Cowboy With A Secret

Whatever, she’d be better off not thinking about it, not talking out loud when no one else was present, and not allowing herself to be fascinated by Colt McClure. She’d be better off watching TV, which functioned as her mind-numbing drug of choice on nights when the stars seemed too near and her body seemed too deprived. This was definitely one of those nights.

Steady, said the voice in her head that she sometimes heard when she sat here. Steady.

That was all it said. She didn’t know for sure if the voice came from Justin or not. Maybe it was merely her own thoughts rattling around inside her brain. Whatever it was, it gave her heart. It gave her the will to go on.

After a while she stood and followed the path along the creek until it bisected the driveway about a half mile from the house. She was walking along, hands in pockets, mulling, when she saw a small car cut out of the driveway onto the blacktop highway. They’d had a visitor, then. She didn’t recognize the car at first, but as she watched it she thought it resembled the light-colored sedan that she’d seen moseying past when she was talking to Colt that afternoon out in the far pasture.

The car’s presence made the pit of her stomach feel hollow, which was ridiculous. It was just a car, perhaps someone visiting the Neilsons or lost on this remote stretch of highway after taking a wrong turn from town. She squared her shoulders and ignored the feeling that something was wrong.

Chances were that the car was driven by one of Mott’s minions, who might be checking out anything from the new hand to the line of fence posts going up along her property line. Well, let Mott look. She wasn’t ready to declare bankruptcy yet. Or to sell. He and his vultures would have a long wait.

She strode forward, head down, preoccupied with calculations. She’d ship cattle to the feed lots later in the month, and she’d be able to pay her bill at Kraegel’s after they were sold at auction. Fred Kraegel had thrown in an extra bag of feed today, she thought because he liked her and wanted her to succeed. Or maybe he just didn’t like Mott, which was not all that unusual in these parts.

She’d left the house before dark, so the porch light wasn’t on. When she started up the porch steps, lost in her musings, she almost tripped over the wicker basket.

Bethany’s first thought was that Dita had left her laundry on the front porch, which was a natural assumption because Bethany and the Neilsons shared one washer and dryer located in the utility room off the kitchen. But the kitchen was in the back of the house and had its own porch, so it was highly unlikely that Dita had left her basket in the front of the house.

And then she heard the whimper. Something inside the basket moved.

To her utter amazement, a small pink fist flailed the air. The whimper swelled to a cry, and when Bethany bent over to look, she saw a tiny baby wrapped in a print blanket. No, it must be a doll. It couldn’t be a baby. People didn’t really leave babies on peoples’ doorsteps. Certainly they didn’t leave them on her doorstep.

But it wasn’t a doll. It moved. It was crying, its face screwed up and its legs kicking emphatically under the blanket. Bethany dissolved into total bewilderment, half thinking this must be some trick of Mott Findley’s, yet knowing in her heart that it couldn’t be.

Jesse, who among his many failings never bothered to bark at strangers, loped over from the barn, tail wagging, tongue lolling, and looking doggily curious. And, ominously, much too happy.

Before the dog could proceed with his self-appointed mission to water the world, Bethany yanked the basket out of harm’s way. She nudged the front door open with the toe of her boot and carried the baby inside, letting the door slam in the perplexed Jesse’s face.

“Mercy me, what on earth!” she said to the baby, which only wailed more loudly.

Bethany pushed aside a stack of catalogs to set the basket on the narrow hall table and unpinned an envelope from the baby’s blanket. The outside of the envelope was blank, so she opened it and unfolded the note inside.

COLT, it said in printed block letters. PLEASE TAKE CARE OF ALYSSA FOR ME. I’LL BE BACK WHEN I GET SOME MONEY. I LOVE YOU, MARCY.

CHAPTER THREE

“WELL, I’LL BE,” SAID Frisco.

“Is the baby going to live with us?” Eddie asked. “Like a sister?”

“I don’t know, son,” Dita said as she slid an arm around his shoulders. Though she was a native of Mexico, her voice bore little trace of an accent; she’d lived in the States for more than twenty years.

“Colt?” Bethany stood with her arms folded across her chest, reminding herself to be tough. As soon as she’d realized that this baby wasn’t about to be leaving the premises right away, she had summoned Frisco and Dita and Eddie with a quick phone call. Eddie, goggle-eyed, had hurried to get Colt, who ran all the way from the barn. Now the five of them hovered over the wicker basket, and the baby was cooing and laughing up at them, putting on a show.

“I—well, I sure didn’t expect this,” Colt said. His voice rumbled deep in his throat, prickly as a cocklebur.

“The note was addressed to you.” In Bethany’s mind, Colt had some explaining to do.

Colt frowned at the bit of paper, then folded it and stuffed it down into his jeans pocket. He wore only jeans, a T-shirt and boots, and the T-shirt was wrinkled as if he’d just pulled it out of his bedroll. “I don’t know what to say,” he admitted.

“It’s a very nice baby,” Eddie said.

“Yes, it is. But it’s not our baby,” Bethany replied firmly, her irritation building.

Colt cleared his throat and looked from one of them to the other, his gaze stopping when it reached Bethany. The pause lengthened, stretched, hung there. “I know whose baby it is,” he said finally.

“Would you mind telling us?” Frisco growled.

Colt seemed to stew over this before shaking his head. “I can’t,” he said.

“What do you mean, you can’t?” Bethany asked, sharp as all get-out. She recalled the well-worn photo on Colt’s bed and figured that the girl in the picture was Marcy.

“I just can’t say right now, ma’am. Mrs. Burke.” Colt had the good grace to look embarrassed, but he met her gaze squarely.

“Call me Bethany,” she said.

“Bethany,” Colt repeated. He drew a deep breath. “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask your patience. And your understandin’. I’ll look after the baby.” He looked away for a moment as if considering. “The baby can stay in my apartment for tonight,” he added.

“There’s barely room in your apartment for one, much less a baby, and there’s no air,” Dita said. She tended to have a blunt manner, which people sometimes misunderstood.

“She could stay with us,” Eddie suggested, looking hopeful.

“Absolutely not,” Frisco huffed. “We ain’t set up for a baby.”

At that the baby puckered up her face and began to wail.

Frisco pounced on this development. “You see? Babies cry, and they make messes. Babies are a lot of work. We can’t have the baby at our house, and that’s that.” He stumped over to the door and stood looking out toward the barn.

The baby’s squalling roused a maternal instinct in Bethany. She found herself absolutely incapable of listening to the baby’s screams. Before she’d even thought about it, she had slid her hands beneath the tiny body and lifted Alyssa out of the basket. She halfway expected the child to fill her arms like a minisack of feed grain, but she wasn’t at all like that. Alyssa had less heft to her, and bones. Not only that, but the baby stiffened every time she screamed, clutching her little fingers into wildly brandishing fists and contorting her face into a tight red knot of anger. Instinctively and with only a slight hesitation at first, Bethany rocked the baby back and forth.

“Shh,” she crooned softly. “It’s all right. We won’t hurt you.” Her motherly instinct, or whatever it was, billowed full-blown. It took only a moment to decide what she had to do. She looked around at the others and spoke over the baby’s cries. “Alyssa can stay with me tonight. In the extra bedroom.”

“Great,” said Frisco. “Peachy. I’m going home to watch TV. Too much noise around here.” He slammed outside and down the stairs.

The noise of the door’s banging distracted Alyssa so that she suddenly stopped screaming. Dita touched the baby’s cheek. “So soft,” she said. “So sweet. Look, Eddie, at her little fingers. Have you ever seen anything so perfect?”

“Never,” Eddie breathed in awe.

“Dita, how old do you think she is?”

“A month or two, I’d guess.”

Colt rummaged under the blankets in the basket. “There’s canned formula and a bottle here,” he said, setting them on the table. “And enough disposable diapers until I can get more. And a pacifier.”

“Eddie and I can bring the old family cradle over,” Dita said. “It’s stored in the attic. Oh, and you’ll want cornstarch. I have that, too.”

“Cornstarch?” Bethany said blankly.

“It prevents diaper rash,” Dita told her.