A Rancher's Pride(38)

At that news, Kayla almost staggered. She reached out, grateful for the counter beside her.

She had always admired cool, sophisticated Ronnie. Always. That image had started to crumble after their meeting with the judge earlier that day. And now, she didn’t know what to think.

What Sam had said was ridiculous. “That’s not true about her family. Ronnie’s mom is gone. My mom is her stepmother. But Ronnie still has her dad—my dad. And two half sisters.”

“Guess her memory’s pretty patchy about that. It wasn’t till she started threatening to leave that I learned about y’all.”

“I can’t—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. You can’t believe it.” He moved forward, coming so close she had to raise her chin to look into his eyes. “Well, as we say around here, ‘can’t never could do nothing.’ Maybe it’s time you started figuring out just what you can believe.”





Chapter Eleven





Sam pulled the pickup into the yard and parked it near the barn. Over at the house, Sharleen sat on a wooden bench on the front porch with her foot propped up on a chair and a book in her hands.

No sign of Kayla and Becky. Last he’d heard, at breakfast, they were planning on baking cookies.

It had been a long three weeks since the day he’d run off at the mouth about Ronnie. Spending most of his time in Kayla’s company since then had been hard enough. They had gone into town for the Fourth of July parade. Bringing Grandma Sharleen along gave their little group the touch of a real family—and had made an already awkward situation nearly unbearable.

Leaving the supplies he’d bought in the pickup for later, he crossed the yard to the porch and leaned against the railing.

Sharleen closed her book and smiled at him. “About time you came home. Becky’s been looking for you.”

“She has?” For a second, his breathing hitched.

In these past weeks, he’d made some progress with Becky. Tousled her hair. Sat with her in the evenings. Sometimes handed her one doll or another. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Wasn’t it?

Maybe so, if she had noticed he’d gone missing that morning.

“Well,” Sharleen said, “she’s been prowling around here ever since noontime as if she’s lost something.”

“She have fun making cookies?”

She smiled. “Sure did. And Kayla made peach cobbler for supper, too.”

He stared at her, his eyes narrowed. Peach, apple, cherry, it didn’t matter. Cobbler was his favorite. “Was that your idea?”

“Not at all.”

He wondered.

Sharleen nodded in the direction of his pickup. “Did you get everything you needed at the hardware store?”

“Yeah.”

That morning, when Jack had brought up the list of supplies, Sam jumped at the chance for a trip alone. At the chance to get away from the ranch and clear his head. Too bad he hadn’t succeeded at that.

Still, he’d accomplished more than just buying the supplies. “Stopped and saw the judge, too.”

“That’s good,” she said.

Kayla wouldn’t think so when she heard about it.

Becky came around the corner of the house dragging her toy-filled wagon. When she saw Sam, she grinned and waved.

He waved back.

A minute later, she bounded onto the porch, a doll and a plastic bottle in her hands. He ruffled her baby-soft blond hair.

When Sharleen patted the empty seat beside her, Becky climbed up onto the bench and settled herself with her toys. Once she’d caught the child’s attention again, Sharleen cupped her hand and ran her fingertips down her stomach. “Is the baby hungry?” Becky nodded.

Sam looked at his mother in surprise. “How did you learn that?”

“At first, just from watching. Kayla always tells me what she’s saying to Becky. Then I asked her a few other words. She was nice about showing me, too.”

If only things could be that easy.

Holding back a sigh of frustration, he recalled the day he’d met Kayla and Becky at the Double S for lunch. Before heading to the café, he’d stopped at the bookstore to pick up the dictionary he’d had to special-order. The book that showed the basics of sign language. The one he thumbed through night after night when everyone else in the house had gone to bed.

He had bought that dictionary feeling confident he could solve his problem on his own. But he’d soon found that talking with his hands would be a lot harder than he’d thought.