The Ranch She Left Behind (25 page)

Which was one of the reasons their love qualified as a mini-miracle. How many men would be willing to do all that?

They’d build a bigger house someday, Bree said, but right now they were happy to live in each other’s pockets, hardly able to move around the little apartment, which would someday belong to the stable manager, without bumping into each other. But bumping into each other was their favorite thing, and apparently it was making quite a honeymoon. Penny and Rowena teased Bree mercilessly, but she knew how they really felt.

“I’m getting some art stuff for Ellen.” Max patted the stack of books under his arm. “And she asked me to pick up some books for Bell River’s story time day. Apparently there’s some kind of tradition?”

Penny laughed. “I’m not sure the ranch has been open long enough for anything to qualify as a tradition, exactly, but yes. Several of the families who stayed there this last year decided to buy books for story time. The kids love the program, so when they go home they leave behind copies of their favorite books, with notes inside, explaining why the book is so wonderful.”

“Ellen has
fifteen
favorite books, apparently, from
A Little Princess
to…oh, that reminds me. Do you have a problem with vampire cheerleaders?”

“Nope.” Penny grinned. “The kids love
Vampire High.
Bring it on.” She touched the spine of the Sargent book. “Mind if I play with these while you shop? They look so gorgeous my mouth is watering.”

He started to hold them out to her, but decided instead to set them down on the stairs that led to the Cozy Corner. Penny dropped down beside the luscious stack of books and opened the top one eagerly. Beautiful, intelligent-eyed women stared at her, their satin and lace and velvets glowing, so real it was hard to believe she couldn’t reach in and touch them.

After a few minutes, Max sat down on the other side of the stack, a smaller pile of novels in his lap. He watched as she ran her fingers reverently across the plates, one after another.

She looked up, smiling sheepishly. “Sorry. He’s a favorite of mine, and this is such a beautiful volume.”

“I’m not complaining. I’m enjoying. Ellen has that same look when she’s painting. Or even talking about art. I’m never going to be able to thank you, or the people out at Bell River, adequately for helping her find that passion.”

She shrugged lightly. “She would have come to it on her own, eventually. The harder thing would have been to prevent her from finding it.”

“Maybe. But finding it right now was a real gift.” He leaned back against the pillar behind them, which was covered in Tigger-colored fur. “So what brought you to town? Surely you didn’t know I’d be here, holding the perfect book of Sargent prints.”

“No. I was just…” She glanced around the bookstore. The cashier had earbuds in, and, judging by his drumming hands, was listening to hard rock. None of the other customers was close enough to be listening.

“I’m downtown because it’s tattoo time.” She tried to sound enthusiastic, but it came out almost a question. It’s tattoo time? Like a kid asking if it’s really time to get the tetanus booster, or take the dreaded math exam.

“Yeah? This makes number seven, right? Moving through that list like a buzz saw.” He smiled. “And yet…somehow I’m not getting that
thrilled
vibe.”

“No.” She had to laugh. He could read her too well. “I’m nervous, naturally.”

“Do you want some company? Not that I’m getting a tattoo, you understand. I just mean…for moral support.”

She would love that, actually. It would change the experience entirely, to have him by her side.

But it would also negate the value.

“It would be heavenly to have you there,” she said honestly. “But then
you’d
be conquering my fear, not me. I’m actually far more frightened of the rafting than I am of the tattoo. So if I can’t do this…”

He put one knee up and draped his hand over it, getting comfortable. “Wasn’t dancing on the list? You didn’t seem afraid of that the other night. In fact, your Casanova Cowboy is so good I’m calling foul on the whole ‘I’m uncoordinated’ excuse.”

“I’m pretty sure that was just the champagne,” she said, wondering whether her moves had maybe been a little too uninhibited. Several people had remarked that she seemed to have a flair for dancing, especially for someone who supposedly had been a virtual recluse since she was eleven.

At least she knew it wasn’t totally awkward or unattractive, because she’d seen Max watching her. And his eyes…

“So champagne is the key to shutting up the little voice that says you can’t do physical things?” He looked intrigued, his eyes alert and interested.

“Maybe. It seems counterintuitive, but apparently I’m not as clumsy when I’m tipsy.”

“Okay, then, how about maybe adding a little champagne to the juggling practice sessions?”

“I already did,” she said ruefully. “When I got home that night, I gave myself a juggling lesson.”

“And?”

“And I was still terrible. Liquor doesn’t seem to be the answer. I’m not sure there is an answer.”

His smile spread slowly. “Oops. Well…is the Risk-it List open for revision, if it becomes necessary?”

She bit her lip. It was a question she’d been asking herself for the past half an hour, as her anxiety about getting a tattoo grew to ridiculous proportions.

“I don’t know. I hate the thought that I might give up too soon, instead of pushing through. Once you start saying you
can’t,
where does it end?”

“Maybe it ends in self-awareness.” He clearly wasn’t teasing anymore. “Some limitations are self-imposed, obviously. But there are going to be at least a few things you really
can’t
do.” He lifted one eyebrow. “I can’t be Sargent, for instance. Or Baryshnikov.”

She smiled.

“And, similarly,” he continued, “there are some things you are afraid to do—not because you’re a coward, but because they really are mistakes. Sometimes fear is your subconscious trying to warn you away from trouble.”

“But how can you learn the difference between the two?”

“I don’t know. It takes a long time, I think.” When he spoke this time, his mouth was a flat line. For whatever reason, he was deadly serious about this.

“A couple of years ago, when I was on a business trip in Mexico, I had a gut feeling that something wasn’t right. I was nervous about a certain place, a certain person. But I told myself it was ridiculous. I hated the idea that I might be giving in to some irrational fear.”

“And were you?”

“No. My subconscious was right. I shouldn’t have gone. If I’d listened to my gut…”

He trailed off. “Well, it doesn’t matter, really. I should let you get back to your day.”

He stood, brushing Tigger fur from his jacket with one hand, holding the books with the other. “I’m just saying that maybe, if you’re not comfortable with a plan, it’s not because there’s something wrong with you. Sometimes there’s something wrong with the plan.”

* * *

I
RONIC,
M
AX
THOUGHT,
that the occasion of Bree and Gray’s wedding had provided him so much more happiness than his own ever had. But the evening at Cupcake Creek had been joyous, and the week since had been pretty good, too.

At the reception, Penny’s companionship and conversation had been deeply satisfying, in an easy way that amazingly wasn’t all tangled up every single second with thoughts of making love to her.

Even more important, he’d spent a truly pleasant evening in his daughter’s company.

She was back—the real Ellen, the one who had once laughed when he called her Bubbles, and embraced the world with so much happy passion.

At the reception, Ellen had stood on his shoes and laughed in his arms as they danced. She’d bustled around the party, eager to be of use. She’d tended old ladies and old men like a princess, and then she’d bopped and wiggled on the dance floor with Alec like a barefoot urchin.

It was brief, but it was beautiful.

So it was doubly hard to even consider broaching the conversation that he feared might send her scuttling back into her sullen shell. He’d put it off for a week now.

He dreaded the thought that he might lose his daughter all over again. But after seeing Penny at the bookstore, he recognized that he was being a coward.

If Penny could tackle her fears, surely he could do the same.

His chest tightened, just thinking about it.
Damn it, fatherhood was hard.
But Ellen wasn’t a baby. She had undoubtedly picked up confusing signals through the years of her parents’ troubled marriage. She had probably been trying to process those signals, and arrived at half-truths, or completely unfair self-blame.

So it didn’t matter how much Max dreaded the talk, or how hopelessly inadequate he felt to find the right words. She deserved the truth. Even if it hurt. Confusion and self-blame hurt, too. In the end, she was strong enough to deal with it.

And so was he.

Just after lunch, his arms full of the books she’d asked for, he knocked on her door. Technically, he hadn’t needed to knock, because, for once, she hadn’t shut the door. She’d left it ajar as she sat on the bed, cross-legged, drawing in her sketchbook.

“Come on in,” she said absently, as though that were routine. As though she hadn’t slammed that same door in his face every night for almost a month now, up until this past week.

“Hey,” he said, pausing just over the threshold. He aimed for as normal a tone as possible. If she assumed they were friends, he would do the same. “I brought the books. And…are you busy? I’d like to talk a little, if it’s a good time.”

She closed her sketchbook, but it wasn’t a rude gesture. More protective than anything, as if she weren’t sure the drawing was ready to be viewed by any eyes but her own. She kept her purple watercolor pencil in her hand, as if to say she’d need to get back to drawing in a minute.

The same way he went into a meeting with his secretary primed to buzz him if it ran too long and he needed an out. He smiled at the universal instinct to preserve options.

“I’m not busy,” she said. Her voice had acquired a thin thread of wariness, but she seemed receptive. “I’m just fiddling around. What’s up?”

“I just hoped we could talk,” he said. He set the books down on her nightstand, but she didn’t turn to look.

Instead, her spine straightened slightly. “Talk about what?”

“Us,” he said. He’d already decided there was nothing to be gained by beating around the bush. She was smart. She’d see any serpentine segue coming a mile off.

“I guess…Mom, mostly. The anniversary of the day we lost her is just a few days away. I wondered if there was anything special you’d like to do.”

Her brows drew down. It was like watching a thundercloud overtake a blue sky, inch by inch. He wanted to throw out his arms and hold back the rain.

“I would have liked to visit her grave.” She shrugged tensely. “But she doesn’t
have
one.”

They’d been over this before, so he knew how tender a spot it was.

“That was Mom’s decision, remember. She had it specifically spelled out in her will. She wanted to be cremated. Even if we don’t like it, we couldn’t let what we wanted be more important than what she wanted.”

Ellen’s scowl deepened, but he recognized that for what it was—an attempt to hold back tears. Not true rage. Not yet, anyhow.

“Yeah. I guess.” Ellen rolled the watercolor pencil through her fingers. “Whatever.”

Okay. “I also wondered whether there were any questions you would like to ask me. About Mom, or the way things were between us when she died. Or…” But why suggest topics? “About anything, really.”

Ellen ruffled the pages of her sketchbook. “No. Not really.”

“There’s
nothing
you’d like to talk about? Nothing that…confused you or upset you?”

“No.”

“What about the time I was gone, then? The months I was in Mexico. Would you like to talk about that?”

“No.”

God.
She sure wasn’t going to make this easy, was she? Or maybe he just was awful at encouraging intimate dialogue. Lydia had certainly thought so.

The truth was, in his heart of hearts he had desperately hoped Ellen wouldn’t want to ask much about Mexico. Even Lydia was easier to discuss than that.

Squaring his shoulders and girding his will, he came in and sat on the edge of the bed.

“Nothing? That doesn’t really seem possible,” he prodded gently. “For instance, I know you must have noticed that Mom and I were fighting a lot.”

“
She
was fighting,” Ellen said, glancing up briefly, her eyes as cold as marbles. “You weren’t really there. You didn’t
care
enough to fight.”

A streak of heat moved through his chest. For a moment, he heard her mother’s voice in those words. “Goddamn it, Max,” Lydia had cried, night after night. “Where
are
you? You don’t even
care
enough to fight!”

He was taken aback, in spite of how prepared he thought he’d been for any anger. When had she heard these words, in that exact tone? Had Lydia repeated her complaints when they were alone, seeking a sympathetic ear in her daughter?

Or had Ellen overheard the words, listening through the walls in the middle of some sleepless night, as Lydia hurled them at her cold, unreachable husband?

“I cared,” he said, keeping his voice and face steady. “But just not the way she wanted me to. It was very frustrating for your mother, having a man like me for a husband. I’m too repressed, not open enough with my emotions—especially after Mexico. We weren’t interested in very many of the same things. Again, that was worse after Mexico. Some experiences change your perspective on everything.”

But that wasn’t fair. He hadn’t been happy in his marriage, hadn’t been interested in Lydia’s clothes and gossip and parties, since long before Mexico.

“Plus, your mom and I married very young. People change as they grow up. Over the years we’d both changed a lot.”

“You weren’t
very young.
” Ellen sounded disdainful, also an echo of her mother. “You were twenty-four. People have families, and go to war and die, and become senators, and everything, by the time they’re twenty-four.”