Chloe and Linnea gasped, and he sensed more than saw his brother-in-law and brother pull them into their arms. But Garrett kept his gaze on his dad, who looked as if he’d taken a jolt from a cattle prod to his heart.
“Are you sure?” Chloe asked, drawing his attention away from his dad.
“Yes. She hid it from us all this time.” He told them everything Natalie had said, whether he believed it or not.
“Where is she?” His dad’s voice sounded shaky and...older.
“The last time I saw her was in the barn, but that was hours ago.”
His dad got slowly to his feet and headed for the back door.
“Dad?”
The man who had raised them on his own just shook his head once, saying without words that he needed to be alone. That or he was going to find Natalie and face her himself. For several seconds after his dad stepped outside, nobody moved or said anything. But then a rush of rage welled up in Garrett. He grabbed a coffee mug from the counter beside him and threw it across the room, causing it to shatter against the far wall.
After a few more seconds, Owen was the first to speak. “What did you say to Natalie when she told you?”
“That I didn’t appreciate being used because she thought it would be easier to break the news afterward.”
The faces staring back at him winced.
“Oh, Garrett, you didn’t,” Chloe said.
What the hell was wrong with them? “Why are you reacting this way? She lied to all of us, pretending to be our friend before lowering the boom.”
Though his sister’s eyes were shiny with tears, her innate sense of trying to see the good in people shone through. But she was wrong this time.
“What her father did was awful, but it wasn’t her fault. She was a victim as much as we were.”
“How can you say that? She’s been here for days and didn’t say a word.”
“Days during which she saved my horse, helped out Doc Franklin and was repaid for her kindness by being trampled by a bull. How easy do you think it was for her to come here?”
He wished Chloe would stop taking Natalie’s side. He wanted someone to be as angry as he was. But then, none of them had been on the verge of giving her their heart.
Garrett paced across the width of the kitchen. “We would have been better off if she’d never come here.” He made the mistake of looking at Chloe. Her expression told him that she knew the real reason he was so angry—because he’d allowed himself to care for Natalie more than he’d ever cared for a woman before.
As they all fell into stunned silence, thunder rumbled in the distance. The sound was still fading when his dad came back inside.
“Is Natalie in her room?”
Surely she hadn’t been in there listening to the conversation going on out here. Anger at her still roiled within him even though a part of his heart wanted to let his sister’s words ease that anger. He wondered if Natalie was too afraid to come out of the room. And why wouldn’t she be after how he’d responded to her news? If she heard dishes crashing?
Damn, why were his feelings so twisted into knots?
Linnea hopped up from the table. “I’ll check.”
Garrett fought the urge to retreat outside. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was going to feel or say if he looked into Natalie’s eyes again. He couldn’t just erase the anger and sense of betrayal. They’d cut too deep.
Linnea returned to the kitchen with a look of concern on her face. “She’s not in there. Has anyone seen her since Garrett did earlier?”
Despite how mad he was, unease crept into his middle with all the other emotions when everyone indicated they hadn’t seen Natalie all day.
“She’s probably just sitting outside somewhere,” Chloe said as she stood. “Sometimes it’s easier to think without four walls closing in on you.”
“From the sound of that thunder, though, she needs to come inside,” Linnea said.
They all headed outside and spread out in different directions, calling out Natalie’s name. Garrett hoped someone else found her because he wasn’t ready to talk to her again, might never be. After several minutes, all of them made their way back to the front of the house. Garrett’s concern grew at the expressions staring back at him. They all said something was wrong. Suddenly, the need to find Natalie safe and sound eclipsed all the other mixed-up feelings bombarding him.
“You think she headed into town?” Wyatt asked.
Garrett shook his head, wanting to believe that Natalie was just sitting somewhere out in the dark nearby, hiding from him and his anger. Just because he was upset with her didn’t mean he wanted her physically hurt again.
“Her car’s still in town, and she can’t drive with that cast anyway,” he said.
“She could have hitched a ride,” Owen said.
Linnea shook her head. “But all her stuff is still here. And she wouldn’t have left Milo behind. I’ve never seen someone fall in love with a dog so fast.”
Was it possible she had fallen in love with him that quickly, too? Despite his accusation, had what they shared the night before been real?
His gaze caught Chloe’s.
“Do you think she was upset enough to just start walking?”
“On crutches?” Owen said. “That’s too far. She’d never make it.”
“If you’re upset enough, you don’t think rationally,” Chloe said.
Details of their heated conversation came back to him. If he peeled away his anger and let himself believe she hadn’t meant to hurt him or his family, he could see the look in her eyes right before he’d stormed off. He hadn’t been the only one in pain.
Garrett looked toward the roadway now cloaked in darkness. What if she had set out on foot? How far would she get before she couldn’t go any farther? What if someone had picked her up, someone bad? Worst-case scenarios started flying through his head.
A fresh wave of anger built that she was now making him worry about her, the woman who had shattered the happiness his family had managed to find. But he couldn’t help thinking that if something happened to her, it would be his fault.
He had to find her. Once he was sure she was safe, he could wrap himself in his anger again, return to trying to figure out if there was any way he could forgive her. If she deserved forgiveness.
He grabbed his phone and walked away from the group. But when he asked for Natalie at the Country Vista Inn this time, the clerk responded that they didn’t have a guest by that name but that the car he described was still parked at the edge of the lot. His stomach sank even further as he turned back toward the others. He could tell from the expressions on their faces that they were as worried as he was.
“Lin, you stay here in case she comes back,” he said. “Wyatt, keep checking around here. I’ll head to town.”
“I’m coming with you,” Chloe said.
“Dad and I will drive the other direction,” Owen said.
Panic beginning to take root inside him, Garrett raced to his truck as rain started to fall. Chloe hopped in beside him.
“We’ll find her,” she said.
He wasn’t sure if she was trying to convince him or herself.
As he pulled onto the road and headed toward Blue Falls, the heavens opened up with an ill-timed deluge. Even with the windshield wipers on their fastest setting, it was hard to see the road. He drove slowly, not wanting to slip off the side or hit Natalie if, God forbid, she was out in this mess.
“Would she really try to walk?” he asked out loud. “That would be insane.”
“Having your heart broken can make you do crazy things you’d never normally do.”
He glanced over at her. “You think I broke her heart?”
“Now’s not the time to talk about this.”
“No, I
want to know.” But he refocused on the road, hoping it would provide some sort of buffer or distance between him and his sister’s words.
Chloe sighed. “No matter what he did, she’s mourning her father.” She paused. “And her feelings for you are as obvious as the fact that it’s raining. You’ll think I’m nuts, but it feels like one of those meant-to-be sort of things. I mean, she had the biggest crush on you when we were kids.”
He jerked his gaze toward her again. “She did?”
“Don’t tell me you had no idea.”
“I didn’t.”
“We’ve really got to work on your sense of awareness.”
Evidently.
He cursed the rain and the way it restricted his view. He leaned forward over the steering wheel. The wipers swiped the windshield in front of him in time for him to notice something silver on the side of the road. He hit the brakes when he realized it was an aluminum crutch.
“God, no,” he said as he threw the truck into Park and jumped out into the rain. His heart in his throat, he called out, “Natalie! Natalie, where are you?”
He grabbed the crutch and looked up and down the road. When he saw no sign of her, he peered into the darkness along the side of the road, praying she hadn’t been hit by a car and was lying dead in the ditch.
Because of him.
Chloe ran up next to him, a flashlight in hand. She shined it into the ditch, which was already flowing with a river of murky water. They both called out Natalie’s name. He would never forgive himself if she was hurt or worse. Damn it, why couldn’t he be as understanding as his sister? Why had he stormed off instead of listening to Natalie? He hadn’t given the first thought to how gut-wrenching it must have been for her when she found out what her father had done. He remembered enough about her younger self to know she’d cared for his mother a great deal. She’d cried over her passing every bit as much as Chloe had. But he’d forgotten that in the hot rush of anger and renewed sorrow.
“Stop,” he said, holding out his arm toward Chloe. He strained to hear anything other than the pounding rain. Then there it was, a distinctly human sound. “Natalie!”
He hurried up the side of the road, desperate to find her. The beam of the flashlight finally illuminated her clinging to a flimsy-looking sapling growing out of the side of the embankment. One look at her drawn face, and he knew she couldn’t hang on much longer. He couldn’t let her be swept away in a flash flood. He saw her lips move, but no sound emerged. At least nothing he could hear.
Her fingers slipped, and Garrett launched himself into the waist-deep water. Horror filled him as he watched the fight go out of her eyes and her desperate grip failed her. As the water tugged at him and tried to steal her away, he grabbed her wrist and pulled with all his strength. He slipped and nearly went under himself, but he fought until he could grab the end of the crutch Chloe was holding out to him. Gradually, he pulled Natalie free of the water, pushing her up the bank toward Chloe.
“Come on,” his sister called out over the sound of the storm as she clutched Natalie with one hand and held out the crutch with the other.
“I’m fine,” he said, struggling to make himself heard. “Take her.”
Chloe grabbed under Natalie’s arms and dragged her up to the road. Garrett didn’t even take time to fully catch his breath as he followed on his hands and knees. He sucked in great gulps of air as Natalie coughed up muddy water.
“We’ve got to get her to the hospital,” Chloe said in her doctor voice.
Though all of his muscles felt like overcooked noodles, he scooped Natalie up into his arms and headed for the passenger side of the truck. Chloe hopped into the driver’s seat and headed toward town. He pulled the blanket he and Natalie had shared the night before from the back and wrapped it around her cold, soaked body. And tried not to think about the last time he’d held her in his arms. He rubbed her exposed flesh, scared to find it so icy. How long had she been in the water? God, how long had she been in the ditch? Why hadn’t anyone seen the crutch and stopped to investigate?
She tried to say something, but it came out a garbled mess.
“Shh,” he said. “We’ve got you. You’re safe now.”
Despite his best efforts to warm her up, she was still shivering when Chloe pulled up to the emergency room door at the hospital. As he carried Natalie inside, Chloe started calling out orders to the nurses on duty.
When another doctor met them and Natalie was suddenly being taken from his arms, he didn’t want to let her go. Despite how he’d pushed her and her explanations away that morning, now he was afraid to let her out of his sight.
Chloe took his hand and squeezed to draw his attention from where Natalie was being wheeled to an examination room.
“I promise we’ll take good care of her.”
He saw in her eyes the knowledge of how he felt about Natalie, feelings that prevented him from sitting down when his sister disappeared into the exam area. That mass of confused feelings had him pacing a trench in the floor and berating himself for pushing Natalie to the point where she’d nearly gotten herself killed.
He had no idea how they would deal with the truth of how her dad had nearly destroyed Garrett’s family, but right now that wasn’t his main concern. As the rain continued to come down in sheets outside, all that mattered was that they’d found Natalie in time. And that she had to be okay.
* * *
NATALIE RECOGNIZED THE sounds and smells of the hospital even before she opened her eyes. She wasn’t in that ditch, cold, soaked to the bone and trying not to drown anymore. Just the memory of feeling helpless, and the foolish decision that had led to her being in that situation, sent a shiver through her body. As she moved to pull her blanket up over her arms, someone leaned forward in the chair beside her bed.
“You’re awake.”
As soon as Natalie saw Wayne, she could tell he knew about her dad. Tears filled her eyes. Unable to stop them, they overflowed to trail down her cheeks. “I’m so sorry,” she said, her voice raw from screaming for help. Screams that she had feared would go unheard, until miraculously Garrett had found her.
No, she couldn’t think about him.
To her utter surprise, Wayne took her hand between his two warm, work-roughened ones. “Shh, no tears. It wasn’t your fault.”
“The fact I didn’t tell you immediately upon my arrival is.”
“You were put in an unfair situation.” He looked down at their joined hands. “But I want you to tell me everything.”
“Didn’t Garrett tell you?”
“I suspect he didn’t give you time to fully explain.”
She bit her bottom lip before asking, “Are you sure you want to hear this?”
He lifted his gaze to hers. “No, but I need to. I’ve lived all these years with a hole in my heart where Karen should have been, and I didn’t even know why she was gone.”
She closed her eyes and wondered when the pain would stop. If it ever would.
“If you need to wait until you feel better—”
“No,” she said. “You’ve waited long enough.” She repeated everything she’d told Garrett and continued with what she’d aimed to tell him before his hasty exit prevented it. “It’s okay if you’re angry. I’m still angry. But even though it might not make any difference, I do believe he was genuinely sorry for what he did. I know that doesn’t change anything, but...I needed you to know that. It’s up to you whether you read it, but there is a letter from him to you in my bag at the house.”
Wayne didn’t react for several seconds and then just gave a slight nod. After another stretch of silence, he lifted his tear-filled eyes. “Thank you for telling me. I know it was hard.”
She blinked fresh tears away. “I loved her, too, as much as my own mom.”
“I know you did. And she loved you
.”
Natalie grabbed one of the rough tissues from the box sitting on the rolling table on the other side of the bed and dabbed her eyes.
Wayne stood and leaned over her. His kiss on her forehead was almost her total undoing.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said. “You had us all scared half to death, especially Garrett.”
She shook her head. “I appreciate you saying that, but I know Garrett hates me. And I understand. There’s a part of me that hates myself.”
Wayne started to say something, but then stopped. Was he realizing that she was right? Her heart broke even more at that thought.
After a few moments, he said, “Give him time. This was a shock.”
Natalie managed to nod, but she knew the brief time she’d had with Garrett was over.
Wayne squeezed her hand. “Feel better.” And then he walked out of the room, his boots clunking on the tile as he retreated down the corridor toward the exit.
She’d give anything if she could follow him out that door and leave this latest blast of heartache behind. Instead, she turned her back on the door and stared at the wall filled with posters about patient safety and the dry-erase board that identified today’s nurse as Ginnifer. She tried to distract herself by reading all of the posters, but they blurred as her eyes filled with tears again.
She had to find a way to get out of this hospital and out of Blue Falls without seeing Garrett again. She couldn’t face him when she knew in her heart that she loved him and he didn’t love her back. Her decision to keep the truth from his family had killed any hope of him reciprocating her feelings. And that she couldn’t blame on her father. Her heartache was of her own making.
Chapter Thirteen
Garrett released the jack, allowing the truck to lower back to the ground. He eyed the spare, already detailing in his mind the next ten tasks on his to-do list. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t slept the night before or that he’d been working since about two in the morning. He had to keep busy, occupy his mind with anything and everything but Natalie and the horrible revelation that her father had killed his mother. If he slowed down for even a moment, he started imagining that night, wondering if his mom had seen the other vehicle coming. The official report said that she’d died instantly, but was that true? Had she even for a moment looked into the eyes of the man who’d killed her?
The Heart of a Cowboy Page 15
