by Ann Major
“Hey, you have a gift. Don’t belittle it.”
She smiled.
“So, what are you doing exactly?”
“I catch the foals with a rope and then gently teach them to be led. Once they’ve got that, I kneel and teach them to yield their feet to me, first the front ones and then the hind ones.” She stopped, feeling a little shy about her enthusiasm. “I—I don’t know why I love doing it so much.”
“I think sometimes we’re simply born to do certain things. Unfortunately some of us never find what those things are.”
“When I’m with the horses, I feel complete, happy even, hopeful. I forget about Octavio Morales and all the horrible stories that are being written about me and him.”
Since her family was so famous, at least in Texas, every day there was a fresh story in some newspaper about the charges made against Mia in Mexico or about the fact that Cole had married both sisters. Detailed articles with legal arguments were constantly printed about which sister was really Cole’s wife. Then there were the more salacious news stories that speculated she’d had a torrid love affair with Tavio.
“I keep worrying that some of my friends and family will believe I did those awful things.”
“You can’t control what other people think, so don’t torture yourself trying to.”
“Tell that to the talking heads on the television and the reporters besieging the ranch and jamming our phone lines.”
He frowned. “I know it’s hard now, but it will die down.”
“I just hate the thought of people reading and listening to those stories and believing I’m such an evil person.”
“Fortunately most people have short memories and an even shorter attention span.”
Although his eyes were kind and his voice reassuring, she knew he’d been working overtime because of all the problems her homecoming had caused him. He had the ranch’s PR machine in high gear. He’d made himself available to be interviewed for countless articles and shows, and his quotes and appearances were usually the only rational defense of her conduct in the scandalous pieces written or broadcast about her.
“Thank you for all you’ve done,” she said.
“You ready to sign some papers?” Leo pulled his glasses out of his pocket and put them on.
“That’s why I flew up.”
He leaned down and opened his briefcase.
“Being alive again is turning out to be more incredibly complicated than I ever would have believed possible.”
“We’ll get over these hurdles. Luckily Cole is being very fair about the inheritance issues.”
Her will had been read over a year ago, and her properties had passed to others, mainly to Cole. Since then, Cole had sold and bought both land and stock. Thus, all sorts of legal compromises were being worked out between them. Documents, which would return legal title to most of her former holdings to her, were being drawn up. The whole process would take months to sort out. Cole would keep the stock she’d given him as part of the arrangement they’d worked out when he’d agreed to marry her.
“I won’t work for Caesar Kemble without at least owning some stock in the Golden Spurs,” Cole had said before agreeing to marry her.
Caesar had been apoplectic when he’d discovered a Knight owned stock in the Golden Spurs. Her relationship had been strained with her father until the plane crash. Now she would never know if he would have ever forgiven her.
Leo set a fat stack of documents with little yellow tags on certain pages and a blue pen in front of her.
“Flip to the tagged pages and sign at the red arrows,” he said. “It won’t take long.”
“What about that awful Comandante Guillermo Gonzales? Can he really extradite me and make me stand trial in Mexico the way he brags in the newspapers?”
“In his dreams.”
They’d had this conversation several times because she tended to panic every time she read any of Gonzales’s threats.
“Not unless he kidnaps you,” Leo continued. “I told you we’ve got a legal team in Juarez. But the main thing is for you to stay out of Mexico.”
“I have no wish to go back other than the fact I keep wondering what happened to this girl I befriended…Delia. I got her into trouble, and I keep worrying….” She remembered Tavio saying Delia was dead.
“Well, worry all you want to in the States. You’d just get yourself in trouble if you went down there.”
She fell silent at that, so she tackled the pages with the blue pen. Leo was right. Signing the papers didn’t take long.
When she was done, Leo said, “Good. I’d better get to the office.” He slid his glasses off and put them in his pocket. “When you’re ready, we’ll drive you and Gus to the airport.”
Dallas, Texas
As he climbed onto Hurricane, Shanghai’s riding hand hurt so bad he was afraid it was broken. Because of Mia, he’d lost his temper and rammed his fist full-force into his motel-room door this morning.
Shanghai nodded. When the chute banged open, Hurricane jumped and then immediately started spinning and bucking. Ignoring his pain, Shanghai moved with the plunging bull as gracefully as a dancer. Not that every twist of the monster didn’t send white-hot darts of agony up his riding arm. But hell, he preferred physical misery to what he’d felt at breakfast when he’d read all about Mia and Morales.
At the end of eight seconds, when the horn blared, Shanghai raised a leg and jumped off easily, landing on his feet. Then he turned his back on the bull, daring the bull to charge him and walked toward the rails. As bullfighters ran toward the infuriated bull, the crowd erupted in thundering applause.
He stopped to wait for the score, hoping their approval would revitalize him.
“You’re not gonna see a ride any better than that in this century!” The announcer’s voice was shrill with excitement. “Shanghai’s score is 92, which puts him ahead of everybody. He’s either the best! Or he’s one lucky son-of-a-gun!”
The crowd screamed and hooted for Shanghai.
Looking up from the thousands of faces to the scoreboard, he felt nothing—no emotion, absolutely nothing—except maybe gratitude that he’d gotten off another monster with all his favorite body parts intact.
Even the little kids and the pretty girls gazing out at him tonight from the stands with their wide, awe-filled eyes did nothing to fill the emptiness inside him.
What was wrong with him? He’d felt dead ever since he’d left Mia at the Golden Spurs.
The fans kept on clapping and yelling, but the only thing screaming in his head were the damning words he’d read about Mia and her drug lord.
Smiling, a cowgirl ran up to him and pressed a business card, that probably had her phone number, in his shirt pocket. She winked coyly. In disgust, he held his injured riding hand against his chest and headed for the locker rooms.
He was thirty-nine. Too old for the same old games he’d always played.
When he strode into the locker room, his buddies all shut up. Looking sullen, Zach grabbed his rigging bag and headed past him, slamming out the door without bothering to even meet his gaze or speak.
Ever since Shanghai had lost his temper yesterday, his buddies were wary around him. For a second or two they all just stared. Then they looked away, not knowing what to do or say.
Shanghai heaved in a thick breath. Things had started to get awkward in the locker room ever since he and Mia and Morales had become big stars on television and in the newspapers. Finally yesterday Zach had made the mistake of asking why anybody cared how many times a no-good bastard like Morales had screwed the rich-bitch heiress during her captivity.
Shanghai had jumped him and had slammed him into a locker, yelling at him not to talk like that about her.
“What’s she to you?”
“Nothing. I just don’t like hearing lies about her. That’s all.”
It had taken four of their friends, including Wolf, to pull him off and calm him down.
Wolf grabbed a be
er out of the cooler and walked up to him.
“Great ride, cowboy.”
Shanghai shrugged. “I got lucky.”
“What else matters?” Dakota’s glum tone reminded Shanghai that the kid had been suffering a run of bad luck for the past two years.
“Where you goin’ next, Shanghai?” Robby wanted to know.
“Nebraska,” he replied, feeling strangely bleak at the thought.
Dakota hunched lower over his beer, not drinking or talking to the rest of them.
“Nebraska’s an awful long way from Texas,” Wolf said, sidling closer. He lowered his voice. “Have you been back to see your little girl yet?”
Shanghai squinted as he stared down at the beer bubbles racing up the side of his brown bottle. Then he hunched lower.
“You ever going to see her?”
“You know what our problem is, Wolf?”
Wolf glanced at him questioningly. “Didn’t know we had one—other than you being a wuss sometimes.”
“You’re not a cowboy. You don’t follow the rules.”
“Which are?”
“Cowboys don’t pry. And they don’t give unwanted advice.”
“You don’t say? They probably don’t complain, either, but on another tack—you know that truck you sold me last week—”
“That was an as-is deal.”
“The transmission’s slipping.”
“You knew it had over two hundred thousand miles on it. I said no guarantees. So it’s your baby now. Look, I’m not in the mood for this! Like you said, Nebraska’s a long way, so I’d better hustle.” Shanghai stuffed his chaps and rope in his riggin’ bag and waved goodbye.
“Not so fast,” Wolf said, following him. “What are you going to do about your kid?”
“I started sending Mia a check. Not that it’s any of your business.”
“That’s it? That’s all you think there is to being a daddy?”
No, he didn’t think that was it! That’s just what was eating at him! “Would you shut up about her?”
“Man, if you don’t quit being a wuss and go down and meet her, you’re gonna be sorry—”
“Mia and Vanilla…they’re not my family.” Shanghai spoke through tight lips. “Not really. I’ve been giving this a lot of thought. I’d best let them go.”
“You’ve been giving this a lot of thought…and this is the best you can do? Jesus! I knew you bull riders had to be a dumb bunch, but this takes the cake!”
“I’m outta here! Like I said, I don’t have to take this! You’re a trainer! Not a therapist! You’re fired!”
“Which means I’ll see you in Nebraska. Only I’m flying, buddy.”
Shanghai was too furious to reply. He kicked a bench out of his way, and headed for the door. When he reached it, Dakota Post was there first, to open it for him.
“Thanks.”
“I know I already owe you plenty, Shanghai,” he muttered in a low voice meant only for Shanghai’s ears when they were alone in the corridor.
“I told you not to worry about it.”
“But Melly…She’s pregnant again.”
“Congratulations.”
“And the bank’s going to repossess the trailer…”
Dakota had had a bad wreck on a rank bull two months ago and hadn’t won any prize money since.
“I know you lent me all that money toward my hospital bills and I haven’t paid—”
“How much do you need?”
“A few hundred I guess.”
Shanghai threw his gear down and pulled his wallet out of his back pocket. Quickly he counted out five one hundred dollar bills and laid them across Dakota’s palm.
“You hang in there. Your luck’ll turn. Sooner or later it always does.”
“Thanks. I’ll repay you…as soon as I can.”
“Sure.” Shanghai patted him on the shoulder. Then he picked up his gear and started for the parking lot, but no sooner was Shanghai outside the locker room, than a small voice stopped him.
“Can I have your autograph?”
Another kid came up to join his friend, and Shanghai knelt in the dust, signing their programs until the last skinny kid in a belt buckle and hat too big for him ran off, waving his program.
At last Shanghai stood up. Instead of picking up his gear, he pulled Vanilla’s picture out of his pocket and studied it. It was the one where she was halfway down her red slide, and her blue eyes were alight with excitement.
She was so damn cute she tore his heart out.
Carefully, so as not to bend it, he replaced the picture. Then feeling lonelier than ever, he headed for the parking lot.
When he got to his truck and started the engine, Mia started haunting him. He shrugged, hating the way he’d been obsessing about her lately. But just like always, she refused to let him go.
He remembered how her skin had glowed golden in the lamplight as she’d bathed herself in the cabin. She’d felt so good on top of him, too. He remembered the feel of her pulse beating soundlessly against his skin. She’d been so soft and hot, so sinfully lush and wet with her legs wide-open to him. She’d been so tight when he’d been inside her, too. And, oh how sassily she’d pestered him when they’d been trying to hitch a ride the next day because she’d felt so ashamed of herself for being so sexy.
Images of her as a kid consumed him, as well. He saw her bright head under the wheel of her daddy’s truck right before he’d jumped to save her. He’d been so scared, he’d thought he’d die. He saw her laughing up at him as she petted Spot. He remembered her huge, whiskey-colored eyes shining with concern for him as he lay sprawled underneath her dining-room table after Caesar had slugged him.
But it was funny—how most of all he remembered how good he’d felt filling up on homemade biscuits while sitting across the Williamses’ kitchen table from her.
What would it be like to wake up every morning and know they’d share breakfast together? At their own kitchen table? Or talk about the day they planned to have together? Maybe they’d sit on one of the swings on his shady porches and drink iced tea on a summer day. What would it be like to have a normal life and settle down with a family?
So far this season, he’d driven ninety thousand miles. The underside of his left wrist was callused because he mainly drove with his left hand. Maybe Wolf had a slight point about the mental acuity of those who wore Stetsons. His life was passing him by.
Mia hadn’t phoned him once since he’d left with Abby. He knew because he checked his cell phone for messages at least twice a day. Maybe she was as dead-set on forgetting him as he was on forgetting her.
“Maybe that’s for the best!” he yelled.
Not that anybody heard him.
If you’re not careful, you’ll end up all alone.
“Maybe that’s for the best, too!”
Closing his eyes, he clenched the steering wheel harder, but it was impossible to stop the sudden surge of regret. Mia had always adored him and chased him, and he’d taken it as his due. Never had he appreciated her.
Hell. Had he ever asked her to love him? He didn’t owe her a damn thing.
You owe the kid, though.
Shanghai caught himself.
What was he doing sitting here in a Dallas parking lot wasting his time thinking about Mia or the kid when he had a rodeo to get to in Nebraska?
As Wolf sprinted for his truck, he passed a rusted-out pickup parked in a lonely spot and instantly got a bad vibe. He stopped to look around. Not that he saw anything to worry about other than the lights being out in this section of the lot.
A full moon hung from a starless, black sky. Not that he was one for views, or art, or pretty sights of any sort. He wouldn’t have noticed the moon tonight except he felt spooked, and paying attention was a defense strategy.
When he reached his truck, which was parked in a lonely spot and got out his keys, two men rushed him from behind. They blew into him so hard and fast, he was thrown into the gravel gasping. He managed
only a single, well-placed kick into one of the bastard’s balls.
The man groaned and dropped a machine gun. As Wolf grabbed the gun, a flashlight beamed into his face. He aimed the gun at the light, which went out instantly. Blinded, he heard frantic Spanish curses and caught Morales’s name.
This was a hit. The bastards had deliberately staked out his truck.
Scrambling backward, Wolf punched his panic button, causing his truck alarm to blare. At the blast of noise the bastards took off. Wolf sprang to his feet and raced after them. He was built like a barrel, all muscle, but short legs. They were skinnier, lighter and way faster.
Within seconds he heard their squealing tires.
Cowards.
His hand tightened around the machine gun as he walked back to his new truck. Who the hell were those slimeballs?
Why him?
“The whole thing is simply incredible.” Mia shut the scrapbook.
She meant the scandal about Cherry and her father and Cherry’s murder as well as her father’s murder. She still couldn’t believe that Uncle Jack and not Caesar was her real biological father.
“I can’t believe Sam, of all people, could kill anybody. And believe me, I should be a judge of murderers after this past year.”
Joanne didn’t smile. “He burned down the barn and the old aviary. I lost a few of my darlings. Fortunately Cole went in and slashed the screens and drove most of them out. He saved the horses, too.”
They were sitting across a library table by the window that overlooked the playground Cole had built for Vanilla. Between reading the newspaper clippings that had to do with last year’s scandals and thumbing through old photographs of Uncle Jack, Mia and her mother had watched Vanilla run about the lawn and swing with Sy’rai.
At the moment Sy’rai was pushing her in a swing and Vanilla was yelling, “Wheeeeee!”
“She’s got so much energy,” Mia said.
“Oh, she’s a handful. Just like you were. It’s just a matter of channeling the energy in the right direction.”
They were silent for a little while. Then her mother took her hand. “It’s been so difficult trying to make you understand about Jack. I grew up loving him and admiring him. Then he was gone. You’re so much like him. I think that’s why I’ve always loved you so much. You’re all I have left of him.”
