Cowboy in Charge (4 page)

“Better.
Much
better.”

“You didn’t get a lot of sleep.”

“Enough. Believe me, lately, a two-hour stretch is a marathon.” She eyed Jill’s fresh jumper and noted the lumpiness of the diaper beneath it. Jason must have made an effort. Tears rose to her eyes. She blinked them away. “You changed the baby?”

“Me and Jason did,” Scott said. “
De-e-e
. Greenhorn at doing diapers.”

Last night, she had noticed how quickly her ex had gone from
that man
to
Jason
. This phrase was also a new one for her son—and for her. She stared at him, then glanced at Jason. “‘Greenhorn at doing diapers?’” she repeated.

“It’s a guy thing.”

“Right.” She turned back to Scott. “Oh, dear—a dirty diaper?”

“A danged dirty diaper,” Jason said.

Scott laughed till he almost toppled off the chair. She wondered if he had told Jason about their game.

“I don’t imagine you’ll be up for doing a lot yet.”

She stiffened. He couldn’t insist on staying here all day. Or could he? He’d been adamant enough last night. “I’ll be fine. I told you, I’m feeling much better. And a friend of mine is stopping by this morning.” Shay would listen to the phone message she had left and would pick up on the tension in her voice. She wouldn’t let her down.

Not the way Jason had.

He transferred the bacon to a paper-towel-lined platter. “Between being sick and having no one to watch the kids, seems like you’re going to have to miss the wedding,” he said. “Who’s getting married, anyhow?”

“Pete Brannigan.”

“You’re kidding. Thought he’d already gone down that road before we...before.”

“He did. He’s going down that road again.” Just the way she had. Unlike her, Pete had made a much better choice his second time around. “He’s Jed Garland’s ranch manager now, and he’s marrying one of Jed’s granddaughters.”

She touched Jill’s tiny fist. “Pete has two young kids of his own. He and Jane will understand that I can’t make it.” She gave a half laugh. “It’s Jed who will be upset if everyone in town doesn’t show up for the ceremony and the reception afterward. He and his family reopened the banquet room at the Hitching Post. They’ve started holding weddings there again, too. He’s so happy all three of his granddaughters are walking down the aisle right there on Garland Ranch. Well, one already has. Jane will be the second.”

“Too bad they weren’t back in the wedding business when we got married.”

She looked at him in surprise. “We couldn’t have afforded a reception there—or anywhere else, for that matter. We were lucky to have rings and enough left over for me to buy a dress.”
Lucky.
Or so she had thought.

She stared down at the tabletop.

At the time, she had been so in love with Jason, she would have worn ragged jeans and flashed a beer can pop-top for her wedding ring.

Despite everything, she couldn’t regret that ceremony. Her marriage had given her Scott, and she could never wish away her son or her daughter.

Still, she should have known better than to marry her high-school sweetheart. She should have waited till the heat of the moment—the heat of their relationship—had burned itself out, as it had always been bound to do.

Speaking of burning...

She caught the distinct scent of breadcrumbs beginning to char. Rising, she said, “I’d better grab the toast. That old thing’s getting temperamental.” She popped the lever of the toaster and removed the slices to a plate.

This far from the table, she could talk to Jason without Scott overhearing. “Thanks for starting breakfast,” she said in a low voice. “I’ll take over from here. I don’t want to hold you up, and I’m sure you’d much rather eat in peace and quiet at SugarPie’s.”

He frowned. “I’m willing—”

“Thanks,” she repeated firmly. “I appreciate all you’ve done, but I’m fine now. Really. A few solid hours of sleep were all I needed. And I won’t be alone. I told you, I have a friend dropping by.”

She had called Shay deliberately to give herself an out this morning. Maybe it was the coward’s way out. She couldn’t help that now.

Ordinarily, she would stand up for herself and her kids and send Jason packing. But somehow, she couldn’t seem to gather the strength to do that. Or to face another argument with him and all the memories that would surface along with it.

The flu, of course. No matter how much better she felt this morning, she wasn’t quite herself yet, and she could—and
did
—blame her weakness solely on the flu bug.

“So,” she continued, “you’ll be able to go on your way.”

As if on cue, the doorbell rang.

She swallowed a sigh of relief and plucked the spatula from his hand. “Since you’re so willing to help, you
can
do me one last favor, please. Answer the door.”

Chapter Four

At the Hitching Post Hotel, Jason paced from the long, waist-high reception desk, across the lobby to the wide doorway of the sitting room opposite, and back again. On his drive to the hotel, he had fought a mix of anger and irritation that had gotten stronger by the mile. Now he’d arrived, he wasn’t sure what had brought him here, except the determination not to leave town yet. Not to let Layne have the last word—again.

“That’s new flooring,” a familiar voice drawled from behind him. “It’d be a shame to wear grooves into it this soon.”

Jason turned to face the tall white-haired man now standing alongside the reception desk. He returned the familiar smile. Jed Garland had once been like a father to him.

Jason nearly staggered from the slap on his shoulder the older man gave him and found his hand engulfed in Jed’s.

“It’s been quite some time, boy. I thought maybe we’d never see you back on this ranch again. You looking for work?”

He shook his head. “No. I’m here for a place to stay.”

Jed raised his white eyebrows. “How long are you planning to stick around?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “It’s complicated.”

“Life can be. All we can do is our best.”

“Yeah.”
Lately it seemed he’d fallen down in that regard a long time ago. At Jed’s level stare, tension tightened his belly. Who knew what Layne had told folks about their split and his disappearance. The memory of the comment she’d slammed him with last night—about his contribution to their son’s birth—kicked up his tension a notch.

Damn
, she didn’t pull any punches. She never had. The worst of it was, he deserved the hit.

“Follow me.” Jed led the way toward the doorway behind the registration desk. “We’ll take over Tina’s office and sit for a while. The girls are all getting ready to head to town to prepare for Jane’s big day tomorrow.”

As Jed closed the door behind them, Jason took a seat in the guest chair, leaving the one behind the desk for Jed. “I hear Pete and Jane are tying the knot.
And
that you had a hand in roping them together.”

The older man laughed. “They are, and I did. This is wedding number two, and the third one won’t be too far along the road.”

“I’ll have to track down Pete and say hello.” The two of them had once worked together as wranglers, being broken in while under Jed’s supervision.

“He’ll appreciate seeing you, I’m sure.” Jed leaned back in the swivel chair with his hands linked behind his head. “I didn’t realize you’d kept up with the goings-on in Cowboy Creek after you left town.”

“I...saw Layne. She filled me in on everything.”

“I also didn’t realize you two kept in touch.”

He didn’t fall for Jed’s apparent innocence. The man had always had his ways of finding out anything that went on in Cowboy Creek, and everyone understood if there was one thing Jed Garland was famous for, it was
knowing
. It wouldn’t have come as a surprise to learn Jed had already heard about his arrival in town yesterday. “We don’t keep in touch. We hadn’t even spoken to each other in years until last night.”

“Another of life’s complications, huh? You and Layne seemed to deal with more of those than most kids.”

He’d always felt comfortable talking with Jed back in those days. The man had been good at keeping confidences to himself, and Jason would risk betting that was still true. “I spent the night at her place,” he said. “She wasn’t feeling well and needed somebody to help her out.”

“That was nice of you.”

“Yeah.” So anyone would think. Except Layne. He’d done his best to care for her and the baby and their son. And what had that gotten him? A sucker punch that had nearly knocked him to his knees.

My son
, she had stressed last night. She had been as quick to draw the line about that as she had in throwing her verbal right hook about his lack of involvement with Scott. Knowing she was right hadn’t made him feel any better. “It was just to help her out for the night,” he clarified. “And now, I’m looking for a room.”

“So you said. Well, we’re nearly full up with everyone here for the wedding. But we’ll fit you in...somehow. You also said Layne’s sick, though, didn’t you? Has she got the flu that’s going around?”

“Yeah. But she said she was feeling better this morning.” The minute she had claimed that, the second she’d found someone else to help her, she had tossed him out.

“From what I hear, folks don’t recover too quickly from it.” Jed’s piercing blue gaze made him want to break off eye contact, but he managed to hold the man’s gaze. “And you just went off and left her?”

“No. Shay O’Neill’s with her. I thought you could pass along the word to her brother that she could use a hand.”

Jed shook his head. “Cole won’t be around. He and the other groomsmen are off to Santa Fe with Pete, helping him get through his last day as an unmarried man.”

Jason tried to hide his grimace. “I wouldn’t think there’d be any ‘getting through’ about it. Being unmarried’s a good thing.”

“Not always. Not when you’re a single parent like Pete. Or like Layne.”

“Jed—” He clamped his jaw tight.

The other man nodded. “Good choice. There’s no sense trying to argue your way out of that one when you haven’t been around to see what’s going on. Now, you know darned well that whenever we talked in the past, I never pulled any punches with you. And I’m not about to start. I never steered you wrong, either, so I’ll tell you this flat-out straight. Cole’s not here to look in on his sister and the kids. My girls have their day planned, too. And I happen to know Shay’s joining them all for lunch at SugarPie’s.”

Jed rose from his seat. Automatically, Jason stood, too. “I’ll hold a room for you, no worries there, but if I were you, I’d seriously consider hightailing it back to Layne’s and seeing what else you can manage to help her out with. It’s the only decent thing to do.”

He nodded. He recognized Jed’s thinly veiled attempt to shame him into doing what the man wanted. An easy agreement to the suggestion might have looked like he was giving in. But so what? He’d already come to the same conclusion himself.

Even as he’d driven away in the white heat of anger, he had known he wasn’t going for long. He had to see Layne, because his plans had changed. His intention had been to get her to take the child support she had always refused to accept. But after seeing the boy—after spending time with his son—after connecting with Scott the way he had done that morning, no matter how brief the link might have been, the situation had changed. Now he wanted more.

For his son’s sake and his own, he wanted contact with his child.

* * *

“W
HAT
ARE
YOU
up to, Abuelo?”

At the sound of his youngest granddaughter’s voice, Jed Garland started. He pushed aside his coffee mug on the Hitching Post’s kitchen table and glanced at Tina. “What makes you think I’m up to anything?”

Grinning, she took a seat. “The last time you had that look on your face, you were plotting how to get Mitch and Andi together. So I’ll ask again, just what are you up to?”

He grinned back. He loved all his granddaughters equally, but Tina had grown up in this very hotel and they knew each other best—which, come to think of it, didn’t always work to his advantage. But today he definitely saw the benefits to their relationship. “While you girls were all upstairs, I had a visitor. A new hotel guest, actually, and you’ll never guess who.”

“So tell me.”

“Jason McAndry.”

Tina’s breath hitched. “You’re kidding. What is he doing home?”

“Seeing Layne, for one thing. When he stopped in, he’d just come from her apartment.”

“Have you told Cole?” Coincidentally, Cole was both Layne’s brother and Tina’s husband.

“No, I haven’t, and for now, I think that’s something we’ll need to play close to our vests. If Cole hears Jason’s back in town, it’ll ruin all my plans.”

“Plans? You mean...? You’re not thinking about Layne and Jason as a couple, are you?” She shook her head. “You’re a wonderful matchmaker, Abuelo, but there’s no chance you’ll get those two back together.”

He frowned. “You’re a fine one to say that, after the state you and Cole were in not so long ago.”

“That was different. Layne and Jason have already been married. And divorced.”

“And you think as a wonderful matchmaker, I haven’t already considered that?” He reached across the table to pat the back of her hand. “Haven’t you learned a lot yourself about the redeeming power of love?”

“Yes, I have,” she said softly, “thanks to a little help from my own private matchmaker.”

“Then trust your old grandpa, won’t you, and return the favor. I want to keep Cole from finding out for a bit. Give these kids a chance for more time on their own.”

“But you said Jason planned to stay here. He and Cole will see each other at breakfast tomorrow.”

“No, I don’t believe they will. When Jason left again this afternoon, he was headed back to Layne’s...thanks to a little nudging, I might add. He’d already spent the night with her.” Tina’s jaw dropped, and he laughed. “Not what you’re thinking, girl. I played dumb with Jason, but you and I both know Layne’s down with the flu. He kept an eye on the kids for her so she could catch up on her sleep. Now I’ve got him back there, I need to
keep
him there. I can’t get you involved, at least not just yet.”

“That’s true. Not if you plan to leave Cole out of the loop.”

“And I surely do. We need to get someone else to pull the strings for a bit, while we stay in the background. Someone to be our eyes and ears, at least, and keep us
in
the loop.”

“You mean someone to spy for us, don’t you?”

He chuckled and repeated, “I surely do. I’ve got lots of folks who can do that from a short distance. But we need someone who can get close to Layne. Who’s our best bet?”

“Well...considering Layne goes in to work at SugarPie’s every day, I would say Sugar, of course.”

“No, thank you. That woman would want to run the whole show.”

She laughed. “Like someone else I know.” She thought for a moment. “One or two of the other waitresses might do, but I think Layne’s closer to Shay O’Neill.”

“Yes.” He slapped his hand on the table. “Shay would be downright perfect. In fact, Jason said she’s over with Layne right now. Give her a call and tell her we need to speak with her.”

“I’ll be seeing her in town—”

“Even so. Let her know to be careful what she says around Layne—and the other girls—before we get a chance to sit down with her. And when you all are done with your shopping, make sure to get her out here to see us.”

“To get her on our side, you mean.”

“That’s my girl.” He grinned. “I do believe you’re catching on to this matchmaking business.”

* * *

“A
RE
YOU
SURE
you’re going to be okay on your own with the kids?”

Layne looked at Shay’s worried frown and managed to nod. “I’ll be fine.” But, despite the afghan tucked around her and the cup of tea in her hands, she shivered. Chills from the flu had combined with what she suspected was a delayed reaction to seeing Jason again.

She couldn’t have felt more relieved—or more guilty—when Shay had walked in the door and he walked out. “I shouldn’t have called you—”

“Of course, you should have. I’m your friend.”

“I know, but you’re busy with work and helping out with the wedding. And with so many other things.” Shay’s grandmother, Maureen, was getting up in age, and Shay did a lot for her. “How’s Mo?”

“Good days and bad.”

“And how are
you
feeling?”

“Fine.”

Shay was pregnant and due in the near future. She would talk about her pregnancy, about her excitement at becoming a mom. But Layne knew better than to mention anything about the dad. Months ago, Shay had confided his name to Layne but sworn her to secrecy. At the same time she had made it clear he wouldn’t be a part of her life.

Shay tucked a strand of her long blond hair behind her ear and glanced down at her rounded stomach. “I’m getting bigger every time I take a peek.” She eyed Layne again. “And you’re not getting away with changing the subject.”

“I wasn’t trying to. I was just pointing out that you have a lot on your mind.”

“So do you.” Shay added quietly, “It’s not every day an ex-husband shows up and spends the night.” From the purse she had set on the coffee table, her cell phone rang. “Sorry, I have to grab this. I’m on call for some extra hours at the Big Dipper, and I sure could use them... Hello?”

Layne tuned out Shay’s voice but couldn’t stop thinking of what she had just said.

It’s not every day an ex-husband shows up and spends the night.

Hearing that, Layne had had to swallow a groan. The truth was, she already had not
an
ex-husband but
two
ex-husbands to her credit. Or more like it, discredit. Either way, she certainly had no luck when it came to men.

Shay ended her call and dropped the cell phone back into her bag. “I’m sorry again, Layne. I wish I could offer to take care of the kids for the rest of the day.” She grinned. “I need all the practice I can get. But that was Tina. The bridal party’s meeting for lunch at SugarPie’s and then doing some shopping, and they had invited me along. She was letting me know they’re already here in town. I could cancel—”

“No, you couldn’t. Go and have fun. I told you, I’ll be fine.”

Shay smiled. “Maybe you can get Jason to come back. And to stay over again.”

Layne sighed. “He didn’t ‘stay over.’ At least, not in the way you probably meant when you said he’d spent the night.”

“Maybe you wish he had?”

“No.”

From her playpen a few feet away, Jill let out a surprised squawk.

Layne lowered her voice again. “I don’t want anything to do with Jason. And I wouldn’t have called you, but I just couldn’t think of any other graceful way to get him to leave.”

“Why would you want to? It’s been years since the two of you were together. People change.” She hesitated. “Well,
some
people. Maybe you and Jason both have. And obviously, he cares about you and the kids, or he wouldn’t have volunteered to stay here to take care of them.”