Karen Smith - The Cowboy's Secret Baby

He was still smiling.

Before he could say a word, she blurted out, “What are you doing here?” Once the question was out, she couldn’t take it back. Besides, she had to know.

“I’ve been back about two months,” he said, not really answering her question.

She motioned to the physical therapy room. “But what are you doing here ?”

He looked down at his left leg and grimaced. “I guess the latest gossip hasn’t reached you.”

Fawn Grove was a small town, and if you kept your ear to the ground, and the coffee shop, and the family diner, and the feed store, rumors floated all over the place. But she didn’t get to any of those places. Besides, only Sara and their friend Kaitlyn knew she’d had a fling with Ty. So why would anybody tell her anything about him?

“So let’s bypass the gossip and get to the truth,” she suggested.

His Stetson was on a chair beside the table where he’d sat. He studied it for a moment, then raised his gaze to hers. “My rodeo days are over. A bull got the best of me, and I had to have a knee replacement.”

Wow! She hadn’t been expecting that.

“When did it happen?”

“About four and a half months ago. I had surgery in Houston, and I did rehab there. But I’ve come back to the Cozy C to help out my uncle, to get plans going that we started when I was in Houston. The doc in Texas thought it was a good idea if I continued physical therapy here, considering I wanted to be back in the saddle sooner rather than later.”

“You’ll be able to ride again?” she asked, knowing how much it meant to him.

“I am riding. Horses, not bulls.” His tone was wry and she suspected there were a lot of feelings behind it. However he didn’t express them.

“I did hear your uncle’s having a tough time of it.” Jase Cramer, Sara’s husband, had mentioned he was thinking about buying the Cozy C property if it ever went up for sale. He’d mentioned Eli Conroy was having a problem paying his taxes. She’d briefly thought of Ty when she’d heard that, but she’d never imagined he’d be back here.

“Yeah, Uncle Eli has had it rough. He was finally honest with me about it after this happened. But I won my best purse ever the night that bull did me in. So Uncle Eli and I are going to turn the Cozy C into a vacation ranch.”

Marissa supposed that was one solution. That would take an awful lot of money, and one huge overhaul. Which meant Ty was going to stay around...

She had to get out of here. She couldn’t make chitchat with him. She didn’t want him to find out anything she didn’t want him to know, at least not yet. Though she understood in her soul that the day was coming when she’d have to tell him about Jordan.

She checked her watch. “I’m on my lunch hour and I have to get back to work. It was great to see you. Good luck with your uncle’s ranch.”

And before Ty could say another word, could even utter a goodbye, she turned and fled.

* * *

Ty stared after Marissa Lopez, totally baffled by what had just happened. When their gazes had connected across the room, he’d seen the same sparks there now that he’d seen when they’d attended the wedding of friends together two years ago. They’d known each other years before that. They’d gone to the same high school, known some of the same kids, though he’d been two years older than Marissa and had stayed away from her. No easy feat, because she’d been a beauty even back then.

Automatically his thoughts returned to the wedding they’d attended in Sacramento. He’d known the groom and she’d known the bride. At the reception, they’d hooked up. Then they’d gone back to his motel room.

That had been a night that had been hard to put out of his memory. That had been a night he’d even thought about the day the bull had ended his career. Thinking about Marissa had helped him deal with the pain. He had to admit he’d intended to look her up again eventually—when he was whole once more, when this PT was all done with, when the Cozy C was an amazing success. He didn’t know why all that had been important, but it had been.

Seeing her today...

His gaze still on her as she headed toward the door, he watched the receptionist stop her. He listened, without being concerned at all about eavesdropping.

The blonde at the reception desk asked, “Are you going to be helping with The Mommy Club food drive for Thanksgiving?”

Casting a quick glance his way, Marissa turned her back to him, nodded and then murmured something in reply.

Then she was gone.

Just like she’d been gone the morning after their night of passion.

He’d awakened as she’d dressed, but he’d known they really hadn’t had anything to say. He was going out on the circuit again. She would be staying in Fawn Grove. He didn’t know when he’d be back. So he’d let her leave without a word.

And that had been that.

But the receptionist’s question stuck with him.

The Mommy Club? What did Marissa have to do with that ? Every once in a while he checked in on Fawn Grove’s Chamber of Commerce’s Facebook page, just to see what events were going on, what was happening in the town he’d grown up in. He vaguely remembered seeing postings about The Mommy Club.

As soon as he got back to the ranch, he’d have to check it out.

* * *

As Ty opened the newly painted white wooden screen door and stepped into the Cozy C’s renovated kitchen, he was barely mindful of the smell of new paint and coffee. Yet he couldn’t miss the sight of his uncle Eli sitting at the oak pedestal table nursing a mug of a dark brew.

“You’re leaning on that cane pretty heavy. Tough workout?” his uncle asked.

If it were up to Ty, the cane would be tossed into the recycle bin. He rarely used it now, though his physical therapist wanted him to. But after today’s exercises, he needed to ice the muscles around his knee before getting along with his day.

“No tougher than any other,” he assured his uncle, leaving the cane by the door and hanging his Stetson on the hat hook. There were four of them there now, for any of the dude ranch’s guests who came to visit the main house’s kitchen.

“Still smells like paint in here,” his uncle grumbled.

“You wanted to keep the wooden door. It needed a facelift.”

“And that stainless-steel stove and refrigerator make me want to close my eyes when I come in here in the morning. It’s so damn bright.”

That was an exaggeration if Ty ever heard one, but he could tell his uncle was in a complaining mood.

“You like the new touch faucet, though, don’t you?”

His uncle glanced at it and scowled. “I liked that old white porcelain sink just fine. And in my day, a spigot for hot and a spigot for cold was all I needed. Now we’ve got that fancy sprayer and a filtered water tap.” Eli shook his head.

“Any complaints about the new guest cabins?” Ty asked, amused by his uncle’s rant.

“If somebody wants to stay here, they should be happy with the bunkhouse,” Eli muttered.

“You can’t expect a family to stay in a bunkhouse, even if we did give it an overhaul and a more refined look. Single guys who come for the ranch experience can bunk with the hands there. But what if we get a couple who wants to explore the area on horseback for their honeymoon?”

“So you want to provide a love nest?” Eli sounded aghast at that thought.

“I want to provide a cozy cabin where they’ll be happy so they spread the word to their friends and we get even more guests. Instead of all these changes, would you have rather sold the Cozy C?”

They’d had the conversation many times since Eli had confessed the state of the ranch while Ty was still in Houston. Ty supposed his uncle hadn’t wanted him to return and be shocked by what he found. And Ty would have been. When he returned two months ago, the place had been sorely run-down. The tax collector had been on Eli’s doorstep for the past year. With his bull riding winnings tucked into a bank account, Ty had been able to think, plan and move fast—from his rehab facility in Houston. He and his uncle had spent long sleepless nights over this decision before renovations started, but there really had been no other choice but to turn the Cozy C into an income-generating ranch.