by Helen Lacey
“A family trait,” he said and smiled. “He’s a beautiful child and I’m glad I’ve been able to get to know him.”
“I’m glad, too.” She cradled the cup in her hands. “I know I’ve been a bit hot and cold about you being part of his life...but I am genuinely pleased that he has an uncle who cares about us.”
*
She hadn’t meant to say “us.” But the word slipped out and it was impossible to avoid the query in his gaze. He did care; that was obvious. He was a caring, kind man and she’d been naively deceived by Doug into thinking Tanner was some sort of closed-off, unfriendly loner who didn’t need or want any kind of familial relationships. He did want them... The way he’d bonded so effortlessly with Oliver was evidence of that.
“I’ll help you get the house ready,” she said and smiled. “Some of the rooms need painting and the backyard could do with an overhaul. And perhaps some new light fittings. It shouldn’t take long to fix up.”
“Sure,” he replied. “And don’t stress about moving. When the time comes we’ll find a place for you both.”
“And what about the safety deposit box?” she asked. “Did you find anything important in it?”
He shook his head. “No. It was empty.”
It seemed odd, but Cassie didn’t press the issue. She nodded and finished her coffee. “I think I’d like to walk for a while.”
“Want some company?”
Did she? Being around him was increasingly unsettling. And since the tense moment in the kitchen when he’d comforted her she’d done little else but think about him. She could have sworn he was going to kiss her...and not just on the hand as he’d done. Naive and inexperienced she might be, but there was heat between them and spending time with him only added fuel to the fire.
She should have sent him on his way. Should have.
“Okay,” she said and got to her feet.
He stood and tossed their empty cups in the trash. “Lead the way.”
The beach was deserted and when they reached the sand she flipped off her sandals and shoved them into her tote. There were gray clouds rolling in from the sea and the wind whipped up around them. “I love it here on days like this,” she admitted as they started walking along the sand. “It’s got a mysterious mood about it when the clouds rumble and the wind howls.”
He laughed. “Cold wind and unswimmable seas...not exactly my idea of a great afternoon at the beach.”
“Wimp,” she said and laughed back. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”
They walked closely together and Tanner quickly steadied her when she lost her footing and tripped.
“Oh, sorry,” she said breathlessly, gripping his arm. “I’m something of a klutz.”
“I bet you’re not. Doug told me you were a dancer when you were young.”
She grimaced. “Not exactly. I did ballet with Lauren when I was about ten. But I lasted only a few months.”
“Best I not take you to the upcoming Rosemount Rodeo, then,” he said and grinned. “There’s a cowboy dance being held in the evening. Don’t want you stepping on my feet.”
She released his arm. “I saw flyers advertising the rodeo when I was in town the other day. It’s about half an hour out of Bellandale, isn’t it?”
“About that.”
She nodded a little. “I’ve never been to a cowboy dance. I’m not sure I’d know how to move.”
“It’s easy. You just hang on to one another and sway.”
Suddenly the notion of hanging on to him, be it dancing or otherwise, sent another surge of heat coursing through her veins. It had been so long since she felt a man’s arms around her. And she missed it. She missed intimacy and closeness and...sex.
Not that she’d had much of a sex life in the past few years. Doug’s visits were so infrequent and brief before she’d fallen pregnant with Oliver she’d begun to question his commitment to her and their relationship. Being involved with a career soldier was one thing...being involved with a man who could leave so easily time and time again, another thing altogether. Doug wasn’t tied to Crystal Point. And there were times when she’d wondered if she was little more than a cook and housekeeper for him to come back to every now and then. She’d also wondered what might have happened if Oliver hadn’t come along. She knew in her heart there would have to have been some serious changes to the dynamic of their relationship if it was to last.
It certainly wasn’t the relationship she’d dreamed of when she was younger. As a teen she’d had her share of romantic fantasies. She’d been quiet and studious and anything she knew about romance and love she’d learned through novels and old movies.
Well, almost everything...
Once, long ago, she’d been swept off her feet. By a boy riding a horse, no less.
She’d been on the beach with Lauren and they’d spotted the lone rider at the edge of the river mouth. Horses were common enough on the beach, so she hadn’t taken much notice, until her thirteen-year-old eyes had realized the rider was a boy around her age, and that he looked too gorgeous for words in jeans, plaid shirt and cowboy hat resting low over his eyes. Lauren had pushed her forward when he’d come close and she’d tentatively said hello. He’d done the same and they’d chatted for a couple of minutes. He was on vacation, staying with a relative. She’d explained she lived in the small town permanently. It had been puppy love at first sight for Cassie and she’d agreed to return the following afternoon and he was already riding off on his horse when she’d realized they hadn’t exchanged names.
“What are you thinking about?”
She glanced sideways when she realized Tanner was looking at her. “Nothing. You’ll think it’s silly.”
“Try me,” he said with a wry grin. “Sometimes we all need a little silly in our lives.”
Gosh, he was so right. She was tired of being serious all the time. Of worrying. Of overthinking. Of being a grown-up. Some days she longed to be frivolous and just have fun.
“All right,” she said and took a deep breath. “I was thinking about how right over there,” she said and pointed to a crest of sand covered in clumps of grass, “is where I got my very first kiss.”
His gaze narrowed. “Really?”
“Yep. I was thirteen and very naive.” She laughed and grinned. “Hard to imagine, huh?”
He smiled, as though he’d guessed she was a teenage dork. “And?”
“And he was a boy I met on the beach. He was a cowboy,” she said and met his eyes. “Like you, I guess. He had a horse and a hat and a nice smile and he kissed me.”
“And that’s it?”
She shrugged. “It was enough. It was everything a girl’s first kiss should be... It was sweet and soft and his lips tasted like peppermint.”
She smiled coyly, embarrassed by how foolish she must seem to him. But Tanner wasn’t laughing. He was watching her with such burning intensity she couldn’t move. The wind whipped around them and she shivered even though she wasn’t cold. Something kindled between them. A look. A memory. Something she couldn’t fathom. For the thousandth time she wished she knew him better. And she wished she wasn’t scared to death of letting him into her life and then knowing he’d be out of it once he left.
“Anyway,” she said, stepping back. “It was a long time ago. And I never saw him again.”
“So he just kissed you and took off?” he inquired, continuing to walk. “That’s not exactly chivalrous.”
Cassie took a few long strides to catch up with him. “Actually, I took off. I spooked and ran.” She came to a sudden stop and waited for him to halt and turn around. “We should get back. I promised Mary-Jayne I wouldn’t be too long.”
He crossed his arms, unmoving. “So why did you spook and run?”
“Because that’s what I do,” she admitted on hollow breath. “When it comes to getting close to someone I guess I spook easily.”
He stared at her. “You didn’t run from Doug.”
“He was never around,” sh
e said quickly, hearing her words echo on the breeze. Did I really say that?
“But you wanted commitment,” he reminded her. “Marriage, family...right?”
“I thought so,” she said warily, feeling the intensity of his gaze so acutely it was like a fire racing over her skin. “But maybe...”
“Maybe it was safe to want it from Doug because you knew you’d never get it?”
There was something so elementally powerful about his words she stepped back, stunned by how much truth she heard. Was it possible? Had she set her sights and her dreams on a man she knew would never be able to deliver? Were her expectations and hopes that low?
“I don’t know. Perhaps,” she murmured, wavering between a sudden rage at Tanner for working her out, and an irrational fear that no one else ever would. “I don’t usually psychoanalyze myself.”
“You mean you don’t dwell on your abandonment issues?”
“I don’t have—”
“Sure you do,” he said gently. “You lost your parents at a vulnerable age and now you expect everyone else to leave you, too.”
“You lost your parents around the same age and you don’t have—”
“Of course I do,” he said, sounding suddenly impatient as he cut her off. “Anyone who loved Doug ended up as collateral damage in one way or another. I know that from experience. He dumped me into boarding school, remember? Why the hell do you think I’m back here, Cassie? Why do you think it’s so important to me that Oliver doesn’t grow up thinking that the people who are supposed to protect him didn’t bail and take what’s rightfully his?”
Chapter Seven
The moment the words were out of his mouth Tanner wanted to snatch them back. He’d said too much. Revealed too much. Felt too much. Cassie’s eyes were wide and filled with questions. And he couldn’t and wouldn’t say anything more.
“What does that mean?”
He shook his head and turned. “Nothing. Let’s go back.”
“No,” she said firmly. “I want to know what you mean. We’re talking about you, not Oliver. We’re talking about something Doug did to you...something he took from you. What was it?”
“Nothing,” he said again and started walking back toward the kiosk.
Cassie moved up beside him and grasped his arm. “Tanner, stop. I want to know. I need to know.”
“You don’t need to know this,” he replied and brushed her hand away.
“Please,” she implored. “Tell me. Stop treating me like I’m made of glass. I can handle it...whatever it is.”
“Go home, Cassie,” Tanner said flatly. “I’ll call you about the house in a day or so.”
He strode up the beach and waited by their cars until she caught up. When she reached him her cheeks were ablaze and her blue eyes bore into his like icy chips.
“You’re a real jerk, McCord, you know that!”
He bit back a grin. She had spunk, that’s for sure. And he’d rather see her spirit than her tears. “Talk to you soon.”
“So, that’s it? You’re just going to leave?”
He opened the car door. “I won’t be far away.”
That didn’t seem to give her any comfort. “Go to hell.”
He grinned. “Well, I’m not going that far...but I’ll be at Ruthie’s if you need me.”
With that, she gave him one last glare before she got in her car and drove off.
By the time Tanner returned to the Nevelson farm it was past five. He hit the shower, changed into jeans and a T-shirt, and joined Ruthie on the porch for a beer.
“Girl trouble?” she asked with a wide grin.
Tanner bit back a smile. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Ruthie didn’t let him off the hook. “You’ve got the look of a man with a woman on his mind.”
He did, but he had no intention of admitting it. “I’ve got no such thing,” he said and drank some beer.
The older woman harrumphed. “Deny it all you like, but I know what I see. Call me sentimental, but I don’t wanna see you get hurt.”
“I won’t,” he said quietly. “I know what I’m doing.”
Yeah...right.
Ruthie didn’t look convinced. “Just make sure you do. And don’t forget you promised to start long reining that ornery new colt tomorrow.”
He hadn’t forgotten. In fact, he was looking forward to working with the animal. It had been over a week since he’d been near a horse and he missed it as he missed air in his lungs. Plus, he knew working with the colt would take his mind off Doug, Cassie and the letters he’d discovered were in the safety deposit box that afternoon. Letters from Doug. Letters written on old-fashioned paper and with the gold fountain pen that had belonged to their grandfather. Letters to him. To Cassie. Letters his brother had written and sent because he was going into a covert, dangerous mission and wasn’t sure if he’d return. They were essentially words written by a man who had predicted his own death. As expected, his brother had begged his forgiveness one final time while insisting none of his past actions were done out of malice. Tanner wanted to believe it. They were Doug’s last words to him and should have given closure, and might have if it weren’t for the letter he’d written to Cassie. It wasn’t sealed and Doug would have to have known he’d read it. Tanner was also sure his brother would know he’d never let her read the words that would break her heart. Perhaps that’s what Doug was hoping for? Maybe his brother wanted him to let him off the hook. And he would. But not to protect Doug. Rather to protect a woman who deserved better. Because it was there, in black and white, every possible callous, unfeeling thing a man could say to the woman who was going to have his child. As Tanner had scanned the pages, all the suppressed rage and censure he’d felt toward his brother had risen to the surface and consumed him like a rogue wave.
And he knew one thing.
Cassie would never know the truth.
His brother’s legacy wouldn’t be that of an unscrupulous and self-absorbed bastard who didn’t care who he hurt. She could spend her life thinking of Doug fondly and without knowing he intended to abandon her and the child she’d borne. Just as he’d done with Leah.
He’d give Cassie a few days to cool off and start work on the house the following week. But he missed Oliver. And he missed her, too, as much as he knew it was foolhardy. He had enough on his mind without wasting time missing her. The house had to be sold and hopefully it would go to contract before he headed back to South Dakota. He’d spoken to a couple of real estate brokers earlier that day and was sure the property would sell quickly once it was painted and the yard tidied up.
As promised, Tanner spent most of the next day long reining Ruthie’s colt. He didn’t hear from Cassie and figured she was still mad at him for shutting down their conversation at the beach. But he’d said too much. Besides which, he’d been sideswiped by her admitting she’d been kissed there for the first time.
He remembered everything about that day. He’d come to stay at Ruthie’s for a couple of weeks during summer vacation and spent most of his time working his horse. When his parents died, Ruthie had agree to keep Rusty, the buckskin gelding he’d owned since he was a small child, at her farm. Vacation time was always spent at the Nevelson farm. That morning he’d been working Rusty along the sand bed. It was low tide and he’d spotted a pair of teenage girls watching him from the crest of a small dune. Boarding at a boys’ school meant limited interaction with girls, and naturally curious about the opposite sex, he’d headed across the sand. He’d pulled up in front of the dune and heard their combined giggles.
The girl with pale blue eyes had immediately captured his attention and when she’d smiled Tanner’s insides had jumped all over the place. They’d talked for just a moment and then Tanner had dipped his hat lower, clicked Rusty into a trot and headed back over the dune. But with the promise to meet her again the following day.
That’s when he’d kissed her. Her first kiss. His, too.
Fourteen years later he met
her again. Only this time she was living in Doug’s house and sharing his brother’s bed. And she didn’t remember him. There was no recollection in her eyes. He’d been forgotten. As had their kiss.
Or so he thought.
But he had no intention of telling her that he was the boy she’d kissed. Things were complicated enough already. And he had enough on his mind without dwelling on that teenage kiss.
On Saturday morning, however, she turned up.
Tanner was in the corral and he eased the colt to a smooth halt when he saw her car pull up outside the farmhouse. He watched as Ruthie came down the steps and greeted Cassie by the vehicle. The two women chatted for a moment, and then Cassie pulled Oliver from the backseat. Within seconds the baby was in Ruthie’s arms and he heard both women laughing. Something uncurled in his abdomen as he watched them together. Cassie’s laughter traveled across the yard and he tried to concentrate on the horse and forget her. Which was impossible. Because while Ruthie took Oliver inside the house, Cassie headed toward the corral. And to him.
*
She really had no idea what she was doing. Except that she wanted some answers. And fast. She’d been stewing for three days. Getter madder, more confused and more determined than ever to find out what Tanner was really playing at. By the time she reached the round yard she was short on patience and breath.
He stopped what he was doing when she reached the fence.
“Cassie...hello.”
He wore dark jeans and a blue shirt that stretched across his shoulders and outlined the strong musculature of his chest. His sleeves were rolled up and he wore a wide-brimmed cowboy hat. He looked, in a word, gorgeous. And he’d been in her thoughts all week.
“We need to talk.”
He smiled. Damn. There was a tiny dimple in his cheek. How had she never noticed that before?
His brown eyes caught her gaze. “What about?”
“You know very well,” she snapped back. “I may seem like a gullible doormat to you, Tanner, but be assured that I am not.”
He actually laughed. “Doormat? I don’t think that.”
“You must,” she said, hands on hips. “Otherwise you wouldn’t keep avoiding my questions like a coward.”
