Texas Secrets (3 page)

"No need to be, child. You look like you've seen a ghost."

Maddie smiled. "Did you know my grandmother Wheeler?"

"Old Rose?" Vondell nodded. "Not well, but everyone knew the story. After Dalton..." She fell silent. "Well, never mind about that."

Maddie's heart stuttered. These people believed her father a murderer. "I know what you're thinking, but he didn't kill anyone. Sam's lawyer was satisfied about that."

"Well, it's not my place to be talking about Dalton Wheeler." Vondell turned away toward the refrigerator, dropping ice cubes into a glass. "I'll get you that tea that I promised you."

"You don't believe me."

"Hon, I—it's just that for years, everyone knew—well, it'll take some getting used to, is all. But it's old news. It really doesn't matter."

"It does matter. It matters to me. The man I knew never even got a traffic ticket. Did you know him?"

The tiny redhead shook her head. "That was before I moved here. It was a long time ago, Maddie. Water under the bridge."

Vondell was being kind, but once again Maddie felt very much alone, very much the outsider. Very sorry she had agreed to come. She remembered the brief, unguarded glance she'd had into Boone's blue eyes. That man had been hurt badly by his father. Now she was helping to hurt him more.
Why did you do this to me, Sam Gallagher?
How could a man who would seek to make peace with a total stranger use that stranger to hurt his own son?

"Here, child, sit down and drink this tea." Vondell placed the glass in her hand.

Maddie took a sip, vaguely registering the cool freshness of mint. She watched moisture bead on the outside and thought of her daydream of porch swings and iced tea. This sure wasn't the vacation she'd expected. Her head jerked up.

"Why didn't he just give the house to his sons, no matter what he owed my father?"

"Sam was powerfully troubled in his last weeks, and he seemed determined to make things right."

"But why didn't Boone know about this already?"

"Sam waited too long to let anyone contact him." Vondell's eyes darkened. "Sam has a lot to answer for, the way he treated those boys. I can't explain Sam Gallagher to you, Maddie. I doubt anyone could. He was a complicated man who was never the same after his wife Jenny died. He destroyed a whole family in his selfish grief, just flat abandoned Boone, who was only fourteen at the time, and tried to have Mitch arrested when any fool could see her death was an accident.

"I've never seen anyone lose his mind in grief like that. If it hadn't been for Boone, Sam would have lost this place, too. Young as he was, Boone kept this place running until Sam took the reins again. But Sam was never the same after that, and he lost two fine sons anyone would be proud to claim."

Vondell brushed away angry tears, her eyes sparking. "I kept trying to talk sense into that man, but a more stubborn sonofagun never walked the face of this planet. When Boone left, I think Sam realized some of what he'd lost, but he just hardened his heart and went on as if those boys had never existed. If I hadn't gotten in touch with Boone back when Sam had his heart attack a few years ago, I don't guess they would have ever spoken again. And the way things turned out, maybe Boone would have been better off."

"What do you mean?"

Vondell rose and reached out for her apron, tying it around her waist. "That's not really for me to tell. If Boone wants to, that's his business."

Maddie shook her head. "I doubt Boone will want to give me the time of day, and I don't think I blame him. The best thing I can do is to pass my thirty days and get out of his way."

Vondell turned to face her. "You don't think you'll want this place?"

Maddie had to smile at that. "No offense, but I can't imagine it. There's not much demand for a chef in a place like Morning Star."

The older woman's eyebrows rose. "You mean you're one of those fancy cooks like Paula Deen or that Italian girl who uses leeks and such?"

"I cook with all sorts of ingredients. I'm not a snob about food. I just want it fresh and wholesome."

"Well, that about sums up my cooking. Most of what I cook comes from my garden and the stock raised here."

"You have a garden?" Maddie's pulse sped up. Her dream was her own restaurant with a greenhouse where she could control the quality of her food more closely. She actually was a supporter of the slow food movement, using ingredients grown in the surrounding area. "What do you grow?"

"The usual stuff. Onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, beans and such."

"Do you grow your own herbs?"

Vondell smiled. "Hon, these men around here only care about meat and potatoes. Salt and pepper's plenty for them. I have to work hard to make them eat a salad."

Maddie's vision of fresh arugula, of pots of oregano and rosemary and chives, vanished as quickly as it had come. "I'd love to see your garden. I've wished for my own, but space is at a premium in the city, even if you could get good sun with all the buildings."

Vondell cocked her head, oddly hesitant. "You wouldn't happen to know how to make those little radish roses, would you?"

Maddie smiled. "I can make carrot garnishes to die for, too."

Vondell cackled. "I'd like to see Boone's face if I put a radish rose on his plate. You gotta teach me."

"I'm not so sure I need to antagonize Boone right now."

"Aw, hon, once Boone gets some sleep and has a chance to think about it, he'll be all right. Besides, this place could use a little shaking up." She grinned like a conspirator, practically rubbing her hands with glee.

Maddie couldn't help returning her smile. It was going to be a long thirty days, no matter what she did. No sense making it grim, as well. Robert had told her she wasn't serious enough, that her sense of play was more appropriate to a child.

Well, she was here for a vacation, here to remember who Maddie was. She'd stay out of Boone's way as much as possible, but she was through making herself into something she wasn't.

She'd sworn, after Robert, never to get involved with a man who couldn't accept her as she was. Not that getting involved with Boone Gallagher was even remotely possible or desirable, no matter how handsome he might be.

Maddie had a feeling that surviving Boone's disapproval was all the practice she would need. 

* * *

Boone walked into the horse barn, scrap of barbed wire in hand, looking for Sam's foreman. "Jim?"

No answer, except the whinny from a stall down the way. Boone stuck the length of wire into a trash barrel and headed in the direction of the sound, wondering if it could really be Gulliver, Sam's horse.

It was.

"Hey, buddy," he soothed, holding out his hand for the big gelding to sniff. Gulliver's head lifted, then he passed his muzzle over Boone's hand, the soft whuffle of his breath warm on Boone's palm.

While he stroked the old roan, Boone's mind wandered to all the times he'd seen his father on the back of this horse. Sam had loved this horse with a fierceness that he gave no one else once Jenny died. If Boone could have claimed half that love for himself, they could have built on that. But when Mom died, his father had crawled inside his grief and slammed the door shut. There had been no room for anyone else.

Gallagher men love only once
, Sam always said, and Boone had vowed to be different. If the price of such a love was to cast away everything else if you lost it, abandon everyone who needed you most, the price was too high.

Boone had succeeded too well at his vow. He had married a woman who had pursued him like a trophy, a Senator's daughter who saw a chest full of medals and a sparkling future. The wounded soldier, weary of roaming the globe, had had no home to which he could return. He had seized the opportunity to make a new start and counted himself lucky.

They had both been wrong.

He had come to care for Helen, but he hadn't loved her the way she'd needed. And then he'd yanked her out of her world and brought her to Texas after Sam's first heart attack. Helen's heart had dried to nothing in the harsh Texas wind.

And she'd died fleeing the life that was killing her, day by lonely day.

He'd tried to help. Tried to be enough, torn between two people who couldn't stand each other—an old man who'd written him off years ago and a wife who was pining for a life that was light years away. He'd given her money he couldn't spare so she could go home and visit, too proud to let her daddy foot the bill. It had been a futile effort to help her recharge her batteries so she could endure coming back to a place that she hated. Every visit back East only made things worse, though, because Boone knew by then that this was the only place he would ever be home.

The last time he'd seen her, she'd been carrying his baby and never even told him. His hope for a family died with his wife in a sailing accident.

With her old college flame at the helm.

Gulliver stirred and stamped, and Boone realized his hand was knotted in the gelding's mane. Easing his fingers apart, Boone stepped away. The past was the past. He would spend his future alone because he had never figured out how to manage love.

But he had the ranch, and that would be enough.

Gulliver nuzzled at his hand. "Anybody exercising you, boy?" Suddenly Boone realized that he needed the ride, too. Needed to feel the wind and the sun, a good horse beneath him. He headed for the tack room to get Gulliver's bridle.

He stopped in his tracks before the tree that held Sam's saddle. His hand hovered over the leather, and happier days rushed back. Memories of being lifted up in front of his father, too young to ride his pony where they were headed. His mother would wave to them as they turned toward the pastures where Sam would pass along to his son the legacy of a lifetime's hard work. Mitch had never felt the ranch sing in his blood, but Boone had soaked up every scrap of knowledge Sam wanted to share. He had been an eager student, and he had thought his future began and ended on this land.

Boone looked around the tack room and wished for his own saddle, uneasy at using Sam's. Jim's was missing from its tree; there were two others, neither big enough for Boone.

His gaze returned to his father's saddle, symbol of all that Sam had once been, all that Boone had once hoped. In that moment, memories, bad and good, jostled for room in his chest. But what pierced through them all was a sharp ache for what could now never be.

Sam was gone, without a word to the son who had once thought the sun rose and set in him. They would never heal the pain that was now the legacy of this place.

But one thing Boone knew, deep in his bones. He loved this place, needed this land. If it hadn't become his in the way he'd dreamed as a kid—worked with his father and then handed down with love—it was still his. Not the house yet, but even that would come in time. And his brother would be found, no matter how long Boone had to look.

He would reclaim this place for what was left of Jenny Gallagher's dreams. He had spent enough years wandering, been rootless too long. He would have no one to pass it on to, but perhaps Mitch would.

Boone was home now, where he belonged. And here he would stay.

He picked up Sam's saddle and with it, his own lost dreams. He had plenty to do to restore the neglect he could see all around him. Whatever the price to buy Maddie out, he would find a way to meet it.

He would ignore the gypsy with sass in her eyes and too little sense. He would give her wide berth, gone before she rose and back after she slept. And if his hands itched a little to touch remembered curves, well, he'd often been off on missions or at sea for months at a time. Boone knew how to control himself, and he would, for an instinct that had kept him alive in some hairy situations whispered that this woman could be trouble with a capital
T
. She was beautiful and totally out of place. She was what stood between him and the home he'd never wanted to leave.

Whatever her claim, whatever wrong Sam was trying to right, he would simply wait her out. She would stay her thirty days, he'd definitely see to that. The Caswells would get this place over his dead body. But everything he loved about the ranch was everything she'd hate.

It was no place for city girls. Maddie would be gone soon enough.

* * *

Maddie stretched and yawned, surprised that she'd fallen asleep. She'd only meant to lie down for a minute, but the bright sun had gone far past the window of this lovely room.

Vondell had told her it was once Jenny's sewing room and like much of the house, Sam had left it almost a shrine. Vondell had wanted to put Maddie in the master bedroom, but Maddie couldn't imagine a move more calculated to raise Boone's hackles than to take over Sam's quarters or the room that Vondell said had belonged to Boone's brother Mitch. She was temporary, and this was the only room left. The downside was that Boone's room was at this end of the hallway and there was only one bathroom, but neither could be helped.

She liked this room, its old wallpaper dotted with tiny yellow roses. White Priscilla curtains over the windows matched a white chenille bedspread on the twin bed where she lay. The chenille had made her smile at first sight. It was just one of the things about Maddie that had driven Robert crazy, that she loved vintage clothes and wore them whenever she could. Stored in her apartment in New York was one whole closet of odds and ends she'd picked up, from broad-shouldered suits and tiny hats with veils to a genuine flapper dress and a big brown mouton coat.

Among her prize possessions was a lilac chenille robe that she'd brought along with her. It wasn't sexy and it sure wasn't glamorous, but Maddie loved the peacock design spreading across the back, the chenille feathers topping the patch pockets in front. She didn't wear it often because it wouldn't stand up to daily wear, but whenever Maddie was troubled, bundling into that robe made her feel protected and coddled.

It was the kind of robe she could imagine a grandmother wearing, a grandmother who would have fixed her a cup of hot chocolate when she spent the night, who would have worn that robe while bustling around the kitchen in the morning.