Last Chance Cowboy

“Then I guess you’ve done your thinking,” she said.

She reached the main doors of the bank, leaving Grey to stand on the sidewalk, she assumed, but then he reached around from behind and caught the brass door pull, so close she could smell the soap he must have showered with that morning. “What happened after you went to Doc? And he gave you ‘options’?”

“As I said, I spent the night at his house.”

“Which option? You didn’t—” for a moment he couldn’t go on “—do something drastic?”

Shadow felt the blood drain from her face. That next morning, when she’d wakened at Doc’s house, she’d known what to do. She’d already begun to love Ava. “No,” she murmured, barely able to push out the words. “That choice might be right for some people but it wasn’t for me.”

She watched Grey relax. “Then, what option did you choose?”

Shadow hesitated. “I decided to give her up for adoption.”

Another look of alarm crossed his features. “So, she’s not...with you?”

Her heart skipped a beat. “Let me tell you what I did after I left Doc’s then. You’re right, I was trying to stall because I don’t know how to say all this now, and you left my office before I could tell you.” She looked around. “Can we talk in your truck? I hate to stand here like this where anyone could see us.”

Grey nodded. He waited while she made her deposit then guided her to his silver pickup with a light hand at her lower back. Shadow felt his warmth through her summer dress. In that instant, she remembered other days and nights when they’d been inseparable, when she and Grey were in love, when she’d loved everything about him: his voice, his hands, his laughter, even the way he’d loved Wilson Cattle...because that told Shadow there was at least a different kind of family there, a different kind of home.

He sat against the driver’s door while she pressed against the passenger side. And tried to think how to begin. The direct way seemed best.

“Doc and I discussed my choices that next day. He encouraged me to do what I thought best for her and for me, but he didn’t pressure. You know he wouldn’t.” She studied the stores along Main Street, the bank, people passing by. “Please try to understand—I had no means of support, Grey, I hadn’t finished high school, I didn’t know how I could possibly care for a helpless baby when I could barely care for myself—Doc called his lawyer. We arranged a private adoption and I went to stay with the Merritts.”

“Where? I don’t recognize the name. Who were they?”

“A middle-aged couple, lovely people, who lived in Farrier. They still do. They agreed to pay all my expenses, the doctor there, the hospital...”

She told Grey about waking up there each morning, rolling over in bed in the sunny room she’d been given, feeling the baby kick against her palm. “When I saw a sonogram, I was able to make out fingers and toes and a snub nose. It was a little girl.” Shadow laid a hand over her stomach. “‘Good morning, Sunshine,’ I always told her.”

Grey’s mouth tightened. “You should have called me.”

“I still didn’t feel I could. I’d left home, my family, you...all my friends behind. My parents hadn’t changed their minds. The only people I saw were the Merritts and my obstetrician.”

She kept her gaze on her lap. “I was so lonely, but for the first time in my life I didn’t have to share a bed—except with the life growing inside me. She was so precious, but for her sake I knew I had to give her up.” She paused. “Every morning Mrs. Merritt called up the stairs that breakfast was ready. She was a wonderful cook.”

And every morning, still lying there for another few minutes, Shadow would cry softly into the blanket. Hormones, she’d thought. They were all over the place and she never knew which mood would come out next.

“They had no other children?”

“No, Mrs. Merritt was only forty but she couldn’t have her own babies. Neither can my sister Jenna, and I know how that hurts. If I couldn’t take care of my baby, I wanted to be happy that the Merritts would love and adore her.”

“I’m glad they were kind to you,” Grey said.

Shadow managed a smile. “Mrs. Merritt was so excited to have a baby. So was her husband. They couldn’t seem to do enough for me. After breakfast, Mrs. Merritt and I always took a walk around the neighborhood. They live in a nice area with old but well-kept houses and big green lawns for children to play on.”

They had really wanted her baby. Ava would have a good life with them, she’d told herself.

“What did they tell everyone else?”

“That I was their niece from upstate New York who’d come west because my pregnancy had worsened my lifetime asthma.” Shadow lifted her gaze. “That was ten years ago and Kansas is pretty traditional, or was then. Now we could probably tell everyone the truth.”

Shadow paused to steady her voice. She couldn’t tell Grey that every day she’d thought that if Jared hadn’t died, if she and Grey hadn’t broken up and her father hadn’t turned his back on her, maybe she and Grey would have woken each morning together, talked about their baby in low, happy tones. At times she’d yearned so much for that, she almost couldn’t breathe, as if she really did have asthma.

But, instead, in the view of many, he had killed her brother, and Shadow still had her own doubts. Was Grey innocent, as he claimed? Or guilty? Certainly she’d resented the fact that Grey had gone back to finish college as if nothing had happened, that he would take over his father’s ranch...marry someone else. She was still surprised that he never had.

“So, after the baby was born...” His gaze flickered. “Where is she now?”

Shadow swallowed. “In school, staying at my sister Jenna’s.”

“You didn’t give her up,” he said, looking more than surprised.

“No,” she murmured.

His mouth had that stubborn set she’d seen so many times before. “Then I want to see her,” he said in a tone that didn’t allow for her refusal.

“Grey, I’ll need to talk to her first. We can’t just show up and say, ‘Hi, honey, this is your father.’”

He frowned. “I didn’t exactly plan to do it that way.”

She glanced at the darkening sky again. The thunderheads looked close enough to touch now. And a little frisson of doubt ran through her. If only Jared wasn’t gone and she and Grey were still together. If only she could believe, like Blossom and Logan now, in happy endings and having the family she still yearned for.

With Ava home again, maybe she would. But that family didn’t include Grey.

The first drops of rain began to fall. Soon the sky would open up, and unless she moved, they would still be here, eye to eye, at odds with each other.

Shadow said, “I’ve been planning to bring her back to Barren—but to introduce you that abruptly? No,” she said again. “That’s not in her best interest.”

His voice was close to a growl. “I think it is. You’ve had nine years, Shadow. She’s my daughter, too—and you’ve lied to me. All this time. No more.”

CHAPTER FIVE (#u995d0323-f33c-51bf-a6be-3f279ccd2c50)

SHADOW HAD CUT short her work hours several days ago after she’d told Grey about Ava then gone to see Blossom. After talking with her mother and Derek, she’d meant to visit her client at the rehab center, but instead went back to the office. Then she’d told Grey about Doc and the Merritts and fallen even further behind. She needed to catch up. However, earlier today, she’d finally called Blossom to say she could be in the wedding if Blossom still wanted her. Even to avoid Grey, she couldn’t disappoint Blossom. How many true friends does a person have? To be honest, she also felt guilty about him.

He was right. For too many years she’d kept Ava from Grey. The least she could do was stand with him while their mutual friends got married, a happy ending she couldn’t picture for herself. Other than that she didn’t know how to atone for what she’d done. To Ava, too.

Clearly, she’d made mistakes. Had it been easier to go about her life with Ava in Kansas City and Shawnee Mission rather than face Grey? If she’d never come back to Barren, would she ever have told him? She’d always planned to—at some point—but the opportunity never seemed to arise, and she’d tried to tell herself maybe that was for the best, that Grey had his own life without her. Now she knew that had been another error on her part. What if he’d simply run into Ava somewhere? She couldn’t risk that.

Today, as the next step before he met her, she was going to see Ava. She wouldn’t mention Grey just yet, although Ava had asked about her father over the years. Shadow had always kept it vague, telling Ava he couldn’t be part of their lives but that, of course, he loved her. Another reason to feel guilty now.

But first, after dealing with the morning emails and texts at the office, she had an appointment at the rehabilitation center to finally check on Ned Sutherland, the elderly rancher who had suffered a stroke. Shadow had provided a caregiver for him before that and he would probably need one again.

“You’re doing well, Mr. Sutherland. When do you expect to go home?”

For a moment, he didn’t answer. Their visit had been punctuated by long silences and the obvious frustration she saw in his weathered face. His speech halting, Ned covered his first stumbling attempt to speak with a discreet cough.

“I...go...prob’ly next...week.” His mouth leaned a little to the right and he gripped his weak hand in his lap with the other. The staff here had done their work, though. They’d gotten him on his feet and walking again, although he seemed to prefer staying in his room. That wasn’t good. He needed cheering up.

Shadow had found him sitting by the window, his bony shoulders slumped, looking out toward the babbling brook on the lush green property. Several rough wooden benches were arranged along the bank for patients to enjoy the view and listen to the rushing water. For a man who’d spent most of his life outdoors on a horse or a tractor, like Logan’s grandfather Sam—like Grey—Ned’s enforced confinement had likely been more than difficult.