“You’ve looked better,” Chloe said bluntly, following Rex into the study.
Hanging his hat on the wall peg, he chuckled, well aware that he was dirty, unshaved and uncombed. “No doubt, but I’ve never been happier, Dad’s health notwithstanding.”
“I guess that means you’re not coming back to the firm.”
Surprised, he walked around the desk. “I thought we’d already settled that.”
Chloe shrugged. “Your talents have been missed. In all areas.”
Knowing perfectly well that she referred to her daughter, Rex snorted. “I find that hard to believe.”
In a gesture of studied submissiveness, Chloe sank down onto the edge of the chair in front of the desk, her hands folded atop the slender, expensive briefcase in her lap. “Amy wonders if you would consent to meet with her. She wants to talk, to apologize.”
With his hands at his waist, Rex looked Chloe straight in the eyes. “There’s nothing to talk about.” He pulled open a desk drawer and removed a file, tossing it onto the blotter. “You can tell her that her apology is accepted, and that’s the end of it.” He pushed the file forward. “The Shallot file.”
Chloe reached out and picked it up. “You’ve moved on.”
“I’ve moved on,” he confirmed. “The invoice is attached to the inside of the file jacket.”
Flipping open the file, Chloe glanced at the invoice and raised an eyebrow before sliding the file into her briefcase. Relaxing back into her chair, she lifted her gaze.
“Callie, is it?”
Smiling, Rex went to the study door. “Callie!” he called.
Within five seconds she appeared, Bodie on her hip, a dishtowel on her shoulder. “Yes?”
“Sweetheart, would you mind if Chloe and I have lunch in here? We have work to do.”
She glanced curiously into the study, while Bodie reached for him. “No problem.”
“Thank you.” He kissed Bodie on the forehead, which allowed her to get one hand on his collar and the other in his hair. He laughed. “Hey, monkey, I’m too dirty for you.”
“Let go,” Callie admonished gently, trying to pry her off.
“Oh, let her stay until you bring lunch,” he said, changing his mind. He pulled the towel from Callie’s shoulder as he gathered Bodie into his arms.
Her forehead furrowing, Callie asked, “Are you sure?”
He nodded, arranging the towel across his chest and holding Bodie against it. “She’ll have to have a bath afterward.”
“She has to have a bath anyway,” Callie said. Leaning close, she whispered, “Lunch is just sandwiches, though. Why didn’t you warn me?”
“Great,” he said heartily, ignoring the latter. “Bring it on.” He hadn’t warned her because he’d been too tired to think the previous evening, and he’d completely forgotten to leave her a note this morning. If Chloe hadn’t called for directions when she’d reached War Bonnet, he’d still be in the field now. For apology, he kissed Callie on the forehead. He really wanted to kiss her on the lips, but he feared that would embarrass her in front of Chloe.
Frowning, she went off to put together the meal. Rex carried Bodie into the room and sat down behind the desk with her, turning her so that her back rested against his towel-covered chest. She stared at his guest, her fist in her mouth, drool sliding down her arm. What passed for shock widened Chloe’s carefully arranged lawyer’s expression.
“You’ll have to forgive her,” Rex said smugly, jiggling Bodie’s bare feet. “She’s not much of a conversationalist, especially right now. She’s teething like crazy. Aren’t you, princess?” Bodie tilted her head back, yanked her fist from her maw and gave him a grin that showed all four of her tiny teeth. “She is, however, quite entertaining.” As if to prove the point, Bodie suddenly pitched forward and made a grab for the ink pen beside the blotter. Rex calmly flicked it out of her reach.
She flipped over and crawled up his chest. Rex leaned back in his chair, laughing as she bounced up and down on his thighs, her chubby knees digging into his ribs.
“Good grief, you mean it,” Chloe said. “You’re not coming back.”
“No, I’m here to stay,” Rex told her, looking around Bodie as she smacked both hands on the top of his head. “Home has never been sweeter.” He kissed Bodie’s belly, where a strip of skin showed between the hem of her little T-shirt and the top of her diaper. She squealed with delight, tickled by his whiskers, and patted herself while he held her steady with both hands. “Work’s never been more enjoyable. Or harder.”
Chloe shook her head. “Surely you’re not giving up the law.”
“Nothing of the kind,” Rex said, tucking Bodie into the curve of his arm. “I’m thinking of specializing in ranching and cattle issues. It’s what I know best, after all, which is why your firm called me in on the Shallot mess. Though I may open an office in War Bonnet.”
“Well, you’ve certainly got the chops for that specialization,” Chloe conceded. “And Callie?”
“Haven’t worked that out yet,” he admitted. Callie suited him somehow, she and Bodie, but he wasn’t sure the feeling was mutual. That, however, wasn’t why he’d asked Chloe to come. “I’ve got some things to clear up first.”
“And that’s why I’m here,” Chloe guessed.
Rex smiled. “You did say that you wanted to pick up that file, too.”
Glancing around the room, Chloe said, “I wouldn’t have to if you’d buy a printer with a scanner.”
Laughing, Rex wrestled Bodie down into his lap. “It’s on my list of things to do, right below get the sorghum planted and harvest the oats and right before buy a new truck.”
Chloe gaped at him. “Will wonders never cease?”
“You know what they say. You can take the boy off the ranch, but you can’t take the ranch out of the boy. Or something to that effect.”
Laughing dryly, Chloe asked, “So what do you need?”
“It involves a church and a loan that I want paid off anonymously.”
Chloe stared at him for five full seconds. “She must be something, this Callie.”
“Not something,” Rex said softly. “More like everything.” But he couldn’t be her escape from her father any more than he’d been Amy’s gift to hers.
If he and Callie couldn’t be together because they were right for each other, because they belonged to each other, were made for each other, then they shouldn’t be together at all.
He’d tried to tell himself that it didn’t matter how they came together, only that they be together, but experience had shown him the folly of that. Besides, Callie’s late husband had been an exemplary character, heroic, even. A man like that could be difficult to live up to. If Rex was to risk his heart again, he had to know beyond any doubt this time that he was chosen and loved purely for himself. As sweet and caring and affectionate as Callie was, he could see those doubts in her eyes.
That didn’t stop him from letting everyone around them think they were a couple. Even the ranch hands had started to assume that they were “courting,” as Woody put it. Stark Burns called it “getting serious.” Rex had bluntly told the pastor and head deacon that Callie was the finest, most moral and completely adorable woman he’d ever known. He’d made his personal interest plain while defending her reputation, even worrying aloud that he might not be worthy of her. Both knew that she’d been married to a minister who’d died in an act of heroism, though Stuart talked about Bo Deviner as if the man had been a bounder after his money. At least Rex could escape that accusation. He hoped.
Callie came in with two plates of food, flatware, napkins and drinks on a tray. Her sandwiches stood two inches thick and came accompanied by a colorful, fresh fruit salad, bread-and-butter pickles, pretzels, cold iced tea and some dainty white cookies. She off-loaded the tray and set it aside, reaching for Bodie just as Rex sneaked the baby a bite of cookie.
“Don’t you dare,” Callie scolded softly.
“Aw, come on,” Rex protested, popping the remaining cooking in his mouth, where it literally melted. “They’re so good.”
“You spoil her,” Callie said, parking Bodie on her hip.
“You spoil me,” Rex countered with a smile.
Callie glanced uneasily at Chloe, who was picking delicately at her fruit. “I don’t. And if I do, it’s because you work too hard.”
“Look who’s talking,” he retorted with a wink, popping another cookie into his mouth.
Shaking her head, Callie leaned over, snatched the dishtowel off his chest and spun on her heel.
“Close the door, hon,” he called as she exited the room. She shot him such a look that he wanted to laugh, or get up and hug her. Instead he ate another cookie then grinned very broadly as she carefully, quietly closed the door.
“Boy, you have got it bad,” Chloe drawled.
“Uh-uh,” Rex corrected, picking up his sandwich. “I have got it good. Very good.” Please God, he prayed silently, let it last.
They talked out a solution to his loan issue over lunch. Chloe jotted down the particulars on a notepad. Then they went online using Rex’s laptop and made the necessary financial transfers.
“I’ll take care of it before I leave town,” she promised.
Callie tapped on the door, asking if she could come in for the dishes.
“Sure,” Rex called, lounging back in his chair. She opened the door and came in. He’d stacked the dishes on the tray and left them on the end of the desk. Smiling, he said, “We’re just about through here, babe.”
She widened her eyes at him, picking up the tray.
“Speaking of babes...” Chloe said, her voice laced with humor.
Callie smiled tautly. “Bodie is napping upstairs.” She looked pointedly at Rex, adding, “And Wes is sleeping in his room.”
In other words, he should have looked in on his dad before he’d closeted himself in here with Chloe. Point taken.
“I’ll look in on him when we’re done.”
Callie nodded, the slightest of smiles on her face, and carried the dishes from the room.
“Keeps you in line, doesn’t she?” Chloe observed wryly.
“With great ease,” Rex admitted, a grin breaking across his face, “and I don’t even care if she knows it.” Chloe laughed. “Back to business. What do I owe you for your help today?”
Chloe reached into her bag and drew out the file he’d given her earlier. Opening it, she reached inside and pulled out the invoice stapled to it. “Let’s just call it even, shall we?” She crumpled the invoice in her hand and tossed it onto the desktop.
“That’s very generous, Chloe. Thank you.”
“It’ll earn me brownie points at the firm when they don’t have to pay you for this,” she said dismissively, returning the file to her bag.
A few minutes later, he walked her to the door, delicately kissed her cheek, ignoring her wrinkled nose, and sent her on her way before going in search of Callie. He found her in the laundry room, shoveling wet clothes into the dryer. She straightened and turned when he came into the room.
“All done?”
He nodded. “She’s going to handle paying off the church loan for me. That’s why I asked her to come. That and she needed to pick up the case file I prepared for her firm last week. Um, remind me to buy a new printer with a good scanner function.”
“So she’s a lawyer, too.”
“Yes.”
“But why do you need a lawyer?”
“For the same reason that a doctor needs a doctor. It would be foolish to represent myself, especially when I’m trying to remain anonymous.”
Callie blinked at that. “Why do you need to be anonymous to pay off the church loan?”
“I don’t need to be,” he said. “I want to be.”
She fluffed her bangs, showing him a beetled brow. “Why?”
He shrugged. “Just seems the right way to handle it. What is it Matthew says? When you give, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. Give in secret.”
“‘Then Your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you,’” Callie quoted.
“I don’t want to be rewarded,” Rex said. But didn’t he? Wasn’t he on some level competing with at least the memory of her late husband? He felt a certain shame at the realization of that, but at the same time, common sense told him that Bo Deviner no longer walked in this world while Callie did. She deserved and needed someone to care for her. Why not him?
He stepped closer, realized that he was still covered in dirt and no doubt smelled like a goat, so he simply skimmed his fingertips along her jawline before saying, “I’ll probably be late tonight. Don’t hold dinner for me.”
She looked down. “You can’t keep up this pace for much longer.”
“I won’t have to.”
“Go see your dad. I’ll pack you a snack.”
Leaning close, he whispered into her ear, “Cookies.”
Laughing, Callie pushed him away. Ridiculously pleased with himself, Rex went out to slip into his dad’s room and watch him sleep for several long seconds. When he returned to the kitchen, Callie handed him a thermos, an apple and a Baggie of cookies.
“Come home as soon as you can.”
“I always do.” He smiled, adding softly, “I always will.”
He could tell that she didn’t quite believe that. Why should she? No matter. She would learn how ardently he meant those words, provided he could keep her around long enough.
* * *
Strangely, the more Rex talked of planting his roots in War Bonnet, the more Callie feared that her time for leaving quickly approached. Moreover, she knew that Rex would not be paying off the church loan if she hadn’t come to work at the Straight Arrow. It seemed to her that she had brought more difficulty than good to the Billings family, and she felt terribly conflicted about her growing attraction to Rex.
Bo had drawn her to him with his quiet, peaceful presence. He’d made her feel safe and treasured. There were elements of that with Rex, too, but he excited her in ways that she found disturbingly addictive. Even as she fought those feelings, she craved them, too, and that made her question her own judgment. Worse, she didn’t know where to turn for advice, so she simply prayed on the matter. Then Wes called her to task.
“What’s troubling you, girl? And don’t tell me it’s nothing. I’m sick. I’m not stupid.” He sighed as he sank down onto the side of his freshly made bed and kicked off his slippers. “Talk.”
Callie shook her head, gathering the discarded bed linens, and gave him a half-truth. “I guess I’m just waiting for the next round in this ongoing war between my dad and Rex.”
“Hmm.” Wes lifted his feet onto the bed and leaned back. “I wouldn’t worry none. Rex can outfox old Stu.”
“Rex is as clever and resolute as my father, that’s true.”
“And you don’t think that’s a good thing?” Wes asked, clearly hearing what she hadn’t said.
Callie bit her lip, hugging the laundry to her. “Do you?”
Wes chuckled. “You know, I admire a lot about your father. I admit he sometimes lets his business sense get the better of him, but he’s done plenty good around town, and he’s made a lot out of nothing. Why, I remember when your dad first started in business.” Shaking his head, Wes grinned. “His little old grocery wasn’t much more than a convenience store back then. He built that up, and then he bought out the Feed and Grain and improved that, and when the bank faltered, he stepped in there and put it to rights. Soon, he owned most of the town. He was well on his way to being the big fish in our little pond when your mother died.” Sighing, Wes went on in a more somber tone. “After that, he seemed to pour all his grief and fear into making money. I remember him telling me that the best thing he could do for you was to leave you a fortune.”
“But life isn’t just about material things,” Callie argued, realizing as she said it that those words had become a mantra over the years, one her father had heard many times. And ignored.
“Of course, it’s not,” Wes agreed, “but I think Stuart didn’t know what else to do for you, Callie. Believe me, I understand his dilemma. I have daughters myself. I was also blessed to have a wife to help me navigate the confusing stages between infancy and womanhood with my girls. And it’s still pretty much a mystery to me. I admit that I’d have been lost without Glory to help me raise my kids, and that includes Rex.” Wes rubbed a hand thick and heavy with years of hard toil over his bald head. “Except for those few years, Stu didn’t have the luxury of a wife at his side, and he did love your mom.”
“He never talks about her,” Callie said softly. “What was she like?”
“You,” Wes told her succinctly. “Calm, strong, smart, pretty.”
Callie smiled, blushing. “I’ve always wondered how I could miss someone I never really knew, but I do. I always have.”
“Why, naturally you would. That’s just human nature.” Wes stared into the distance, musing, “Jane balanced Stuart somehow. The day of the car wreck, I’d never seen anyone so devastated. I thought of him the day my Glory died and how blessed I was to have her for so many years.” He looked at Callie then, saying, “I understood Stu better that day. I don’t think he’s ever gotten over losing Jane. Seems to me one reason for his controlling ways is that he doesn’t want you to go through life living with that kind of pain and loss.”
“And yet, here I am doing that very thing,” Callie said softly.
Wes nodded. “And he’s trying to fix it.”
Shocked, Callie sighed. “Poor Dad. He can’t fix it. If he could, I’d let him. Doesn’t he know that?”
Reaching out to pat her hand, Wes said, “You’ll find out for yourself one of these days how very hard it is to let go of your children and give them over to God. But it’s like my Glory always said, God gives us the free will to choose our own way, and that’s the example we have to follow with our own children.”
“I know Dad thinks I was wrong to marry Bo,” Callie said thoughtfully, “but I’d do it again, even knowing how it would end.”
“I’m glad for you then,” Wes told her. “I just hope you can understand your father’s motivations a little better now. And I hope you can see how much there is to admire about Stuart Crowsen. And my son. They’re strong men who make things happen, Callie. This world needs men like them.”
Callie smiled. “Those aren’t the only two admirable men around here.”
Wes linked his fingers and tucked them behind his head, grinning. “Of course not.” He winked, then he closed his eyes.
Laughing, Callie carried the laundry from the room. With a father like that, Rex couldn’t be too much like Stuart, which just made her situation all the more acute.
Callie knew that she had some thinking and praying to do, where both her father and Rex were concerned.
Was it possible that she had misunderstood her father all these years? Might this new insight help them come to an understanding at long last, and if they could manage that, might she and Bodie be able to stay around War Bonnet long enough for something meaningful to develop between her and Rex?
She still felt a prick of guilt, as if thinking of even the possibility of a future with another man was a betrayal of Bo. Yet, she knew that her late husband would not begrudge her happiness, help or love. She didn’t doubt that she could—probably already did—love Rex, but she had no assurance in her heart that he could or would love her.
Oh, she knew that he was attracted to her, but that was not the same thing as true love, and neither was gratitude or pity. What she didn’t know was if he truly meant to stay on at Straight Arrow Ranch or if he was God’s will for her.
She supposed that time would tell, but her time here could be very limited. Ironically, now that she wanted to grasp time and make it stand still, it seemed to slip through her hands like sand.
If she could make peace with her father, convince him to back off his plans for her future and stop trying to force Ben Dolent on her, she could stay around War Bonnet. If, however, her father insisted on trying to bully everyone around them until she did as he wanted, then she’d have no choice but to take her daughter and move away.
She began to pray that God would give her the means to reach him. Doubt argued that she’d never been able to do so before, but that was before she’d known how like her mother she was.
Like mother like daughter. Calm, strong, smart. She hoped.