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Jude glanced away from her computer monitor toward the outside and the barns and corrals. From her office in the back of the ranch house, she had a clear view of the big red horse barn with a huge encircled C painted on the second story. Clary Harper, the horse wrangler, was working a colt in the round corral attached to the barn. This was unusual. Most Sundays only a few hands worked at chores that were absolutely necessary.
Jude’s husband and her father, their backs to her, had their arms hooked over the corral’s top rail, watching Clary and the colt. The two men were about the same height. Both had a right boot braced on the bottom rail. Both had on Wranglers and long-sleeve light-colored shirts, both wore gray hats. Jude couldn’t keep from grinning. Brady and Daddy were such total cowboys. Other than herself, that was probably the most profound connection they had.
In the year and a half that had passed since she had married Brady, he and her father had grown close. Since her father had always wanted a son, she was happy to see him bond with her husband.
She left her desk and ambled out to the corral to see what was going on. She walked up between them. “Hey,” Brady said. He hooked an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close to his side. “How you feeling?”
She’d had a few bouts of morning sickness, but that phase of her new pregnancy seemed to have settled down. “Great.”
“You ate something, right?”
“Bowl of cereal, just like every morning.”
He gave her his white-toothed grin and a smack on the lips. God, she loved him.
“What do you think of the cook?” her father asked.
Jolie was the first ranch employee Daddy hadn’t had a direct hand in hiring. He had left it entirely up to her. Jude still hadn’t told him Jake had recommended Jolie, but her father was so happy these days, he probably wouldn’t care that Jake’s two-bits had gone into the hiring of the kitchen help.
“She seems okay. I told her not to worry about the kitchen until Tuesday. She has to enroll her daughter in school tomorrow. Y’all want a sandwich for dinner? I could probably manage that without doing too much damage.”
“Sure,” Daddy said. “When did you learn to cook?”
She gave him a flat look and he chuckled.
“Sounds good,” Brady said. “I’ll help you. As you should recall, I’m pretty good at sandwiches.”
The very first meal Jude had shared with Brady had been a bologna and cheese sandwich he had made in his antiquated kitchen at the old 6-0 ranch that had been left to him by his aunt. And for the rest of Jude’s days, “baloney and cheese sandwiches” would hold a special place in her heart. Brady grinned and Jude grinned back.
Her father’s face took on a blank expression. He didn’t get the private joke and Jude made no effort to explain.
The three of them sauntered toward the ranch house, with Jude walking between them, Brady resting his big hand at the base of her neck. She slid her arm around his waist. “Whose colt is Clary working with?” she asked.
“Betsy’s,” her father answered. “Remember, we bred her to Sandy Dandy a couple of years ago?”
Betsy was one of the ranch’s best broodmares and Sandy Dandy was a prize-winning stud. “Oh, wow. I do remember. That pairing should produce a good horse.”
“Clary thinks so, too. That’s why he’s working him on Sunday. He doesn’t want to miss a single day.”
In the kitchen, with Brady’s help, Jude made three ham, cheese, lettuce and tomato sandwiches, sliced them into halves and laid them on plates. Then she found tortilla chips in the pantry. They took seats at the glass-topped breakfast table and while they ate, discussed branding the spring calves. The branding would occur in June as it had every year for generations. Soon Brady and the hands would start to tally how many calves would be branded and Daddy would determine if they needed to hire extra temporary help.
At the end of the meal, Jude offered to make a tuna casserole for supper. “Suzanne gave me the recipe,” she added, “and we know she’s a good cook.”
“Don’t mean to hurt your feelings, punkin,” her father said, “but I think I’ll just go to town later and eat supper at Maisie’s.”
He left the table for his office on the other end of the house. Soon after Grandpa’s death, Daddy had taken over Grandpa’s office.
Brady hung behind. As she rinsed their dishes in the sink, he came up behind her, wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her close. “Ride to Abilene with me?”
She turned in his embrace, placing her palms on his chest. “What’re you doing in Abilene on a Sunday?”
“I was thinking if I had a hot date, I might take her to a nice dinner somewhere, then to a movie.”
She smiled up at him. She had never been as happy as she was now. “Dinner and a movie. Hmm.”
“Yep,” he said.
They kissed, thoroughly enjoying each other. When it ended, she said, “Lord, I can’t remember the last time someone wasn’t here to eat supper. This old house won’t know what to think if all of us are gone at suppertime.”
“I’ll bet it’ll still be here when we get back.”
“I’ll bet so, too,” Jude said, still smiling.
Abilene was an hour-and-a-half drive from Lockett. As they turned onto the highway, Brady said, “I heard what you told your dad about the cook, but what did you really think?”
“I don’t know yet. She’s a woman with a past, I think. But obviously, I didn’t want to mention that to Daddy.”
“Couldn’t have much of a past. She can’t be thirty years old.”
“Amanda said she’s twenty-seven. She seems older than that. I sense that she’s very responsible and Amanda says she can cook. I’m just going to keep an eye on things for a while. Not with the cooking but with the management of the kitchen and the budget. I know she’s Amanda’s cousin, but we don’t know her. And Amanda might not know her as well as she thinks she does.”
***
JOLIE REMOVED THE REMAINDER of the food she had brought from the Cactus Café from the cooler and spread it on the table in the dining area off the kitchen. She opened bottles of milk for Danni and herself and they sat at the table to eat. “Tomorrow we’ll start eating in the ranch house,” she said.
“Do you think there’s some kids here?” Danni asked, mincing at her sandwich.
“You heard Mrs. Fallon, er, Jude. She has a stepson near your age.”
Danni finally took a bite of her sandwich, then said, “But he doesn’t live here. And she doesn’t have any girls.”
“Your aunt Amanda said the ranch has around fifty employees and most of them live here on the ranch. Surely some of them have girls.”
They ate the rest of the sandwiches in silence. “Are you tired?” Jolie asked.
Danni nodded.
“Me, too. I’m worn out. We could watch TV and maybe take a nap on the sofa. This might be the last day we aren’t busy. It might take all day tomorrow to get you enrolled in school.”
Danni grimaced.
“It’ll be fine, Danni. You’ll see. Just try, okay?”
“Will I have to ride the school bus?”
“You rode the school bus in Grandee.”
“But I knew everyone.”
“You’ll know everyone again. You’re a sweet, friendly person and all the kids at school will want to be your friend.”
“No, they won’t. Couldn’t you take me?”
In Jolie’s mind’s eye, the stolen license plates glared. Dare she risk driving to the school and back? Well, there wasn’t much traffic and she had been lucky so far and she didn’t want her daughter to be more uncomfortable than necessary. “Look, I’ll drive you for a few days, just until you get used to things. I’ve been thinking, I wonder if we could figure out a way to enroll you using a different last name.”
Jolie didn’t know if this was even possible or legal, but she intended to try it. Dealing with Danni in a new school had been a worry from the moment Jolie had begun to formulate her escape plan. When she had removed her daughter from school in Grandee, she had told the principal they were moving west for work and the principal’s office had given her all of Danni’s records. Unfortunately, they had her last name as “Jensen.”
“Why?”
“So Billy won’t be able to find you. I was thinking maybe we could get the school to let you enroll as Danni Kramer. That used to be my name before I married Billy. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”
Danni answered with a shake of her head. “Will Billy hurt us?”
Danni had never called her father “Dad” or “Daddy” or anything other than Billy. Most of the time, he hadn’t given her the time of day. They had lived almost as if Danni were just Jolie’s child and Billy had had nothing to do with her existence.
Who knew if he would hurt them? Not Jolie, even after living with him for more than ten years. If he was doing drugs and wasn’t passed out, he was short-tempered and she believed he was capable of violence. He would be really mad that she had left and even madder that she had taken their only dependable vehicle. His old pickup ran only half the time. “Don’t worry. We just won’t let him find us.”
***
PAT GARNER DISMOUNTED the blue roan stallion he was training for a calf roper in Abilene and headed for the end of the arena. An engine noise caught his ear. Suzanne Breedlove’s daddy’s pickup truck. He felt a lift in his chest. Just seeing that woman could turn a dark day bright. He led Blue Streak outside and waited for Suzanne to come to a stop.
She scooted from behind the steering wheel looking beautiful. Her long blond hair had that messy look like some of the movie stars wore. She had a big smile on her full, kissable lips. Lord, he loved just the sight of her. He couldn’t help it.
Without a moment’s hesitation she walked straight to him, slid her arms around his middle, rose to her tiptoes and kissed him. Still hanging on to Blue Streak’s reins with one hand, he kissed her back in a long, languid joining, not even trying to hide his hunger. He’d had that hunger almost from the beginning of their relationship and it had never waned. When they stopped for air, he was hard as a rock and Blue Streak snorted in his ear. “Even this horse knows how you tear me up.”
She grinned up at him and rubbed his fly where his erection pushed against his zipper. “Did you miss me last night?”
He huffed a grunt. “What do you think?”
“I missed you, too. I’ve gotten so used to sleeping with your long hairy legs and big strong arms, I have insomnia when I’m not in your bed.”
He smiled. She had a way of making him feel ten feet tall. “Yeah? Well, you’re welcome to stay over any time.”
“Hmm. I can see that.” She kissed him again, pressing her belly against his erection.
Blue Streak snorted and stamped and Pat broke their kiss. “Did your dad get home okay?”
“Sure did. I had the house all clean and shining and supper on the table when he got here. His favorite. Fried pork chops and mashed potatoes and gravy.”
Suzanne felt an obligation to provide a haven for her father to come home to. He spent his days driving an eighteen-wheeler on the highways and his nights in his sleeper cab parked in some grocery store parking lot. She believed he had been an unhappy man when her mother was alive and she wanted him to have something to look forward to now.
“Damn,” Pat said. “Wish you would’ve invited me. I had a frozen pizza.”
“You’re invited tonight. Daddy spent last night in the Walmart parking lot west of Fort Worth. Before he started home, he went inside and bought three great T-bones.”
They kissed again and she rubbed him more. Dammit, if she didn’t quit it, he might just go off in his shorts. “I was just going to the house for a sandwich,” he said huskily. “But I could be arm-twisted into having dessert first.”
She gave him a wicked grin. She knew what she had done to him. “You know that old saying. Life’s uncertain; eat dessert first.” Then she drew back and looked up at him with an earnest expression. “I came to talk to you about something.”
Uh-oh. What’s gone wrong? Things with her were just going too well to not have something happen. The enthusiasm in his jeans softened. “Okay. But I need to put this horse away.”
She helped him unsaddle Blue Streak. As they brushed him down, Pat on one side and her on the other, she said, “Guess what?”
“Don’t know.”
“Jude’s pregnant.”
He stopped and looked at her across Blue Streak’s back. Jude Strayhorn was Suzanne’s best friend. They had known each other since they were kids. Jude’s family was richer than all get-out and owned most of Willard County. Pat had lived here only a few years, but it was common knowledge Jude’s dad and granddad had been waiting for her to get married and have kids. Sons, preferably. “No kidding. That ought to make all of them happy. A new Strayhorn heir.”
“Jude’s an heir.”
Pat laughed and returned to brushing Blue Streak. “But she’s the wrong sex. You know how they are.”
After they turned the horse loose in the pasture, they walked toward the house hand in hand. Pat had a nice house in which he took pride. Three bedrooms and two baths. He had gutted the old sixties-vintage house that was here originally and started over. It wasn’t a mansion, but after the major remodel, it was the newest house in the county. He had more or less redesigned it himself, then gone into hock to pay for it, all for his ex-wife, Becky. He felt he owed his bride a decent place to live. She had walked out of it as if it were a shack and had never looked back.
Inside the house, they headed straight for his bedroom. In record time they were washed up, undressed and under the covers and they were kissing and exploring each other as if they had been apart for weeks instead of only a day. Just touching her voluptuous body anywhere he wanted, filling his hands and mouth with her breasts, making her scream with pleasure would thrill him forever. He still couldn’t believe that she wanted him as much as he wanted her.
“I’m so hot,” she breathed, urging him on top of her.
He was, too. Thoughts of her and the time they spent together constantly circled in his mind no matter what he was doing. He crawled between her thighs, trailed kisses over her face, down her neck, licked her nipples and suckled in the way she had told him she liked. She moaned in the way he liked.
“You said you wanted dessert first,” she said huskily. Her hands pushed on his shoulders, urging him down.
On a deep hum he moved his open mouth down her middle, stopped and licked her right hipbone, felt her belly quiver. “Feel good?”
“Yesss.” She arched to him.
He trailed his tongue over her soft fragrant skin, flicked it along the edge of her crisp pubic hair until he reached the other hipbone. He pushed her left knee high and wide, inhaling her woman’s scent. He would go to his grave with her female smell branded on his brain. He kissed the inside of her thigh, licked his way up to her knee and back, stopped between her legs and buried his face in her nest of curls and licked the seam of her sex.
On a big sigh, she raised her opposite knee, opening herself completely, and he pushed his tongue into her warm, salty slickness.
“Ooh,” she murmured, and he felt her fingers in his hair. Pushing her knees high and hooking them over his shoulders, he began thrusting his tongue in a sexual rhythm and at the same time suckling her sweetness into his mouth. She squirmed within his grasp and little gasping noises came from her throat.
Soon she was moving against his mouth. Her fingers clawed at his head, yanking a fistful of his hair, almost to the point of pain. “Now, Pat...now.”
Oh, yeah, he was ready, too. His balls were on fire, his dick throbbed and blood pounded in his head, but he gripped her ass and held her still and kept teasing her. He intended to make this last as long as possible.
She was breathless and panting. “Dammit, Pat...hurry.”
“Say please,” he mumbled against her sweet, wet flesh.
“Please, dammit.”
He leisurely slid his tongue up to her clit, sucked the firm little button of flesh into his mouth and she went crazy. Her hips undulated, her pussy contracted against his mouth and tongue. She sobbed and panted and came and came. He was ready to burst into flames himself. His cock couldn’t get any harder without exploding, but he fought against his own orgasm.
After she finished, she tugged him up by the hair. “Getuphere,” she gasped. “Putitin. Please, Pat....I wanna come with you inside me.”
He crawled up, kneeling between her thighs, hovering over her, his penis hot, hard and eager.
She reached between them and frantically guided it to the right spot. Though it was torture, he teased her some more by giving her just the head.
“Pat,” she whined, arching herself up to him.
Finally, he pushed into her, shuddering from the powerful sensation of his hard flesh gliding along the soft, hot walls of her tight sheath.
Her legs came around his waist and her heels dug into his ass cheeks. He pushed one more time and seated himself deeply inside her. Her vaginal muscles clamped down on him and he almost lost control. She did that on purpose, he knew. He gave a grunt. Too close to climaxing for her tormenting, he pressed his face against her neck. “Goddamn, you’re killing me....”
“Please don’t die. You feel too good.”
He braced himself on his hands and pushed himself up. Looking down at her glistening parted lips and closed eyes, he began to rock in a steady rhythm.
“Yesss,” she hissed, moving with him. “I love your big cock inside me.”
He kissed her, quick and fierce, sought a sweet spot. “Feel good when I do this?”
“Yes, yes.... Like that.... It feels like it’s up in my stomach.”
They moved in perfect practiced rhythm, her fingers digging into his biceps. He sensed her restlessness. She was as hot as he had ever seen her. He picked up the pace, striving to make every stroke count before he lost it. Their breathing became labored pants. She cupped the back of his neck and pulled his face against her cheek, her mouth against his ear. “Harder. Fuck me harder.”
She was the only woman he had ever known who talked like that during sex. It turned him on big time. He had no trouble giving her what she wanted. He pumped hard and fast, making her pant and cry out and making the headboard bang the wall. Moments later when her sweet pussy clutched him and milked him with powerful contractions, he couldn’t last through it. Orgasm burned through him like a raging fire and he jetted his seed into her over and over until he was empty.
Still heaving for breath, she wrapped her arms around his back and held him close. When the storm began to calm, she whispered in his ear, “That was stupendous, you big brute. Fantastic. You’re always fantastic.”
Lord God, sex with a woman who liked it was amazing. He sure as hell knew the difference. He had been married to one who barely endured it. “You make me that way. I never was before.” Getting his breath back, he covered her mouth with his for a long, lush kiss.
They lay with legs entwined for a long while, drifting in hazy satisfaction. The smell of sex filled the air around them and they both had slick bellies. They fucked without rubbers. She took the pill. There was almost no chance she would get knocked up and zero chance she would catch an STD from him. He wasn’t worried about catching anything from her, either. They had already crossed that bridge.
He hated to move, but finally he said, “Guess I oughtta get a towel.” He left the bed and washed himself in the bathroom. He returned carrying a towel, which he used to wipe her stomach and between her legs. He dropped it on the floor and crawled under the covers again and they snuggled belly to belly.
After a while she said, “We should clean up, huh? So we can have lunch.”
“Yeah, I’m starved.” He freed himself and started to sit up, but recalled her earlier statement at the arena and the serious look on her face. He turned on his side, propped himself on his elbow and placed a hand on her silky hip. “What do you want to talk to me about?”
“It could be a long conversation. You sure you want to get into it now?”
He stretched alongside her. “You’ve got my curiosity aroused. And my undivided attention.”
She gave him a tentative smile. “Okay, here goes.” She turned onto her stomach, braced on her elbows and looked down at him, her tousled hair a messy golden aura around her head and shoulders. Her lips were pink and swollen from their kissing. He loved seeing her like this, the way no one else ever saw her. He touched the corner of her mouth for no reason other than he just liked touching her.
She caught his finger and kissed it. “How long have we been, you know, doing the nasty?”
He couldn’t put his finger on exactly when things began to change between him and Suzanne. Of course, he clearly remembered the first time they’d had sex. She informed him one day that she had been taking birth control pills for a month preparing for the day they would do it and she was tired of waiting for him to make a move. What had followed was one of the most embarrassing sexual experiences he’d had in his life. That first time, he had been so nervous, nothing worked the way it was supposed to. The second time, though, he had settled down and gotten it right and experienced the most mind-blowing sex he’d had up to that moment. Thinking about it now, he chuckled and tucked a sheaf of yellow hair behind her ear. “I don’t know. Since before Jude got married. Over a year.”
“And how many fights have we had?”
“None. I always give up and let you have your way.” That wasn’t entirely true, but teasing her was part of their relationship.
“You do not.” She leaned over and placed a quick kiss on his shoulder. “My point is we get along, right?”
He gave her an even wider grin and gently tugged at her hair. “We sure do.”
“So what would you think if I got off the pill?”
His grin fled and words failed him. He looked at her, only able to blink. He thought he knew what she meant, but just to be sure, he finally asked, “Why? Are they causing you problems?”
“No, no. It’s just that...” She turned away from him and stared at her interlocked fingers.
Now he was concerned. “What is it, Suzanne?”
“Well...they’re keeping us from making a baby, Pat.”
More than words failed him. His ability to think and breathe flew right out the window. “God, Suzanne...”
An expression of hurt fleetingly passed through her eyes. “I was hoping you wouldn’t tell me not to.”
He had never seen that look on her face. She was the last person in the world he wanted to hurt, but he couldn’t be cavalier about what she had said. “But why all of a sudden do you want to have a baby?”
“I don’t know. You know how you sometimes just feel like it’s time for something?” She turned her head away from him and focused her attention on her fingers again. She began rubbing her two thumbs together. “Maybe it’s because my best friend’s pregnant and she and Brady are so happy. Even Jude’s dad is happier than I’ve ever seen him. He came all the way into town just to tell Lucky and Carlene about being a grandpa.”
Lucky and Carlene Henson owned Lucky’s Grocery, where Suzanne worked. Lucky and Jude’s dad, J. D. Strayhorn, had been friends their whole lives. While Pat thought about how the wealthy Strayhorns interacted with the community they practically owned, he didn’t reply to what Suzanne had said.
“Maybe I’m envious of all that,” she continued. “My dad would be happy to be a grandpa, too.... Or maybe it’s because I’m thirty-one years old and not getting any younger.” She looked at him pointedly. “You aren’t getting any younger, either.”
She was right about that. He would be thirty-five his next birthday. Both of his sisters were married with families. They and his parents nagged him all the time about being single and childless at thirty-five. He had never been opposed to having kids. When he was younger, he had even thought that was what he would do someday. His far-from-perfect marriage had reversed that attitude for a while, but he still believed a man should have kids with the right woman.
But was Suzanne the right woman? His mind spun backward to when his relationship with her began, when she had first returned to Lockett carrying a flaming torch for ProRodeo and PBR bullrider Mitch McCutcheon. With a plan to return to barrel racing, she had hired Pat to help her get her old horse Buck into shape.
While they had worked at that, Pat commiserated with her about her former lover. On some days, she would be so distraught she would break down in tears and have to leave their workout. But she would show up the next day and doggedly try again. There had been times when they had spent more time discussing McCutcheon and her failures as a woman than working with poor old Buck. Back then, Pat hadn’t had the heart to tell her Buck was simply too old to ever make it as a winning barrel racing horse.
As much as she had talked about that good-for-nothing fucker McCutcheon who had abused her emotionally and physically, Pat still didn’t know if she and he had been married or if they had just hung out together for a long time.
Pat wasn’t a man to shrink from reality. Even with as well as he and Suzanne had gotten along from the first, even as close as the two of them had grown, even with the sex as good as it was, he still didn’t know if she still secretly carried that torch for Mitch McCutcheon. Pat might not mind the idea of having kids, but he had to ask himself if he wanted that with any woman who had settled for him while in her heart of hearts she loved another man.
“Hey,” she said softly, running her finger along his biceps, “you’re not talking to me.”
He pulled the woman he loved more than he had ever loved the one he married into his arms, their faces only inches apart. He looked into her sky-blue eyes intently. “By now you know me,” he said gently, treading lightly, fearing revealing all that was tumbling through his mind. “You know I’m a dull turd. I own a house, an arena and a few acres. Not much to offer. I don’t know why you’d want to have a baby with me.”
Her head shook slowly and he thought he saw love glowing in her eyes. “God, Pat, you don’t even know all that you have to offer. You’re good and kind and honest and funny. You’re not dull. You’re smarter than anyone I know.” Her palm cupped his jaw and her eyes locked on his. “Maybe I think a little kid would be lucky to have you for a daddy. I can see you teaching him or her to ride, to know about horses, to know about the cattle. I can see you teaching a son what it means to take responsibility and be a man.”
Those words hit home, overwhelming his negative musings. A lump swelled in his throat. An image of her big with his child charged into his mind. How many times had he seen pregnant cows, mares, dogs, cats? How many times had he helped them give birth? The process had always humbled him and made him feel closer to God. What would it do to him to watch a woman he loved go through pregnancy and pain bearing a child he had sired? “But you’d have to put up with a lot. You’d be in pain. I don’t know if I could stand that.”
She kissed him tenderly. “Pat. You raise cattle and horses. You know the females are supposed to have babies. It’s the scheme of things.”
He placed his hand on her flat stomach. “But you’d get fat.”
“Shh.” She planted a fierce kiss on his lips.
“You’ve thought about this,” he said, stalling, struggling to get a grip on his emotions. “This isn’t just a whim. Like you said, Jude is—”
“Jude doesn’t have anything to do with it. I was thinking about it a long time before I heard about Jude. I guess her news brought it to the front of my mind.”
“You know I’m a traditional guy, Suzanne. We’ve never talked about it, but you must have figured out I’m not the kind who’d believe in all this free love and single parent stuff. As it is, I sometimes worry that what you and I are doing is wrong. I couldn’t take it, you being pregnant and me not being there for every minute of it. And I wouldn’t want a kid of mine to be a bastard.”
She gave him a grin he could only call sly. “I know.”
Damn her orneriness. He grinned back at her. “Are you trying to tell me something I don’t know? Did you already stop—”
“I’m not pregnant, if that’s what you mean. I’d never stop those pills without talking to you about it.”
“Okay, I’m dense. You’re gonna have to clue me in.”
“Pat. I know you wouldn’t want to be a single parent, okay?”
“So are you asking me to marry you?”
“I’m just saying that if you said it was all right if I stopped the pill, I would. And if you don’t want to be a single parent, I’d probably say yes.”
He had never told her he loved her, had been afraid she would think he was hanging on too tightly and would run away. He loved her more at this moment than he would ever have dreamed possible, but so much emotion had filled his chest, the word wouldn’t come out. “You know how I feel about you. You know I can’t refuse you anything.”
Her beautiful blue eyes grew misty and she sniffled. “I love you, too, Pat. And I want a little boy with wavy brown hair and big brown eyes who’ll remind me of you every time I look at him.”
“Yeah?” Now he was grinning like a damn fool, latching on to the idea of fatherhood and spending the rest of his life with Suzanne. “And what if I want a pretty little blue-eyed blonde who’d remind me of you?”
She laughed. “Oh, my Lord. We might have to have two.” Her face grew solemn. “Pat, please don’t ever think what we’ve been doing is wrong. You saved my life. After Mitch, I thought I could never care about any man.”
“And what about Mitch?”
“There is no Mitch. He’s gone. Forever.”
But was that true? Sometimes when they were in bed making love and she closed her eyes, he wondered if she fantasized that Pat Garner was Mitch McCutcheon. And here and there, she had said some things that made him question if one day the sonofabitch might show up.
