Cassidy Harte and the Comeback Kid (6 page)

She was more than a little annoyed with herself for finding the conversation so awkward and for the low, subtle tension that always seemed to draw her shoulders back whenever she talked to Wade.

He was a very nice man. Considerate, decent, hardworking. The very antithesis of Zack Slater.

He had made it clear several months earlier that he wanted more from their casual relationship, and she was furious with herself that she couldn't manage to drum up more feelings than friendship for him, no matter how hard she tried.

Wade would be perfect for her. They shared common interests, common background, common goals in life. He was good-looking and even owned his own very successful guest ranch just a mile or so from the Lost Creek.

If she married him, she could have his entire modern kitchen at her disposal. Could probably have free rein doing what she loved for the rest of her life.

But the no-good-cowboy-who-done-her-wrong cur
rently standing behind her, listening to every word, had left a gaping hole in her heart that no one else had ever been able to fill.

Wade began to wind down, and she forced herself to pay attention as he reached what she discovered was the real reason for his call. “One of the repertory companies in Jackson Hole is doing a production of
Shenandoah.
It's getting fairly good reviews for a small theater, and I've got tickets for Sunday night. Would you be interested?”

His voice was tinged with a faint hesitation that only intensified her self-disgust. These days Wade offered each invitation with the wariness of a child whose fingers had been slapped one too many times, but who still couldn't help hoping this time he might be able to reach the cookie jar.

What was worse? she wondered. Continuing to turn down his tenaciousness in the hope that he would eventually give up? Or dating him when she knew she would never be able to feel anything more than friendship for him?

She opened her mouth to decline once more, then she caught sight of Zack leaning against the door frame, looking lean and tawny and gorgeous. The heartless, cheating son of a gun.

She jerked her gaze back to her desk and winced as she heard her next words tumble out. “Sure,” she told Wade. “Sounds like fun.”

An awkward pause simmered across the line and she knew he was taken aback that she had agreed but he quickly recovered. “Great. Show starts at eight. I'll pick you up at six and we can have dinner first. Will that work?”

“Yes. Oh, no. Wait a minute.” Her Sunday com
mitments jostled through her memory. “I'll be having dinner at the Diamond Harte on Sunday with my brothers. We always do.”

“Oh.” The disappointment in his voice was painful to hear.

She caught sight of Zack again and swallowed her resigned sigh, trying to inject enthusiasm in her voice. “We can eat early and finish up by six-thirty. Why don't we skip dinner together and just go to the show? You can pick me up at the ranch.”

The polite thing would be to invite him to dinner with her family but she didn't want anybody—especially not Wade—getting the wrong idea.

“That would be great. I'll spend the rest of the week looking forward to it.”

“Me, too,” she lied. “I'll see you then.”

As soon as she hung up the phone, Zack uncoiled from the wall to loom over her. “Big plans?”

“A show in Jackson.” She busied herself pretending to tidy up her desk, just to give her hands something to do.

Zack was quiet for a moment, then his mouth tightened. “I don't want you going anywhere with Lowry. Call him back and tell him to forget your plans.”

It took several moments for the sheer audacity of his words to pierce her brain. When it did, she could do nothing but stare at him. “Excuse me?” she finally managed to exclaim.

“He's trouble. Stay away from him.”

“Trouble? You're warning me that
Wade Lowry
is trouble?” She didn't know whether to laugh or scream. She thought she had been as angry as she'd ever been that morning in the kitchen, but when it came to Slater she was discovering all her emotions were on a short
fuse, just looking for any excuse to come brimming to the surface.

“I'm serious, Cass. I don't want you going out with him.”

“And I don't want to be the topic of dinner conversation at every house in Star Valley tonight because you showed up again,” she snapped. “Here's a little life truth for you, Slater. One I learned the hard way. We don't always get what we want.”

A muscle in his jaw flexed. “What would you think if I told you Lowry is one of the reasons I left town?”

She eyed him skeptically. “If I believed you—which I absolutely don't—I would probably think I should just run over to the Rendezvous right this minute and give Wade a big, sloppy, wet kiss for doing me the biggest favor of my life.”

His face went completely still, and she thought she saw a glimmer of hurt in his gold-green eyes. For one terrible moment she had to fight the urge to apologize to him. As if she had anything to be sorry about in this whole awful mess!

“Stay away from him,” Zack finally growled. “I don't trust the man. You shouldn't, either.”

He turned on his heels and walked out of her office, taking with him any soft feelings toward him she might have been crazy enough to entertain for even a second.

Furious with the blasted man and with herself for being such an idiot about him, she picked up the paperweight shaped like a chef's hat that Lucy had given her for Christmas. With all the strength and technique Alvin Jeppson had tried to drum into her head through those years of coaching, she threw it as hard as she could at the door frame where Slater had just been leaning.

It bounced off with a loud thud, leaving a big, ugly nick in the wood, then clattered to the floor.

She'd chipped it, she saw when she went to pick it up. Just a little on one side, barely noticeable, but still, tears pricked behind her eyelids. She blinked them back. She refused to cry over a silly little paperweight, even though it had been a gift from her beloved niece.

And, damn it, she wouldn't cry for Zack Slater, either.

 

He had no business here.

In Star Valley, at the Lost Creek, and especially not camped out on the front porch of Cassie's cabin. The porch swing chains rattled as he shifted position, watching moonlight gleam like mother-of-pearl across the gravel pathway leading to the main lodge.

Why wasn't she home? The dining room had closed more than an hour ago and all the guests at the ranch were either taking an evening ride around the lake or playing board games at the main lodge or relaxing in their cabins.

So where was Cassie? If these were the kind of hours she kept, he was going to have to do something about it. It wasn't healthy, physically or mentally, no matter how much she loved her work.

He heard his own thoughts and grimaced at the irony. He was a fine one to talk. He'd spent just about every moment of the past ten years pouring his blood and sweat and soul into Maverick, trying to make it a success.

The magnitude of what he had accomplished still sometimes made him sit back in wonder. The kid of a dirt-poor drunk had no business wheeling and dealing with the big boys.

While he listened to the night seethe and stir around him, he thought of the strange, twisting journey that had begun when he left Salt River a decade earlier. He had wandered aimlessly for a while, then had joined up on the rodeo circuit, looking for a bit of quick cash.

Amazingly enough, right out of the gate he'd won a couple of fairly decent bronc busting purses, fueled more by reckless despair than any real skill on his part. He wasn't aware of any kind of conscious plan at the time, but some instinct had led him to him plow the money into investments that had paid off.

He had turned around and invested those dividends again, then again and again, hitting big on just about everything he turned his hand to. Much to his surprise, he discovered he had an uncanny knack for predicting market trends. Through that knack, a lot of hard work and a few mistakes along the way, he had built Maverick into a huge, highly successful company.

By all rights, he should be deliriously happy. He had just about everything a man could want. Everything he'd ever dreamed about.

Hell, more than that. A decade ago, he hadn't had any dreams. Whenever he pictured the future—something he didn't like to do much back then—he figured he would turn out just like his father, a penniless drifter always looking to see what was over the next hill.

Cassie had given him the rare and precious gift of faith. She had believed in him, had seen potential he'd never even suspected lurked inside him. Even after he left her, he had cherished that gift. Without it, he probably would have lived out that prophesy and become just like his old man.

Yeah, he had just about everything he'd ever wanted.

Except Cassidy Harte.

He gazed out at the moonlight, remembering the silk of her skin and the slick, incredible heat of her mouth under his. Even after a decade, the memory of her enthusiastic, wholehearted response to his touch was still as strong and as vivid as it had been the day he drove out of town with his heart shredding into little pieces.

The way things were going, he had a fairly strong feeling he would never again taste her mouth or feel those small, competent hands caress him. He blew out a breath, cursing again the tangled whims of fate.

Why the hell did Melanie have to leave the same night he did? It would have been hard enough trying to explain everything to Cassie, trying to make things right again, without the onus of trying to explain away the unbelievable coincidence.

Maybe he should give this whole thing up. Just go on back to his life in Denver and get on with things, forget about trying to repair the damage of his decisions.

He fiddled with a loose link on the swing's chains. He didn't want to give up. Not yet. He needed to talk to her, at least. He owed her an explanation that was ten years overdue.

He had tried to tell her earlier in the afternoon. That's why he had gone in search of her after his dismal trip into Murphy's, to set the record straight. He'd gotten a little sidetracked, though, when he had overheard her on the phone with Lowry.

Fierce jealousy hadn't been the only emotion curling through him when he pictured the two of them together. He didn't like the idea that Cassie could ever be mixed up with scum like Lowry.

He sighed and shifted in the swing again. Jealousy hadn't been the only emotion but it had been by far
the strongest. Even though logic told him he had no right to be jealous—absolutely no claim over her—he had about as much control over it as he did that moon up there.

He leaned his head back, watching the path for some sign of her and listening to the chirp of crickets, the tumble of the creek behind the cabins, the far-off whinny of a horse….

He must have dozed off. He wasn't sure how long he slept but he awoke to find her propped against the porch rail watching him, her arms folded across her chest and her face in shadows.

“Hi.” He heard the sheepishness in his voice at being caught in a vulnerable moment and tried to clear it away. “You're late.”

The moon slid from behind a cloud, and he saw her raise an eyebrow. “I didn't realize I had a curfew.”

“You put in long hours. Too long. Is it like this every day?”

“No. Not usually. Claire Dustin, one of the wranglers' wives, usually helps out with breakfast but she's in Bozeman catering her sister's wedding this week.” She paused. “I'm thinking she'll make a good replacement for me. I'll talk to her about it when she gets back Monday. If she's agreeable, I can start training her right away.”

“That eager to be gone, are you?”

She said nothing for several moments, then straightened from the porch railing. “I'm tired, Slater. As you said, it's been a long day. To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I have enough energy left to tangle with you again tonight.”

“I don't want to fight. I just want to talk to you. Explain a few things.”

“I don't think I have the energy for that, either.”

He should just let her go inside and sleep. But he didn't want this ugliness between them any longer. Not if he had any chance of clearing it away. “Please. Sit down.”

She was quiet for a long time watching him across the width of the porch with only the night sounds between them—the cool sigh of the wind, the crickets' chatter, the creek tumbling along behind the trees.

Just when he began to fear she would ignore him and march into her cabin, she blew out a breath and slid onto the swing next to him.

Now that she was there, he didn't know where to begin.

“Gorgeous view from here,” he finally said, which wasn't at all what he wanted to talk to her about. Still, it was the truth. He could see the Salt River Range behind them. Even in mid-June, the mountains still wore snowcaps that gleamed bluish white in the moonlight.

The Lost Creek had a prime location on a foothill bordering national forest land. From here he could see small glowing settlements strung along the Star Valley like Christmas lights.

“I like it,” she finally murmured.

“I would have to say it's almost as nice as the view from the Diamond Harte.”

“Almost. Not quite.”

The pride in her voice for her family ranch made him smile. Although he knew she wouldn't be able to see much in the darkness, he could feel the heat of her gaze on him. What she could see apparently displeased her because her voice was curt when she spoke. “I'm tired, Zack. What did you want to talk about?”

This wasn't the way he wanted to do this, with her already testy and abrupt. But it didn't look as if she was going to give him much of a choice.

“I'm sorry about this afternoon. About Lowry.”

“You should be.”

He winced at the residual anger in her voice. He wasn't sorry for warning her about the bastard, just that he had gone about it the wrong way.