by Janet Dailey
“Let’s go.” She offered him the keys. “Want to drive?”
“Sure. It’s been a while since I’ve driven one of these babies.” He walked around the car to let her in the passenger side, then returned to slide into the driver’s seat and turn the key in the ignition. The powerful engine purred to life.
“Runs smooth for an older car,” he commented as they headed out of the parking lot. “I can tell it’s had good care.”
“This was my father’s car,” Maggie said. “It was his baby. I try to keep it up the way he’d have wanted me to.”
“Are you sure he wouldn’t mind me driving it?”
“Don’t worry. I’m sure a man with your experience can drive anything on the road.”
“My experience?” He glanced at her, his eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”
Maggie could have bitten her tongue, but it was too late to take back what she’d just said. Now her only recourse was honesty. “I know about your having been a patrolman,” she said. “And I know you went to prison.”
His jaw tightened, but he kept driving toward Main Street. “How did you find out?”
“I asked the sheriff. He told me. As mayor, it’s my business to know about the people in this town.”
“Is it, Mayor Maggie?” The question was laced with irony.
“Don’t worry, I haven’t told anybody, and I don’t intend to.” Maggie’s voice betrayed her unease. This was not going the way she’d hoped.
“Did the sheriff tell you what happened?”
“A little, but I had the impression he didn’t know the whole story.”
“He knows.”
Maggie didn’t answer. There was nothing she could say that would ease the situation.
Travis stopped outside the restaurant but made no move to get out of the car. “Well, are you waiting for me to tell you?” he asked.
“Only if you want to.”
He exhaled, gazing through the windshield at the faded leaves that blew along the sidewalk. The wind had picked up, blowing a bank of heavy clouds across the sun.
“It was after midnight, and I was working,” he said. “We’d gotten an alert earlier about a kidnapping—a twelve-year-old girl. Her friend said she’d been grabbed by a stranger in the mall parking lot and thrown into the trunk of a dark blue Toyota Camry. We had a partial on the plate—the first three digits. The friend hadn’t been sure about the rest.
“I was wrapping up a long shift, headed home on the freeway, dog tired, when a car passed me going twenty miles over the speed limit. Blue Camry, the plate matched what we’d been told. I turned on my lights and siren and pulled it over. The driver looked about twenty, like maybe a college kid. He seemed nervous. I took his license and registration, and then I asked him to open the trunk latch. He started the car and took off.
“All I could think of was that little girl, locked in the trunk and headed for God knows what kind of hell. I drew my pistol and fired through the back window. The car skidded off the road, into a ditch. He was dead by the time I got to him, shot through the head. When I opened the trunk, there was nothing in it but some OxyContin and a couple bags of weed.”
“And the little girl?” Maggie asked.
“She showed up safe. It turned out she and her friend had made up the whole kidnapping thing.” Travis shook his head. “The boy’s family had money and influence. They made sure I paid for my mistake. Three years for manslaughter, and I’ll never work in law enforcement again.”
“That’s awful,” Maggie said. “So unfair. I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too. I ended an innocent life, and I’ll always wonder what I could have done differently. But it’s in the past and can’t be changed. So what do you say we put it aside and go have that coffee and pie?”
“Sure.” Maggie waited while he came around to help her out of the car. Life wasn’t fair, she thought. All Travis had meant to do was save a child. Instead, his action had ended in tragedy—and a burden of guilt he would carry for the rest of his life. She was just beginning to discover the kind of man he was.
* * *
By now it was mid-afternoon. The Saturday lunch crowd had gone, leaving Buckaroo’s more or less quiet. They took a booth, and Travis gave the waitress their order. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d taken a beautiful woman out to eat—not that this was any kind of date. But it wouldn’t hurt to pretend a little.
Telling Maggie about his past hadn’t been easy. But he was glad she knew and seemed to understand what had happened. At least she’d know he wasn’t holding back. And she wouldn’t have to get the story from someone else.
But why should it matter? he reminded himself. He knew why she was spending time with him. She wanted his help with the Christmas parade. But that was her problem, not his. Apart from a case of giant economy-sized tomato juice, he didn’t owe Mayor Maggie a blasted thing.
“You said your friend was coming.” She sipped the coffee the waitress had brought her. “I don’t suppose he has a round belly and a white beard?”
Travis had to smile. “If I remember right, Conner’s even skinnier than I am. He’s been a champion bronc and bull rider—made the national finals five times and won twice. Took second in the all-around competition a few years ago. But I just found out he’s been injured and needs a place to go, so I invited him here. Figured I could use his help, especially with the horses. He’s driving in from Waco, could be here as soon as tomorrow. And he’ll be tired. That’s why I’m trying to get his room ready.”
“Could you use some help?”
“From you?” His eyebrows shot up.
“I may not be as strong as you,” she said, taking a dainty forkful of pie. “But I can help balance the heavy things and carry in the light things, like drawers. It could save you some time.”
He frowned, studying the way her windblown hair curled around her face and how the loosely buttoned collar of her denim shirt revealed the barest shadow of cleavage. Why would she offer to help him with a heavy job that didn’t strike him as women’s work? He already knew the answer to that question. But that didn’t mean he was going to turn her down.
“Sure, thanks,” he said. “I’ll need to pick up some sheets and blankets at Shop Mart on the way.”
“No need. I’ve got a box of spare bedding I was planning to donate. My house isn’t far. We can stop by and pick it up when I take you back to your truck.”
“Thanks.” He hesitated. “Are you sure you’ve got time for this?”
“It’s Saturday. I was just going to run an errand or two and hang around the house. I’d rather make myself useful. Thanks for the coffee and pie, by the way. It’s not very often I get treated by a man.”
“I find that hard to believe, Mayor Maggie,” he said. “I can imagine men lining up around the block just to buy you coffee.”
She laughed. “Then you don’t know Branding Iron—or me. My age qualifies me as an old maid around here.”
That was what Abner had called her. He’d said she was too bossy for most men. If that was true, Travis thought, it didn’t say much for the male population of Branding Iron. Maggie Delaney was a goddess.
They left Buckaroo’s, and Maggie drove to her house—a cozy-looking brick bungalow with a deep, covered front porch. It reminded Travis of the house he’d grown up in after his mother remarried.
Hank had a smaller house. Travis had driven by it once. That one time was enough for him.
“Do you need help with the box?” he asked her as she pulled into the driveway and stopped.
“It’s not heavy. I’ll be back in a jiffy.” She climbed out of the car, darted into the house, and appeared minutes later with a hefty-looking cardboard box, which she slid onto the backseat. He should have insisted on helping her, Travis thought. But something told him Maggie wasn’t accustomed to being helped.
She drove him back to the Shop Mart and let him off at his truck. “I’ll see you at your place,” she said.
<
br /> “It still smells like skunk out there,” he warned.
“I grew up in Branding Iron. I can deal with that.” She gave him a cheerful wave as she drove away.
When Travis arrived home, he saw that she’d made it there ahead of him and propped the gate open for the truck. Maggie was on the front porch, with Bucket at her side. Travis pulled in, parked by the house, and got out of the truck to close the gate.
By now the sky was dark with clouds. Wind whistled through the ancient cottonwoods that lined the road. A storm front was moving in. Would it be chilly enough to bring the season’s first snowfall?
Travis mounted the porch where she was waiting. “Hang around with that dog and you’ll have to bury your clothes when you get home,” he said.
She grinned. “Too late for that now. We’re already pals. Come on, let’s get that truck emptied before the weather hits.”
“Right.” As mayor, Maggie was clearly accustomed to calling the shots, Travis observed. No wonder some men found her off-putting. But he, for one, enjoyed a woman with backbone. He tossed her the leather work gloves he kept in the truck. “Put these on,” he said.
She hesitated. “They’ll be too big.”
“Put them on—unless you’d rather get splinters.”
She slipped the gloves on her hands. “All right, let’s get to work,” she said.
With Bucket trailing them back and forth, they hauled the pieces into the house. Maggie carried the bureau drawers and the nightstand in by herself. But it took both of them to lug and balance the rug and the ends of the wooden bed frame and wrestle the full-size mattress and box spring through the door and down the hall.
Travis had to admit Maggie was a lot of help. She was strong for a woman, and she didn’t stand around waiting to be told what to do. It took them maybe fifteen minutes to get everything out of the truck and in the house, and another fifteen minutes to put everything together in the bedroom. When the mattress finally lay over the box spring on the bed, she fell backward across it with a little whoosh and lay there, laughing. “Now that was work!” she said.
As he looked down at her, with her cheeks flushed and her hair falling in glorious tangles, it was all Travis could do to keep from flinging himself down beside her and taking her in his arms. Not a good idea, he told himself. Either Maggie would slap his face, or she wouldn’t, which could mean serious trouble for them both.
For a few more seconds, he feasted his eyes on the sight of her. Then after announcing that he was going to get the box from her car, he turned and strode outside. Safe on the porch, he took a breath.
Was the woman aware of her effect on him? He would bet good money she was. Maggie hadn’t gotten to be mayor by being a shrinking violet. She was an expert at getting what she wanted.
He knew what she was up to—playing up to him, helping him with Conner’s room, flirting with him in her maddeningly subtle way. But it wasn’t going to work. He wanted nothing to do with the Christmas parade, especially if she expected him to play Santa.
* * *
Maggie sat up, pulled down her jacket, and brushed back her hair. She’d come out here hoping that Travis would open up about his father. Understanding what had driven a wedge between them could be the first step in getting father and son back together. But so far all she’d done was haul furniture.
Maybe she was wasting her time. Not that she hadn’t enjoyed herself. Travis was the most attractive man she’d met in a long time, and the way he treated her made her feel—as the old Carol King song put it—like a natural woman. But she’d come here on business, and that business was getting nowhere.
She heard the front door open and close, then the sound of footsteps as he came down the hall with the box of bedding.
“I can make the bed for you,” she offered as he walked into the room and set the box on the bed. “There’s a mattress pad in the bottom of the box. It needs to go on first.”
“I know how to make a bed, Maggie,” he said. “You’ve been a lot of help, and I’m grateful, but you must have better things to do than hang around here.”
The words felt like a cold slap in the face, but Maggie chose not to react. “Fine,” she said. “Just one more thing. I’d like to look at the sleigh and the other things Abner left. I need to make sure everything is there and nothing needs to be replaced. Then I’ll be on my way.”
“Sure. Come on. But it’s getting cold out there. You won’t want to spend much time.”
He led her through the kitchen and out the back door to the open shed. Bucket, who’d been waiting on the porch, tagged along after them.
Maggie could see the covered sleigh, mounted on the flatbed. She stepped back while Travis pulled the tarp to one side. “It looks fine,” she said. “I’m always amazed by this sleigh. Abner put so much love into building it. And he loved being Santa for the kids. When he was dressed up in that red suit and beard, it was like he was the real thing.”
“Too bad he had to leave,” Travis said. “I know you won’t have an easy time replacing him.”
“Actually, I have someone in mind.” Maggie spoke cautiously, knowing she couldn’t push him too far. “I think he’d be perfect, but I haven’t asked him yet. I don’t know if he’d be willing.”
She held her breath, waiting for him to ask who it was. But at that moment, Bucket, who’d followed them into the shed, jumped into the sleigh and onto the seat. He wagged his tail and gave a little yip, as if to say, Let’s go!
“Maybe Bucket could do the job,” Travis joked. “All he needs is a red suit and a beard.”
“Bucket always rode on the seat with Abner,” Maggie said. “He even wore a red Santa hat. The kids loved him. Look at him now. He knows right where he belongs.”
With Bucket supervising from the seat, Maggie inspected the boxes that contained the harness gear and the Santa costume. “Everything seems to be here,” she said. “We’ve got all we need except our Santa.” She glanced at Travis, wondering whether he’d be open to her mentioning his father. His stone-faced expression told her to wait. “Where are the horses?” she asked.
“They’re out in the hay pasture. So far they’ve done all right. But Conner is the horseman. He’ll know how to take care of them. Meanwhile, our resident horse handler is right here.” He gave Bucket a nod. “Come on, I’ll show you.”
They covered the sleigh again and left the shed with Bucket trotting at their heels. Fine, powdery snowflakes were blowing on the wind. Maggie felt their cold sting against her cheek as they walked out to the wire fence that surrounded the pasture. She could see the big Percherons in the middle of the field, standing close together as if to shield each other from the weather.
“Time to get them in.” Travis glanced down at Bucket. “What do you say, boy?”
Bucket gave a yip and ran to the gate. Travis lifted the latch and swung it back. The dog raced through and made straight for the horses.
Maggie knew what she was about to see. Border collies were born herders, and Abner had trained his dog well. What surprised and delighted her was seeing Travis’s pleasure as Bucket did his job and brought the horses in. It was the first time she’d seen genuine happiness on his face.
Hallelujah, there’s hope for the man yet!
They stepped out of the way as the huge horses trotted through the gate with Bucket at their heels. When they were safely in their stalls, Travis closed the gates and rewarded the dog with a bowl of kibble.
“Does he sleep in the barn?” Maggie asked him as they walked outside, into the blowing snow.
“He’s got a bed in the straw. So far, he seems to like it fine.” Travis closed the barn door.
“Abner used to let him sleep in the house. Don’t be surprised if he charms his way in as it gets colder.”
“He won’t be doing that until that skunk smell goes away. Come on.” His hand cupped her elbow, firmly guiding her. “I’ll walk you to your car.”
Snow swirled around them as they walked to the front g
ate. The flakes were fine and weightless, leaving the barest skim of white on the ground. Neither of them spoke. It was as if they’d run out of things to say. Whatever she’d come to accomplish here, she’d failed. The wall Travis had raised against her was as solid as ever.
He walked her around to the driver’s side door. Maggie was shivering beneath her leather jacket. Travis put his hand on the latch, then hesitated. One hand moved upward to cup her jaw. Leaning down, he let his mouth touch hers in a light, lingering kiss that sent electric jolts through her body. She willed herself not to move as his lips nibbled hers, sending her pulse on a roller coaster ride. This was trouble. But she never wanted it to end.
He drew away, his steely gaze holding hers. When he spoke, his voice was thick and husky. “In case you’re wondering, that’s what I want from you, Maggie,” he said. “Now I want the truth about what you want from me. No pretty lies, just plain honesty.”
Maggie fought back welling tears. This was the moment of truth—and the truth had just become cheap and ugly. “I want your father to be our new Santa,” she said. “And I want you to reconcile with him so you can work together with the horses and sleigh.”
The lines of his face had shifted and hardened. He opened the car door. “That’s what I thought,” he said. “Goodbye, Maggie.”
Chapter 6
Maggie drove home through a blur of snow and unshed tears. What could she have done differently? Lied about her motives? Slapped Travis’s face? Begged his forgiveness?
Nothing would have made any difference. He’d backed her into a corner, stripped her emotions bare, and left her with no choice except to tell the truth. She’d deserved what had happened. But his abruptness, after that soul-searing kiss, had left her raw inside.
It wasn’t just the way he’d dismissed her. It was the way he’d made her feel—like a lying, scheming manipulator. The sting was even worse because it was pretty much true. She couldn’t blame him if he never spoke to her again.
At the house, she pulled into the garage, took her purse and the sack of groceries she’d bought out of the car, and carried them inside. As she was putting the milk and cottage cheese in the fridge, the dam broke. A tear trickled down her cheek, then another and another. Blast it, she was crying—crying over a man she scarcely knew, a man who meant nothing to her.
