Tall, Dark & Western Read online

  He turned and glared at her, and for a long, tense moment she thought he was going to agree to an annulment. But then he spoke again. “We made a bargain and I’m sticking to it.”

  Her hands shook as she started her car and followed him out of the parking lot. Relief that he still wanted the marriage warred with worry. What was he thinking about right now? Why was he so furious?

  In retrospect she admitted that it had been an incredibly stupid thing for her to have done, keeping Bobby’s existence a secret from the man who would be raising him. A headache formed behind her eyes, pounding more and more fiercely with each passing mile.

  They pulled off I-90 at Wall for a quick break, and she walked the dog and changed Bobby’s diaper while Marty stood by the truck, his back to her. He hadn’t even taken a close look at her son, and she started to get a little angry herself. How could he know whether or not he’d like Bobby when he hadn’t even seen him?

  It was a good thing the drive was a straight shot because he was on autopilot the whole way. Several times during the interminable drive home, Marty’s fists clenched on the steering wheel until he had to make a conscious effort to release them.

  Memories blew into his brain like tumbleweeds piling themselves up just like the pesky vegetation caught against his fences.

  He hadn’t discussed children with Juliette specifically because he hadn’t been able to bring himself to raise the issue. And since she hadn’t, either, he assumed that having more children wasn’t high on her list of priorities, either. More children… Hell, he couldn’t even bear to be around babies, much less consider having another one.

  Against his will he was back in the pediatric unit of the hospital in Rapid…. His wife, his beautiful, vivacious wife, was gone and his infant son was lying in an incubator struggling to live. He barely heard the hushed voices of nursing staff around him or the quiet hum of life-sustaining machines. Grief weighed on him with the force of a heavy snow. Lora…you should be here.

  But she wasn’t. And his life would never be right again. How could he go on without her? He couldn’t raise two children alone. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be, dammit.

  And it hadn’t been. His son, his tiny, precious, premature son had simply been too small, the doctor told him regretfully. So there’d been another tiny headstone added to the family plot, right beside Lora’s.

  He took deep, ragged breaths, refusing to allow the moisture that burned his eyes to turn into a deluge of tears.

  What the hell was he going to do? He hadn’t even been able to bring himself to look at Juliette’s little guy when they’d stopped at Wall. The thought of hearing baby coos and babble made him feel sick.

  And then another thought struck him. How was this going to affect Cheyenne?

  He’d gone to great lengths to prepare his daughter for a new mother. But he hadn’t said anything about a baby. Sharing the limelight wasn’t Cheyenne’s strong suit.

  He recalled the stricken look in Juliette’s blue eyes as she’d offered to give him an annulment. It probably would be the best thing for all concerned. But he hadn’t been able to bring himself to agree. In the short week since they’d met, he’d come to need her presence in his life. Even if she walked away today and he never saw her again, a part of him would always remember, and regret.

  Besides, he thought, not only had he gotten Cheyenne all ready for a big change in her life, he’d told half the town of Kadoka he was getting married. He’d even made one of his periodic attempts at picking up the damn house so Juliette wouldn’t think he lived like a pig. No way was he getting an annulment.

  That little dog was one thing. Annoying, but nothing he wouldn’t get used to. But for God’s sake—a baby! Clearly there was a lot more to Juliette’s decision to marry him than he’d known. She hadn’t just been overwhelmed by his charm—she’d been checking him out for fatherhood. For her son.

  Her son. He shuddered with the effort it took not to scream his anguish aloud. How was he going to stand having some other man’s son growing up in front of him day by day?

  A son. A stepson, perhaps, but still a son.

  Not his. He pounded his fist against the steering wheel in a rare display of helpless rage. Never his.

  Three

  He was still struggling with grief and anger an hour later when he drove up the bumpy lane to the house. He’d attacked the lane with his usual speed, leaving Juliette to follow at a slower pace. By the time she pulled in front of the house he had most of her boxes unloaded and sitting in the living room.

  He watched as she stepped from the car and looked around. Out here, in the quiet space of his ranch, she looked even smaller and more fragile than she normally did. She walked around the back of the car, looking in vain for dry patches of ground that wouldn’t ruin her pretty heels, and unloaded the little dog’s crate. Then she bent and opened the small metal door.

  The little critter came bouncing out, leaping around her legs in paroxysms of delight, occasionally yapping a hoarse little cough of noise. He looked like a wind-up toy, and Marty shook his head in disgust. A rat with fur.

  Just then, the two ranch dogs, both Australian shepherds, came around the corner of the barn. Streak, the older one took his time coming across the yard but the younger dog immediately began to bark, a deep, manly “real dog” bark, as he charged across the yard.

  Juliette had been reaching into the car when the dog started barking. She leaped out hastily and snatched up the wind-up toy. She backed against the car, and her body language clearly said she was terrified.

  Hell. She couldn’t be afraid of dogs, could she? She had a dog.

  The dogs were determined to get acquainted with the mop, which Juliette was holding behind her back. They took the most expedient route to their quarry, which happened to be right over Juliette.

  She squeaked once as one dog leaped up, planting his paws on her shoulders, and as Marty caught a glimpse of her face, he was startled by the naked fear in her expression. Abruptly he moved, coming down off the porch and hollering at both dogs to get back.

  They obeyed, and Juliette sagged to the seat in the open door of the car. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not used to big dogs.”

  He started to point out that they weren’t exactly enormous, but then he realized that to her they probably were. “Put your little dog down. They won’t hurt him.”

  “But—”

  Marty saved himself some aggravation by simply reaching around her for the dog. As he took the black critter from her, it gave a happy yip and started licking his chin. “Quit that, you mutt,” he said, “or I’ll feed you to the coyotes.” He set the little dog down and immediately the two bigger ones surrounded him. But, as he’d predicted, after some initial stiff-legged strutting and butt sniffing, the dogs all relaxed.

  Juliette kept a wary eye on the dogs, he noticed. He guessed he couldn’t blame her. Her long wool coat had two large muddy spots on the shoulders, and there was a wet streak of dog slobber across one pocket. She unhooked her baby’s carrier from the car and hesitated, looking at the dogs. Out of the corner of his eye he could see one tiny booted foot that had worked its way free of the blanket, kicking wildly.

  “Come on,” he said shortly, unable to speak for the painful constriction in his chest. He didn’t offer her a hand, but he stayed beside her until she got to the porch. Her dumb little dog followed her, getting its paws filthy, so short its belly nearly dragged in the mud.

  Once she’d climbed the few steps, she stopped and looked around. “This is…spread out,” she said.

  He read between the lines. “It can get pretty isolated sometimes. The other women around here keep each other from getting too squirrelly.” He yanked open the door and motioned her inside.

  “Whoa, there,” he said, making shooing motions when the dog tried to follow her.

  She turned to face him, her features full of dismay. “But Inky’s an indoor dog, remember?”

  “Not full of mud lik
e that, he isn’t.” He retrieved the dog crate, setting it in the utility room just inside the door. “He can stay in there until you have time to clean him up,” he said with finality, closing the little critter firmly inside.

  Her face was still dismayed, but at least she wasn’t arguing. She stayed on the rug just inside the door until she’d slipped out of her muddy shoes and coat, silently looking around her.

  He knew what she was seeing. The area in which she stood was a part of the large L-shaped kitchen. It led to a smaller room just behind her that held the washer and dryer, the freezers and a sink. There were hooks on the walls with an assortment of grubby hats and clothing on them, and one wall was a door that led to a full bath with a shower for the times he came in filthy.

  In the kitchen the remains of the morning meal—cereal—still sat on the table. Damn. He’d forgotten all about that in his rush to get to town this morning. The kitchen was pleasantly decorated in muted-wheat and gold, colors that he’d always liked, but the curtains were pretty dingy, and the rugs and tea towels had seen better days. The counters were crammed with a hodge-podge of stuff that he knew needed to be put away, and the floor was in dire need of a good scrubbing. When he had time.

  He turned abruptly, jingling his truck keys in one hand. “I’m going over to Deck’s to get Cheyenne. When I get back I’ll put the boxes wherever you want them.”

  She nodded. “Could you show me where I’ll be sleeping? I can go ahead and start putting away some of my clothes.”

  Where she’d be sleeping? He wondered what was going through her head. All week long he’d been looking forward to this night; where did she think she’d be sleeping?

  He picked up the biggest suitcase she’d brought and led her toward the stairs without speaking, waiting until she’d grabbed the infant seat and started lugging it up the steps. He knew it was too heavy for her, knew he should offer to carry it, but he broke out into a cold sweat at the mere thought of getting close to that baby. So he let her struggle up the stairs and then stepped around her, leading her toward the big room at the end of the hall.

  “This is our bedroom,” he said gruffly. It felt too intimate, standing there in his bedroom with a woman other than his wife. His first wife, he amended silently. He pointed toward the wide pine dresser that occupied one wall. “I cleared out some drawers and some closet space for you.”

  “Thank you.” Her voice was subdued.

  There was a squeak and rustle from the little carrier as the baby beneath the blue blanket stretched. He could feel panic rising. He hadn’t had much occasion to be around tiny babies in the two years since Lora had died, for which he was thankful. Once they started to crawl and walk he was all right, but he could hardly bear the memories that the sight of a tiny baby swaddled in a blue blanket evoked.

  He’d even been praying that his sister-in-law’s baby, which was due in February, would be a girl. He thought maybe, just maybe, if it were a girl he’d be able to look at it. If it was a boy, it might have to wait a while to meet Uncle Marty.

  A memory from those long, horrible days after Lora’s death floated back to him. Lora’s sister and mother had been taking turns caring for Cheyenne. Deck had told him to forget about the ranch, and he had. He’d spent every minute of every day at the hospital, just sitting beside his son’s incubator in the modest neonatal unit. He tuned out the doctors who spoke of “abnormal pulmonary function,” concentrating all his mental energies on the tiny being behind the transparent walls of the incubator.

  C’mon, little guy. Don’t give up.

  But on the third day the look on one nurse’s face told him the truth. The woman was performing one of the frequent routine checks on the baby. As she worked, silent tears slipped down her cheeks and fell onto the papers in her hands.

  He’d been paralyzed by the sight. And then despondent, as the truth crushed the bubble of irrational hope he’d been preserving.

  His son had died that night.

  In the hushed hours when everything slept and only the quiet noises of the machines around them kept them company, the tiny heart had slowly stopped beating. A nurse had unhooked all the machines, and Marty had sat in the same rocker where he’d kept vigil, holding his child’s body until the sky lit with dawn.

  Juliette’s baby squeaked again, a thin little cry, and he felt beads of sweat breaking out on his forehead.

  God, he had to get out of here!

  Juliette looked around the big, plain room she’d be sharing with Marty from now on. She wondered where Bobby was going to sleep but after the way Marty had reacted, she was reluctant to bring up the baby again. She would wait and look around after he left.

  “My brother’s wife has organized a get-together for us tonight,” Marty told her.

  “A get-together?” she repeated cautiously.

  “You know. A party.”

  “Do you mean a wedding reception?” She was horrified. The way things stood between them right now, a wedding reception would be several hours of the worst torture she could imagine.

  “A wedding dance,” he corrected her. “Nothing fancy.” His tone was curt. “Just a little get-together in town. I have a baby-sitter coming.”

  “I don’t dance very well, remember? What will I have to do?”

  He looked annoyed. “You don’t have to dance. You just have to—” he made a frustrated gesture of masculine impatience “—show up. It’s just an expression.”

  So it really was some sort of wedding reception. Juliette swallowed. “But…Bobby’s only eleven weeks old. I’ve never left him with anyone but the woman who kept him while I worked.” She stopped. Marty’s face was a thundercloud, and it looked as if he was about to throw a lightning bolt her way. “I—suppose that might work,” she conceded. She knew she’d been unfair to him, and she was determined not to make more problems. “Does she have any experience with babies?”

  “She’s got six little brothers and sisters.” Marty’s face had relaxed a fraction, though she could still feel the tension and anger he’d kept bottled up since this afternoon, and an indefinable something else that she hadn’t had time yet to fully figure out. “She’s been handling babies all her life.”

  Bobby began to stretch and squirm in the infant seat, and she absently reached in and scooped him up, putting him to her shoulder and rubbing his back as she debated. “All right. What time do we need to leave?”

  “Around eight, I guess.” And with no more warning than that, he disappeared down the hall.

  She started to call after him, a dozen more questions swarming around in her brain, but she stifled the impulse. It was obvious Marty didn’t want to be around her. Or her son.

  Tears stung her eyes and she hung her head, still rubbing Bobby’s back. She heard the truck engine turn over, and then he was driving away. A tear fell onto the white wool of her dress. Only a few hours ago she’d been on cloud nine, dreaming of a new start and a future that held breathtaking possibilities. Now…now she wasn’t even sure whether or not she should unpack.

  Marty had rejected her offer of an annulment. But could she live like this, with a man who seemed to despise her all of a sudden? True, she’d made a bad mistake, an error in judgment for which she was prepared to make amends. But he didn’t seem to want her apologies.

  Although he had directed to her to a bedroom he clearly intended them to share, so she guessed there was at least one thing he still wanted.

  What kind of marriage could they have if they started out with problems like this?

  She sighed. This is your own fault, she reminded herself.

  Putting off the question of unpacking for a while, she decided to take a look through the house. Bobby was cooing now, and she swung him down from her shoulder, holding him up in front of her.

  “Well, little man,” she said. “Shall we take a look around?”

  He seemed happy, as he usually was unless he was hungry or wet, so she decided to wait a little longer to feed him. The bottles and formul
a were in one of the boxes at the foot of the stairs, anyway.

  She started with the upstairs. There was a bathroom off their bedroom and another hall bath that apparently served the other three bedrooms. At the moment, it was full of children’s bath toys and toothpaste with television characters on it.

  One of the bedrooms was a guest room with what looked like a king-size bed. It was the closest to the master suite so she decided she could set Bobby’s portable crib up in there temporarily until she figured out what room to use for a nursery and got it decorated.

  The second was clearly Cheyenne’s room, decorated with pink and lavender ponies bouncing on the white wallpaper, white-painted furniture, a handmade quilt in similar shades covering the bed, and toys, books and clothes scattered over every square inch of the pink carpet. She shook her head, rather stunned at the mess. Cheyenne had a few things to learn about keeping her room clean, even if she was only four.

  The door to the third room was closed and locked. But a short investigation revealed the key on the top of the doorframe. She guessed it was intended to keep Cheyenne out more than any adult.

  Unlocking the door and leaving the key in the lock, she stepped into the room.

  It was a nursery. She supposed it had been Cheyenne’s when she was smaller. No wonder Marty kept this door shut. Seeing the baby things would be a reminder of the wife who’d died and the additional children she assumed they’d planned to have.

  The thought gave her pause. That was one thing they hadn’t discussed in all the phone marathons of the past week.

  Did he want more children? It wasn’t something she could ask him now, that was for sure. She’d always planned to have more than one child. And she supposed, in her deepest daydreams of this marriage, she’d imagined they’d have children together, younger brothers and sisters for Cheyenne and Bobby.

  But that was hard to picture after the way Marty had reacted to her son. His shocked expression when he’d been confronted with her baby invaded her mind again.