She knew that was probably true, even as some secret, silly little part of her wanted to at least have the chance to test her willpower around him.
Chapter Six
“Hurry, Mama.” Alex practically jumped out of his booster seat the moment she turned off the engine at the River Bow Ranch on Saturday. “I want to see the dogs!”
“Dogs!” Maya squealed after him, wiggling and tugging against the car-seat straps. The only reason she didn’t rush to join her brother outside the car was her inability to undo the straps on her own, much to her constant frustration.
“Hang on, you two.” Their excitement made her smile, despite the host of emotions churning through her at visiting the River Bow again for the first time in a decade. “The way you’re acting, somebody might think you’d never seen a dog before.”
“I have, too, seen a dog before,” Alex said. “But this isn’t just one dog. Miss Bowman said she had a lot of dogs. And horses, too. Can I really ride one?”
“That’s the plan for now, but we’ll have to see how things go.” She was loath to make promises about things that were out of her control. Probably a fallback to her marriage, those frequent times when the children would be so disappointed if their father missed dinner or a school performance or some special outing.
“I hope I can ride a horse. Oh, I hope so.” Alex practically danced around the used SUV she had purchased with the last of her savings when she arrived back in the States. She had to smile at his enthusiasm as she unstrapped Maya and lifted her out of the vehicle.
Maya threw her chubby little arms around Laura’s neck before she could set her on the ground.
“Love you,” her daughter said.
The spontaneously affectionate gesture turned her insides to warm mush, something her sweet Maya so often did. “Oh, I love you, too, darling. More than the moon and the stars and the sea.”
“Me, too,” Alex said.
She hugged him with the arm not holding Maya. “I love you both. Aren’t I the luckiest mom in the world to have two wonderful kiddos to love?”
“Yes, you are,” he said, with a total lack of vanity that made her smile.
She supposed she couldn’t be a completely terrible mother if she was raising her children with such solid assurance of their place in her heart.
At the sound of scrabbling paws and panting breaths, she raised her head from her children. “Guess what? Here come the dogs.”
Alex whirled around in time to see Caidy approaching them with three dogs shadowing her. Laura identified two of them as border collies, mostly black with white patches on their faces and necks, quizzical ears and eerily intelligent expressions. The third was either a breed she didn’t recognize or some kind of mutt of undetermined origin, with reddish fur and a
German shepherd–like face.
Maya stiffened nervously, not at all experienced around dogs, and tightened her arms around Laura’s neck. Alex, on the other hand, started to rush toward the dogs, but Laura checked him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Wait until Caidy says it’s safe,” she ordered her son, who would run directly into a lion’s enclosure if he thought he might have a chance of petting the creature.
“Perfectly safe,” Caidy assured them.
Taft’s sister wore jeans and a bright yellow T-shirt along with boots and a straw cowboy hat, her dark hair braided down her back. She looked fresh and pretty as she gave them all a welcoming smile. “The only danger from my dogs is being licked to death—or maybe getting knocked over by a wagging tail.”
Alex giggled and Caidy looked delighted at the sound.
“Your mother is right, though,” she said. “You should never approach any strange animal without permission until you know it’s safe.”
“Can I pet one?”
“Sure thing. King. Forward.”
One of the lean black-and-white border collies obeyed and sidled toward them, sniffing eagerly at Alex’s legs. The boy giggled and began to pet the dog with sheer joy.
“This was such a great idea,” Laura said, smiling as she watched her son. “Thank you so much for the invitation, Caidy.”
“You’re welcome. Believe me, it will be a fun break for me from normal ranch stuff. Spring is always crazy on the ranch and I’ve been looking forward to this all week as a great respite.”
She paused. “I have to tell you, I’m really glad you’re still willing to have anything to do with the Bowmans after the way things ended with Taft.”
She really didn’t want to talk about Taft. This was what she had worried about after Caidy extended the invitation, that things might be awkward between them because of the past.
“Why wouldn’t I? Taft and I are still friendly.” And that’s all they ever would be, she reminded herself. “Just because he and I didn’t end up the way we thought we would doesn’t mean I should shun his family. I loved your family. I’m only sorry I haven’t stayed in touch all these years. I see no reason we can’t be friends now, unless you’re too uncomfortable because of…everything?”
“Not at all!” Caidy exclaimed. Laura had the impression she wanted to say something else, but Alex interrupted before she could.
“He licked me. It tickles!”
Caidy grinned down at the boy’s obvious enjoyment of the dogs. He now had all three dogs clustered around him and was petting them in turns.
“We’ve got puppies. Would you like to see them?” Caidy asked.
“Puppies!” Maya squealed, still in her arms, while Alex clasped his hands together, a reverential look on his face.
“Puppies! Oh, Mama, can we?”
She had to laugh at his flair for drama. “Sure. Why not? As long as it’s all right with Caidy.”
“They’re in the barn. I was just checking on the little family a few minutes ago and it looks like a few of the pups are awake and might just be in the mood to play.”
“Oh, yay!” Alex exclaimed and Caidy grinned at him.
They followed her into the barn. For Laura, it was like walking back in time. The barn smelled of hay and leather and animals, and the familiar scent mix seemed to trigger an avalanche of memories. They tumbled free of whatever place she’d stowed them after she walked away from Pine Gulch, jostling and shoving their way through her mind before she had a chance to block them out.
She used to come out to the ranch often to ride horses with Taft and their rides always started here, in the barn, where he would teach her about the different kinds of tack and how each was used, then patiently give her lessons on how to tack up a horse.
One wintry January afternoon, she suddenly remembered, she had helped him and his father deliver a foal. She could still vividly picture her astonishment at the gangly, awkward miracle of the creature.
Unbidden, she also remembered that the relative privacy of the barn compared to other places on the ranch had been one of their favorite places to kiss. Sultry, long, intense kisses that would leave them both hungry for more… .
She absolutely did not need to remember those particular memories, full of heat and discovery and that all-consuming love that used to burn inside her for Taft. With great effort, she struggled to wrestle them back into the corner of her mind and slam the door to them so she could focus on her children and Caidy and new puppies.
The puppies’ home was an empty stall at the end of the row. An old russet saddle blanket took up one corner and the mother dog, a lovely black-and-white heeler, was lying on her side taking a rest and watching her puppies wrestle around the straw-covered floor of the stall. She looked up when Caidy approached and her tail slapped a greeting.
“Hey, Betsy, here I am again. How’s my best girl? I brought some company to entertain your pups for a while.”
Laura could swear she saw understanding and even relief in the dog’s brown eyes as Caidy unlatched the door of the stall and swung it out. She could relate to that look—every night when her children finally closed their eyes, she would collapse onto the sofa with
probably that same sort of look.
“Are you sure it’s okay?” Alex asked, standing outside the stall, barely containing his nervous energy.
“Perfectly sure,” Caidy answered. “I promise, they love company.”
He headed inside and—just as she might have predicted—Maya wriggled to get down. “Me, too,” she insisted.
“Of course, darling,” Laura said. She set her on her feet and the girl headed inside the stall to stand beside her brother.
“Here, sit down and I’ll bring you a puppy each,” Caidy said, gesturing to a low bench inside the stall, really just a plank stretched across a couple of overturned oats buckets.
She picked up a fat, waddling black-and-white puppy from the writhing, yipping mass and set it on Alex’s lap, then reached into the pile again for a smaller one, mostly black this time.
Now she had some very different but infinitely precious memories of this barn to add to her collection, Laura thought a few moments later. The children were enthralled with the puppies. Children and puppies just seemed to go together like peanut butter and jelly. Alex and Maya giggled as the puppies squirmed around on their laps, licking and sniffing. Maya hugged hers as enthusiastically as she had hugged her mother a few minutes earlier.
“Thank you for this,” she said to Caidy as the two of them smiled at the children and puppies. “You’ve thrilled them to their socks.”
“I’m afraid the pups are a little dirty and don’t smell the greatest. They’re a little young for baths yet.”
“I don’t worry about a little dirt,” Laura said. “I’ve always figured if my kids don’t get dirty sometimes, I’m doing something wrong.”
“I don’t think you’re doing anything wrong,” Caidy assured her. “They seem like great kids.”
“Thank you.”
“It can’t be easy, especially now that you’re on your own.”
As much as Javier had loved the children, she had always felt very much on her own in Madrid. He was always busy with the hotel and his friends and, of course, his other women. Bad enough she had shared that with Taft. She certainly wasn’t about to share that information with his sister.
“I have my mother to help me now. She’s been a lifesaver.”
Coming home had been the right decision. As much as she had struggled with taking her children away from half of their heritage probably forever, Javier’s family had never been very welcoming to her. They had become even less so after Maya was born, as if Laura were to blame somehow for the genetic abnormality.
“I’m just going to come out and say this, okay?” Caidy said after a moment. “I really wish you had married Taft so we could have been sisters.”
“Thank you,” she said, touched by the words.
“I mean it. You were the best thing that ever happened to him. We all thought so. Compared to the women he… Well, compared to anybody else he’s dated, you’re a million times better. I still can’t believe any brother of mine was stupid enough to let you slip through his fingers. Don’t think I haven’t told him so, too.”
She didn’t know quite how to answer—or why she had this sudden urge to protect him. Taft hadn’t been stupid, only hurt and lost and not at all ready for marriage.
She hadn’t been ready, either, although it had taken her a few years to admit that to herself. At twenty-one, she had been foolish enough to think her love should have been enough to help him heal from the pain and anger of losing his parents in such a violent way, when he hadn’t even had the resolution of the murderers being caught and brought to justice.
An idealistic, romantic young woman and an angry, bitter young man would have made a terrible combination, she thought as she sat here in this quiet barn while the puppies wriggled around with her children and a horse stamped and snorted somewhere nearby.
“I also have a confession.” Caidy shifted beside her at the stall door.
She raised an eyebrow. “Do I really want to hear this?”
“Please don’t be mad, okay?”
For some reason, Laura was strongly reminded of Caidy as she had known her a decade ago, the lighthearted, mischievous teenager who thought she could tease and cajole her way out of any situation.
“Tell me. What did you do?” she asked, amusement fighting the sudden apprehension curling through her.
Before the other woman could answer, a male voice rang out through the barn. “Caidy? Are you in here?”
Her stomach dropped and the little flutters of apprehension became wild-winged flaps of anxiety.
Caidy winced. “Um, I may have casually mentioned to Taft that you and the children were coming out to the ranch today and that we might be going up on the Aspen Leaf Trail, if he wanted to tag along.”
So much for her master plan of escaping the inn today so she could keep her children—and herself—out from underfoot while he was working on the other renovations.
“Are you mad?” Caidy asked.
She forced a smile when she really wanted to sit right down on the straw-covered floor of the stall and cry.
Yes, when she decided to return to Pine Gulch, she had known seeing him again was inevitable. She just hadn’t expected to bump into the dratted man every flipping time she turned around.
“Why would I be mad? Your brother and I are friends.” Or at least she was working hard at pretending they could be. Anyway, this was his family’s ranch. Some part of her had known when she accepted Caidy’s invitation to come out for a visit that there was a chance he might be here.
“Oh, good. I was worried things might be weird between the two of you.”
But you invited him along anyway? she wanted to ask, but decided that sounded rude. “No. It’s perfectly fine,” she lied.
“I thought he could lend a hand with the children. He’s really patient with them. In fact, he’s the one who taught Gabi to ride. Gabi is the daughter of Becca, Trace’s fiancée. Anyway, it’s always good to have another experienced rider on hand when you’ve got kids who haven’t been on a horse before.”
“Caidy?” he called again.
“Back here, with the puppies,” she returned.
A moment later, Taft rounded the corner of a support beam. At the sight of him, everything inside her seemed to shiver.
Okay, really? This was getting ridiculous. She huffed. So far since she had been back in town, she had seen the man in full firefighter turnout gear when he and his crew responded to the inn fire, wearing a low-slung construction belt while he worked on the renovations at the inn, and now he was dressed in worn jeans, cowboy boots and a tan Stetson that made him look dark and dangerous.
Was he purposely trying to look as if he just stepped off every single page of a beefcake calendar?
Taft Bowman—doing his part to fulfill any woman’s fantasy.
“Here you are,” he said with that irresistible smile.
She couldn’t breathe suddenly as the dust motes floating on the air inside the barn seemed to choke her lungs. This wasn’t really fair. Why hadn’t his hair started to thin a little in the past decade or his gut started to paunch?
He was so blasted gorgeous and she was completely weak around him.
He leaned in to kiss his sister on the cheek. After a little awkward hesitation, much to her dismay he leaned in to kiss her on the cheek, as well. She could do nothing but endure the brush of his mouth on her skin as the familiar scent of him, outdoorsy and male, filled her senses, unleashing another flood of memories.
Before she could make her brain cooperate and think of something to say, her children noticed him for the first time.
“Hi!” Maya beamed with delight.
“Hey, pumpkin. How are things?”
“Look! Puppies!”
She thrust the endlessly patient black puppy at him and Taft graciously accepted the dog. “He’s a cute one. What’s his name, Caid?”
“Puppy Number Five,” she answered. “I don’t name them when I sell them as pups without training. I let their
new owners do it.”
“Look at this one.” Alex pushed past his sister to hold up his own chubby little canine friend.
“Nice,” Taft said. He knelt right there in the straw and was soon covered in puppies and kids. Even the tired-looking mother dog came over to him for affection.
“Hey, Betsy. How are you holding up with this brood?” he asked, rubbing the dog between the ears and earning a besotted look that Laura found completely exasperating.
“Thanks for coming out,” Caidy said.
“Not a problem. I can think of few things I enjoy more than going on a spring ride into the mountains.”
“Not too far into the mountains,” she assured Laura. “We can’t go very far this time of year anyway. Too much snow, at least for a good month or so.”
“Aspen Leaf is open, though, isn’t it?”
“Yes. Destry and I checked it the other day. She was disappointed to miss the ride today, by the way,” Caidy told Laura. “Becca was taking her and Gabi into Idaho Falls for fittings for their flower-girl dresses.”
“And you missed out on all that girly fun?” Taft asked, climbing to his feet and coming to stand beside his sister and Laura. Suddenly she felt crowded by his heat and size and…maleness.
“Are you kidding? This will be much more enjoyable. If you haven’t heard, Trace is getting hitched in June,” she said to Laura.
“To Pine Gulch’s newest attorney, if you can believe that,” Taft added.
She had heard and she was happy for Trace. He had always been very kind to her. Trace, the Pine Gulch police chief, had always struck her as much more serious than Taft, the kind of person who liked to think things through before he spoke.
For being identical twins, Taft and Trace had two very unique personalities, and even though they were closer than most brothers, they had also actively cultivated friendships beyond each other, probably because of their mother’s wise influence.
She did find it interesting that both of them had chosen professions in the public-safety sector, although Trace had taken a route through the military to becoming a policeman while Taft had gravitated toward fire safety and becoming a paramedic.
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