Cowboy Daddy

by Carolyne Aarsen

  He knew he should be teaching the boys so they could carry on the tradition. It was in their blood too. They were as much Cosgroves as he was.

  “Uncle Kip will have to show you, won’t you, Uncle Kip?” Justin said.

  “Maybe,” was his curt reply.

  Since Scott died, he hadn’t worked with his horses. Hadn’t competed in any of the races. Chuck-wagon racing took up too much of the time he didn’t have anymore.

  He felt a pinch of sorrow. He missed the thrill of the race, the keenness of competing, the pleasure of working with his horses.

  “Uncle Kip was one of the fastest racers,” Tristan said, pride tingeing his voice. “But he doesn’t race anymore. He says it’s not ’sponsible ’cause now he has us.”

  “Well, that sounds like a good way to think,” Nicole said.

  Kip shot her a glance, wondering if she was serious. But he caught her steady gaze and she wasn’t laughing.

  “So where’s the tractor?”

  “Just over here.” He was only too glad to change the subject. Chuck wagons were in his past. He had enough going on in the present.

  “What do we need to do?” Nicole asked as they walked across the packed ground toward the shop.

  Kip gave her a curious look. “You don’t have to help.”

  “Of course I do.” She gave him a wry look, as if to say “you asked for it.”

  Their eyes held a split-second longer than necessary. As if each was testing the other to see who would give. Then he broke the connection. He didn’t have anything to prove.

  Yet even as he thought those brave words, a finger of fear trickled down his spine. Actually, he did have something to prove. He had to prove that Justin and Tristan’s were Scott’s boys. That they belonged here on the ranch.

  Kip pulled on the chain and the large garage door creaked and groaned as light spilled into the usually gloomy shop. He loved working with the door open and today, with the sun shining and a bright blue sky, was a perfect day to do so.

  “This is where the tractor is,” Justin said. “Uncle Kip took it apart and he said a bad word when he dropped a wrench on his toe.”

  “Did he now?” Nicole’s voice held a hint of laughter and Kip made a mental note to talk to the boys about “things we don’t tell Ms. Williams.”

  “Tristan, you can wheel over the tool chest. Justin, you can get me the box of rags,” Kip said, shooting his blabbermouth nephew a warning look as he rolled up his sleeves.

  “I got the rags the last time,” Justin whined. “How come Tristan always gets to push the tool chest? I never do.”

  As Kip stifled his frustration, he caught Nicole watching him. As if assessing what he was going to do.

  “Just do it, Justin,” he said more firmly.

  But Justin shoved his hands in his pockets and glared back at him. Kip felt Nicole’s gaze burning on him. For a moment he wished he hadn’t insisted that she visit the kids here. Now everything he did with the boys would be with an audience. A very critical audience who, he was sure, would be only too glad to see him mess up.

  He tried to ignore her presence as he knelt down in front of Justin. “Buddy, I asked you to do something. You wanted to help me, and this is part of helping.”

  “But…my dad always…” Justin’s lower lip pushed out and Kip could see the sparkle of tears in his eyes and his heart melted.

  “Oh, buddy,” he whispered, pulling Justin in his arms. He gave him a tight squeeze, his own heart contracting in sorrow. It had been only six months since they stood together at Scott’s grave. In the busyness of life, he sometimes forgot that. He held Justin a moment longer and as he stood, he caught Nicole looking at them both, her lips pressed together, her fingers resting on her chin.

  She understood, he thought, and he wondered if she was remembering her own sister.

  Their gaze held and for a moment they shared a sorrow.

  The rumbling of the tool chest broke the moment. “I got it. I got it.” Tristan called out.

  Kip gave Justin another quick hug, patted him on the head and turned back to the tractor with a sigh.

  “What do you have to do?” Nicole asked.

  “It’s a basic fix,” Kip said as he pushed a piece of cardboard under the tractor. “Replace a leaky fuel line, but whoever designed this tractor has obviously never worked on one.” Kip bent over, squinting at the nuts holding the old line. Then he grabbed the tools he needed, lay on the cardboard and pulled himself under the tractor.

  “Justin, why don’t you get those rags for your Uncle Kip,” he heard Nicole say. “Tristan, maybe you can clean up those bits of wood lying in the corner.”

  A born organizer, he thought, straining as he tried to pull off a bolt. He was still trying to wrap his head around the woman whom he’d seen in the office this morning—the all-business woman in her stark suit—and the woman wearing blue jeans and a flannel shirt, standing in his shop.

  He pushed the picture aside, focussing on the job at hand.

  “Tristan, does your Uncle Kip have a broom?” he heard her asking, and a couple of minutes later he heard the swishing of the broom over the concrete floor accompanied by her quiet voice giving directions to the boys to move things out of the way.

  He felt a squirm of embarrassment as he worked another nut free, imagining the shop through her eyes. He knew it was a mess. He liked his shop organized and neat but hadn’t had the time to tidy it up.

  Finally he got the line free, and as he pulled himself out from under the tractor he found the box of rags.

  His second surprise was the clean floor and the boxes of oil and grease stacked neatly in one corner by the compressor. The shop vac sat beside it, the hose attached again and the cord wrapped neatly around the top.

  “So when will you need my socket and wrench?” Nicole asked, poking her head around the front of the tractor.

  Kip released a short laugh. “Right now.”

  “So you were serious about that?” she asked, arching a perfectly plucked brow.

  “I was joking about you bringing them, but I wasn’t joking about needing them.” He hadn’t been able to find the wrench and socket ever since the boys “helped” him the last time. In his rush to get back to the ranch after seeing Ron, he had forgotten to pick up the tools at the hardware store.

  He blew out a sigh of displeasure thinking of yet another trip to town.

  “Then I’ll go get them,” she said.

  He frowned. “You have them here?”

  “In my car. Shall I get them?” She gave him a wry look.

  “If you’ve got them here, that would be great,” he said, completely serious this time.

  “Can we come?” Justin and Tristan chimed in.

  “Ms. Williams can go by herself,” Kip said.

  “I’m just going to the car.”

  “The boys stay here.”

  Nicole held his gaze a beat, as if reading more into his comment than he meant. Which was fine by him.

  “Okay. I’ll be back.”

  Kip watched her go, her blond hair catching the sun, her hands strung up in the pockets of her snug blue jeans.

  He didn’t need this right now. He looked down at the boys who were watching her go, looking a bit starstruck. Not that he blamed them. She was beautiful, she was attentive.

  Only they didn’t know was that she was big, big trouble.

  Nicole didn’t have to look over her shoulder to know Kip was watching her. She felt his eyes drilling into the back of her neck and wished he hadn’t insisted on her visiting the boys at the ranch. It was as if she was under constant scrutiny.

  When she got to the car she shot a quick look over her shoulder, but she was out of sight of the shed. She pulled out the bag of tools and grabbed her cell phone at the same time.

  “Pretty sweet cell phone.”

  Nicole jumped, then spun around in time to see Isabelle sauntering down the stairs with all the confidence of a sixteen-year-old girl.

  “
You got any fun games on it?” she asked.

  “I don’t play games on my phone.”

  Isabelle slanted her head to one side, her eyes narrowed. “No, but you play games with us. Pretending to be a housekeeper. You know how much trouble I got into because of you?”

  “You seemed glad to leave me alone with your mother and all the work,” Nicole countered.

  “I don’t think I like you,” Isabelle said, crossing her thin arms over her chest.

  “I don’t think that matters.” Nicole was sure she wasn’t well liked by the rest of the Cosgrove family either. She wasn’t here to win a popularity contest. She was here to get her father’s grandchildren back to him. Her atonement.

  “My brother won’t let you take Justin and Tristan away from here, you know. He’ll fight you.”

  “I know he will,” she answered, checking her voice mail while she spoke. Five new messages. She hit the Answer button as she walked back to the shed, taking the bag of tools with her.

  Isabelle followed a few steps behind her.

  “Don’t you have work to do?” Nicole asked, feeling like was being spied on.

  “My mom is sleeping and I don’t want to wake her up.”

  Nicole gave her a vague nod as she skipped through the messages from her assistant, Heather. She could deal with those when she got back to the motel, but the one from the lawyer…

  “No news to report yet.” Her family’s lawyer’s voice was brisk and businesslike, and he didn’t waste any words or time. “Still working on the legalities of the will. Should have more information in a couple of days.”

  Isabelle took a quick step to get ahead of Nicole. “You can’t do this to my mother, you know,” she said, her voice intense. “She’ll die if you take the twins. Those are Scott’s boys and he’s gone.” This was followed by a dramatic sniff.

  Nicole caught a flash of her own intensity in the young girl’s eyes. Her own reasons for reuniting the boys with her father.

  Her step faltered, but for only a moment. “I’m sorry, Isabelle, but I’m not talking to you about this.”

  She walked past Isabelle toward the garage, shoving her phone into her pocket. As she came near she saw Kip watching her, wiping his hands on a rag. Had he been looking at her the entire time?

  “What did you say to my sister?” he asked, pointing his chin toward Isabelle.

  Nicole shot a quick glance over her shoulder. Isabelle stood in the middle of the yard, her arms wrapped around her middle, staring at Nicole, her expression tight with anger.

  “I told her I wasn’t talking to her about the situation.” She handed him the tools. “Where are the boys?”

  Kip angled his head to the back of the shop and without a word to him, Nicole walked toward them.

  But even as she did, her stomach twisted with old, familiar emotions. Again she was on the outside of a family looking in. Sure, she hadn’t expected to be accepted and greeted with warmth, but she hadn’t counted on how much their antagonism would bother her. Especially when, for a few hours, she had been welcomed by them.

  “Auntie Nicole, there you are.”

  Nicole smiled and looked around. “I can’t find you Justin,” she called out, warmth flooding her heart at the sound of his voice.

  Then a pair of arms flung themselves around her waist and she looked down onto the blond head of a little boy.

  As she hugged him back, she felt her own heart crack open just a little wider. She could not let the feelings of the Cosgrove family stand in the way of what she had to do.

  Her father’s needs came before theirs.

  Chapter Six

  Nicole pushed the accelerator further down as her car climbed the hill. She had Vivaldi on the stereo, the windows open and her car headed in the direction of the ranch and Tricia’s boys.

  The highway made a curve, then topped a rise, and Nicole’s breath left her. The valley spread out below her, a vast expanse of space yawning for miles, then undulating toward green hills and giving way to imperious mountains, their peaks capped with snow, blinding white against a blue, blue sky.

  In spite of her hurry to get to the ranch, she slowed down, taking it all in. The space, the emptiness.

  The freedom. She felt the faintest hitch in her soul.

  She was a city girl, but somehow this country called to her. Yesterday she’d almost got lost on her way to the ranch because she kept looking around, taking in the view.

  She took in a deep breath and let the space and quiet ease into her soul.

  Yesterday, after seeing the boys, she’d come back to a raft of emails all dealing with the foundation banquet she and her assistant had been planning. Nicole first sent a quick update to her father, then waded into the work, dealing with whatever came out of them until two. This morning she’d gotten up early and finished up. Then, still tired, she’d grabbed a nap, only she forgot to set her alarm. Now she was an hour and a half late for her meeting with the boys.

  The ringing of her cell phone made her jump. She blew out a frustrated sigh, glanced at the caller ID and forced a smile.

  “What did the lawyer say?” her father asked.

  Sam Williams may have been ill, but he hadn’t lost his capacity of getting straight to the point.

  “The usual lawyer stuff,” Nicole said tucking a strand of hair behind her ear that the wind coming into the car had pulled free from her ponytail. “Things are going to take time. He needs to verify Tricia’s will. Nothing definite.”

  “How are the boys?”

  “I wish you could see them. They’re so cute.” A picture of them pushing the oversize broom in their uncle’s shop yesterday made her smile. “They’re such little cowboys.”

  Her father didn’t say anything to that and Nicole guessed it was the wrong response.

  “I’ll try to call from the ranch today,” Nicole said. “See if you can talk to them.”

  “The new school year starts in three months,” her father said as Nicole turned onto the road leading to the ranch. “I’m looking into schools for them.”

  As Sam spoke, Nicole’s thoughts slipped back to Kip’s comment about putting the boys on the bus and his obvious regret. At least he wouldn’t have to deal with that come September.

  “I’m getting to a bad area and I’ll be losing reception. I’ll try to call you from the ranch.”

  “If I was feeling better I’d be there…”

  The rest of her father’s words were cut off when Nicole’s car dropped into the valley.

  As Nicole turned onto the ranch’s driveway, she felt another clutch of frustration at Kip Cosgrove’s insistence that she visit the boys only at the ranch.

  How was she supposed to get to know her nephews in two and a half hours under his watchful eye? But as she came around the corner, her frustration gave way to anticipation at the thought of seeing the boys again.

  As Nicole parked her car beside Kip’s huge pickup she jumped out of the car, looked around, but didn’t see anyone. She walked to the house and knocked on the door.

  Nothing.

  Where was everybody? She lifted her hand to knock again when she saw a note on the door addressed to her.

  “In the field. Moving bales. Mom sleeping.” The words were hastily scribbled on a small piece of paper and stuck to the door with a piece of masking tape.

  Nicole blew out a sigh. Which field? How was she supposed to find them? She could almost hear the clock ticking down the precious seconds on her visit.

  She paused, listening, then heard the sound of a tractor. Thankfully, it sounded like it was coming closer.

  She jogged across the yard, past the chuck wagons. As she raced around a corner of the barn, a tractor lurched into view pulling a wagon loaded up with hay. Smoke billowed from the stack and the engine roared, a deafening sound in the once-stillness.

  The sun reflected off the glass of the closed-in cab of the tractor, but as it came closer, Nicole saw Kip driving and Justin and Tristan standing behind the seat
.

  With a squeal of brakes the tractor came to a halt beside her and Kip opened the side door. “You’re late,” he yelled over the noise of the tractor’s engine.

  Like she needed him to tell her that.

  “Yes. Sorry.” What else could she say?

  Justin leaned over Kip’s shoulder and waved at her. “Hey, Ms. Williams,” he shouted.

  Ms. Williams? What happened to Auntie Nicole?

  Nicole just smiled and waved, quite sure Kip had something to do with the change.

  She walked to the tractor, raising her arms to take the boys out. “Hey, Tristan. You boys helping Mr. Cosgrove?” Two could play that game.

  Tristan gave her a puzzled look. Nicole could tell that Kip understood exactly what she was doing.

  “We just have to unload these bales.” Kip closed the door before she came any closer and before the boys could get out. He put the tractor in gear and drove away.

  She was left to trail behind the swaying wagon, fuming as bits of hay swirled around her face. With each step her anger at his pettiness grew. He was depriving her of valuable time with her own nephews so he could prove a point.

  She easily kept up with the tractor and followed it to where she assumed he was going to pile up these bales. But neither he nor the boys got out of the tractor. Somehow he unhitched the wagon from inside, turned the tractor around and started to unload the bales. One at a time.

  She was reduced to watching as the clock ticked away precious minutes of her visiting time.

  Kip reminded her of her biological father and how he used to make her wait in the motel room while he busied himself with who knew what in his truck while her aunt fumed. Older, buried emotions slipped to the fore. As she had done the first few years at Sam and Norah’s, she fought them down. She was here and she had a job to do for her father. That was all she had to focus on.

  She waited until the last bale was unloaded and then she marched over to the tractor before Kip could decide he had to go for another load and leave her behind.

  But just as she reached the tractor, Kip shut it off and the door opened.

  “You finally came,” Tristan called out.