Home To Copper Mountain

by Rebecca Winters

  On the morning of a race, there was nothing he loved better than to listen to Vivaldi or Brahms or Mahler while he ate a big breakfast. Any of them brought structure and order to his mind, helping him to focus on the task ahead.

  Aware his nerves were frayed from a combination of fatigue and a growing inner anxiety he couldn’t throw off, he pressed the scan button to tune out the heavy-metal music blaring from some rock station out of Austin.

  The next couple of stations were phone-in talk shows about politics or UFOs. He was about to shut off the radio for good when he came across a station where he heard a female vocalist backed by a terrific guitarist. It sounded like country music, but she sang with such a great voice he pressed the button to keep the tuner there.

  You invade our space,

  You drink our beer,

  You pollute the place,

  You shoot our deer,

  You build your castles,

  You do as you please,

  If it’s worth the battle you change the course of streams,

  You grow Bermuda grass,

  You even plant hay,

  Then you can’t figure out why the wildlife went away.

  You fly down for weekends

  To your twenty-acre spread,

  Then you wonder why,

  Your cattle all lie dead.

  You’re the dreaded windshield rancher invading the Hill Country,

  You wanted a part of Texas,

  And by golly,

  You destroyed habitat and birthright during a bad economy.

  You came, you saw, you conquered,

  You took my legacy.

  Because of you, you, you, you,

  This happened to me, me, me, me.

  I’m an uprooted bluebonnet,

  I no longer have a home,

  Do you hear me, windshield rancher? Thanks to you I’m alone.

  The light has now gone out,

  I can’t see in front of me,

  There’s no home to go back to,

  Fear is my destiny.

  The past is gone forever,

  It walked out the door.

  What once excited, excites no more,

  The song ended, jerking Rick back to cognizance of his surroundings.

  Damn. He’d been so mesmerized by what he’d heard, he’d overshot the turnoff to the ranch by four miles. Since no one was around, he made a tire-squealing U-turn in the middle of the road and flew back down the highway.

  “And now for all you night creatures like me who can’t sleep because your demons won’t let you—oh yes, I’ve got them, too—shall we have a change of pace? I’ve had a lot of requests for Gounod’s Ave Maria for voice and harp. Enjoy this last number before we say good-night.”

  Rick almost missed the entrance again because the female disc jockey had started to play the next recording. The second he heard the voice, he realized it was the same vocalist who’d performed the amazing country song. This time she was singing to an exquisite harp accompaniment.

  Why didn’t the disc jockey give out the name of the singer?

  Whoever she was, she had extraordinary talent to be able to perform such diametrically opposed pieces of music with equal ability. He wanted her name so he could look for some of her records.

  Parts of the first song resonated with him.

  The light has now gone out,

  I can’t see in front of me,

  There’s no home to go back to,

  Fear is my destiny.

  The past is gone forever,

  It walked out the door,

  What once excited, excites no more.

  Rick could have written those lines himself. Whoever the composer was had to be a native Texan, considering the subject matter. It sounded like life had dealt them a hard blow.

  Realizing someone else out there in the cosmos was going through the same disquieting experience helped him to understand he wasn’t the only person who felt as if they were losing their mind.

  Absorbed in his painful thoughts, he was slow to process the fact that the white three-quarter-ton pickup truck moving toward him came to a stop as Rick passed it. He blinked, then reversed.

  His father’s familiar half smile had never been more welcome than in this back of beyond. They both put down their windows at the same time. The air still held the earth’s warmth. He could smell skunk.

  “Dad—” His throat swelled with unexpected emotion.

  “It’s good to see you, too, son. You told me you’d be driving a new M3. For a moment I thought I’d come upon James Bond. So…how did your first car handle?”

  Rick’s lips twitched. “A lot better than my first homemade go-cart.”

  “That’s reassuring. I’ll turn around so you can follow me the rest of the way.”

  Beyond tired, he was grateful to be led down the dark, dusty road. When they reached the ranch house three miles from the entrance, Rick regretted having to turn off the beautiful voice with the harp accompaniment. He wished her music could have kept him company all the way from Colorado.

  He got out of the car eager to feel Clint Hawkins’s famous bear hug.

  Silhouetted against a night sky partly obscured by clouds, the Queen Anne–style house loomed behind his parent. The two-story structure had many gables and a tower with a conical roof. For a ranch house it looked totally out of place and unlike anything Rick had been imagining.

  “IT’S THAT TIME AGAIN, ladies and gentlemen. We’re coming up on three in the morning. I’ll be taking your requests Friday at midnight on KHLB, the Hill Country station out of Austin at 580 on the AM dial. Thank you for listening to the Red Jarrett Show, where I aim to bring you a little bit of the best of everything.”

  The line-board operator back at the station in Austin turned the switch, and Audra Jarrett was off the air. Her boss had arranged for her to do her program from the ranch while she was recuperating from her accident. Several technicians from the studio had come out to the house to set up the mixing board, stands, plug-in mike and Telos digital sound system. So far everything had worked perfectly, but it seemed she had a ways to go before she was fully recovered.

  She let out a groan of exhaustion and ran her fingers through her hair, which was damp at the roots from exertion.

  After eyeing the short distance from her table to the bedroom doorway, she felt for her crutches and with superhuman effort, grabbed them from where they’d been leaning against the wall. She stopped long enough to turn out the lights, then moved out into the hallway and into the bedroom next door and lay down on the bed. The night was warm enough that she didn’t need a blanket to cover her.

  There was no way she’d be getting up again any time soon to brush her teeth or change out of her top and cutoffs. They were the only shorts loose enough around the legs to slide up and down over her cast.

  The strain of perching on the stool with her left leg in a full cast had been too draining. Whatever had possessed her to think she could transfer from her guitar to her harp between commercials while operating her own mixing board at the same time? Tonight she should have relied solely on recorded music.

  She’d been home from the hospital almost a month. By now she assumed it wouldn’t be a problem to perform some of her own music live during her radio show, broadcast from the bungalow on her uncle David’s property.

  It was a small three-bedroom home. With a few steps, everything was in easy reach. No stairs, no basement. But Audra hadn’t counted on the weakness that assailed her body through the simple act of singing into the microphone again. It may have just been her leg that was broken, but this seemed to affect her whole body.

  The car accident that had taken Pete Walker’s life could have done a lot more damage. But it hadn’t been her time to go.

  No. Destiny’s plan had been to kill her off in increments. She figured when her uncle found a buyer for the ranch, that would be the final blow.

  Her eyelids fluttered closed from sorrow and fatigue.

  Wha
t would she do without her music? Thanks to Pam, who’d started her on the piano in grade school, Audra had found her muse. Not even Boris, the talented French conductor she’d fallen in love with at the Paris Conservatory of Music, had been able to stamp out the solace when he’d rejected her.

  As she settled back against the pillows her cell phone rang. That would be her cousin calling from the main ranch house three miles away to make sure Audra was okay.

  Pam…the wonderful woman who’d been mother, sister and best friend rolled into one since Audra was a little girl.

  She reached for her phone. After checking the caller ID to make sure, she clicked on to talk to her cousin. “It’s 3:15 a.m., Mrs. Hawkins.”

  Audra loved calling her that. Clint Hawkins was the best thing that had ever happened to Pam. Audra was half in love with him herself.

  “Your new husband is going to resent me if you keep this up. I’ve been out of the hospital for some time now, yet you’re still hovering!”

  “That’s because I listened to your broadcast tonight. You were fabulous, but you overdid it.”

  Audra couldn’t hide anything from her. “I found that out as soon as I was switched off the air.”

  “I’m mad at you, honey. The doctor warned you to be careful.”

  “I wanted to start performing again. It’ll be easier next time.”

  “Why not wait till the cast comes off before you go back on the air, period?” Pam urged.

  Because I can’t stand the nights.

  Memories of the crash wouldn’t leave Audra alone. Her guilt—that she’d escaped death and Pete hadn’t—continued to haunt her.

  “I’d die of boredom, but I appreciate your phoning. I’m in bed, so stop worrying about me. Now, hurry and hang up before Clint discovers you’re awake and talking to me again.”

  “My husband isn’t here.”

  She frowned. “Has he flown to Colorado on another family emergency?” Audra hoped everything was fine with his recently married son, Nate. That marriage almost hadn’t come off.

  It didn’t seem as if Clint and Pam were ever going to get the time alone they deserved, no thanks to Audra, whose accident had ruined their honeymoon.

  “He’s out in the truck looking for his son who should have arrived by now.”

  Audra blinked. “I didn’t know you were expecting his family.”

  “He didn’t either until earlier in the day.”

  “Which one is it?”

  “Rick.”

  Ah yes, the famous race-car driver, Lucky Hawkins. The speed-loving son he’d secretly worried about for years. The one Clint feared would end up a statistic.

  Audra refused to entertain the thought that he might have been in a collision on the highway driving down here. She didn’t want Pam thinking bad thoughts either.

  “It would be a hoot if he’s lost.”

  “Now, Audra…”

  She chuckled. “Well, it would. Can’t you see this living sports legend whizzing around to the various ranches asking, ‘Does my daddy live here?’”

  “Be nice,” her cousin murmured, but Audra could tell she was on the verge of laughter. “It’s easy to get lost in the Hill Country after dark, and lest you forget, he’s no boy.”

  Her cousin was right about that. An image of the good-looking male with black hair she’d seen in some of Pam’s wedding pictures filled Audra’s mind. Clint and his sons were more attractive than any three men had a right to be.

  “Is this to be a quick visit?”

  “Yes. Clint’s so thrilled Rick agreed to come here on his way to Arizona, he’s been restless all day waiting for him. I put him to work helping me cook. We’re going to have a big lunch at noon. Sleep now and I’ll be by for you about quarter to twelve.”

  “No, no. This is your first chance to show his son around your turf for a change. There’s no way I’m going to interfere with that!”

  “Audra—Uncle David wants everyone to meet. The cousins and their families are coming from Austin. He insisted.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “I’m not too excited about that myself.”

  Their uncle probably had to threaten leaving them out of the will for them to agree, but Audra didn’t say the words out loud. Their bitterness over his handling of the Jarrett family finances since their parents’ deaths years before had turned them into angry men.

  After the loving care Pam had always shown their cousins growing up, Audra couldn’t believe how mean-spirited and ungrateful they were. When they’d heard she was marrying what they considered to be some old geezer from Colorado, they’d mocked her and laid bets the relationship wouldn’t last.

  To their shock, she’d returned to Texas with her new husband following their honeymoon in Hawaii. Despite family emergencies that required Pam to leave Hawaii early to be with Audra after her accident, and Clint to fly home to Copper Mountain to talk some sense into his son Nate, who was hurting from a broken engagement, it appeared their marriage was thriving. Clint would be a permanent fixture around the ranch from now on.

  Tom, the oldest of the three boys and their spokesman, had given their uncle David an ultimatum. They wanted Clint out of the main house. Until he was gone, they would no longer come out on weekends to help keep the fencing in good repair, a never-ending project.

  That kind of cruelty pained Audra, who was still hampered to a large extent by her broken leg. Her unexpected accident had brought Pam running to her side to wait on her when Pam should have been enjoying precious time with her brand-new husband.

  As it turned out, Clint Hawkins was anything but an old geezer.

  Audra didn’t know such a wonderful person existed anywhere. She’d shed tears of happiness he’d come into Pam’s life. Already she sensed that beneath Clint’s mild-mannered nature lived a highly principled man and a force to contend with. He protected Pam in so many subtle ways, their male cousins would be no match for him when they did meet.

  As for Uncle David, Audra could tell that Clint had won him over when he’d agreed to fly Pam’s husband to Odessa in the middle of the night.

  There’d been some family emergency that required Clint’s getting on a plane back to Colorado. Their uncle wouldn’t have gone out of his way like that if he hadn’t respected Clint a great deal.

  When Audra really thought about it, lunch with the whole family ought to be downright interesting.

  “I’ll make sure I’m ready when you arrive. Thanks for checking up on me, Pam.”

  “As if I wouldn’t. Get a good sleep.”

  I won’t. “You, too.”

  Audra clicked off, then lay back against the pillows. The time she dreaded every night was here once again.

  No longer on heavy painkillers that blotted out consciousness, when she closed her eyes, her mind replayed the horror of the accident.

  Refusing to let it happen tonight, she turned on the lamp and reached for the spiral notebook she kept by the bed. She could almost hear the music as she pulled the pencil from the coil and started jotting down the words to a song formulating in her mind. She’d already entitled it “Racetrack Lover.”

  Hey cowboy, can you hear me?

  Better hold your sweetheart tight.

  There’s an exciting new man.

  Coming into town tonight.

  He’s lucky on the track and lucky with the women,

  He’ll mess with your gal,

  Consider that a given.

  Tall, dark and sexy,

  Handsome as sin,

  He’s the racetrack lover

  Who’s about to drive in.

  If you don’t want a broken heart before daylight,

  Keep your gal out of sight and locked up tight.

  Better put her in the barn,

  And throw away the key,

  Don’t let him get near her,

  Or believe you me,

  He’ll take her for a ride,

  And rob you blind,

  Before he spins his wheels,

>   And leaves her behind.

  He’s a charmer,

  He’s a talker,

  He’s a no-strings guy,

  He’s the racetrack lover in town on the fly.

  Hey cowboy, can you hear me?

  Better hold your sweetheart tight.

  There’s an exciting new man coming into tow—

  “I’m so cold. Are you cold, Pete? Pete? Talk to me! Oh no! Oh please God, no.

  “Don’t let him be dead! Help him! Help him!” She pounded her fist against the glass.

  “Why doesn’t someone come?” She pounded harder. “Help! So much blood. He’s not moving.

  “Someone help! What am I going to do?”

  “Audra?”

  “Oh thank God. Get him out. Hurry!”

  “Audra? Wake up,” an alarmed voice sounded from the murky haze engulfing her. “Wake up! You’re having a nightmare.”

  She felt a hand on her shoulder. “Come on. Wake up. It’s all right. You’re home in bed. It was just a bad dream.”

  “Pam?” she cried, clutching the hand that gripped her upper arm to force her awake.

  But it wasn’t small and feminine. This hand felt solid and male. Her eyelids flew open.

  A man with black hair stood over her bed.

  CHAPTER TWO

  AUDRA SCREAMED bloody murder and threw off his hand while she tried to reach the nearest crutch. To her horror, her bad leg pretty well held her anchored.

  “Forgive me for frightening you, Ms. Jarrett,” he said in a low voice. “I’m Clint Hawkins’s son Rick. I told Pam I’d pick you up for her.”

  Rick Hawkins?

  She fought to catch her breath and waited for her heartbeat to return to normal. Her mind began to clear now that the threat of bodily injury had passed. Audra recognized him from Pam’s wedding photographs. In those pictures his tall, well-honed physique had been dressed in a formal suit instead of a black T-shirt and jeans. He was even more attractive in person.

  “When I got out of my car, I could hear screaming. It gave me the chills,” he explained. His compassionate gaze let her know her nightmare must have been a beaut.