The Rancher Takes a Family

by Paula Altenburg

  He flipped the rod forward, lifting her thumb with the blunt of his so she’d release the line. The baited hook sailed a few yards away and dropped into the water with a light splash. She squealed with delight, gripping the fishing rod in a chokehold while she beamed up at him, her cheeks flushed with sun and excitement.

  “I did it!”

  “You sure did.”

  They weren’t going to catch any fish this way though, and Jake didn’t care. Watching her having so much fun was a reward in itself, which was why they were here—to relax and unwind before he forgot how.

  She’d parked her car on the side of the road and together, they’d walked across Wagging Tongue land to get here. They had this hole on the Tongue River, around a slight bend and out of sight of the world, all to themselves. A high, red rock embankment faced them on the opposite side of the river, while the shade of a few towering cottonwoods beckoned from a few feet away.

  A few miles upriver, however, there was a public dam where the fish and the diehard sports fishers preferred to hang out.

  Lacey had threaded her ponytail through the back of a Cincinnati Reds ball cap and every time she turned her head, it brushed against his cheek. She smelled of warm skin and coconut oil.

  He’d been biding his time for the right moment to kiss her again. He’d put some thought into the point of reference for public displays of affection they’d established last night, and if they factored the kids in, he figured the line where critical pieces of clothing became optional was somewhere between a three and a two. Fishing on the Tongue River rated maybe a four, because of the occasional boat floating by, but they were in no immediate danger of being spotted by locals who might feel the need to complain about a teacher giving a rancher a little private tutoring.

  He couldn’t say he was crazy about sneaking around to spend time with Lacey, but he got to have her all to himself so right now it worked in his favor.

  “I felt something!” she cried.

  The tip of her rod dipped toward the glittering surface of the water and she jerked it upward before he could stop her. The line went slack. Whatever might have been there was gone. Her lower lip puckered in disappointment and she let out a few choice words that were decidedly un-teacher-like. She might be taking the sport a little too seriously. It was funny as hell but he thought twice about saying so.

  He helped her cast again. “If you get another bite, don’t jerk the rod. Feed the line out, like this.”

  He eased up on the thumb bar to show her what he meant, then let her get the feel of it, too. They’d been out here in the river with the sun beating on them for over an hour and she wasn’t showing any signs of wearing out, yet last night, he could have sworn her enthusiasm for fishing wasn’t this high.

  “It’s hot and I’m hungry. Have mercy,” he finally pleaded. “Can we take a break?”

  She tilted her head and swiveled her chin so that hazel eyes swept upward to his. “Of course—if you’re going to be a baby about it.”

  “Big talk from a woman who’s only on her feet because I’m holding her upright. Have fun getting back to shore on your own.” He raised his hands in the air and took two steps away.

  Immediately, the current caught at her and she started to wobble. The boots on her waders were a little too large.

  “Get back here and help me!” she shrieked, her arms pinwheeling wildly.

  The fishing rod in her right hand hit the water and he grabbed for it to keep it from sinking. He cupped a hand to his ear. “What was that? I didn’t hear the magic word.”

  She caught a fistful of his shirt and regained her footing. The word that came out of her mouth wasn’t magical. Not at all.

  But it was entertaining.

  “It’s going to be like this, is it?” he sighed.

  He bent forward, swung one arm under her legs, and hoisted her out of the water and over his shoulder. Then, with his hand on her rubber-clad ass, he waded toward shore. A black-necked stilt, feeding on insects nearby, fluttered its black wings before hopping away in indignation.

  By the time they reached shore Lacey was laughing so hard she couldn’t breathe. He carried the rod, but the line had gotten tangled up in rocks or debris on the bottom of the river and the spool had almost completely unwound.

  He tossed the rod on the ground before easing her weight off his shoulder. She slid down his front until the toes of her waders hit land. She clasped her hands behind his neck and hung on. More laughter spilled from her lips.

  God, she was pretty—all long-lashed hazel eyes, sunshine, and smiles, with a dash of freckles salting the bridge of her nose.

  As far as minding PDAs went, this was as good a moment as any.

  Chapter Seven

  He lowered his mouth to cover hers and lost himself in the sensation. He cradled her face between his palms. The pulse in her throat fluttered under his thumb. He slipped the tip of his tongue past her lips. Just a flick.

  She tasted so sweet. Like every dream he’d ever had where she’d been the star.

  The distinct sound of oars scraping against rock interrupted. He broke off the kiss seconds before a shallow-bottomed drift boat rounded the bend. Ian McKillop, a retiree from town, occasionally took tourists fishing. This, it seemed, was one of those days.

  Jake waved to him, figuring a friendly acknowledgment was the best way to go. Lacey, clad in chest waders and with a ball cap shading her eyes, was in no danger of being recognized by an eighty-year-old man who was partially blind. She kept her back to the river and reached for the cooler she’d left in the shade of a tree as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening.

  Everyone was simply enjoying their Sunday.

  The fisherman in the stern of the boat was more interested in watching his line than in being friendly with strangers. Lacey, her cheeks flushed from the sun and the heat, rummaged around in the cooler. She passed Jake a bottle of water and a sandwich. He downed half the water before unwrapping the sandwich and taking a bite. Chicken salad on whole wheat. Not bad at all.

  The drift boat disappeared down the river. Another mile and its passengers would have to portage—the drought had lowered the water level too far in places for even a shallow-bottomed boat to get through. It widened out again where the Tongue met the Yellow, but even there, the marshlands had dried up. Grand needed rain.

  They were alone again. Lacey slid wide elastic straps over her arms before peeling out of the chest waders. Jake held her elbow so she could step from the boots and onto the blanket where she’d parked canvas shoes. She inched her bare toes inside and bent over to tie up the laces, giving him a flash of pink panties under the cutoff fringe of her denim short-shorts, before sitting down cross-legged to eat.

  Jake continued to stand while he polished off his sandwich. He didn’t doubt that old Ian, who might be half blind but wasn’t stupid, would mention to his wife that he’d seen Jake McGregor on the Tongue with a woman. Word would be all over Grand before sundown.

  So what?

  Let the gossips have at it. It was a far better topic than how deep in debt the Wagging Tongue was, how long before his brothers bailed on him, or if Liz’s children stood a chance of growing up normal.

  He stripped down to his jeans and T-shirt, hung both pairs of waders from a branch to dry off, and then sat so he faced Lacey to block her from view if anyone else happened by on the river. Their only witness at the moment was the pink-legged stilt they’d pissed off.

  “Another sandwich?” she asked, reaching into the cooler.

  “Please.”

  He ate this one more slowly. It was thick, and delicious, and a lot better than the peanut butter one he would have made for himself. A bee droned nearby, contributing to the lazy, rippling sound of the river as it trickled over rocks and bounced off the steep red bank on the far side. A low, pale-gray mass of air hovered on the far-off horizon. He hoped that meant rain was approaching, but the sky directly above them was clear blue and shimmered with heat, so it didn’
t seem likely.

  Lacey, who could chatter like a magpie on crack, seemed content with the silence, if somewhat bemused. Oddly enough, he liked listening to her conversation, but they’d done a lot of talking about him the few times they’d been together and there was a good chance she’d had enough. He wanted to know more about her and what she’d been up to over the years. She’d mentioned she’d gone to college in Maine. He hadn’t asked why.

  He’d fix that now. “How come you decided on a Maine university after high school?”

  “My grandmother had terminal cancer and she didn’t want to die alone. She offered to pay my tuition if I went to live with her.” Lacey dusted crumbs off her hands with meticulous care. “I would have gone even without the incentive. She knew that. She died my fourth year.”

  Of course Lacey would have gone to be with her grandmother. She was kind.

  “This was your father’s mother? What about your dad? Is he still around?”

  He was touching on territory Lacey had never been very forthcoming about. She’d once said her father was a deadbeat dad and that was about all he’d ever learned. Her mouth arced in a way that said he was prying, but also that she didn’t mind.

  “My father is a plastic surgeon who volunteers for Doctors Without Borders. He primarily treats children in war zones who require facial reconstruction. His work never left him with much emotional energy for us, and since he considered us privileged, we learned early on not to expect anything of him. My mother found out that being married to a plastic surgeon wasn’t what she’d assumed it would be. She met Blue when I was nine and she moved on with her life.”

  Jake couldn’t begin to imagine how mentally hard it would be on a doctor to treat damaged children day in and day out. But Lacey’s father had sacrificed his own kids in order to take care of someone else’s. That didn’t seem right. He’d always had so much guidance from his dad that he’d taken it for granted—until it was no longer there. He set the sadness aside. He’d dwelled enough on his problems. He was done.

  He scrunched up his sandwich wrapper and tossed it into the open cooler. “You don’t resent your father for that?”

  “Of course I do,” Lacey said, giving him a look that said he’d asked a dumb question. “But he’s improved the lives of thousands of people and made a significant contribution to the world. Not everyone can say they’ve done that.”

  True enough. A smart man would let it go. “After four years in Maine, why did you bother coming back to Grand to teach?”

  He got another one of those withering, judgmental looks from her again. This one said he should hone up on his math—but his math was just fine. He was after information. The best way to get it was to allow her to correct him.

  “I was in Maine for ten years, not four,” she said. “But this is my home and these are good people. I missed Grand every day I was gone.” Her hazel eyes went all misty as she reminisced.

  Jake got it. It was the same reason he wanted to raise Liz’s kids here—he might find the nosy neighbors frustrating at best, but in the days following the plane crash, every single one of them had been here for the McGregor brothers in some way, shape, or form. They’d helped with the announcements, the memorial service, and especially, the meals. All he had to do was ask and he’d have more help than he could use. The problem—and it was his, he owned it—was that he didn’t like having to ask, so he didn’t.

  She stretched her legs out, crossed them at the ankles, and leaned back on her hands. Wide hazel eyes scanned his face. “Mind if I ask you a personal question, now?”

  It wasn’t as if he’d been able to stop her so far. Besides, fair was fair. It was her turn to pry.

  “Go for it.” He took another long swig from the lukewarm bottle of water.

  “Why aren’t you married?”

  The water went down the wrong way and he coughed to clear it out of his windpipe. He swiped at his mouth with the back of his wrist. “What the hell kind of question is that?”

  “Enquiring minds want to know. You could have any woman you want. So why are you unattached?”

  She said it with such conviction he was a little embarrassed, but even more, he was flattered. Did she really think he was some sort of prize?

  “Kids put a real damper on a guy’s love life,” he said.

  Like right now, for instance. He wasn’t going to get to see her again until next Saturday night. Even then, he’d likely have to sneak in through the back door. He’d begun to hate this arrangement already and it was less than twenty-four hours old.

  “I could ask you the same question,” he added, swerving the conversation back into the right lane. “Why aren’t you married?”

  “I got engaged in college,” she said, “but we broke it off. Something was missing.”

  Lacey had loved another man enough to consider marriage.

  Jealousy welled up inside him to poke at a tender spot that had never healed. Whatever this “something” she spoke of might be, it must have been missing when they were dating, too. At least for her.

  Because at eighteen, he’d believed she was the one.

  “I guess we have the same excuse, then,” he replied. “I haven’t found what I’m looking for, either.”

  He should have known she wouldn’t leave it alone.

  “So what are—”

  That was as far as she got. A spider’s web of lightning stretched from the heavens to the earth like a child’s Etch-a-Sketch gone wild. Great rolls of thunder shook the ground. The horizon had turned angry—the sky above them fading from bright blue to a dull, dirty gray—even though there were no clouds in sight. The fresh tang of ozone bit the air. The change in the weather came at them so fast, and out of nowhere, that it took a few seconds for Jake’s brain to process the danger.

  They were sitting on the bank of a river, underneath cottonwoods, in the middle of a dry lightning storm. He grabbed Lacey’s hand and hauled her to her feet.

  “Leave the cooler,” he said, jerking her into a run. “Come on. Your car is closest.”

  *

  They dashed between the dancing cottonwood trees and through the scrub before scrambling up the embankment that shored the road.

  Lacey’s car, pulled well off on the shoulder, beckoned to them from a few hundred feet away. She had the key in her hand and pressed the release to unlock the doors. She veered for the driver’s side and Jake for the passenger’s.

  They tumbled into the car. Streak after streak of brilliant white light cut through the air directly overhead. The ground shook as if a giant were stamping his feet in rage. It was hot inside the car so they rolled the windows down a few inches. Lacey gripped the steering wheel in both hands. She leaned past it to peer at the sky.

  Not a drop of rain fell.

  “Wow,” she breathed. That was all she could think of to say.

  Jake looked a lot less impressed than she felt. “Let’s hope nothing catches on fire.”

  Spoken like the rancher he was. Dry lightning strikes caused forest fires and burned buildings down. But this was an amazing display that Mother Nature was hurling their way. The least they could do was enjoy it. She clawed under the seat for her purse.

  “What are you doing?”

  She dug around inside the small crocheted handbag, then held up her phone. She’d left it in the car because she’d wanted to enjoy their afternoon without any interruptions. “Taking a picture for my students.”

  “Of course you are.”

  He was making fun of her and she didn’t care. “They’ll love this.”

  She held her thumb down to get a series of rapid shots in the hopes of getting just one. When she checked them, however, the results were disappointing.

  She flipped the phone around, about to show the photos to Jake, when she saw a thin spiral of smoke rising from the badlands, in the direction of Camelback Butte.

  She pointed to it. “Do you have cattle pastured near the butte?”

  His mouth settled into a
forbidding line. Piercing green eyes glittered through narrowed black lashes as he studied the broadening plume through the car window. “I do.”

  “I’ll drive you home. Once the storm passes, I’ll come back for the waders and your fishing rod.”

  His attention—all one thousand megawatts—settled on her. It shot through her much the same way a lightning strike would—prickling from the roots of her hair to the tips of her fingers and toes. The hard green glare softened in a way that weakened her knees.

  “Sorry, Lacey. I didn’t mean to ruin your afternoon.”

  Her afternoon was hardly ruined. Every time she recalled the way he’d kissed her, she went all goofy inside and lost track of her thoughts. He’d improved his technique over the years, and it had been pretty great to begin with. She’d been having a fantastic time, right up until the storm started. Even now, as it moved off down the river, it was a spectacular sight. And Jake was worried about his livestock—as any rancher would be.

  But, yes, she was disappointed it was ending this way, and he could tell. She’d once tried to make him choose—to prove she was the most important thing in his life—and she suspected deep down, he hadn’t forgotten what a spoiled princess she’d been.

  She wasn’t about to be judged for a sixteen-year-old’s self-absorption, however. She liked to think she’d matured. They’d have more afternoons to themselves—even though summers were busy on ranches and Jake had a ready-made family with a bigger lien on his free hours than she did. To add to the challenge, they were trying to keep the fact they were seeing each other a secret.

  Okay, yes. She saw the rabbit hole. And she wasn’t diving in. Jake didn’t need any more worries.

  “This was your afternoon as much as mine,” she said. “I thought it was perfect. Are you trying to tell me you didn’t enjoy it, too?” She had to stop talking. She reached for the key. “Let’s get you home.”

  He intercepted her hand. He tucked his thumb into her palm and clasped her fingers around it. “I’m trying to say I’m not in a big hurry. There’s nothing I can do about the cattle until the lightning lets up. We might as well ride out the storm here.”