by Jane Porter
“Have you stayed in touch with any of the folks here?”
Cade knew exactly what Larry was asking, and he shifted on the vinyl booth. “Not the way I should have.”
“Did you hear that Sally James passed a couple years ago?”
“Found out today.”
“She was a good woman.”
“Yes, she was,” Cade agreed. There were few people he’d liked as much as he’d liked Sally. She was born to nurture, and she’d been kinder to him than any of the foster-care mothers he’d known in his seven and a half years under the state’s care.
“Rachel took her passing hard,” Larry added, glancing up, staring Cade straight in the eyes.
Cade nodded. “I can imagine.”
Larry’s light blue eyes bored into his. “She hasn’t had an easy life.”
“Who?”
“Rachel.”
Gut knotting, Cade stretched his legs out under the table. “She seems like she’s doing all right now.”
“Have you seen her?”
“Yes. Today. Stopped by the house. Thought she looked great. Thinner, but still the prettiest girl in Texas.”
“So you know what’s going on with her?”
“She told me.”
Larry looked skeptical. “Doesn’t bother you?”
Cade shrugged uneasily. He didn’t want to talk about Rachel, or think about her getting married tomorrow. He was glad for her. He was. But it didn’t give him cause for celebration. “Things didn’t work out the way we’d imagined, but that’s life. You don’t always get what you want.”
Larry’s bushy gray eyebrows lifted. “Wouldn’t have pegged you for heartless, King.”
“Not heartless, just realistic. Things don’t always go as planned. So you move on and, frankly, things have worked out the way they were meant to be.”
“You sound like the rest of them, judging her. But everybody makes mistakes and Lord knows, she’s had her hands full. First with Tommy, then Sally’s cancer—”
“You’re misunderstanding me. I’m not judging her. I’m happy for her. Happy that things have turned out the way they have for her.”
“Which part makes you happy, son?” Larry asked slowly, dragging the words out.
Cade’s right hand clenched into a fist under the table. What was the point of this? What did Larry want from him? “I’m glad she’s found happiness—”
“You’re joking, right?”
Cade drew a sharp, deep breath. “Why would I joke about something like that? I care about Rachel, and I’m happy she’s getting married tomorrow, and I hope he’s a great guy. He better be a great guy—”
“Rachel’s not getting married tomorrow.”
“Yes, she is. We talked about it, and she showed me the flowers and the cake.”
Larry laughed shortly. “Rachel showed you a cake because she’s a baker. She supports herself by making cakes, works out of her home, and this cake was for Mia, who is getting married tomorrow afternoon over in Weatherford at the botanical gardens, not Rachel.”
The cake was for Mia...
It was Mia getting married, not Rachel...
Cade’s brain worked to process this information but it didn’t make sense, and he found himself frowning, feeling stupid. Something wasn’t right. “If Rachel’s not getting married, why is she moving?”
Larry didn’t immediately answer. Instead he took a big sip from his coffee cup and then slowly set the cup back down in the saucer, his expression hard and scornful as he met Cade’s troubled gaze. Silence stretched, heavy with disapproval. “Maybe, cowboy, you should ask her.”
* * *
RACHEL MOVED SOUNDLESSLY through her house, picking up a few toys, turning out a table lamp in the living room, washing up Tommy’s dessert plate and cup from his milk.
Tommy had fallen asleep earlier tonight than usual, but frankly, it was a good thing. He’d come home from Mrs. Munoz overly exhausted, stressed and needing to decompress, which for him meant opening and closing his bedroom door thirty some times. She’d tried to distract him, but it’d only made him more determined to bang, so after a while she left him to his door activity. She folded a load of laundry, and then unloaded the dishwasher, trying to stay busy, trying to stay calm, trying not to worry about Tommy or think about Cade.
But now Tommy was in bed, and the house was tidy, and the laundry put away, and she couldn’t keep Cade from intruding on her thoughts any longer.
Cade had once been her world. She’d loved him so much, and she knew he wasn’t perfect, knew he had his fair share of demons...not that he talked about them. No, Cade was private and a bit of a lone wolf. But he’d loved her and Grandma. He’d really loved Grandma, and her grandmother had loved him, too.
She opened a flat empty box and was taping the bottom when the doorbell rang. Rachel tore the tape, sealed the flaps and hurried to the front door, hoping that the doorbell wouldn’t wake up Tommy. Wondering who’d be stopping by now, Rachel peeked through the window and saw a big black pickup truck with a huge cab and lots of shiny chrome parked out front. Rachel dropped the curtain, tensing. Cade’s truck.
He was back.
Stomach knotting, she unlocked the front door. “Cade,” she said, opening the door.
His head tipped. “Rachel.”
Her heart was racing, thudding so hard her hands shook, and suddenly she couldn’t do this. Make conversation with him again. Act as though everything was all right. Everything wasn’t all right. She was exhausted, frazzled and overwhelmed, and seeing him just made it worse. Seeing him made her realize how much life had happened in the past five-plus years. How much had happened to her. She’d changed. She wasn’t the same girl he’d left behind, and there was no place in her life for him now.
And so instead of letting him into the house, she stepped out onto the porch, quietly closing the door behind her, not wanting to wake Tommy. But joining Cade on the small stoop put her in close proximity with him, reminding her with a jolt that he wasn’t just tall, but broad shouldered, lean hipped and handsome. Heartbreakingly handsome. But looks had never been his problem. Drinking was his problem. Drinking and control...or lack of.
But she didn’t want to go there, didn’t want to feel all that again. Deliberately she pushed the past away and glanced out to the street where the lamp shone yellow on Cade’s big glossy truck. “That’s a nice truck.”
“Bought it two years ago with some of the prize money, and now it’s got close to 100,000 miles on it.”
“You do a lot of driving.”
“That I do.” He hesitated, cleared his throat. “Just saw Larry Strauss. At the diner downtown.”
“How’s he?” she asked, crossing her arms tightly over her chest to keep from shivering. It was a clear night and cold, but she wasn’t going to be out here long enough to need a sweater.
“Good.” Cade paused. “But concerned about you.”
“Oh? Why?”
“He said you’re moving.”
“I’m not allowed to move?”
“But this was your grandmother’s house, and your house—”
“Not anymore.”
“She didn’t leave it to you?”
“No, Grandma did.”
“Then why would—”
Cade never finished. He couldn’t because he was cut off by a piercing shriek from inside the house.
Rachel threw open the door, racing inside to Tommy, who stood in the middle of
the hallway in his pajamas.
“Ma! Ma!” he screamed, even as she crouched in front of him.
“Hey, Tommy, Momma’s here. It’s okay.” She tried to smooth his dark hair back from his forehead but he flinched and pulled away.
“Ma.” He batted her hand away.
“Did you have a bad dream?”
But he wasn’t listening to her. He was looking past her to Cade, who’d followed Rachel inside.
“Man,” he said, staring at Cade.
She glanced over her shoulder, her stomach falling. Cade’s jaw had dropped. He looked stunned. She swallowed hard, wishing none of this was happening. “That’s Mommy’s friend. Cade. Cade King.”
Tommy shook his head. He didn’t like strangers, and he especially didn’t like them in his home. “Go.”
“Tommy, can you say hi to Mr. King?”
“Man. Go. Leave.”
“That’s not nice,” she rebuked gently, reaching up and trying once again to soothe him by smoothing a fistful of hair off his brow. This time he let her, and her palm lingered on top of his head, his hair silky smooth and reminding her of rich, dark chocolate.
“Leave,” he insisted, pointing at Cade. “Go. Leave.” Then he pushed her hand away and ran back to his room.
Rachel watched him go, heart heavy, before standing and looking at Cade, her lips curving in a tight smile. “And that was my son, Thomas James.” Her gaze met Cade’s and held. “And no, he’s not yours. He’s four and a half. He’ll be five in July.”
Then she, too, walked away, but headed in the opposite direction, going to her kitchen where she pushed in the chairs around the small kitchen table, the legs scraping the old linoleum floor, and knocked an imaginary crumb off the scratched table surface.
Cade entered the kitchen, too, but she ignored him, continuing to straighten things that didn’t need straightening, but it was better than looking at Cade and seeing whatever it was he was thinking.
“He has developmental delays,” she said jerkily, adjusting the faded terry-cloth dish towel hanging on the handle fronting the old oven. “Autism. Which isn’t actually a single disorder, but a spectrum of closely related disorders—” She broke off, took another breath. “And he doesn’t mean to be rude. He just doesn’t have strong verbal skills.”
“That’s all right.”
She heard his flat tone and shot Cade a quick glance. He looked pale, almost sick, and she looked away just as swiftly. It’d been so difficult getting Tommy diagnosed...none of the Mineral Wells doctors agreed on his exact diagnosis. Obviously Tommy had PDD, pervasive developmental disorder, but was it classical autism or autism with Asperger’s syndrome, or PDD-NOS? “People don’t understand that he has special needs. He’s not a bad boy, and he’s not a problem. He just gets agitated easily. Overwhelmed by change and too much stimuli. Kind of a sensory overload.”
“You don’t have to explain to me. I wouldn’t judge him or criticize him.”
Her head jerked up again, and her eyes searched his. She knew Cade had had problems, knew he’d gotten in plenty of trouble growing up, and wished she could believe him. But she didn’t. Couldn’t. Her shoulders twisted. “You wouldn’t like how he acts in public. You’d say he was out of control. And you know, he does get out of control. He’ll throw something in a store—a can of soup or frozen orange juice—and it’ll hit someone or something, or he’ll knock over a display and send a hundred packages of toilet paper all over the store. And you’d be like everyone else. ‘Why don’t you give that boy some discipline?’ It’s embarrassing, but it’s not his fault. He didn’t ask to be born this way—” She stopped, gasping for breath, horrified to discover she was close to tears. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I’m tired. It’s been a long day.”
Cade didn’t say anything and after a long moment Rachel glanced at him. He was leaning against one of the counters, big arms bracing his weight, his jaw set, his brow furrowed, his gaze resting on the cardboard box she’d just begun to pack, looking every inch the bull-riding champion he was. Not just All-Around champion, but a bull-riding champion, too. In the past seven years he’d won four national bull-riding titles in one of the world’s most dangerous sports. Four. The man was fearless. Tough as nails. Stronger than anyone she’d ever met, but also more dangerous, too.
“Where’s his dad?” he asked roughly.
“Not in the picture.”
“Why not?”
She drew a ragged breath. “His dad didn’t want him.”
Cade was slow to respond and hot emotion rolled through her, blistering her heart. “But that’s okay,” she said fiercely, “because I do. And I love him. I love him more than anything in this world and he is perfect to me. Absolutely perfect and just the way God intended him to be.”
His lips curved but his eyes were shadowed. “I bet Sally doted on him,” he said quietly.
Rachel blinked back tears. “Loved him to pieces.”
He nodded once, as if thinking. “So if Sally left you the house, and this is where you’re raising your boy, why are you moving, Rache?” he asked, looking up at her, his voice gentle.
“I couldn’t pay the property taxes.” There, she’d said it. Now he knew. She didn’t feel much better, but the truth was out in the open. “So we lost the house.”
“The taxes couldn’t have been much—”
“Grandma had deferred taxes for eight years, and even though it’s deferred, you’re accumulating interest and fines, and a little bit of money turns into a lot of money. By the time it was brought to my attention...” Her voice faded and she shook her head, sickened all over again by her inability to save her home. “It was too late.”
“Let me pay the taxes for you, Rachel.”
Of course this was what he’d say. This had always been Cade’s way. Cade was generous to a fault, and she knew he’d help her. Cade liked helping people. Cade had once loved being the good guy...rushing in, playing hero, being Mr. Wonderful—and he was Mr. Wonderful, he could be incredibly wonderful—until he started craving his buddy Jack Daniel’s again. “You can’t,” she said huskily. “I don’t own the house anymore. That’s why we’re moving.”
“Who bought the house? And how much did they pay you for it?”
She blinked, but couldn’t hide the tears. “Some company in Fort Worth bought it. But they didn’t pay me—they paid the county. Turns out all they had to do was go in and pay all the back taxes on Grandma’s house, and the house became theirs.” She put a hand to her mouth, fighting to hang on to her composure. And then when she was sure she could speak without falling apart, she added, “That’s why we’re moving. Another family is moving in middle of the month.”
“So they got Sally’s house for what...twenty-five thousand? Thirty?”
“Twenty and some change.” She laughed even as she cried, because it was ludicrous—it was. And Larry Strauss had offered to help her. Mia’s parents had wanted to help her. Even Mrs. Munoz had tried to give her some money but she couldn’t take it. Not from any of them. She was proud, and it was a fault of hers, but she couldn’t bear to go through life pitied and whispered and talked about. It was better to lose the house and maintain some self-respect, than take loans from people she’d never be able to pay back.
“You told me earlier today that everything had worked out the way things were meant to work out.” Cade’s voice was hard. “But that’s not true—”
“Yes, it is.” Rachel jerked her chin up. “I have Tommy and I love being a mom
and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Chapter Three
Cade drove the deserted back roads to his ranch as if the devil pursued him. It was reckless driving, but then his thoughts were reckless, too. Fortunately it was late, and the moon was high, casting bright winter light across the dark pastures and clusters of oak and elm trees.
Cade knew these back roads well, and he drove with his foot heavy on the accelerator. With its V-8 engine, his truck could fly and it flew now.
He’d told himself five years ago he was leaving her for the right reasons. He’d told himself he was walking because he wanted a different life...a better life than the one he had with Rachel.
But it wasn’t true.
He’d walked away from her out of laziness. Selfishness. He’d left her because he hadn’t wanted to change. He’d left to send her a message that he wasn’t about to let her start controlling him. He’d had enough of that growing up, being bounced around from home to home in foster care, and he was done being dictated to. Done having people tell him who he was supposed to be and how he was supposed to behave. Done being criticized and marginalized. He was a man and he was going to succeed his way, on his terms.
And so he left Rachel, sure that it’d been the right thing to do—for her, and himself—and for the next couple of years he’d lived his life his way...drinking too much sometimes, getting some success on the circuit, winning some big events only to lose others. He was always hurt or rehabilitating—part of the life of a professional rodeo cowboy—and alcohol helped ease the pain. He drank to medicate himself. Drank to help himself sleep. Drank to help himself forget.
But drunk, he thought of Rachel. Sober, he thought of Rachel.
Rachel became his demon, and he vowed he’d excise his demon once and for all.
And he thought he had, until he’d sat in one of those damn AA meetings two years ago November and thought about the people he’d hurt with his drinking, and Rachel was top of the list. But she was the one person he couldn’t go to. The one person he couldn’t face. Not because she didn’t deserve an apology, but because he didn’t want to see her.
