The Cowboy's Little Surprise (3 page)

She hadn’t had the money to rent a truck for the move, either, and wouldn’t let him get one, though he’d told her he could easily afford to pick up the tab.

In the years he’d been gone from Cowboy Creek, he had worked as a wrangler on one ranch after another.

On the run
, Jed had said.

He’d rather think of it as staying open to possibilities.

In any case, he had never tied himself to anything permanent, never owned a home or even paid rent or electricity, and he had always traveled light enough to fit all his belongings into a couple of duffel bags. No sense buying things that would only weigh him down. Cheap, some folks might say, but again he preferred to look at things his way and call it being frugal.

That frugality had paid off. So had his time on the rodeo circuit. He now had a good-sized nest egg he’d been sitting on, thinking of investing.

As he’d said to Layne, what better investment could he come up with than spending some of it on his sister and her son?

He knew the answer to that question, all right. So did Layne. He would do anything for the little sister he’d raised practically single-handed.

In the years he had been gone from Cowboy Creek, he made sure to send money when she asked to borrow it, and even when she hadn’t.

Deep down, he knew money could never make up for not being here for her the last few years. True, he hadn’t known how bad things were between her and Terry until the end. But maybe if he’d stayed, he could have helped her out more. Been there to keep an eye on her son once in a while, so she and her now-second ex could have had some time together. Maybe that would have saved the relationship—not that he’d believed it had ever really had a chance. Neither he nor Layne knew what a good marriage looked like.

But if nothing else, helping her back then might have him feeling less like a stranger with his own sister’s child now.

In the long run, his offer to get the truck for her move had done no good.

You’re taking care of enough already,
Layne had said.

So he had loaded his pickup and made one trip after another between her former two-story house and this so-called two-bedroom apartment.

He thought of the trip he’d made out to Garland Ranch that afternoon.

Though he and Tina had been a couple of grades ahead of Layne in school, the two knew each other. Suddenly, he felt the urge to tell Layne about running into Tina again. About what a jerk he’d been to her in high school and about how that could come back to bite him. About how he wished he’d done some things...maybe a whole lot of things...in his life differently.

But he’d never dropped his problems on his sister before and sure wouldn’t start now. Not when she had enough troubles of her own.

She turned from the closet. “I talked to Sugar about giving me more time at the shop and maybe even letting me back her up when she needs help in the bakery.”

“Do you really need to take on more hours, especially when it means being on your feet, in your condition? If that bast—”

“
Don’t.
Please.” She shot a glance toward the door. “I don’t want to talk about Terry around Scott. And I can’t blame Terry. If he were Scott’s father, things might be different, but I can’t expect the man to give me extra support for a child that’s not his.”

“Is he still planning to see Scott?”

“He said he would.” But she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

Damn.
A man didn’t just walk away from a child he’d raised, even if that child wasn’t his own.

But he didn’t push the issue. This was the first time he and Layne had discussed the subject, and he realized the wisdom of keeping the rest of his feelings about it to himself. For now.

“What about financial support for the baby?” he asked.

She touched her stomach, not much rounder than it had been the last time he’d seen her.

Late December. She had just discovered she was pregnant and hadn’t wanted to be home for the holidays. They had met halfway between Cowboy Creek and the Texas ranch he was working.

For the first time since he’d left town, they had spent Christmas together. They ate dinner in a nearly empty diner decorated with limp tinsel and faded ornaments. But the waitress wore a pin with a reindeer whose nose flashed like a small red strobe light and had made Scott laugh.

Layne, expecting a baby but already on the road to divorce, had done her best to smile.

The effort it took told him he needed to come back to Cowboy Creek.

Layne shifted one of the boxes he’d set on the bed. “My lawyer’s making sure Terry’s keeping up with the insurance payments to cover the hospital.”

“He’d damned well better keep up. You have any problems, you let me know and I’ll talk to him.”

“Always the protective big brother,” she murmured, her eyes misting. She sat beside him and rested her head against his shoulder. “I really appreciate everything you’re doing, Cole. Coming back to town. Helping with the move. Even giving me a hand with the unpacking.” She sat back and looked up at him. “I couldn’t have done all this without you.”

“I’m not begrudging any of it, you know that. But you also have to know you’re not alone here. You heard what Sugar told you the other day. You’ve got friends in town, plenty of friends who would help out.”

“Yes, I do.” She gave him a crooked smile. “Maybe I should have said what I was really thinking. I didn’t
want
to do this without you.”

To his dismay, her voice broke. “Layne...”

“Let me go check on Scott.” She hurried from the room.

Earlier, after giving her son strict instructions to stay on the floor with his trains, she had settled him in the living room. With boxes piled throughout the apartment, it wasn’t safe to let him run loose.

Cole looked at the boxes piled around him in the small bedroom and had a sudden urge to run loose himself. Or just to run. Maybe Jed hadn’t been wrong, at that.

He felt the need to get the hell out of Cowboy Creek again. Coming back here had dredged up too many bad memories, too many thoughts of how helpless he’d been to protect Layne against their mama’s indifference and their dad’s vicious tongue.

Too many reminders of the boy he’d once been.

On the other hand, his return to help Layne through a bad time had brought with it an unexpected advantage. Taking a job at Garland Ranch again would go a long way toward proving he had changed.

His talk with Tina should have done the same, but her acceptance of his apology had rung about as true as a forced smile at a sad Christmas dinner.

He’d have to try harder to convince her they could put their past behind them.

Chapter Three

“What do you think, Paz?” Jed asked.

At the table in the hotel kitchen after breakfast, he sat finishing up his coffee. Paz stood at the counter where she was making one of her fancy desserts for tonight’s supper. With Tina and Robbie at the breakfast table, they hadn’t had a moment to themselves till now.

She cracked an egg into the ceramic bowl in front of her. “I think,” she said, “by asking Cole to return to work here, you have stirred up more than the sugar in your coffee.”

Frowning, he looked at her. She had sounded tart and a few worry lines creased her forehead, but she gave him a faint smile.

He grinned back. “I
have
set some things in motion, haven’t I? For step one, anyhow.”

“Do you think everything will go as you want it to?”

“Of course. All according to plan. And once the other girls are here, we’ll move on to step two.”

She cracked another egg into the bowl and added a spoonful of vanilla. “Sugar called me this morning. Tina and Ally were at the shop last night.”

“To see Layne?”

“Yes. And asking about Cole.”

He chuckled. “What did I tell you? Nothing to worry about. Everything’s falling into place.” At the sound of light, familiar footsteps in the hallway, he added, “Hush. Here comes the girl now.” He got up to rinse his mug at the sink.

Tina entered the room and set a tray of dishes on the counter beside him. “Thank goodness for the Women’s Society and their monthly breakfast! Maria’s just clearing the last couple of tables. I’ll take care of loading the dishwasher for you, Abuela. I’ll take that, too.” She plucked the rinsed mug from Jed’s hand. “And then I’ve got to get to my office.”

“Already?” he asked.

“Yes, unfortunately. And I know the next part by heart, Abuelo.” She laughed. “‘You can’t work all day, every day.’”

“Well, it’s true. You need to relax once in a while, girl. Have some fun. You work too hard.”

“Somebody has to, while you brush up on being lord of the manor. You’ll want to make a good impression on Andi and Jane when they get here.”

“Oh, I’ll make an impression on them, all right. One of these days, I might even make you sit up and take notice, too.” Smiling, he left the room.

* * *

I
N
HER
OFFICE
behind the hotel registration desk, Tina entered items into the accounting software. Working with finances normally grabbed her attention, but for the past couple of days, she’d had trouble concentrating.

Again, her thoughts flew to the cause of her distraction—her brief reunion with the man who had fathered her child.

Cole had broken her heart years ago. That was nobody’s fault but her own. She was over that—and over him.

Still, his return had resurrected the old memories.

She had gotten close to him, yet he had walked away from her without looking back.

Apology or no apology, if she let him get close to Robbie, how could she believe he wouldn’t walk away from their son?

She pushed the thoughts of Cole from her thoughts and envisioned her little family—Robbie, Abuela and Jed. For their sakes she needed to focus on her work. On what was important to her. And that definitely didn’t include Cole.

She forced her attention back to the computer screen.

Though she made sure to double-check each entry, the numbers didn’t look good. Not because she hadn’t totaled them correctly, but because they didn’t add up to enough.

She had just finished her entries when she heard the familiar sound of Jed’s boots on the stairs. His steps grew louder as he approached the front desk in the hotel lobby.

“Tina, you in there?”

“Yes,” she called. “Give me a second.” She hurried to back up her file and close the program.

In the kitchen that morning, Jed had seemed more like his old self. But that couldn’t make her forget the past few weeks, when every time she’d tried to talk to him about her concerns, he’d brushed her off. Maybe now, he finally wanted to discuss what he had on his mind.

The office doorway led right to the lobby’s registration desk. There, Jed stood with his crossed arms on the counter and one boot planted on the brass foot rail. Tall and thin, he had neatly combed his sparse white hair and wore his usual boots, jeans and Western shirt with a string tie.

Though she often lovingly teased him about being lord of the manor, as she had done in the kitchen a while earlier, there was some truth behind her words. He now left the day-to-day working of the ranch to his manager, Pete, and his cowhands, but Jed kept tabs on everything. And he always took care to project just the right image for a man who owned both a ranch and a hotel.

“Hey, my handsome
abuelo,
” she said. “What’s up?”

“Not much. Just checking to see if you were in there. And where’s that little guy of ours?”

Her throat tightened at the thought of her son. How would she explain her years of silence about his daddy to Abuela and Jed? She swallowed hard and forced a smile. “He’s in the kitchen with Abuela.”

“You and Paz get all the shopping done this morning?”

“We did. She had quite a list.” Unlike their trip earlier in the week.

“We’ll use everything she bought. Things are gonna be a mite busier around here soon.”

“You mean with Jane and Andi coming to visit?”

“That. And more.” His grin made her heart fill with love—and additional concern. The low number of reservations continued to bother her. For years now, they hadn’t opened the small wedding chapel on the property or even catered a reception. They would manage, especially with the bookings she had taken for later this week and the next. But they had nothing on tap for the next few months to justify Jed’s level of excitement.

“Did you book a large group while we were gone?” she asked.

“Nope.”

“Did half of Cowboy Creek call to reserve tables for dinner?”

He shook his head.

“Then, what? Come on, tell me.”

“It’s a surprise.”

“Oh, really? And is this surprise the reason you’ve been so quiet lately?”

“Might be.” He winked. “No more questions. You’ll see soon enough. And I’m off to see your gran.”

Relieved to have him acting like himself again, she returned to her office with a smile.

Before she could take her seat, she heard a discreet buzz, the signal Jed had set up in the hotel’s office and kitchen to announce the opening of the front door. Again, she went out to the registration desk. This time, she froze behind it.

Cole Slater stood in the entryway, looking back at her.

His nephew, Scott, gave a little cry. He had seen the collection of horse figurines in the sitting room off the lobby. As if he visited the Hitching Post on a regular basis, the boy headed right toward the next room. She watched him go.

Better to focus on Scott than to stare at the man standing across the room from her. But even that didn’t help, when she knew the little boy she watched was just a few months younger than her own son.

“Looks like he made himself at home,” Cole said. He glanced around. “As I told Jed, this place never changes.”

“Like some people I know.” A pile of brochures sat on one side of the desk, the paper edges neatly aligned. She reached out to straighten them, anyhow.

“I wouldn’t make snap judgments,” he said.

“I don’t. As you might remember from school, I’m the one who analyzes everything.”

“Yeah, I do recall that.”

When he approached the counter, she hid her dismay behind a frozen smile. Any second now, Robbie might come down the hall.

The minute she had seen Cole in the lobby, she had thought of what Jed had said. Her
abuelo
had been on edge for weeks, but Cole’s arrival couldn’t be the surprise he had referred to.

She couldn’t forget what Cole had told her the other day. Jed had invited him to the ranch and then hired him again. It was odd Jed hadn’t said a word about that to her beforehand. As the bookkeeper, she should have been told about a new hire. Maybe he had intended to spring Cole’s return on her, after all.

Unfortunately, his secret would pale by comparison once he learned about hers.

She couldn’t let the impending disaster make her forget her obligations—no matter how eagerly she wanted to run to the kitchen, grab Robbie and head for the hills. She took a deep breath and said, “Welcome back to the Hitching Post.”

“Thanks. Are you managing the place now?”

“I’m the assistant manager. And bookkeeper for both the Hitching Post and the ranch.”

“Bookkeeper, huh? That fits. You always were good at math.”

“What can we do for you? I know you can’t be looking for a room.”

“Why not?”

Her fingers tightened, crumpling the long-forgotten brochure she still held. “You’re staying with Layne at her new apartment, aren’t you?”

“How did you know that?”

“It’s a small town.”

“Yeah.” For a moment, he looked irritated. “And speaking of small, that describes Layne’s couch. Now you mention it, the idea of taking a room here doesn’t sound bad at all. It would get me off the hook for minding Scott, too.” He laughed and shook his head. “And before you take me too seriously, I’m just kidding about that. But let me tell you, babysitting is not the gig for me. When I swore off marriage and kids, I should have added extended family to the list.”

The statement hit her like a fist to the chest. “You don’t mean that. And you wouldn’t say it if you’d never had a sister or brother.”
Or if you already had a child.

Would learning about Robbie make any difference?

“In any case,” he said, “I’m not looking for a room. Jed wanted me to stop by to fill out some forms.”

“Why? New hires usually do that on their first day of work.”

He shrugged. “Beats me. He wanted me to come by. Since I had some time as well as the kid on my hands, I thought I’d take care of it today. Is that a problem?”

“Not at all.” With the rate of turnover of temporary wranglers, she always kept a blank set of employment forms on a clipboard in Jed’s credenza.

“You know where Jed is?”

“In his den.”

“I’ll just head down there, then. Keep an eye on Scott for me, will you?”

She nodded, willing to do anything to get some space from him.

Leaving the crumpled brochure on the desk, she crossed to the sitting room and smiled at Scott. He ducked his head shyly.

Sighing, she watched him play with Robbie’s favorite toys.

And she thought about Robbie’s daddy.

No matter how she felt about Cole, she had to tell him the truth. What he did once he heard the news would be up to him. She had no doubts about what she had to do. Her job was to protect Robbie.

She also had to tell Abuela and Jed. They loved her son, had helped her raise him from the moment he was born. She owed them so much, and she wanted them to hear the news first.

* * *

B
Y
THE
TIME
Cole returned to the lobby, Tina stood behind the registration desk again, waiting. “All done?” she asked.

“Yep.”

“Good. Now you’ve taken care of your business with Jed, I’m sure you’ll want to head back to town. It’s getting late, and Scott’s hungry. He said you’re all going out to dinner tonight.”

“That’s right.”

“Scott,” she called. “Your uncle’s ready to go.” Turning to Cole again, she added, “I’ve got to go help Abuela in the kitchen.”

Almost sighing with relief, she began to move from behind the desk. The sound of sneakers slapping on the hallway floor froze her in place again.

“Mama?” Robbie entered the lobby and ran up to the desk. “I didn’t know where you was.
Hey!
” His blue eyes widened. He pointed across the reception area at Scott, who now stood in the doorway of the sitting room cradling a toy Appaloosa. “That’s
mine.
”

She couldn’t manage to force a word past her tight throat.

“It’s okay,” Cole said, sounding as though he had trouble speaking, too. “He’s not doing your horse any harm.”

She kept her gaze fastened on her son. Robbie stared up at Cole, then looked toward her. After a deep breath, she said quickly, “That’s right, Robbie. Scott’s just playing with the horse, the way all the kids who come here do.”

“He’s ’sposed to keep the ponies in
there.
” He pointed toward the sitting room. “That’s the rules.”

“He doesn’t know that,” Cole said. “Why don’t you and Scott go in there with the horses? You can explain the rules to him...while your mama explains a few things to me.”

“Okay.” Robbie headed toward the younger boy.

Tina reached for the crumpled brochure and began smoothing it on the desktop. She could feel Cole’s angry gaze on her, could feel the rush of her own anger and confusion spreading through her. Again, she fought an overwhelming desire to hurry over to Robbie, grab him by the hand and flee the hotel.

Running wasn’t the answer—not that she would choose that way out, anyhow. Neither was this light-headed, weak-kneed, schoolgirl-with-a-crush reaction. She squared her shoulders. If the time had come to tell Cole the truth, to make the explanations she’d spent five long years dreading, she’d stand straight and tall and look him in the eye.

And if it came down to a battle between them, she would give him the fight of her life—and Robbie’s.

For what seemed like forever, Cole stood staring at the boys in the sitting room.

Then he turned back to the desk, placed his palms flat on its surface and glared at her. “When were you planning on telling me?”

“About what?”

“About you-damned-well-know what.” To his credit, he kept his voice low and even. Unfortunately, he also leaned in closer, probably to make sure she wouldn’t miss a single word. “You didn’t think I’d take one look at that kid and make the connection?”

“
That kid
is my son,” she snapped.

“Mine, too, judging by the looks of him. He’s about a year older than Scott, isn’t he? Which means he’s four.”

The accuracy of his guess made her flinch.

“I knew it.” Though he gave her a smug smile, his face had paled. “You might’ve always been the math whiz in school, Tina, but I can danged sure add—”