by Lisa Jackson
Jenner tore the letter from the envelope, scanned the contents, and let out a long, low whistle. His face drained of color, but the line of his jaw was still rock hard and defiant. “Jesus,” he whispered, and it sounded like a prayer.
“I didn’t drive across the state to lie to you, Jenner. Why would I? Believe me, my life was much simpler without you.”
A quiet cough caught her attention, and for the first time since Jenner had stormed into the house, Beth remembered her mother. Great. Just what she needed. “Listen,” she said stiffly, “why don’t you come in and meet my mother, Harriet Forrester.”
Jenner lifted his head and his gaze touched Harriet’s for just a second. “Excuse us,” he said and drew Beth out onto the porch. “I don’t think we need an audience.”
“My mother knows the whole story.”
“Well, then she’s one step ahead of me, isn’t she?” His lips barely moved but his nostrils flared with a single-minded fury. “I think you’d better tell me all of your little story, starting at the beginning.”
“I tried to earlier.”
“I know. I wasn’t in the mood.”
“And now you are?”
The fingers around her arm tightened just a fraction as if he wanted to shake the living daylights out of her. “Now I am,” he said so slowly the words seemed pulled from his lips. “Start.”
Beth yanked her arm away and rested her back against the door. She’d been humiliated and infuriated by this man already tonight, so she didn’t have much to lose. Except Cody! Alarm bells sounded in her head, but she decided it was time to come clean. This was it—her one shot.
“You may not remember me, cowboy, but I remember you. From the time I was eleven or twelve you were already something of a legend in town. You know, in trouble with the law, giving your rich father fits, breaking all the girls’ hearts. I remember when you rode your first rodeo, right over in Dawson City. I was there and I saw you win first prize riding a wild bull or some such nonsense.
“It’s embarrassing to admit it, but I had one helluva crush on you, Jenner McKee, and it stayed with me for a long, long time. Of course, I thought I was long over it, but then, a few years ago, at the Independence Day celebration in the park, I saw you again. You were still the same cowboy I’d adored from afar, but now I wasn’t a scrawny little kid anymore.” Beth choked on the sudden gush of memories that teased at her mind—memories she’d tried for years to hide—even from herself. Rather than dwell on them now, she cleared her throat. “Anyway, the next time I saw you it was at the roundup in Dawson City, then we happened to run into each other in Portland the next week, bumped into each other in a restaurant downtown. I mentioned that I saw you win, you bought me a drink, and even though I was old enough to know better, one thing led to another. To make a long story short, we spent the night together and... in the morning you were gone. No note. No loose ends. No promises to be broken. End of story.”
“Except that you claim you got pregnant.”
“I did get pregnant.”
His teeth gnashed together as he stared at her so intently she thought she might crumble right in front of his eyes. It seemed as if he thought he could tell if she was lying or not simply by studying her with a gaze meant to cut through steel. “Maybe I should see the boy.”
Her heart nearly quit beating. She’d considered this moment a thousand times, and though she accepted that it was bound to happen someday, she didn’t know if she had the constitution to witness father and son meeting. What should be a joyful experience was certain to be agony. Gathering up her courage, she said, “He’s asleep.”
“Doesn’t matter. Not if he’s my kid.”
She notched her chin up a bit and met his gaze boldly. “First, I think we should get a couple of things straight. Yes, Cody is biologically your son, but he’s my child not only by blood but because of my emotional commitment to him. In that respect, he only has one parent. You mean nothing to him and so I won’t have you saying or doing anything that might upset or scare him.”
Jenner considered this, his blue eyes narrowing in the darkness. “Fair enough,” he finally agreed.
“And I’m not going to wake him up. If he happens to open his eyes, okay. But other than that, he sleeps.”
Jenner’s lips curved in grim amusement. “What’re you afraid of, Beth?”
“Nothing.”
“Think I might get all caught up in some latent fatherly feelings and try to swipe the kid from you?”
“I don’t know what you’ll do, Jenner,” she said, reaching behind her and opening the door. “But if I thought you’d do anything to hurt Cody—and that includes ‘swiping’ him from me—I wouldn’t have come to see you, and you might have spent the rest of your life not knowing your son.” She shoved open the door with her back and he hobbled inside.
“Just show me the kid.”
Back ramrod stiff, Beth led Jenner past the open archway to the living room and down a short hallway past the kitchen. She didn’t bother glancing at her mother, though she was certain Harriet had overheard most of the conversation and was apt to come to her own conclusions.
The door to her old bedroom was ajar and Beth leaned against it, allowing light from the hall to slice into the room and spill over the playpen shoved up next to a small closet. Cody rustled around a little and snorted but didn’t wake.
The strings on Beth’s heart tugged as usual when she saw the curly blond down of his hair, his pink cheeks and the soft motion of his lips as he sighed. Gold-tipped eyelashes curved against his smooth skin and he slept with his legs tucked under him, his tiny rear end high in the air.
Sneaking a glance at Jenner, she wished she could read his mind. Without expression, he leaned forward and squinted at the boy under the faded blue blanket.
Jenner was determined to prove her a fake. One look at the kid and he was certain he’d know the boy didn’t belong to him. But standing in the hallway, he’d begun to second-guess himself.
Could she be telling the truth? Could that little bit of a human be my son, for God’s sake? For the first time since Beth had charged into his father’s den at the ranch, Jenner began to doubt his own convictions. Not that there was any resemblance that he could determine—the fact that the kid was white and had pale hair didn’t mean a thing—but there was something about the woman, her aura of determination and hostility, that bothered him.
Unwillingly he admitted that he admired her grit. He’d insulted her, tried to reject her, and she’d given as well as she got. But to think that this two-year-old... He glanced at her. While gazing at her son, her expression had softened. It was obvious she adored the child, so why would she put him at risk and claim he was Jenner’s?
For money?
Because she still harbored some feelings for him?
For revenge?
She had to know that the McKee wealth could bring her—along with her child—to her knees. She risked being exposed as a fraud, an unwed mother trying to scam a rich man, a woman with no moral standards who didn’t deserve the child she’d borne. The McKee team of lawyers were merciless and would tear her story and reputation to shreds if they were ever unleashed. She wasn’t stupid; surely she must realize how tenuous her position was.
Disgusted at the turn of his thoughts, Jenner stepped aside as she quietly closed the door. He didn’t move from the hallway. “You know, you never answered my question earlier.”
“What question?”
“I asked you what you wanted from me.”
Her gaze, which had been rock steady, slid away. “I came back because your grandmother thought you’d want to meet your son. Now that it’s done—”
“It’s not done. I haven’t met him yet.” He rubbed a hand impatiently around the back of his neck. “I want you to bring him to see me tomorrow.”
“I don’t know—”
He couldn’t stop himself from reaching forward and gripping her arm. He felt the involuntary tightening of her muscles
and saw a spark in her gray-green eyes. “You started this,” he reminded her in a harsh whisper.
“Did I?” She tossed her hair away from her face. “It started three years ago, Jenner. And I wasn’t alone.”
“Well, it’s time to finish it then, isn’t it?”
“Finish it?”
Was it his imagination or did she tremble a little? “Bring the boy to my apartment.”
“I thought you were living at the ranch.”
“Not anymore. I’ve got an apartment in Doc Fletcher’s old clinic on Pine and—”
“I know where it is,” Beth said. “And I remember the doctor. He took out my tonsils right before I entered kindergarten and set my broken arm after I fell off my friend Mary’s old horse when I was twelve. And, if I’m not mistaken, he’s probably the one who informed your father that he was about to become a granddaddy.”
Again the fire in her eyes, and Jenner wondered how it was possible that he’d made love to this woman and barely remembered her. “Just come around, okay?” he asked, his voice more gentle than it had been. “I should meet him.”
“And then what?”
“I wish I knew,” he admitted as the shape of his future seemed to change before his eyes. Not only was he a cripple, but he might have fathered a child... or had he? What if this woman, this seemingly sincere woman, was just a common con artist, a user who fed off men and their mistakes?
Or, God forbid, what if she was telling the truth?
Sagging against the front door, Beth waited until she heard the sound of Jenner’s truck fade into the night. She’d seen the change come over him and realized that finally he might believe her.
And then what?
Shuddering at the thought that he might change his mind, might decide he wanted to be more than a blank space on a birth certificate, she slowly forced her legs to move back to the living room where her mother was shaking a long cigarette out of a nearly empty pack.
“He’s not father material,” Harriet said as she found her lighter on the table. “Not that many men are. From my experience, it seems that most of ’em would rather be little boys themselves than help raise a child right.” She clicked her lighter to the end of her cigarette and inhaled deeply. “I guess I can understand how you were attracted to him. Like all the McKees, he’s a handsome devil. But he’s so damned irresponsible....” She glanced through the window and watched as a car crawled down the street. “Same with your father, you know. Probably the best-looking of all the men I ever dated and oh, what a charmer he was. I knew I’d marry him the first time I laid eyes on him, but I didn’t expect that he would leave at the first hint of trouble. He sure wasn’t father material, but I guess you know that.”
Beth couldn’t disagree. Growing up, she’d seen little of her father. He always made a half-hearted attempt to visit her around her birthday, though the demands of his job and new family often interrupted his plans. And Charlie Crandall had been content to let Harriet’s string of husbands help raise his firstborn daughter.
A little pang of doubt entered her heart. Cody, too, would grow up not really knowing his father.
“You’re better off marrying Stan,” Harriet said, gazing thoughtfully at her daughter through the smoke curling from her cigarette. “He’s stable and trustworthy, won’t be running around on you chasing other women or elusive dreams. You should count yourself lucky.”
“I wish I could be sure about that,” Beth said, feeling that ever since coming face-to-face with Jenner again, her luck wasn’t getting any better.
Cursing under his breath, Jenner slowly climbed the front steps to the apartment house where he’d once planned to live in a unit on the second floor. Since the fire and his accident, the owner of the house, Skye Donahue, had hastened to make some efforts to fix up the basement apartment for him. It had a ramp as well as a short flight of exterior concrete stairs. Skye was a doctor in the clinic next door; she’d bought out Ralph Fletcher when he’d retired. Skye was also engaged to Jenner’s brother, Max.
Sweating by the time he’d negotiated the five steps, Jenner plowed through the open door to the foyer and rapped loudly on the door to Skye’s apartment. “Come on, come on,” he growled under his breath.
An upstairs door opened at the racket he was making, and Mrs. Newby, a short, elderly woman with apricot-tinged hair poking out from a nightcap, peeked through the opening. “Oh, Mr. McKee, it’s you,” she said, obviously relieved as she bustled into the upper hallway and leaned over the rail. “My goodness, I thought you were supposed to be recuperating.”
“I am.” Jenner was in no mood for small talk.
“You’re a hero around here, you know. Saving Max’s daughter and those horses and all.”
Funny, he didn’t feel like a hero. In fact, in light of the past few hours after meeting Beth and that kid of hers, he was beginning to feel like a first-class jerk.
“I’m looking for Skye.”
Behind thick, rimless glasses, Mrs. Newby’s eyebrows lifted. “And good luck finding her. Between the clinic and your brother, Dr. Donahue doesn’t have much time for this place, let me tell you. Why, half the things I requested to be done to my apartment haven’t even been started! Just last week I spoke to her about the carpet—”
The door on the opposite side of the landing opened and Tina Evans, Skye’s other tenant, stepped onto the landing. Her smile stretched wide at the sight of him. “Well, look who’s come home,” she said.
Jenner gritted his teeth and forced a smile. “I’m trying to track down Skye so I can get into the basement.”
“It’s not finished yet.”
“No? I bet it’s close enough.”
Tina’s smile faltered a little. “She’s probably with your brother, but I’ve got a key so that I can show prospective tenants the vacant apartments.”
Mrs. Newby snorted. “I don’t know why she’d want more occupants seein’ as she can’t take care of the ones she has.”
Tina tried and failed to suppress a grin. “Give me a minute to get the keys and I’ll meet you downstairs.”
Tina disappeared into her apartment, and Mrs. Newby, still leaning over the rail, said, “Be careful you don’t trip over the cat. It’s always up to no good, slinking around, carrying fleas and shedding everywhere ... never giving my allergies a rest, let me tell you! I’ve talked to Skye. But does she listen? Of course not—”
Jenner didn’t hear the rest of her complaint. He headed out the front door and down the steps to the concrete path leading to the side entrance that once had led to Doc Fletcher’s clinic. There was enough light from a security lamp so that he didn’t stumble, and true to her word, Tina used the interior staircase, cut through the basement, and opened the door for him.
“See,” she said, snapping on the overhead lights, “it’s a long way from being finished.”
“It’ll do,” Jenner said as he crossed the threshold and looked around. Fresh Sheetrock had been nailed to the walls, taped together and mudded, but only half the apartment had been painted. The cabinets were up, but the doors hadn’t yet been hung and the tile floor was bare. Appliances were still packed in boxes, but he turned on the kitchen sink and was relieved to find that the plumbing was working.
“The painters are due to finish up this week and the carpet’s coming next Wednesday. Skye didn’t expect you to be moving in so soon.”
“Neither did I,” he admitted as he crossed the room to a closet where all of his worldly possessions—a bedroll, duffel bag and a few odds and ends—had been stashed.
“If there’s anything you need...?” she said, offering him the keys, and Jenner flashed her a smile he didn’t feel.
“I’ll let you know.”
She glanced at his crutches and bit the corner of her lip before shrugging and waving goodbye. He listened as her footsteps clomped up the interior stairs, then he shut the door and threw the bolt.
“Home sweet home,” he said to himself as he tossed down the bedroll. T
he apartment didn’t have the comforts of the ranch, but at least here he was his own man. It had been a long time since he’d felt this free.
Slowly easing himself onto the faded sleeping bag, he thought of Beth and her son. A pain shot up his leg, reminding him that he was no longer a complete man, that he might forever be chained to crutches or a wheelchair. He could no longer support a family by riding the rodeo circuit or training horses or hiring on as a hand at one of the neighboring ranches.
But he wasn’t foolish enough to think that he was poor.
Max would probably let him run the Rocking M. Jenner could handle the paperwork and supervise the work in the fields from a truck. Chester, the ranch foreman, could run interference with the rest of the hands.
Max had already given him three hundred acres that old Jonah hadn’t included in his will. Wildcat Creek slashed through one corner and the old cabin built by a great-grandfather needed some work, but was sound. A little bit of elbow grease and it would do just fine. For one.
But could he really just give up the life he’d known?
He wondered what kind of a father he would be. He’d never be able to play baseball, shoot baskets or teach the kid how to rope a calf. Swimming would be tricky and...oh, hell, what was the matter with him? He wasn’t cut out to be a father or a husband. Seeing Beth and her kid had played havoc with his mind. Not that it mattered. He probably wasn’t the kid’s father, anyway.
Chapter Four
Max wanted to strangle his brother. Of all the low-life, stupid, selfish stunts Jenner had ever pulled, this was the worst. He leaned against the wall of his farmhouse, cradling the phone to his ear, imagining his mother wringing her hands.
“...so he didn’t come home and heaven knows he shouldn’t be driving,” Virginia. was saying. “I hate to bother you, Max, but I... Oh, Lord, I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to him.”
Max shoved a hand through his hair and stared through the window as the first rays of sun began to spill over the horizon. His dog, Atlas, a half-grown Border collie, flushed a flock of quail from the brush bordering a thicket of pine trees. “If Jenner had been in an accident, he would have been taken to Dawson Memorial,” Max said, glancing at the clock and scowling. It was only ten after six—way too early to be dealing with Jenner and his bad moods. “Skye’s working in the emergency room. She would’ve called.”
