A Cowboy's Tears

by Anne McAllister

  But when he called to ask her out for Saturday, Jenny didn't think that was the time for it.

  "Why don't you come here?" she said.

  She thought a casual dinner at the ranch house would be smarter—make them less of a couple, give them more space.

  It was a mistake.

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  « ^ »

  Mace was not having a good day.

  "You start out with a chip on your shoulder," his mother always told him, "and it won't be long before someone knocks it off."

  Mace didn't think of that at the beginning. At the beginning he simply showed up at Taggart's. It was a bronc-riding school Saturday. He'd weathered the cold shoulders of bull-riding school and then all the more active interference that his friends could throw at him.

  What else could they possibly do?

  It didn't take him long to find out.

  He'd only been there half an hour, had just helped Jed and Tuck sort out the horses for the first round of rides while Noah was in the classroom with his students, when Taggart came out of the house with a man Mace didn't know.

  Jed took a look at Taggart and the man who was accompanying him across the yard, took another look at Mace, who was just shutting the last gate, and said, "Uh-oh," under his breath.

  "What? Didn't you get 'em all in?" Mace asked, glancing around for a stray horse.

  But before Jed could answer, Taggart said, "Hey, come meet my brother-in-law."

  The penny dropped.

  Mace finished putting the chain through the clasp, then turned slowly to take his first good look at the new man in Jenny's life.

  He had thought of him as "the professor." A sort of weedy, balding, goateed nearsighted jerk. And those were the kindest terms Mace had considered him in.

  The guy beside Taggart was a little taller than Mace, an inch or so over six feet. Lean, not really weedy. Clean shaven, with a healthy head of straight, blond hair brushed back from his forehead. If he was nearsighted, he must wear contacts.

  But as far as Mace was concerned he was still a jerk. His jaw tightened. His gaze narrowed. Taggart cleared his throat and gave him a steely look—one that warned him to act like a grown-up. Mace tried.

  Taggart smiled. "Tom, this is Mace Nichols whose ranch runs alongside ours. Mace, I want you to meet Felicity's brother, Tom."

  Mace waited to see if Taggart would add, "The man who's dating your wife."

  Taggart, occasionally the soul of tact, did not.

  The two men stood assessing each other. Sounds of conversation around them rose and fell and stuttered … and stopped.

  Tom stuck out his hand. "Mace. I'm pleased to meet you. I've heard a lot about you."

  From my wife? Mace wanted to say.

  He, too, could manage a bare minimum of tact. He gave Tom's hand a brief clasp. "Likewise."

  And a damn sight more than he wanted to hear, that was for sure.

  "Taggart says you've done the very nearly impossible, building a ranch up from scratch in this day and age." Tom's tone was warm and admiring.

  Mace might have basked in it if he hadn't wanted to punch the guy's lights out. "I've done all right," he said grudgingly.

  "You're doing very well," Taggart said.

  Mace thought it sounded more like a comment on his present behavior than on his ranching ability. He shot a dark look in Taggart's direction and tugged his hat down a little tighter on his head.

  He gave Tom a curt nod. "Gotta get some more horses moved."

  "I'm glad to have met you," Tom said genially.

  Mace grunted.

  Taggart glared at him, but he ignored it and turned back to the holding pens. What was he supposed to do, say he was glad to have met Tom, too?

  He wasn't that good a liar.

  Obviously Tom was. He seemed to be everything that Mace was not. Civilized. Couth. Polite. Educated. Fertile.

  Mace slammed his boot against the metal of the fence. The resulting thunk was embarrassingly loud.

  Taggart and Jed and Tom turned to see what had happened.

  Mace felt hot blood rise in his face. He turned away, stumbling slightly to try to make it look like an accident.

  Then, hauling himself up on the fence, he hollered louder than necessary at Tuck. "Open the gate and let those horses in!"

  The day seemed to go downhill from there.

  He stayed away from the stands during the rides. But all the while he worked, he was aware of Tom sitting at the top of the bleachers.

  Halfway through the second round of rides, he was joined by Felicity, babes in arms. Tom scooped up the one who was fussing, jiggling it and bouncing it in his arms like that sort of thing came natural to him.

  Probably it did, Mace thought sourly, because after a few minutes he couldn't hear its cries anymore.

  So he was good with kids, too. Becky had said he was. He shot a glare in Tom Morrison's direction. Felicity saw him look that way and waved at him.

  Gritting his teeth, Mace lifted a hand in return, then dropped his gaze and his hand and focused all his attention on the horses he was putting in the chutes.

  Well, almost all.

  Behind him, he could hear Mick Hamilton and Warren Crosser, a couple of Noah's bronc-riding students, in earnest discussion.

  "Wouldn't mind goin' out with her myself," Warren said as he began to unfasten his chaps after his ride. "She's quite a filly."

  "She is," Mick replied. "But you're too late. She's already got another fish to fry."

  Mace wondered idly which buckle bunny was no longer available.

  "Who's she goin' with?" Warren asked.

  "Taggart's brother-in-law."

  Mace almost slipped on the fence and bit his tongue. Jenny? They were talking about Jenny?

  "Must be gettin' pretty cozy," Mick continued. "Larrabee saw 'em in Bozeman a couple of times and I hear tonight she's having him over for dinner."

  Mace's fingers tightened on the rail at the top of the chute.

  Warren made a doubtful sound. "How do you know?"

  "Asked her out myself."

  "I didn't even know she was gettin' a divorce until today," Warren said enviously.

  "Neither did I."

  Warren grinned. "Talk about fast workers."

  Mick grimaced wryly. "Yeah, well, the brother-in-law was faster."

  "Wish I'd known," Warren grumbled. "Had my eye on her for years. Thought she was hitched to Nichols for life." He finished unbuckling his chaps and snapped them against his leg to smack the dust out. "Just goes to show, I guess, ain't nobody in it for life anymore."

  "Coulda blowed me over," Mick agreed. "If I was Nichols, I wouldn't let her get away. Hell, I'd've kept her barefoot and pregnant for years."

  "Would you?" Mace's voice dripped ice as he glared down at them.

  The two cowboys looked up for the first time.

  "Oh, hell," Mick said under his breath. He swallowed helplessly. "Sorry, Mace, I didn't know you was—I mean, I didn't think—"

  "We didn't mean nuthin' by it," Warren said nervously. "We were just talkin'."

  "Were you?" Mace said pleasantly. He dropped over the fence and stood in front of them, his fingers curling into fists. "Well, I've got a suggestion for you—shut up."

  There might be more space at home than there was sitting side by side in a theater or studying paintings at an art gallery and sharing a meal in a restaurant…

  But somehow, Jenny discovered, it was also more intimate because it was more personal.

  The ranch house living room was her space. Those were her books on the bookshelves. Her hand-knitted afghan on the back of the rocker. Her pictures on the wall.

  Hers.

  And Mace's.

  Maybe that was the problem, she thought, as it seemed as if the walls of the room were closing in on her and Tom.

  When she and Tom went out, Mace was there, but in the background. He was a factor—Mace always seemed to be a factor—but he wasn't everywh
ere they turned.

  Here—in this house—he was.

  His Stockman's Journal still sat alongside her magazines. His muffler, the one she'd knitted him for Christmas and that he wore every winter day when he went out to feed the stock, still hung on the hook beside the back door. The pictures on the mantel were not just of Jenny, but of Mace, too.

  She couldn't help but see him: Mace on their wedding day, Mace on horseback, Mace bottle-feeding a newborn calf.

  She turned her head and tried to pretend he wasn't there.

  She tried to be casual and unconcerned, the perfect hostess, babbling a welcome, taking Tom's jacket, commenting on the weather, gulping in surprise when he proffered a bottle of wine.

  She and Mace never bought wine like that, with a cork and not a cap that screwed on.

  "I—I don't know if I have a c-corkscrew," she mumbled, feeling her cheeks burn.

  "No problem." Tom dug a pocket knife out of his jeans and proceeded to open it with that. "You do have wineglasses?" he asked hopefully moments later.

  They were on the top shelf of the cabinet over the refrigerator—and they were very dusty. More embarrassment. But she got them down, rinsed them and dried them and tried to pretend she wasn't embarrassed as she handed them to Tom.

  He poured two glasses and offered her one.

  She shook her head. "Not … yet. I—I don't drink while I'm cooking," she said. It was true. And tonight, of all nights, she needed a clear head if she wasn't going to burn the house down!

  "You drink yours and keep me company," she said, "unless you'd rather sit in the living room and read a magazine."

  Tom lounged against the refrigerator. "I'd enjoy watching you cook."

  Jenny felt like a monkey in a zoo—or a butterfly pinned to a board. She wasn't used to being watched.

  She started making the gravy, reciting the process in her head, hoping she wasn't forgetting anything.

  Tom stood watching, talking to her while she made the gravy and tried to look like she entertained gentlemen in her kitchen all the time.

  She wasn't that good an actress. But Tom, bless his heart, didn't seem to notice—or if he did, he didn't care.

  He'd spent the day alternately watching Noah's bronc-riding school and reading a new biography of Henry Fielding. And he enthused about both while Jenny stirred and listened and prayed that the gravy would thicken.

  It was a cream gravy for the chicken-fried steak she was keeping warm in the oven, and it had never failed to do what she expected. But there wasn't much you could count on these days, as she well knew.

  So she stirred—and prayed—and tried to think of questions she might ask about Henry Fielding with what was left of her mind.

  It turned out the gravy was more reliable than Mace.

  Just as she was about to despair of it, the gravy began to thicken, and Jenny sighed with relief. "Finished?" Tom asked.

  "Yes."

  "How about that glass of wine, then?"

  She wiped damp palms down the sides of her trousers. "All right," she said, feeling more sanguine and a little braver, "why not?"

  He handed the untouched glass to her. Their fingers brushed. She jerked back and the wine sloshed in the glass. Quickly she took a sip and then a swallow.

  It was, even to her untested palate, a good wine, smooth and slightly musky. It warmed her and mellowed her, softening the edges of her anxiousness, making Tom's touch seem more acceptable, making the walls of the room recede a bit.

  "It was amazing watching those bronc riders," Tom was saying with a smile. "I wouldn't get on a bucking horse in a hundred years."

  "Well, a lot of those guys wouldn't read Fielding's biography in a thousand, so I guess you're even."

  "I guess. But Taggart was telling me he had a student in his bull-riding school who plays first violin in some university orchestra."

  "Scott Hunter." Jenny knew him. She set her glass down to ladle the gravy into a bowl. "Did Taggart tell you he's a pretty fair baseball player, too?"

  "What is he? Montana's answer to the Renaissance man?"

  She smiled. "Something like that. A lot of the guys are talented in a variety of areas."

  "I met your husband this afternoon."

  His words were as blunt as they were unexpected. "Ow! Drat!" Jenny dropped the platter she'd just distractedly grabbed with her bare hand. "You met Mace? At Taggart's?"

  Why hadn't she considered that?

  She groped for a pot holder, but Tom got it first and steered her toward the sink while he rescued the platter.

  "Run your hand under cold water," he commanded. "Are you okay?"

  "Yes." Tell me about Mace.

  Tom put the rescued platter on the table, then took her hand, examining her reddened fingers for a moment. He stuck them back under the running water.

  "Keep them there for a few more minutes. I don't think it's a bad burn."

  "I've had worse," Jenny said. What about Mace?

  "You still need to take care of it as soon as you do it. Heals faster that way."

  "I know." What did he say to you? "How's Mace?"

  The words came out fine, with none of the intensity and none of the desperation she felt. They sounded casual, normal.

  Maybe she was a pretty fair actress after all.

  "He seemed fine," Tom said equally casually. "Taggart introduced us."

  Did he say, "This is Mace, the man whose wife you're dating? The one you're having dinner with tonight?"

  Did Mace behave? Suddenly Jenny found herself searching Tom's face for signs of mayhem.

  "He was pretty busy with the horses. Taggart said Mace used to ride broncs."

  "And bulls now and then. But it was a long time ago."

  "Taggart said he was good."

  "He was." But he wouldn't go down the road with them. He wanted the ranch more, and he always said rodeo was too hard on marriages.

  There were other things even harder, Jenny thought now.

  She took her stinging hand out from beneath the faucet and dried it off.

  "He told me you and Mace built up this ranch from scratch, that you built this house together." Tom looked around the small homey room appreciatively. "He said Mace felled the trees, put up the frame, made the cabinets, did the finish work. That's pretty renaissance, if you ask me."

  "Mace can do a lot of things," Jenny agreed.

  She wondered what Tom would think if she told him Mace had been lurking on the hillside after he'd brought her home last week. He'd better not be there tonight, she thought grimly.

  "Taggart seemed to think a lot of him."

  "They've been friends for a long time."

  Tom smiled but didn't reply. He stood waiting while Jenny hung up the towel. Was he expecting her to say something? Did he want to know the reason Mace had left her? If he did, he was too polite to ask.

  Still the silence went on for a few more seconds, as if he intended to give Jenny time in case she wanted to add anything else. When she didn't, he said, "The smell of that steak is making my mouth water. How does your hand feel?"

  Jenny breathed again. "Fine." She wiggled her fingers. "Just fine. Come on. Sit down and let's eat."

  It was the sideways glances that got to him. The whispers. The hushed voices. Were those snickers he heard?

  Every time he came upon a gathering of cowboys, the conversation stopped. Every time he left, it started again. Murmurs. Mutters.

  Yeah, those were snickers!

  Mace felt his neck burn and his face heat. He wanted to pound their faces into the dirt. Warren and Mick and all the rest of them.

  Oh, after Mick's gaffe earlier in the day, he never caught another obvious reference to Jenny and him and Tom Morrison.

  But he was no fool.

  And even if he were, even a fool wouldn't mistake the sudden silences when he came near, the speculative looks and sly smiles that followed when he walked away.

  "Poor Mace. Couldn't hang on to his wife. Let her get away, and she
's going with a college prof now."

  "Poor Mace. Stupid fool Mace." He didn't have to hear the words to know what was being said.

  Damn them!

  And they didn't even know!

  What would they be saying—and snickering—if they did?

  When Tom left the bleachers shortly after five, Mace was aware of it. When he came out of the house, all cleaned up, half an hour later, Mace saw him. When he got in his car and drove away, Mace almost put his fist through a fence.

  "Hey, dreamer! Let's go. Move 'em up, for crying out loud!" Jed yelled at him.

  Mace gritted his teeth and slapped the horse in the chute on the rump, trying to move her into the next one. "Keep your mind on business," he told her.

  Which was what he ought to be telling himself.

  He did the best he could for the rest of the day. He concentrated on the horses, ignored their riders, and refused to let himself think about Jenny and her intimate dinner that night.

  It was almost nine by the time Noah let them go. Mace's stomach was growling. He was dirty and sweaty and aching, and there would be no hot, home-cooked meal waiting for him—just as there hadn't been last time.

  Just as there wouldn't be for the rest of his life.

  "Hey, Mace," Jed called from his truck as he and Tuck headed out. "Brenna's got lasagna in the oven. You want to come?"

  His stomach growled, but Mace barely looked up. "No. Thanks." He kept on loading the tack he had promised to mend for Taggart.

  When he finished, he opened the door of his truck.

  "Hi."

  He turned to see Becky standing at his elbow and realized it was the first time she'd been around all day. "Hey, shadow, where you been?"

  "Me an' Susannah went to Bozeman with her uncle to see a movie."

  "Have a good time?"

  Becky's shoulders winged up and she scuffed the toe of her boot in the dirt. "Better'n stayin' around here."

  Considering the day he'd had, Mace could go along with that. "What's the matter? Twin trouble again?"

  "Dad trouble," Becky muttered.

  Mace raised a brow. "That's a new one."

  "I forgot to feed Digger. Daddy says if I don't remember to feed him, we'll have to get rid of him." There was a wavering note in her voice that sounded suspiciously close to tears.