The Cowboy (10 page)

“Trace, you can’t do that,” Summer protested, as she rose to confront him.

Trace’s lip curled in disgust at his sister’s defense of Bad Billy Coburn. “He’s a drunken brawler. I don’t need his kind working for me.”

“You don’t know a thing about him!” she cried. “Luke started it by insulting Emma. Billy was only defending his sister.”

Trace’s gaze shifted to the tall, redheaded Coburn girl, who was being dragged away by her father. It was then he realized Johnny Ray Coburn had left his son lying on the ground without even checking on him. What kind of father was he, Trace wondered, to let his children get involved in a fight without interfering to save them from harm?

Trace saw the older man weaving and stumbling away with his daughter and realized Johnny Ray’s son had grown up to be just like his father—a drunken, scrapping, care-for-nobody.

He turned back to Summer. “Don’t defend that bast—” He cut himself off. Now she had him swearing in front of her. “Don’t defend Bad Billy Coburn to me, Summer. Any man who was a man, wouldn’t fight where women might get hurt.”

“Don’t spout platitudes at me, Trace,” Summer retorted, jabbing him in the chest with her pointed finger.
“You hit Billy with a sucker punch, showing off for Callie Creed.”

“I was not—” Trace cut off his denial. Maybe Summer was right. He wanted Callie’s admiration. But he’d sunk pretty low, if he was reduced to fighting for it.

Trace felt like hitting something. Unfortunately, his cowhands were keeping their distance. And Bad Billy Coburn was still flat on his back.

Trace frowned as Summer knelt beside the fallen cowboy. His brow furrowed more deeply when she brushed the sweaty black hair from Bad Billy’s brow and pulled the bandanna from Billy’s pocket to dab at the blood streaming from his mouth and nose.

He’d thought Summer had merely stumbled onto the fight and gotten involved in an attempt to help the Creed boy, who was younger and slighter and had less experience brawling than Bad Billy. But as Summer spoke in soothing tones to the downed man, it became increasingly apparent that his sister was somehow involved with the drunken cowboy.

“Summer, it’s time to go,” he said.

“Billy’s hurt. He needs medical attention.”

“Leave him,” Trace ordered.

“No,” she said flatly. “I’ve got to take Billy home. He can’t drive in this condition.”

Trace looked around for someone who could take Bad Billy home, but all of his cowhands had slunk quietly away. “Dammit all to hell,” he muttered under his breath. He was tempted to leave Bad Billy lying in his own vomit, but one look at the obstinate tilt of Summer’s chin convinced him he wasn’t going to get away with doing that.
At least, not without hauling his sister home kicking and screaming all the way.

“Aw, hell.” Trace leaned down and grabbed Bad Billy by the arms and hauled him upright, then hefted him over his shoulder like a sack of feed. “Let’s go,” he said.

He ignored Summer’s protest when he dumped Bad Billy into the bed of his pickup without a care for the bruises it would cause. When Summer started to climb in with the boy, he caught her wrist and said, “Get into the cab. We need to talk.”

Her chin came up—when didn’t it?—and she stalked to the front of the truck and got in. Trace caught himself sighing and pressed his lips flat. It would be a cold day in hell before he allowed his little sister to be wasted on the likes of Bad Billy Coburn.

The Coburn ranch was twenty-five miles in the opposite direction from Bitter Creek, which would give them plenty of time to talk. Trace held his tongue, waiting to see what Summer would have to say for herself. He wanted to hear what kind of defense she intended to mount for the jug-bitten cowboy.

Her stubborn silence gave him too much time to think, and his thoughts were all about Callie Creed Monroe.

Trace had told himself over and over since she’d walked away from him at the auction that the smart move was to keep his distance. He’d remained in the house with Dusty and Lou Ann in order to avoid seeing Callie, despite his taunt of claiming a dance. But she’d been in his head the whole time, the same way she was lodged in his heart.

He’d tried to cut her out. He’d tried not to want her. But she was under his skin, and there was no getting rid of
her without peeling himself away a layer at a time, until there would be nothing left. Trace knew what he wanted from Callie. He just wasn’t sure of the best way to get it.

Maybe if he could get her into bed he’d discover that the memories he had of the time they’d spent together wouldn’t measure up. That what he remembered as pure gold would turn out to be dross.

But merely kissing her against the rough wall of the barn had turned him inside out, so that all the pain of loss and the wealth of need were right there on the surface, aching and demanding. He’d wanted to possess her. Needed to possess her. Intended to possess her before he left this place once and for all and went back to where he’d come from.

He’d made up his mind about that tonight.

“Trace, you can’t fire Billy for fighting,” Summer said into the silence. “Especially when the fight wasn’t his fault.”

Trace turned to survey his sister, whose nose looked dark and swollen in the light from the dash. “He was fighting. That makes whatever happened his fault.”

“I told you he had no choice. Luke Creed told Billy’s sister Emma to get lost. He called her a bloodsucking leech.”

Trace lifted a brow. “What was Emma doing out there in the dark with Luke in the first place? No, hold that question. What were
you
doing out there in the dark with Bad Billy Coburn?”

“We were having a beer together,” Summer said defiantly. “So what?”

Trace swore under his breath. “Bad Billy—”

“Stop calling him that. His name is Billy,” Summer
said irritably. “He isn’t a bad person. And it isn’t fair to label him as one.”

“He was fall-down drunk, Summer. The man is a troublemaker, a nothing, a nobody. I would’ve cut him loose a long time ago, except he’s about the best man I’ve ever seen with a rope. I won’t have him at Bitter Creek—”

“Bitter Creek doesn’t belong to you. You aren’t the boss. When I tell Daddy—”

“When I tell Dad you were out drinking with Bad Billy Coburn, he’ll—”

“Trace, you can’t tell!” Summer cried.

“Why not? Was there something more going on between you and Billy Coburn in the dark than just drinking a few beers together?”

“No. Nothing. We’re just friends!” Summer insisted. “But Daddy wouldn’t understand.”

“I don’t understand, either. The man isn’t worth a bucket of spit, Summer. Are you sure you aren’t slumming with that saddle tramp just to get back at Dad for making you break up with that last boy you were dating?”

“No! I just—Billy and I— Oh, you’ll never understand, so there’s no sense trying to explain it to you.”

“Try me,” Trace said.

“Billy never had a chance to be ‘good,’ Trace. His father’s treated him like dirt all his life.”

“How does that give the two of you anything in common?” Trace questioned.

“Let me finish,” Summer said. “Billy wants to do better, but nobody around here will give him half a chance. Everybody has already decided he’s ‘bad’ Billy Coburn, and nothing he does makes any difference.”

“I still don’t see the parallel between the two of you,” Trace said.

Summer shot him a frustrated glance. “Don’t you see? He isn’t what people think he is. And neither am I.”

“You’re not a spoiled brat?” Trace teased gently.

Summer crossed her arms under her breasts. “I don’t know why I even bothered to try and explain. You don’t want to understand. Nobody does.”

“I understand one thing, and you’d better understand it, too,” Trace said. “If Dad catches you anywhere near Bad Billy Coburn, there’s going to be hell to pay.”

“You’re not going to tell him about us, are you?”

“Not if you agree to stay away from Billy.”

“What about you and Callie Monroe?” Summer shot back. “What’s Daddy going to say when I tell him I saw you kissing her tonight?”

Trace glared at his younger sister. “I’m a grown man—”

“And I’m a grown woman!”

“You’re my baby sister—”

“I’m not a little girl anymore,” Summer said. “I grew up while you were off gallivanting around the world. I can manage my own life, thank you very much, without any help from you!”

“You’re bound to get hurt if you hang around with Ba—” Trace corrected himself. “With Billy Coburn.”

“And you’re out of your mind to be kissing Callie Creed Monroe,” Summer countered. “But you don’t see me trying to stop you from following your heart.”

Trace hissed in a breath. “Are you in love with that bum?”

“Of course not! I told you, we’re just friends. Which is more than you can say about Callie Monroe.”

“Callie and I—” Trace cut himself off. He wasn’t about to explain to his sister that he’d been exorcising demons, not pursuing romance, with Callie. Instead he said, “Billy Coburn will only break your heart.”

“It’s my heart,” Summer said. “And if I want to take a chance on having it broken, that’s my business and nobody else’s.”

“I’m warning you,” Trace said. “Stay away from him.”

“Or what?” Summer demanded. “Are you going to tattle to Daddy?”

Trace met his sister’s rebellious gaze and said, “I’ll get rid of Billy myself.”

“You do, and I’ll make you sorry you did,” Summer threatened.

“Look, Summer, be reasonable. You can’t be friends—”

“I can and I will. You’re not going to make me change my mind.”

He braked the Chevy truck to a dust-raising stop in back of the Coburns’ dilapidated ranch house. The porch roof sagged, and one of the wooden steps that led up to the kitchen had rotted through. The back door screen curled away from the frame in the corner, leaving an opening for flies. Trace could see a chipped red Formica table and four mismatched chairs in the light from the single uncovered bulb that lit the kitchen.

An aproned woman stood at the kitchen sink, her brown hair stuck in a bun at her crown. When she turned,
Trace realized it was Dora Coburn, Billy’s mother. She crossed and shoved open the screen door, which squealed on its hinges.

“Stay in the car,” Trace ordered his sister. “I’ll take care of this.”

“But—”

“Who’s there?” Mrs. Coburn called.

“It’s Trace Blackthorne, Mrs. Coburn,” Trace said, stepping out of the pickup. “I’ve brought Billy home.”

“Is he all right?” The woman hurried toward him, letting the screen door slam behind her. “Is he hurt?”

“He’s passed out drunk. He’s been fighting, but he’s not seriously hurt.”

He saw the resignation in the woman’s face, saw her shoulders sag as she looked up and met his gaze. “Would you bring him inside for me, please?”

Trace let down the back of the pickup and hauled Billy up and over his shoulder. To his consternation, he found Summer by his side as he stretched his legs over the broken step and carried the drunken man inside.

“Follow me,” Mrs. Coburn said as she led them through the kitchen and living room and down a dark, narrow hall. “His room is this way.”

Trace saw the look of distaste on his sister’s face when she saw the filth in which Billy Coburn lived. His bed was unmade, and his room, about the size of a jail cell, Trace noted ironically, was strewn with empty beer cans and ranch magazines and dirty clothes.

Mrs. Coburn shoved the rumpled covers aside and said, “Lay him down, please.”

Trace let Billy fall onto the bed, which sagged down at
the center with the weight of his body. He exchanged a look with his sister, whose chin, for once, wasn’t jutting. Her eyes were troubled, confused, even a little sad.

“Can I help you with anything, Mrs. Coburn?” she asked.

“I think it would be best to let him sleep it off,” she said.

“His face—”

“It’ll mend,” the woman said sharply. “Don’t you Blackthornes be worrying about my boy. He’ll be fine.”

Trace watched Summer recoil at the woman’s harsh words. He put an arm around her shoulders and said, “We’ll be going now.”

“I’ll make sure he’s up for work tomorrow,” Mrs. Coburn said.

“There’s no need—” Trace began.

“Oh, he’ll want to be up in time for work. We need the money too much for him to skip a day,” she said bitterly.

“Mrs. Coburn—” Trace felt Summer’s hand on his arm, felt the plea for mercy. But he was doing this for her own good. “Billy doesn’t need to show up for work tomorrow. I fired him tonight.”

“Oh. Oh,” the woman said, looking flustered. “Couldn’t you … Wouldn’t you reconsider?”

“No, ma’am,” Trace said.

Summer took a step away and stared at him accusingly.

“Come on,” he said, as he clamped a hand on her wrist and began dragging her from the house. “It’s time we got home.”

When the screen door slammed behind them, Summer turned on him. “How could you stand there and tell her
Billy was fired, when it’s so obvious they need every penny to make ends meet?”

“I fired him, and he’s staying fired,” Trace said. “I don’t go back on my word.”

“You’re a heartless sonofabitch, Trace Blackthorne.”

Trace didn’t bother denying it.

C
ALLIE HAD NO INTENTION OF LETTING
T
RACE
buy her a dress. But in the few seconds she’d had to make a decision whether to accept his invitation to the gala, Callie had realized they needed time alone to put the past to rest. And Houston was a nice, safe distance from her family and from his.