Taming Rafe (8 page)

This time, however, Lolly didn’t bite. In fact, she ignored Egger, pocketing a tip. “Want fries with that sandwich, John?”

Had he ever wanted fries with his Reuben? He frowned at her, trying to read her eyes, but they avoided his.

She took a washcloth and cleanser and went out to clean the booths.

John turned to Egger, raised one brow.

Egger took the bait. “Cute thing with a New York accent came in here. Recognized Bobby Russell’s autographed picture to his sister.” He glanced at Lolly. “I didn’t know ole Bobby had a sister.”

Lolly didn’t even look up as she scrubbed tables.

Yeah, Bobby had a sister all right. A pang went through John at Lolly’s obvious efforts to act as if the information didn’t hit her like a two-by-four. “Who was she?”

“Richard Breckenridge’s niece, I guess.” Egger finished his coffee. “Went up to the Silver Buckle, thinking they was still running the dude ranch.” He laughed, a deep rumble that ended in a cough. “Remember the trouble they had last summer, trying to start a dude ranch? Betcha Nick takes one look at her and sends her packin’.”

John gave him a look. Last summer had been different
circumstances—and Nick had changed a lot since then. He didn’t miss the sharp look Lolly gave Egger at his prophecy.

Then she went back to spraying, washing, cleaning. As though her past hadn’t come knocking on the door today and shaken her world.

How John longed to get up, take the cleanser from her hands, and wrap his arms around her. To tell her that everything was going to be okay. That her demons weren’t so huge that they couldn’t be tamed by the right force in her life.

But he didn’t. Instead he sat there and watched the woman he loved carry her burdens alone, hating himself for not being able to say the words he could so easily type on the page.

Lolly reached into a booth and came out with a book. “I can’t believe Libby. She was glued to this thing for three days, then leaves it here.” She tossed the book onto the counter, where it landed next to John. He saw the cover, well-worn, and hid a smile. At least
someone
was reading
Unshackled
.

He picked it up, flipping it open, enjoying reading the words instead of anyalzing them.

Mary stood at her daughter’s bedroom window, watching the sky darken, wishing it would finally rain. Storms like these scared her the most. Not because of the dust that would pile up against the house and coat her clothes, her skin, the inside of her ears and nose, but because they frightened Rosie. And then she would cry.

Mary picked up her two-year-old and wrapped Rosie’s legs around her waist, holding her head against her body, wishing
she had more padding on her to soften the curves. Wishing that, when her daughter held tight, it didn’t make Mary bite her lip to hold back the cry of pain. Apparently her ribs hadn’t yet healed.

Thunder pealed across the sky, and Rosie trembled.

“Shh.” Mary rocked the child, smoothing her coarse hair.
Please let Matthias be so soundly drunk that he won’t hear the floorboards creaking above him
.
She’d left him where he lay on the sofa, thankful he’d fallen there last night and not in their bed.

Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to cry. She’d cried enough for three lifetimes. And tears wouldn’t water the land, feed their cattle, or bring Charlie back. She didn’t have time for grief, with the cooking and cleaning and farm chores. She stayed busy by choice. It kept her out of the house.

Sometimes, more and more often, it brought her into conversation with Jonas. Yesterday he’d helped her mound the potatoes in her garden. He sang as he worked, usually hymns, sometimes songs of his own making, and as usual, his voice soothed the wounds inside her.

For all the years I thought I was worth nothin’,

For all the times that I gave up on me,

For all the fears I hid that kept me from believing it could be,

Could I be worth the love that sets me free?

Sometimes just humming those words filled her with hope that she shouldn’t give up. That someday she, too, might be free.

She had no doubts Jonas had heard the shouting last night, had seen the fresh bruises on her arms, her chin. She’d long ago stopped trying to hide them. He’d become her protector of sorts, helping her with chores, and twice, running out to the field, alerting her that Matthias was on his way home. More than once, he’d even knocked on the door, hat in hand, intercepting Matthias’s savage mood.

Unfortunately, Jonas wasn’t always around. Legally, she was Matthias’s wife, and according to Wyoming law, Jonas couldn’t interfere. Besides, with people starving all over the country, who cared if a man took out his frustrations on his wife? Certainly not Sheriff Denny, in whom she’d confided. She’d spent two days in bed after he’d told Matthias her accusations.

Jonas had fed her, and when he thought she wasn’t looking, she’d seen anger cross his face. When Matthias went to town, Jonas silently rewrapped her bruised ribs, his eyes red-rimmed.

Jonas was in a prison of his own. Matthias carried the title on the land owned by Jonas’s family—his parents and his six brothers and sisters. She often saw him standing in the barn entrance, staring at the house, fists clenched.

Perhaps that was why she found an easy, healing friendship in him. They both understood being trapped.

Lightning flickered, and right behind it came another peal of thunder.

Rosie shrieked, and Mary shushed her, singing softly. “Hush, little baby . . .”

“Make her shut up,” Matthias bellowed from downstairs.

Mary stiffened. Thus far, he’d never harmed Rosie, but that didn’t stop the toddler from shaking. “Shh,” Mary said, trying to stave fear from her voice.

The lightning flashed again, and in that split second, she saw a silhouette in the doorway of the barn.
Jonas
.

Rosie’s crying heightened.

“Shh, baby, shh,” Mary said, moving in time with her hums.

Heavy footsteps thumped up the stairs. The door banged open. “I told you to shut her up!”

Mary refused to turn, even as she felt him lunge toward her. She kept her eyes on the silhouette until the last moment.

John closed the book, remembering the ache inside when he’d written that scene, hating the fact that he’d bound Jonas’s hands. He’d purposely made Jonas watch while the woman he loved suffered, knowing he couldn’t do anything about it because sometimes life worked out that way. He often wondered if the hands at the Big K had ever felt like that, watching John Senior go after his kids.

“Seems as if the entire town is reading that book.” Lolly took Egger’s plate away.

He tossed a couple of dollars on the counter.

“Maybe you should read it.” John pushed the book toward her.

Lolly rang in the bill, slipped the cash into the drawer. “No. I don’t believe in fairy tales.”

As if her own words jarred her, she stilled and looked up at him. In that beat of time, something passed between them. A sadness or just the sense of inevitability.

Whatever it was, John knew he had his answer to the question
he couldn’t ask. “Right,” he said softly. Of course she wouldn’t believe.

He was getting up to leave when the doorbell jangled. In the doorway stood the shapely brunette Egger had described. But John—probably
only
John—saw so much more.

He saw Bobby, courage in his eyes as he faced down his bull, and Felicia, poised, beautiful, and full of hope. Most of all, he saw Lolly, her pride wounded and desperation lining her face as she stood in a dusty street.

And just as he’d done then, he came over to the brunette and tipped his hat. “Ma’am, is there anything I can do to assist you?”

CHAPTER 5

“S
WEET THING!
H
E
actually called me sweet thing! Rafe Noble is the most bullheaded, insufferable, arrogant guy I’ve ever met. If he thinks he’s getting away with his lies, he’s got another think coming.” Katherine sat at the diner counter, stabbing at a chocolate malt with her straw and wishing she’d been able to string enough words together to tell Rafe what she thought of him to his face. Apparently she could only resurrect Wild Kat over the telephone. Or a chocolate malt.

It didn’t help that he had blindsided her with his expression of defeat. Maybe he really didn’t have any money. If his sister hadn’t shown up and practically begged Katherine to return, she might have believed him. Stefanie obviously had a reason for wanting her to stay. All Katherine knew was that winning the bull-riding championship came with cash—lots of it. He was just trying to play her.

“What lies?” Lolly asked.

Katherine had discovered the diner owner’s name shortly after sliding onto the stool in a puddle of despair. When Lolly asked her
name, she’d debated a moment, then decided on Kat, liking the spunk she attributed to the nickname.

Now, reading Lolly’s response, she realized she’d dissed the local hero. If Rafe Noble thought he could scare her away, he hadn’t seen the daughter of Bobby Russell. Mr. Noble’s surly demeanor wouldn’t spook her. “Nothing . . .”

“So, how did he look? His sister said the accident roughed him up good,” Lolly said, nursing her own malt.

“He’s in a neck brace and a cast, stitches over his eye,” Kat said. She didn’t mention the tumble he’d taken on the porch. “He looks like he’s been run over by a buffalo.”

But it didn’t diminish his overall stun power. If Kat were hunting for the quintessential cowboy, with a lazy smile, heavy-duty arms, and a physique that could wrestle cattle, she had to look no farther than Rafe Noble. Under different circumstances—say a cover shot and some airbrushing away of his snarls—the man could steal her breath. As it was, when she’d met him, her heart had gone galloping off into those green, wildflower-scattered hills, scared silly.

Until he’d called her sweet thing and offered to sign something. Like what? Her hand? She had a gut feeling that Noble’d had his share of interesting signings over the years.

“He won’t be getting on a bull anytime soon,” said the man next to Kat.

Kat glanced at John. He looked about forty and had warm brown eyes and short brown hair. He leaned on the counter, his jaw propped on one of his wide hands, suddenly looking very interested in her adventure at the Silver Buckle Ranch.

“I don’t know why not. Seems to me that Rafe Noble needs
somewhere to put all that nastiness.” Kat took the straw out of her glass and licked the ice cream from it.

“Sounds like you’ve joined the victims—there’s a club, I think, of women scarred by Noble men.” Lolly sipped her malt. “Especially Rafe. He’s been in the bull-riding circuit since he was about eighteen, collecting fans and trophies, in that order. Rafe was born with a mile-wide streak of trouble running through him. I think they retired his detention chair at the school, and for years he was the sole street cleaner in Phillips. I still remember him on those hot summer days in his yellow vest, picking up trash for community service.” She grinned and glanced at John, who nodded.

Lolly’s smile faded. “After his mother died and Nick left, Rafe sort of ran wild. Didn’t your dad hire him on for a while, John?”

“He worked for Maggy’s dad—our trail boss—breaking horses. I remember Maggy saying that he didn’t seem to have a lick of fear in him. Which can be a dangerous thing for a teenager, even worse for a man who rides bulls.”

As they talked, Kat envisioned Rafe younger, with dark, shoulder-length hair, recklessness in his eyes.

She remembered reviewing an application for a grant to help fund an after-school program for at-risk kids. One of their case studies reminded her of Rafe. Yet hidden inside all that anger, defiance, and pain had lurked great potential because that kid—with the help of the program, encouragement, and hope—had gone on to graduate from high school and was currently in the military, serving as a medic. Helping people, just like Rafe could.

There she went again, seeing life’s best possibilities instead of reality. But wasn’t that why she’d trekked out here? Because Rafe had potential?

Please, Lord, let him have potential.

“I met his sister—she seems real nice,” Kat said quietly. “Why did Rafe turn out so . . . ?”

“Rafe isn’t as bad as he seems.” John ran his fingers along the brim of his hat lying on the counter. “He used to volunteer as a teacher for the junior rodeos when he was in high school—got a real way with kids. And he did some charity work at a youth center with his winnings. I think he’s just licking his wounds. He nearly got killed last fall at the bull-riding world championships.”

She knew it—Rafe
did
have a soft side. John’s words settled into Kat’s thoughts. She’d always had her world handed to her on a platter. Even now, she lived a perfect life—well, mostly. But what must it feel like to have your dreams slip out like sand between your fingers? No wonder he looked so broken.

“My unsolicited advice to you,” Lolly said, “is stay away from Rafe Noble. If you haven’t figured it out by now, cowboys are a passel of trouble.”

“Hey, now,” John said. “Be nice.”

“Okay,
some
cowboys are real gentlemen.” Lolly glanced at John, and something friendly, even sweet, passed between them. “But Rafe is a special kind of trouble. Anyone who looks a bull in the eye and dares him to buck him off is going to ride right over you without a look backward.”

Yeah, Kat had met
that
Rafe. As she left the Silver Buckle, everything inside her had wanted to keep driving and forget the idea that she could talk Rafe into anything. Especially after her brief stop at her uncle’s ranch—the Breckenridge Double B. That hadn’t exactly perked her spirits. She’d nearly beelined out of town. As she drove
by Lolly’s Diner though, she’d felt the strangest urge—maybe even a divine urge—to stop. Go in.

It seemed as natural as breathing to sit here on the barstool, pouring her heart out to the owner. “If you two can keep a secret . . . I’m here because I need Rafe’s help. He destroyed something I was working hard on, and I need him to own up to it. Or at least help me figure out what to do next.” She dug into her purse and set the ad for the Silver Buckle dude ranch on the table. “I have this idea . . . but I have to talk Rafe into it. I have to get him to trust me, to see that I really want to help both of us. And then convince him my idea will work.”

“How are you going to do that?”

Kat smoothed out the wrinkled advertisement. “Not exactly sure. I guess . . . I’m going to wait for the right moment, let him see I’m sincere.” She shook her head. What would her mother have done? Probably flashed him a smile, and he would have asked how many zeros to add. Kat didn’t have a clue how to emulate that. “Thankfully, Stefanie is on my side, although I don’t know why. Rafe wanted to call the cops, but Stefanie invited me back to the ranch tomorrow.”

“Oh, Kat, I don’t think it’s a good idea to hang out with Rafe. He’s not in a good way right now,” Lolly said.

“Listen,” Kat said, speaking to herself as much as to Lolly, “I need to do this. You don’t understand, but it’s my last shot.”

Lolly looked down at her malt, stirring it. Kat had noticed that despite her age—she put her in her early forties—she had a youthfulness about her. A tease around her eyes and a sparkle in her smile. She liked Lolly, and her easy friendship seemed exactly what Kat needed, especially after her conversation at the Breckenridge ranch.

“But I have a bigger problem than Rafe Noble at the moment. I went to Uncle Richard’s ranch today—”

“And he’s in London.” Lolly made a face. “I forgot earlier. Sorry, honey. He goes to London every June.”

Kat nodded. “So, do you have any hotels in town?”

Lolly looked at John, who gave a small shrug.

“Nope,” she said.

Kat winced. “I guess I can sleep in my Jeep.”

“You’re not sleeping in your Jeep—,” John started.

“Maybe it’s not meant to be,” Kat said.

Lolly looked down, stirring her malt again. “Don’t you have someone waiting at home for you? A . . . boyfriend, maybe?”

Kat’s entire body tensed. She fished around for something that didn’t sound like a lie. “Let’s just say I’m here on business. And I can’t go home until it’s finished. Maybe I can go back to the Breckenridge ranch and—”

“You’re staying with me.” Lolly put a hand on Kat’s arm.

Kat couldn’t hide the relief that poured through her. “I’ll pay you—”

“No, you won’t. It’ll be my pleasure.” Something glistened in Lolly’s eyes, something sweet and kind. It made the knot inside Kat’s chest ease.

“I promise I won’t be any trouble.”

“Of course not. My place isn’t very big, but I do have an extra room. I just need to change the sheets, fluff a pillow or two.”

Kat noticed John staring at Lolly, his expression unreadable.

“Thank you, Lolly.” She finished her malt, then picked up the ad. She opened her purse to tuck it inside and saw the picture of her and her father. A five-year-old’s innocent happiness.

She took the picture out of her purse and ran her thumb over it. “Um . . . this may sound like a strange question, but you don’t happen to know Laura Russell, do you? I see Bobby Russell autographed his photo to her.” She nodded to the picture behind Lolly’s counter. “If my aunt is still around, I want to find her.”

Lolly picked up Katherine’s empty glass and wiped the condensation from the counter.

“I know just about everyone in the county,” John said slowly. “I’m not sure Laura Russell lives around here anymore.” He put his hand on Lolly’s arm. “Do you know, Lol?”

Lolly glanced at him. “No. No, she’s not around here anymore.”

Kat’s hopes dipped. “My mother never talked much about my father,” she said, deciding that she’d already told them about her present—why not her past? “But I always had a curiosity about how they ended up together and how he really died, beyond the reports in his obituary. I was really hoping my aunt Laura could fill me in.”

Silence passed between them. Lolly finished her malt.

John fiddled with his hat. Then he said quietly, “I knew your father. He was my best friend.”

The last time Rafe had eaten dinner in the Noble dining room, pine wreaths festooned the stained log walls and ivy wound through the wrought-iron chandelier. His mother, still alive but in her last season, had managed to pull together a roast with all the trimmings, homemade rolls, and red velvet Christmas cake.

The Noble family—whether purposely or unconsciously, he wasn’t sure—avoided this room after Elizabeth Noble’s death. His
father certainly couldn’t cook, and after Nick left home, they hadn’t had much reason to celebrate. Stefanie took over running the ranch with Bishop, and Rafe ran away to join the rodeo circuit.

“Rafe, you’re at this end, Nick at the other,” Piper said as she carried in the roast and put it in the center of the table. Behind her, Maggy St. John and her eleven-year-old son, CJ, came in with fresh green beans and rolls. Rafe had known Maggy from the days when she’d been Nick’s girlfriend. Sometimes it felt strange to see her married to Nick’s best friend and co-owner of the Silver Buckle Ranch.

The smells had the power to make Rafe’s stomach turn to knots. Or perhaps the twist inside came from the residual adrenaline from his fight with Katherine Breckenridge. He couldn’t believe she’d actually followed him to his hometown of Phillips. How had she even known where to find him?

“It’s Katherine Breckenridge from the hotel,” he’d said to Stefanie. His voice was probably still echoing off the far hills. “She’s here to ask for my money. Which I don’t have because . . . I’m broke.” Despite his tone, he had felt a little guilty when Katherine flinched.

“I just want to talk to him,” Katherine had said.

Even though Rafe had stood there, barely balancing on his broken knee, in his neck brace, smarting from his recent fall—right at Katherine’s feet—Stefanie merely nodded and invited the woman back for another go-round the next morning. If he could have, he would have thrown something. Anything to wipe that smug little smile off Katherine’s face.