“Hey, how’s it goin’?” the man said as he turned toward the door. He touched the brim of his straw cowboy hat, his smile suggesting some history between them that she knew nothing about. “You wanna show me where to put my gear?”
She glanced past him at the blue pickup truck she assumed he’d parked in her driveway. “Put your gear?”
“It’s not much. Mainly me and ol’ Raven here.” At its master’s cue, the dog sniffed at Meredith’s hand. “Looks like he smells his girlfriend,” the man said, exchanging doleful looks with his dog. “Sorry, ol’ son, but she’s gone. That’s why we’re here.”
“And…”
Don’t ask, and don’t pet the dog.
The dog nosed its way under her hand.
“And who would you be?”
“We’d be your new boarders, ma’am.”
“Boarders?” She peered up at him, searching the bronzed, angular face for clues to his meaning. “I’m sorry, Mr….”
“Ryder,” he supplied.
“Mr. Ryder, I’m afraid this can’t be the place you’re looking for.”
“Why can’t it?” He glanced past her, trying to get a look inside the house, possibly scoping it out for a future visit.
She pulled the door closer, wedging herself in. “I don’t rent rooms out. I don’t have any…”
“Sure, you do,” he insisted jovially. “The one where Kenny and his little boy were staying. Plus, you’ve got room for Raven now that they took Lydia and left you an empty doghouse. Raven tried to get her to stay, but that little boy wasn’t havin’ none o’ that.”
“No, I’m sure he wasn’t. Collin is so attached to Lydia, I just couldn’t separate them, so I had to let Ken…” Her son. The mention of his name, and she was suddenly chatting up a total stranger. She drew herself up, gripping the doorknob. “But I’m not renting their room.”
“Kenny told me you’d say that, but I insist on paying for my keep. Cash or chores, it’s up to you, Miz Woodward.”
“Mr. Ryder—”
“Ryder’s my first name, but hardly anybody uses it. I was hoping you would. I won’t get familiar until you give me the word, but…” His slow smile started in his eyes and worked its way to one corner of his mouth. It faded for lack of encouragement, leaving him to expound with a straight face. “It’s Ryder Red Hawk, but I’ve got so damn many nicknames, I hardly ever hear my…”
“I don’t know you,” she reminded him quietly. “I’m not about to give you the word, Mr. Red Hawk. I’m not about to rent you a room, either.”
“You’re all alone here, right?” This time the front door protected her living room from his attempt to check things out for himself.
“Ye—no! No, I have…very close neighbors. I have…” She frowned. “How do you know Ken?”
“He saved my dog’s life.”
“Raven?” Her tone suddenly sympathetic, she rewarded the dog’s tail-thumping rejoinder with a pat on his silky head. “What happened to Raven?”
The man chuckled. “Kind of embarrassing, you wanna know the truth. He took off into a lake after Lydia. Ran the whole length of a dock and jumped in after her. Trying to show off, I guess. She was fetching a Frisbee for Kenny, paddlin’ after it pretty as you please. Ol’ Raven was hooked right off, so to speak. Only there wasn’t a hook, line or a sinker—nothin’ to grab onto—and Raven can’t swim.”
“But he looks like he’s part Lab.”
“He is. Guess it’s his other parts that hold him back.”
“Did Ken pull him out of the water?” she asked, testing.
“Well, now, that boy of yours ain’t much of a swimmer, either.”
Meredith acknowledged the truth of this with raised eyebrows. That was Ken, all right. A swimming-lessons dropout. One thing he’d assured her he wouldn’t miss about Minnesota was all the water. She’d made him promise that Collin would learn to swim better than his father.
“Neither am I,” the cowboy added quickly, “but between the two of us and Lydia, we got him out, got him resuscitated.” He squatted on his heels and traded Raven a two-handed, flapping ear rub for a face licking—clearly working the dog as the key to Meredith’s front door. “Remember, boy? Lydia gave you some muzzle-to-muzzle, and then Kenny hauled you over to his vet clinic and pulled you through.”
Meredith folded her arms, taking her motherly stance as the man stood, his knees cracking as he pushed to his feet. “Is any of this true?” she asked him.
“Some of it, yeah. I know Kenny from the vet clinic.” He took off his hat, pushed his finger through a thick shock of hat-creased salt-and-pepper hair, and glanced past her again. The door had eased itself open, as though offering an invitation on its own. His stiff denim jacket rustled as he squared his shoulders. “Now, can we come in?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude, I just…” She gave a moment’s thought to the idea, and then shook her head. “I don’t know where Ken got the idea that I was going to rent his room out.”
“You’re Kenny’s mom, right? You sure don’t look old enough to have a grown son, but I’d swear you’re the lady in the picture he showed me.”
“Ken showed you…”
“Carries it in his billfold, right behind the little boy’s picture.”
“Mr. Ryde—Red Hawk…” She caught the teasing sparkle in his eyes and left the warning to dangle as the name Red Hawk echoed, and she thought, Native American; how interesting, and wondered idly what pictures he carried in his wallet. “Which picture was it?”
“You had a blue-ribbon smile,” he hinted.
“Oh. The one they took at the State Fair.” She pushed back her hair, which had been shorter then. The art director had made her wear a silly checked apron because he thought it made her look more “Minnesota wholesome.” She had hidden most of it behind a pyramid of jars of her prize-winning antipasto. “That was for the last cookbook. I didn’t know he kept a copy in his wallet.”
“You’re the only woman he’s got in there. Had to give him a bad time about being a mama’s boy.”
She sighed. “Ken hasn’t had much luck with women lately.”
“You ask me, he was lucky from day one.”
Her face felt warm. She couldn’t believe his country-hick charm was actually getting to her. “I had to give him a bad time about having to move back home with his mother, but I hated to see them leave.”
“You can be sure he hated to leave the comforts of his mother’s home. Especially when she’s a blue-ribbon cook. He thought I might be able to talk you into board along with the room, but I don’t wanna push my luck.”
“I’m always testing recipes. Ken was my guinea pig.”
“He mentioned that.”
“So there’s always a ton of food, but it might not be to your liking.”
He laughed. “I never met a plate of food I didn’t like.”
“Then you won’t be much help, will you?” She caught herself imagining him sitting at her table, eating poached salmon off her Fiestaware and complimenting her on the sauce. Instinctively she stepped back. “What am I saying? This really isn’t a boarding house, and I’m not…”
“But Raven here, he’s about as fussy as they come. If it ain’t done right, he passes it over to me. I’m the one eats his leftovers.”
All right, she had to smile for the dog. He had no pedigree, but he was surely well-mannered. She could see him playing Tramp to her Lady Lydia, the impeccable English spaniel. They would be great together in the spaghetti scene.
“That’s why I’m a little on the lean side,” the man was saying. “He takes all the richest morsels, and I get what’s left.”
“Do you get the meatballs, Raven?” She was softening. She could feel it, and she knew darn well they could see it. “What do you do to pay for your meals, Mr. Red Hawk?”
“Whatever needs doing.” She questioned him with a look, and he shrugged. “I’m a South Dakota cowboy, ma’am. Jack-of-all-trades. I’m here for the rodeo.�
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With a look she told him she had no idea what he was talking about.
“You got a rodeo comin’ up at the Target Center this weekend.”
“So you won’t be here long?”
“Depends on how I do. Win or lose, I need a place to stay for about a week. Most places’ll take one of us, but not both.”
“Some hotels have kennels.”
“Yeah, but it’s a tight squeeze, and ol’ Raven gets testy when I try to stretch out.” He grinned. “We’re kinda used to sharing whatever bed we got.”
The image of the lanky cowboy tucked into a cage with his dog had her laughing easily now. How dangerous could he be, a man who shared his meals and his bed with his dog? She missed having Lydia stretched across her legs or tucked between them.
“Come on in,” she said finally, swinging the door open.
The man followed the wedge of sunlight that cut across the Persian carpet. The dog followed the man.
Meredith gestured toward the stairs. “I’ll show you the room. I could use a couple of discriminating tasters this week, but my son is in for an earful when I call him tonight.”
The heavy sound of his boots treading the stairs just behind her espadrilles seemed to make mockery of her judgment, first in taking him in, and then in taking the lead up the stairs. Her new khaki slacks were a size larger than most of the slacks she had in her closet—the ones that she recently had to admit were a bit too snug. Why hadn’t she put on the black ones? The stairway felt unusually narrow, and he was tailgating her, probably thinking he couldn’t see where he was going behind her big bumper.
The dog had the good sense to wait for a clear path up the stairs.
Meredith consciously added some spring to her step and spun on her heel as she rounded the newel post at the top of the stairs, eager to fill the silence. “What do you do in the rodeo?”
“I’m a bullfighter.”
“Bulls?” She surveyed him pointedly, foot to head. “Isn’t that a little dangerous for a man your age?”
He laughed. “I knew I shoulda kept my hat on.”
“That’s a wonderful hatband. Is that a turtle?” She pointed to the beaded amulet affixed to the beaded band on the side of the crown. “Is your umbilical cord inside?”
His almond-shaped eyes widened, coal black and glistening with merry surprise. “My what?”
“Isn’t that part of your tradition? The turtle amulet for a baby’s umbilical cord?”
“You’re talking about Indian tradition?”
“What’s your tribal affiliation?” she asked eagerly. “My guess is Lakota. That beadwork looks like Western Sioux.”
He laughed again. “My guess is, you know more about it than I do. But, yeah, South Dakota Sioux.” He slid the brim of the hat through his leathery brown hands, examining the amulet from several angles as he spoke. “As far as the turtle goes, if he ate somebody’s umbilical cord, it sure as hell wasn’t mine. I may be old, but not that old.”
“You don’t do that anymore?” Her question drew a puzzled glance. “Make a beaded amulet for a baby’s umbilical cord?”
“I wouldn’t know how to make a beaded anything. Like I said, you probably know more about it than I do. I’ve got the name and the face, but I’m not really a practicing Indian. I was raised by a white family.”
“I’m sorry,” she said softly, getting all hot in the face. “I was being presumptuous, wasn’t I?”
“That you were, ma’am, but no offense taken.” To prove it, he laid the hat in her hands for her own closer inspection. “I got this from a relative. An old lady gave it to me when I was real young. I think she was my grandma. This ol’ turtle goes way back, probably even before her time.”
“Then maybe there’s something inside. Maybe we could loosen a few stitches and see.”
“Why would we want to do that?” He laid a protective hand over his hat, but he didn’t try to take it back. It was a gesture that pleased her in some foolish and perplexing way.
“Just to see. I think these relics are just fascinating.” She smiled up at him and offered reassurance. “I could fix it, of course. Put it back exactly the way it was.”
“Not exactly,” he averred, answering her smile with his own. “The mystery would be gone. Now that you’ve planted the idea that my turtle might have a secret in his belly, I kinda like the mystery.”
“He might have been an ancestor.”
“Or she. I’ve been kinda short on blood relatives, but I guess everybody has ancestors.” He glanced at the pictures of Kenneth and Collin that covered the wall of the upstairs hallway. “You’ve fixed your house up real nice, ma’am.”
“Meredith,” she said, too quickly. “Or…well, Meredith.”
“First names generally mean first base to a cowboy, you know. Gettin’ pretty familiar.” He shrugged diffidently. “‘Course, you’ve already tried to get into my turtle, so I guess I got some catchin’ up to do.”
“Mr. Ryder,” she admonished. “Red… Ryder. Red Ryder.” She hardly recognized the sound of her own laughter, the way it bubbled up from deep in her throat.
“Don’t you be toyin’ with my name, now. A man’s honor-bound to defend his name.”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t making fun.” Using his hat as a come-on, she beckoned him to follow her down the hall. “I would never do that.”
“Make fun? I’ll have to see what I can do to change that.” He gave a soft whistle. “It’s okay, Raven.”
“This is Ken’s room,” she said, pushing the door back to the wall. The cowboy’s proximity took the edge off the empty feeling she faced whenever she stepped across the threshold lately. The toys were gone, the books, the desk, the computer, the hand weights. There were no clothes piled in the chair beside the window, no keys or cookies on the bureau. A room that had long been cramped now seemed cavernous, the air stale.
“I was just about to get a big-boy bed for Collin and get rid of the crib.” Meredith set his hat on the empty bureau, crossed the floor quickly, unlocked and opened one of the windows on either side of the double bed. She laid hands on the baby’s bed she’d folded and left leaning against the wall. Ken had taken the mattress and mentioned a plan to use it in a youth bed. “Now all I have to do is get rid of the crib,” Meredith said quietly.
“Don’t change anything around on my account.” He folded his brown, weathered hand around the crib rail, his thumb touching hers.
“It was Ken’s crib, too.” She looked up at him, saw the sympathy in his dark eyes and realized she was giving away more sentiment than she meant to. She shrugged. “I could have quite a garage sale with all the stuff they left behind.”
“You need any help, you let me know. I’ve had some experience along those lines. My foster mother practically ran a store out of her garage every summer. Actually, she managed it, and I ran it. Got so I was a helluva wheeler-dealer when it came to junk.”
“Junk? This is—”
“Vintage,” he supplied. In fine wheeler-dealer mode, he turned the tables on her, gesturing with a flourish. “Now, ma’am, this bed has seen two boys through short pants and into blue jeans, but I can give you a good deal on her. Not only does she have a lot of life left in her, she’s got added character.”
She took to her role, examining scratches like a would-be buyer rather than the woman who knew the story behind every scar in the wood. “You’ll have to knock off at least ten dollars for the teeth marks.”
“Knock off? I generally add to the price for a mark like that. It’s like barn wood. Everybody’s lookin’ for genuine barn wood these days, but how do you know what that barn was home to? You don’t want to get tricked into buying chicken-coop wood, do you? You gotta look for signs of horse cribbing.”
“What difference does it make?”
“The difference between the smell of horses and the stink of chicken crap.”
“Of course.” She laughed. “The proof is in the poop.”
“You could say
that, but we’re talking crib here, not cribbing. Now this sweet little bed, she’s got a soft luster about her. A warm finish, just like the woman who cared for those two boys.”
“You’re overselling, Mr. Red Hawk. Neither one of us has quite reached antique status.”
He shook his head. “You don’t want an antique. You can’t be comfortable with an antique. This bed has proven her worth beyond dollars and cents. For an extra ten bucks, I’ll throw in a mattress.”
“Generous.”
“To a fault, they tell me, but that’s the way I was brought up. I’ll load it up for you, too.”
“I’ll say,” she said, laughing with him far too easily. “I might just take you up on your offer. I couldn’t sell water in the desert.”
“I might feel a little guilty about that, too.” He sat down on the bed, testing, giving a nod of approval, which Raven took as a signal to join his master. Ryder forestalled the jump with a hiss. “Not yet, boy. We still haven’t settled on a rate.”
The dog flopped down on the braided rug at the foot of the bed and snorted in frustration.
“I’ll have to give it some thought. Trust me,” Meredith said with a smile for both man and dog. “I’ll be fair.”
“Uh-oh. My daddy warned me about women who say, ‘Trust me.”’
She tested the bedside table for dust and made a mental note to slip into the room sometime with a rag and some lemon oil. “I’ve never had a boarder before, so I’ll have to find out what’s fair.”
He chuckled. “I’ve never had a woman ask me to trust her before, so I’ll have to find out what’s not to trust.”
She feigned surprise. “Your daddy didn’t say?”
“I never had a daddy.” His knees cracked as he pushed off the bed. “But I’ve got this voice in my head that sounds like one.”
“Really?” She glanced at the dog. “Voices in your head?”
He waited until she looked up at him. He had that naughty twinkle in his summer’s night eyes, and he was working hard on damming up a laugh.
“I wouldn’t be teasing me too much if I were you. My sense of humor is fairly limited.”
“Meaning the jokes sail right over your head?”
Lakota Legacy: Wolf DreamerCowboy Days and Indian NightsSeven Days Page 9
