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“Yeah. I knew they would be. I was just waiting to call until I was thinking and talking a bit straighter. Were they watching the game?”
“They always watch your games, Nick.”
“Good boys. I miss them.”
So he always said, but she wasn’t going there with him right now. “How are you?”
“I have the feeling back in my arms and legs. They burned like they were on fire for a bit, but they’re better now. The E.R. doc said that was the neurons firing back up so I figure that’s a good sign.”
“Is there a diagnosis?”
“They think I have a spinal cord contusion. They make it sound serious, but you know doctors. They like complications and two-dollar terms no one else can understand. I’ll be fine.”
He didn’t sound it. He was talking so slowly she could have read the newspaper between sentences. “Do you feel like saying good-night to David and Derrick?”
“Sure. Put them on. I need some cheering up.”
That’s what she thought Brianna was for. She put the boys on speakerphone so they could both talk at once. Nick made light of the injury, like she’d known he would, and started joking with the boys as if this was just a regular Sunday night post-game chat.
He loved his sons. He even loved her in his own way. It just wasn’t enough. She backed from the room as an ache the size of Texas settled in her heart.
MORNING CAME early at Jack’s Bluff Ranch, and the sun was still below the horizon when Becky climbed from her bed. She’d had very little sleep, and her emotions were running on empty. Still she managed a smile as she padded into her sons’ room to get them up and ready for school.
“Okay, sleepyheads, time to rock and roll.”
“Already?” Derrick groaned and buried his head in his pillow.
David rubbed his eyes with his fists and yawned widely as he kicked off his covers. “How come you always say time to rock and roll when we’re just going to school?”
“Tradition. That’s what your grandma used to say to me.”
“Grandma said that?”
“Yes, she did. “Now up and at ’em. She said that, too. And wear something warm. It’s about twenty degrees colder than yesterday.”
“I wish it would snow,” Derrick said as he rummaged through the top drawer of his chest and came up with a red-and-white-striped rugby shirt.
“It never snows in Colts Run Cross,” David said.
“Not never, but rarely,” Becky agreed. But a cold front did occasionally reach this far south. Today the high would only be in the mid-forties with a chance of thundershowers.
“Have you talked to Daddy this morning?” Derrick asked.
“No, and I don’t think we should bother him with phone calls this early. Now get dressed, and I’ll see you at breakfast.”
Juanita was already at work in the kitchen and had been for over a half hour. Becky had heard the family cook drive up. She’d heard every sound since about 3:00 a.m. when she’d woken to a ridiculous nightmare about Nick’s getting hit so hard his helmet had flown off—with his head inside it.
Crazy, but anxiety had always sabotaged her dreams with weird and frightening images. Some people smoked cigarettes or drank or got hives when they were worried. She had nightmares. Over the last ten years, Nick had starred in about ninety-nine percent of them.
Juanita was sliding thick slices of bacon into a large skillet when Becky strode into the kitchen in her pink sweats and fuzzy slippers and poured herself a bracing cup of hot coffee.
The usually jovial Juanita stopped the task and stared soulfully at Becky. “I’m sorry to hear about Nick.”
“Thanks.” She hoped she would let it go at that.
“I brought the newspaper in. Nick’s picture is on the front page.”
The front page and no doubt all the morning newscasts, as well. Nick would be the main topic of conversation at half the breakfast tables in Texas this morning.
“The article said he may be out for the rest of the season,” Juanita said.
“The rest of the season could be only a game or two depending on whether or not Dallas wins its play-off games, but I don’t think anyone knows how long Nick will be on injured reserve.”
“I’m sure the boys are upset.”
“They talked to him last night, and he assured them he was fine. So I’d appreciate if you didn’t mention the article in the paper. They need to go to school and concentrate on their studies.”
“Kids at school will talk,” Juanita said. “Maybe it would be best if you show them the article and prepare them.”
Becky sighed. “You’re right. I should have thought of that myself.”
Juanita had been with them so long that she seemed like an extension of the family. She fit right in with the Collingsworth clan, none of whom had ever strayed far from Colts Run Cross.
And if Juanita had been helpful before, she’d been a godsend since Becky’s mother, Lenora, had started filling in as CEO for Becky’s grandfather, Jeremiah, after his stroke. Thankfully he was back in the office a few days a week now, and Lenora was completing some projects she’d started and easing her way out of the job that would eventually go to Langston. As Jeremiah said, he had oil in his blood.
Jack’s Bluff was the second largest ranch in Texas. Becky’s brothers Bart and Matt managed the ranch, and both had their own houses on the spread where they lived with their wives.
Her youngest brother, Zach, had recently surprised them all by falling madly in love with a new neighbor, marrying and also taking his first real job. He was now a deputy, in training for the county’s new special crimes unit. He and his wife, Kali, lived on her horse ranch.
And though her oldest brother Langston lived with his family in Houston, close to Collingsworth Oil where he served as president for the company, he had a weekend cabin on the ranch.
Her younger sister, Jaime, who’d never married or apparently given any thought to settling down or taking a serious job, lived in the big house with Becky and the boys, along with Becky’s mother, Lenora, and Jeremiah, their grandfather. Jeremiah was currently recovering from a lingering case of the flu that hadn’t been deterred by this year’s flu shot.
Commune might have been a better term for the conglomeration of inhabitants. Becky hadn’t planned to stay forever when she’d left Nick and returned to the ranch, but the ranch had a way of reclaiming its own.
The boys missed their father, but they were happy here. More important, they were safe from the kinds of problems that plagued kids growing up in the city.
Becky took her coffee and walked to the den. Almost impulsively, she reached for the remote and flipped on the TV. She was caught off guard as a picture of Nick with David and Derrick flashed across the screen.
Anger rose in her throat. How dare they put her boys’ pictures on TV without her permission? Both she and Nick had always been determined to keep them out of the limelight.
“Nick Ridgely’s estranged wife Becky is one of the Collingsworths of Collingsworth Oil and Jack’s Bluff Ranch. His twin sons Derrick and David live on the ranch with their mother. There’s been no word from them on Nick’s potentially career-ending injury.”
She heard the back door open and Bart’s voice as he called to Juanita about the terrific odors coming from the kitchen. Becky switched off the TV quickly and joined them in the kitchen. It would be nice to make it through breakfast without a mention of Nick, but she knew that was too much to hope for.
The next best thing was to head her family off at the pass and keep them from upsetting Derrick and David with new doubts about their father’s condition. Nick had left things on a positive note, and she planned to keep them there.
The phone rang, and she inwardly grimaced. Where there’s a way, there would be a reporter with questions. And once they started, there would be no letup. Whether she liked it or not, she and her family, especially her sons, were about to be caught in the brutal glare of the public eye.
BULL STARED in the mirror as he yanked on his jeans. “Hell of a looker you are to be living like this,” he muttered to himself. Without bothering to zip his pants, he padded barefoot across the littered floor of the tiny bedroom and down the short hall to the bathroom.
After he finished in the john, he stumbled sleepily to the kitchen, pushed last night’s leftovers out of his way and started a pot of coffee. This was a piss-poor way to live but still better than that crummy halfway house he’d been stuck in until last week.
And the price was right. Free, unless you counted the food he donated to the roaches and rats that homesteaded here. The cabin had been in his family for years, but he was only passing through until he came up with a plan to get enough money to start over in Mexico.
His parole officer expected him to get a job. Yeah, right. Everyone was just jumping for joy at the chance to hire a man fresh out of prison for stabbing a pregnant woman while in the throes of road rage. No matter that she deserved it.
He stamped his feet to get his blood moving and fight the chill. The cabin was without any heat except what he could get from turning on the oven, and he didn’t have the propane to waste on that. The only reason he had electricity was because he’d worked for the power company in his earlier life just long enough to learn how to connect to the current and steal the watts he needed.
Once the coffee was brewing, he started the daily search for the remote. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear the rats hid it every night while he was sleeping. This time it turned up under the blanket he’d huddled under to watch the late show last night.
The TV came to life just as the local station broke in with a news flash. He turned up the volume to get the full story. It was all about Nick Ridgely. Apparently he’d gotten seriously injured in Sunday’s game. Like who gave a damn about Nick Ridgely?
They showed a picture of him with his sons. Cute kids. But then they would be. Nick was married to Becky Collingsworth. He still had sordid dreams about her in those short little skirts and sweaters that showed off her perky breasts.
But the bitch had never given him the time of day. The announcer referred to her as Nick’s estranged wife. Apparently she’d dumped him. Or maybe he’d dumped her. Either way they were both fixed for life, lived like Texas royalty with money to burn while he lived in this dump. The little money he’d stashed away before prison was nearly gone.
No cash. No job. Nothing but a parole officer who kept him pinned down like a tiger in a cage.
Bull’s muscles tightened as perverted possibilities skittered through his mind. He went back to the kitchen for coffee, took a long sip and cursed himself silently for even considering doing something that could land him right back in prison.
Still the thoughts persisted and started taking definite shape as the image of Nick Ridgely’s twin sons seared into his mind.
Chapter Two
“Too bad about your dad.”
“Yeah, man. Tough.”
Derrick joined the boys entering the school after recess. “I talked to him last night. He’ll be back and better than ever.”
“That’s not what they said on TV this morning.”
David pushed into the line beside them. “Yeah, but they don’t know. My mother said they’re just making news.”
“Well, my daddy said neck injuries are the worst kind. Anyway, I’m sorry he got hurt,”
“Me, too,” Butch Kelly added. “I’d be scared to death if it was my dad.”
“It’s not like he’s crippled or anything,” David said. “He just took a hit.”
Janie Thomas squeezed in beside Derrick. “They put your picture on TV, too. My big sister thinks you’re cute.”
“Yeah, David, you’re cute,” Derrick mocked, making his voice sound like a girl.
“You look just like me, you clown. If I’m cute, you are, too.”
David followed Derrick to their lockers. They were side by side because they were assigned in alphabetical order. He shrugged out of his jacket and took off the Dallas Cowboys cap his dad had gotten signed by all his teammates. Derrick had one, too. His was white. David’s was blue. He wore it everywhere he went.
“Are you worried about Daddy?” Derrick asked.
“I am now,” David admitted. “Do you think he might really be hurt too bad to ever play again?”
“I don’t know. I think we should ask Uncle Langston to fly us to Dallas to check on him.”
“Momma said we couldn’t go.”
“She said we couldn’t miss school, but he could fly us up there at noon, and we could be home by bedtime, like he did when he took us to watch Daddy play the Giants back in October.”
David shrugged. “Yeah. Maybe, but I bet Momma’s still going to say no.”
“We ought to call Uncle Langston. He might talk her into it.”
“We’d miss practicing for the pageant.”
“So what?” Derrick scoffed. “How much practice does it take to be a shepherd?”
“I’m the little drummer boy.”
“Big deal. You just follow the music. I say we call him. The worse thing he can do is say no.”
“The office won’t let us use the phone unless it’s an emergency.”
“Our daddy might be hurt bad,” Derrick said. “That’s an emergency.”
“You’re right. Let’s go call Uncle Langston now. Maybe he’ll check us out early, and we won’t have to do math.”
“I like that plan. I hate multiplication. It’s stupid to do all that work when you can just punch it in the calculator and get the answer right away.”
The boys went straight to the office. The good news was that Mrs. Gravits, who worked behind the desk, let them use the phone to call their uncle. The bad news was that Langston wasn’t in.
They left a message with his secretary saying they really needed to fly to Dallas today.
BECKY DROVE up to the church ten minutes before the scheduled time for practice to end. Several mothers were already waiting, parked in the back lot nearest the educational building. Her friend Mary Jo McFee waved from her car. Becky waved back.
Normally she would have walked over and spent the ten minutes of waiting time chatting, but she knew that conversation today with anyone would mean answering questions about Nick, and she wasn’t up to that.
As it was, the phone at the big house had rung almost constantly since breakfast, and Matt had wranglers guarding the gate to keep the media vultures off ranch property. A couple of photographers had almost gotten to the house before they were turned back.
Becky leaned back and tried to relax before she faced her energetic sons who’d no doubt have new questions of their own about their father. Five minutes later, a couple of girls came out of the church. Mary Jo’s daughter was one of them.
A couple of boys came next, and less than a minute later, the rest of the kids came pouring out the door. Some ran to waiting cars; the ones who lived nearby started walking away in small groups.
Two boys climbed on the low retaining wall between the church and the parking lot. A couple of girls pulled books from their book bags and started reading. But there was no sign of David and Derrick.
Becky waited as a steady group of cars arrived to pick up the waiting children. Her cell phone rang just as the last kid left in a black pickup truck.
She checked the ID and decided not to answer when she didn’t recognize the caller. Probably yet another reporter, though she had no idea how they kept getting her cell phone number.
