had been dreading all day. “Show me where you used to live.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  TWYLA WANTED TO REFUSE him, but she couldn’t. He’d come a long way with her, and she was pretty sure it wasn’t because the Hell Creek High School’s ten-year reunion sounded like a great time. Besides, for reasons of his own, he had shown her a glimpse of his own past. Walking with him through the cabins and dorms at Lost Springs had taught her more about this man than she could learn from doing his hair for five years. She could only imagine what it had cost him to return to a place full of such bittersweet memories.

  With a tug of the reins, she turned Mabel down a tree-lined street. Until today, she’d never understood the appeal of horseback riding, though she’d grown up in a place where it was common. There hadn’t been room for a horse at the Lazy Acres Mobile Home Court.

  The uncomplaining responsiveness of the horse had a calming effect on her. The unhurried walk allowed the sights to unfold gradually. Somehow, nothing seen from the saddle could intimidate her.

  They passed houses where kids she used to envy had lived. The older wooden homes on tree-lined streets had the sort of solid permanence she’d never known.

  Jake was going to buy her one of those houses once his career at the Jackson law firm took off. It was one of many promises he’d broken.

  At the end of the main road, the shade trees thinned to weedy, unkempt shrubs, the territory of her youth. A half-empty industrial park with dismantled engines and odd auto parts strewn around marked the edge of town. After that was a surprise. Something new. Unexpected.

  “A drive-through funeral parlor?” Rob scratched his head.

  “That’s what it looks like.” She felt a horrified sense of amusement. The place looked as polished and prosperous as a graduate with a new haircut. The area had been professionally landscaped with little hillocks covered in bark mulch and planted with flowering shrubs and small trees. The long, low building was as discreet as a whisper, camouflaged in the landscape with natural earth tones and river-rock walkways. The drive-around had a tinted glass viewing window. She wondered if a sensor was triggered when a car drove over the barrier, turning on the light. Without even getting out of the car, mourners could send condolences via a tube, like making a deposit at the bank.

  “You missed your calling, Daddy,” she said softly. “You would’ve made a killing with this.” She laughed darkly at her own pun.

  “He would have?”

  “He owned this piece of property, a hundred acres going back to the riverbank,” she explained. “It was repossessed when my father…died.” She almost said “was killed,” but she didn’t want to get into that with Rob. “He tried a little of everything on this lot. One year it was growing jojoba beans because he read somewhere they were the next big boom in farming. Oh, and that thing over at the river’s edge is where he was going to put in an emu barn.” She pointed to a broken concrete slab in the distance.

  “Emus?”

  “You know, those big birds with long skinny feathers that look like dreadlocks. He was convinced emu was going to take the place of beef as the ‘other red meat,’ but he never did sell a one of them. I think he imprinted the first hatchlings. They followed him around like a flock of six-foot ducklings.” Seeing Rob’s face, she laughed. “I’m not kidding. Eventually he donated them to the Winter Ranch in the Texas Hill Country.”

  “Your father,” he said, “must’ve been an interesting guy.”

  “You have no idea. His last project was a miniature golf course with a gold-mining theme. You saw the photo at my house. He spent two years building it. It had a working waterfall and a stream with fake gold nuggets, a lookout tower, and hole number eighteen yelled ‘Eureka’ when you got the ball in the hole.”

  “Sounds sort of…weird. But fun.”

  “Ever
yone in town used their coupon for a free round. After that, no one came back, and the tourism in Jackson didn’t spill over.”

  With bittersweet remembrance, she regarded the long expanse of meadow and riverside. No trace of her father lingered here, no hint of his humor and pie-in-the-sky dreams or his wacky money-making schemes. Just the real world, rock solid. A drive-through funeral parlor where emus used to roam.

  She angled the horse back onto the path and rode on, determined not to make a big deal out of this silly tour. But she felt a taut dread in her chest as they came to the place she had called home for eighteen years.

  Lazy Acres Mobile Home Court, the billboard read. It was the same sign that had marked the place years ago. A cartoon cowboy, poorly rendered in peeling paint, grinned out at her. At the bottom of the sign was written Day-Week-Month…

  “Forever,” she muttered. She and her friends used to joke about it.

  “Looks like the whole area’s been abandoned,” Rob said, scanning the dilapidated trailers and overgrown grass.

  “And not a moment too soon.” Twyla pointed. “That one was our place.”

  Rob dismounted and took hold of her reins. “Leg over, and then slide down with your belly against her side.”

  He made it sound so easy, but her legs dangled in midair and the ground seemed a mile away. Then a pair of strong hands grabbed her by the waist. “Easy now,” he said gently. “I’ve got you.”

  Considering their position, she couldn’t help remembering his comment about her butt, and hoped he couldn’t tell she was blushing as her feet touched the ground and she turned to face him. “Thanks,” she said. Her legs felt wobbly and strange from being on the horse.

  He tethered the horses by a ditch where water ran down from the mountains. The animals dropped their heads to drink. She walked toward a double-wide with moss growing on the roof and greenish mildew streaking the textured aluminum siding. A thick, waxy vine snaked up and over the TV antenna. Several of the windows were broken or missing.