Big Sky Mountain(5)

“About my boots,” Madison began.

So, Kendra thought wryly, she’d been right to suspect that, while genuine, the compliment on her outfit had its purposes.

“There will be all sorts of vendors—people who sell things—at the rodeo this weekend. We’ll check out the boots then.”

Madison beamed, but then her face clouded over. “But I still have to say sorry to Miss Abbington and Becky,” she recalled.

“Absolutely,” Kendra said firmly. “Suppose Becky had taken your boots, without permission, and then refused to give them back. How would you feel?”

“Bad,” Madison admitted.

“And so?” Kendra prompted.

“Becky felt bad,” Madison said. Then something flashed in her eyes. “But I didn’t wear Miss Abbington’s shoes. Why do I have to say sorry to her?”

“Enough,” Kendra said, softening the word with a smile. “You know darn well why you need to apologize to Miss Abbington.”

“I do?” Madison echoed innocently.

Kendra simply waited.

“Because I was misruptive in class,” Madison finally conceded.

“Bingo,” Kendra said.

* * *

AN HOUR LATER, with Madison at preschool and Daisy minding the office, Kendra showed the mansion to the second client, a representative of a large investment group with an eye to turning the place into an apartment complex.

Kendra knew right away that there would be no actual sale, but that didn’t matter. The real estate business was all about showing places again and again, until the right buyer came along. Generally, she had to bait a lot of hooks before she caught a fish.

Work was the furthest thing from her mind anyway, with that printout of the webpage burning a hole in the bottom of her purse.

At lunchtime, she locked up the office, loaded the always adventuresome Daisy into the Volvo and headed for the neighboring town, Three Trees.

She didn’t know Brylee Parrish well—the two of them were barely acquainted, with a five-year gap in age, and they’d grown up in separate if closely linked communities—but she knew exactly where to find her. Brylee, with her flourishing party-planning business, was the original Local Girl Makes Good—she had a large warehouse and offices just outside Three Trees.

During the drive, Kendra didn’t rehearse what she was going to say, because she didn’t know, exactly. She doubted that Brylee personally was behind the webpage photo and the remark about Hutch being up to his old tricks, but she’d know who was.

Arriving at Brylee’s company, Décor Galore, Kendra rolled down one of the car windows a little way, so Daisy would have air, and promised the dog she’d be back soon.

A receptionist greeted her with a stiff smile and several furtive glances stolen while she was buzzing the boss to let her know that Kendra Shepherd wanted to see her.

“She’ll be here in a couple of minutes,” the receptionist said, hanging up. Now, for all those sneak peeks, the young woman wouldn’t look directly at Kendra. She nodded toward a small and tastefully decorated waiting area. “Have a seat.”

“I’ll stand, thank you,” Kendra said politely.

When Brylee appeared, opening a side door and poking out her head, Kendra was immediately and oddly struck by how beautiful she was, with those huge hazel eyes and that glorious mane of chestnut-brown hair worn in a ponytail today.

“Come in,” Brylee said, and her cheeks flared with color, then immediately went pale.

Kendra followed Brylee through a long corridor, through the busy, noisy warehouse and into a surprisingly plain office. The furniture—a desk, two chairs, some mismatched file cabinets and a single bookcase— looked as though it had come from an army surplus store. There were no pictures or other decorations on the walls, no knickknacks to be seen.

“Sit down—please,” Brylee said, taking the chair behind her desk.

Kendra sat, opened her purse, dug out the folded sheet of paper and slid it across to Brylee.

Brylee swallowed visibly, and her unmanicured hands trembled ever so slightly as she unfolded the paper and smoothed it flat.

Kendra felt a brief stab of sympathy for her. After all, losing Hutch Carmody was a trauma she well understood, and it had probably been worse for Brylee, all dressed up in the wedding gown of her dreams, with all her friends and family there to witness the event.

Brylee, meanwhile, gave a deep sigh, closed her eyes and squeezed the bridge of her nose between one thumb and forefinger. Then, rallying, she squared her slender shoulders and looked directly at Kendra.

“I don’t expect you to believe me,” she said with dignity, “but I didn’t know about this.”

“I have no reason not to believe you,” Kendra replied moderately. She drew in another deep breath, let it out and went on, feeling her way through her sentence word by word. “Some people—maybe a lot of them—would say it’s just a harmless photograph and I ought to let it go at that. If this is as far as it goes—fine. I can deal with it. But I have a four-year-old daughter to think about, Ms. Parrish, and—”

Brylee put up a hand. She still looked wan, but a friendly sparkle flickered in her eyes. “Please,” she interrupted. “Call me Brylee. We’re not enemies, you and I—or, at least, I hope we’re not—and I totally get why this bothers you.” She paused, bit her lip, studying Kendra’s face with a kind of broken curiosity. “Really, I do.”

“Then we don’t have a problem,” Kendra said, wanting to be kind and at the same time picking up on just how much Brylee wanted to ask if she and Hutch had some kind of “thing” going. “Just ask whoever put this up on the web to take it down, please, and leave me alone.”

Brylee arched one perfect eyebrow. “What about Hutch?”

“What about him?” Kendra countered mildly.

“Never mind,” Brylee said miserably, looking away for a long moment.

Kendra was relieved when Brylee didn’t press the point. What about Hutch? Indeed. She had no idea what, if anything, was happening between her and Hutch Carmody. Sure, he’d kissed her, and made her want him in the process, but he was on the rebound, after all. He must have cared for Brylee at some point or he’d never have asked her to marry him.

The realization struck her like a face full of cold water; she grew a little flustered and fumbled with her purse as she rose from her chair. “I’d better go—my dog is in the car and—”

Brylee stood, too, her smile sad but real. “I’m sorry, Kendra. About the webpage, I mean. It seemed pretty innocent at first—all my friends were mad at Hutch and so was I—but enough is enough. I’ll see that they take the page down.”

To Kendra’s mind, Hutch was a big boy and he could fight his own battles; her only concern was that she’d been featured. “Thank you,” she said.

Brylee walked her back along the corridor, through the reception area and out into the parking lot. She smiled when she saw Daisy poking her snout through the crack in the window, eager to join in any game that might be played, but Kendra felt edgy. She knew there was something else Brylee wanted to say to her.

Sure enough, there was.

“I don’t think Hutch ever really got over you,” Brylee said quietly, and without malice. “I should have paid more attention to the signs—he called me by your name once or twice, for instance—but I guess I was just too crazy about him to see what was happening.”

Kendra felt another tug of sympathy, even as all the old defenses rose up inside her. “Thanks again,” she said, and climbed into her car.

Daisy whimpered in the backseat, either because she needed to squat in the grass or because she’d taken a liking to Brylee, or both, but the dog was going to have to wait. No way was Kendra going to let Daisy christen Brylee’s parking lot right in front of the woman—it might seem, well, like a symbolic gesture.

Brylee waved, watching as Kendra drove away and Kendra waved back.

Thoughts assailed her as she pulled onto the highway leading home to Parable; she heard Brylee’s words, over and over again. I don’t think Hutch ever really got over you—he called me by your name once or twice—

“Stop it,” Kendra told herself, right out loud.

Daisy whimpered again, more urgently this time.

Kendra pulled over when she came to a wide spot in the road, got out of the car, leaned into the backseat to hook Daisy’s leash to her collar and took the dog for a short walk in the grass.

By the time they were on their way again, she was starting to feel foolish for confronting Brylee with that printout at all. She’d probably overreacted.

Before pulling back onto the highway, Kendra got out her cell phone and called Joslyn.

“Were you asleep?” she asked, first thing.

Joslyn laughed. “I’m a new mother,” she said. “We don’t sleep.”

Kendra laughed, too. “Is your mom still visiting?”

“She left this morning,” Joslyn answered. “Mom was a lot of help—Callie has been, too—but it’s time things got back to normal around here. Besides, Slade and Shea are great with the baby.”

“Good,” Kendra said.

“You called to find out if I was sleeping?” Joslyn teased. “Is this about that stupid webpage? Five minutes after I hit Send, I wished I hadn’t just sprung the thing on you like that. Tara feels the same way.”

“It’s all right,” Kendra said, watching as cars and trucks zipped by on the highway. “But, yeah, that’s the reason I called. I’ve just been to see Brylee.”

“Come right over,” Joslyn commanded cheerfully. “Immediately, if not sooner. I want to hear all about it.”

“Nothing happened,” Kendra put in lamely. It wasn’t as if she and Brylee had gotten into a hair-pulling match or anything; they weren’t a pair of junior high schoolers fighting over a boy.

“Be that as it may,” Joslyn replied, “you obviously need some BFF time or you wouldn’t have called. Come over.”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” Kendra capitulated, grateful.

“Good,” Joslyn answered.

When Kendra and Daisy arrived at Windfall Ranch, Tara’s sports car was parked alongside the main house, next to Joslyn’s nondescript compact. Slade’s truck was nowhere in sight—maybe he’d driven his mother-in-law to the airport.

Joslyn and Tara both appeared on the back porch as Kendra got out of the car and freed Daisy from the confines of the backseat. Lucy, Tara’s dog, was on hand to greet her and the pair frolicked, overjoyed at their reunion.

Joslyn smiled and waved, but Tara looked worried.

“Have I just made a world-class fool of myself or what?” Kendra fretted as she approached the porch. By now, of course, Joslyn would have told Tara about the visit to Brylee’s office.

Tara finally smiled. “I’m not sure,” she joked. “Come inside, and we’ll figure it out over coffee and pastry.”

They all trooped into Joslyn’s recently remodeled kitchen, including Lucy and Daisy, who greeted Jasper, Slade’s dog, and were roundly snubbed by Joslyn’s cat.

Baby Trace lay in his bassinet, gurgling, his feet and hands busy as he tried to grab hold of a beam of sunlight coming in through a nearby window.

Joslyn smiled, tucked his blanket in around him, and bent to plant a smacking kiss on his downy head. “I love you, little cowboy,” she said softly.

The backs of Kendra’s eyes scalded a little, in the wake of a rush of happiness for her friend. Joslyn had built a successful software company on her own, sold it for a fortune and righted an old wrong that wasn’t even hers in the first place. But this—Slade, his stepdaughter, Shea, the baby, the ranch, all of it—was her dream come true.

And it had been by no means a sure thing.

Now, though, she absolutely shone with fulfillment.

Tara, following Kendra’s gaze, smiled and said quietly, “There she is, the world’s happiest woman.”

Kendra nodded and blinked a couple of times, and they all sat down to enjoy the tea Joslyn must have brewed in advance. There were doughnuts with sprinkles waiting, too.

“Do you miss your mom, now that’s she’s gone home to Santa Fe?” Kendra asked Joslyn, deciding to skip the doughnuts because her stomach was still a little touchy.

“Of course I do,” Joslyn said. “It was lovely, having her here, but she has a life to get back to and, besides, we’re sure to see her again soon.”

“We shouldn’t have forwarded that webpage to you,” Tara interjected, looking fretful again. “I don’t know what we were thinking.”

“It’s all right,” Kendra said truthfully. “I would have seen it sooner or later anyway, and it was better that it came from the two of you.”

“You really went to see Brylee Parrish?” Joslyn asked, wide-eyed.

“No,” Kendra joked. “I just said that to get a rise out of you. Yes, I went to see Brylee, and I feel like an idiot. One of those people who are always on the lookout for something to raise a fuss about.”

“I’d say you had reason to raise a fuss,” Tara said, loyal to the end. “Sometimes things like that picture of you and Hutch being posted with a snarky comment start out small and then mushroom into a major hassle.”

“Well, anyway, it’s done,” Kendra went on with a little shrug. “Brylee is actually a very nice person, you know. She’s going to make sure the page gets taken down—so no harm done.”

“Did she ask if you and Hutch are involved?” Joslyn asked. No sense in pulling any punches; cut right to the chase—that was Joslyn’s way.

“She wanted to,” Kendra said, “but she didn’t.”

“Are you?” Tara prodded.

“Am I what?” Kendra stalled.

“Involved. With. Hutch. Carmody,” Tara said with exaggerated patience.

“No,” Kendra said, thinking, not if you don’t count that hot kiss by Whisper Creek yesterday afternoon.

“I heard he bought a pony for Madison,” Tara persisted.

“Who told you that?” Kendra wanted to know.

“Word gets around,” Tara said.

“Opal,” Kendra guessed, and knew she was right by the looks of fond chagrin on her friends’ faces.

“Don’t be mad at Opal,” Joslyn was quick to say. “We were talking on the phone and it just slipped out that Hutch bought a pony for Madison to ride and, well, it’s only natural to draw some conclusions.”

“Which, of course, you did,” Kendra pointed out sweetly. “It just so happens that you’re wrong, though. Hutch bought the pony because the people who owned it before said it was lonely, with their kids grown up and gone from home.”

Tara and Joslyn exchanged knowing looks.

“Every hardworking cattle rancher needs a pony named Ruffles,” Joslyn observed dryly and with a twinkle.

“It means nothing,” Kendra insisted.

“Whatever you say,” Tara agreed, grinning.

“You two are impossible.”

“At least we’re objective,” Joslyn said. “Unlike some people I could mention.”

Kendra picked up her teacup and took a measured sip. “You are so not objective,” she said at some length.

“We want you to be happy,” Tara said.

“Well, I want you to be happy, too,” Kendra immediately replied. “So why aren’t we trying to throw you together with somebody—like Boone Taylor, for instance?”

Tara turned a fetching shade of apricot-pink. “Oh, please,” she said.

Joslyn, comfortably ensconced in her own marriage and family life, grinned at both of them. Happy people could be downright insufferable, Kendra reflected, especially when they were trying to make a point. “There was a time,” she reminded them, “when I couldn’t stand Slade Barlow. And look how that turned out.”

“Oh, right,” Tara said grumpily. Her teacup made a clinking sound as she set it back in her saucer. “We’ll just go out and find men we absolutely cannot abide, won’t we, Kendra, and live happily ever after. Why didn’t we think of that?”

Joslyn’s eyes shimmered with mischievous amusement. “You might be surprised if you gave Boone even the slightest encouragement,” she said before turning her gaze on Kendra. “And as for you, Ms. Shepherd, we all know that Hutch Carmody makes your little heart go pitty-pat, so why try to pretend otherwise?”

Kendra sighed a long, sad sigh. “Maybe he does,” she confessed, almost in a whisper. “But that doesn’t mean things will work out between us. They didn’t before, remember.”

“You do feel something for him, then,” Joslyn pointed out kindly, patting Kendra’s hand.

“I don’t know what I feel,” Kendra said. “Except that he scares me half to death.”

“Why?” Tara asked. Her tone was gentle.

“Once burned, twice shy, I guess,” Kendra answered. She glanced down at her watch, partly as a signal that she didn’t want to talk about Hutch anymore. “I’d better get back to the office,” she added, “before people decide I’ve gone out of business because I’m never there.”

Nobody argued. Both Tara and Joslyn rose to hug their friend goodbye.

Kendra called to Daisy and within minutes the two of them were on the road again.

When she reached the office and checked her voice mail, Kendra learned that three prospective new listings were in the works. She called back each of the people who’d decided to sell their property, arranging meetings for the afternoon, glad to be busy.

The first of the three was a modest ranch-style house with a big yard, a detached garage and plenty of space for flower beds and gardens. The owner, an aging widower named John Gerard, had decided to share a condo in Great Falls with his brother. The place had been impeccably maintained, but it needed some upgrading, too—it would make a good starter home for a young couple, with or without a family.

Kendra and Mr. Gerard agreed on an asking price and other details, and papers were signed.

The second property was commercial—a spooky old motel that would be difficult to sell, given the dilapidated state it was in, but Kendra liked challenges, so she took that listing on, too, mainly because it was in a good location, almost in the middle of town.

By the time she visited the third offering, a double-wide trailer in her grandmother’s old neighborhood, she was getting anxious. She had to be at the preschool by three o’clock to pick up Madison, that being the present arrangement, and she couldn’t be late.

The owner—in her distracted state Kendra hadn’t connected the dots—was Deputy Treat McQuillan. His face was still colorfully bruised from the set-to with Walker Parrish the other night at the Boot Scoot Tavern. By now the incident had assumed almost legendary proportions in and around Parable and she wondered, a little nervously, if Deputy McQuillan had followed through on his threat to press charges against Walker for assault.

In uniform, McQuillan was waiting on his add-on porch when Kendra pulled up in her car. She’d dropped Daisy off at home on her way over and, at the moment, she was glad. There was something about this man that made her feel slightly overprotective, of Madison and her dog.

“Hello,” she sang out pleasantly, a businesswoman through and through, leaving her purse in the car and unlatching the creaky wooden gate that opened onto the rather hardscrabble front yard. “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting.”

“Some things,” McQuillan drawled, letting his gaze drag over her in a way that was at once leisurely and sleazy, “are worth waiting for.”

Kendra felt profoundly uncomfortable and not just because her last encounter with this man, when he’d warned her about Hutch at the Butter Biscuit Café, still irritated her. Her grandmother’s old place was just two doors down, on the other side of the unpaved road, and the old sense of futility and sorrow settled over her as surely as if she’d stepped back in time and turned into her childhood self, abandoned and scared.

“You’re planning to move?” she asked sunnily, pretending this was business as usual. McQuillan was, after all, a sheriff’s deputy and, even if he had stepped over the line with Brylee over at the cowboy bar, there was no reason to paint him as a rapist on the prowl for his next victim.

“I’m not sure yet,” the deputy replied, keeping his eyes on her face now, instead of her breasts. “Maybe I’ll buy a patch of land and build a house, if I can get the right price for this double-wide.”

Kendra approached confidently, with her shoulders back and her spine straight. “I see,” she said. “What if it sells right away, though? Where would you live in the interim?”

He favored her with a slow grin that made her skin crawl a little and stepped down off the porch to put out a hand to her. “I haven’t thought that far ahead,” he admitted, gesturing toward the trailer behind him. “I’m just taking things as they come.” He glanced at his watch. “I’m on duty in a few minutes,” he went on, handing her a ring with two keys dangling from it. “You go on in and take a look around and, if you wouldn’t mind, lock up on your way out. I’ll pick up the keys later on and we’ll work out the details.”

Kendra was used to being alone in houses and apartments with people who made her uneasy—that was part of being in the real estate business—but she was wildly relieved that McQuillan meant to leave her to explore on her own. The idea of being confined in a small space with this man made her more than edgy.

She smiled, though, and nodded. “I’ll be back at the office around three-thirty,” she said. “You could stop by any time after that.”

“Fine,” he said, and walked on toward the gate. With a jaunty wave of farewell, he left the yard, crossed the sidewalk and got into his personal vehicle, a small green truck, clearly old but polished to a high shine.

Kendra waited until he’d driven away with a merry toot of his horn, before starting up the porch steps.

The front door stood open, but there was a sliding screen, so she moved that aside to step into a living room exactly like her grandmother’s.

Her stomach curled around what was left of her quick lunch, a fruit cup and some yogurt hastily consumed at home while she was getting Daisy settled, and she instructed herself, silently and sternly, to get over it.

She wasn’t a little girl anymore and this wasn’t her grandmother’s mobile home.

Deputy McQuillan’s living room was shabby—the carpet, drapes and furniture had all seen better days—but every surface was immaculately clean, like the outside of his truck.

She made a hasty circuit, checking out the kitchenette, the fanatically neat bathroom, the three bedrooms, two of which were desperately small. The master bedroom boasted a water bed with a huge, mirrored headboard, and the coverlet was made of crimson velvet.

Cringing a little, Kendra backed out of that room. It was a silly reaction, she knew, but she had to force herself to walk—not run—through the kitchenette and the living room to the front door.

Outside, she sucked in several deep breaths and resolutely took a tour of the yard. There was a tool shed, a detached garage and a small rose garden encircled by chicken-wire that was painted white. The blossoms inside seemed timid, somehow, like prisoners waiting to be rescued.

Now she was really being silly, she decided.

It was a relief, just the same, to get into her car, shut and lock the doors and drive away.

* * *

“I ’POLOGIZED!” MADISON announced when Kendra picked her up at preschool. “Becky and me are friends now! She invited me to sleep over sometime—and she has horses at her house—”

Kendra bit back the correction—Becky and I—and smiled as she strapped Madison into her car seat. “That’s wonderful,” she said. “Did you apologize to Miss Abbington, too?”

Madison nodded vigorously, but a frown creased her forehead. “Where’s Daisy? You didn’t give her back to that lady at the shelter, did you?”

Slightly stunned, Kendra straightened. “Daisy’s at home,” she said gently. “And of course I didn’t give her back, sweetheart. Why would I do that?”

“Sometimes people give kids back,” Madison ventured.

Kendra swallowed hard, worked up another smile. Madison had been shunted from one foster home to the next during her short life, so it wasn’t difficult to figure out the source of the child’s concern, for Daisy and for herself.

“You’re staying with me,” Kendra said carefully, “until you’re all grown up and ready to go off to college. And even then, you’ll always have a home to come back to, and a mommy, too.”

“You won’t give me back? Not ever?”

“Not ever,” Kendra vowed, fighting tears. “And the same goes for Daisy. We’re in this for the long haul, all three of us. We’re a family, forever and ever.”

“It would still be nice if there was a daddy,” Madison mused, though she looked appeased by Kendra’s promise never to leave. It was one she’d made a thousand times before, and would probably make a thousand more times in the future.

“I guess,” Kendra allowed, getting quickly behind the wheel and starting up the car so they could head for home.

“If I could pick out a daddy, I’d choose Mr. Carmody,” Madison went on.

By then, Kendra was beginning to wonder if she was being played, but she didn’t hesitate to give her daughter the benefit of a doubt. Carefully, she put the car in gear and drove away from the community center, waving to other mothers and fathers coming to collect their children. “Unfortunately,” she explained, “it doesn’t work that way.”

“How does getting a daddy work, then?”

Kendra suppressed a sigh. “It’s not like baking cookies, honey,” she said. “There’s no recipe to follow. No formula.”

“Oh,” Madison said, and the note of sadness in her voice made Kendra ache.

They drove in silence for a minute or two.

Then Madison spoke up again. “It’s not fair,” she said.

“What’s not fair?” Kendra asked patiently, concentrating on the road ahead.

“That my daddy’s in heaven instead of right here in Parable with us,” Madison replied succinctly. “I want a daddy I can see and talk to.”

Kendra didn’t trust herself to answer without bursting into tears, so she held her tongue.





CHAPTER FOURTEEN



THAT EVENING, AFTER supper and a story and going-to-sleep prayers—Madison asked God for a daddy and suggested Hutch Carmody as a promising candidate for the job—Kendra sat alone at her kitchen table for a while, a little dazed by all that had been going on lately.

She’d had a heck of a time keeping back the tears while Madison was putting in her request for a father; now, as she sat there with a cup of herbal tea before her, they ran freely.

Daisy, who had been snuggled up at the foot of Madison’s new bed only a few minutes before, meandered into the kitchen, came straight over to Kendra’s chair and stood on her hind legs to plant her forepaws on Kendra’s thigh. Her brown eyes shone with canine sympathy and she made a low, whimpering sound in her throat.

Kendra gave a raw chuckle, sniffled and laid a gentle hand on the dog’s golden head. “You’re a good dog, Daisy,” she said, thick-throated with all the complicated emotions swamping her just then.

Daisy rested her muzzle on Kendra’s leg and sighed sweetly.

Kendra continued to stroke the dog, used her free hand to raise her teacup to her mouth.

“I’m so confused,” she confided after several sips and swallows.

Daisy sighed again, lowered herself to all fours and looked up at Kendra with those glowing eyes, tail wagging slowly back and forth.

“Listen to me,” Kendra muttered, sniffling again. “I’m talking to a dog.”

Daisy sat now, watching Kendra alertly, as if waiting for her to go on. Yes, you’re talking to a dog. That’s a problem?

Kendra laughed and brushed away her tears with the backs of her hands. “I’ll be all right,” she assured the animal quietly. “So please stop worrying about me.” Then she got up, took Daisy out into the backyard just once more and returned to the kitchen.

Apparently satisfied that her second-favorite mistress would indeed remain in one piece without her, at least for now, Daisy ambled back to Madison’s room, retiring for the night.

Kendra finished her rapidly cooling tea, went into her home office and logged on to the computer. She’d waited this long to see if Brylee had kept her word and had the web picture taken down, but she couldn’t wait any longer.

She was too jittery and frazzled to read or take a luxurious bath by candlelight or simply go to bed early, her usual remedies for everything from wrenching trauma to minor frustrations. That was what she did when she felt too much—when it all became overwhelming—she read, or bathed, or slept.

While those things were all perfectly okay, in and of themselves, Kendra was beginning to see them as forms of running away now, time-honored methods of avoidance or denial, metaphorical hiding places where she could take shelter from thoughts and emotions that chafed against the bruised and tender parts of who she really and truly was, deep down inside.

She was a woman now, a mother, and while she figured she functioned pretty well in the latter role, the former was beginning to issue some pretty powerful complaints. That Kendra was tired of doing everything alone, including sleeping in an otherwise empty bed. She wanted a man to hold her when she needed holding, to love her in every way, on every level—emotionally, mentally and, oh, yes, physically.

The problem, she admitted silently, as she clicked her way over to the Down-With-Hutch webpage, was her complete lack of confidence in her own ability to choose the right man.

First, there had been Hutch, not caring enough to fight for her, even after all the dreams and hopes they’d shared, trampling her heart to dust, leaving her self-esteem in shreds. Then along came Jeffrey, the knight in tarnished armor. Had he ever really loved her or had he simply wanted her sexually? She’d never thought of herself as anything more than moderately attractive, but she’d had her share of admirers—too many of them shallow and inherently noncommittal.

Sure enough, the picture of her and Hutch in the three-legged race had been taken down, along with the bitchy remark that had accompanied it, but the smear campaign against the errant groom continued, unabated.

That troubled Kendra—made her feel defensive on Hutch’s behalf—which was probably just more proof that she was teetering on the edge of the same old dark abyss as before, when he’d essentially handed her over to Jeffrey like a book he’d already read and hadn’t found all that interesting in the first place.

She sighed, clicked over to her email.

There were friendly notes from both Tara and Joslyn, along with one from Treat McQuillan. Kendra had, of course, given him the address she used for business, after he’d stopped by the office late that afternoon to pick up his keys. He had seemed pleased about putting his double-wide up for sale and moving on to whatever it was he meant to move on to; they’d come to terms quickly and the contract was signed.

But this was her personal email account—supposedly, only friends knew it.

Hi, Kendra, the deputy had written, as though they were pals from way back. The rodeo is coming up this weekend, as you know, and I was wondering if you’d like to go with me. If you got a sitter, we could have some dinner and stay up late to watch the fireworks. Maybe even make a few of our own.

Instinctively, Kendra lifted her fingertips off the keyboard, as if it had suddenly turned slimy. Maybe even make a few of our own.

Was he kidding?

She recalled McQuillan’s tirade in the Butter Biscuit Café that morning, when he’d practically ordered her to stay away from Hutch Carmody—as if he had the right to dictate anything to her.

And now he had the nerve to suggest fireworks? Where did he get off, making a remark like that?

She breathed in, breathed out. Lowered her fingers back to the keyboard, and replied, Thanks for the invitation, but I’ve already made other plans. Also, I normally try to keep my business and social lives separate. Best, Kendra Shepherd.

The message was short, to the point and only partially true. She did have other plans, heaven help her, to go the rodeo, the carnival and the fireworks display with Hutch, bringing Madison along. And socializing was a big part of her business; she did a lot of lunches and dinners, sometimes threw parties for clients, and before Madison entered her life, she’d dated the occasional business contact, too, though only casually.

Seeing Deputy McQuillan on a potentially romantic basis, however, was certainly not in her game plan. She didn’t find him attractive, but that was the least of it. She disliked him; it was that simple. He went around with the proverbial chip on his shoulder and the way he’d treated Brylee at the bar that night didn’t do him any credit, either.

The male ego being what it was, Kendra fully expected McQuillan to respond to her refusal, however politely it had been offered, by firing her and finding someone else to sell his home for him. There were two or three other real estate brokers in the county, each with a few sales agents on staff, but hers was the only firm in Parable.

A competent businesswoman, through and through, Kendra hated to miss out on a commission, even the relatively modest one she could expect if she found a buyer for the deputy’s mobile home, but if things went down that way, so be it. Even at best, real estate was a catch-as-catch-can affair—you showed a lot of houses, the more the better, and if you worked hard and had decent luck, you eventually sold a few.

McQuillan’s response popped up in her online mailbox just as she was about to shut down the computer, push back her chair and brew another cup of herbal tea.

You think you’re too good for me? was all he’d written, in a line of lowercase letters, oddly spaced and with no punctuation.

A chill slithered down her spine, but anger immediately quelled it. Please see the first email, she responded tersely, and hit Send.

He replied within seconds, but Kendra didn’t open the new message. She blocked any further communications from Deputy McQuillan’s email address and logged off with an irritated flourish.

Was the man merely obnoxious, she wondered, storming back to the kitchen, or did he present an actual threat of some sort?

She considered calling Boone, not as a citizen of Parable County, but as a friend, but she quickly disregarded the impulse. The sheriff had a wide area to police and, besides, sending rude emails wasn’t a crime. If it were, she thought, with a tight little smile, she’d probably be in the slammer herself, with Brylee and her posse for company.

Kendra brewed that second cup of tea she’d promised herself earlier and sat down to drink it, silently reminding herself that she didn’t have to make all her life decisions that very night, or the next day, or even next year.

She would stop pushing the river, as the saying went, and just let things unfold at their own pace—even if it killed her.

* * *

BOONE AND HUTCH met at the Butter Biscuit Café for breakfast the next morning, both ordering the special, as they did whenever they had a free morning, their joking excuse being that they shouldn’t be expected to eat their own cooking day in and day out just because they weren’t married.

“Did McQuillan go ahead and file charges against Walker Parrish?” Hutch asked, looking across the table at Boone while they waited for the first round of coffee.

“Hell, yes,” Boone said, looking as weary as he sounded. His kids were due to arrive soon, probably on an afternoon bus, and while he seemed anxious to see them, it was obvious that he was already dreading the whole thing, too. “I would have had to arrest Walker, except I called Judge Renson ahead of time and she went ahead and set bail before the fact. Walker paid it, of course, so he didn’t wind up in my jail, but he still has to go to court in six weeks or so and answer to an assault charge.”

Hutch sighed, swore under his breath. “I’ve always wondered why Slade didn’t fire McQuillan when he was sheriff. Now I’m wondering the same thing about you, old buddy. The man’s a hothead—the original loose cannon—not to mention a pain in the ass.”

“It’s not that simple,” Boone answered, “and you damn well know it. We’re all civil service, remember, and while my recommendation carries some weight, the powers that be aren’t going to let Treat go on the grounds that nobody likes him.”

The pancakes arrived, stacks of them, teetering on two plates, and Essie herself did the honors, setting the meals down in front of Hutch and Boone with a deft swoop of each arm.

“On the house,” she said, with a sidelong glance at Boone. “Even if you did give my favorite niece a speeding ticket last week. Now her insurance premium will go up.”

Boone chuckled hoarsely, distractedly. “It’s Carmody’s turn to pick up the check anyhow,” he said, then added, “Tell Laurie to keep her foot out of the carburetor of that little car of hers and poof, the problem’s solved. No more tickets.”

Essie shook her head as though she wouldn’t have expected any other reaction from the boneheaded likes of Boone Taylor, and walked away.

“Looking forward to seeing your boys again?” Hutch asked after they’d both drenched their buttery pancakes in thick syrup.

“Of course I am,” Boone snapped, downright peckish now. “I just wish I had a better place to put them up, that’s all.”

“There’s no better place than home, Boone, and as far as those little boys are concerned, home is wherever you are.”

Boone glowered at him over the towering pancakes. “Excuse me for saying so,” he growled, “but you don’t know F-all about raising kids, now do you?”

Hutch slanted the side of his fork through the syrupy stack on his plate. “You’re already moderating your language,” he observed lightly. “That’s good. Can’t have the munchkins picking up all kinds of dirty words from dear old Dad.”

“Shut up,” Boone said without much conviction.

Hutch chuckled and took a big bite of his food. While he was still chewing, Slade wandered into the café, taking off his hat as he crossed the threshold.

Hutch waved him over and Slade joined them, drawing back a chair and sinking into it.

“Ever since you stole Opal out from under us,” Slade told Hutch, probably only half kidding, “I’ve been having cold cereal for breakfast.”

“What a pity.” Hutch grinned with mock sympathy. “Poor you.”

“How’re Joslyn and the baby doing?” Boone asked between bites.

At the mere mention of his wife and child, a light seemed to go on inside Slade. His eyes twinkled and he grinned. “They’re good,” he said. Then the grin faded. “I’m a little worried about Shea, though,” he added, lowering his voice, since the place was doing a brisk trade, as always.

Essie appeared table-side, wielded the coffeepot she carried and took Slade’s order for a pancake special like the ones his friends had.

When she was gone again, bustling off to the kitchen to confer with the fry cook, Boone said, “Shea? She’s a good kid—never gets in any trouble as far as I know.”

Slade sighed, ran a hand through his dark hair in a gesture of suppressed agitation. “She is a good kid,” he agreed. “But she’s normal, too.”

“I don’t follow,” Boone said, still scarfing up pancakes like there was no tomorrow. To look at him, a person would think he hadn’t eaten in a week.

Hutch wondered idly if Shea had gotten herself a boyfriend, thereby rousing her stepfather’s famously protective instincts, but it wasn’t his business either way, so he didn’t ask outright. He just went right on putting away his breakfast and swilling his coffee.

“The Fourth is coming up in a few days,” Slade reminded Boone unnecessarily. “You know how it is. During the fireworks, a few kids always climb the water tower to get a better look. Joslyn overheard Shea saying something about it to a friend on her cell phone.”

Hutch felt a mild twinge at the mere mention of the water tower, but neither Boone nor Slade would have noticed, being intent on their own concerns, and that was fine with him.

“And you think she’s planning to scale the tower with some of her high school pals?” Boone prompted, sounding mildly amused now.

“We’ve both asked her, Joslyn and I, I mean, and she says she wouldn’t do anything that stupid,” Slade said. “But—”

“Climbing the water tower is dangerous,” Boone agreed, making a gruff attempt at reassurance, “but it isn’t illegal, as you know.”

“Couldn’t you station a deputy out there on Saturday night,” Slade pressed, “just to keep an eye on things?”

Boone was clearly regretful as he spread his hands in a gesture meant to convey helplessness. “You ought to know better than anybody, Slade, that I don’t have that kind of manpower. And I need the few deputies I have to keep the celebrating down to a dull roar.

Folks get all riled up after the rodeo and a few spins on the Tilt-a-Whirl over at the carnival, not to mention the beer and the dancing at the Boot Scoot and then the fireworks to top it all off.”

“Damn it, Boone,” Slade argued, just as Essie returned to set his plate down in front of him with a thump, “some kid could fall and break their neck. Whatever happened to ‘serve and protect’?”

“I can’t be everywhere at once,” Boone pointed out reasonably. “Neither can my deputies. The best I can promise is that somebody will drive by the water tower once in a while to make sure everything’s all right.”

Slade seemed to deflate a little. “Then I’ll watch the place myself,” he said. “During the fireworks, anyhow.”

Boone held up his fork, like a teacher about to point to something written on a blackboard. “You’re not sheriff anymore,” he said. “And you’re not a deputy, either. Keep an eye on Shea if you’re concerned and leave it to the other parents to do the same for their own kids. That tower is a menace, I grant you, but kids have been climbing it since right after the turn of the last century and nobody’s ever actually taken a header off it in all those years, now have they?”

“There’s always a first time,” Slade grumbled, but he began to eat his pancakes.

Hutch didn’t bring up the obvious solution—which was to just pull the water tower down, once and for all, and haul off the debris—because better people than he had lobbied for that for a couple of decades now and gotten nowhere. Besides, he wasn’t inclined to remind Slade of that humiliating afternoon when they were kids and he’d gotten stuck up there himself, scared shitless and unable to move until his half brother alternately goaded and cajoled him down.

Now mercifully—at least for Hutch—the conversation took a different turn. Slade asked how long Boone’s boys would be staying with him and Boone said only until Sunday night because they were both attending summer school this year.

“Summer school?” Hutch echoed. “Damn, Boone, that’s harsh. Summers are for goofing off—for swimming and playing baseball and riding horses until all hours, not beating the books. And, anyway, those kids are what, six and seven years old?”

Boone favored his friend with a reproving glance. “Thank you for your profound wisdom, Professor Carmody,” he drawled. “I guess if I wanted to raise a couple of cowboys, that approach would suit me just fine. It just so happens that I don’t.”

“What’s wrong with cowboys?” Slade interjected, being one.

“If you wanted to raise Griff and Fletch,” Hutch retorted, leaning forward to show Boone he wasn’t cowed by his tone or his badge, “they’d be living with you, like they should.”

Boone flushed from the base of his neck to the underside of his jaw. “Opinions are like *s,” he told Hutch, in a terse undertone. “Everybody has one.”

Hutch grinned, picked up his coffee cup and raised it to Boone in a sort of mocking toast. “Good thing you went to college, Boone,” he said. “You might not have such a good grasp on human anatomy if you were, say, just a cowboy.”

Slade chuckled, but offered no comment. By and large, he wasn’t much for chitchat. He’d said his piece, about Shea and the water tower, and now he was probably done talking, for the most part.

Boone huffed out a breath, plainly exasperated. “Tell me this,” he demanded in a hoarse whisper. “Why does everybody in this blasted county feel obliged to tell me what’s best for my kids?”

Slade and Hutch exchanged glances, but it was Essie, back to refill their coffee cups from the carafe in her right hand, who actually answered.

“Maybe,” she said crisply, “it’s because you can’t seem to figure it out on your own, Boone Taylor. Those boys need their daddy.”

* * *

KENDRA, MADISON AND Daisy passed the fairgrounds on their way to the community center and preschool, and Madison could barely contain her excitement. The carnival was setting up for business; banners flew in the warm breeze and a Ferris wheel towered against the sky. Carousel horses, giraffes, elephants and swans waited to take their places on the merry-go-round, hoisted there by teams of men in work clothes, and cars, trucks and vans were parked, helter-skelter, outside the exhibition hall where vendors and artisans from all over the state were getting ready to display their wares. The Fourth of July weekend was a big moneymaker for practically every business in town and it was coming up fast.

“Look, Mommy!” Madison called out as though Kendra could possibly have missed the colorful spectacle taking shape on the fairgrounds. “It’s a circus!”

Kendra smiled. “Actually, it’s a carnival. And we’re going there on Saturday, remember?”

“Couldn’t we go now? Just to look?”

“No, sweetie,” Kendra responded, signaling for a turn onto the street that led to the community center. “It’s time for preschool. Besides, the carnival isn’t open for business yet.”

“When does it open?”

“Not until Friday afternoon,” she said. “That’s two days from now, so it’s three days until Saturday, when we’ll go to the rodeo, and then the carnival, and then the fireworks.”

“Mr. Carmody is going to ride a bull in the rodeo part,” Madison said, mollified enough to move on to the next topic. “We get to watch.”

Kendra swallowed. She didn’t know which scared her more, the prospect of letting Hutch slip past her inner barriers again—he was bound to score, eventually—or the thought of him riding two thousand pounds of crazy bull, risking life and limb.

And for what? A fancy belt buckle and prize money that probably didn’t amount to the cash he routinely carried in his wallet—if he won?

He was wild and reckless, a kid in a man’s body. Mentally, she added bull-riding to the long list of reasons why Hutch Carmody was her own personal Mr. Wrong.

She made the turn, headed toward the community center.

Glancing into the rearview mirror, she saw Daisy standing with her paws on the back of the seat, gazing out the rear window as the fairgrounds disappeared from view.

“Does Daisy get to go to the rodeo, too?” Madison queried, from her safety seat.

“That wouldn’t be a good place for her, sweetheart,” Kendra explained. “She could get lost or hurt somehow and, besides, all that noise would probably scare her.”

“Won’t she be scared if she’s all alone at home?” Madison fretted.

“She’ll be just fine,” Kendra said gently.

They’d reached the community center by then, and a little girl immediately broke away from the crowd of children on the grassy playground, running to greet them.

“That’s Becky,” Madison said, delighted. “She’s my best friend in the whole world!”

Kendra smiled, watching as Becky, a small dynamo with blond pigtails, dashed in their direction. The little girl wore jeans, a ruffled cotton blouse and a pair of neon pink cowgirl boots—possibly the same pair Madison had appropriated—along with a broad grin.

Evidently, all was forgiven.

Madison wriggled out of her car seat and jumped to the ground while Daisy, excited, barked and scrambled around inside the Volvo.

“This is my mommy,” Madison told Becky, indicating Kendra, who stood beside the driver’s door in her working-mother outfit, a trim beige pantsuit, expensively tailored. “Mommy, this is Becky. She’s six already, but she likes me anyway, even though I’m only four.”

Becky stopped, looked up into Kendra’s face, squinting a little against the bright sunshine and said, “My mom is going to call you on the phone. She says both of you have to get to know each other a little before there can be any sleepovers for Madison and me.”

“I’ll look forward to hearing from your mom,” Kendra said, offering a hand. Privately, she thought Madison was still too young for sleepovers, but she didn’t want to cast a pall over the girls’ day by saying so now.

The child shook Kendra’s hand without hesitation. “Mom says,” she went on cheerfully, “that for all you know, we could be a family of ax-murderers.”

Kendra chuckled. “I doubt that,” she said, though she was a little taken aback by the graphic visual that came to mind. Becky’s family must have moved to Parable recently, because she couldn’t place them.

Madison waved at Daisy, who had wriggled into the front passenger seat at some point and was pressing her nose against the inside of the windshield, and waited politely while Kendra bent to give her a see-you-later kiss on the forehead.

“Be a good girl,” Kendra said.

Madison, young as she was, actually rolled her eyes in what appeared to be comical disdain. “I will,” she replied. “Mostly.”

“Try to do a little better than ‘mostly,’ please,” Kendra instructed, folding her arms and tilting her head to one side, letting her eyes do the smiling while her mouth pretended sternness.

Madison and Becky clasped hands, giggling, and ran toward the throng of children and playground attendants up ahead.

Kendra watched until they were safely enfolded in the group, then got back into her car, told a fretful Daisy that everything would be all right and drove off.

Deputy McQuillan was waiting on the sidewalk in front of her office, once again in full uniform.

Daisy growled at him, at the same time cowering a little.

“Good morning,” Kendra said with a businesslike smile.

McQuillan looked down at the little dog—for the briefest moment Kendra thought he might try to kick Daisy, there was so much distaste in his expression—then turned his attention back to her. “I’ve decided to get another real estate agent,” he announced bluntly. His eyes fairly snapped with suppressed fury.

Kendra shifted her keys from her left hand to her right and unlocked the office door, gently urging Daisy inside. The pup took refuge under the desk Joslyn used when she came in.

“That’s certainly your prerogative,” Kendra said with cool dignity, setting down her purse and keys. She took their listing agreement from her in-box and handed it across to Deputy McQuillan.

He tore the document into two pieces and threw them at her, before stalking out of the office and slamming the door behind him.

“That certainly went well,” Kendra told Daisy ruefully as the dog low-crawled out from under Joslyn’s desk, now that the coast was clear.

For the next hour, Kendra busied herself with routine tasks—reading and replying to emails, initiating and returning phone calls, and surfing the web for for-sale-by-owner listings in the surrounding area.

She came up dry that morning, though, and was thinking about locking up the office and playing hooky for the rest of the day when Walker Parrish came in again.

Daisy went right over to him, and he laughed as he bent to ruffle the dog’s ears in greeting.

“My friend’s decided she’d like to take a firsthand look at your house,” Walker told Kendra. Once again she thought how attractive he was, and marveled that he didn’t do a thing for her. “Casey’s on the road with her band until after the Fourth, but she says she could stop in for a quick look at the place late next week.”

“Not Casey Elder?” Kendra asked, surprised to find herself holding her breath for the answer. She’d dealt with a number of celebrities in the course of her job, and she wasn’t the type to be starstruck, but Ms. Elder just happened to be one of the biggest names in country music and Kendra was most definitely a fan.

“Well,” Walker said sheepishly, “yeah. But I wasn’t supposed to mention her name.”

Kendra smiled to reassure him. “Your secret is safe with me,” she said lightly, “but the minute Ms. Elder sets foot in Parable, everybody is going to know it. She is, after all, a superstar.”

Walker chuckled. “She considered wearing a disguise,” he admitted.

“A pair of horn-rimmed glasses with a big plastic nose and a mustache attached?” Kendra joked. Then, more seriously, she added, “It must be difficult, being so recognizable.”

“Casey copes with her fame pretty well,” Walker said, while Daisy sat gazing up at him in her usual adoring way. “And I assured her that while she has a big following around here, nobody’s likely to mob her or anything.”

That was true enough. People would be curious about her, especially at first, but if Casey Elder decided to become a permanent part of the community, she’d be welcomed with casseroles and supper invitations, like any other newcomer.

“I take it she liked the pictures you took when we went through the house the other day?” Kendra prompted, wondering about the connection between Walker and Casey and immediately deciding it was none of her business. She certainly wasn’t about to ask.

“She liked them, all right,” Walker answered, looking as though he wanted to say more but wasn’t sure he should.

“You told her the asking price?”

“She didn’t bat an eye,” Walker said with a nod.

He still had that peculiar look on his face.

“Walker,” Kendra nudged, “what is it?”

“Casey’s from Dallas,” he said uneasily. “I’m not sure she understands what it means to live in a small town, even though she writes and sings songs about it all the time.”

Kendra folded her arms, tilted her head to one side and waited. What on earth was going on here?

“Casey and I—” Walker began, stopping to clear his throat. “We have a—complicated relationship.”

So, Kendra thought, my hunch was right. They’re more than just friends.

“No need to explain,” Kendra said briskly.

Walker looked miserably determined to go on. “We were never married—never even involved, really, but—” He paused, swallowed visibly. “But Casey’s kids are both mine.”

Kendra barely kept her mouth from dropping open. What he’d said didn’t surprise her as much as the fact that he’d said it at all. “I don’t—” she began, and then gave up on completing the sentence.

“The thing is, they don’t know it yet,” Walker went on. “The kids, I mean. Casey and I want to break it to them gently, once they’ve gotten settled and everything.”

“It’s a secret, then,” Kendra said quietly.

Walker nodded, shoved a hand through his hair, slapped his hat against his thigh once, lightly. “Nobody else knows,” he said. “Not even Brylee.”

“Then why tell me?”

“I’m not sure,” Walker said, looking flustered. It was odd, seeing him like this, when he was usually so self-possessed.

Kendra made a lip-zipping motion with one hand. “I won’t breathe a word,” she promised.

Walker’s grin was appreciative and she could tell he was relieved. “Thanks,” he said. “Casey will be calling you one day soon. To make an appointment to see the house, I mean.”

“Great,” Kendra said. “I hope she likes it.”

“Me, too,” Walker said very quietly. Almost, Kendra thought, wistfully.

She shook off the romantic notion. Ever since Hutch had kissed her down by Whisper Creek, she’d been prone to overthink the whole concept of love.

Walker started for the door, and Kendra returned to her chair behind her desk, smiled a goodbye when he looked back at her over one broad shoulder.

“Interesting,” she told Daisy, once he’d gone.

Daisy went back under Joslyn’s desk and was soon snoring.

Kendra fidgeted. The urge to call Joslyn or Tara or both of them at once to find out if either of them knew anything about Walker and Casey Elder was strong, but she never really considered giving in to it. After all, she’d promised not to tell what she knew, and if there was one thing Kendra Shepherd believed in, it was keeping promises.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN



SATURDAY MORNING ARRIVED right on schedule, although Madison had seemed certain it would somehow be postponed, if not canceled entirely.

The weather was warm and brilliantly sunny, the sky an achy blue that left sweetly tender bruises on Kendra’s heart as she stood at the kitchen sink, her arms plunged into hot, soapy water, gazing out the window as she finished washing the breakfast dishes. By her calculations, two bowls, a couple of spoons and the pot she’d cooked the oatmeal in didn’t justify running the machine and, besides, she needed to keep her hands busy.

It had been a couple of days since she’d last seen Hutch, but he’d called once, said he’d pick her and Madison up for the rodeo and the other festivities around eleven-thirty, if that was okay with her. He’d sounded almost shy, but that was probably some kind of ruse.

Hutch Carmody didn’t have a shy bone in his red-hot cowboy body.

She’d replied in a blasé tone that eleven-thirty would probably be fine and been jittery every waking minute since, much to her private chagrin, wondering if this get-together qualified as an actual date or, since Madison was going along, just a friendly outing. Deciding what to wear wasn’t a problem: a long-sleeved T-shirt, jeans and sneakers—she didn’t own boots—would fill the bill just fine, for both her and Madison. But what about my hair? she dithered. What about makeup? She wanted to look her best, of course, but not as though she was hoping she and Hutch could slip away alone at some point and make their way up the mountainside to the magic meadow.

Was she a bad mother for even thinking such a thought? Madison had separation issues, though she seemed more secure every day, settling in well at preschool and in the new house and, anyway, there were only a few people Kendra would feel comfortable leaving her daughter with—Joslyn and Tara, certainly, and of course Opal. But they would all be busy with their own plans, wouldn’t they? And, besides, any one of them, if asked to babysit, would instantly guess why Kendra wanted to disappear for a while.

Behind her, Madison and Daisy scuffled on the linoleum floor, Madison laughing with delight, Daisy barking exuberantly, as she always did when they played.

Kendra emptied the sink of water, rinsed her hands under the tap, dried them on her flowered apron, and turned to smile at the pair of them, girl and dog, raising her voice just enough to be heard over all that happiness. “We’d better get going,” she said, “if we’re going to drive Daisy out to Tara’s place and get back in time to meet Mr. Carmody.”

Tara had suggested the canine sleepover, reminding Kendra that it would be quieter out there in the country, far from the Fourth of July fireworks, and thus not so frightening for Daisy. Plus, Lucy would be there and the pups could keep each other company. In the morning, Tara could bring Daisy home or Kendra could pick her up on the chicken farm, whichever worked out best.

Madison, fairly bursting with excitement—new boots and a day with Hutch Carmody, would wonders never cease?—nodded hard enough to give herself whiplash. She’d been making a ruckus ever since they’d finished breakfast, trying to keep busy until it was time to go.

It was hard to say which event Madison was most excited about: choosing the promised cowgirl boots, watching Hutch ride a bull in the rodeo, going on rides at the carnival, or taking in the fireworks, which weren’t even scheduled to begin until ten o’clock, when the sky would finally be dark enough to launch the first sprays of multicolored light against a black velvet background.

This would be a long day for Madison, Kendra thought not for the first time, when they were all in the Volvo, seat belts fastened. She bit her lower lip as she backed the car down the short driveway and eased carefully onto the street. It would be a long day for her, too, given that Hutch would be at her side for most of it.

What did they really have to talk about, she and Hutch, once they got past hello? Not the old days, certainly—how about all that steamy sex we used to have?—and the present didn’t offer a lot of topics, either.

And what if she just kept reliving that sizzling kiss by the creek the whole day and night? She’d be in a perpetual state of arousal, with nothing left of her but smoldering embers by the time it was all over.

“Can we buy Daisy a present at the rodeo?” Madison asked from her safety seat when they were well on their way to Tara’s. “And for Leviticus and Lucy, too?”

Kendra knew the little girl was fretting about the dogs being left alone, thinking they might be lonely or scared, even with each other for company. “I think that’s a fine idea,” she said, smiling. “Tell you what—while we’re looking for those boots of yours, we’ll keep an eye out for something they’d like.”

Madison cheered at that, and Daisy started barking all over again, sharing in the headiness of the moment.

Tara came out of the main chicken coop when they drove up, wearing work clothes and scattering indignant hens in all directions as she came toward the car.

“You’re not going to the rodeo like that, are you?” Madison asked with great concern as soon as they’d come to a stop and Tara had opened the back door of the car to help her out of the seat. “You have chicken poop on your shoes.”

Tara laughed and shook her head, but before she could reply, Lucy came bounding down the front steps from the shady porch, barking gleefully. This, of course, got Daisy all worked up again and the canine chorus began.

“I’m not much for rodeos,” Tara explained when the din subsided a little and Madison was out of the car seat. “But I’ll be in town later for the fireworks.” A pause. “Without the poopy shoes, of course.”

By then, Daisy and Lucy were playing a merry game of chase, and Madison ran right along with them, transcendence in motion, the sunlight catching in her coppery curls.

Watching, Kendra felt literally swamped with love and gratitude. She was so blessed, she thought. She had everything a woman could want.

Then the memory of Hutch’s kiss sneaked up on her, as it had a way of doing, and heat swept through her in a fiery flood.

Okay, she clarified to herself. She had almost everything.

Tara, meanwhile, took in Kendra’s French braid, small gold earrings and carefully applied makeup, and looked fondly sly. “Don’t you look nice today?” she drawled. Then, in a lower voice, though Madison couldn’t possibly have heard her over all that racket she and the dogs were making, “Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were looking for a little Hutch-action.”

“Oh, please,” Kendra said, averting her eyes for a moment.

Hutch-action, she thought. Oh, Lord.

Tara merely folded her arms and raised her perfect eyebrows. She might have been wearing dirty coveralls and manure-caked shoes, but she still managed to look like the class act she was, right down to the double helix of her DNA.

“Madison will be with us the whole time,” Kendra pointed out when her friend didn’t say anything more, probably because she didn’t have to, having made her point. “What could happen?”

“Nothing,” Tara admitted, pleased. “But that doesn’t mean all that time together isn’t going to crank up the dials. I don’t know why you and Hutch don’t just—” she leaned in now, and dropped her voice to a whisper “—do it. It’s going to happen, you know. It’s inevitable, fated, meant to be.”

“No,” Kendra argued too fiercely, “it isn’t going to happen, because I won’t let it!” Deep down, though, she wasn’t so sure, because some part of her had been hankering to head for the meadow ever since Hutch had reminded her of the things they’d done there, back in the day. “This is just an outing, nothing more.” She counted off the events on her fingers. “Rodeo. Carnival. Fireworks. Over.”

“Right,” Tara said. She wasn’t actually smirking, but she was close to it.

That was when Kendra blurted it out, the thing she hadn’t meant to say at all, to anyone. Ever. “What are we going to talk about for a whole day?”

Tara’s smile turned gentle and she touched Kendra’s arm. “You and Hutch don’t need a script, honey,” she said. “Just let things happen. Roll with it, so to speak.”

“Easy for you to say,” Kendra pointed out. “You’ll be here, shoveling chicken poop all day!”

“Some people have all the luck,” Tara confirmed wryly as Madison left the dogs and came toward them. Daisy and Lucy were settling down in the shade of a nearby tree for an impromptu nap.

“Let’s go, Mommy,” Madison said eagerly, clasping Kendra’s hand. “It’s almost time for Mr. Carmody to come and get us, isn’t it?”

“We have a little while yet, sweetheart,” Kendra assured her child after a glance at her watch.

“Come inside and have some lemonade, then,” Tara said. “I just made it fresh this morning, before I went out to do the chores.”

Madison looked doubtful. Like most children and all too many grown-ups, she probably thought she could make the minutes pass faster just by force of will, and she was a nervous wreck from the effort.

“I also have cookies,” Tara bargained with an understanding smile.

“What kind?” Madison wanted to know.

“Madison.” Kendra sighed.

Tara chuckled. “Chocolate chip,” she said.

“Just one then,” Madison agreed.

“Madison Shepherd,” Kendra said. “What do you say when someone very kindly offers you lemonade and cookies?”

“If it’s somebody I know, you mean?” Madison asked. “Because I’m not supposed to talk to strangers, am I?”

Kendra suppressed a sigh. “No,” she answered patiently. “You most certainly aren’t. But Tara isn’t a stranger.”

Madison beamed, remembering her manners at last, or maybe just willing to use them. “Yes, please,” she told Tara triumphantly, like a quiz show contestant coming up with the right answer and thus taking home the prize.

They all went inside, Tara leaving her dirty shoes behind on the step, followed by the sleepy dogs, who both curled up on Lucy’s fluffy dog bed in a corner of Tara’s kitchen, Daisy’s head resting companionably on the scruff of Lucy’s neck, both of them awash in the summer sunlight pouring in through a nearby window. They shimmered.

Tara, as charmed by the scene as Kendra was, quietly got out her cell phone and snapped a picture of the pair.

“I’ll send you a copy,” she said, setting the phone aside.

Kendra nodded, and she and Madison went off to the powder room to wash their hands.

When they got back to the kitchen a couple of minutes later, Tara was pouring lemonade into cut-crystal glasses, and chocolate chip cookies beckoned from an exquisite china plate.

Kendra smiled at the contrast between the old farmhouse and Tara’s elegant possessions, vestiges of her other life back in New York. Close as they were, Tara had been fairly tight-lipped about her pre-Parable life—she’d admitted to a bitter divorce and a passion to reinvent herself completely, but that was about all.

Both Joslyn and Kendra figured Tara would open up to them when she was ready and, in the meantime, they were content with things as they were.

Tara, Kendra and Madison chatted amiably while they enjoyed the refreshments, and then it was finally time to go back to town, much to Madison’s delight.

The little girl said goodbye to Daisy, who barely opened her eyes in response, and Kendra thanked Tara for everything, offered up a see-you-later.

Madison and Kendra had been home for fifteen minutes or so when Kendra heard the sound of a vehicle rolling into the driveway.

“He’s here!” Madison shouted from the living room. She’d been keeping watch at the window from the moment they got back from Tara’s. “And he’s in a shiny truck!”

Kendra had never known Hutch to drive anything but one of the battered old pickups used on the ranch—he seemed content to take whichever one wasn’t in use at the moment. She, like most people, tended to forget that he had money, and plenty of it, because he lived simply and never flaunted his wealth.

She went out onto the back porch, her heart hammering under her sensible shirt, and watched as Hutch climbed out of a red, extended-cab pickup, the rig gleaming in the sunlight.

“New truck?” she asked. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, but she probably looked calm on the outside.

Or so she hoped.

“I’m taking it for a test drive,” Hutch said. His hair was a little too long and slightly tousled, and he wore a black hat, jeans, a colorful shirt and clean but serviceable boots. He was, Kendra was reminded, planning to ride in the rodeo later that day. “Like it?”

“It’s...nice...” she said, rattled. If she asked him not to enter the bull-riding, would he agree?

She’d never know, because asking was out of the question.

Madison, meanwhile, dashed past Kendra, lingering on the porch, and fairly catapulted her small body into Hutch’s arms.

He caught her deftly and plunked his hat on her head with a laugh. Her whole face disappeared under the crown. “Hey, short-stuff,” he said. “Ready for a big day?”

Madison peeked out from under the hat, transfigured by the sheer magic of Hutch Carmody. “We’re buying boots!” she crowed.

Hutch chuckled again, shifting her easily to his left hip. “So I hear,” he said. “You look mighty good in that hat, cowgirl. Maybe we ought to get you one of those, too.”

Kendra opened her mouth to protest—she worked hard not to spoil Madison, and it wasn’t easy because her tendency was to grant every whim—but closed it again in the next instant.

It’s no big deal, she told herself.

Hutch’s gaze swung back to her then, and he let it roam over her briefly. Appreciation sparked in his eyes.

“Pretty as a mountain meadow,” he commented smoothly.

Kendra felt that now-familiar surge of heat go through her. Such an innocent-sounding reference and, at the same time, a bold invitation.

Or was it more of a promise?

“Thanks,” she said, hurrying back into the house in an effort to hide her pink face. Once there, she dragged in several deep breaths, struggling to regain her composure, and took her time getting her handbag, making sure all the stove burners were turned off and the doors were locked.

When she came outside again, Hutch had installed Madison and her car seat in the spiffy truck.

With a laugh, Madison plopped his hat back on his head, and it landed askew, pushing down the tops of his ears. He made a goofy face for the child’s benefit before straightening it, and Madison found that uproariously funny.

“Ready?” he asked almost gruffly when he turned his attention on Kendra.

It was a loaded question. He was asking about more than the rodeo and the carnival and a fireworks display, and she couldn’t pretend not to know it.

She said nothing, because “no” would have been a lie and “yes” would lead to all sorts of problems.

He grinned, reading her well, and held open the passenger door for her. He did give her a brief boost when she stepped up onto the high running board, the way he’d done when they went riding.

She blushed hotly and refused to look at him, staring straight through the windshield when he chuckled again, shut the truck door and came around to the driver’s side.

During the short ride to the fairgrounds, Madison made conversation between the adults unnecessary, if not impossible, chattering away about Ruffles—she couldn’t wait to ride again, would they be doing that soon?—and her new boots and whether she should get a pink cowgirl hat or a red one.

The parking lot at the fairgrounds was already bursting with rigs of various kinds, but Hutch found a spot for the truck and had Madison out of her safety seat and standing in the gravel before Kendra had alighted and walked around to their side.

Hutch gave her a sidelong look, grinned and set his hat down on her head. “Relax,” he said. “You’ve got a pint-size chaperone here, and that means I’ll have to behave myself, now doesn’t it?”

The hat smelled pleasantly of Hutch—sun-dried cotton, fresh country air and the faintest tinge of new-mown grass—and, for just a moment, Kendra allowed herself to revel in the moment, as happy as Madison had been when she wore Hutch’s hat back at the house.

Her hands shook a little as she lifted it off and handed it back, and the question she’d promised herself she wouldn’t ask tumbled out of her mouth with no prompting from her addled brain.

“You’re dead-set on this bull-riding thing?”

Hutch regarded her for a long moment, his expression unreadable. “Does it matter?” he asked.

Madison, by that time, had taken his hand and was trying to drag him toward the ticket booth, some fifty yards away.

Kendra sighed. “Yes,” she admitted as he took her hand and Madison pulled them across the lot like a little tugboat. “It matters.”

“That’s interesting,” Hutch said. “Why?”

“Why, what?” Kendra was stalling now. She was between a rock and a hard place, and there was no way to extricate herself. If she asked Hutch not to ride, she’d seem controlling, and he’d probably refuse to skip the event just because he was stubborn. If she didn’t ask, on the other hand, she’d have lost her one chance to make sure he didn’t break his damn fool neck in front of her, half the county and, worst of all, Madison.

“Why does it matter?” Hutch pressed quietly.

“I’d hate to see you get hurt, that’s all,” Kendra said in a light tone that didn’t match the urgency she felt. Madison, the human tugboat, was within earshot, after all.

“I’d hate to see that, too,” Hutch said, one side of his mouth tilting up in a classic Hutch Carmody grin. “But I don’t believe in sitting on the sidelines, Kendra, just to be safe. I love the rodeo, especially the bull-riding.”

She felt frustrated and something was doing the jitterbug in the pit of her stomach, on icy feet, even though it would be a couple of hours before he actually climbed down off the catwalk and into the chute where an angry bull would be waiting for him.

“You’re not scared?” she asked against her will.

They’d reached the winding line in front of the ticket booth by then, and Madison let go of Hutch’s hand and fidgeted.

“What if all the boots are gone when we get there?” she fretted.

Hutch touched the top of her head lightly and briefly and in a very daddylike way. “No worries, short-stuff,” he assured the child, though his gaze was still fastened to Kendra’s face. “There will be plenty to choose from when our turn comes.”

If she’d said something like that, Madison probably would have ratcheted up the angst another notch, but the little dickens settled right down after Hutch spoke to her.

Kendra rested her hands on her hips, waited for him to answer her last question.

He grinned. “Walker Parrish has some famously nasty bulls in his string of rodeo stock, and flinging cowboys three ways from Sunday is what those critters do best, so, yeah, I might be a little nervous. I’d be an idiot if I wasn’t.”

“Then why do it?”

“Because I want to,” Hutch said easily, “and because fear isn’t a good enough reason to keep to the sidelines when there’s living to do.”

They’d reached the booth by then, so Kendra didn’t reply. She just bit down hard on her lower lip while Hutch extracted his wallet from the hip pocket of his jeans and paid their admission.

Their hands were stamped, so they could come and go throughout the day, and Madison thought that was the coolest thing ever, especially when Hutch told her the mark would show up even in the dark.

Once they were inside the fairgrounds, Hutch crouched in front of Madison, pushed his hat to the back of his head, and looked the little girl straight in the eye. “You stick close to your mama and me, now,” he said very seriously. “Will you do that, munchkin?”

Madison nodded solemnly.

Kendra’s heart pinched, watching them together. Some things were so beautiful, they hurt.

Hutch straightened, shifted his hat. “Well, then, that’s settled,” he said. “Let’s take a look around.”

They headed for the exhibition hall first, where all the vendors had set up booths to market everything from handcrafted silver and turquoise jewelry, always popular with the rodeo set, to custom-made saddles and other tack. There were hats and boots galore, of course, in every conceivable size, style and color.

Madison zeroed in on a pair with a peacock-feather design sewn into the leather and rhinestone accents.

“These are pretty, aren’t they?” she said, looking up at Hutch for his opinion.

A little stung that she hadn’t been acknowledged, let alone consulted about the boots, Kendra began, “But they’re too—”

Hutch silenced her by taking her hand and giving it a light, quick squeeze. “Mighty showy,” he agreed thoughtfully, focused on Madison. “But stalls and barnyards are messy places, and riding horses stirs up a lot of dust. Splashes up some creek water, too.”

Madison tilted her head to one side, considering. Kendra might have been invisible, for all the notice the child paid her. Hutch’s opinion was apparently all that mattered, at least in this situation.

“Boots aren’t supposed to be pretty?” Madison asked, looking mildly disappointed. She was a girly-girl, as well as a sporty type, and she loved tutus, flashy toy jewelry and plastic high heels.

Hutch’s grin was like a flash of sunlight on clear water. “Yes,” he said. “They can be pretty. But a real cowgirl like you needs to think about how her boots are going to hold up over the long haul.”

Madison was clearly puzzled.

“You need boots that will last,” Kendra translated, glad to be of some help even if she was on the fringes of the question.

Madison weighed that. “Okay,” she finally agreed. “Let’s find some that will last and look pretty.”

“Good plan,” Hutch said with another sideways glance at Kendra, fueled by a grin that made her feel as though her clothes had just dissolved. “We’ll keep looking until we find just the right pair.”

Eventually, they did find the right pair for Madison. They were dark brown and sturdy, with a tiny pink rose stitched into the side of each shaft.

Kendra smiled as she handed her debit card to the merchant and shook her head at the offer of a box. “She’ll wear them,” she said. “Thanks anyway, though.”

Madison, prancing around in the new boots like a little show pony angling for a blue ribbon, had forgotten all about the sneakers she’d been wearing before.

A cowgirl-Cinderella in boots instead of glass slippers, Madison twinkled like a fully lit Christmas tree, showing off for Hutch.

Prince Charming in jeans, Kendra reflected, taking a good long look at Hutch while he was busy raving over Madison’s footwear.

Beware, said the voice of Kendra’s rocky childhood, and her once broken, barely mended heart. Danger ahead.

But there was another voice in her head now, and it repeated something Hutch had said minutes before. Fear isn’t a good enough reason to keep to the sidelines when there’s living to do.

Madison brought Kendra back to the here and now by tugging at her hand. “You need boots, too, Mommy,” she said earnestly. “So you can go riding with Mr. Carmody and me.”

“True enough,” Hutch said with a twinkle. “Boots are a requirement if you’re going to travel farther than the creek.”

The creek.

The kiss.

There she was again, stuck in the same old dilemma. If Madison was set on learning to ride for real—and she obviously wanted that very much—then Kendra, of course, would need to go along, at least until her daughter was older. Which meant she might as well invest in a pair of boots for herself—and it wasn’t as if she couldn’t afford the purchase. The rub was, doing that meant a lot more than just selecting the right size and style and paying up. It meant she was agreeing to not just one more horseback ride, but very possibly dozens of them.

With Hutch, it seemed, everything had at least two meanings.

It was maddening.

Half an hour later, Kendra was the owner of a pair of well-made and very practical black boots, with no frills whatsoever.

While she and Madison waited in the shade of an awning near the cluster of food concession booths, Hutch took the box out to the truck.

“I wanted to wear my boots,” Madison said, turning backward on the bench to stick both feet out so she could admire them. “Mr. Carmody says they have to be broken in right.”

Mr. Carmody says this. Mr. Carmody says that.

Madison was obviously in love.

“Let me know if they start pinching your toes or rubbing against your heels,” said Kendra, ever practical. “New shoes can do that.”

Madison turned around, rolled her eyes once, and reached for one of the French fries from the order they were sharing. She swabbed it in catsup and steered it toward her mouth. “Cowgirls don’t mind if their toes are pinched,” she announced. “They’re tough.”

Kendra laughed, after reminding herself to lighten up a little. This was Madison’s first pair of boots and she might remember this day all her life. And Kendra wanted that memory to be a good one.

“Yes,” she agreed, “they are. And you are definitely a born cowgirl.”

Madison was pleased, and dragged another French fry through the catsup just as Boone approached the table, flanked by two small, dark-haired boys—miniature versions of him.

They wore jeans and striped T-shirts and brand-new sneakers, and they both had freckles and a cowlick above their foreheads. If one of the little guys hadn’t been almost a head taller than the other, they could have been mistaken for twins.

Looking at the children, Kendra saw their mother in them, as well as Boone, and a lump rose in her throat. She’d liked Corrie Taylor, and it still seemed impossible that she was gone.

“Well,” Kendra said warmly, blinking a sheen of sudden moisture that blurred her vision. “Griffin and Fletcher. You’ve grown so much I almost didn’t recognize you.”

The smaller of the two boys huddled shyly against Boone’s side. Like his sons, he was wearing casual clothes; he rarely bothered with a uniform, and today he was probably off duty.

The taller boy put out a manly hand. “I’m Griff,” he said. Naturally, he didn’t remember her. Most likely she was just another friend of his mom and dad’s, faintly familiar but mostly a stranger.

Madison, whose mouth was circled with catsup, regarded the boys with a curious combination of wariness and fascination. To her, they were probably members of an alien species.

Kendra shook the offered hand. “Hi, Griff,” she said. “I’m Kendra.” She peered around at the other little boy, who was still trying to hide behind Boone’s leg. “Hello, there,” she added.

“Fletch is sort of shy around the edges,” Boone said, sounding pretty shy himself.

“This is my daughter, Madison,” Kendra said to all three of them, gesturing.

“I have new boots,” Madison said. She got down off the bench, rounded the picnic table, and walked right up to Griff, standing practically toe-to-toe with him. “See?”

Fletch peeked around Boone to take a look. “Girl boots,” he scoffed, but there was a certain reluctant interest in his tone.

Boone chuckled and made a ruffling motion atop the boy’s head. If the kid’s hair hadn’t been buzz cut, Boone would have mussed it up. “Of course they’re girl boots,” he reasoned.

“Because Madison’s a girl, dumbhead,” Griff told his brother.

Boone let out a long sigh. He looked overwhelmed, completely out of his depth, this man who, in the course of his job, feared no one.

Kendra took pity on him. “Join us?” she said, moving over to show that there was plenty of room at the table, with just herself and Madison taking up space. “Hutch took something to the truck, but he’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

Boone considered the invitation carefully. “You guys hungry?” he asked.

Both boys nodded quickly.

“What’ll it be?” Boone said, indicating the row of concession wagons lined up along the side of the fairgrounds, offering everything from hamburgers and hot dogs to chow mein, Indian fry bread and tacos.

They both wanted hot dogs, as it turned out, and orange soda to drink.

Madison, Kendra noticed, squeezed in beside her and left the bench on the other side of the table to the boys. Like them, she was shy but intrigued.

“Is that your dad?” she asked, nodding toward Boone, who was waiting in a nearby line by then.

“Yeah,” Griff said, elbowing Fletch, who sat too close to him for his liking.

Fletch ignored his brother’s gesture and shook his head. “No, he isn’t,” he argued stubbornly. “Uncle Bob is our dad.”

Uh-oh, Kendra thought.

And then Hutch was back, all easy charm. He sat down on Kendra’s bench, lifted Madison onto his lap, and proceeded to win both boys over in two seconds flat.

By the time Boone returned with lunch for himself and the kids, Griff and Fletch were grinning at Hutch and lapping up every word he said.





CHAPTER SIXTEEN



FOR ALL KENDRA’S fears that the day would drag by, the next couple of hours unfolded easily, naturally. She and Hutch and Madison went on most of the rides at the carnival. On the merry-go-round, Hutch made Madison laugh so hard she nearly fell off the pink swan she’d chosen, just by waving his hat around and pretending the blue-and-green tiger he sat upon was sure to buck him off any minute. Kendra, standing protectively beside her daughter while the mechanism turned and the Kaliope played, watched him, her heart full but on the verge of breaking.

Don’t, she wanted to say to him. Don’t make Madison love you. She’s lost so much already.

But it was too late for that, of course. The man had won the child over completely, helping her choose just the right cowgirl hat, and bandannas for the canine contingent. He’d even presented Madison with a giant pink-and-white teddy bear—it had been consigned to the truck for the duration, like Kendra’s new boots—having acquired it by getting a perfect score at the target-shooting booth.

Madison hadn’t wanted to give up that bear, even long enough to have it safely stowed away until it was time to go home. She’d have preferred to lug the thing around all day, showing it to everyone, recounting the glorious legend of how Hutch had won it for her. He’d been the one who’d finally managed to persuade the little girl to give up the huge toy, however temporarily—

Kendra had gotten nowhere with her sensible advice.

She was pleased because Madison was pleased, of course, but Rupert, her daughter’s beloved purple kangaroo, once her constant companion, formed a lonely figure in her mind’s eye. Ever since Daisy had landed in their lives like a space capsule falling out of orbit, Rupert had been forgotten, left behind in Madison’s room, albeit in a place of honor. Even though she was having a good time and she knew that Madison’s reduced dependence on the tattered stuffed animal was a good sign, Kendra felt a pang when she thought of poor Rupert. She could identify with him.