Jake (13 page)

“It’s worth a try.” The chief glanced at Meg. “That is, if you’re willing, Miss Stanford.”

Meg was chewing on her lower lip. “I don’t like the idea of having all of you involved in my troubles. Especially if this intruder decides to get even more vicious than just doing damage to a rental car. You’ll all be vulnerable.”

“That’s what neighbors do.” Cole laid a big hand over hers and squeezed.

She let out a long, slow breath. “Thank you. You’re all being so kind. And honestly, I can’t think of any other solution. I’m such a coward, but I know I’d never be able to sleep in my father’s house another night, knowing someone was waiting for his next chance to break in.”

“It’s only for a few days, Miss Stanford.” The chief lumbered to his feet. “At least, Jake, you’ve got us thinking in a new direction. I’m going to ask around town, see what I can find out.” He turned to Meg. “I’ll be at your father’s funeral tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Chief Fletcher.”

“See you, Cory.” When the chief dropped a hand on the boy’s shoulder, Cory flinched before looking away. Everett smiled at Phoebe and Ela. “Breakfast was certainly worth the long drive, ladies. My thanks to you both.”

At the back door he retrieved his wide-brimmed hat before walking out to his car.

When he was gone, Jake looked at Meg and Cory. “Why don’t I drive you both back and you can pack a few things?”

“Right now?” Meg pushed back her chair and stood. “I don’t see why we can’t stay at my father’s place for the day.”

He nodded. “All right. You ought to be perfectly safe all day. Whoever is trying to scare you off is afraid to show his face. Why else would he wait until dark to make an appearance?”

Meg turned to Phoebe and Ela. “I’m sorry that we’ll be making extra work for both of you.”

Phoebe answered for both of them. “We’re happy to make you welcome in our home.” She turned to Cory. “Especially because it’s been much too long since we’ve had a boy to fuss over.”

Calling out their good-byes and thanks, Meg and Cory trailed Jake to the mudroom and out the back door. Instead of going to his truck, Jake led them toward the barn, where he spent the next hour examining Shadow’s leg and injecting the colt with an antibiotic before wrapping the leg with clean dressings.

Seeing Jake’s look of concern, Cory looped an arm around the colt’s neck, pressing his face to the soft, velvet muzzle. “Shadow’s leg is getting better, isn’t it?”

Jake forced himself to smile. “I wouldn’t say he’s out of the woods yet, but at least the leg isn’t getting any worse.”

Cory murmured words of encouragement to his colt. “I have to leave you for a little while, but tonight I can spend as much time with you as I like. And maybe, if nobody minds, I’ll even sleep out here with you.”

Jake stood to one side, watching the play of emotions on the boy’s face. It was clear that Cory loved this colt with all his heart.

As they made their way to his truck, he found himself hoping that the drugs worked their miracle as promised. If anybody deserved some good news, it was Cory Stanford. With the loss of his mother and now his father, the boy had faced enough hard times in his young life.

Chapter Ten

On the way to the Stanford ranch, Jake played his phone messages and found himself wondering if there were enough hours in the day to complete all the ranch visits before dark.

Meg studied him as he dropped the phone into his shirt pocket. “I’m sorry we cost you a night’s sleep.”

“Don’t be.” He gave her a smile guaranteed to melt her heart. “All in a day’s work for a Wyoming veterinarian. If it weren’t you, it would have been Flora’s cat or Honey about to give birth to her litter.”

“Those are legitimate reasons to lose sleep.”

“I’d say your emergency was as legitimate as it gets.”

Meg couldn’t help smiling. “Cory and I can’t thank you enough.”

He pulled up to their ranch house. “If you’d like, I could call you when I’m finished with my last patient and pick you up on my way home.”

She shook her head as she climbed down from his truck. “Cory and I will drive over to your place in my car.”

“Okay. I’ll see you at supper time.”

She and Cory waved until he turned the truck around and headed back toward the highway.

When he was gone, Meg took a deep breath and climbed the steps to the back door. She turned to Cory, who hung back. “Coming in?”

“Naw.” He kicked at the dirt. “Guess I’ll do some things in the barn.”

“All right. Don’t forget to pack whatever you’ll need for a couple of days at the Conway ranch.”

He nodded before shoving his hands in his pockets and starting toward the barn.

Meg watched him walk away before turning and letting herself into the house. Despite the heat of the day she shivered. Then, squaring her shoulders, she decided to do something about the gloom of this place.

Meg looked around the great room with a sense of deep satisfaction. She’d begun by taking down all the heavy, dusty draperies that probably hadn’t been cleaned in years. Now sunlight flooded the room. Because there were pull-down blinds for privacy, she had no need to return the drapes to the windows.

She’d boxed up dozens of old framed photos, labeling the top of each box so that she would know which ones she wanted to keep, and which ones Cory would want. A third box held pictures of her father with his second wife, and Meg found herself wondering if Sherry had any distant relatives who might enjoy them.

She finished with a thorough dusting of the shelves, mantel, and faded oak floor. A smile tugged the corners of her mouth. Her father wouldn’t even recognize the place.

She headed up the stairs to pack what she would need for her stay with the Conways. After that, she intended to tackle her father’s room and eliminate a few dozen more boxes she’d spotted in his closet.

Meg folded yet another Western shirt, her father’s trademark, and placed it in a bulging plastic bag. When she’d removed all the shirts and pants from their hangers, she started on the tall leather boots lined up on the floor of the closet.

After bagging several pairs, she caught sight of the large box stored behind them. It was a plain brown box with no markings of any kind. With a sigh she set it inside a large plastic bin into which she’d already tossed several photograph albums. These would give her something to do at the Conway ranch. Whenever she wanted to slip away from the others, she could pass the time going through old photos.

It took her the better part of the day to completely empty her father’s closet. Then she tackled the dresser drawers.

She stood back to admire her handiwork. Ten plastic bags lined the hallway outside her father’s room, ready to be hauled to town. She’d been assured by Reverend Cornell, pastor of the Paintbrush Church, that a group of volunteers would see that everything was clean and mended before their annual clothing drive.

As she headed toward the shower, she felt a warm glow that came from a day of hard work. She’d missed this. With her work as a trial lawyer, the days and weeks of preparation often culminated in a settlement rather than in the satisfaction of a hard-fought trial. She preferred the trial. But it was really the hard work that went into each and every case that gave her the greatest sense of satisfaction.

She had always felt that way.

As a child she’d often worked alongside her father and the wranglers, sharing the hard, dirty, muscle-straining work required for the smooth operation of a ranch. She’d never forgotten the reward of such hard work. Whether it was a clean stall or a healthy horse, bales of hay in the field, or a sturdy roof over the barn, it was instant gratification. There was always a sense that all that hard work paid off. Not to mention the glow that came from the knowledge that her father approved of her.

That approval had meant the world to her as a child.

The thought had her frowning. As always, the old doubts and hurts crept in to taunt her.

If Porter had really approved of her, he would have fought to see her. Instead, he’d let her go without a word, and he had made no attempt to have any personal contact with her through the years.

What kind of father swept his daughter out of his life, and out of his thoughts, like so much dust?

She stripped and stepped under the hot spray, wishing as always that she could wash away the sting of her father’s dismissal as easily as the grime of hard work.

In her old bedroom she pulled on a pair of clean denims and a cotton blouse of apple green. She allowed her hair to air dry while she packed a few necessities in an overnight bag. Slinging it over her shoulder, she paused to pick up the plastic bin in her father’s room, and then headed down the stairs and out to the barn where she’d stored the rental car.

After stashing her things in the trunk, she called out for Cory. Her voice echoed around the empty barn.

Getting no reply, she struggled against the sudden panic that lodged in her throat. She’d been so preoccupied with work in the house, she hadn’t given a single thought to Cory, out here in the barn. What if the intruder had found him, alone and vulnerable, and had kidnapped him?

Or what if Cory, giving in to loneliness and fear, had run off somewhere to grieve by himself?

He was just a little kid. A frightened, very lonely little boy. There was no telling what kind of trouble he could find himself in.

Nudging aside the fear that sent a trickle of ice along her spine, she drove the car to the back door before racing inside.

Cupping her hands to her mouth she called his name as loudly as she could before running from room to room.

Minutes later his head appeared at the top of the stairs. “Yeah?”

She felt a dizzying wave of relief, and realized that her nerves were strung as tightly as violin strings. “There you are. Have you packed some things?”

“Doing it now.”

“All right. I have the car outside. Let’s go.”

She turned away and put a hand against the door to steady herself. She was going to have to do something about this unreasonable fear. She mentally cursed the intruder who had planted this seed of distrust in her heart.

The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that Jake was right in thinking that she had been the target of this man’s wrath. For whatever reason, he wanted to frighten her.

And he had done a very good job of it.

“Come on, Cory.” Meg’s voice sounded shrill to her own ears, and she took several deep breaths, hoping to calm her nerves.

When she heard no response, she climbed the stairs and stepped into the boy’s room. He was busy stuffing things into a backpack.

He looked up in surprise, his tone betraying his frustration. “I’m almost ready.”

Meg felt a wave of remorse. Poor kid. He probably felt every bit as pressured as she did. “It’s okay. Take your time. I’m not in any rush. Do you need any help?”

“No.”

As Cory zipped his backpack, Meg paused to study the row of faded photos that lined his dresser top. She picked up one of a young teenage girl laughing with a scruffy youth.

“Is this your mother?”

Cory glanced over. “Yeah.”

She pointed to the boy. “Who’s this?”

He shrugged and looked away. “Don’t know,” he muttered.

“You never asked your mother who he is?”

Cory gave a shrug. “Why do you care?”

“Maybe it’s her brother. Maybe you have an uncle.”

“She was an orphan.”

“You’re sure?”

“That’s what she said. She was in fos…something.”

“Foster care?”

He nodded. “Yeah. That’s it.”

“And the boy with her? Was he in foster care, too?”

“I guess. His name is Blain. That’s all I know.” Cory struggled with the zipper of his backpack.

Something in his tone made Meg look at him, but the boy kept his gaze averted.

“Well.” She returned the photo to his dresser top and turned away. “I guess we’d better get moving.”

“I’m coming.” The boy descended the stairs behind her, his backpack looped over one arm.

At the back door she paused. “Did you remember a toothbrush?”

“Yeah.”

“Pajamas?”

He shrugged. “Don’t need ’em. Figured I’d sleep out in the barn with Shadow.”

“I don’t know if the Conways will allow it.”

“Then I’ll sleep in my underwear.” He brushed past her and stormed down the porch steps.

Meg locked the back door and followed. Once in the car she waited until he’d stowed his things and secured his seat belt.

She tried to keep things light. “I guess we won’t worry about getting lost on the way to the Conway ranch. It’s just over that hill, right?”

Cory shrugged and looked out the side window, shutting her out.

She turned on the radio and fiddled with the dials until she found a station playing country.

With Carrie Underwood singing, Meg put the car in gear and started along the gravel drive.

“
Right now
…”

As the song’s lyrics rolled over her, Meg added her own in her mind.

Right now, I wish I were slow-dancing….

The image of Jake Conway came unbidden to her mind, and she could almost feel his arms around her, leading her in a slow dance around the floor of some dusty saloon.

Damn the man. One kiss and he’d managed to take over her brain just the way she’d found herself wishing he would take over her body.

There was just something about that smooth-talking, slow-walking, sexy-as-sin cowboy that had a way of jumbling all her thoughts and making her feel all hot and cold and itchy.

Yeah. Itchy.

She almost laughed out loud. That was an apt description of the way she’d been feeling ever since she’d met him.

But she was a big girl now. Old enough to know that it wasn’t necessary to scratch every itch.

She would ignore the temptation to get to know Jake Conway better, even though the mere thought of him had her tingling with anticipation.

Just for a few more days to practice a little self-control. She would try to think of him as a client. One who was strictly off-limits. There had been enough of them in her career. Handsome, successful guys who figured that having a good-looking lawyer from one of the country’s top firms gave them license to ply their charms in the hope of guaranteeing that she would give them her full attention, at least until the trial was successfully completed. She’d learned early on to hold such clients at arm’s length without being too insulting. It took some finesse, but she’d mastered the art to such a degree, she had gained a reputation among her fellow lawyers as being tough as nails.