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Tanner shot another look at Keira, still baffled at her hesitation, but then turned his attention back to Monty. “Yes. I’d like to see how Ellen’s doing,” he said.
“And your mother,” Monty added. “She’s been looking forward to your visit.”
Tanner doubted that. He and his stepmother had never been close and less so since David’s death. She had never come out and said it, but he knew she blamed him for the accident. And why not? Tanner blamed himself, as well. If he had been more insistent, he would have been driving his stepbrother back to the hotel. And both he and David would have made it safely to Cheyenne.
“Are you coming, Keira?” Monty asked as he dropped his worn cowboy hat on his head.
“Maybe later. I’ve got to cut out some wallets before I quit for the day.”
“Can’t that wait?” Monty asked.
“No. Not if we have to work on Tanner’s saddle, too.” Keira’s unexpectedly sharp tone grated on Tanner. But he shook off his frustration.
He’d gotten his first visit with Keira out of the way. Though he’d hoped his heart wouldn’t race at the sight of her, at least that was done. Maybe next time he saw her he would feel more even-keeled.
Help me, Lord, he prayed as he clapped his hat on his head. Help me get through this emotional tangle.
He turned up the collar of his jacket and followed Monty out of the shop and over the snow-covered yard to the house, shivering as he stepped from the warmth of the shop into the chill of the outside air. Help me get through the next couple of days. Help me stay focused on what I set out to do.
He felt guilty praying to God right now. Living the life of a rodeo cowboy wasn’t always conducive to a robust spiritual life. Too many late nights. Too many weekends taken up with riding and work and getting over injuries. Then back to work, only to repeat the same weekend cycle.
But he knew God was real, and right now he needed all the help he could get.
The snow squeaked under their feet, showing him how cold it was outside. Thanksgiving was just around the corner, and there were still months of winter ahead. Tanner looked out over the hills blanketed with snow undulating to mountains sharply etched against a sky so blue it hurt his eyes. Gray clouds were piling up on the horizon, hinting at potential winter storms.
But for now the sun shone on Refuge Ranch, sparkling off the snow-covered hills.
“The house won’t be as noisy as usual,” Monty explained as they walked toward the it. “Ellen usually takes care of John’s little girl, but he’s got her today. He’s doing some bookwork in his house.”
“I heard that he came back here with his daughter after his wife died. That’s a sad story.”
“It is. But Adana’s a little treasure and we’re all pretty crazy about her. Taking care of her is a small price to pay to have John back. His father was the best hand a rancher could ask for, and John has the same cattle smarts his father did.”
“John was always a good, solid guy,” Tanner said. “I always thought he and Heather were a better match than her and Mitch.”
“Didn’t we all,” Monty said, shooting Tanner a look, as if he was thinking the same thing about him and Keira.
Tanner kept his comments to himself. No sense in digging up the past.
They walked up the steps, and Tanner pulled open the door to the porch.
“Got company,” Monty boomed as the porch door fell shut behind them.
Warmth from the adjoining kitchen slowly penetrated the many layers of clothing Tanner had on. He stripped off his coat and hung it and his hat on an empty hanger in the porch. Then he toed off his boots, set them aside and followed Monty into the familiar coziness of the ranch house.
“We fixed up the kitchen since you been here,” Monty said as he led Tanner through the room as familiar to him as the kitchen on his parents’ ranch. “Ellen had a notion she wanted some fancy new stove and fridge and granite countertops. Place looks like a dairy barn with all these shiny appliances far as I’m concerned,” he said, waving a dismissive hand at the stainless-steel stove, refrigerator and dishwasher. “At least she kept the table in the nook.”
A large bay window with French doors opening to a snow-covered deck was home to a small wooden table with mismatched chairs that, Tanner knew, were part of Monty’s father and grandfather’s ranch house that this house had replaced.
“Still looks cozy,” Tanner said, stopping by the table. He remembered drinking many a cup of hot chocolate in the winter or root beer in the summer at this table when he and Keira were dating. Refuge Ranch had truly lived up to its name when his own home had been a place of discord and conflict. Tanner’s father, Cyrus, had married Alice less than a year after his wife’s death, when Tanner was only three. David was born within the first year of that marriage. While David and Tanner always got along, Tanner remembered many fights between Cyrus and Alice, though he never knew the cause.
Yet in spite of their antagonism, Alice had inherited the entire ranch when Cyrus died. Tanner had suspected that his father had neglected to change his will as he had always promised Tanner he would. To be fair, his father hadn’t planned on having a heart attack when he was still in his prime, but still...
Then, shortly after the funeral, Alice had made it crystal clear that her son David would be the one to run the ranch. Not Tanner.
He had kept the shame and pain of it to himself after his father’s death, unable to tell Keira.
All throughout their courtship she talked about moving to the Fortier ranch and how they would fix it up. Tanner knew how much she loved the wide-open spaces of the ranch and the valley. He knew how hard it would be for her to move into town. Too proud to tell her exactly why, he started working as a mechanic, trying to to scrape enough money together to find a small place outside town and still find a way for him to make a living. Weekends were spent rodeoing. Things had slowly been coming together and he’d weathered their fights, hoping to present it to her once he had a place to buy. Only then did he mean to tell her about his father’s will and the repercussions for them.
He’d obviously waited too long. After one particularly bad fight about why he was gone so much and working so hard, she had given him back his ring. After a long spell of work and rodeoing, he realized he had to tell her about Cyrus’s will. He called her, saying that he had important news. Nothing.
Then he texted her. Again, nothing.
He came back to Saddlebank to talk to her in person, but she was gone. She couldn’t or wouldn’t give him that second chance or any explanation why.
He hadn’t heard from her since.
“Hey, ladies, look who I brought,” Monty announced as they stepped into the large, exposed-beamed living room. A fire crackled in the woodstove, generating a welcome heat.
His stepmother sat on a leather easy chair, facing him, her blond hair cut in a serviceable page boy, dark framed glasses emphasizing her green eyes. She wore a white shirt, black chinos and sensible white shoes, all of which combined to make her look precisely like the nurse she was.
Ellen sat with her back to him, her long brown hair, tinged with gray, pulled back in a ponytail hanging over the large brace that held her neck and upper chest immobilized. She sat upright in a chair and as she slowly got to her feet Tanner winced at the sight of the brace.
“I know, I know, I look like an alien,” Ellen said, her voice sounding restricted and strained. “I hope I don’t scare you too much. I’d still like a hug.”
“Be careful,” Monty whispered, detaining Tanner a moment. “She’s still in a lot of pain.”
Tanner nodded and slowly approached Ellen and, bending over, brushed a gentle kiss on her cheek. “Sorry, Ellen, that’s all you get from me for now.”
She smiled up at him and reached up to touch his face, then blanched in pain. “I keep thinking I can do what I used to. But it’s great to see you again. Though you look tired.”
“Been a long drive,” was all he said, glancing over at his stepmother. “Hello, Alice,” he said.
Alice set her cup aside, brushed her hands over her pants and slowly rose to greet him, as well. That Ellen, in spite of her disability, was quicker to greet him than his stepmother rankled.
Alice walked over and managed a perfunctory hug then pulled back, folding her arms over her chest. “Hello, Tanner. Good to see you. How have you been?”
“Good.” He struggled to think of what else to say. Since that horrible conversation when she’d accused him of causing David’s death, every exchange with her was stilted and strained.
The problem was, her accusations—spoken and unspoken—only underlined what he had always thought himself.
If he hadn’t let David stay behind to spend time with that girl, David would still be alive.
Monty walked over to his wife and kissed her lightly on the cheek. “How are you feeling, my dear?” Concern laced his voice and Ellen gave him a faint smile.
“Exactly the same as I did when you left two hours ago to go coffee drinking,” she said, a note of humor in her voice. “Would you like some coffee, Tanner?”
“Sorry, but I’d like to get back to the ranch and catch up on some phone calls and paperwork.” He caught a frown from Alice. “If that’s okay?” he added.
His stepmother shook her head with an expression of regret. “I’m sorry, but you can’t. I thought while I was here taking care of Ellen, I would get some renovations done on the house,” she said. “So it isn’t livable right now. In fact, I’ve been staying here at the ranch the past couple of nights.”
“So you’re saying I should stay somewhere else?”
“Might be a good idea.”
Her voice held a bite that he was too tired to interpret.
“You can stay here,” Monty said, slapping Tanner on the back. “Give you a chance to spend time with your mother, catch up with us. Keep tabs on your saddle’s repair.”
His stepmother didn’t seem pleased with the idea and he guessed that Keira would feel much the same.
“I don’t think so,” Tanner said. “I’ll try to find a place in town instead.”
“Don’t know if you’ll be able to,” Monty said. “There’s some hockey tournament going on this weekend in Saddlebank. Fairly sure the few hotels we got are full. So I guess you’re stuck here.”
Tanner stifled a sigh, feeling as if he was slowly getting pushed into a tight corner. Never a good place to be. “I’m not sure—”
“Not sure about what? We got plenty of room. John is staying in the house his parents used to live in, and our last hired hand quit on us so the bunkhouse is empty. You can stay there. It’s all ready to go. Trust me, its no problem.”
Tanner was about to object again but felt that doing so would make him look ungrateful and un-neighborly. He eased out a smile. “Sure. I guess I can stay. I’m only here for a couple of days.”
“It will take longer than that to fix David’s saddle,” Monty said. “Besides, you can help. You know a few things about saddle repair. You and Keira used to hang out at the shop all the time.”
“David’s saddle?” Alice glanced from Tanner to Monty, looking confused. “Why does Monty need to fix David’s saddle?”
“I’ve been using it all season and it needs some work,” Tanner said, glancing over at his stepmother. “It got a real working over the last time I competed.”
“You’ve been using it this year?” Alice asked.
“All year,” Tanner replied. “It’s been a busy run.”
“When are you ever going to quit the rodeo?” Ellen asked, a note of disappointment lacing her voice. “Surely your mechanic work keeps you busy enough?”
“It does. But I’ve got some good workers who are running it for me. Just hired a foreman last year so I could do this one last circuit.”
“Will this really be the last?” Monty asked. “I know you cowboys. You don’t quit until you’re dragged from the arena on a backboard. Surely you need to decide when the time comes...” He let the sentence fade away but Tanner finished it for him.
“To hang up my rigging and my spurs,” Tanner said. “Yeah. I know. Hopefully this year will be that year.”
“Why are you using David’s saddle?” Alice asked. “Don’t you have your own?”
Tanner was silent a moment, trying to find the right way to answer her.
“I do. But I wanted to finish what David started before...before he died.” It had been two years since David’s death, and those words could still cut like a knife. “So I thought I would use his saddle and dedicate the season to him. I want to take the saddle all the way to the NFR. But it got busted up at the last rodeo. Monty said he would fix it for me so I could finish with it at Las Vegas.”
He hadn’t told Alice what he’d been doing. He had hoped to surprise her after the season was over and give her David’s saddle as a memento. Tell her face-to-face why he did what he did. Hope that, by some miracle, she would grant him some measure of absolution.
Their eyes held and for a moment, her smile softened and he recognized it for what it was. A small movement toward forgiveness. Then she gave a curt nod and her mouth shifted into the polite smile he knew only too well.
“I think that’s admirable,” she said, her tone impersonal. “I’ll guess we’ll have to see how you do in the end.”
The end. For a brief moment Tanner wondered if there would be an end to his quest. To his desire for some type of reconciliation with the only person he could legitimately call family. His father and stepbrother were gone. He and Alice only had each other. All his life he’d hoped for some kind of relationship with her. While she may not have given birth to him, in truth, she had been the only mother he’d ever know.
But now, as ever, her manner was aloof, reserved and cool.
Time to go.
“So, the bunkhouse?” Tanner asked Monty.
“It’s all fixed up. Do you want me to bring you there? It’s not locked.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll come over with clean sheets for the bed,” Alice said, getting up from her chair.
“Just tell me where they are. I can make a bed.” She was the one who had taught him, after all.
“Of course. I’ll get them for you.”
She left and Tanner caught Ellen watching him, the neck and chest brace supporting her head giving her a vulnerable look. “We’ve missed you, Tanner. I’m glad you’re staying here.” Her voice, sounding so strained created an extra poignancy.
“I’m glad I’m back, too,” he said quietly, though staying on the ranch with Keira so close by was not how he had envisioned his temporary stay.
His mother came back with a stack of sheets and some towels. “I gave you extra. Just in case.”
Tanner gave her a tight nod, then took a step back. “I better get myself set up.”
“And we’ll see you for supper tonight?”
Resistance rose up again but the expectant looks on Monty’s and Ellen’s faces quashed it. Surely he could manage this for these dear people, who had been such a part of his life so long?
“Sure. What time?”
“Come at six.”
He gave them another smile, glanced over at his mother, who stood with her arms crossed, her stolid expression making him wonder if he had imagined that momentary bond.
A few moments later he was walking toward his truck, his breath creating clouds of fog in the chill winter air. He stopped at the truck, dug his keys out of his pocket one-handed and caught a movement from the saddle shop.
Keira stood in the doorway and his heart pounded doubletime in his chest. For a moment his thoughts drifted back to times he would help her in the shop, then go out for a ride in the hills. He watched her a moment, but he could see her eyes weren’t on him. They were on the mountains just beyond the edges of Refuge Ranch.
Her arms were wrapped around her midsection. Then, to his surprise, he saw her hand swipe at her cheeks.
As if she were crying.
* * *
“Excellent meal, Ellen,” Tanner said as he set his knife and fork on his plate and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “I haven’t had a good Angus steak for ages.”
