The Loner (30 page)

"Wow." He blinked and a smile played across his mouth. "I always wondered... It didn't make sense that he'd be so heroic as a range detective, but such a louse in his personal life."

Caroline drew a circle in the center square of the neglected game grid. "He's definitely not a louse and he wants to be part of your life, Will."

The boy marked his
X
in the dirt and with studied casualness said, "Oh yeah?"

"Yes. Let me tell you about our trip to the general store."

Her description of the gifts Logan had purchased and the tornado destroyed had Will bemoaning the cruelty of nature. Still, he was a bright enough young man to look past the presents to the heart of the matter. "So where do we stand, Mama? Is he going to live with us? Is he going to be a real father to me? Is he going to be your real husband?"

She hesitated and drew a circle without paying attention to the game. "It's complicated."

"Didn't look complicated when he was all tangled up with you." He jabbed his
X
into the ground, then slashed a line through the row of three indicating a win. "You've been lonely a long time, and I'm afraid that when it comes to men you are as green as grass."

Her first instinct was to snap at him and tell him her private life was her own business and she wasn't all that green thank you very much, but she recognized she needed to step carefully here. She and Will had been a pair for a long time and naturally he was protective and probably a little jealous.

"I understand you want to watch out for me, but you keep in mind that I am not a fool, young man. The situation we have with Logan is this." She ticked her points off on her fingers. "We have a number of different relationships going on—one between you and me, one between you and your father, one between me and your father and one between the three of us as a family. With you and me—our relationship doesn't change. You are my son, and nothing and no one will ever affect my love for you. Now, while I might have opinions and concerns about your relationship with Logan, I am staying out of it. It's your relationship, not mine, and the two of you will need to work it out however is best for you. It's the same way with my relationship with Logan. It's our business, Will. Not yours."

"I wasn't trying to..." He shrugged.

"I know, honey. You care. But I am an adult and I am responsible for my own decisions, just like you are."

That distracted him. Surprise lit his eyes as he asked, "Did you just call me an adult?"

"Well, don't get too big for your britches, young man." She gave in to temptation and smoothed back his hair. "But I do recognize the changes in you. You are certainly adult enough to decide just what sort of relationship you want with your father."

While he digested that, she hurried on to the one in which the two of them would need to work together. "Now, that last one—the family—is more complicated, like I said. Will, I think Logan wants to be a part of our family more than anything else in the world."

"You do?"

"Yes, I do. I could be wrong, but I honestly don't think that's the case. Unfortunately, he has reasons— good reasons—to believe it is better he not try."

Will's brow furrowed. "What reasons?"

"It's not my place to tell you, honey. That's information that needs to come from him. What I need to know is how
you
feel about the idea of us living as a real family. I know you've just met the man and you might not know the answer yet, but it would help me to know what you want. Would you like the three of us to be a family, Will?"

He drew idle circles in the dirt with the stick. "I dunno. I guess so. If you want it. And as long as he treats you right."

Caroline recognized yearning in the shrug of his shoulders and deliberate insouciance of his manner. Smiling, she reached over and gave him a hug. "I do want that, yes. So, what I think we need to do to work on that family relationship is for us to treat him like he is the head of the family."

Will's head jerked up and he shot her a worried look. "Does that mean we have to mind him and do everything he wants us to do?"

"Oh, heavens no." She kissed his cheek, then added, "We just have to make him
think
that's what we're doing."

"You have got to be kidding!" As the sun ascended in the eastern sky, Logan stood with his hands braced on his hips, his incredulous gaze shifting from his wife to his son, then back to his wife again. "Haven't the two of you had enough trauma, drama and danger to last you for a while? Jesus! I swear, if you think I'm going to cart you two into Black Shadow Canyon then you don't have the sense God gave a turnip."

Caroline smiled impishly. "Actually, I thought we'd ride horses, or maybe walk. No need to take a cart."

"Very funny."

Will spoke up. "Sir, we can't simply leave when we're this close to Ben."

"Sure we can."

Will looked him straight in eyes and said, "He's family, sir. You don't just abandon family."

It was a shot through the heart and the boy knew it. Logan couldn't help but admire the effort. He nodded his acknowledgment of the hit, then said, "Nor do you consciously put family in danger. From what I know about Ben Whitaker and from everything your mother has told me, I doubt he'd disagree. If he'd wanted you with him in Black Shadow Canyon, I suspect he'd have taken you along when he left."

"Ben wasn't thinking straight," Will explained. "He wouldn't have gone himself if he'd been right in the head."

"Which doesn't help your argument at all." When Will glanced toward his mother for help, Logan sighed. "Look, here's what I'll do. Let me take you and your mother back to Artesia, where it's safe. Then I'll come back out here and find Whitaker for you. Fair enough?"

Will scowled. "But that will waste so much time. You were going to take my mother into the canyon, weren't you?"

"Yes, but only because I knew she'd go on her own if I didn't take..." seeing Caroline and Will share a look at that, Logan knew he'd put his foot in it".. .her. No. I won't have it. Do you hear me? Caroline, I'll have your word right here, right now that you will stay put where I put you."

"But, Logan—"

"No buts."

Will said to his mother, "I don't know that I like this head-of-the-family stuff."

Caroline rolled her eyes at her son, then said, "What if you 'put' us somewhere in the canyon that's hidden away? It's a large place. Isn't there a place where you hid when you went into Black Shadow Canyon before?"

Yes, there was, and Logan had already thought of that possible solution. In fact, the hiding place was so good that he credited it with getting him out of the canyon alive. While fleeing from men determined to kill him, Logan had chosen to forge his own path up to the canyon rim in the hopes that they'd lose his trail. Halfway up, one of them had clipped his leg with a lucky shot and he'd feared he was a goner.

When he'd spied the dark slit in the rocks, he'd expected to find a bear or coyotes or, at the very least, a snake. Instead, he'd escaped into an underground cavern. A huge underground cavern. He'd explored a very little bit and damn near couldn't find his way out, which was why he didn't want to stash Caroline and Will there.

He realized he had given himself away when Caroline said with triumph in her voice, "There is a place!"

"It's a cave. It's enormous and confusing and if one of you wandered off we might never find you."

"But no one found you."

"No."

Will spoke up. "Let me understand this. You know of a great hiding place but you don't want us to use it because you're afraid Mama or I will get lost?"

"You don't understand just how enormous this cavern is. I'm lucky I found my way out at all. If it hadn't been for the trail of blood I left behind, I might still be down there."

"But you wandered off. We won't do that."

"But—"

"Sir, I give you my word."

"I appreciate that, Will. I truly do. The problem I have with the idea is that the other night, I stashed your mother somewhere, and she gave me her solemn word that she'd stay put. That didn't happen. She came looking for me when she thought my life was in danger."

"It
was
in danger."

"And you almost got yourself killed saving me."

"That's easy enough to prevent," Will quipped, before Caroline could voice her protest. "We won't try to save you."

When both Logan and Caroline gazed at the boy in surprise, he said, "Seriously, sir. You make a list of rules, and I'll make a solemn vow that we will uphold them. If that means not leaving the cave, even if you're outside and begging us to save you from a bear, we won't do it. It's whatever you say. Your rules, period. It will be the first commitment I'll ever make to you as son to father, and it will include my promise to make my mother mind the rules, too. Even if I have to physically restrain her. I'm bigger than she is now. I could do that if I had to."

Caroline gasped. "Why, William Benjamin Grey."

Well, hell. The boy—the young man—had just maneuvered him between a rock and a hard place. How could he possibly begin their relationship by telling Will no and effectively calling him a liar?

Logan narrowed his eyes and studied his son. "You are a pretty sharp fellow, aren't you?"

"Yes, sir. Maybe I take after you."

Kiss ass, too.
A reluctant grin flirted with Logan's lips, then he said, "Caroline? Do we have a pencil and paper anywhere in our supplies?"

"I carry a small notebook in my handbag."

"Excellent. Get it for Will. Son, you ride next to me so I can dictate my list of rules."

Will's expression lit with delight. "You'll take us with you into Black Shadow Canyon? Will we get there today? Will you begin your search for Ben today?"

"After you and your mother sign my rule book—in blood, if necessary—then yes." It didn't escape Logan's notice that Will didn't protest his use of the word
son
that time, so he guessed he'd handled that all right.

He knew it when the boy extended his hand for a handshake and said, "Thank you, Pa."

Logan shook hands, then had to turn his head away to blink back tears. Damned blowing dust was stinging his eyes, he told himself.

"Himself" didn't believe that for minute.

Caroline eyed the dark slit between the rocks and pasted a smile on her face. She wasn't about to let either Logan or Will know just how much she dreaded the thought of hiding in a cave. Ever since she'd spent an afternoon trapped in a dry well on her father's ranch where she'd fallen when she was eight years old, dark, enclosed spaces made her skin crawl. But the men in her life were counting on her, so she would do her part and be a good little soldier.

"Let me check it out and make sure it's still safe." Logan squeezed between the boulders and disappeared.

He was gone a good ten minutes and Caroline got antsy. "Maybe I should go after him..."

"No, Mama."

"But—"

"Rule number three."

She scowled at her son. "We're not there yet so the rules don't apply."

"Don't be difficult, Mother."

She shot him her best mean-mother glare, but Will proved steadfast and impervious. In a switch of roles, she wrinkled her nose and made a childish face at him. He laughed.

Another incredibly tense five minutes ticked by. "What is he doing in there? This was a bad idea. Logan was right. He should have taken us back to Artesia. Or, we should have waited where we camped this morning. Just because he was safe there once before doesn't mean it's automatically safe now."

Will eyed her warily, then suggested, "Would you like a drink of water? It might help you calm down."

"I don't need to calm down. I am calm. I'm calm as a horse trough in a drought. I am a veritable sea of tranquility, do you hear me?"

He blinked. Twice. "Yes, ma'am."

She put her hands on her hips and stared at the entrance to the cave. "If he doesn't come out of there soon, I'm going to kill him."

She knew she wasn't making any sense, but that was beside the point. She was a wife and a mother; she didn't have to make sense.

Just when she was about to explode with fear-filled frustration, she saw Logan's hand emerge from the narrow black slit. Relief washed over her—until she got a good look at his face. "Something is wrong."

"No," he said. "Well, yes, I guess it is. We've an unexpected complication."

"Did you find someone dead inside?" Will piped up.

"Not another body!" Caroline exclaimed. "I can't deal with that tonight."

"No, I didn't find anybody dead. Come inside, you two. There is something you have to see."

Caroline took hold of the hand Logan offered and let him guide her through the slim opening and into the cavern, Will following on her heels. The interior was cool and dark, the air fresh and clean. She grabbed Logan's hand a little tighter as he waited a moment for their eyes to adjust to the dim light.

Off to their right, a soft glow of light provided a beacon in the darkness, and she wanted to cheer when Logan headed that direction despite the fact that the cavern appeared to narrow to the space of a doorway. The cave lent her voice a hollow sound as she asked, "What's there, Logan?"

"A surprise."

"I can't say I've enjoyed the surprises I've had lately."

"You'll like this one—though I have to say it's as prickly as a cactus."

"A prickly surprise?" At the passage, he stopped, then motioned for her to go first. Caroline gave him a long look then said, "Only because I trust you..." She stepped through, then stopped abruptly in shock. "Oh my God."

Behind her, Will gasped with pleasure. "Ben!"

Ben Whitaker stood at the center of a lantern-lit area the size of a small church, his arms spread wide and a warm smile on his face. "Hello, squiggles."

Caroline heard Logan murmur, "Squiggles?"

She ran into Ben's arms and inhaled his comfortable, familiar scent. "You're safe. Oh, thank God, you're safe." She cried and blubbered in his embrace for a bit, then pulled back and stared up into his pale blue eyes. Anger pulsed in her veins. "I could kill you, Ben Whitaker, for running off like you did."