by Susan Crosby
“We both know you only came home for a visit, and with a specific purpose in mind. As soon as you’re inseminated, you’ll move to Red Rock. I’ve decided to live there, too.”
“I haven’t even started the paperwork at the clinic. And you’ve lost your mind, Vicki. I think you’ve had too many margaritas.”
“I’ve had three sips of one.”
“Well, it’s gone to your head. Why would you go back to the place of such heartache?”
“Because I felt alive there.” Which was the tip of the iceberg for her. Yes, a lot of it had to do with Garrett, but a lot didn’t.
“What will you do for work?”
“I can commute to San Antonio if I have to. I’ll find something, Em. I can’t stay here anymore. Too many people. Too many cars.” Not enough Garrett.
“Are you going to try to rent this place or sell it?”
“I’m going to cut ties. I’ll be home to visit often, but I can stay with any number of family members. So, do you want to come along?”
“When will you leave?”
“Saturday. I can spend the night midway. Where would that be? Jackson, Mississippi, maybe? I’ll drive the rest of the way on Sunday.”
“I couldn’t be ready by then,” Emily said. “I can’t believe you’re doing this.”
She needed to end the nightmares again. If she stayed in Atlanta, they would never go away. She was haunted by visions of Garrett’s animals wandering loose or getting caught in storms. She dreamed about him getting hurt with no one there to see, much less be able to help. If only he’d get a cell phone—
“You’re going after Garrett again,” Emily said, narrowing her eyes.
Victoria shrugged. “We’ll be living in the same town, shopping in the same stores, eating in the same restaurants. It’ll be hard to avoid him completely.”
Emily grabbed her hand. “I don’t want to see you hurt again. You haven’t even recovered yet, no matter what you say.”
“He’s worth fighting for.”
After Emily left, Victoria called Jordana and made the same offer of a ride to Red Rock.
“No, thank you.” Her answer was quick and light. “Drive safe.”
“Do you ever plan on telling Tanner?”
“Of course I do.”
“Well, maybe you should do it before he gets married to someone else.”
There was a brief, tense silence, then, “He’s getting married?”
“How would I know? But there’s nothing to stop him, is there?”
“That was mean, Vicki.”
“It was the truth. Honey, I know you’re scared. I would be, too, but you can’t wait any longer. Pretty soon your family is going to storm your doors, your secret will be out and they’ll force you to tell him. It’ll be better if you do it.”
Victoria hung up feeling strangely energized. Once she’d made her decision, she had stopped grieving. She had a plan, a goal. She would not live the rest of her life regretting that she hadn’t tried hard enough.
She wasn’t even nervous about telling her parents.
Four days later, her car packed full and with more to be shipped later, she hit the road, alone, excited and feeling a freedom she’d never felt before. She knew what she wanted. Now she had to go get it.
Red Rock, here I come.
* * *
Garrett arrived at Red at his usual time on Sunday night. Marcos looked up from the podium and smiled. One hurdle jumped. At least Marcos wasn’t going to shun him for hurting his wife’s cousin. Or maybe he didn’t know yet.
“How’s business?” Garrett asked.
“Can’t complain. Thanks for letting me know you’d be in to pick up last week’s order tonight.”
“I would’ve paid for it regardless.”
“I know. Your usual tonight?”
“Sounds good. No, wait. How about some Carne à la Mexicana instead?”
“Shaking up your life, huh?” Marcos asked.
Is that what he was doing? He headed into the main dining room and bar. The bartender spotted him and started pulling a draft. Garrett had almost reached his usual bar stool when he spotted a woman sitting a few seats down, her shiny brown hair cascading in soft curls down her back. His heart stopped for a couple of beats as he was reminded of Victoria. He didn’t even want to sit near the woman.
But then she turned and spotted him. “Well, hello there, cowboy,” Victoria said as if nothing had happened between them. “I was hoping I’d run into you tonight.” She patted the stool on the other side of her. “I brought your things.”
Numb, he took a seat, leaving one chair between them.
“How’s it going?” she asked.
“What are you doin’ here?”
She’d changed in ways he couldn’t define yet. She smiled a kind of a secret smile, like she knew something he didn’t. She nodded, too, as if he’d said something she’d been waiting to hear. What the hell was going on?
“I moved here,” she said. She might as well have been telling him she was running an errand, something routine and normal, her voice was so calm. This was not normal.
“Why?”
“I’m looking for what I need, not just what I want.”
“You are making no sense.”
“I came to love Red Rock, so I quit my job, packed my car and here I am.”
She sipped some frothy concoction, which left a bit of pink foam on her lips. Rather than use a napkin, she ran her tongue across her lips. She had to know it would drive him crazy.
“A bunch of your stuff is still at my place,” he said.
“I know. I’ll get it all sometime. Or you can drop them off at the Red Rock Hotel. I’ve got a room there for now. If Emily moves here—and I don’t know that she will—maybe she’ll rent a house with me. We’ll see what happens.”
“Is she pregnant?”
“She hasn’t started the process.”
“And Jordana?”
“Still hiding out.”
Maybe he should give her a call, give her a man’s point of view about her keeping that critical information from Tanner. “How do your parents feel about your move?”
“They want me to be happy.”
He stared at her painted nails, which reminded him why he’d left her in the first place. “Do you really think you’ll find happiness here?”
“This town has felt like home almost since the first day I got here.”
He didn’t know what to say. It changed everything and nothing. “Have you eaten?” he asked.
“Yes.” She stretched and yawned. “And I’m wiped out. I drove four hundred and fifty miles today. I need sleep.” She tucked some bills under her glass and climbed off the stool, then slid his suit bag onto the chair next to him.
“Guess I’ll be seeing you around town, cowboy.” She patted his arm, then looked over his shoulder. “Do you believe in destiny, Garrett?”
“Sometimes.”
She looked at him and laughed. “That is so you. Well, in this case, I’m looking at Tanner Redmond, who just walked in.” She dug into her purse, pulled out a business card and turned it upside down on the bar. He watched her write Jordana’s name and phone number on it.
“Bye, Garrett,” she said. She went right up to Tanner, who’d taken a stool at the bar. “You need to call her,” she said to the surprised man. “She has something important to tell you.”
She held up her hands toward Garrett, her fingers crossed. She was taking a big risk, and the possible unforgiving wrath of her cousin for interfering, but Garrett approved.
After a minute she passed in front of the window and didn’t look inside at all. She was over it? Over him? Just like th
at?
He’d been afraid he’d hurt her, but apparently she’d recovered better than he had.
He sipped his beer, considering her. He’d never known loneliness. Even though he’d spent most of his life alone, he never would’ve called himself lonely.
And he wasn’t lonely now, he decided…
No, he was forlorn. And desolate.
Marcos set his hot plate on the counter in front of him.
“You might have mentioned that Victoria was here,” Garrett said.
“I didn’t know it mattered.” He smiled grimly and walked away.
Was that the response he would get from everyone in town now? Did everyone know? She’d made herself a welcome part of the community in less than a month. He’d lived here most of his life, and he didn’t figure anyone would champion him like that, although Victoria had seemed to from the start, even without knowing the details of what had happened with Jenny Kirkpatrick. After all these years, did he need to explain it? Her family moved away years ago.
When Garrett arrived home later, he went straight to his bedroom and opened the closet door. Her clothes were still hanging there. He’d ignored them all week, even though he knew he should pack them up and ship them to her.
One by one, he took her clothes off the rack. Out of his dresser he withdrew the rest of her things, a rainbow of lacy lingerie he loaded into a paper sack. Her perfume wafted from the bag. He rolled it down and took it to the living room along with her clothes. He would take them all to her tomorrow. Get it over with.
He tripped over her boots when he returned to the bedroom. He’d brought them in from the porch a few days ago, had cleaned and polished them so that he could mail them with her clothes. He’d been methodical and unemotional, doing a job that needed doing.
But he clasped them now as he remembered the way she kicked the dirt when she was getting ready to tease him or tick him off. The way she pitched dirty straw into the wheelbarrow, her feet planted. The way she’d saved Dum, her boots filling up with mud so that she could barely walk.
Indelible memories. And now she’d moved to town. He couldn’t escape the memories—or her. She would probably start dating, in time get married and have children. Another man’s children.
Garrett threw the boots across the room, rattling an old cross-stitch sampler on the wall that said Home Sweet Home. It had come with the ranch, and he’d never taken it down. The sampler tilted for a second then fell to the floor, the old wooden frame breaking into pieces.
It seemed like an omen—or a sign of what his life had become. No home sweet home for him.
Garrett picked up the four wooden pieces, then the cloth sampler itself, which disintegrated at his touch. Dust must’ve been holding it together, and now it had turned to dust.
He shoved his hands through his hair, then he went to his shop and got out the bolo he’d created for her from his safe. He set it on the counter, pried out the stone, then threw the silver into a crucible. He could melt it down, reuse it. He didn’t want reminders of a farewell gift to her.
He turned the stone over and over in his hand. He needed to do something else with it, something that made a statement.
The idea came to him in a flash of light. He settled in and got to work.
It would be his best work yet.
Chapter Fourteen
“He hasn’t even had the courtesy to return my clothes,” Victoria complained to Wendy after eating dinner on the sunporch after Marcos went to work. “It’s been days.”
“Maybe he wants you to come to him. Come to the ranch. Victoria, you are bouncing MaryAnne like you’re on a trampoline. Please sit down.”
Victoria stopped bouncing and looked at the baby in her arms, all wide-eyed and beautiful. “She looks fine to me.”
“She’s getting green around the gills. You’re making her seasick!”
Victoria sat in Wendy’s rocking chair. “Why would he want me to go to the ranch?”
She hadn’t come up with a clear plan about winning him back, but she knew it had to start with contact, and she thought for sure he would bring her clothes to her at the hotel. Make contact. She’d counted on that.
“I don’t know. I’m just trying to think like a man,” Wendy said.
“Men like the chase. Are you listening, sweetheart?” Victoria said to MaryAnne. “Don’t make yourself too available. They’ll drop you like a hot poker.”
Wendy threw up her hands. “Will you please not poison my not-yet-three-month-old daughter?”
“You’re right. She has plenty of time to learn about heartache on her own.”
Wendy rolled her eyes. “So, when you told me you were moving here no matter what happened with Garrett, was it a lie? If you’re going to spend years being angry at him, what’s the purpose of a new beginning here?”
Which was an excellent question, Victoria decided. “I’m not ready to give up, that’s all. I’ll adapt when I have to.”
“In the meantime, we all have to listen to you moan and gripe?”
“Pretty much, yes.”
Wendy laughed, then Victoria joined in.
“So, now what?” Wendy asked.
“I guess I’ll go out to the ranch and collect my stuff. I’ve been feeling like a walking neon sign wearing my Atlanta clothes instead of my jeans and boots.”
“Let me know how it goes.”
“I will.” Victoria kissed MaryAnne’s cheeks then passed her to her mother. They’d spent enough time together in the past few days, and without Emily there to hog the baby, that Victoria had started feeling comfortable not just holding her but changing her diaper and getting her in and out of her baby carrier, with all its complicated straps and fasteners.
Dogs were easier, but they wouldn’t let her cuddle them for long.
“What are you smiling about?” Wendy asked as they moved toward the front door.
“How incredibly my life has changed in a month. Just one month. Can you believe it?”
“Since the same thing happened to me, I can believe it. I hope you have the same happy ending I did.”
Victoria debated whether to go back to her hotel room and change into something more alluring than the blouse and slacks she wore or just go straight to the ranch. It would be dark in an hour. She should wait until morning—
No. She needed to get it over with.
The drive seemed incredibly long. She hadn’t driven the route in more than a week. As it became more desolate, with fewer houses, she began to question herself. Was she still so sure she wanted this life? Would it satisfy her?
Could she satisfy him? Not in bed, that was easy, but as a partner?
Apparently he didn’t think she could. She wanted the chance to prove him wrong, maybe even prove herself wrong. The niggles of doubt would be settled with time.
She pulled into the driveway. Her heart thundered so loud, she thought it would open her chest. She didn’t see his truck, but saw Jimmy’s pickup.
Where could Garrett be? He didn’t have a regular place to go on Thursday nights.
“Howdy, Victoria,” Jimmy said, coming up to her. “I didn’t recognize the car, but I guess it’s your own, not a rental. Heard you moved to town for good.”
Abel shoved his head into her, his tail and hindquarters wagging like crazy. Pete watched, looking somber. “I did. Where’s Garrett?”
“He didn’t say. He had me come before the crack of dawn. Want me to give him a call?”
She was giving Abel a rubdown that he was thoroughly and noisily enjoying. “If you don’t know where he is, how can you call?”
Jimmy grinned. “He got himself a cell phone. Can you believe it?”
No, she couldn’t. What did that mean? “It is hard to im
agine. Anyway, it’s okay. Um, I just came to pick up a few things I left. I’ll just go in the house and get them.”
“Sure thing. You want to see the animals? I’m about ready to get them bedded down for the night, so now would be the best time. Just put Dee and Dum in the house, in fact.”
“Yes, I’d love to.”
She kicked up dust as she walked next to Jimmy into the barn. She peeked into the stall with the mama dog and puppies. “Look how they’ve grown,” she exclaimed, tears springing to her eyes. Babies grew so fast. The kittens had their eyes open and were stumbling over each other and their mama. There were a couple of new dogs, a few were gone. Apple Annie held court in her stall, but only one other horse was in residence.
Changes could happen in the blink of an eye.
“Somebody brought a boa constrictor the other day,” Jimmy said. “Garrett about threw a conniption fit. I took the snake home with me. Figured I could find it a permanent place somewhere.”
She couldn’t imagine Garrett throwing a conniption fit over anything. He was patience personified. “That must’ve been something to see.”
Jimmy shrugged. “He’s been pretty edgy lately. I didn’t know him before I started working here, but I’d heard from my mom that he wasn’t one to shift gears real easy, you know? Pretty mellow guy. I haven’t always seen that.”
“Everybody has problems now and then.”
“That’s what I figure. He keeps his mouth shut pretty good about stuff, though.”
Except when he tells you it isn’t gonna work and walks out, she thought.
She headed into the house and reached for the light switch. The room lit up. Dee and Dum started making noises, knowing someone was there.
And right smack in front of her on the sofa were her jeans and shirts on hangers draped over the back, and a paper sack that probably substituted as a suitcase for her undergarments and toiletries and her boots, polished to such a shine she could see her reflection.
She felt the blow of rejection as hard as she had at her parents’ house, maybe harder, because this time she had no doubts whatsoever. She knew she wanted to be his wife, the mother of his children, his partner in everything.
