This Wandering Heart

by Janine Rosche

  Robbie opened the adjoining door.

  Keira, lying with her head at the foot of the bed, tilted her chin back. Even upside down, he looked worried after the call he made to Vivian in the other room.

  “Daddy, watch me play airplane,” Anabelle said, breathlessly.

  “That’s not how you play airplane.”

  “Oh yeah? How do you play, Mr. Guy-Who-Knows-Everything?” Keira extended the challenge before she thought better of it.

  Soon, Robbie had kicked off his boots, commanded Anabelle to stand to the side, and lain on the bed next to Keira. Right next to her . . . on a bed.

  Keira rolled off, happy to watch the scene from a standing position several feet away.

  He looked at Keira and pulled his knees to his chest. “Climb on.”

  Anabelle jumped and clapped her hands.

  “Nope.”

  “Chicken.” It was less of an insult and more of a dare. He patted his shins. “Think I can’t hold you, Knudsen? Do you doubt my strength?” Still lying down, he spread his arms out wide and flexed his biceps.

  Definitely strong enough. No doubt about it. He could be one of those Momentso guys who used his girlfriend as a prop, lifting her like a barbell or performing a one-armed push-up with her sitting on his back.

  Pleating some of the fabric on her ankle-length skirt in her fists, she climbed on the bed.

  Anabelle grinned, scrunching her facial features in what may have been an attempt at a wink.

  “Don’t you laugh at me, Anabelle.”

  The girl balled her hands in front of her and pounded them in a rhythm. “Air. Plane. Air. Plane.”

  Keira laid her stomach on Robbie’s shins, tucking the extra skirt fabric beneath her for modesty’s sake. She reached for his hands.

  “Put on your helmet,” he said in a robot voice.

  “What helmet? Have you ever even been on an airplane?” She sought help from Anabelle, who pretended to place a helmet on her head and hook a strap under her chin. Keira rolled her eyes at Robbie. But after he repeated the command, she reenacted Anabelle’s motions.

  “Buckle seat belt,” Robbie commanded.

  This time, she obeyed. The sooner this was over with, and she could get away from him, the better.

  “Clasp hands.”

  She interlocked her fingers with his.

  He did a countdown from ten before he announced “liftoff.” The whole thing was rather un-airplane-like. But then again, there was no game called “space shuttle.” Or maybe there was. Keira wasn’t exactly the expert on childhood games. All she knew, from her father, was “pour me a scotch,” which was way more fun than “if you cry, you get hit.”

  As if she weighed a feather, he lifted her up parallel to the bed’s surface. It was a nice, pleasant ride if she could ignore the strange intimacy of it. But then, Robbie looked to Anabelle. “Should I take her higher?”

  “No need to go higher,” Keira insisted.

  Anabelle’s chant changed to “Do. It. Do. It.”

  “You know what they say about the apple and the tree, right?” Keira said, in a strained voice.

  “I’m sorry. I can’t hear you. We’ve lost contact due to the high altitude.”

  Before she could protest, he straightened his legs until she was nearly upside down. Now she was the one squealing, especially when he started wobbling his legs.

  “Uh-oh. Turbulence!”

  “Don’t you drop me, Robbie Matth—” Her panic caused her arms to give way. She thunked down onto his chest—hard. She couldn’t breathe. After a moment, she realized it was because she was laughing. That silent kind that sucks all the air from the room for thirty seconds before it releases in an entirely-too-loud guffaw. It drew out his belly laugh, and she buried her face against his neck.

  Anabelle joined the embrace. Something strange bloomed deep within Keira and, despite her efforts to subdue it, forced all her fear and insecurity to the surface of her skin.

  Keira rolled away from them both and climbed off the bed. In the mirror, she checked her makeup. It was smeared, but she could fix it.

  Anabelle hopped off the bed and ran to the bathroom. “I have to go potty.”

  Robbie, in the reflection behind Keira, sat on the edge of the bed watching her reapply her lipstick.

  “Thanks for keeping her occupied while I called Vivian.” Leaning forward, Robbie clasped his hands between his knees. “Saturday afternoon she’s coming over, and we’re going to have a picnic by the river. Like a regular, old family. But I doubt we’ll do any cloud watching.”

  There was that twinge near her heart again. It was fiercer this time, and she half expected to see an alien burst through her skin above the neckline of her tank top. “Why is she coming over?”

  He pushed a hurricane-force wind out of his lungs. “She’s her mother. A little girl needs her mother.”

  “Not one like that. You know what Viv is like. She was determined to come between us our entire relationship. Eventually, she did.” She loosened the elastic band securing her braid. “What if that’s what she plans to do with Anabelle?”

  “I hear your concern. But Vivian has a heart. She does. She wouldn’t take Annie away from me.” Robbie’s gaze met hers in the reflection. “Besides, it wasn’t Vivian that got between me and you. I’m not sure what did, but it wasn’t her.”

  From the bathroom, water roared from the faucet. In Anabelle’s singsong voice, the alphabet sounded through the door—a trick her dad had taught her, no doubt, to ensure she washed her hands thoroughly.

  Then Robbie was there, standing at Keira’s back. She didn’t need to look in the mirror or over her shoulder. She could feel him just as she could feel an impending rainstorm in the marrow of her bones. When he touched the end of her braid, she closed her eyes. As he unthreaded the sections of hair, releasing the long, loose curls around her face, chills coursed down her spine into the tips of her toes.

  In the mirror, his eyes were pained. “We haven’t talked about what happens when we go back to Montana on Friday. Annie’s loved being around you this week.” His arm slid across her collarbone and pulled her back against his chest. “I have, too.”

  She had enough words in her head to rival War and Peace. His warmth and his strength tied them into knots. She didn’t dare turn around, lest she give in to the desire to kiss him.

  Not a moment too soon, the bathroom door opened. Bounding into the room, Anabelle barreled into their legs. “Family hug!”

  From the nightstand, Keira’s phone buzzed a rare incoming call.

  In the mirror, the look in Robbie’s eyes begged her to ignore it, to stay like this.

  Within her, claws tore her every which way. The pain was too much. She needed an escape. Stepping away from them, she snatched the phone and answered.

  “You are everywhere, girl!” Dora’s voice bounced several octaves higher than normal. “Brilliant move.”

  “What are you talking about?” Keira glanced at Robbie. Oh, the way he looked at her . . . As if he was a sailor lost at sea, and she was dry land.

  “That picture you posted today. Sure, it was a bit off-brand, but my, oh my, it has skyrocketed you to a new playing field. Haven’t you been keeping up with your notifications?”

  “No, I’ve been busy with other things.” Keira opened her laptop and waited for it to awaken.

  “Does ‘other things’ have a brother?”

  “Dora, I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about.” The laptop’s home screen lit up. Keira clicked the Momentso icon.

  “The hot guy in your picture. Please tell me that’s your new assistant. Man, John never stood a chance. Your followers are going nuts over him. The girls love him. The guys? Not so much.”

  Her profile boasted the newest picture. The one of them cloud watching. It was imperfect. The camera�
�s light shadow covered part of her chin. Still pretty, though. Robbie looked like bronzed perfection with his jawline, made to look even sharper by a shadow. His hair fell just right around his head so that even now, Keira’s hand itched to dig her fingers into it.

  But one thing arrested her heart most of all. He had, in fact, kissed her crown.

  Robbie looked over her shoulder. “I thought you weren’t going to post that.”

  “I didn’t.” Keira’s thoughts jumbled. Dora jabbered on about what she would let the mystery man do to her. It was enough to shock Keira back to the phone call. Dora wasn’t exactly a saint. “Dora, I didn’t post this.”

  “You’re telling me someone hacked your profile to share a ceiling-busting picture of you and your cute-as-can-be insta-family? Look, I have to go right now, but the Adventure Channel loves this. Don’t quote me, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you get an offer soon. I’ve heard that your idol, Margot Jorgensen, is on the outs with the producer of Traveling Light again. Rumor has it, they are looking to replace her . . . with you.”

  During the last few minutes of the conversation, hopes swirled around Keira’s brain as if they’d been caught in a blender. After saying goodbye to Dora, she set down the phone.

  “What’s the time stamp on the picture?” Robbie asked.

  She scrolled. “Four forty-one p.m. I was driving, so I couldn’t have . . . What if Anabelle uploaded it while we were asleep, and it posted once we got service?”

  They turned toward the little rapscallion, who was bouncing on the bed.

  “I doubt it. She isn’t exactly tech savvy.” Robbie looked over his shoulder to where Anabelle had picked up the handset for the hotel room’s phone. She slid her finger across the smooth plastic surface of the handle as if she expected it to light up. When it didn’t, she replaced the receiver on the base . . . sideways. Robbie glanced back at Keira. “See?”

  “But on this phone, all you have to do is hold your finger down on the photo, and it lists apps you could post to. Momentso is the first one that would’ve popped up.” She refreshed the page. The likes and comments on the picture had increased even more. “So much for ‘no harm, no foul.’ I’ll delete it.” She clicked the options menu and scrolled the cursor down to Delete.

  Robbie’s hand covered hers. “Hold up a minute. What did Dora say?”

  “You mean other than what she’d pay to have seven minutes in a closet with you? She said you’ve made my whole virtual world implode.”

  His smug smile was deliciously infuriating.

  “Have I ever told you how much you remind me of Gaston from Beauty and the Beast?”

  He lifted her hair over her shoulder, dragging his fingers down her back until she shivered. “I thought I reminded you of a young Robert Redford.”

  “Him, too. Anyway, she said this picture is ‘ceiling-breaking’ and has taken Kat Wanderfull to a new level. She expects Adventure to reach out to me soon.”

  “Isn’t that what you want?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, don’t delete the picture.”

  “I have to. It’s not an honest portrait of who I am.”

  “It isn’t? It’s not like you’ve claimed I’m some royal prince you’re engaged to or anything. It’s a picture with no caption. Let your followers think what they want. Maybe it will fend off some of those guys who feel you owe them something.”

  What does he mean by that?

  The envelope icon didn’t indicate a new message. What would MRCustom think about this? She had to admit his opinion mattered greatly to her.

  And yet, so did Robbie’s.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Thursday was the kind of day Robbie’s old history teacher would have lived for. Not only had they taken a ride on an 1880s steam train through the Black Hills that morning, but they’d headed up to the Old West town of Deadwood around lunchtime. After settling into their lodgings at a supposedly haunted hotel, they’d arrived at the outdoor dinner theater for a western show that was cheesy, kitschy, and altogether perfect, especially when a cowboy led Anabelle up onto the stage.

  The only thing better than watching his daughter overcome her shyness in front of the cheering crowd was sharing his pride with Keira. She beamed each time Anabelle mimicked the gunslinger’s movements, spinning her pink plastic gun on her finger and saying things like “Reach for the sky, partner.”

  Other than those aimed at the stage and the stars overhead, the only lights were the lanterns on the long, wood-planked tables. Keira’s beauty didn’t just shine in the warm light; it shimmered.

  Keira sat back on the bench. She settled against Robbie, beneath his arm propped on the backrest.

  He wanted to move his hand down to her shoulder and sweep his thumb over the bare skin of her upper arm, but best not to push it. Physical touch was her love language. He was also quite aware that too much too soon would make her run for the Black Hills.

  Perhaps an arm on the back of the bench would make it clear she was off-limits to all these cowboys eyeing her. These jokers weren’t even real cowboys, but actors. And bad ones, at that. Sure, he’d had to fight guys off her in college a few times, but this felt different. What’s wrong with you, Matthews? It’s not like she’s your girlfriend or anything.

  He shouldn’t have veered into the comment section of her recent Momentso posts. It would have been better for his mental health to walk into a lake of fire. The comments of some of the so-called men on there made his stomach churn. Were they raised in strip clubs? Brothels? They wanted Kat Wanderfull to know how much pleasure she gave them. Their words were disgusting, degrading, and—at least in Robbie’s mind—dangerous.

  He was probably paranoid. Even after all this time, she felt like a piece of him. He could no sooner see her hurt than sit back and allow a mountain lion to gnaw on his right arm.

  One guy, tall and lanky with chaps over his jeans and a button-up shirt his mom likely bought him at the mall, kept looking from his phone to Keira and back again. When she’d posted a selfie an hour earlier using the app’s check-in feature, she’d given her location to hundreds of thousands of sickos. What if one decided to try to find her?

  After Anabelle’s gun toting scared off the train robber, the host fit her with a sheriff sticker. A waitress in full 1800s garb walked Anabelle back to their table. Considering the way she was grinning, she either really liked her job or really liked Robbie. “Thanks for letting us bring your daughter onstage. She did great.”

  “Yes, she did.” He waited for Anabelle to climb onto the bench opposite him, then reached over to her for a high five.

  “Is there anything else I can get you?” The waitress flattened her hand against her waist, sliding it across and drawing his attention to her unnatural-looking curves.

  “Another iced tea would be great.”

  Keira held up her mason jar glass with only ice remaining in the bottom. “Can I get more water, please?”

  “Sure.” The waitress looked Keira up and down, clearly unimpressed. She flashed Robbie a smile. “I’ll grab that tea for you.”

  After she’d walked away, Keira elbowed Robbie’s ribs. “She likes you, and she’s pretty. You should talk to her.”

  A cool breeze dipped into the eating area, threatening to steal the paper napkins. A rash of gooseflesh rippled down her arm, and she nestled closer, wedging her arm against his side.

  A complete enigma, that’s what she was.

  “Not my type. I like chicks with forehead scars.”

  Keira pursed her lips as the flush of pink rose into her cheeks. Another breeze came through as a junkyard band began picking a song onstage. Robbie curved his hand around her arm, sweeping down from the shoulder to the elbow and back until the bumps retreated, then for several minutes after that. “You should’ve brought a jacket.”

  “I don’t need one. I brought you. Y
ou’re like a furnace.”

  Robbie caught the eye of Mr. Tall-and-Lanky as the man held the phone up in their direction. Had he just taken a picture of them?

  When the song ended, Keira asked Anabelle if she needed to go to the ladies’ room, but she was too busy building a tower with the leftover corn bread to answer.

  “I’ll be back.” Keira stood and shimmied out from between the table and bench.

  “Do you want dessert?” She’d been eating a few more bites than normal in recent days. Dessert was far-fetched, but he offered anyway.

  She thought a moment. “Why not?” When she batted her eyelashes at him, Robbie may as well have climbed into one of the pinewood coffins the restaurant used as props. He was as good as dead.

  The ice cream on top of her chocolate cake was half-melted by the time the host of the show introduced the final song of the night. Still, Keira hadn’t returned from the restroom. Had she fallen in or something? More importantly, where had the guy with the phone gone?

  An eerie fog filled Robbie, like the one that often draped the Madison River Canyon early in the morning.

  The waitress leaned against the wall near where the food came out. She looked at him, then the vacant spot at his side. She strutted to him with a tilted smile he may have found attractive once.

  Robbie placed his cloth napkin on the table and stood. “Miss, could you keep an eye on my daughter for a moment? I need to check on—”

  “Your girlfriend?”

  Such a simple question, yet it stumped him for a moment. “Yes. Annie, stay in your seat.”

  The restrooms were located in the structure bordering the western wall of the dining area. Farther into the opening, the dirt floor surrendered to patio tiles. The hall was dark, with only sconces on the wall next to the men’s and women’s restrooms, providing a halo of light. Robbie put his hands on the women’s room door and was ready to shove it open and call into it, but he heard scuffing noises farther down the hall. He let the sound guide him until he recognized the man’s black-shirted back and chaps over jeans. His arms stretched across a doorway. Though Keira was pushing him, he shifted his weight to block her.