Her Favorite Maverick

by Christine Rimmer

  Once she started talking, she couldn’t stop. She spilled it all, about her disappointments with Tuck and the sheer rat-crappiness of Mercer Smalls, how she just couldn’t trust a man anymore and so she knew it was the best thing, to end it with Logan now.

  When she finally fell silent, she glanced over and saw that Sophia had fallen asleep in her bouncy chair, her little head drooping to the side, the plastic keys fallen to the floor, where Opal batted at them and then jumped back when they skittered across the tile.

  Her mom got up and poured them each more coffee, put the pot back on the warmer and then resumed her seat. “Before we get into everything you’ve just told me, I have to ask. Are you upset over your dad and me leaving? Is that bothering you? Do you want us to stay?”

  Sarah opened her mouth to insist that she didn’t, no way, no how.

  But before she got the words out, her mom shook her head. “Tell me the truth, honey. Please.”

  Sarah dabbed at her eyes to mop up the last of her tears. “Okay, it’s a factor, that you’re going. I will miss you. I mean, all those years growing up, it was like we were strangers sharing a house. And now, it’s so different. You and Dad are helpful and fun. You’ve become the parents I always wished for and it’s been so great having you nearby. But no. I don’t want you to stay. If you stayed, you wouldn’t be getting your dream and I want that, Mom. I want you and Dad to finally live the life you never let yourselves live before.”

  “But if you need us—”

  “You’re a phone call away. If I needed you, you would be back in a flash.”

  “But do you need us to be here, day-to-day? Do you need us close by?”

  Sarah leaned forward and took her mom’s hand between both of hers. “No. You and Dad are going. It’s settled. I’m good with it, I promise you.”

  Her mom pulled her hand free of Sarah’s hold, only to reach out and fondly smooth Sarah’s hair. “And what about your dream, sweetheart?”

  “Um. Yeah, well. That’s life, you know.”

  Flo let out a wry laugh. “Honey, you grew up a lonely child in a silent house with unhappy parents. Then you set out to conquer Chicago. You worked so hard, got so far. But sometimes in life, our big plans don’t turn out the way we want them to. You had to come home. I know it hasn’t been easy for you, with so much on your shoulders. But the past few weeks, you’ve seemed to thrive. You’re really good at running the business. I think you’ve been happy, especially since you’ve been with Logan. You’ve been sprucing up the cottage, settling in beautifully here with a little help from your friends and neighbors. It seems to me you’ve been having a pretty fine time in your old hometown.”

  Sarah sat back in her chair and eyed her mother warily. “You’ve become so upbeat and hopeful. Sometimes it’s just exhausting.”

  Her mother laughed some more. “Well, honey, now think about. Ask yourself, is it maybe just possible that you came home in defeat only to discover that you can have your dream here? Is it possible that taking over the family business is more satisfying work for you than killing yourself at that giant firm in the big city? Is it possible you like running your own show, being your own boss? And as for Logan, well, the two of you seem to me like a great match. Didn’t he offer you exactly what you’ve longed for—a good life with the right man, a father for your child?”

  “Mom, it didn’t work out, okay?”

  “But it could.” Flo leaned in again. “If you’ll just let it.”

  Sarah glared at her. “Look. You want me to say it?”

  Flo sat up straight again and smiled way too sweetly. “I do, yes. I absolutely do.”

  “Okay, Mom. I’ll say it.” Sarah sniffed and brushed another random tear away. “I freaked out. That’s the truth. He went down on one knee to offer me just what I’d given up on, what I’ve always wanted most and have learned to accept that I’ll never have. And when he pulled out that ring, well, I choked, okay? I just couldn’t do it, couldn’t reach out and take it.” Sarah put her hands to the sides of her head because right at that moment it kind of felt like her brain was about to explode. “I blew it. I really did. I threw away my own dream. I turned away the man I love. I freaked out and now it’s too late.”

  “Oh, sweetheart,” said her mother. “As long you’re still breathing, it’s never too late.”

  * * *

  Logan had taken to sleeping out under the stars.

  After all, there were a lot of fences to fix on the Ambling A. He was taking care of that—and avoiding any contact with other human beings in the bargain.

  The morning after it ended with Sarah, he’d had an argument with his father over nothing in particular. Really, he picked a fight because he blamed Max, at least partly, for the way it had all gone wrong with Sarah.

  Then, that same day at breakfast, his brothers were yammering on about some discovery they’d made—an old, locked diary with a jewel-encrusted letter A on the front. They’d found it right there in the ranch house under a rotted floorboard and they were all trotting out theories as to who might have hidden it and what might be inside.

  Logan could not have cared less about some old, tattered relic that had nothing to do with him or any of them, either. He yelled at them to shut the hell up about it.

  Then Wilder made the mistake of asking him what his damn problem was. He’d lit into his youngest brother. They’d almost come to blows.

  That did it. Logan realized he would just as soon not have anything to do with his family right now—or with anyone else, for that matter. He’d considered leaving for good, packing up his things and heading back to Seattle.

  But the big city didn’t thrill him any more than dealing with his family did. Nothing thrilled him. He was fresh out of enthusiasm for anything and everything. Until he could figure out what move to make next, he just wanted to be left alone.

  So he’d loaded up his pickup with fence posts and barbwire and headed out across the land. He had a sleeping bag and plenty of canned food. For five full days he worked on the fences, brought in strays, dug out clogged ditches and didn’t speak to a single person.

  Eventually, he would have to return to the ranch house, have a hot meal, a bath and a shave. But not for a while yet. Not until he could look at his father without wanting to punch his lights out, not until his heart stopped aching.

  Come to think of it, it could be a long time before he had a damn shower. Because the ache in his heart showed no signs of abating anytime soon.

  * * *

  On Tuesday, three days after her talk with her mother, Sarah had yet to do anything about how much she missed Logan.

  Yeah, she got it. She did. She’d finally had a chance at what she really wanted with a man—and she’d thrown her chance away. It was up to her to go to him, tell him how totally she’d messed up and beg him to give her just one more shot.

  But she didn’t do it. She felt...immobilized somehow. She visited clients, cared for her baby, cuddled her cat. Inside, though, she was empty and frozen and so very sad.

  Tuesday evening, as Opal jumped around the kitchen floor chasing shadows and Sophia sat chewing her rubber pretzel and giggling dreamily at the mobile of dancing ladybugs hooked to her bouncy seat, Sarah stood at the refrigerator with the door wide open.

  She stared inside at food she had no interest in eating and tried to decide what to fix for dinner. Really, she wasn’t hungry. There was a half a box of Cheez-Its on the counter. She could eat that—yeah. Perfect. Cheez-Its for dinner, and maybe a glass of wine or ten. Once she put Sophia to bed, she could cry for a while. That would be constructive.

  The knock on the front door surprised her. Would it be her mom again or maybe Lily, somebody who loved her coming to tell her to snap out of it?

  She almost didn’t answer it. Really, she didn’t want to talk to anyone right now and she couldn’t figure out why anyone would want to
give a pep talk to an emotional coward like her, anyway.

  But then whoever it was knocked again. She shut the fridge door and went to get it.

  “Hello, Sarah,” Max Crawford said when she opened the door. He actually had his black hat in his hands. “I wonder if you would give me a few minutes of your time.”

  Her best option was obvious. She should slam the door in his overbearing, judgmental face.

  Instead, she just sneered. “Didn’t you get the memo? Logan and I broke up. You got what you wanted. There is absolutely no reason for you to be darkening my door.”

  “Please,” he said, all somber and serious—and way too sincere. “A few minutes, that’s all I’m asking for. Just hear me out.”

  Oh, she wanted to shove that door shut so fast and so hard...

  But she didn’t. Partly because she was too tired and sad to give him the angry, self-righteous rejection he deserved. And also because she couldn’t help but be curious as to what Logan’s rapscallion dad had to say now.

  She stepped back and gestured him inside. “Have a seat.”

  He crossed the threshold and sat on the sofa. “Thank you.”

  She took the easy chair across from him. “Okay. What?”

  Carefully, he set his hat on the cushion beside him. “Logan’s out on the far reaches of the Ambling A. He took a sleeping bag, a truck-bed full of barbwire and fence posts, a shovel or two and a bunch of canned goods. He hasn’t been back to the house since last Thursday.”

  Alarm had her heart racing and her palms going sweaty. “You’re saying he’s disappeared?”

  “No, he’s mending fences and bringing in strays. We been out, me and the boys, checking on him from a distance because he wants nothing to do with any of us. Sarah, you broke my boy’s heart.”

  She saw red. She would have raised her voice good and loud, given him a very large piece of her mind, if it hadn’t been for the innocent baby in the other room who would be frightened if her mother started screaming like a crazy woman.

  With deadly softness, she reminded him, “Well, I guess you’re pretty happy then, since that was what you wanted all along.”

  “I was wrong,” said Max. “I was all wrong.”

  That set her back a little. She blinked and stared. “What did you say?”

  “I just need you to know that I am so sorry, Sarah, for any trouble I have caused between you and Logan. I truly apologize for my behavior. I’m a guilty old man with too many secrets. I see—and I always saw—that you are a fine woman. And my son does love you. He loves you so much. I get it now, I do. Trying to chase you off was wrong. I never should have done that, and that I did it had nothing to do with you. It was a knee-jerk reaction born of my own bad deeds in the past.”

  Okay, now she was really curious. “Exactly what bad deeds, Max?”

  He picked up his hat and tapped it on his knee. “Well, Sarah, at this time, I’m not at liberty to say.”

  She snort-laughed at that one. “Of course, you’re not.”

  He had the nerve to chuckle. “Sarah, I just want you to know that I am finished trying to come between you and Logan. When you two work it out, I will be there for both of you, supporting you in every way I can.”

  “When we work it out?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “You have no way of knowing that we will work it out.”

  “My son is long-gone in love with you. His heart may be broken, but he has not given up on you. He’s just licking his wounds for a while, until he’s ready to try again.” Max rose. “He took his phone with him when he left, so if you were to call in order to put him out of his misery, chances are you would get through.” He went to the door.

  She followed him—until he stopped suddenly and turned back to face her. For several seconds they just stood there, regarding each other.

  Sarah broke the silence. “You know where he is, right? You could take me to him?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I’ll be at the Ambling A ranch house at eight tomorrow morning.”

  The lines around Max’s eyes deepened with his devilish grin. “Now that is what I was hoping you might say.”

  * * *

  Sarah decided against Cheez-Its and wine for dinner—not because she knew she should eat something more substantial, but because she was so nervous about what might happen tomorrow that she couldn’t eat at all.

  She fed Sophia, gave her a bath and put her down to sleep at a little after eight. Then she sat in the living room with a pencil and a scratch pad trying to organize her thoughts for tomorrow. She wanted to have something really meaningful and persuasive to say when she finally saw Logan again, something to convince him that she truly did love him, that he could trust her with his heart. She needed just the right words, words that would reassure him, make him believe that if he said yes to her, she would not disappoint him ever again.

  It was almost nine when she heard the truck pull up out in front.

  An odd little shiver went through her and she rose to peer out the window behind the sofa.

  It was Logan’s crew cab, all covered in dust and dried mud, with a big roll of barbwire sticking up out of the bed.

  With a cry, she threw down the scratch pad and ran to the door, flinging it open just as he got out of the truck. She stepped out on the porch and then kind of froze there as his long strides took him around the front of the truck and up the front walk.

  He looked so good, in a nice, blue shirt and dark-wash jeans, clean-shaven, his hair still damp. He must have come in from the wild, talked to his dad, had a shower and a shave.

  Her heart was going so fast she kind of worried it might beat its way right out of her chest, just go jittering off up Pine Street and vanish forever from her sight.

  He stopped at the foot of the steps. “Sarah,” he said. That was it. That was everything. Really, how did he do it? He could put a whole world of meaning into just saying her name.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Sarah.” And he came up the steps.

  “Yes!” She threw herself into his waiting arms. “All the yeses. All the time. Forever, Logan. I’m sorry I was so scared. I’m sorry I blew it. I choked in the worst kind of way. But I’m over that. I want a life with you. I want our forever. I want it, I do.”

  His Adam’s apple bounced as he gulped. “You mean that?” His eyes gleamed down at her, full of hope and promise and so much love.

  “I do. Oh, yes, I do. I love you, Logan. I’ve missed you so much. If you give me one more chance now, I will never let you down again.”

  “Yeah,” he said, one side of that fine mouth quirking up in a pleased smile. “That’s what I’m talking about.” And he kissed her, a long kiss, full of all the glory and wonder and desire she’d been missing so desperately since she sent him away.

  She melted into him, happier than she’d ever been in her whole life up till now.

  And when he lifted his head he said, “Give me your hand.” He pulled the ring from his pocket and slipped it on.

  “It’s so beautiful.” And it was, emerald-cut with smaller diamonds along the gleaming platinum band. “I love it.” She cast her gaze up to him again. “I love you.”

  “And I love you. So much. Sarah...” He grabbed her close for another kiss and another after that.

  Then someone whistled. They looked out at the street to see one of the neighborhood kids jumping on his bike, speeding off, laughing as he went.

  Sarah caught Logan’s hand and pulled him inside. He shoved the door shut and grabbed her close again.

  She said, “Your dad came to see me today.”

  “I know. He told me.”

  “I was coming after you tomorrow.”

  “He told me that, too. I couldn’t wait. So here I am.”

  She lifted a hand and pressed it to h
is warm, freshly shaven cheek. “Oh, I am so glad. I want to—”

  A cry from the monitor on the coffee table cut her off.

  “I’ll go get her,” said Logan. They shared a long look. He knew the drill, after all. If they just waited, the baby might go back to sleep. “I need to see her,” he said. “I need to tell her I’m here now and I’m not going away again.”

  Sarah blinked back happy tears. “Yeah. Go ahead.”

  Logan yanked her close and kissed her hard—and then turned for the short hall to the baby’s room.

  “Reow?” Opal sat beneath the dining room table. Delicately, she lifted a paw and spent a moment grooming it. Then she stretched and strutted over to where Sarah stood by the door.

  Sarah scooped her up and kissed her on the crown of her head between her two perfect pink ears. “Logan’s home,” she whispered.

  Opal started purring.

  * * *

  In the baby’s room, Logan turned the lamp on low and went to the crib.

  Sophia let out the sweetest sound at the sight of him—something midway between a laugh and a cry. She waved her hands wildly. “Ah!” she crowed. “Da!”

  “How’s my favorite baby girl?” he asked as he gathered her into his arms.

  * * *

  Much later, in bed after a more intimate reunion, Logan and Sarah made plans.

  They would live in town—at the cottage for now, and eventually in the larger house where she’d grown up. Before they moved, Logan was going to get that garage-door opener installed and hire some guys to build the breezeway from the garage to the back door. They would keep the cottage for Flo and Mack so they would have their own place in their hometown any time they wanted a break from their adventures in the Gulf.

  Neither Logan nor Sarah wanted to wait to get married. Her parents would be leaving soon and Sarah insisted the wedding had to happen before they headed south.

  “How about Monday?” she suggested.