Scarlett woke feeling better rested than she had in a long time. And when she thought about Denver, she felt truly excited to see him at breakfast.
Their conversation about Travis had been a breakthrough. Just a small one, admittedly—but it was still a start. For the first time, he was looking at her as a real person, as somebody he might have common interest with. If she could build on that, she might be able to make a difference in his life, after all. That was all she had ever wanted, and the idea that she could really do it made her giddy.
She was sure it was going to be an excellent day…right up until she walked into her bathroom and felt the water soak into her slippers. She was still partially asleep, and it took her a moment to understand what was happening. Then she groaned and hung her head.
“One step forward, two steps back,” she murmured. “Just like always.”
There was water leaking from not only the ceiling, but the walls of her bathroom. She was no expert, but her guess was that a pipe had burst. The most likely scenario was that something froze, then exploded, sending a steady stream of unwanted water into her place.
This was the last thing she wanted for Denver. Her job was to give him a safe, stable home. With a drug addict for a mother, he’d probably lived in sub-par conditions for at least part of his life. Scarlett was supposed to pull him out of that, and she was failing.
She marched back into her room, grabbed her phone, and dialed the super. She was determined to get somebody to fix things and fix them now. But the call went badly. After an argument that circled round and round without ever getting anywhere, it was made painfully clear to Scarlett that the super wasn’t willing to pay the surcharge fees to have someone come out to make repairs during a holiday week. No amount of anger or cajoling could move the woman.
Feeling defeated, Scarlett threw her phone across the room. When she turned back toward her bedroom door, she found Denver standing there.
There was no trace of the fragile camaraderie they had started building the night before. In its place was mistrust so acute it was almost on par with their first meeting. The worst part was that it was a look she recognized. She was pretty sure she had given it to several of her own foster parents. It was a look that said, “You’re in over your head, aren’t you?”
His jaw tightened, a gesture that should be reserved for a much older boy. “What’s going on here?”
“There’s a leak,” she answered quickly. “And I tried getting the building super to take care of it, but apparently nobody is working right now. Because of the holidays.”
She hated the pleading tone of her voice but couldn’t seem to stop it. The expression on Denver’s face as he trudged across the room to retrieve some towels from the closet made it even worse. It was a look of resignation, one that said he had already spent far too much of his young life trying to make up for the incompetence of the adults around him. She was supposed to alleviate that, not put him right back into the role of caregiver.
She was still wrestling with her feelings of failure when there came a knock on the door. Scarlett, her jeans damp with God only knew what kind of dirty water, groaned.
That would most likely be Travis.
She sighed, then attempted to smile at Denver. “Just stay here, alright? I’ll—”
“It’s fine, I’ll get it,” Denver said. And because he was closer to the door, he got there first.
She heard the front door swing wide and steeled herself for what she suspected would come next. Denver’s reaction to Travis standing on their front stoop was exactly what she had thought it would be. The boy let out a gasp, then laughed with delight.
“You’re Travis Harvey!” He exclaimed. His voice had risen an octave or two, and he sounded younger than he usually did. He sounded, she thought, like a kid his age was supposed to.
She heard Travis chuckle warmly as she scrambled to her feet. She glanced in the mirror hanging on her bedroom wall and winced. She tried to tell herself that it didn’t matter what she looked like in front of Travis, but she was still horrified at her disheveled state. Travis was arguably the best-looking man she had ever seen in real life, and at the moment, she was a damp, rumpled mess. She ran her hands over her hair in a half-hearted attempt at smoothing it, then shook her head in disgust.
“Enough. You’re being an idiot. It doesn’t matter.”
She hurried for the door, where she could still hear Denver talking excitedly, careful not to give herself another look. When Travis saw her, he raised his eyebrows, but his smile was genuine enough. In a way, that only made things worse. Even on a good day, her tiny, dumpy apartment wasn’t exactly anything to be proud of. And today wasn’t a good day. She didn’t want Travis to see her like this. She couldn’t stand the idea that he might be pitying her in any small way.
“Well,” he said good-naturedly, his hands resting casually in his pockets. “Denver here was telling me that you guys are in something of a pickle.”
She shook her head, her messy bun coming even more undone. “We’re fine, really. It’s just a little bit of water.”
“No way,” Denver contradicted. “It’s a ton of water. Scarlett shut off the water so it’s not gushing like it was, but there’s still some that got trapped behind the walls and is leaking through, bit by bit. It’s like a horror movie. Plus, the building lady said nobody is going to fix anything until the holidays are over.”
Scarlett placed a desperate hand on Denver’s shoulder. “Come on, bud, it’s not that bad.”
“That’s no good,” Travis said with a frown, looking past Scarlett and Denver. “Want me to talk to the super?”
“No!” Scarlett said quickly. “You don’t need to do that. Seriously.”
He considered her face for a moment, then nodded to himself. He looked like a man who had just made a decision, and Scarlett’s heart sank. Whatever it was, she didn’t think she would be able to stop him from announcing it, and she was sure Denver would be on board.
“Right, then it looks like the two of you will be needing a place to stay. You can’t very well stay in a place where the water’s been shut off, can you?”
Scarlett felt dizzy as she shook her head again. “That’s really not necessary, Travis. We’re—”
“Yes!” Denver shouted, turning to race down the hall even as he spoke. “That’s so excellent! I’ll pack my stuff.”
That left Scarlett and Travis alone for a moment. She could feel how furiously she was blushing, and she was tempted to lash out at Travis as a result. She wanted to tell him that being a rodeo superstar didn’t give him permission to direct everyone around him as he saw fit. She wanted to make sure he knew that no matter what Denver thought, she wasn’t impressed.
The thing was, he was only trying to be helpful. She could see that plainly enough. It wasn’t his fault that she had grown up watching her mom look for one man after another to sweep in and rescue her from her miserable life. Even as a child, Scarlett had been determined never to do the same.
But it wasn’t all about her and her pride. Not with Denver in the picture. So, she swallowed her pride and made herself give him a weak smile. “That’s very kind of you.”
“Don’t mention it,” he said warmly, glancing in the direction Denver had run. “I didn’t know you had a son, by the way.”
“I don’t,” she sighed. “I’m fostering him. And I suppose I should go and pack a few things, too.”
Travis wasn’t sure what to do in the flurry of packing activity that followed his invitation. He settled on remaining where he was for the moment, hands in pockets, while he tried to adjust to this latest bombshell.
“A kid,” he whispered to himself. That changed things. He’d been hoping to get to know her better while he stayed in town—but any kind of relationship, even a short-term one, took on a different complexity when there was a kid in the picture.
He shook off his thoughts and pulled out his phone. His chances with Scarlett weren’t the most important issue right now—his focus needed to be on making sure she and Denver had somewhere safe to stay. He’d offered the ranch house to them automatically, but he should really clear it with the actual homeowner first.
“Hey, brother,” he said as soon as Alex picked up. “I need to ask you about something. And keep an open mind, okay?”
There was a brief pause. “Sure, okay. I think I can do that. But you’re not in any trouble, are you?”
“No, nothing like that. I’m at Scarlett’s apartment, picking her up like I told her I would.”
“Right,” Alex said slowly. “Go on.”
Travis cleared his throat. “Well, her apartment is flooded, and the building super won’t be doing anything about it until after the holidays, whatever that means.”
“So, you invited her to stay at the ranch?” Alex asked. He sounded approving to Travis, which was a relief. “Good. We’ve got too much space here as it is, and she and her foster kid shouldn’t have to stay in a mess like that.”
“You knew she was a foster mom?”
“Yeah, of course. She was really excited to get her first placement.”
“How come I didn’t know?” Travis asked. He knew he sounded a little whiny, but he couldn’t help it. It was just another reminder that he hadn’t been around, that he didn’t know much about the daily lives of the people on the ranch. Not anymore, anyway.
“Maybe because when you talked to her, you were more interested in talking about yourself and hitting on her than learning anything about her?” Alex said dryly.
“That’s…” True, Travis admitted to himself.
Alex laughed, as if he knew what Travis was thinking. “She and I had talked about setting up a play date with the girls once the kid got settled. I guess we’re just moving up the timing on that. I haven’t met the boy yet. What’s he like?
“He was pretty excited to meet me,” Travis said. “Apparently, he’s a fan.”
“Of course, he is,” Alex said with a good-natured groan. “Ten years old, right? He’s the age for it. I bet he’s over the moon about an invitation to stay with the one and only Travis Harvey.”
Travis shrugged. “I don’t know. He seems pretty pumped, but that might just be about getting away from the flood. So, it’s really okay with you?”
“Of course it is,” Alex answered without a modicum of hesitation.
“Awesome. Thanks, brother. We’ll be home in a little while. They’re just getting a couple of things together.”
Travis hung up and breathed a sigh of relief. That was one concern out of the way. As for the news about Scarlett’s foster son, that was going to take more than the length of a phone call to adjust to. Honestly, he wasn’t sure what that was going to take.
The front door opened behind him and he turned to see Scarlett standing there, a question on her face. “Hey, if Alex doesn’t feel comfortable having us there, I totally understand. We can figure something else out.”
“No,” he said warmly, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder. He felt a jolt of electricity running up the length of his arm at the contact and did his best to ignore it. “I just spoke with him and he’s totally on board.”
She smiled, and some of the strain went out of her face. Travis was pleased to see it. It was a beautiful face, there was no denying that. But there was more to it, too. He had been around plenty of beautiful women at this point, many of whom were more than happy to go to bed with him. There was something about Scarlett, though, that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. It made him want to please her, to see her face light up with a smile.
“Hey,” she said softly, almost shyly as she peered up at him through thick lashes. “I just wanted to say thank you. For coming over to give me a ride, and for the invitation to stay with you guys as well. I promise we’ll be out of your hair as soon as possible.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Travis said with a smile. “Now, let’s get your stuff loaded and be on our way.”
She smiled again and nodded. Travis felt that crackling electricity between them again, and with it, a warning. This was a woman he could easily fall for, if he wasn’t careful. But she was also a woman who was clearly headed toward a family, and he wasn’t the kind of man for that. The best thing he could do, for both of them, was to steer clear. Scarlett didn’t need a guy like him messing up her life.