His Texas Wildflower

by Stella Bagwell

  Jake stared at him. “If the bull is the problem that’s even worse! Replacing him would take a hunk of money!”

  Quint frowned. “Look, Jake, if you’re so worried about taking losses, then you might as well pack up and sell this place, because every good rancher knows he’s going to take some hammering at times!”

  Jake’s gaze slipped to the beer bottle he was gripping with both hands. “I’m thinking about doing just that!”

  “What?”

  The incredulous tone in Quint’s voice had Jake looking up at his longtime buddy. “You heard me right,” he muttered. “I’m thinking about…doing something else.”

  With slow, purposeful movements, Quint climbed down from the stool and walked over to the table. “What are you talking about?”

  The censure in Quint’s voice made Jake feel even worse. Like it was possible to feel worse, he thought grimly. His mind, his whole body felt as if he’d been whipped, beaten down by a hand that he couldn’t see or defend himself against.

  “I was at the track a couple of days ago and—”

  “I should have known,” Quint interrupted with disgust. “You just can’t stay away from that place, can you?”

  Angry now, Jake glared at him. “And why the hell should I? Shoeing racehorses, managing the stables, those jobs made me a living for many years, Quint. And I have good friends there. Friends that don’t preach to me because I’m not perfect,” he added hotly.

  The caustic remark didn’t send Quint packing out the door. Instead, he eased down in the seat across from Jake and gave his friend a long, troubled look. “All right, Jake,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry. I was out of line and I shouldn’t have said anything about you visiting the track. I understand that place will always be a part of you.”

  “Damn right it will. And they’ve offered me a huge salary to come back to work.”

  Quint stiffened. “Are you considering taking it?”

  Jake couldn’t look him square in the face. “Maybe.”

  Shaking his head, Quint mouthed a curse word under his breath. “So you’re just going to throw all this away? All you’ve worked for?”

  “Look, Quint, I’m not cut out for this. In the end, I’ll probably lose it all, anyway. Better to sell out and get what I can while the getting is good.”

  “That’s a hell of a thing to say!” Quint spat. “And I don’t know where this thinking of yours is coming from. You were my ranch foreman for a few years—you know everything about ranching. Your dad—”

  “My dad is gone!” Jake interrupted flatly. “So don’t go trying to bring him into this!”

  Unfazed by Jake’s anger, Quint said, “The man taught you a lot about horses and cattle.”

  And women, Jake thought bitterly. Oh, yes, Lee Rollins had charmed them, loved them and left them. Just like Jake. Until one important woman had come along. Until Rebecca had taught him that giving up his heart was something entirely different.

  When Jake didn’t reply, Quint leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “All right, Jake, my father is gone, too. So what do you think we ought to do? Sit here and cry in our beer? Convince ourselves that we’re losers?”

  Jake glared at him. “Sometimes you can be a real bastard, Quint, and if we were eight years old again, I’d knock your head off. Or at least try.”

  Quint shrugged a shoulder. “If that would make you feel any better, we can go outside and pretend we’re eight years old again.”

  Realizing the absurdity of that notion, Jake scrubbed his face with both hands and let out a long, weary breath. “Things were simple back then, weren’t they?” he asked softly. “We both had fathers and I had no idea that mine was going to leave me behind.”

  Quint leaned forward and laid a hand on Jake’s shoulder. “I thought you weren’t going to let that—him—hurt you anymore.”

  “I believed I’d put it all behind me,” he admitted, “until Rebecca came.”

  “Ah.”

  The one knowing word from Quint put a rueful twist to Jake’s lips. “Yeah. I guess she reminded me all over again what it’s like to lose someone you care about.”

  Quint studied him for long moments. “The racetrack, this ranch, the land, you’re not agonizing over any of those things, Jake. You’re just learning that none of it means a damn thing without someone to love. And someone to love you back.”

  Pain smacked the middle of Jake’s chest and he fixed his gaze on the tabletop in hopes that his friend wouldn’t be able to spot the misery.

  “Well, she doesn’t. Love me back, that is,” Jake muttered.

  “How do you know?” Quint countered. “I doubt you asked her.”

  “I didn’t have to. She left. That was the answer she gave me.”

  “Did you give her any reason to stay?”

  Jake looked dismally up at him. “No. I don’t guess I did.”

  A week later, Rebecca lifted the stainless steel lid covering the main course of her dinner and gave the piece of glazed salmon a disinterested glance. It might have whetted her appetite if she’d gone down to the hotel restaurant instead of ordering room service, she thought. At least she could have sat among the other diners and pretended she wanted to eat. Now the food was growing cold and she had little desire to fork any of it to her mouth.

  Across the opulent hotel room, piled upon the bed, were a countless number of flowing ruffled dresses, lightweight spring jackets, handbags, shoes and chunky pieces of jewelry. All of which she’d collected at today’s fashion bazaar. None of those things interested her, either.

  With a heavy sigh, she walked over to the outer wall of plate glass and stared out at the dark night. The twinkling lights of the Chicago skyline stretched endlessly in all directions and directly below on the well-lit street, people were entering and exiting cabs as they made their way to some of the nearby nightspots.

  There were times when an assistant traveled with Rebecca, but this time she’d made the trip alone to the Midwest Fashion Fair. Yet even if a friend had accompanied her, she wouldn’t have had any desire to go out for a night on the town.

  Face it, Rebecca, you’re confused, miserable and missing Jake Rollins something fierce.

  The voice going off in her head was suddenly interrupted by the ring of her cell phone.

  Turning away from the untouched meal, she walked over to the nightstand where she’d left the phone and immediately frowned. She’d expected the caller to be her boss, Arlene, but the number illuminated on the front of the instrument was totally unfamiliar.

  And then it dawned on Rebecca that the area code she was seeing was from New Mexico! Dear God, could it be Jake?

  Snatching up the instrument, she fumbled it open and finally managed to slap it next to her ear. “Hello,” she answered in a rush.

  “Rebecca? That you?”

  Stunned to hear Abe Cantrell’s voice, she sank weakly onto the edge of the bed. Had something happened to Jake and the older man had called to let her know? The mere idea left her hands trembling.

  “Yes, this is Rebecca. How are you, Abe?”

  “Fine and dandy. Been sittin’ outside watchin’ the sunset and it was mighty pretty. Made me think of you. So I gave you a call to see how you’re doin’.”

  A hot, painful lump filled her throat. While she’d lived on her mother’s place, she’d not spent a great deal of time with her elderly neighbor, but enough to get to know and love him. Before she’d left for Houston, she’d told Abe about Gertrude being her mother and how confused and hurt the whole thing had left her. Surprisingly, Abe had understood her distress more than any of her friends in Houston. Perhaps that was because he was much older and wiser. Or maybe she’d simply opened up to him more. Either way, his thoughtful support had bonded her to him in a way she’d not expected.

  “Well, right now I’m sitting in a hotel room in Chicago,” she told him.

  “You on a vacation?”

  Rebecca closed her eyes as images of everythi
ng she’d come to love in New Mexico swam to the forefront of her thoughts. “Nothing that pleasant. I’m on a business trip. My job requires a lot of traveling.”

  “Went right back to work, did you? Guess that means you haven’t had time to miss much about this place back here.”

  “Actually, I—I’ve been missing everything out there.”

  He said, “Your mother’s place looks deserted now. I don’t like seeing it that way.”

  Before she’d left for Houston, Abe had taken her animals and given them a nice home on Apache Wells. Another reason she was very grateful to the man.

  She said, “It would be better if I could find a nice little family to live there and keep the place maintained. Maybe you know of someone?”

  “I’d rather see you there.”

  She swallowed hard as she struggled to blink back a wall of tears. “Well, you know how it is, Abe, a person has to work to keep their head afloat.” She cleared her throat, then asked, “How is Beau?”

  “After you left he moped around for a few days. But he’s okay now. I never was one to have a dog for a buddy, but he can’t seem to shake me and I can’t seem to shake him, so we’re stuck together. The cats are in mouse heaven down at the barn and Starr has made a few friends in the remuda. And I know you didn’t ask me to, but I sent someone to mow your grass. Just in case you decide to come back.”

  Beyond the door to her suite, Rebecca could hear a group of people passing in the hallway. From the sound of their laughter, they sounded happy and young. Had she ever been that way? Yes, she’d been happy, but that had been eons ago. Long before she’d grown dissatisfied with her job, before she’d learned Gertrude was her mother, that Gwyn had been harboring secrets, and her father had been unfaithful. And definitely long before she’d met Jake and fallen in love with him.

  Tugging her attention back to Abe, she said, “Unfortunately, that won’t be anytime soon. But thank you for the lawn work. It makes me feel better to know the place doesn’t look raggedy.”

  “You haven’t asked about Jake,” he said pointedly.

  The old man was crafty, Rebecca would give him that much. She breathed deeply, then asked, “How is Jake?”

  “He ain’t good. That’s about all I can say.”

  Rebecca instantly gripped the phone. “Why? What’s wrong with him?”

  “You’d have to ask him to get the answer. All I know is what Quint tells me. And he tells me that Jake is considering taking a job at the track and selling the Rafter R.”

  “Selling his ranch?” She was stunned. “But, Abe, that doesn’t make sense! He’s worked so hard on it! And he seemed so proud of the place.”

  “Well, Jake never was one to want a pile of material things. To a certain point, Quint’s the same way. Guess that’s why the two boys have always been such good friends. Frankly, I think he needs to get rid of every damn cow on the place and focus on raisin’ his horses. That’s what he loves to do and that’s what he ought to do.”

  “Then you should tell him so, Abe! You’re his friend and I know he respects your opinion.”

  Abe chuckled. “He wouldn’t appreciate me tellin’ him what to do. Now you, that’s another matter—if you was to tell him that might carry some weight.”

  A tear slipped from Rebecca’s eye and fell onto her cheek. At one point during her stay in New Mexico, she’d believed that Jake might actually grow to care for her, maybe even love her. But once she’d met Gwyn in Ruidoso and learned the truth about how she was conceived, something had happened to her. She’d felt sick and desperate and lost.

  And when she and Jake had ridden out to the windmill and made love under the open sky it had been so beautiful, so bittersweet, that her heart had ached. She’d desperately longed to hear him say that he loved her. Or at the very least, he wanted her to remain in New Mexico. But while he’d held her for those long minutes, he’d not said anything and his silence had opened her eyes. Suddenly, she could see she was deluding herself in thinking he would ever love her and the longer she stayed, the more her heart was going to break.

  Then later, at the house, Rebecca had once again attempted to draw out his feelings, to get any sort of sign from him that he wanted her in a permanent way. When she’d told him she no longer knew where she belonged, she’d done so while hoping and praying he would open his mouth and tell her that she belonged with him. For always. But he’d failed to say anything meaningful, except goodbye.

  “I don’t think so, Abe. I’ve not even heard from Jake and I don’t expect to.”

  “There ain’t no law written that says you can’t call him, is there?”

  Call Jake? What good would that do, except tear her heart wide open again? she wondered miserably. “Jake doesn’t want to hear from me.”

  Abe snorted. “And grass don’t grow in the spring.”

  Closing her eyes, Rebecca rubbed fingertips against her furrowed brow. “In order for grass to grow it has to be fed sun and rain,” she reminded the old man.

  There was a long pause and while she waited for Abe to reply, in the far background she could hear a horse neigh softly. Was it Starr still calling out for Banjo? The notion put a hard lump in Rebecca’s throat.

  “Jake is like a son to me,” Abe finally said. “I don’t want to see him mess up. Think about calling him, Rebecca. That’s all I ask.”

  “I’ll do that much,” Rebecca conceded.

  Abe thanked her and after a quick good-night ended the call.

  Rebecca placed the phone back on the nightstand, then dropped her face in her hands and sobbed.

  The next morning Jake was on his way to the Downs to shoe three racehorses when Clara rang his cell phone and asked that he stop by her place before going on about his business.

  Jake had agreed to see his mother, although he’d been surprised by her request. Only last night he’d dropped by for a visit, the first one he’d had with her since the day he’d raked her over the coals about his father and how she’d allowed the man to dictate her life. Taking all that in account, Jake had expected to find Clara more than a little frosty, but she’d met him at the door with a welcoming hug. And when he’d told her about Rebecca going back to Texas, he’d braced himself to hear a bunch of I-told-you-sos. Instead, she’d appeared truly sorry for him. He’d been inwardly shocked by the pleasant change in her and though he’d wondered what had brought it about, he’d decided it best not to ask and simply be thankful for it.

  Now this morning as he walked onto the porch of his mother’s house, he could only wonder what was going on with her and hope that she’d not had another health setback.

  Rapping his knuckles slightly on the storm door, he opened it and stepped inside. “Mom? I’m here.”

  Clara immediately hurried through a doorway leading to the back of the house. She smiled at him with a measure of relief.

  “Jake, I’m so glad you took the time to come by. I know you’re busy, but I have something important to give you. At least, I think it will be important.”

  Walking over to his mother, Jake dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “What is it? You sent plenty of baked things home with me last night. I don’t need any more food.”

  She let out a short laugh that sounded strangely nervous to Jake. Which only confused him more. In the past Clara had often complained and whined and accused him of being like his father, but one thing she’d never been with him was nervous.

  “It’s nothing like that.” She took him by the hand and led him over to a short couch. “I—uh—I didn’t tell you last night, but I talked to Quint the other day.”

  “That’s nothing new. You two have always been friends.”

  A sheepish expression stole over her face. “We talked about you.”

  Jake grimaced. “Oh. You shouldn’t have done that, Mom.”

  “I didn’t. He’s the one who approached me. And frankly, I’m glad that he did. I didn’t know—well, that day we argued—I didn’t understand about Rebecca, not really. I th
ought she was just another one of your women. I think—well, I’ve been so wrapped up in feeling sorry for myself that I couldn’t really see what was going on with you and the girl from Texas.”

  Jake stiffened. “What makes you think she’s any different?”

  “Oh, son, don’t try to pretend with me,” she said gently, then attempted to laugh and lighten the moment. “I mean, your mother has finally opened her eyes, don’t try to hide from me now.”

  Dropping his head, Jake stared at the scuffed toes of his boots, but all he was really seeing was Rebecca’s face, her sweet smile, the warm shine in her blue eyes. “I miss her,” he mumbled. “So much.”

  He felt his mother’s hand rest upon his back and then she said softly, “That’s how it is when you love someone.”

  Lifting his head, he looked at her with remorse. “I’m sorry, Mom. I’ve been hard on you at times. I said things to you that I didn’t know about or understand.”

  Smiling faintly, she shook her head. “You had every right to say what you did. I’ve been wallowing in self-pity for far too long. I lost Lee and let the hurt ruin a big chunk of my life. I don’t want that to happen to you.”

  She pulled a small piece of paper from a pocket on her blouse and thrust it at him. “Here. I think you need to use this.”

  He glanced down to see a phone number scratched across a torn piece of notebook paper. “I don’t need that. I already have Rebecca’s number. Besides, I wouldn’t know what to say to her.”

  With a smile of encouragement, Clara pressed the paper into Jake’s hand and folded his fingers around it. “When the time is right you’ll know what to say to her. But before you talk to Rebecca I think you should make this call.”

  Bewildered, he asked, “Why?”

  “Because it’s a link to your father.”

  Less than a week later, Rebecca was sitting at her desk, sifting through a stack of fashion sketches, when Arlene’s voice came over the intercom.

  “Rebecca, I need you on the second floor. We’re having a disagreement that only you can settle.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  She walked out of her sumptuous office and took the elevator up to the second floor, a space used exclusively to display Bordeaux’s formal evening wear. At the front entrance of the department, she found Arlene and her young assistant, a guy named Nigel, trying to put the finishing touches to a mannequin dressed in a designer frock fashioned from yards and yards of shiny faille. She considered the dress far too flamboyant for the store, but this was one time Arlene had dismissed Rebecca’s opinion and purchased the garment in several sizes anyway.