Uncommon Passion (37 page)

“Fourteen years. Figure out romance and you can probably knock some time off.”

If Rachel could leave behind life at Elysian Fields, then he could leave behind a life of aimless

debauchery. “We’re about to find out.”

He got to his feet, crossed the garage, and held out his hand to his brother. When he was upright Sam

didn’t let go, but instead pulled Ben into a hard hug. “I missed you, man.”

He relaxed into the hug, into his brother’s heartbeat and breathing, familiar from the womb. “Yeah,”

Ben said. “Me, too.”

They parted, and this time it was Sam wiping tears on his shoulder. “Help Dad with the fences

sometime,” he said. “Pick up your guitar while you’re out there. Time we started playing together again.”

• • •

His brother, as usual, was right. He had to get his house in order, air it out and sweep it clean before he

invited anyone else into it. So he started with the obvious.

He deleted any contact from his phone that was a woman’s first name only, or worse, a descriptive

nickname.

He talked to Linc, made a couple of recommendations for replacements, and quit No Limits.

He lived with the great gaping hole inside him, dark and empty, oddly weightless but very specifically

shaped, curving against the interior of his ribs, present with every breath and heartbeat. He carried it

around, studied it, made peace with it. He went to briefings and did his job and let that darkness ride along.

Because Rachel shouldn’t have to save him.

As the summer progressed his awareness of it diminished, as if patience made it part of his lived

experience when alcohol, anger, resentment, sex, and adrenaline only fed it. Then he went to where it all

began. He went back to the Bar H to see his father.

He knew what he was getting into. His father was a hard man, a successful rancher, and Ben had been

pretty unforgivable. If his father didn’t throw him off the ranch, he’d spend all day out on the fence line

with a man he hadn’t talked to in over a decade, but driving past the turnoff to the creek reminded him

what was at stake, strengthening his resolve. He’d dressed for the job in work pants and sturdy boots, his

gloves on the seat beside him. When he pulled up the dirt driveway, his father was walking from the house

to the barn, dressed in a worn denim shirt with patches at the elbows. Time had bowed his shoulders a

little, and when he turned to see who was coming up the lane, Ben saw wisdom and pain etched into his

face.

“You get a new truck . . . ?” His gaze widened, taking in Ben’s broader shoulders and tanned face as he

got out of the truck, and probably the wary look in his eyes. “Ben?”

“Dad,” he said. When the silence stretched longer than Ben could bear, he added, “Sam said you were

mending fences today.”

Tears gleamed in his father’s eyes, but what tightened Ben’s throat was the way his father’s firm mouth

trembled. His father cleared his throat. “Yeah. I am.”

Ben ignored them, and the ones stinging behind his own eyes. “Need some help? I’ll drive.”

His father loaded a new spool of staples into the fencing gun. Together they tossed the wire, posthole

diggers, replacement posts, crowbar, hammer, and staples into the truck bed and climbed in. “South

pasture,” his father said, and Ben set off.

The smell of new grass and earth rose into the late spring sunshine while his father pried out the rotten

posts. Ben dug postholes for the new ones. His father held the post while Ben hammered it into place and

tamped down the dirt, then leaned his whole weight on it to test it. He gripped lengths of barbed wire in his

gloved hands while his father stapled them to the posts. The work was physical, required two people to do

it properly, and other than grunts and half-spoken instructions back and forth, mostly silent as they made

their way down the fence line.

He kept waiting for the accusations, for the argument. Instead he got the quiet presence of a man who’d

hurt, who’d learned lessons, who desperately wanted to make amends.

They were better than halfway done when his mother brought out lunch, steaming hot meatball

sandwiches, fruit, chips, brownies, and fresh lemonade. The tight squeeze of her hand, dotted with age

spots, made him duck his head as he thanked her. They sat on the pickup’s tailgate and ate overlooking the

creek.

“I always felt connected to this place,” Ben said, thinking about Rachel.

“I hoped one of you boys might take it over,” his father said.

Ben swallowed the last of his fresh lemonade before answering. “You never know, Dad. One of us

might.”

They finished the job as the sun set, bumping home over the hillocks as the sun bled red and orange in

the rearview mirror. He stayed for supper. His mother brought him up-to-date on local gossip, but the only

thing he remembered saying, over and over, was
I’m sorry
, words his father repeated while his mother

wept.

He promised to be at Sam’s on Sunday morning.

Before he left, he went into the room he shared with Sam for sixteen years. It was a craft room now,

where his mother made scrapbooks and knitted toys for his nieces, but when he opened the closet his guitar

case leaned against the back wall. He studied it, the stickers on the case, knew it would be out of tune and in

need of repair. But it was a good guitar, the one Sam bought for him with money he saved doing chores for

the next ranch over.

Could he be that man again? There was no point in playing the guitar if he didn’t bring passion and love

and intensity to the music, throw body and soul into a song.

He didn’t know. He honestly didn’t know.

It was time to find out who he could be.

Chapter Twenty-two

After crying in Rob’s arms, Rachel didn’t fal apart so much as disappear into the long, hot summer.

More baby goats arrived as the weeks passed. Business at the farm stand picked up as the growing season

progressed and the farm’s reputation grew. She planted and harvested, sold and educated, cared for the

baby goats and litters of kittens.

She continued to go to open-mike nights at Artistary, and used the long summer evenings to page

through apartment guides, and browse roommate want ads online. Reinventing herself wasn’t a one-time

thing. Every success, every failure offered the opportunity to adapt, but it required awareness. Patience.

She avoided apartment listings in Ben’s neighborhood.

One of the baristas at Artistary asked her on a date, so she went. She found she liked him, and so was

relieved when the budding romance faded into friendship. When it became clear that Rachel wouldn’t move

on from Ben to Rob, Jess became much easier to live with.

���You don’t change men like Ben Harris,” Jess commented from across the root vegetable table as

she unloaded another bushel of beets.

Rachel considered this while she jostled new potatoes in their sloped container until they found a

precarious synergy. Jess wasn’t jeering at Rachel for being naïve. If anything, she was commiserating.

Except Rachel had known exactly what Ben was from the moment he strode into the auction tent.

“I didn’t hope to change him,” she said finally. “He’s living on the fringes in so many ways. Always on

the outside looking in.”

“Housebreak him?”

She shot Jess a glance over the carrots. “He’s not a dog.”

“Tame him, then. He’s a wolf. A lone wolf.”

“Where are you getting these comparisons?”

“You lack an entire cultural framework,” Jess said. “Look, maybe he likes life on the edges. No

responsibilities. No obligations.”

Ben carried the weight of responsibilities so heavy they’d break a lesser man. “Maybe he does,” she

said.

She worked her way back into the Sunday morning cooking rotation, made more of an effort to hang

out with whichever A&M boys were sharing the bunkhouse. When the next term began she enrolled in

biology and chemistry classes at the community college. True to his word, Rob worked around her class

schedule, but the long drive took a toll on her. With fall coming she stepped up the search for a roommate

and a job in town. Positions at clinics were few and far between, but she circled them and applied online.

One day she was in the goat pen helping the vet give the kids a round of vaccinations, when her cell

phone rang. She lifted an eyebrow at the vet, in the process of laying out the drugs and syringes. He nodded

and Rachel stepped into the tack room that now doubled as storage.

“Hello?”

“I’m calling for Rachel Hill.” The accent was brusque, flat, and grating. A Yankee, and she didn’t know

any.

“Speaking.”

“Rachel, this is Dr. Carly Weisen. I own the Dog Days clinic in Galveston, and I’ve got an opening for a

receptionist. I understand you’re looking for a position in a clinic.”

Her heart stopped. She knew the names of all the clinics she’d applied to, and the Dog Days, one of

Galveston’s biggest, wasn’t on the list. Had Rob called someone and not mentioned it to her? “Yes, ma’am,”

she said. “I am, but how did you know?”

“I have the contract to care for the Galveston Police Department’s K-9 animals. Hera, the SWAT team’s

dog was in for her annual checkup yesterday. One of the officers with her saw the sign on the front door

and said I couldn’t hire a more committed, dedicated, hardworking individual.”

Ben. Rachel sank down on a hay bale.

“I’m from New York,” Dr. Weisen continued, “but I’ve learned that when a Texas man leans on a

counter and plays up his drawl, he’s charming you into something.”

Definitely Ben.

“Or out of something, but in this case Officer Harris charmed me into giving you an interview. Tell me

about your experience.”

Apparently the interview was right now. Rachel ducked into the tack room and related her history and

experiences with record keeping for Elysian Fields and Silent Circle Farm.

“Any experience with AVImark?”

AVImark was a common system to track appointments and patient records. She knew this from

position descriptions but had never seen the software in use. “No, ma’am,” she said, “but I’m a fast

learner.”

Rachel heard keyboard keys tapping. “He must like you very much,” Dr. Weisen said absently.

“Yes, ma’am,” she said. Was it true? Weeks and weeks of the summer gone without a word from Ben.

No texts, no emails, no calls. Then this. Out of the blue. Totally unexpected.

Just a chance at the most important thing in her life.

“When can you come in so we can talk face-to-face, and you can take a look around the clinic?”

• • •

When Rachel arrived the clinic was quiet except for one little dog barking frantically in the kennels until

Dr. Weisen took her out and held her. She showed Rachel the exam rooms, the lab in the back, the surgery,

and the outdoor kennels. “We’re open late a couple of nights a week. Any scheduling concerns?” she asked

as they made their way back to the receptionist area.

“I’m applying to vet tech school. I was homeschooled so my science isn’t quite up to standards but I’m

taking night classes in the fall,” she said steadily. “Once I get into school, I’ll be in class during the day.”

She glanced at Rachel’s unpolished, blunt nails and tough hands. “I grew up on a working dairy farm in

upstate New York. I’m the first person in my family to go to college. I know what it’s like to work your

way through the world.” She gave Rachel a smile. “The job’s yours if you want it.”

“I do,” Rachel said. “I really do. Thank you.”

They settled on a start date. Outside the clinic Rachel pulled her phone from her purse. After a

moment’s thought, she sent Ben a text.

I got the job. Thank you.

The answer arrived while she was waiting at the light at the corner.

You’re welcome.

That was it.

Suddenly change was in the wind at Silent Circle Farm. The sweet baby goats weren’t so sweet

anymore, instead capering around the pen and testing Rachel’s knots. After deciding that farming wasn’t for

her, Jess took a position in the kitchen of an organic restaurant in Houston. The A&M boys all went back to

school. Rachel found a roommate-wanted ad on Craigslist with the header NOPARTIES! NO DRINKING!

NO DRUGS! She emailed the poster, had coffee with a no-nonsense nurse who worked nights, and rented

her second bedroom.

On moving day Rob followed her into town with his truck and helped her purchase and bring home a

single bed, dresser, bookshelf, and a desk. When all the furniture was assembled and arranged, he packed

up his toolbox and gave the room one last look. It was just a room, with beige carpet, cream walls, and

cream vinyl blinds covering the window, but it was hers, paid for with money she earned at her job.

“It’s not exactly my own apartment,” she said. “But I’ll get there.”

“I don’t doubt it,” he said. “I’m sorry things didn’t work out.”