The Forgotten Cowboy

If it was, he hoped he never woke up.

The Party Barge was about to dock. Cal left a generous tip for their server, then steered Willow toward the gangway. They were first in line to get off.

“You’re not getting too tired, are you?” He was still a little shaky from his own hospital stay, and he’d been released several days before Willow.

“No, I’m fine. And the Party Barge was wonderful, everything I always imagined it would be. But I’m ready to—”

She stopped, and Cal was dying to know what she was about to say. But he didn’t want to push her. He again helped her into the truck, then climbed in and started the engine.

“Where do you want to go?” he asked as he eased the truck out of the bumpy parking lot, glad they were beating the crowd. “We could take a drive. Lots of pretty country roads around here.” Though he would not go anywhere near the place where he and Willow used to go parking.

“Could we go to your place?” She sounded a little nervous. “Or maybe it’s rude to just invite myself over. You could—I mean, Nana wouldn’t mind if we hung out at her house. But you might not think hanging with my grandmother is that cool.” She laughed, then looked at him uncertainly to see if he was laughing with her.

He smiled. She was nervous. “We can definitely go to my house.” He wasn’t the best housekeeper in the world, but he hired a cleaning service to come in every couple of weeks and give the place a good going-over. Fortunately, they’d just come that morning. “Not that I don’t adore Clea, and I wouldn’t mind a few more of her cookies.”

“They’re outrageously good, aren’t they? You should try her fudge.”

It was on the tip of Cal’s tongue to remind Willow that he had tried Clea’s fudge dozens, maybe hundreds of times. They were his favorite, and Willow used to accuse him of dating her just so he could get to her grandmother’s cookies.

It was odd Willow wouldn’t remember that. But he decided to say nothing. He didn’t want to bring up the past at all. They were starting over tonight with a clean slate.

Cal rented an apartment in one of Cottonwood’s oldest neighborhoods, just off the square, on the second floor of a painted-lady Victorian.

His grandmother on his mother’s side had left him a farm up in Lancaster, a small town just southwest of Dallas. He could have sold it and used the money to buy just about any kind of house he wanted. But buying seemed like such a permanent decision for someone who didn’t know where he would be in five years. So he rented, and the money he collected from leasing the farm for grazing went into shares of a mutual fund that had performed steadily despite the roller-coaster economy. If Cal ever decided what he wanted to be when he grew up, he had the funds to do it.

That was a big if.

“Oh, my gosh, what a great place,” Willow said when he turned into the driveway. “I’ve always loved this house. The Whittakers used to live here, didn’t they?”

“They still do—on the ground floor. They rent out the second floor to me.” He took her around to the back and up the fire-escape stairs. They could have gone in the front door, but Mr. and Mrs. Whittaker would waylay them and talk their ears off, and he would never get Willow alone.

He unlocked the French doors that led from the balcony into the living room. Before he could switch the lights on, a familiar black-and-white blur met them, tail thumping, pink tongue lolling.

“Oh, a dog!” Willow stooped down to pet the border collie. “Hi there, fella.”

“It’s a girl.”

“Oh, sorry. What’s her name?”

“Clementine. Clem for short.”

“She certainly is well-behaved.”

“She likes to please. Clem, go outside.” The dog reluctantly but obediently slipped out the door and down the stairs.

“Aren’t you afraid she’ll run off?” Willow asked. “You don’t have a fence.”

“No, she won’t go anywhere. She’s trained. Besides, she knows she’s got a good deal here. Have a seat.” He switched on a couple of lights. He didn’t want Willow to think he had seduction in mind.

And he didn’t. Okay, it was in his mind, but he had no intentions of following through. His raging hormones had driven Willow away from him once. He had to prove that he was attracted to more than just her delectable body. Not that he had any complaints about the package.

“Do you want some coffee?” he asked, playing the polite host. Coffee would keep their hands and their mouths busy. They could listen to music. Watch a DVD. Play checkers.

“That sounds good.”

He was a patient man, he thought as he left her for the kitchen. He’d waited five years to make Willow his again. He could wait a little longer.

He’d just turned on the coffee maker when an ear-piercing scream split the evening calm. Cal raced back to the living room, visions of mayhem and blood making his pulse pound. He found Willow standing on the sofa, her eyes huge, her face pale as vanilla ice cream. She pointed down to the rug near a chair.

“I just saw the biggest rat in the entire world. It went under that chair.” She pointed more emphatically.

Cal groaned. “Oh, no. Willow, it’s okay. It’s just Rudy.”

“You name your rats?” She didn’t budge from her position on the couch.

“Rudy is a ferret.” Cal got down on his hands and knees and peered under the recliner. Two red eyes glowed at him. “You probably scared him more than he scared you.”

“I seriously doubt that.”

Cal reached under the chair and withdrew the cream-colored ferret. Rudy was trembling, but with a few strokes and some reassuring words from Cal, he soon calmed down.

The same couldn’t be said for Willow.

“I’m sorry he scared you,” Cal said. “He’s supposed to be in his cage, but he’s figured out how to escape. He squeezes under the door, I think.” Turning to his ferret, he scratched it under its chin. “Aren’t you a smart fellow?”

Willow looked at him dubiously from where she still perched on top of the sofa.

“Come down from there. Rudy is completely harmless, I promise.”

She stepped down to the floor using his hand for support, then sank onto the sofa. “Sorry about that. Guess I just proved the stereotype. I screamed like a girlie-girl, didn’t I?”

Cal laughed. “You did.”

She cast a cautious look toward the ferret, which had climbed onto Cal’s shoulder and was staring back just as hard at Willow. “Okay, let’s have a look at Rudy.”

Cal scooped Rudy off his shoulder and held him out to Willow. She lightly stroked his head. And when he seemed to enjoy her attention, she took him into her lap.

“Well, I guess you’re pretty cute. Not really that much like a rat.”

This was the Willow he remembered. Cal had always maintained a menagerie at the little farm just outside town where he’d grown up, and Willow had always loved the animals. She only objected a little when he tried to make a pet out of a giant king snake he’d found in the garage.

Clem yipped once to be let in. And right after that, two more members of his household darted into the living room, probably curious about the screaming. The two cats hopped up on the sofa, eager to make the newcomer’s acquaintance.

“Goodness, are there more?” Willow asked.

“The orange one is October. The black-and-white one is Tyson.” Time enough later to tell her about the other members of his family, not all of which were cute and cuddly.

Willow scratched each of the cats, showing a bit of extra attention to Tyson’s left ear. Half of it was missing. “These guys look pretty battle-scarred.”