A Cowboy for Christmas

by Rachel Lee

  “You ever heard of a war of attrition?” he asked.

  “Vaguely.”

  “He who lasts the longest wins. Take no prisoners, and all that.”

  Her heart skipped. She didn’t know if she liked the sound of this. “What are you going to do?”

  “Nothing I don’t have to. Let me put it this way. I’m far more successful than Stella’s ever been. Last time I tried to play fair, and I’m still furious that the judge was so biased against men. This time I’m not counting on justice to be blind. She wants a fight? By the time I get done, she and her lawyers are going to be in the poorhouse.”

  Then he grabbed the cordless phone, punched in a number and went out to the living room. She could hear him talking and soon gathered he was speaking to his lawyer.

  Man, she thought, she wouldn’t want to get on Rory’s bad side. On the other hand, trying to take his daughter away? Maybe Stella deserved everything she got.

  By early afternoon, the sky had grown leaden and the wind was blowing strongly enough to rattle windows and keen around the corners of the house. No rain or snow yet, but there was little doubt there’d be some.

  Abby made them both sandwiches, and Rory ate his with one hand while he continued pacing and talking with his lawyer. A lawyer who was available on Saturday. She supposed that said something else about Rory’s power in the world. Or his nature, that his lawyer would work for him on weekends. They actually sounded like friends and allies from what she could hear.

  Not that she tried to listen. It was really none of her business, and she guessed Rory would tell her what he wanted her to know. She put in her earbuds, stuffed his CD into the player on the laptop and listened to that haunting melody to block out what was undoubtedly a private conversation.

  She paused to make another pot of coffee, to fuel whatever he was doing, and he gave her a faint smile and a thumbs-up. She managed to return his smile and went back to blindly surfing the web. She was here if he needed anything. Much as she hurt for him, it seemed to be all she could do.

  She was feeling helpless again, the way she had when Porter said he was leaving. Nothing she could do or say would change a thing.

  A couple of hours later, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Rory replace the cordless set in the charger. She quit pretending she was fascinated by something online, pulled out her earbuds and looked up. He seemed to have relaxed quite a bit, but still had an air of determination as he poured more coffee for both of them.

  “Any better?” she asked.

  “Much. Do you want the dirty details?”

  She hesitated, then tried to joke, hoping to leaven his mood. “As long as it doesn’t involve contract killings.”

  He actually laughed. “Good one. No, it doesn’t. But the digging has begun.”

  “Digging?” She closed the computer and pushed it to the side. “As in?”

  “As in I’ve known for a long time about some of the things Stella does on the road. Drinking, drugs, sleeping around, stuff like that. Whether she knows it or not, even her roadies gossip. A good reason to behave yourself whenever you’re not completely alone.”

  Abby drew a sharp breath. “And I felt exposed after the divorce.”

  “Nothing like I could expose about Stella.”

  One question rose to the forefront of her mind, one that battered her for an answer. She needed to know about Rory. She hesitated, biting her lip, then dared to ask, “But you don’t do those things?”

  “Not since I had my epiphany. So for me, you have to go back to before Regina was born to get any dirt. For her you only have to go back to last month. Do you think I’m loathsome?”

  She thought it over. On the one hand, it didn’t sound like a nice thing to do. On the other... “No. Not if it will protect Regina.”

  He nodded. “That’s how I feel. Anyway, it’s not my intent to expose her. When we divorced, my lawyer insisted I get some private investigators. They got a thick file on her, but I refused to use it. So my lawyer is going back to the investigators to get all the new stuff in sworn statements in case I need them.”

  “And then your lawyer will threaten her?”

  Rory shook his head. “He can’t do that. It’d be extortion. I can’t exactly do that either for the same reason. But there are ways to let her know that we know without demanding anything. We go public with it only if we have to prove in court that she’s unfit.”

  Abby thought it over, amazed by the tortuous reasoning. “A threat that’s not a threat? I don’t exactly get it.”

  “Neither do I. Basically my lawyer said that he’d just let her people know that he’s trying very hard to convince me not to take this information to court because it would be bad for Regina.” His face darkened. “And it would. God, that’s why I didn’t do it before. I didn’t even mention it. I hope to heaven she’s smart enough to back off.”

  His hands clenched and whatever relaxation he’d achieved vanished in an instant. “I hate this. I absolutely hate this. I don’t want to let Regina go back to her and that lifestyle because she says she was miserable, but I don’t want to drag my daughter’s mother through the mud.”

  Abby understood his feelings. It wasn’t difficult. On the one hand he needed to protect his daughter. On the other, he might have to do something awful in order to protect her. Rock and a hard place of a kind she could scarcely imagine. “You know,” she said finally, staring at the tabletop, “from the outside looking in, you seem to lead a charmed life.”

  He gave a short bark that didn’t quite make a laugh. “Right. I know.”

  “I guess everyone has problems, huh? And this is an especially hurtful and ugly one. I wish I could help.”

  “You have. You listened. And you didn’t tell me what a dog I am to even consider what I’m considering.”

  She met his gaze. “It’s ugly, yes, but I can understand wanting what’s best for Regina. You didn’t put yourself in this position.”

  “Didn’t I? I got Stella pregnant and married her. I was just too besotted to know the trouble I was buying.”

  She rested her cheek in her hand, looking into herself, as well. “Aren’t we all?”

  For the first time that day, he genuinely smiled. “Point taken.”

  “Sometimes,” she said quietly, “when I’m really, really honest with myself, I know that marrying Porter was a mistake. I dropped out of college, I’d only known him a short time and I was too much in love to wonder about the kind of man he was. And in those really honest moments I realize that the signs were there.”

  “Such as?”

  “He didn’t always treat me very well. He wasn’t abusive, but he was selfish. I always excused it. But one of my girlfriends said something a few years ago when she was dating that made me think...although not hard enough at the time. But I think about it now.”

  “What was that?”

  “That she wanted a man who thought the sun rose and set in her eyes. I thought it was a silly, romantic notion, but looking back I think she had it right. It won’t be like that every single minute, but it should be like that at least some of the time.”

  He stood abruptly. “Willing to brave the weather with me?”

  She stared at him. “What?”

  “Come out with me to the barn. What you just said... I need to noodle around an idea. If you don’t mind.”

  She gathered up her cold-weather gear, figuring that working on his music might soothe him. He needed some soothing. So did she, come to that. She’d been hurting for herself for so long now it was surprising that she had anything left to feel for someone else’s anguish. But feel it she did. Her own problems seemed awfully trivial compared to this. After all, she’d only lost a lying, cheating husband and her self-esteem. Rory could lose his daughter, and Regina could be taken from the father she clearl
y loved. That put Porter’s conduct into cold perspective and made her own reaction seem small and maybe even petty.

  Yes, the man had hurt her. Yes, he’d shamed her. Yes, he’d said horrid things about her. But that was a far cry from taking her child. The things Porter had taken from her could be regained if she’d just stop wallowing. Rory and Regina were in a very different position.

  She met Rory on the back porch and saw that snow had begun to fly. The wind whipped the ends of her wool scarf around.

  “I’m reconsidering,” he said. “Maybe it would be best for you to stay here.”

  Her heart plummeted. The last thing in the world she wanted right now was to be alone with her own thoughts. She’d spend the whole time working up a real head of steam and worry about Regina. And she might as well admit she wanted to be with Rory, dangerous though it might be.

  He continued speaking. “If that snow gets much heavier, we won’t need a whole lot of it in this wind to create a whiteout. I love my studio, but being stuck in it indefinitely wouldn’t be the most comfortable thing.”

  “Okay,” she said, trying to get her stomach to stop dropping.

  He turned his head. “I’ll be right back. The main thing I want is my guitar and a digital recorder. Easy enough to carry. You get back inside and stay warm.”

  He jumped down the steps and loped toward the barn. Rally ran with him. Abby didn’t go right inside though, not until he disappeared through the door.

  He was coming back. The relief she felt overwhelmed her, idiotic or not.

  * * *

  When she’d gone shopping the last time, she had picked up a few things that she could make dinner with at the last minute, just in case. She decided this was going to be an “in case” day. Rory was wound up on rage, fear and worry, and she was doing only slightly better.

  But it was too early to cook, so she went to sit in the living room and wait for whatever came. He rejoined her only fifteen minutes later, bringing cold into the room with him along with his guitar case and a small digital recorder.

  He set the case beside the piano, and after wiping the recorder he placed it on top. “This’ll probably be boring,” he said frankly. “You don’t have to hang if you’d rather do something else. When an idea first starts emerging, it can bounce all over the place.”

  “Okay,” she answered, though she felt no desire to do anything else. She’d been welcomed into his creative process for the second time, and she didn’t undervalue the invitation.

  To her surprise, he didn’t immediately bring out his guitar. Instead he sat at the piano and began running his hands lightly over the keys, a rippling waterfall of sound. But then it changed. As if the anger in him took over, the room was suddenly filled with loud, discordant notes. She could feel the rage and discontent and shrank a little in her chair as the music nearly battered her.

  She didn’t object, though. He was lucky to have such an expressive outlet. She could have used a few of her own, ones that would release her pain and anger without harming anyone. Sometimes she wanted to break something, but even as the urge surged in her, she swallowed it. Rory wasn’t breaking a thing, but he was sure expressing the desire to.

  As abruptly as it started, it ended. The notes quieted down, lost their discordance, began to slide away into something gentler. He spoke as he played.

  “Do you trust like you used to?” he asked.

  “No,” she admitted. “It’s only now that I’m starting to trust my friends again.”

  “Why did they lose your trust?” Notes kept spilling from the piano, beginning to reach a melody that was pleasant to the ears.

  “Because I think they knew what Porter was doing and didn’t tell me.”

  He nodded and played for another few minutes. Occasionally she got the feeling that he had stopped some through-line in the melody and started in a slightly different direction. “What would you have felt if they told you? Would it have helped?”

  She felt the vise of old grief grip her again. “I don’t know.” All of a sudden it seemed hard to breathe, but she didn’t want to let her own pain resurface. Rory had more important things on his mind, justifiably so.

  “I don’t know, either. But maybe they thought they were protecting you. Maybe they thought Porter would cut it out and return to you. Why hurt you unnecessarily?”

  “That’s possible,” she agreed.

  He glanced her way as he continued to summon notes from the keyboard. “It’s possible,” he repeated, his blue gaze intent. “It’s even likely if they’re good friends. But that doesn’t change the trust issue, does it.”

  “No.” She sucked air, hoping to ease the tightness that threatened to suffocate her.

  “Betrayal is a hard thing to get past,” he remarked, returning his attention to something only he could see. Now he seemed to be feeling his way through the music he played. Notes sounded more tentative. “When it’s one or two people, you stop trusting them. When it’s a whole lot of people, you stop trusting everyone.”

  That was so true. She drew another shaky breath. “What about you?” she asked.

  “I find it hard to trust anyone anymore. A few people I’ve known for a very long time, but most people? Nah.” He shook his head a little, and the music changed again. “That’s one of the ways I’ve changed since I left here, and I’m not real happy about it. I don’t think I can ever get back there though, to that boy.”

  Now the quality of her pain changed. She ached for him yet again. So much lost innocence in this room, and she suspected he had lost more than she.

  Presently he spoke again. “There’ve been people in my life that I really cared about. Deeply.” The music took a more somber tone. “Then one day they did something beyond the pale. It sometimes amazes me when I look back to realize that it’s possible for your heart to go utterly cold and empty. For love to turn to complete indifference in an instant. I can’t explain it any better than that. It’s like something dies between one moment and the next, and you know it’ll never resurrect. It’s gone for good.”

  “I could use a bit of that.”

  He glanced her way. “Still pining for Porter?”

  “No.”

  “Then maybe it happened. Maybe it’s not love for Porter that’s got you tied up in knots. Maybe it’s the other stuff.”

  She thought that over and realized he was right. If she closed her eyes, she could think back to the shaft of agony that had speared her when he told her he was leaving. But she also remembered something else, the moment when everything inside her turned cold as ice. The instant when she had ceased to love him. It had happened fast, and soon vanished in all the other pains she dealt with, but her love for that man had been gone. In that instant, their argument had ended. She had stopped trying to hang on to him. Stopped arguing with his insults.

  She had ceased to care. She had turned from him and walked into their bedroom and begun to pack. Yes, the things he said haunted her because she feared they might be true. Yes, she felt humiliated and betrayed in front of the whole world. Yes, future dreams had gone up in smoke. But Porter? There wasn’t a cell left in her that gave a damn about him.

  She opened her eyes and realized Rory was watching her. “You okay?” he asked.

  “Thank you. You’re right. It died, and it died fast when it did.”

  He nodded and returned his attention to the piano. “Feel freer now?”

  She did. She couldn’t explain what had just happened. Maybe all the humiliation and anguish she’d been through hadn’t come from still loving Porter. Maybe it was, as he’d said, other stuff. And if that was the case, she felt that she’d be able to deal with it better if she didn’t tell herself she was still carrying a torch. Whatever grieving she was still doing, it wasn’t over Porter.

  “Always amazes me when that happens, when
I realize someone’s been cut out of my heart forever.” He stopped playing. “I want some coffee.”

  “I’ll get it.”

  “We can both go get it. I need to move, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you do, too. Sitting around listening to me noodle a piano isn’t exactly exciting.”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” she answered as she stood. “I feel like I’ve been over all kinds of mountains and valleys of emotions. I knew music was evocative, but I’ve never experienced it like this.”

  He gave her a half smile. “It was hard on the ears at first.”

  “You were angry. I was thinking how lucky you are to have a way to express it. I sometimes want to smash things.”

  “Do you?” he arched a brow.

  “Never. What’s the point?”

  He laughed quietly and they walked together into the kitchen. “And I never got around to working on that idea that was coming to me after we talked earlier. But it’s still tucked in the back of my brain. It’ll come when it’s ready.”

  She looked out the kitchen window and realized that snow had taken over the day. It was dark out there, and the mountains had utterly disappeared. Rory filled their mugs, but before they could move, the phone rang.

  Abby automatically started to move toward it, but Rory grabbed it first. “Maybe my lawyer,” he explained.

  Then she heard him say, “Regina? Are you having a good time?” Silence, then in an anger-laced voice, “She called you and said what?”

  Abby took her cup and went to her apartment, leaving the door open a few inches. She desperately wanted to know what had happened, but figured she had no right to be nosy. Despite all that Rory had shared with her that day, she needed to respect whatever privacy he chose to maintain.

  She turned the rocker around so she could look out her window, marveling at the way the entire world seemed to have disappeared. Except for a telephone, it might have stayed gone for a while.