Secondhand Cowboy Read online

  Secondhand Cowboy

  Lacy Williams

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Epilogue

  Dear Reader

  Also by Lacy Williams

  Prologue

  He didn't belong here.

  Twenty-year-old Callum Stewart stood at the back of the darkened Oklahoma City auditorium, smelling of sweat and horse.

  On stage, ballerinas swirled in a complicated pattern. Attendees were dressed in gowns and suits, making his jeans and boots stand out, though he stood behind most of them.

  He might not belong here, but he was exultant over the purse he'd won. The prize belt buckle was stashed in the glove box of his truck, the check for his winnings burning a hole in his jeans' pocket.

  Things were finally happening for him. When he added the cash prize to the savings he'd scraped together, it was enough for a start for them. For himself and Iris. Things would be tight. They'd have to get a crappy little apartment—he'd vowed never to live in a trailer like the one he'd crawled out of—but if he kept beating the eight second clock, it was doable. He'd work whatever kind of jobs he had to between traveling to rodeos on the weekends.

  This was happening. He was going to marry Iris in one week, when she turned eighteen.

  Even riding high on his win and sick with anticipation about the next week, he was conscious of the richie-rich couple on the aisle seats closest to him, the condescending glances they kept sending him. Almost like they were thinking about fetching an usher to drag him out.

  But Iris had given him a ticket that morning before she'd kissed him for luck. He'd carried the memory of her kiss through the harrowing ride on the back of the bull he'd bested, and he carried it with him now.

  They were young, but he'd spent his whole life wanting. In those early days, wanting a roof over his head, a real family, someone who loved him. For the last two years, that want had narrowed to a person: Iris.

  He knew what he wanted, and he was going to have it.

  The problem with his ticket was that it was for a seat all the way down front, in the middle of the packed auditorium. He would have to climb over twenty folks to get to it.

  And his seat was next to Wade Tatum, Iris's dad. Who hated him. Better to watch from back here than let Wade ruin his high.

  There was a hush over the crowd, and the stage lights focused on a single ballerina at center stage. Prickles of awareness raised the hair on the nape of his neck as he recognized Iris in a frilly white tutu. The pointe shoes made her slender legs look even longer.

  He couldn't look away. As she began to dance, there was a noticeable difference between her skill and that of the other dancers that had been on stage before. This was the biggest, most professional dance company in the state, and she was better than everybody up there. He might be biased because he loved her so much, but he didn't think so.

  She did a long series of spins on the very tips of her toes without breaking momentum, and the crowd burst into applause, some of them standing up.

  She was amazing. He'd seen her dance before, in smaller productions and at practice several times before he'd given her a ride home, but tonight she was exceptional.

  * * *

  A week later, Callum still couldn't get Iris's performance out of his head. Today was Iris's eighteenth, and she'd had a dinner with her dad, her uncle, and her sister. He'd gently declined when she'd invited him. If they were leaving town together, this might be the last time she had a pleasant supper with her family. He didn't want to ruin it for her with the tension that simmered between Wade and him—no matter what he did, how much he tried to prove he was worthy of Iris.

  After her dance performance last weekend, he'd retreated to the safety of his truck and watched through the glass-walled event center as her father greeted her with an armful of blood-red roses. Cal had glanced down at the single rose lying across his passenger seat and felt again the starkness of exactly what he was asking her. The difference between what Wade could give her and what Callum could give her was like the difference between riding a bull and riding a lamb, and he hadn't done that since he was five.

  He couldn't put words to the emotion that had prompted him to leave instead of going in and congratulating her. Or the ugly things he'd felt when he'd kept it a secret that he'd attended her performance. He'd only promised to try, and she'd assumed his rodeo had kept him from attending. He'd never corrected her.

  He'd been unable to summon the same excitement for their plans all week, though he'd faked it when they'd spoken on the phone. The one night she'd been able to sneak away and see him, he'd forced himself to act like the same old Callum, so she wouldn't know.

  He was afraid they were making a mistake. That she was making a mistake being with him.

  Today's ride had him questioning himself, too. He'd been pitiful. He'd stayed on the bull's back for all of four seconds and, when he'd been thrown, he'd landed badly on his left knee. He didn't think anything was busted, just bruised. He rarely went out with the other cowboys, but tonight, he'd accepted an offer to go to a nearby bar. He'd kept it to one beer, but a friend flirting with the waitress had spilled a drink that soaked Callum's shirt and jeans. He'd changed T-shirts, but the smell of alcohol remained with him.

  It was late, he was tired and beat up. And he kept seesawing on what he was going to say to Iris when he saw her.

  He loved her so much, he couldn't see straight.

  And that was dangerous. Didn't he know it? He'd loved his mother with the same deep affection, and she'd left in the middle of the night. His dad had been cruel and a drunk to boot. He'd been thrown in jail after a bar fight when Callum was in middle school. He'd apparently ticked off the wrong person in the slammer, because he'd been killed in a fight among the inmates. Which had left Callum stuck in the foster system. Where he'd learned that anything he wanted got taken away.

  Only Iris had stuck. She'd spent summers on her uncle Joe's ranch with her older sister and had befriended him even though he'd rebuffed her at every step.

  He loved her so much, he couldn't imagine going on without her.

  Earlier today, he and Iris had agreed to meet in their special place, under the big oak on one corner of her uncle Joe's ranch. There was no real reason for the secrecy of their plans other than her dad would be furious when they got married at the county courthouse tomorrow. If they went through with it. Maybe...maybe putting it off was the best thing.

  His headlights cut through the darkness, illuminating empty fields on both sides of the gravel road. It wasn't far now. Through his open window, the sweet smell of growing wheat and cool air from the nearby creek rushed into the truck, knocking his Stetson back on his head until he mashed it down.

  Both anticipation and dread roiled in his stomach.

  What was the right thing here? When they'd daydreamed about their future together, she'd talked about working in New York City with a ballet company. He'd thought he was indulging her when he'd agreed that they would find a way to get her there after they were married.

  But last weekend, seeing her on stage...

  She had an amazing talent, one that he believed could put her on stage in New York or even Europe.

  How was he supposed to support Iris's dreams when his plans would barely keep them afloat financiall
y?

  For a year, since she'd turned seventeen, he'd lived off of this dream of marrying her and starting their life together. But seeing her dance had rocked the foundations of his plans. She deserved a chance to get to New York. And he wasn't sure he could give it to her, not like they'd planned.

  From out of nowhere, a huge dark shape separated from the darkness and barreled toward him, right in his path.

  He stomped the brakes and yanked the wheel. The truck swerved, but there was no avoiding the collision with the horse.

  1

  Her past stared her in the face in the form of pixels on paper.

  Iris Tatum went weak-kneed as she took in the local weekly newspaper, which had been folded to the sports page and left on the nook table in her kitchen. A prominent ad showed a smiling cowboy leaning against a huge combine tractor, one leg bent at the knee in a relaxed pose, his lips quirked in a smile that promised secrets.

  Once upon a time, she'd known those secrets.

  The bagel crumbs on the counter and dirty knife in the sink spoke of her older sister, Jilly's, presence, though the house was quiet now. Had her sister left the paper open to this particular page on purpose? Surely Jilly wouldn't be so cruel, even after all the times Iris had forced her to choke down the meds she needed.

  Iris's finger traced over the Stetson atop the cowboy's head before she realized what she was doing and flipped the newspaper face-down on the table, removing him from her sight.

  Why hadn't Jilly thrown it away? Better question: why didn't she?

  She needed coffee. The piquant scent drew her through the morning sunlight streaming through the window above the sink and straight for the coffee maker.

  She was shivering, just from seeing her high school boyfriend's photo.

  Her reaction irked her. She was over him. Completely. It had been five years since he'd disappeared from her life without a word.

  But she almost sloshed coffee over the rim of her mug, and her spoon clinked noisily against the sugar bowl. She had to get herself under control.

  If she were a little bit undone, at least no one was here to witness it. She clung to the counter with both hands, leaning forward and breathing noisily through her mouth.

  It was only because she'd never gotten closure. That was it.

  She let go of the counter and bent in half, reaching behind her calves and tucking her head to her knees in a stretch. She exhaled as evenly as she could, imagining that she expelled the negative feelings with the breath. Straightening up, she stood at the window, looking out over the spread Uncle Joe had left her and Jilly. The wheat was aging nicely, thanks to the spring rains. Cattle dotted the furthest field, and the faded red barn stood sentinel.

  Three years had passed without her uncle, and the grief had faded, as had the urges to check over her shoulder in case he walked through the door.

  After spending all her teenage summers here and then her senior year of high school, she'd learned the rhythm and seasons of ranch life. Now the ranch had become home.

  And Callum Stewart being back in town threatened to upset the delicate balance she'd managed to rebuild after Jilly's diagnosis and continuing battle.

  Was he back?

  She quit pretending that she wasn't dying to know and plunked herself and her coffee mug down at the nook table. She flipped the newspaper so that the cowboy's photo was back in view. A sip of coffee left an aftertaste of bitterness.

  Why was a long-departed bull rider featured in an ad for a local custom harvester?

  She let her eyes follow the lean, rangy lines of his picture. He looked good, but then when hadn't he? She'd been flustered by that smile the first time they'd met, but it was seeing his vulnerability over the next summer that had made her fall in love with him.

  But she wasn't that girl any more. That girl had grown up. Moved on.

  She saw the headline on the same page, Local Bull Rider Returns to His Roots. What?

  The article gave sparse details about him partnering with a local custom harvester. No dates were mentioned, but the article clearly stated he was moving back to Redbud Trails. It didn't make sense.

  Back when they'd made plans to run away together, he'd vowed that once he got out, he would never come back to Redbud Trails. He'd wanted to leave his past—and all the people in town who wouldn't let him forget it—behind. Including her father.

  She'd been so in love with him, she would've gone anywhere with him.

  Until he'd left without her, abandoning her without a word.

  She'd tried to contact him, obtaining his phone number at a hotel where he'd been staying near one of the out-of-state venues, but he'd hung up on her. He'd well and truly left her behind.

  What would make him come back? Why now?

  The doorbell rang. With Jilly already out for the morning, there was no one in the house but Iris and her Boston Terrier, Rowdy, who, at twenty pounds, wasn't much of a guard dog. His toenails clicked on the wood floors as he followed her to the front door.

  If Jilly had left the newspaper article as a warning that Iris's past had come calling, it wasn't warning enough.

  She opened the door to find a dark-haired cowboy on the doorstep.

  * * *

  Iris.

  The name slipped from his lips like a prayer.

  The smell of earth baking in the early summer sun filled his nostrils as his breath stuck in his chest.

  Seeing her unexpectedly, he felt like he was right on the edge of taking a nasty spill from a two-thousand-pound bull. That moment of anticipation, fear, weightlessness.

  What was she doing here?

  He hadn't meant to speak aloud—again—but she answered him anyway.

  "I live here."

  His world tipped a little more, like he'd left the bull's back and was flying through midair.

  She what?

  She looked the same, and yet, different. Her blonde hair was cut chin-length and highlighted the structure of her cheekbones. She wore a blouse and flowing, knee-length skirt. The cowboy boots on her feet surprised him. The coldness in her eyes did not.

  She was supposed to be in New York City, dancing professional ballet. It was the only reason he'd dared to come here, to her uncle's place. He was two chances past his last one, looking for a nanny for his boys for the summer. Joe Tucker knew everyone in town and had been Callum's last resort.

  Questions swam through his mind, spinning slowly as if swimming through molasses. Why was she living here? Why not at her dad's place in town? What had changed her plans?

  But none of it was his place to ask. He swallowed back his curiosity and glanced over his shoulder to his truck, a ten-year-old red Ford. No heads popping up, no windshield wipers going or horn honking. The boys were staying put, for now. Surprise.

  He had to remember why he'd come, even if this conversation was more painful than he could've expected.

  He took off his hat and ran one hand through the curls matted to his head. "Is your uncle at home? I was hoping to talk to him."

  Iris's shoulders dropped slightly, her lips pinching. "Uncle Joe had a heart attack three years ago. He passed away."

  The stiffness didn't surprise him. He deserved it if she hated him.

  Then her words registered and hurt sliced through him. Joe was...gone?

  Agitation made him shift his feet as grief bloomed in his chest cavity, filling up every corner. Chimes blew from a corner of the covered porch, and a cow lowed in the distance, the familiar sounds and familiar landscape intensifying his despair.

  Joe had been a mentor and friend when Callum hadn't had anyone else.

  "I'm sorry to hear that. Real sorry." The floorboards of the porch creaked under his weight as he shifted again.

  Something of his despair must've shown on his face, because her expression softened slightly before she firmed her lips into a pinched white line.

  Almost grudgingly, she asked, "What did you need? Uncle Joe ran his own harvest."

  Curiosity flared
. He couldn't help it. She'd heard he was back in town, knew about his partnership with Buck. Was she running the ranch now?

  But his curiosity and her circumstances didn't change what he'd come here for. "No. No, I needed..." Nothing she could give. There was no way he was asking Iris to watch his boys. Hadn't he hurt her enough five years ago?

  "I've got to go."

  He jammed his hat on his head and doffed it at her before he spun on the heel of his boot and stalked to his truck.

  The door creaked when he opened it and he had to shove aside some fast food wrappers before he could buckle his seatbelt. He hadn't cleaned his truck out yet after the drive up from Texas.

  Goosebumps ran up his arms. He'd left the A/C on, expecting it would be a short visit, even though he'd hoped differently, but the frosty air that blasted him in the face offered no relief from the heat and grief that stayed with him as he settled behind the steering wheel.

  A glance in the backseat showed why the boys hadn't been causing trouble. The triplets were out cold in their booster seats, their little booted feet hanging limply. It had been a long couple of weeks, packing up their lives in Texas to move here.

  There had been a lost stuffed bear two nights ago, a midnight low-grade fever, and later bedtimes than their normal schedule as they settled in.

  One last glance at the farmhouse, and he swallowed back the old wishes and dreams, swallowed back the hurt of seeing Iris again after all this time and the grief at the sudden loss—even though she'd said it had happened three years ago—of the man who had changed his life.

  He had to think about the boys. They were the reason he'd come back to this town he'd never wanted to see again.

  He'd find a nanny. He had to. Their future depended on it.

  And he refused to screw things up for them. He would give the boys everything he'd never had.

  * * *

  Iris watched through the window as the red pickup pulled a three-point turn in the gravel drive and headed toward the two-lane state road in a cloud of dust.