Their Wander Canyon Wish

by Allie Pleiter

  Marilyn gave him a look. Ah, so she hadn’t forgotten him. There was a time when collecting women’s phone numbers had been a spectacular talent of his. Still was, if the filled pages of that little notebook were any indication. The right kind of woman always had a soft spot for the wrong kind of man.

  “For the girls,” he emphasized, adding his best contrite look. If she did remember him like her current scowl implied, she should know dating widowed mothers was definitely not in his wheelhouse. “For disappointing them today.”

  She did not look convinced, nor did she offer a phone number. He flipped the book closed and slipped it back into his pocket. “I’ve got another idea, then.” He pulled out his wallet and produced a small red tag with his signature on the back. Holding it up, he said “Go on over there to the Wander Bakery.” He pointed to the shop down the block his new sister-in-law purchased this past winter. “Give this to Ms. Yvonne inside. She’ll know it means I said you could have any cupcakes you wanted. On my tab.”

  “Cupcakes!” the girls shouted in perfect unison. “Mom, can we?” asked one while the other tugged insistently on her mama’s sleeve.

  “And whatever you want, too,” he added to Marilyn, handing her the ticket. “I figure it’s the least I can do until I get things up and running in there.”

  She took the ticket with a reluctant smile. Marilyn was pretty, elegant even, with delicate features and the creamy skin of a well-to-do woman. And while that chin tilted up a bit too much for his taste, she also had a tired, scraped-thin kind of look. She held herself too erect—like someone afraid of toppling over. She forced up the corners of her mouth in a way that told him she hadn’t had too many genuine reasons to smile of late. The stance of a soul just barely holding it together. Given the sad news she’d told him, it was likely true. “That’s very kind of you.” Her tone was overly formal.

  Kind? Maybe. Mostly just opportunistic. In his experience, only the rare female turned down free baked goods. Especially ones as good as Yvonne made. Dates who’d been canceled on, disappointed garage customers, moms of customers, most anyone could be easily appeased with something from Yvonne’s bakery. Running his “red ticket tab” at Yvonne’s had been one of the smartest ideas he’d ever had. His new sister-in-law might give him grief over it, but it had come in handy for a whole host of reasons, business and otherwise.

  “Which one do you like?” a tiny voice asked.

  “Cupcakes? I go for the double chocolate,” he replied. “And Yvonne makes them with a whole pile of frosting, just the way I like it.”

  A set of pigtails bobbed in giggles as one girl pointed to the building behind him. “No, silly, I meant the animals. In there. You tried to guess our favorites. You didn’t tell us yours.”

  Wyatt told the truth as he flashed his most charming smile. “Me, I like ’em all.”

  Over the top of the girls’ heads, Marilyn gave him a look that said some things never change. Clearly, she wasn’t referring to cupcakes.

  Yep, she remembered him all right.

  Chapter Two

  “The merry-go-round was still broken.” Maddie’s pout was as wide as Wander Canyon as they walked in the door of the Ralton family home.

  Marilyn’s mother looked up from her knitting. “You’re kidding. I was sure it’d be fixed by now.”

  You could have told me to check, Mom. Marilyn tried to tamp down as many disappointments as possible for her girls since moving back. It took a heroic effort to paint this move as a happy, positive step, and she needed all the help she could get.

  “But we got cupcakes,” Margie countered, holding up the box of coffee cake Marilyn had purchased for the following morning. “For free.”

  Dad came in from the backyard, wiping his hands on a towel that hadn’t been white since Marilyn was in high school. “Sounds like a pretty good deal to me.”

  “They weren’t exactly free.” Marilyn took the box from Margie and set it on the counter.

  “The nice fix-it man got ’em for us,” Margie explained, producing a “care to explain that?” look from Mom.

  “We met Wyatt Walker coming out of the carousel building. The cupcakes were his idea. He runs a tab at the Wander Bakery, evidently.”

  Mom’s scowl spoke volumes. “I don’t know who thought it would be a good idea to let Wyatt Walker try to fix that carousel. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised it’s still not running.” The carousel was a source of huge civic pride for the small town. Which made it not at all the kind of thing anyone would be quick to put Wyatt in charge of handling. Marilyn was ashamed to admit she’d had the same thought.

  “He’s supposed to be mechanically inclined, so maybe they thought it’d make sense,” Dad said. He peered into the bakery box and sniffed. “Cinnamon. My favorite.” He gave Margie a conspiratorial wink. “Should we connive to have some now?”

  Margie loved “conniving” with her grandfather. Both girls had terrific relationships with their grandparents. It was the only thing that eased coming back to Wander with her tail between her legs. Of course, Mom and Dad still didn’t know the half of it, and Marilyn hadn’t yet decided whether or not to keep it that way. Was it easier to bear if no one knew? Or would the secrets about Landon only fester? After all, her work in public relations had taught her that some secrets—actually most secrets—never quite stay hidden the way you’d like them to. But what would ever be gained by people knowing the truth about Landon? Surely it was better if the girls’ memory of their father remained the upstanding man most of Denver hailed him as.

  Marilyn plucked the box from her father’s grasp and set it up on top of a cabinet by the bread box. “This is for tomorrow. Little girls who had cupcakes for lunch don’t need to have coffee cake, too.”

  “Well, I didn’t have any cupcakes for lunch.” Grandpa adopted an oversize version of Maddie’s pout.

  “We had peanut butter and jelly, too,” Margie argued. Marilyn was glad the new young owner of the bakery Ruth used to own had offered to toss in a pair of PB&J sandwiches “on the house” to go along with Wyatt’s gift of cupcakes. It kept lunch from being a total nutrition loss. She’d felt compelled to buy the coffee cake just to be nice in return.

  “All in all, sounds like a pretty good afternoon for a failed carousel trip,” Dad declared.

  “Mr. Wyatt’s gonna call Mama when it’s fixed so we can get the first ride,” Maddie announced.

  Mom’s eyebrow went up. “Is he, now? Got your phone number, did he?”

  “No, he did not.” When the girls looked as if this might dampen their chances for the first post-repair ride, Marilyn added, “He knows we’re staying with you, so if he wants to make good on his offer, he can.”

  That brought an alarmed look from Maddie. “Won’t he?”

  Don’t, Marilyn warned Mom with her eyes. Let them just think of Wyatt as the nice man who’s fixing the carousel. They don’t need to know we both know he won’t keep that promise.

  Dad stepped in. “Well, if he doesn’t, I’ll take you there myself the second I hear it’s up and running. After all, it’s been too long since I’ve been on a porcupine.”

  Margie’s eye went wide. “I forgot about the porcupine!”

  “Best carousel porcupine ever,” Dad said. After a second, he shrugged and added, “Maybe the only carousel porcupine ever.” He looked at Marilyn. “You favored the ostrich, didn’t you, sweetheart?”

  “Mr. Wyatt guessed wrong on all of ours,” Margie pronounced. “I don’t think he’s very good at it, even though he said he was.”

  “Imagine that,” Mom muttered under her breath as she finished a row and turned her work.

  “Why don’t you run upstairs and get your crayons so you can get started on those coloring books we bought at Redding’s?” Buying a toy at the town general store after a ride on the carousel was one of the fixtures of Marilyn’s childhood. It felt go
od to at least keep that part of their outing. And besides, it was next to the Wander Chamber of Commerce, where she’d dropped off her resume. She couldn’t sit around and play grieving widow forever.

  Mom set down her knitting as the girls barreled past her toward the stairs. “How’d it go with Gail?”

  Gail from the Chamber of Commerce had been kind and polite, but how much staff did a small-town organization need? Marilyn couldn’t honestly say if the woman had taken her resume out of genuine interest or as a favor to her mother. Did it really matter which? “She said she’d look at it and keep an ear open for possibilities.”

  “Sounds promising,” Dad said.

  “Sure,” Marilyn agreed, even though she didn’t. She opted to change the subject. “So what’s the story with Wyatt Walker off his family’s ranch?”

  “Foolish boy,” Mom said, rising to put the kettle on for tea. Marilyn found Wyatt a bit long in the tooth—and long on masculine looks—to be called a boy. The way Mom said it, you’d think Wyatt had just been caught smoking outside the high school gym. Which, come to think of it, he had been. Multiple times.

  “Never could quite figure out why he’d do that,” Dad said. “That ranch is Hank’s pride and joy.”

  “But Chaz runs it now, though, right?” Chaz Walker was Wyatt’s stepbrother. His wife was the woman who owned the bakery now. She’d liked Yvonne instantly, even felt as if she could be friends with the woman.

  Dad got a trio of mugs down from the cupboard, ignoring mom’s tsk as he opened the coffee cake, clearly not intending to save it for tomorrow. “I’m not so sure Hank ever really got over Wyatt just walking away from Wander Canyon Ranch like that. I’m not even sure what he does now.”

  Marilyn got out the sugar. “He told me he’s helping Manny Stewart with his garage.”

  “A garage?” Mom balked. “When you could have all that land?”

  Not really my thing. That’s how Wyatt had put it, hadn’t he? Rather casual for a stunning rejection of the family estate. There was a story there. “Maybe not everyone takes to ranching.”

  “Maybe not everyone takes to hard work.” Mom’s words had sharp, judgmental edges.

  A man who volunteered to fix a complicated old carousel didn’t strike Marilyn as being allergic to hard work. Then again, her marriage had proved how wrong she could be about men, hadn’t it?

  * * *

  Wyatt looked up from draining a Jeep’s brake fluid to see a shapely silhouette standing in the garage bay door. Not a bad way to start a Friday. He put down the bucket and wrench he’d been holding and picked up his charm. “Well, hello there.”

  “Hi. My car needs an oil change.” She walked into the garage and Wyatt realized that silhouette belonged to Marilyn Sofitel. “I figured showing up here was the least I could do after you bought my daughters cupcakes yesterday.”

  Chaz never believed that Wyatt’s cupcake tab at Yvonne’s was effective marketing. It was always fun to prove Chaz wrong. “Cute kids. I felt bad disappointing them.” Given how long it was taking to fix the carousel, this wasn’t turning out to be the easy way to score points with the town fathers he’d planned. Not that delayed parts coming from Albany was his fault, but he wasn’t sure folks would see it that way. People were always quick to judge, but he’d learned to slough it off just as fast.

  “Oh, to hear them talk, they came out ahead. Cupcakes go a long way with those two. But I warn you, they plan on holding you to that first ride. They talked about it all the way home.”

  “I’ll try to make it happen soon.” Yvonne had told him about Marilyn’s visit with the twin girls. She’d given him a good ribbing about how taken the little girls had been with “the Carousel Man.”

  Wyatt had enjoyed many reputations in his day—still did—but he wasn’t quite sure he was ready to be known as “the Carousel Man.” That title belonged to the slightly kooky old guy who’d built the carousel. When he’d died a month ago, a carousel committee had been formed. But when the first malfunction happened, Chaz convinced Wyatt to help. It was supposed to be a temporary thing. Stopgap Carousel Man. Certainly not Wander Canyon’s new purveyor of childhood joy. Even for cuties like Maddie and Margie. Or their mother.

  “So.” He motioned toward the sensible upscale vehicle sitting just outside his garage. “Oil change?”

  She gave the car a dubious look and produced a small notebook out of her handbag. “According to this, at least. I’m just learning how to handle stuff like this. Landon was—” she searched for the right word “—particular about cars.” It fell just short of a compliment, a telling mixture of awkwardness and resentment.

  “It’s not a bad thing to learn how to be particular. I’d much rather service a car that’s been well looked after than one that’s been ignored.” He flashed her a smile. “Although, I admit, I make more money on the ignored kind.”

  She laughed, but there was a tension in it. Life had really taken a couple of hard swings at this woman, hadn’t it? She was prettier than he remembered her being in high school. Her glossy hair framed a delicate face with features he could describe using only the word tender. She moved like a woman still off balance and highly bothered by it. Wyatt wasn’t quite sure what gave him such an insight. He normally didn’t bother to read women that deeply. Perhaps it was the contrast of her current striving to the girls’ faces of easy joy yesterday.

  Being charming came to him as easily as breathing, but he was struck by the overwhelming urge to be nice to her. Genuinely, decently nice, not just the kind of nice designed to get him a phone number or a date. Huh. His upstanding do-right brother, Chaz, might have a lot to say about that, but thankfully Chaz was not standing in his garage watching him give Marilyn a kind smile.

  “I’m not a lot of things, Marilyn, but I am honest.” He held out his hand for the book, which he expected to be a meticulous maintenance log. “Let me look at this, and the car, and I’ll help you figure out what needs doing.”

  “Thanks.” She said the word easy enough, but just before she did, there was a flick in her gaze. A short burst of something behind her eyes that told him someone had given her plenty of reasons not to trust.

  He flipped quickly through the book, confirming that it was a detailed listing of all the vehicle’s maintenance and repairs. “Thorough.”

  She sighed. “My husband was nothing if not thorough.”

  Setting the book aside, Wyatt walked out to the vehicle and slid his hand under the grille to pop the hood. He could live with her suspicions, even dare himself to live them down. He did that all the time, after all. He barely even registered the sideways glances of folks in town anymore.

  The SUV’s hood rose to reveal a pristine engine. “You weren’t kidding.” Particular was an understatement for the kind of care this car received. He bent down over the engine, and whistled in appreciation. “I doubt you’ll have much to worry about with this car.

  She glanced back at the shop. “Have you worked at Manny’s long?”

  He looked farther and removed a spark plug, unsurprised to find it in perfect condition. “Nah. I’ve just been filling in for him while his wife gets her knee fixed. I’m still trying to figure out my long-term game plan.” Now that I’ve booted myself off the family ranch, that is.

  “Open your own garage, maybe?”

  Wyatt straightened up. “Dunno.” He wasn’t sure what made him test her with the next statement—her newness back in town, maybe. “Might be something for me if that new hotel keeps expanding.” He watched her reaction, knowing full well her parents were one of the most vocal opponents to the project. “You know about that?”

  She frowned, her face taking on the scowl most Wander residents did when discussing Mountain Vista. “Dad’s been talking about it,” she admitted.

  The resort firm had been looking at a large-scale expansion in the area. Word had it some offers had been hinted
at to a few of the less successful ranchers. As far as he knew, town disapproval had kept any of the landowners from admitting to considering an offer, but Wyatt knew it was only a matter of time.

  They’d known better than to approach Dad or Chaz about ever selling Wander Canyon Ranch. Still, Wyatt’s buddy Tim had started talking to him about coming on board to run the maintenance and vehicle fleet—if the expansion went through. Sure, it was an unpopular project, but it wasn’t as if he had an upstanding reputation to forfeit.

  He shut the hood of the vehicle. “And what’s your opinion?”

  She gave him just the hint of a challenge with her eyes. “I can’t say I’m in favor of it myself.”

  So she did have a bit of fight left in her. He kept his words casual as he wiped his hands. “They have an uphill public relations battle ahead of them, that’s for sure.”

  She straightened. “I work in public relations. Or did. But I prefer causes I believe in.”

  He pushed out a breath and motioned for them to walk back into the garage. “I believe in fast cars and good steaks. That doesn’t mean I don’t work on slow little Volkswagens and eat my share of chicken wings.” He handed her back the maintenance logbook. “’Course, we all know being respectable’s never really been high on my priority list.”

  “Even if I didn’t care about integrity—” she gave the word a sharp emphasis “—I’m not really in the market for that kind of drama.”

  He laughed at that. “Well, you came to the wrong place to hide out from that. We may look charming from the outside, but I expect we rank as high in the drama department as whatever fancy Denver suburb you came from. Or don’t you remember?”

  “I loved growing up here.”

  Her declaration had the edge of forced hometown pride that always drove him nuts. “Good for you. Three cheers for Wander Canyon.” Why was everyone always insisting Wander was so idyllic? It had never struck him that way—just the opposite, most days.