Wind River Cowboy

by Lindsay McKenna

  Reese sat down after kissing Shay’s cheek. He thanked Kira for the coffee.

  “Have you guys eaten?” Kira asked. “We have tuna sandwiches.” She stood near where Garret sat down and instinctively placed her hand gently on his shoulder. He looked tense. She could feel the tautness in his muscles. There was tightness at the corners of his eyes as well. He turned a little, giving her a slight smile of thanks.

  “No, we haven’t, and I could eat,” Reese said. He held out his hand to Shay and she took it. “Come here,” he coaxed, “and sit down with us?”

  “Garret? You hungry?” Kira asked.

  “Starving. Could you make me two sandwiches, please?”

  “Sure.”

  “Two for me, too,” Reese said, giving her a look of thanks.

  Noah got up. “I’ll help you out, Kira.”

  In minutes they had the sandwiches ready. Harper passed the men the chips, and pretty soon they were eating hungrily, without much talk going on at the table. Kira refilled their coffee cups and then sat down next to Garret, her hand resting on his thick thigh. He closed his hand over hers. She could feel the tension in the kitchen, but it was nothing like before. She saw the hollow look in Shay’s face and knew she needed to hear about her father.

  Reese didn’t take long. He left the second sandwich on the plate, wiping his mouth with a paper napkin. Wadding it up, he looked at all of them. “Ray is now at the White Water Condo complex. He’s got a nice two-bedroom condo on the first floor and it’s completely furnished. Garret went and got him groceries, so he’s well stocked. He’s at a point where he’s quite able to make his own meals and take care of himself.” He took Shay’s hand and squeezed it gently. “Your father is fine. He’s not happy, but I think in time he’ll cool down and adjust.”

  “I was so afraid he was going to have another stroke,” Shay admitted hoarsely, rubbing her eyes.

  “Right now,” Reese said gently to his wife, “we need to climb down off this cliff we’ve all been living on since Ray came back to the ranch. It’s no one’s fault, but an alcoholic can turn a family inside out, creating nothing but continued drama and ongoing stress and chaos.” He smiled a little, looking at everyone, his voice low with emotion. “Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. I’d like to invite all of you over for dinner. Garret has agreed to fix it for us.”

  Harper rubbed his hands together, grinning widely. “That’s great! I always look forward to your vittles, Garret.”

  “We’re going to have ham wrapped in bacon and pineapple, red-eye gravy and mashed potatoes. I’m going to make two pecan pies for dessert. I know that’s a big favorite of yours, Harper.”

  The medic’s grin widened even more. “That’s a Christmas gift to me,” he said, a sudden catch in his voice, gratefulness in his tone.

  Kira’s heart melted. She’d heard Harper’s folks, Bailey and Irene Sutton, who lived in Ontario, Oregon, desperately wanted him to come home. But Harper couldn’t handle home, like so many returning vets. Both his parents were originally from Virginia and were hill people. She felt such love and pride for Garret; the meal he was cooking was purely Southern and truly would be a gift for Harper, who had a gleam of gratitude in his gray eyes.

  “Oh, and some homemade biscuits,” Garret added, giving Noah a wicked grin.

  “Good,” Noah said, “I was hoping you’d make them. I’ve never tasted anything as good as the ones you make, Garret. My ma would kill me if she heard me say that.”

  Kira saw Shay respond to the happy, positive banter around the table, a little color tingeing her cheeks. A fierce love for Garret rose in her chest. She wished they were alone. Wished she could throw her arms around him, hug him, kiss him and thank him for his big, generous heart. Not much got past Garret, and she knew he realized everyone was hurting from this morning’s battle with Crawford. The stress he generated had been ongoing for all of them.

  “Long-term, Reese? How’s my father going to make his appointments?” Shay asked in a soft voice.

  “Either Garret or I will drive Ray to any appointments he has.” Reese gave both women a serious look. “Neither of you will ever do anything for that man again. We want you out of his sight. Neither of you deserves to be around him.” He sighed and gave Shay a tender look. “I know he’s your father and I’m not saying you can’t visit him. But for right now, I think it’s wise you steer clear of him. He’s not in a good place and frankly, I think he’s going to continue to drink. There’s nothing any of us can do about that.”

  Shay closed her eyes, dragging in a ragged breath, her hands tightly clasped on top of the table. “What you’re saying is true. I just have a tough time with it is all.”

  “Well,” Reese soothed, “maybe you’ll have the time now to put yourself back together instead of always being torn apart by him. Give yourself some time to sort everything out.”

  Garret held Shay’s sad gaze. “Listen, Reese and I have this. We’re your guard dogs. Ray knows he has to call one of us on our cell phones. He’s not allowed to call here to the main house. Right now, you need time and space to heal. You don’t need ongoing daily upsets.” And then his lips hooked upward a little. “Besides, I want you hungry and looking forward to my Christmas Eve meal.”

  Shay rallied and gave Garret a watery smile. “You’re right. And I am going to start taking better care of myself. I promise.”

  Garret pointed his chin toward Reese. “He’s just the guy to get you back on your feet, so let him help you, okay?”

  The table had turned into a low-key therapy session, but Kira wasn’t surprised. Dr. Hilbert had given them tools to deal with stressors and other issues. She was so proud of Garret. Everyone looked to him because he’d been here the longest of all the vets who’d come to the Bar C.

  Kira’s respect for Reese was also growing, now that she’d seen the man in action. He had a strategy to protect the woman he loved and he’d pulled the trigger on it to ensure Shay would get exactly that. Kira knew Garret was very much like Reese. He, too, was a long-distance planner, and she’d often seen him do that in Afghanistan.

  “Look,” Reese told them, “it’s one o’clock. Let’s all get back to work. Routine helps de-stress all of us. Garret, we’ll see you here at about ten a.m. tomorrow. Can you have dinner ready for us at five p.m.?”

  “Sounds good,” Garret murmured, draining the rest of his cup and standing, “I’ll be here.” He offered Kira his hand. “Ready to go home?”

  * * *

  “How are you holding up?” Garret asked her, taking Kira into his arms, holding her, allowing her to decide how much space should remain between them. All morning he’d ached to hold her. Every protective hackle he had was up and in place for her. He’d seen the devastation, the shock on her face, when Ray had rounded on her during the intervention. It had taken everything Garret had not to cock his fist and deck the man with one swing. He didn’t care if Ray had had a stroke; his savage rage aimed at Kira outdistanced any concerns Garret had for the older rancher’s health.

  She smiled tiredly and walked into his embrace, sliding her arms around his waist and resting her head against his chest. “I’m fine now,” she murmured, closing her eyes as his arms came around her.

  “Do you feel like doing some translating? You look pretty stressed,” he said, kissing her hair as it tickled his chin and jaw. Garret wanted to love her. Right now. But it was bad timing. He didn’t want her so stressed out that she couldn’t be a fully focused partner. She deserved so much more than that. Just having her lean against him, her breasts pressed against him, their hips lightly grazing each other, was more than he’d ever expected. Savoring her against him, the scent of her, the citrus fragrance of the shampoo she used, conspired to make him thicken.

  “No, not really. I just feel like a mess inside, Garret. I think I’ll go draw in my journal, make some entries . . . something that doesn’t require much of me. Just a way to come down from this and relax.”

  He squeezed and then released her. B
ecause if he didn’t, Garret was going to do the unthinkable: lift Kira into his arms, carry her down the hall to his bedroom and make slow, passionate love to her.

  Someday . . . someday Garret wished more than anything else he could tell Kira he loved her.

  “Why don’t you go do that? I need to help Harper down at the indoor arena. A lot of the renters are coming in to ride their horses before Christmas.”

  She eased out of his arms. “I know. That indoor arena was a great business decision on Shay’s part. We’re full up with thirty renters and their horses. It’s bringing in some good money for the ranch.”

  Garret drowned in her exhausted-looking gray eyes. He nudged some strands of hair off her cheek. “Hey, forget about the business, sweetheart. Go play. Put some good stuff in your journal. Grab that pink afghan, sit out on the couch and relax, okay? You don’t have to make Crawford any more meals. I want you to rest this afternoon. I’ll make us dinner tonight.”

  She reached up, grazing his hard, implacable jaw. “Thanks for the nudge. I think I might take a nap later, on the couch. I’m drained, Garret. It’s been a marathon with Ray and I’m totally exhausted.”

  “I know you are,” he rasped, dropping a kiss on her brow. He turned her around and said, “I’ll see you about dinnertime.”

  * * *

  Garret entered the kitchen quietly at four thirty. The last of the indoor arena horse people were leaving as night started to fall. For the next two days the arena would be closed for the holiday. It would give all the wranglers some needed downtime and relaxation. Closing the door, he heard soft instrumental music coming from the radio in the living room. He hung up his coat, hat and gloves and walked quietly across the tiled floor to the living room in his wet cowboy boots.

  Garret saw Kira sleeping on the couch, all curled up beneath her afghan. His heart wrenched with love for her. He saw there was color back in her cheeks, and that was a good thing. Moving quietly—he had been black ops trained after all—he approached the coffee table in front of the couch where Kira slept. Her huge, rectangular journal was open across it. He frowned, honing in on it. Her pen was in the center, but what he also saw drew his immediate attention. On the open pages facing the chair opposite the sofa was a sketch of himself.

  Quietly sitting down, he wondered what Kira had written about him beneath the drawing, as well as on the next page.

  He examined the head-and-shoulders sketch of him in his floppy hat, a three-quarter rendering. He was bearded, smiling, dressed in his cammies. Kira’s ability to capture his likeness startled him. Garret leaned forward, amazed at her talent.

  His throat tightened as he read her lazy scrawl.

  Garret slowly stood up, not wanting Kira to suddenly awaken and find him reading her journal. His heart thrashed in his chest and he swallowed hard, a hundred emotions roiling around his chest. He moved quietly back to the kitchen, his mind in shock over what he’d just read.

  He stood at the sink, looking at the night fall over the valley. Placing his hands on either side of the cool stainless steel, he closed his eyes, hanging his head, Kira’s scrawled words branding every inch of his heart. She loved him? The date on that page was nine months into their first year of deployment to that Afghan village. Stunned, he shook his head, opening his eyes, wondering how blind he’d been. Kira loved him? Had she never not loved him? For damn sure she’d never said a word about it to him.

  Garret understood her need to hide her feelings from him. Hell, he’d hid that he loved her, hadn’t he? Both of them were mature enough, smart enough, to know that to allow their love to be known to each other, would have torn the team apart in insidious and dangerous ways. Both had kept that secret locked in their hearts, silent.

  He stood, rubbing his chest where his heart lay. Garret began to think about the ambush and the time after he was wounded. If Kira honestly loved him as her words seemed to indicate, she must have gone through such painful grief over not being able to find him after the ambush. Worse, he’d had amnesia for six months, not even knowing his own damned name, much less knowing he loved Kira.

  All that had changed when his memory returned. And that was when Garret had turned over heaven and hell trying to locate Kira. To hear her father, Les, who was in tears on the phone with him, telling him that she’d left his home and he didn’t know where she’d gone had gutted Garret. Kira had been gone from both their lives and it had hurt like hell.

  “Dammit,” he muttered darkly, turning, staring through the quiet kitchen. His heart roiled with anguish, need and love for Kira. He wondered if later entries in her journal still talked about her love for him. Had she fallen out of love for him because she couldn’t initiate a relationship with him in Afghanistan? Her father had never mentioned anything like that to him. Wouldn’t it stand to reason that Kira would tell her father if she still loved him? And wouldn’t Les have told him? Garret rubbed his jaw, feeling the bristles of his five o’clock shadow beneath his fingers. Scowling, he stood there trying to figure it all out.

  All he had to go on was one journal entry by Kira, written early in their deployment. Things could have changed, and yet he was sure she wasn’t in any long-distance romantic relationship during those three years. He had lived with her and knew she sent e-mails regularly to her father, but there had been no hint that there was a man in the States waiting for her.

  Garret didn’t know whether to shout to the heavens for joy or to stop and get logical about that entry in Kira’s journal. One entry. Were there others? Maybe. Kira’s journal was private. It wasn’t like she’d showed it to him. She’d probably been exhausted and accidentally left it open on that page when she left it on the coffee table. Oh, she’d shown him sketches of some of the team members, but she’d never handed the journal over to him to look at her sketches of him. No, it was like a diary to her, and now Garret felt guilty about looking at it more closely and reading it. He should have walked away. He should have . . . Hell. He loved her. He’d been curious. It didn’t make what he’d done right and Garret knew that, but it was human nature.

  Had Kira continued to love him throughout the years or not? If she had, the ambush, the PTSD afterward, had changed her markedly. The love she held for him had probably been destroyed in the wake of that one life-changing event. Or was it possible that she had continued to love him through those years, regardless? Garret found it impossible to believe that Kira had held a torch for him that long. Especially when he’d disappeared off her radar after the ambush. What had she thought when she hadn’t heard from him again? That was enough to kill anyone’s love.

  He stood there, feeling ripped up over his unexpected discovery. Now he was sorry he’d allowed his curiosity to push him to take a peek at her journal. He didn’t know what to think. Or what to do. One thing was for sure: he felt a mountain of grief overwhelming him because at one time she’d silently and secretly loved him. And he hadn’t picked up on it. Not at all . . .

  Chapter Twenty

  Kira was awakened by the sound of pots and pans being moved around. She yawned and stretched, the living room mostly dark except for the light coming from the kitchen. Garret was home. It felt so good to think that. Home. With her.

  She slowly pushed the afghan aside and sat up. Drowsy, she realized she hadn’t closed her journal before she fell asleep. Her mind wasn’t working well; she leaned forward, closing it and pulling it over to her. The love she felt for Garret was so strong that she needed to go back to the pages in it to read every entry and sketch she’d made of him through the years. It gave her solace now, as it always had. It was as if her words, along with the sketches, fed her starving soul and spooned her hope of a future with him. They were now, slowly, becoming intimate with each other. It thrilled Kira as nothing else ever had.

  Slowly, she pulled on her boots and stood up, rubbing her face. Tucking the journal beneath her arm, she walked into the kitchen. Garret was at the counter, putting together their meal. He turned his head slightly in her directi
on.

  “Hey, sleepyhead,” he teased. “Did you just wake up?”

  “Yeah,” she murmured, giving him a soft smile. “What time is it?”

  “Eighteen hundred.” And then he corrected himself. “Civilian time is six p.m. Do you feel better?”

  “Much,” she murmured, going over to the oven. “What are you making? Smells delicious.”

  “Baked chicken with rice and veggies. Should be done in about twenty minutes.”

  She turned, seeing the table was already set. Giving him a teasing look, she said, “You’re such a house frau, Fleming.” She watched his serious features melt and that smile she loved so much appear, lifting her, squeezing her heart with longing.

  “And aren’t you glad, Trouble?”

  Laughing, Kira nodded. “Better believe it. I like the idea of a man in my kitchen.”

  “Not just a cook either,” he reminded her archly. “Chef quality.”

  She groaned and nodded, hesitating at the entrance to the hallway. “A five-star chef for sure. I’m already thinking about that red-eye gravy you’re going to make from the ham drippings for tomorrow’s dinner.” She saw pride come to his hazel eyes. It felt good to praise Garret. “Give me ten? I’ll be back,” she promised.

  * * *

  “Gosh, I’m stuffed!” Kira said, placing her hand over her stomach, giving Garret a look of thanks. He was a master at using spices and the chicken was savory, making her eat a lot more than she’d intended. Satisfaction gleamed in Garret’s eyes as he picked up their plates, taking them to the sink.

  “You have to have some room left, Kira. I made ginger cake with lemon sauce.”

  She groaned. “I’m going to gain too much weight, Garret,” and she tugged at her waistband.

  “You’re at least twenty pounds underweight,” he reminded her, sliding the plate in front of her. Handing her a fork, he added, “And from now on, you’re in my hands. You need that extra weight back, Kira. You’ll never endure the winter cold without a small layer of fat on your body.” He lightly pinched her forearm. “Look at that; you’re a skinny chicken right now compared to the woman you were in Afghanistan.”