The Cowboy's Claim

by Carla Cassidy

  The parking lot was bathed in the cherry light from the motel sign. Cars were parked neatly before the units their owners had rented for the night, but she saw no one who could have made the shadow she’d seen.

  Was somebody there hiding behind a car? Had somebody tried to open her door, and was that what had awakened her from her sleep? Was it the person who had killed two waitresses now stalking his next victim?

  Or had it simply been somebody walking from a room to the vending area nearby? Her heart began to slow to a more normal pace.

  She was definitely jumping at shadows. She flipped the switch that turned on the light over the table. It was probably her encounter with Nick that had her so distressed. A sharp icicle of panic still stabbed the back of her throat.

  A cup of tea. That’s what she needed at the moment. Her mother had always made a big production of teatime. She’d be appalled if she saw Courtney now pull out the battered old teakettle from the lower of the small set of cabinets, and the chipped cup from the upper cabinet.

  No Earl Grey here, just the cheapest generic brand she could find. She put the kettle of water on to boil and then placed a tea bag in her cup, wishing that by drinking a single cup of tea she could banish Nick Benson from her mind, from her life, forever.

  It had probably been dreams of him that had pulled her from her sleep, panicked and feeling threatened, not some nebulous shadow of somebody walking by her room.

  She’d been a fool to think she could keep Garrett a secret from him. The minute Nick had shown up back in town she had been doomed. She’d just felt as if she were getting her life back on course, dating Grant and keeping up with the financial strain of single parenting on a waitress’s salary.

  She felt as if she’d been on track for building a future for herself and her son, and now Nick was like a wrench thrown in to screw things up.

  The teakettle began a soft whistle and she quickly moved it off the burner and poured the steaming water into the awaiting cup. Once the tea was made, she sank down at the tiny table and drew a deep breath to steady her tumultuous emotions.

  Part of the problem was she’d never really resolved her feelings about Nick. For months after he’d left, she’d hated him as she’d never hated another person in her life. She’d felt both bewildered and betrayed by his sudden absence.

  What did he want from her now? What did he want of Garrett? Her biggest concern was that for Nick, Garrett would be a fun novelty for a couple of months, just as she had been in Nick’s life, and then he’d disappear once again.

  She’d rather have no father or a good stepfather than a father who drifted in and out of his life without responsibility, without any thought of long-term consequences to the child.

  She certainly didn’t want any kind of a personal relationship with him. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me, she thought as she finished her tea and put the cup in the sink.

  She walked back to the motel room door and once again checked to make sure the lock was securely fastened. There was no question that every woman in town was more than a little bit jumpy over the two unsolved murders.

  She turned off the light and made her way through the darkness back into bed, even though she knew sleep would probably remain a distant pleasure for hours to come.

  The next thing she knew, the morning sun was peeking through the slit in the curtains, and a glance at her clock let her know it was just after seven.

  Garrett was still sleeping, but she knew it wouldn’t be long and he’d be up and ready for his breakfast. She had so much to do in order to meet Nick at the park at nine.

  As she took a quick shower and tried not to anticipate what might come of the meeting, she reminded herself that at least for the moment she was the one in control. He wasn’t even listed on the birth certificate as the father. That particular box had been marked unknown.

  By eight forty-five she had herself and Garrett dressed and fed and him loaded into his car seat in her car. “Bye-bye,” Garrett said as she started the car engine.

  “That’s right,” she said. “We’re going bye-bye.”

  Her heart thrummed an unsettled rhythm as she headed in the direction of the city park. As she drove down Main Street she saw Cameron Evans and a couple of his deputies walking along the sidewalk and knew they were probably interviewing and investigating the murder of Shirley Cook.

  There was no question that it was more than a little disturbing that there had been two waitresses murdered in the past three months and neither crime had been solved.

  She thought of that moment in the middle of the night when she’d awakened panicked and thought that somebody was outside her motel room door. She knew somebody had been out there, but she couldn’t know if it had simply been an innocent presence or something more sinister.

  But, at the moment she had other things to worry about...like Nick and Garrett. She didn’t even like thinking of the two of them in the same sentence.

  As she pulled into the parking lot of the small park that boasted swings and a slide and a sandbox that Garrett loved, Nick’s truck was already there. She steeled herself as she parked next to his truck, as afraid now as she had been in the middle of the night when she’d imagined the possibility that a killer was stalking her.

  Chapter 5

  As he stepped out of the driver’s door, his dark cowboy hat pulled down low over his brow, Courtney was shocked by a sudden visceral attraction that pierced through her. It was the same reaction she’d had when she’d first seen him coming out of the feed store in Evanston.

  At that time she’d felt as if a rocket had gone off in the pit of her stomach, and he’d later told her he’d felt that same way when he’d first laid eyes on her.

  He walked toward her car with that loose-hipped gait that made him appear to be a carefree cowboy, but when he tipped his hat back and she saw his eyes, there was nothing carefree in those blue depths.

  “Good morning,” he said, his gaze on Garrett still in the car seat. Nick looked slightly nervous, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

  “Out!” Garrett demanded and clapped his hands with excitement. He knew the park. Courtney brought her son here often.

  “Mind if I get him out?” Nick asked tentatively.

  She wanted to tell him no, that she didn’t want him touching her son, but she knew that wasn’t right, that it wouldn’t be fair.

  “Go ahead,” she agreed around the huge lump in her throat.

  She stepped back and watched as he carefully unfastened Garrett while he pulled off Nick’s hat and laughed with glee.

  As Nick gathered the child into his arms and straightened, Courtney saw the look in Nick’s eyes, the expression that swept over his sinfully handsome features.

  She knew that look. She knew exactly what he was feeling at that moment. It was the same thing she’d felt after she’d given birth and they’d placed Garrett into her arms for the very first time.

  Awe.

  It was an awe that sucked the very breath out of you, weakened your bones and humbled you in a way that nothing else would ever do again.

  The moment was broken as Garrett grabbed Nick’s nose. “Nose,” he said proudly.

  Nick laughed, and the sound of it attempted to wrap around Courtney’s heart, but she steeled herself against it. She’d always loved the sound of his laughter. “Yes, that’s my nose and you’re pulling it off,” Nick said as he pulled Garrett’s fingers away.

  Courtney leaned into the car and retrieved Nick’s hat, a diaper bag and a small tote that carried toys for the sandbox. She motioned Nick in that direction as she passed him his hat.

  Next to the big box of fine white sand was a picnic table and beyond that a thick stand of trees. They could sit at the table and talk while Garrett played.

  As they walked, Nick continued to look at his son, as if matching features with his own, as if still processing the fact that Garrett was a reality now in his arms.

  They didn’t spe
ak to each other until Garrett was situated in the sandbox with several plastic trucks, a shovel and a pail. Courtney sat on one side of the picnic table and Nick sat on the other, facing her.

  The anger she’d seen the night before in his eyes was gone, replaced by a quiet simmer of an emotion she couldn’t quite identify. Her heart hammered the uneven rhythm of anxiety. She just didn’t know what to expect from him.

  “Why didn’t you tell me when you first found out you were pregnant?” he finally asked. “You had my cell phone number. I never changed it.”

  An edge of bitterness washed over her. “By the time I realized I was pregnant, two and a half months had gone by since you’d left town. I never changed my phone number and yet you never called me either.”

  She tried desperately to keep the pain, that touch of bitterness, out of her voice and instead simply make it a statement of fact. “I figured if you had any interest at all in me, in what was going on with my life, then I would have heard from you.”

  Nick took off his hat and set it on the table next to him, his gaze on Garrett, who was happily filling his pail with the white sand. “You still should have called me,” he repeated. “This was bigger than both of us. I had a right to know.”

  “You gave up all your rights when you left me without a word.” They were going around and around on the same topic, one that couldn’t be changed. “I was a little too busy planning my own future to worry about you,” she replied tersely.

  He gazed at her curiously. “And how is it that your future became waitressing in Grady Gulch?”

  A wealth of emotion pressed tight in her chest as she thought of those days and weeks right after she’d discovered she was pregnant with Nick’s baby.

  For weeks she’d kept the secret, terrified and so alone. But, by the time she was almost four months pregnant she knew she had to tell her parents, although they would be disappointed in her.

  She’d lived her life trying to be the daughter they wanted, the daughter they’d tried to mold into something great, and until she’d met Nick she’d done and been everything they’d asked of her.

  They hadn’t considered college necessary because their intention was for her to be the arm candy of a wealthy, influential man. So instead of college, she’d had tennis lessons and spent time with her mother in New York. She’d been trained in ballroom dancing and taught all the social skills that would make her a great wife for a great man.

  “Needless to say my parents weren’t thrilled when they found out I was pregnant,” she finally said. The scene the night that she’d confessed to them was forever burned into her memory. She knew she’d let them down, but she’d also believed they loved her enough to support her in her time of need.

  “They demanded to know who the father was, and when I refused to tell them they kicked me out of the house and disowned me.” A lump rose in her throat, but she consciously swallowed against it. Nick had betrayed her first, and then her parents had followed suit.

  A tiny frown line appeared across his forehead as she continued. “So, I packed up my bags, called a friend to pick me up and went to Mary and the Cowboy Café. You’d spoken so highly of her and I knew she had a reputation for taking in people in crisis and letting them work and live in one of the little cottages behind the restaurant.” She shrugged. “And that’s how I happen to be here.”

  Of course it hadn’t been that easy. She’d been terrified and alone. She’d been afraid she couldn’t make it, that somehow she couldn’t be a single mother. Yet, despite her fears, the moment she’d discovered her pregnancy she’d also realized a tremendous love for the baby she carried. She knew that somehow she’d find the strength to make it work.

  He didn’t say anything for a long moment. “Are things better with your parents now?”

  “I haven’t seen or spoken to them since the night they threw me out. But, I’m fine and I’ve learned not to depend on anyone but myself. So, what do you want, Nick?”

  Her heart, which had already begun to beat too fast, stepped up in rhythm, aching in her chest as she stared at the man she had once believed she knew better than anyone else. She realized now she hadn’t known him at all, and after two years she definitely didn’t know the man who sat across from her.

  “I want joint custody.” His gaze met hers boldly, shining with determination.

  For a moment the wind was knocked out of her. She’d thought he’d probably want some sort of informal visitation while he was in town, but she’d never expected for him to ask for this.

  “Why?” she asked flatly.

  The frown in his forehead deepened. “Why? Because he’s my son. Because I want to be a part of his life.”

  “For how long?

  “What do you mean for how long? For the rest of my life,” he replied with a touch of irritation.

  “Or as long as something bad doesn’t happen and you decide to run again. Or until it all gets too complicated and you can’t handle it anymore.” She shook her head. “I’ll be glad to work with you on some kind of visitation schedule, but joint custody is out of the question.”

  The muscles in his jaw tightened and his eyes narrowed. “I can do this with you or without you, Courtney. Don’t fight me on this.”

  It was her nightmare come true. She didn’t want to officially invite Nick into her son’s life, but she also knew he could accomplish what he wanted. He could tie her up in a court battle, a battle she couldn’t afford to wage. He could force a paternity suit and make a case for joint custody. She raised a shaky hand to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear, searching for a way out of this untenable situation.

  “Nick, this has all hit me like a ton of bricks,” she said truthfully. Almost as bad as him wanting custody was the fact that on some physical level he still affected her.

  He wore the same woodsy cologne he’d worn when they had been lovers, and it still created an unexpected warmth inside her as she remembered being held in his arms. “Can we just take everything slow for a couple of weeks and see how it goes?” she asked.

  He hesitated a moment and then slowly nodded. “You know, I could babysit him when you’re working at the café.”

  “You wouldn’t even know how to change a diaper,” she exclaimed.

  He grinned, the slow lazy smile that had once melted her heart. “At least I know what end to diaper. I’m sure I could figure out the rest of it when duty called.”

  She shook her head and looked at Garrett, who was now pouring sand over his own head. “I don’t want to disrupt his schedule all of a sudden. Sophie Martinez has been watching him while I work since he was born. Like I said, we need to take this slow not just for my sake, but for his sake, as well.”

  Nick got up and walked over to Garrett, and for a moment Courtney feared he intended to snatch the boy away and run to his truck. Instead he leaned down and gently swept the sand from Garrett’s short, dark, curly hair and handed him the little blue shovel.

  Garrett gave him a smile that would melt anyone’s heart. Courtney wished at that moment Garrett was throwing a temper fit, or filling his diaper with a particularly nasty poo, doing something...anything that might make Nick rethink his plans.

  “We’ll do it your way for now and take things slow for a couple of weeks,” Nick finally said as he returned to the picnic table. “But, I’d like for you to arrange so that I can spend a little time with him each day. He needs to get to know me, and I want to get to know him.”

  “I’m sure I can arrange that,” she replied, thinking of how complicated everything was going to be from now on.

  “How about we start with all of us having dinner together tonight,” he said.

  “I already have plans for dinner,” she replied. Grant had called her right before she’d left the motel that morning and asked her and Garrett out for dinner.

  Besides, she didn’t want to make the visitations with Garrett about herself and Nick. Dinner felt far too intimate and would only lead to even more complications tha
t she didn’t want or need.

  His gaze narrowed, as if he was unhappy with whatever plans she’d made for the evening. Tough, she thought. He wasn’t about to waltz back into town and insinuate himself into her life again. This was about him and Garrett and nothing else.

  “I work from noon to eight during the next week,” she said. “Why don’t I plan on meeting you here every morning around ten? You can spend an hour or so with him before I take him to Sophie’s.” She could tell her compromise didn’t sit well with him. “At least it will give Garrett a chance to get accustomed to being around you.”

  “Okay,” he finally agreed. “We’ll do that for a week and then see what happens after that.”

  She didn’t want to see what happened next. She just wished she could will him far away from Grady Gulch and the son who was her very heart and soul.

  He got up from the picnic table and grabbed his hat. “I’m not going to run away again when things get tough,” he said as he placed the hat back on his head. “I’m here to stay, Courtney, and you’re going to have to just deal with it. You’re going to have to deal with me.”

  He leaned down and chucked Garrett beneath his chin, then dodged as Garrett attempted to grab his hat. “I’ll see you tomorrow, little guy.”

  Courtney watched as he walked back to his truck, her emotions in turmoil. Despite everything that had happened between them, Nick Benson still stirred inside her a yearning, a longing, a desire that she didn’t feel and would probably never feel for Grant.

  It wasn’t until the truck disappeared from the parking lot that she managed to draw a full, cleansing breath. She still didn’t believe him. She was convinced he’d hang around for only a couple of weeks, maybe a month at the most, and then he’d go back to Texas, where she’d heard he’d been happy.

  Here he would be faced daily with the prospect of being a single father, the fact that Adam was quickly becoming an alcoholic and the everyday reminder that his eldest brother was a criminal.

  He’d run before. She was confident he’d run again. It was just a matter of time. Only this time when he ran, he wouldn’t be taking her heart with him.