Cathleen Galitz - The Cowboy Who Broke The Mold

What must he think about her now that she had lit- erally thrown herself into his arms? In a community as isolated as Harmony, it couldn’t take much to set tongues wagging.

“Are you gonna be all right?” Judson asked, his voice a sexy, agitated purr that sent her imagination traveling down a road clearly marked Danger—Enter At Your Own Risk!

Swallowing hard, Carrie simply nodded.

Apparently unconvinced, Judson ran a work- roughened fingertip beneath her chin and tilted her face up. Beneath his close inspection, twin roses bloomed upon her cheeks.

Certain the most passionate kiss could not have been more erotic than the tenderness in that one callused fin- ger, Carrie felt her knees grow as weak as a baby’s. She hated herself for blushing again. It was the Raben curse—fair skin that acted as a barometer for every emotion and rendered her absolutely useless in a game of poker.

Seemingly satisfied at last that she wasn’t going to collapse and melt into a puddle of estrogen at his feet, Judson turned abruptly on his heels. Following after him like a scolded pup, Carrie heard the gravel crunch be- neath his feet as he reached his pickup and jerked open the door.

Climbing behind the wheel, he tossed her a gruff di- rective. “By the way, if you don’t have one, you’d bet- ter think about gettin’ yourself a gun.”

“But I don’t believe in guns,” she stated unequivo- cally.

Judging by his reaction, Carrie was certain a kick in the stomach would have had a less negative effect than this particular admission. Judson’s eyes glinted danger- ously, making her feel at once both vulnerable and fool- ish.

“What you don’t seem to understand,” he continued, speaking slowly as if English were not her native tongue, “is that our children need someone not just to teach them but to protect them, as well. There may come a time you’ll need a gun, say, to clear off the front steps of some such unfriendly critter as a rattle- snake or a bear.”

Carrie suppressed a shudder at the thought.

“Look, no one would blame you if you decide that you’re just not cut out for this job.” Pausing a moment to wipe the sweat from beneath the brim of his black Stetson hat, Judson Horn looked unflinchingly into her eyes. “Quite frankly, it would save us all a lot of grief if you’d make that decision right now instead of mid- term when it will be damned near impossible to find a replacement. Out here it’s a matter of survival.”

His words pierced Carrie’s heart like the rows of barbed wire that lined the road to Harmony. He was right, of course. She had come out West naively ex- pecting to leave heartache and urban crime behind only to be greeted by a rattlesnake in her front yard! Still Carrie could not allow herself to be so quickly deterred. What she had left behind had been a different kind of wilderness, and she knew that if she kept running away from her fears she would ultimately destroy herself in the process.

“I’m staying,” she said with sudden resolution.

Whether it was disgust or admiration reflected in Jud- son Horn’s eyes, Carrie wasn’t sure. She knew only that she was done running and that she was determined to make Harmony her home.

“Suit yourself,” Judson said, his expression a studied mask of indifference. Reaching into the glove compartment, he pulled out an envelope with her name typed upon it and handed it to her through the open window.

With that, Judson tipped his hat and threw the pickup into gear.

Something in that simple gesture made Carrie’s heart beat more quickly. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but there was something undefinably sexy about that damned cowboy hat.

As dust rose about the receding vehicle, she noticed that Judson Horn didn’t so much as glance back.

She was on her own.

School was to start in less than a week, and she didn’t know where to begin. First there was enough house cleaning in both buildings to keep her busy for a month. Then there was the fact that she wasn’t sure how to organize one schoolroom to accommodate eighteen children at six different grade levels. Still, those worries would have to be temporarily put aside. Right now food was her most imminent problem. Aware that the half a hamburger she’d eaten in Atlantic City wouldn’t last her long, she realized that somehow she was going to have to get comfortable driving a beat-up, old stick shift— and fast.

Sinking to the front steps of the schoolhouse, Carrie felt the tears spill down her face. The surprising thing was that they weren’t tears of self-pity but rather of unexpected joy. Beneath the never-ending Wyoming sky, she felt spiritually cleansed. The sun filtered through the quaking aspen, splaying exquisite patterns upon the ground. The air she breathed was sweet and clean. The rippling of the river and the rustling of the Jeaves seemed to her the most soothing sounds on earth.

High above two eagles circled, brushing wing tips on clouds before separating and going their own ways. A sharp pain ripped through Carrie as she was reminded of the engagement she had severed back in Chicago. From the very start she had worried about the possible consequences of mixing business with pleasure. Never get involved with the boss, she had told herself, but Scott Ballson insisted that the fact that he was her prin- cipal had nothing to do with their out-of-school rela- tionship. He assured her that their private lives were their own.

Then again, Carrie reminded herself bitterly, he had also told her he’d back her a hundred percent. In truth, Scott had stood behind her only long enough to stab her in the back.

“Just because I changed a student’s grade?” he had sputtered incredulously, staring at the engagement ring she had pressed into his palm. “I can’t believe you’re acting so childishly.”

“It’s a matter of betrayal.”

“It’s a matter of politics,” he had scoffed, alluding to the fact that Cindy Lawton’s father was on the school board and that the failing mark the senior had earned in Carrie’s class not only rendered her ineligible to play in the state basketball tournament but also jeopardized the pretty senior’s graduation, as well. When Carrie had adamantly refused Scott’s request to raise the grade, he exercised the “administrative privilege” of changing it himself—without her consent or knowledge.

“I hate to be the one to burst your bubble, Carrie, but it’s the way of the world. Everyone does it.”

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