His Temporary Wife (29 page)

“Mommy, you forgot Daddy’s kiss.” Stella pecked him on the cheek, and Chloe tugged
on her mom’s blouse.

“Mommy, don’t be silly. Mommies kiss daddies on the mouth.”

With lips so tight he could feel her anger, Stella stood on tiptoe and touched her
mouth to his. Then he watched as Chloe grabbed her mother’s hand, delighted that she
was playing mom today, not cop. To Chloe, the world was a game, and everyone in it,
players.

He closed his eyes, but the burning didn’t go away, so he went back to staring blindly
outside. There were no daffodils here, as there were in Alabama, but he heard that
just miles north spring came in on carpets of bluebonnets and waves of flaming Indian
paintbrush. All the locals raved about the Texas wildflowers. They said he should
go see them, but he knew he couldn’t.

The scene he’d rushed to just over a year ago crowded in: the hysteria, the cop cars
with their flashing red and blue lights; the crumpled body of a child, an injured
teacher being wheeled toward an ambulance; and an officer who knew Stella pulling
him aside. She’d taken a bullet for a kid, the officer told him. Unfaithful, maybe,
arrogant often—but nobody doubted Stella Estes’s courage.

The tears rolled down his cheeks and he wiped them away with the back of his hand,
trying not to remember that there’d been blood on the daffodils the day the world
ended.

• • •

Luz Wilkinson tugged on the girth again and nudged Pompom’s belly with a knee. “Let
it out, girl,” she urged. The little pinto sighed heavily and turned around to nose
Luz just as the cell phone in her pocket went off. Her horses would have shied at
the sudden blast of sound, and the other ponies would have lifted their heads and
pricked their ears. Pompom stood there with that complete lack of interest that indicated
absolute lack of intelligence.

Frowning over the pony’s deficiencies, Luz fished the phone out and hit the button
to silence it. She didn’t recognize the number. She hoped it wasn’t a bill collector,
but knew that it probably was.

“Hello?”

“Uh…hi. Is this Eden Acres?”

“Yes.” Luz scratched Pompom’s ear while she tried to connect a physical image with
the deep, masculine voice. She often toyed with visualizing strangers from their phone
calls, and almost always was wrong. Silence pricked her into awareness. Perhaps the
caller expected someone more enthusiastic, more helpful. Someone who could offer more
than one word answers…

“May I help you?” she prodded when he didn’t go on.

Another long pause, then came the abrupt questions: “I heard you have therapy horses?
And ponies?”

Luz hesitated. Sometimes children from a group foster home came out to ride, and occasionally
a counselor who worked with troubled children recommended exposing them to riding.
But therapy? She wouldn’t go that far.

“We have horses and ponies,” she said carefully. “But who told you we have therapy
horses?”

“Esmeralda Salinas,” the voice said, no longer hesitant.

Luz wrinkled her nose, picturing the elegant redheaded school guidance counselor with
her neat suits and perpetual pep. Living in this tiny community, they’d crossed paths
several times. They didn’t much like each other, but Esmeralda loved horses. That
was usually a sterling quality, but this time, Luz’s main yardstick for measuring
“good folks” didn’t hold water, because the counselor struck her as conceited, plastic,
and sneaky. Although they avoided each other as much as possible, she boarded the
woman’s pricey Appaloosa. Undoubtedly Esmeralda would have liked finer stomping grounds
for the horse and herself, but no one else boarded horses in this arid, dying community.
Very few still owned livestock.

Nevertheless, Luz was surprised that the counselor had referred any male new to town.
The director of the children’s group home was an elderly woman, and the other referrals
were long-time residents, parents in established relationships, but Esmeralda sending
a guy her way? He was not single, then, apparently.

“You’re Ms. Wilkinson?” Doubt tinged the deep voice. She’d confused the caller. Didn’t
matter. Confusion was a constant companion these days.

“Yes,” she replied. One word again. He could state his business or not. She didn’t
care.

“Ms. Wilkinson, I need to talk to you about riding lessons for my little girl, Chloe.
Or maybe—” Another brief pause, as if he wasn’t sure what he wanted. “Maybe even buying
a pony. I need advice on what would be best.”

He was a client then. She should be happier than she was. She pasted a smile on her
face, hoping it would make her voice warmer, more caring. “Great. Advice is what we
do best.” Quick questions confirmed he knew how to find Eden Acres, and she clicked
the phone off and returned it to her pocket. She realized, a little late, that asking
the man’s name might have been both friendlier and more professional.

“Screw it,” she muttered with unusual ire. “Professional never worked for me, anyway.
Come on, old lady. Some kid might actually get a pony ride today.”

Half an hour later Luz was feeding the menagerie when she heard tires on the gravel
drive. She called the motley collection of rescued animals her menagerie, because
it took too long to go into the species, circumstances, and problems she dealt with
trying to feed and shelter them day to day. Candy, the burro, butted her as she turned
away, and the kitten with no name left its feeding dish to run away from some unseen
menace, almost tripping her. She wiped her hands on the sides of her jeans and shut
the door separating the odd animals from the handful of horses that were both her
treasures and bread-earners.

By the time she made it outside, a dark-haired, broad-shouldered man was leaning against
an SUV, frowning. He wore long sleeves and a tie, hardly south Texas pony-buying attire.
But she wasn’t expecting anyone else.

She walked over and held out her hand. “I’m Luz Wilkinson. Welcome to Eden Acres.
Are you—?”

“Aaron Estes.” He shook her hand briefly, and then cast another look around the premises.
Not disapproving, exactly, she thought. It was more a look of disappointment.

“Why don’t we go into the office?” she suggested. “It’s cooler.” And it was well decorated
with new paint and shelves of her mother’s trophies, recently polished.

They walked into the barn. The half-open stall doors caught his attention. He pointed
at one of the horses. “Pretty. Yours?”

“No.” She shook her head, and paused to pet the broad blaze of white running down
the mare’s face. “This is Domatrix. One of my boarders.”

“Doma—isn’t this Esmeralda’s horse?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact.” She leaned against the stall door, slanting a glance at
him, surprised that Esmeralda had apparently described Domatrix in detail to a man
new in town. No wonder Aaron Estes hadn’t flinched at the name, even shortened as
it seemed to be. Then again…she thought of the tall, regal redhead and the dearth
of men in Rose Creek. A man with a daughter likely meant a married man. That would
lessen Esmeralda’s interest. Wouldn’t it? She pushed away from the mare’s stall, and
he followed the remaining few feet to the office. She waved a hand at the chairs and
took her own place behind the small, bare desk.

“So tell me how I can help,” she invited.

He looked down for a minute at his hands before looking at her. When he did finally
lift his eyes, she could see why Esmeralda had pounced. The man’s perfect features
and startling green eyes would stop traffic in lots of places, let alone this one-horse,
one-eligible-man town.

“My little girl—Chloe—needs a hobby. Something she’ll like that’s safe.”

Luz studied him, perplexed. Somehow the pieces of the big, attractive man across the
desk didn’t add up. She supposed she was using stereotypes, but he seemed too hesitant
and unsure for his own body. Not as if he was uncomfortable in his own skin, maybe,
but almost as if he were fearful of something.

She puzzled over the discomfort he seemed to feel, trying to figure out his connection
to Esme. He wasn’t family; the Rose Creek gossips knew everyone and every relative,
no matter how far flung. The counselor had aging parents and a half-brother down in
Laredo. A friend? She discarded that. Esmeralda didn’t work weekends, and if he were
a friend, she would be here. So the relationship had to be professional. Maybe the
daughter he’d mentioned was Esmeralda’s client?

“‘Safe as opposed to bike riding or playing with dolls? Or safe, fun, and a perfect
springtime activity—I’m not sure I know what you mean by safe,” Luz admitted. “Riding
has risks—the same as pretty much everything.”

Aaron Estes growled something that sounded profane and hunched forward over the desk,
his face tight. “Don’t you think I know that?” After a moment, his face muscles eased
into smoother lines. His lips twitched, as if they’d known how to smile, but forgotten.
“I’m not as weird as I seem. Just a tad nervous and overprotective.”

“But you’re not in denial,” she observed. “That’s got to be good.” She smiled. “So,
tell me about your Chloe.”

Pure, absolute love washed across his face. His lips remembered how to smile and he
straightened in his chair. “Chloe’s my life,” he said simply.

Luz returned the smile, but prodded gently for more insight. “How old is she? Does
she like horses? Has she ridden before?”

“Six, yes, and no.”

Luz blinked, trying to understand the simple, one-word answers. Saw the dimples appear,
and then deepen in Aaron Estes’ cheeks. She’d always had a weakness for dimples, dammit!
Was he one-upping her? “So, is this payback, or do you always keep things so short
and simple?”

He actually chuckled. It was a short little rumble of laughter, but a chuckle.

“Payback, definitely. I was nervous enough about calling and you were anything but
friendly.”

She thought back on her hesitation to answer the phone, how she’d focused on the pinto
rather than concentrating on encouraging conversation. He had her pegged, but she
didn’t care. Wouldn’t. She needed customers, but wasn’t in the market for relationships
of any kind. And professional? She allowed herself a quick mental shrug. She no longer
had a profession. She’d been a teacher, and a good one. She’d surrounded herself with
kids and poured energy and love into their lives. Then she’d lost it all, including
her daughter Lily. Not her daughter, she reminded herself: Brian’s daughter, given
to her as one more false promise. Now she rescued discarded animals when she could,
and was going broke doing it.

So she pounced on something he said. “You were nervous? About asking if we had ponies?”
Slight derision might have crept into her words, because he flinched and drew away
again.

“Not about ponies.” He paused, looking for the right words. “We don’t know each other.
Esmeralda recommended riding as a form of therapy.” He shrugged. “Telling a stranger
your kid has problems is hard.”

Her cheeks burned with embarrassment. “I owe you an apology—of course it is.” She
stood up abruptly, annoyed with herself. “Guess it’s attack a stranger day—I’m just
not sure why. Would you like to look at Rumbles? She would be the pony Chloe would
work with first.”

“Sure.” He got up too, ignoring her apology, and stretched. Outside the office, one
of the horses whinnied, and another kicked at the stall. The pungent scents of the
stable reminded her it was time to muck stalls—again. Already. Out of the corner of
her eyes, she saw his nose wrinkle.

“Do you even like horses?” she asked, curious.

He slanted a glance down at her and shrugged. “Don’t know. Haven’t been around them.
Not really an animal person.”

Before Luz could murmur a response, he stopped, turning towards her and holding his
hands out in apology. “Not that I don’t like them, exactly. I used to travel, and
before that—well, I just wasn’t raised around them.”

“Okay.” Luz gave him her own shrug. “So I guess Chloe’s mom will be the main go-between
here?”

A muscle in his jaw twitched, and the nervous tension he’d shown in the beginning
visibly tightened his body. “Chloe’s mom,” he said through clenched teeth, “is dead.”

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Unattainable
by Leslie P. Garcia.

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