Patricia Forsythe - Her Lone Cowboy

Monette called out to her, but Laney ignored her as she put the Jeep in gear and sped down the road to Caleb’s driveway.

* * *

CALEB MOVED CAUTIOUSLY toward the front door where he’d heard scuffling noises and then a soft knock. Since his leg had seized up on him last night, he’d been moving much more carefully, trying to handle the pain and outlast the muscle seizures without resorting to more of the painkillers the doctor had given him. Aside from making him woozy and giving him nightmares, they’d probably caused him to stand by his window gawking at his neighbor’s house. Besides, the pills didn’t really cure anything, so why bother with them?

He finally reached the door and swung it open, his curious gaze at eye level. Seeing no one, his focus swung down to right above knee height where Sam Reynolds grinned up at him.

“Hi, Mr. Rasmon.”

“Ransom,” Caleb corrected automatically.

“Ransom. Can Bertie come out and play?” Sam’s huge smile and big brown eyes begged him to agree.

From behind him Bertie shuffled up, tail wagging and mouth open in his own big, doggy grin. He wiggled past Caleb to greet his new best friend, giving Sam a lick on the cheek that sent the eager boy into peals of laughter. Sam threw his arms around Bertie’s neck and sighed blissfully. “I love you, Bertie.”

These two were made for each other, Caleb thought sardonically, stepping onto the porch. He leaned against the doorjamb and crossed his arms. “Sam, does your mom know you’re here?”

Into Bertie’s furry neck, Sam mumbled something that sounded like “Maybe.”

Caleb wanted to pull the boy away and get down at eye level with him, but his weakened right leg wouldn’t let him do that. And if he fell, he might land on the boy. Instead he reached down, cupped Sam’s chin and brought the boy’s face up until their eyes met, the way he’d seen Laney do the day before. He tried to make his voice sound as firm as hers had without resorting to his army sergeant’s voice.

“Sam,” he repeated, “does your mom know you’re here?”

“Sorta.”

“Sam...”

“Maybe, sorta.”

“That means no, doesn’t it?” Caleb said then jerked when another thought jolted him. “Did you come through the pasture? The same pasture where Addie and her filly are? That I told you to stay out of?”

Sam wrinkled up his nose and squinted as if he was thinking about it. “You mean where that pony is? No. I came on the road. I ’membered the way.”

Caleb threw his hands in the air. “That’s just as dangerous. What if a car had come along?”

“I woulda moved,” Sam responded as if he was talking to someone who wasn’t too bright. He went back to petting Bertie, who was eating up the attention.

Caleb stared at him. As an only child of parents who had both worked long hours, he knew what it was like to be lonely and to need distraction, but this had to stop. Why didn’t his mother keep him away? He was still trying to figure out what to say when he became aware of a vehicle on the road. A rooster tail of dust kicked up behind Laney’s fast-moving Jeep and gravel scattered as she turned into his drive. Caleb could see her sitting forward, peering anxiously over the steering wheel, and then visibly relaxing when she saw Sam standing on the front steps with Bertie and Caleb.

On the lane behind her, he saw another car slow at his gate, wait for a few seconds, then turn around and head back the way it had come. Caleb didn’t have time to ponder who that could have been because Laney was headed straight for them.

Sam turned to see his mom’s fast-approaching car. “She looks mad.”

“Ya think?” Caleb fought the urge to laugh at the crazy situation. He didn’t want them here, didn’t want to get caught up in the struggle between this lovable kid and his attractive mother. He knew the more he saw of them, the more he was going to get pulled in.

He was adamant about not getting pulled in, he reminded himself. He had everything carefully planned, exactly what his life would be like and who would be in it—or not.

Laney stopped the Jeep and jumped out. She strode over to the steps; her gaze never leaving Sam, whose face was buried in Bertie’s accommodating neck.

“Samuel John Reynolds, what do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.

“Visitin’ Bertie and Mr. Ramsun.”

“Ransom,” Laney and Caleb said in unison. Their gazes met and skittered away from each other.

“You weren’t invited. Go get in the car. We’ll talk about this at home when I’ve had time to calm down.”

Sam looked at her for a second. “Bertie wants me to stay.”

“ I want you to go. Now move,” she said, tilting her head toward the Jeep.

That ended any argument. Sam trudged toward the car. She turned back to Caleb with a look of consternation. “I’m so sorry. I promise I’ll find some way to keep him off your property.”

Her gaze went to his leg as if she wanted to ask him how it was.

Questions, sympathy, pity were things he didn’t want. He straightened, belying his need to lean against anything for support.

He looked her straight in the eye. “Keep him off my property.”

With a nod, she went back to her Jeep and got her son and herself inside in record time. She started the vehicle, turned in a wide circle and was gone.

By his feet, Bertie whined. Caleb braced himself against the doorjamb once more and leaned to run his hand over the old dog’s head. “It’s better this way, Bert,” he said. “We don’t need them complicating our life.”

CHAPTER THREE

“SAM, THIS IS getting really old.” Laney picked up her son and stood him in the middle of the kitchen table so she could talk to him at eye level. As soon as they had arrived home, she had sent him to sit in the naughty chair while she picked up the items she’d left on the back patio and put them away. Then she had scrubbed the kitchen sink while she tried to think of what to tell him.

It had been physically exhausting, but emotionally easier when Sam was tiny. She had made all the decisions for the two of them. Now that Sam was getting older, Laney was constantly second-guessing herself. Two things she did know: she had to keep him safe whether he wanted that or not, and she had to keep him off Caleb Ransom’s property.

Now she was attempting to make that clear. Whenever he tried to avoid her gaze, she turned his face back to hers and placed her hands firmly on his shoulders, holding him in place. “You are not to leave this house without my permission. Do you understand that?”

He looked at her for a second and then nodded.

“You can’t go over to Mr. Ransom’s house unless I’m with you. He has...things to do and he doesn’t need you underfoot.”

“You sure?” Sam asked. “He hurt his leg so maybe he needs help with...”

“No, he doesn’t want or need us there.”

“But I like Mr. Ramsun and I love Bertie,” Sam answered in an aggrieved tone. He looked up at her, his big brown eyes swimming with tears. “He loves me, too.”

Laney dropped her head forward and closed her eyes as she took a breath. This was like trying to have a conversation with a grasshopper who kept bouncing from one place to another.

“You can’t go over there without permission. You can’t go see Bertie—”

“But—”

“You can’t or you’ll be in big trouble with me.” Her firm tone brooked no disobedience. “Sam, there are other reasons, too.”

She paused, watching emotions play across his face with heartsick dismay. She couldn’t let him spend his young years the way she had, never knowing where she would be or what would be happening that day or the next, who she would be with...