The Rancher's Surprise Son (Gold Buckle Cowboys Book 4)

by Christine Wenger

  And Laura was in charge of the Duke Foundation!

  There would be hell to pay if one of them ever found out, but Laura was satisfied that she’d covered her tracks. Also, Georgianna didn’t know that she was getting Duke money, or she’d definitely have refused it. Laura convinced Georgianna that she was receiving grant money earmarked for the preservation of historic ranches, and the Double M qualified.

  Stubbornness. Who needed it?

  Laura shifted in her chair. She didn’t like all the deception, but what else was she to do? She wanted to help Georgianna. Indirectly, she was helping Cody and Cindy.

  “Cody’s back, so he’ll help his mother get the ranch going.”

  “Oh no he won’t. I’ll keep him so busy, he won’t have time to work his ranch,” J.W. hissed.

  “Dad, how can you be so hateful?”

  “The boy will be so damn exhausted, he’ll realize that he can’t handle both.”

  Laura felt tears of frustration stinging her eyes. “He’ll quit here to work the Double M. I would.”

  “But he can’t.” J.W. grinned, balancing his cigar between his teeth. “It’s a condition of his parole that he works here. I own him for two years. If he screws up his job at my ranch, he goes back to prison.”

  Penny reached over the table and placed her hand on J.W.’s. Her bright red, glittery nail polish gleamed in the light. “Now, that’s the J.W. that I know! Cody certainly will fail. Georgianna will have no choice but to sell.”

  “That’s my plan,” J.W. said, reveling in Penny’s admiration. Laura knew that he didn’t get much of that from her, so he aspired to get attention and adoration from his peers and maybe from some of his ranch hands.

  Laura stood. “I can’t believe how cruel you both are. Cody will collapse with all the work he’ll try to do. And where will Georgianna and Cindy live if you take away their home? How can you both plan something like that? Forget the stupid poker game. Forget about the Double M. Put up a fifty-foot fence if it bothers you to look at it, for heaven’s sake.”

  Her headache was in full force and the lemonade sat sour in her stomach. How could her parents be so loving with Johnny and so hateful to the Masters family?

  * * *

  Laura walked toward the barn. Maybe she’d run into Cody, or at least catch a quick glimpse of him. They had so much to talk about, but first she had to warn him about her father’s plan to work him to death with the hope that Cody would fail.

  Although he had probably figured that out already.

  She thought about her mother. Why couldn’t Penny be more like Georgianna Masters Lindy? She was the grandmotherly type: loving, nurturing and so sweet to Johnny. Whenever she brought him over, Georgianna spoiled him too much—but in a good way. Laura had no doubt that Penny loved Johnny, but she didn’t really show him. Laura sniffed. That was how she had been raised—at arm’s length. Why should she expect anything more from her mother?

  Cody and Cindy both showed love and care to Georgianna. They were three of the best people she knew. Cody and Cindy would do anything for Georgianna, and she’d do anything for them.

  Laura had never been sure that her parents loved her. Her father had wanted a son to carry on the Duke Ranch legacy, so her gender was a strike against her. Instead of teaching her the ins and outs of running the ranch, her father had made sure that she did so-called “girl things” in school: ballet, baton, cheerleading. And he brought in people to give her facials, and then there were personal shoppers, and yoga instructors to teach her how to relax, but she was bored out of her mind.

  J.W. was convinced that his own mother, her grandma Sarah, died from overwork. He often told stories that when his parents, Sarah and Walter Anthony Duke, first came to Duke Springs and farmed and made a ranch out of the Arizona dust, the work just killed her.

  It didn’t matter that Sarah died at age sixty from cancer. J.W. was convinced that it was the hard work that killed her.

  J.W. took that original ranch and made it into the showplace that it was today through his own hard work and determination. He hadn’t wanted Penny to work the land, cattle and horses as he had. Instead, he insisted that she occupy her time opening dress shops and gift shops—ladies’ shops. Still, he didn’t want his “two ladies”—neither Penny nor Laura—to ever remember how the original Duke Ranch had begun.

  Laura had wanted to learn how the ranch operated, and wanted J.W. to teach her. They’d fought and fought over the years, with her father insisting that she do “woman things” instead. Fighting over this had stopped when she had Johnny. J.W. wanted a rough-and-ready boy that he could train to take over the Duke Ranch, and that was going to be her son.

  Laura knew that she had to keep Johnny—and herself—away from J.W. a bit so he would not completely take over their lives.

  And when she wanted to use her degree in finance to work on Wall Street, J.W. asked her if she’d run the Duke Foundation instead. He didn’t want her in New York City because he’d preferred his grandson right by his side so he could make Johnny into the next version of himself.

  Over her dead body.

  It wasn’t exactly brain surgery to give away money and let the world know that J. W. Duke was benevolent.

  Actually, he was! She’d insisted that she had to live away from the ranch house, so J.W. built a cottage on the property for her and Johnny. All right, she could save money that way.

  So, she’d stayed in Duke Springs, not because J.W. had asked her to, but because she’d thought that Johnny should know his family—and that included Georgianna and Cindy.

  Family was everything, and she’d wanted family around Johnny.

  As she walked, she remembered the original Big Upheaval. That was when she’d sat her parents down one day in the family room and told them that she was pregnant by a man at college.

  Then she’d braced herself for their barrage of questions. Yes, they eloped to Vegas. No, she wasn’t going to tell them his name, but he was out of the picture. Yes, she would raise their grandson alone if she wasn’t welcome at home. Yes, she’d filed for divorce.

  The fact that she purposely said the word grandson had mellowed J.W. considerably. Telling him that she was going to name the boy John Wayne Duke after him had J.W. purring like a kitten.

  Laura had told them point-blank that she’d move and take Johnny away if they tried to find Johnny’s father—that he wasn’t in the picture at present.

  But they still brought it up from time to time, and always a fight ensued.

  She’d given serious thought to moving away from Duke Springs after one nasty fight with her parents that had to do with her getting support for Johnny from the man they referred to as her “college husband.” Even though they believed he had run out on her, they insisted that he should be held responsible.

  She told them adamantly that she wasn’t going to pursue financial support and that she could provide for Johnny herself. Even when J.W. ordered her to give up his name so he could sic his lawyers on her “college husband,” Laura kept reiterating that she didn’t want to talk about it, or that she would move and take Johnny with her.

  That never failed to quiet them down—for a while, at least.

  Finally, after a particularly overwhelming fight, she’d made up a name with more vowels than consonants, and said that Johnny’s father had moved to Dubai, that he wanted Johnny and her to move there to live with him.

  Her parents had never brought the subject up again.

  Laura stopped and looked around at the extensive Duke Ranch that went on as far as the eye could see. Little did her parents know, she could never take Johnny from them now. The little guy would miss his horse, miss the beautiful pool, the big playground made just for him and the ranch hands that just adored him. She could never take him away from her parents, from Georgianna and Cindy and now Cody.


  Cody had yet to meet Johnny.

  She wiped the moisture off her face with a handkerchief, took a breath and resumed her walk to the barn. To escape the tension at home and the tension churning inside her, she visited Georgianna and Cindy Masters as much as she could. It was calm at the Double M, like shelter in the middle of a storm.

  * * *

  As Laura turned right to the path that led to the barn, she had to admit yet again that the Duke Ranch was breathtaking in size and scope. It was surrounded by several mountain ranges, and she loved the huge saguaros that lifted their arms to the sky. She loved the lumpy prickly pear cactus with their red berries on top and the coo of the mourning doves.

  The horses and cattle that dotted the hills and valleys of the ranch were prime stock, and she enjoyed looking at them.

  She thought she’d seen Cody go behind the barn. Maybe, just maybe, they could have a quick conversation. She hurried down the path, watchful of her mother and father.

  She needed to see him, touch him and run her fingers through his pitch-black hair that was a bit too long. She wanted to feel the warmth of his skin and feel safe and secure in his arms once again. She wanted to breathe in the special scent that was his and his alone.

  It had been a long three years.

  When the judge gave him five years for involuntary manslaughter, Laura gasped. Cody turned to her and said that he’d be all right.

  Then she’d hurried to the ladies’ room and vomited.

  Walking around to the back of the barn, she saw Cody. He was just...pacing.

  He must have sensed that someone was near, as he whirled around, poised for fight or flight.

  “Laura?” he whispered. “Damn, don’t sneak up on me like that!” He dropped his hands, hands that probably had defended him in prison. “Laura, I’m so sorry...”

  Tears sprung to her eyes. “Cody. I—I... You— I...”

  “I’ve missed you, too.” They always could finish each other’s sentences. “How’ve you been? You look...even more beautiful than...”

  “I wish you would have let me visit you.”

  “I didn’t want you to see me in there.”

  Laura couldn’t wait any longer. She ran toward Cody, and he enveloped her in his strong arms.

  Finally!

  “Aw...don’t cry.”

  “I’ve missed you, Cody. So very much.”

  “What about your husband?”

  She went stiff in his arms. “How do you know about him?”

  “It seems to be common knowledge among the ranch hands.”

  “I don’t want to talk about that now, Cody. Just hold me.”

  “And you have a son?”

  She moved back, out of his arms. She wanted to talk about her son, but not just yet; she just wanted Cody to hold her, to get to know him again. “His name is Johnny.”

  “Johnny.” Cody nodded. “What’s his last name?”

  “Johnny Duke. I named him Duke.”

  “Did his father like that?”

  “His father wasn’t around when he was born, so I gave him my last name.”

  “I see.”

  “Cody, I have so much to tell you.”

  He looked at the mountains in the distance as if lost in his own thoughts. “I told you not to wait for me, but I was hoping you would.”

  “Let’s not talk about that now.” She touched his arm. “Let’s meet. Usual place. Usual signal. Tonight. Okay?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “Johnny and I are living in a cottage that’s to the left of the main house. The window on the right will be our signal now.”

  Their sign was always the half-open shade of her right bedroom window in the main house.

  Actually, since the date he was sentenced, she’d never pulled the shade down on her bedroom in her cottage again. It was always raised because she was always waiting for Cody.

  She’d have to be careful. She didn’t want her parents, especially J.W., to find out that she was meeting him. It would be a disaster.

  Besides, she didn’t want to give her father any reason to send Cody back to prison.

  Chapter Three

  Cody slowly walked back to the remuda barn, which housed the mounts—mostly quarter horses—of the ranch hands and the Duke family.

  He might as well get back to work and think about what he would say to Laura tonight without putting her on the defensive.

  He probably blew it with his pointed questions, but they didn’t have time for a lot of polite conversation.

  He looked over into the stall of Johnny’s horse, Pirate, a cute little black-and-white pinto pony. He could almost picture Laura’s son sitting in the tiny saddle as she led the horse around the paddock.

  Cody wondered if the boy looked like her.

  The Duke Ranch had four more barns with twenty stalls each, most of which housed prize Arabians, the best of which belonged to J.W.

  The Dukes boarded Arabians for others and had an indoor and outdoor show ring for dressage competitions, auctions and some smaller rodeo events. The Duke Arabians attracted interest from all over the world, and “special visitors” were housed in guesthouses on the property.

  He could never give something like this to Laura.

  The fancy Arabian barns had their own staff for mucking out stalls and keeping everything spotless, but Cody knew that he’d be expected to fill in as needed. Or maybe not. If it got around that he’d murdered someone, even if they knew it was done to defend his family, it might send the exclusive clientele galloping away faster than their horses.

  The thought of gathering a quarter ton of manure this afternoon with a pitchfork and shovel, loading it onto the honey wagon that was attached to a powerful ATV truck and then dumping it bored Cody to no end. He’d rather be training J.W.’s magnificent horses.

  Cleaning the stalls was backbreaking work, but he was up for it. Yet he kept looking up at the ranch house, hoping to catch a glimpse of Laura. There was quite a distance from the patio to the remuda barn, but he could spot her anywhere. Laura had a special walk, a kind of bounce in her step, and she always held her head high. Wherever she went, people gravitated to her sunny nature and quick smile. Her eyes sparkled as if she knew a special secret—a good secret—that she was just dying to tell.

  But he hadn’t seen that Laura yet. She’d appeared briefly at the Double M this afternoon when she’d first seen him, but then that Laura had faded almost immediately.

  Obviously, his questions bothered her, but at least she was going to meet him at the creek tonight.

  He wanted to find out everything she’d been doing for the past three years, no matter how trivial or insignificant she might think it was. Just the sound of her voice would calm him, might convince him that they’d someday have a chance together again.

  And what about the college guy? Did he visit Johnny? Did he take him riding and play with him?

  He and Laura had been talking about running away together since high school, but it had been only a hopeful dream. With his mother and Cindy needing him, he couldn’t have just up and left.

  Georgianna had married Hank Lindy, thinking that they’d all be financially secure forever. His mother assured Cody that Hank would be a good partner for her. He made her laugh. He owned the Duke Springs Tractor and Feed store, and wooed Georgianna with expensive gifts—not jewelry, but farm equipment and feed and grain for the ranch. She was enthralled with Lindy, who had been wonderful and attentive to Cindy...until that fateful night when he stepped over the line and began to knock his mother around until he drew blood.

  Then Lindy was going to start with Cindy.

  What a beast Lindy had turned out to be, and he’d ruined all their lives.

  His and Laura’s hopeful dreams had
turned into a hopeless mess.

  Cody shook off the bad memories and drove the honey wagon to the manure pile, more like a manure mountain, and unloaded, then went back to reload.

  Slim whistled sharply and motioned for him to hurry. Cody jogged over to him. “What’s up?”

  “You’re supposed to meet with your parole officer and J.W. in J.W.’s office.” Slim lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. “He wants to see you immediately.”

  Cody had expected a summons sooner or later, but was hoping that it would be later.

  “Where?” Cody knew that J.W. had an office at the ranch house. If the meeting was to be there, maybe he could see Laura again.

  “In A-2.”

  Cody forgot that J.W. had another office in the Arabian-2 barn, which was far from the ranch house.

  “I’m on my way.” Cody hurried away from the smoke of Slim’s cigarette and headed down the gravel path leading to A-2.

  Cody was in no rush to talk to J.W. or hear about his conditions of parole again from his parole officer. He was instructed on each of them at length before he was released from prison.

  He slowed his progress through the desert to J.W.’s office, hoping that his new parole officer would be a decent guy and easygoing. As he walked, he enjoyed the occasional rush of a family of quails in front of him, as well as the dash of a roadrunner.

  It was a great day to be free, and it’d be a great night with Laura.

  Hawks looped above, black feathery kites against the turquoise sky. He’d like nothing better than to take a long hike through the mountains and connect with the land again. He’d missed being able to do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted to do it.

  Freedom would take some getting used to, but then again, he still was tethered to J. W. Duke.

  On the left side of the low, grayish barn, the door to J.W.’s office was open, but Cody knocked on the door anyway. No one answered, so he paused in the doorway, taking in the scene before him.

  J. W. Duke sat in an oversize black leather chair behind a huge, gleaming desk. J.W. was bigger than life and so was his gut. An unlit cigar stub stuck out of the corner of his mouth, and he was shouting into the phone in his usual gruff voice.