Luke’s Ride

“I saw Gabriel on my work order for tomorrow,” he said. “I figured I’d stop on my way home and see if this might be an easy fix—I didn’t want to leave you ladies in the cold overnight.”

“Bless you, Frank,” Kathryn said. “Although there’s just me here—Mom died a few weeks ago.”

His face screwed up in distress. “Say, I didn’t hear about that. I’m sure sorry—she was a nice lady, always sent me off with a piece of her applesauce cake.”

He hefted his tool bag. “Let’s take a look at that furnace. It’s got some years on it, but you’ve always kept it serviced—should be good for a while longer.”

He clumped down the stairs, and soon Kathryn heard clanking and banging. A short time later the whoosh of the burner floated up the stairs. Frank emerged from the cellar wiping his hands on a square of red cloth.

“Good as new,” he said. “It was just a clogged valve. You selling the house?”

“Not any time soon,” Kathryn said. “My cousin just got out of the Marines, so he and his wife are moving in to take care of it. Maybe they’ll want to buy it sometime down the road.”

“Good for you. I’m a Navy man myself, but the jarheads deserve all the perks they can get. Just tell him to ask for me if the furnace gives him any trouble.”

The house was deathly quiet after Frank’s service van rolled down the driveway. Kathryn shivered. She wasn’t afraid to stay in the house alone, but announcing her mother’s death again had brought home its reality, the utter finality, as nothing had done before. She couldn’t bear to be alone tonight. She needed the warmth and comfort of her husband’s arms.

Only eight o’clock—she could be home in less than an hour. She locked the back door and set the box containing Annie Cameron’s letters on the front seat of her Volvo. The air was heavy with the threat of rain, but the first drops held off until she pulled into her own driveway.

A dim light shone through the front window from the kitchen and another from their bedroom—Brad was probably already upstairs, watching TV or getting ready for bed. If she didn’t open the garage door, she could slip in quietly and surprise him.

She stepped out of her shoes in the entryway and padded barefoot into the kitchen. A soft rumble overhead told her the tub jets were running. Brad must be relaxing after a hard day, although he seldom used the big soaker tub without her.

She decided to carry two glasses of wine upstairs and join him. She crossed to the wine keeper and picked up the cork already lying on the counter; he must have taken a bottle up with him. When she reached toward the overhead rack, she saw two glasses were missing. Puzzled, she looked around for the missing glass, and then her heart stopped before beginning again in slow painful rhythm. A woman’s jacket hung on a chair in the breakfast nook. A purse and scarf lay on the table.

She set the cork down like an unexploded bomb precisely where she had found it and lifted the scarf. A whiff of her own cologne struck her like a slap in the face. The name on the cards she found in the purse came almost as an anticlimax: Britt Cavendish.

Moving without conscious volition, she drifted to the stairs. She froze with a foot on the first step when she heard Brad’s laugh answered by a woman’s giggle. The grumble of the tub jets ceased.

Kathryn fled through the kitchen as if pursued by demons; she would never be able to live with the sight awaiting her at the top of the stairs. Into her shoes, out through the rain to her car. She had enough presence of mind to put the gear into Neutral, letting the vehicle roll down to the street before starting the engine.

The downpour lashed at the windshield all the way to her mother’s house while lightning streaked from heaven to earth. Some benevolent angel guided her safely—in her present state, she didn’t care if she lived or died.

She sat in the driveway while raindrops ran down the car windows like endless weeping. Thunder boomed and lightning illuminated the black sky in strobe-like bursts while she sat dry-eyed, wounded too deep for tears.

Brad had been her first and only lover—she had never considered settling for a cheap thrill outside marriage. She might have understood if he’d said he’d been lonely with her gone so much, that he’d fallen to temptation in a single lapse that would never be repeated. Instead his betrayal was deliberate, calculated and ongoing. As the ultimate insult, he had ordered her special perfume for another woman—maybe for many women—to divert suspicion.

By the time the storm moved on, her course was set, her resolve hard as the rocky New England shoreline. She laid her hand on the box containing Annie Cameron’s letters, a testament to faithfulness and courage, before entering her mother’s house. That night she slept as if she hadn’t a care in the world.

CHAPTER FIVE (#ue79c903c-b6ca-5deb-8908-9871437f3ec4)

A HORSE’S NEIGH and the slam of a car door woke Luke before dawn. The bedside clock read five thirty, the usual beginning of a workday on the ranch. Great—now his dad would be on his case for goofing off when he should be halfway to the barn or at least sitting down to breakfast.

He started to swing his legs out of bed before reality flooded back in a bitter wave. He flopped down and considered his options: hole up and feel sorry for himself or get dressed and try to make himself useful.

He pulled on jeans and socks before propping himself up on the edge of the bed, waiting to make sure of his balance before reaching for a shirt. He had just transferred to his wheelchair when he heard a soft knock at his door.

“You up, Luke?” Shelby asked. “Ready for some French toast?”

“Five minutes,” he said and dragged on his boots before heading into the bathroom.

He wheeled into place at the kitchen table and accepted the mug of strong New Orleans coffee Shelby poured for him.

“Man, I’ve missed this,” he said. “Makes other coffee taste kind of sad.”

“I told your dad to stop ordering that for me when the blizzard almost wiped us out,” she said, “but he bought it anyway.”

“You deserve it, lady—you kept us all going through that trouble.”

She waved his words aside. “You feel like working today?”

“You need me to peel potatoes?”

“Later, maybe. You know Cinnamon, that roan filly I started last fall? Something about her trot feels off to me. I’d like you to ride behind me and tell me what you see. You’ve got the best eye in the family.”

Luke snorted. “I doubt I can keep up in my wheelchair.”

“I don’t expect you to. You ready to meet your new legs?”

He plowed through his breakfast in record time and drained his coffee before donning his hat and denim jacket.

“Lead on,” he said. “Time for me to get back in the saddle.”

Out the back door he discovered a narrow blacktop walk now led to the barn. The dirt floor inside had been raked smooth and rolled flat; he could propel his chair almost as easily as on the paved surface. Later he might fret over the extra trouble everyone had taken for his benefit, but now his eagerness to be active overrode all other thoughts.

Getting on a horse would go a long way toward making him feel like more than half a man.

He followed Shelby to the side door opening to the horse pasture and halted beside her as she gave a piercing whistle. Several horses paused in their grazing, but one lifted its head and started toward the barn.

“Whoa! That’s my ride?” A flashy Appaloosa gelding, dark chestnut with dramatic white markings on his rump, halted in front of Shelby and dropping his muzzle into her hand.

“I knew you’d fix me up,” Luke said, “maybe with a nice old bombproof mare, but I didn’t expect anything like this.”

“I got him from a rescue in Utah,” Shelby said. “His owner died and left them a chunk of money if they’d take special care placing his horse. He’s been used for hunting, so he’s not likely to blow up with you.”

“This guy have a name?”

“Luke, meet Duke. Duke, here’s your new person.”

“Duke and Luke—that’s kind of much. How about Dude? He sure is one handsome dude.”

The gelding dipped his head into Luke’s lap, inviting a scratch under his mane.

“Give him this.” Shelby handed Luke a piece of hard candy. “He’s a sucker for butterscotch.”

“Whatever you say, stepmama. Just tell me what to do.” Luke fed Dude the candy and was rewarded with a gentle nudge.

“I’ll tack him up for you this time, but you’ll be able to do it yourself with a little practice.”