The hospital cafeteria had closed at eight. The tables had been wiped, the stainless steel warming table and salad bar scoured and disinfected. Now, at a few minutes before nine, only the squat, gray-haired custodian industriously waxing the floor and a few sleepy-eyed visitors and staff members remained.
Slumped in her chair at one of the corner tables, Karen poked at the dried-out remnants of her tasteless ham-and-cheese sandwich and wondered if Cassidy had hired a cook yet. Vicki had come home on Sunday night after her first weekend with her father to say that her daddy’s cooking was “rank.”
From what Karen had been able to glean from the hyper confusion of her daughter’s comments, they’d eaten mostly steak and eggs with an occasional feast of peanut butter and banana sandwiches—and “gross” store-bought cookies for dessert. Not exactly haute cuisine, but reasonably nourishing. For Vicki, anyway. Cassidy worked so murderously hard most days that he needed a tremendous number of calories to sustain him.
She pinched off a piece of stale crust, popped it into her mouth and reminded herself that his intake of power foods—or lack thereof—was no longer her concern.
It had been two endless weeks since she’d left the ranch, and life post-separation was not progressing at a tranquil pace. In fact, she could count the things that were going right on one hand and still have enough free fingers to make a fist. On the other hand, the list of things that were going wrong seemed to grow hourly.
Usually as reliable as the sunrise, the Rover had developed an oil leak, she hadn’t had time to get her tax records to Cassidy’s accountant, who’d taken to calling twice a day with tactful reminders, and so far, Vicki had hated every rental they’d looked at.
“Mind if I join you, Dr. Sloane, or would you rather brood in peace?”
Karen glanced up and smiled at the pleasant—and she, ruefully admitted, welcome—surprise.
“Sit, please,” she urged, sitting up straighter.
Lindy Chung had piercing black eyes, a figure that had strong men stepping on their tongues when she passed, and the softest heart of anyone Karen had ever known. Past forty now, she had been practicing psychiatry for fifteen of those years and had never shied away from tackling the hard-core cases her fellow shrinks generally—and some said wisely—avoided.
“Thanks.” Lindy deposited a paper cup filled with rancid-smelling coffee onto the table before settling into the hard chair with a heartfelt sigh. “Would you believe this is the second night in a row I’ve had to get dinner from a machine?” she muttered, pulling a plastic container from her expensive leather tote bag.
“Another emergency?”
“Same one. Postpartum syndrome.” Lindy broke the seal with one long red nail and flipped open the lid. She took a delicate sniff of the contents, then wrinkled her patrician nose. “Lord, what do those food service people put into these things, anyway?”
“Noah Howell swears he got boar meat in one of his sandwiches last week.”
Lindy chuckled. “That man’s so besotted with his new wife he couldn’t tell boar meat from shoe leather.”
It was an effort to smile, but Karen managed somehow. “If ever I saw two people who were meant to be together, it’s Noah and Amanda.”
“Me, I’ll reserve my judgment until they make it past the first seven years.” Lindy bit down on one corner of her sandwich and grimaced. “Noah might be on to something here.”
* * *
Karen decided she didn’t want anything more to eat and shoved aside her plate in order to rest her forearms in front of her. At least once per shift she made it a point to call Vicki and chat for a few minutes. Tonight, when she’d called, Vicki had refused to speak with her. Another snit, her mother had informed her with more than a little exasperation in her usually unruffled tones.
“Guess Cassidy and I beat the odds, then, because we almost made it to ten,” she mused aloud.
Lindy put down her sandwich and reached for her coffee. “Are things smoothing out yet, or are you still in that shell-shocked state?”
“A little of both,” she admitted. Telling her co-workers about her separation had been easier than she’d expected. It seemed that many of them had suspected problems in the Sloane marriage. “Most days I don’t have much time to brood. Vicki, on the other hand, seems to be doing nothing but.”
“Adjustment problems?”
“Big-time.” She raked her hand through her hair, a gesture of agitation Lindy acknowledged with a measuring look. “Her teacher has called twice in the past two weeks to ‘communicate her concern’ about Vicki’s behavior. She was very nice about it, but bottom line, my darling, headstrong, bullheaded daughter had better shape up—and fast—or she’s about to become well acquainted with the principal’s office.”
“I take it you’ve had a talk with Vicki about this?”
“Several, in fact, and I’ve discovered that my sixty-pound bundle of joy has inherited Cassidy’s ability to stonewall along with his temper.”
“Now, that is worrisome,” Lindy muttered with a grin designed to soothe rather than mock.
“Phil Potter, Vicki’s psychiatrist, assures me it’s normal behavior in children with newly separated parents.”
“Acting out.”
“Yes.” Karen drew a breath. More and more she was feeling disconnected from her body, as though trying to escape a reality she couldn’t bear to face. “He told me to give her plenty of reassurance but not to give into her when she had one of those tantrums.” Karen sighed. “Easy for him to say, since he’s not the one battling wits with a determined eight-year-old.”
“Phil’s an excellent kiddie shrink. And for what it’s worth, I agree.”
“Yeah, well I know how you therapist types stick together.”
Lindy pushed aside the half-eaten remains of her dinner and settled back in her chair. “Similar to the way you resident types stick up for one another, I expect.”
“Touché,” Karen allowed with a tired smile.
“Karen, Vicki’s in good hands, yours included,” Lindy declared before snatching a napkin from the dispenser on the table. “I’m more worried about you.”
“I’m coping—just,” Karen replied as the other woman blotted her lips. “Work helps. And Mother and Frank have been there for me from that first awful moment.”
“And Cassidy?”
She shrugged. “According to our…his foreman, he’s driving himself and everyone else into the ground. Billy claims the ranch has never looked better or been more productive, and yet Cassidy finds fault with everything and everyone. A couple of the hands have spoken privately to Billy about taking other jobs if Cassidy doesn’t ease up.”
Karen dropped her gaze to the table with its dull Formica top and collection of scratches. Slowly, she reached out to press her fingertip to an errant crumb, which she carefully deposited on her abandoned tray. Across the table, Lindy watched and waited.
“He swears he doesn’t love me, and yet he’s acting like he’s the one with the broken heart,” she declared indignantly. “I could strangle the man for making me waste precious time worrying about him.”
Lindy grinned. “You could always stop.”
“Ha. A lot you know!” She took a breath, and her indignation slipped away like so much hot air. “Damn him, why does he have to be so pigheaded? He works as many hours as I do—more, sometimes, especially in the spring when the babies are being born. I spent a lot of nights alone because he was busy, but I understood. And I never, ever tried to make him feel guilty for putting his work first.” She took an angry breath, her stomach in turmoil and her energy coming back in jerky spurts. “Does that sound like the behavior of an emasculating bitch to you?”
Lindy’s beautifully formed lips twitched. “I take it that’s a direct quote.”
“I’m paraphrasing, but in essence, yes.”
“Sounds like the man has a great many unresolved issues from his childhood.”
“What he has is a mean temper and a blind, self-centered, arrogant, chauvinistic attitude about a woman’s so-called place, and I’m sick of it.” She didn’t exactly stamp her foot, but she thought about it.
Lindy blinked, her mouth twitching. “You’ve certainly got me convinced.”
Karen glared at her, then burst out laughing. “Oh, Lord, Lindy, I think I’m losing it.”
“Hmm, it occurs to me that father and daughter aren’t the only Sloanes in Grand Springs with a hot temper.”
Karen felt her anger slip away and the dull misery surge back. The two emotions were equally strong, but the one protected while the other clawed at her raw insides. It occurred to her that she would do just fine if only she could live the rest of her life in a constant state of simmering rage. On the heels of that bemused observation came another, far more disturbing suspicion.
Was that Cassidy’s way of protecting himself from the pain of his past? By turning an angry face to the world whenever he felt threatened? And if he did, was that anger directly proportional to the depth of the pain he was fighting?
“What?” Lindy prodded in a quiet voice.
Karen turned her thoughts outward as a frown tugged at the network of tiny muscles surrounding her eyes. “Lindy, I think I’ve just had one of those epiphanies you shrinks talk about all the time.”
“I’m listening, if you want to run it by me.” The other woman shifted her tray to the side, then leaned forward and crossed her arms on the table. Something about the angle of her chin and the contours of her mouth had Karen suspecting that her friend had just slipped into her professional persona.
Karen took a breath, then as succinctly as she could, laid out her theory.
“Very possible,” Lindy said after a moment’s thought. “In my practice I’ve treated a great many men who grew up equating tenderness and sensitivity to weakness.” She tapped one finger against the tabletop, clearly lost in thought. Then she nodded and said, “I know it sounds hackneyed, but it’s been my experience that a man’s ability to handle the softer side of his psyche is directly related to his relationship to his mother.”
Isn’t everything? Karen thought with a weary sigh. “I was afraid you were going to say that,” she muttered before going on to tell Lindy everything she knew about Cassidy’s early years. When she was finished, Lindy sat with her chin propped on one fist, her gaze focused somewhere to the right of Karen’s left shoulder.
“Not the prettiest story I’ve heard, but far from the worst.” With a small sigh, she lifted her head and sat back. “I assume he wouldn’t agree to counseling?”
Karen made a show of shuddering. “Not in a million years. He’s the most private man I know.”
“Understandable. Issues of trust are quite common with traumatized children, compounded in this case, I suspect, by his history of losing everyone who mattered to him.”
Karen took a moment to think about that. As she did, she idly watched a gray-haired couple walking toward the exit. The woman’s step was faltering and she was leaning heavily on the man’s arm. His concern was obvious as he matched his steps to hers, and his gaze was soft when he turned to look at her. Though both appeared well into the twilight of their lives, Karen sensed that the bond between them was as strong and as vibrant as a new day in spring.
The weight pressing her heart grew heavier. “And now he’s lost his wife,” she said softly, achingly.
“Did he? Or did he deliberately drive you away?”
“Is there a difference?”
Impatience crossed Lindy’s lovely face. “Of course there’s a difference. Think about it. If he makes it impossible for you to stay, he’s still in control, still making the rules. In other words, he’s safe.”
Karen tested that in her mind and couldn’t find a flaw in the logic of it. But her heart wasn’t so sure. “In other words, he was willing to sacrifice our marriage in order to keep from feeling too much?”
“That’s one possibility, yes.”
Karen noted her friend’s careful phrasing and smiled sadly. “On the other hand, we just might be making excuses for a man who’s exactly as he seems—a decent, hardworking guy who got a virgin pregnant and did the honorable thing by marrying her, but when he finally got tired of putting up with a woman he didn’t love, he took the easy way out and pushed her into doing exactly what he wanted all along.”
“True, in which case it would be fairly easy to prove that hypothesis, wouldn’t it?”
Karen rubbed her tired eyes. “It would?”
“Sure. If the guy is out dating night after night or whistling while he works, or celebrating the fact that he’s free again, it’s a good bet he was never emotionally attached. On the other hand, if he looks anything like you, I’d say he’s pretty much dying inside and fighting it the only way he knows how—with anger.”
Karen inhaled slowly and exhaled the same way. “Does driving himself and his men into the ground count as celebrating?”
The look Lindy sent her way was comprised of both humor and compassion. “What do you think?”
“I think I’m going to have to take some time to mull this over.”
Lindy leaned forward, her expression earnest. “Fight for him, Karen. Find a way to shock him into seeing what he’s doing to himself and to you. Make him face whatever demons he’s battling.” Her voice softened. “Help him see that for once in his life he’s not alone.”
Karen drew a shaky breath. “What if he won’t let me?”
Lindy pushed back her chair and reached down for her belongings. “Think of it this way,” she said as she rose. “Do you really want to hang on to a guy who’s too emotionally crippled to appreciate what you’re offering?”
Yes! Karen wanted to shout, but deep down she knew Lindy was right. Much as she hated to admit it, she wanted more for herself than a man who was too frozen inside to love.
* * *
Karen Sloane was still mulling over her friend, Lindy’s, words a week later while sitting alone in her mother’s kitchen at midnight after a hectic Saturday night helping out in the ER.
She’d seen her soon-to-be ex-husband, Cassidy, only once since the conversation in the cafeteria—this morning when she dropped Vicki and Rags off for the weekend. His face had been impassive beneath the familiar Stetson as he’d nodded in her direction. As far as she could tell, he wasn’t exactly pining for her. In fact, he looked magnificently confident as he stood in the small training corral adjacent to the big barn, working an unfamiliar black gelding on a lunging line.
Though it had been early by her standards, only a few minutes past eight, his jeans and buckskin vest were streaked with grime and sweat.
Stifling a yawn now, she forced herself to take another bite of the quiche she’d heated in the microwave and thought about the meeting she’d had that afternoon with the divorce lawyer. Terse to the point of rudeness, the man had asked a series of questions, then asked her to compile a list of assets she considered exclusively her own, and those she shared with Cassidy.
Assets, she thought with a sad shake of her head. Property. Things.
But what about her dreams? What about the threads of her life that were so firmly braided into Cassidy’s dreams?
And what about her daughter?
The attorney had sounded almost bored when he’d asked what kind of custody arrangement she wanted to set up. As though Vicki, too, was an asset to be divided.
She felt pressure in her sinuses, a sudden difficulty with her breathing. As she’d done too many times in the past few weeks, she banished the need to cry to the list of things she would do later, when she had some spare time.
Time? To spare? she thought glumly. What was that?
A nasty, sadistic gnome with a whip who hated her, she decided with a whimsy that was far from comforting.
“You look like a lady who could use a slug of my famous double strength cocoa,” Frank said, flashing that rogue’s smile of his as he came into her mother’s spotless chrome-and-glass kitchen, bringing a rush of vitality and leashed power with him.
“The man is a saint,” she said, fashioning a smile of her own as she straightened her slumped shoulders and made an effort to force down another bite.
“Not even close, darling Kari,” he said as he rattled through the pans in the cupboard until he found one he liked.
“No doubt that’s a big part of the reason Mom is so crazy about you.”
A chuckle rumbled from his deep chest. “That and the fact that I’ve never tried to change a hair on that gorgeous head of hers. Not that I’d want to, you understand.”
“A refreshing attitude in a male,” she muttered.
Frank let that pass as he opened another cupboard and took down three mugs, then fetched the cocoa, sugar and the milk—all with the easy familiarity of a man very much at home in the kitchen in spite of the aura of lethal toughness surrounding him.
“Of course, your mom is wise enough to offer me the same courtesy,” he said, prying open the lid on the cocoa tin.
“I assume you’re talking about Mom and you exclusively,” she said evenly, watching him.
“Who else would I be talking about?” he asked with a bland look that made her scowl.
“Haven’t a clue,” she said, struggling against a leaden need to throw her tired body into his arms and absorb some of his strength, the way Vicki ran to her father for comfort.
“Mother said you’re trying to talk her into a June wedding,” she said, deliberately changing the subject to one less troubling. “Again.”
“Yeah, well, sooner or later she’s going to get it into her head that I’m not giving up, no matter how many jumps she puts me over.”
Karen felt the skin of her face pulling into a frown. “Are you saying that my mother is deliberately keeping you… uh—?”
“Dangling.” His voice blended a wry humor into the firm declaration.
“Now, that’s flattering,” she grumbled.
His eyes crinkled as he dug into a drawer for a wooden spoon. “I’m in love with your mother, Karen. I’ve been in love with her for years, but I’m not blind to her faults.”
“Faults? My mother?” She clucked her tongue. “Shame on you, sir.”
His grin flashed. “A stubborn streak a mile wide,” he said in his rough baritone as he pulled open the door to the fridge and took out a gallon of milk. “A tendency to fuss over the smallest things, a penchant for worrying about people she loves.” The door closed with a quiet thump as he added softly, “And a deep-seated fear that if she lets herself love me, she’ll lose me.”
Karen rubbed at her suddenly cold cheek. “Because she loved my father and he died, you mean?”
“Smart girl. Excuse me, woman. I’ve spent five years proving to that woman she’s stuck with me, no matter how hard she tries to drive me away.”
“But Mother loves you.”
“Sure she does, but that doesn’t mean she can keep herself from testing me.” He measured the cocoa by his own mental rule and added milk before turning on the burner. Only then did he turn to look at her. “She’s a special lady, my Sylvie. And dammit, she’s going to marry me if I have to toss her over my shoulder on June 1 and carry her to Judge Patrick’s chambers kicking and screaming every step of the way.”
Karen laughed at the image of her impeccably groomed mother dangling upside down over Frank’s broad shoulder. “If you do, promise me you’ll give me enough notice so that I can find a ringside seat.”
“You got it,” Frank said, grinning as he stirred the cocoa that was already beginning to smell sinful. He would make a wonderful husband for her mother and a great stepfather, she decided, watching him lift the wooden spoon to his well-shaped mouth for a taste.
At least, she was pretty sure of that—though she’d heard someone say once that he’d been a real hell-raiser as a young man. Abandoned at an early age by his teenage mother, he’d grown up in series of foster homes—until he’d slugged one of his foster “fathers” for taking a belt to one of the other kids. After that, he’d lived on his own, supporting himself by working in one of the silver mines that had been prevalent in the area thirty years ago.
Though he was nothing like the image she held of her own gentle, intellectual father, he’d knocked around enough in his early years to acquire a rough sort of charm that Karen found endearing. Add to that the fact that he was sensitive, funny and a whiz at making her mother blush, and you had one terrific man. Even dressed casually in jeans and a luscious burgundy-and-cream cable-knit sweater that probably cost more than she made in a month, he exuded a quiet air of authority that had nothing to do with his well-padded bank account. Immediately she thought of Cassidy and waited out the fast little flurry of pain that always accompanied thoughts of him.
“So how’s it going?” he said, turning down the heat before leaning against the counter and crossing those huge miner’s arms.
“Do you want the truth or a soothing evasion?”
He lifted one silvered brow. “Let’s go for the truth first.”
She dropped her fork onto her plate and pushed it away. “Vicki’s miserable, I’m miserable, and Rags is driving everyone crazy with his own version of misery.”
Raised from a tiny pup on the ranch, the sensitive shepherd had developed signs of severe homesickness almost immediately. Night after night he sat in the backyard and howled. When he wasn’t howling, he was barking or trying to dig himself an escape route under the tall redwood fence. Sometimes he barked and dug simultaneously.
Sylvia had already received two complaints from neighbors and a not-so-veiled threat to call Animal Control from old Mr. Hornutt on the corner. They’d tried bringing Rags into the house, but the independent canine hated confined spaces and nearly wore himself out pacing from the front door to the back. It seemed he was only happy at the ranch.
“You neglected to mention Cassidy.”
Karen swiveled to the side and hooked her sock-clad toes onto the rung of the chair. “Cassidy is…like those big old boulders on that ranch he loves so much. It would take an earthquake to move him so much as an inch.”
“Obstinate, is he?”
“You have no idea,” she assured him with a heavy sigh.
A twinkle appeared in his sky blue eyes. “Oh, I think I have a glimmer,” he said before reaching into yet another cupboard for a bottle of very old, very expensive brandy that her mother kept just for him.
“You think I’m being too hard on him?”
He poured the now steaming chocolate into the cups. “What I think is, I’d be ten kinds of a fool to answer a question like that,” he said as he rinsed out the pan and upended it in the drainer.
“Coward,” she accused with a fond smile.
“Absolutely.” He added a generous amount of citrus liqueur to two of the cups, then, bottle poised over the third, lifted a brow in question.
“Sure, why not?” A nice little alcohol buzz might let her sleep through the night for once without dreaming of Cassidy.
“Not on duty tomorrow?” He poured the same amount into hers before corking the bottle and returning it to the cupboard.
“I’m working swing this month,” she said, thanking him with a smile as he set the steaming mug in front of her. The rich scents of chocolate and citrus curled upward, and she inhaled with pleasure.
“Lovely,” she murmured after taking a sip.
“Thank you, ma’am,” he said with a dip of his silvered head.
“Welcome,” she managed to say before treating herself again. The taste was both tart and sweet—and just a little wicked. Exactly like Cassidy’s kisses.
Seconds ticked by, unnoticed, until finally she realized Frank was watching her. No, measuring her. She lifted her brows and tilted her head.
Frank seemed oblivious to anything but her. Finally he sighed heavily and straightened those big shoulders. “Karen, did you know that my company had the listing on the Barlow ranch before Cassidy bought it?”
She shook her head, puzzled that he would bring that up now.
“He still had his army haircut when he showed up with everything he owned in the back of a third-hand pickup and a chip on his shoulder the size of Pikes Peak.” Frank wrapped his big hand around the mug and brought it to his lips for a quick sip. “He had no credit, no friends to recommend him and, sadly, not nearly enough cash to cover the down payment Sue Ellen Barlow was demanding for her daddy’s place.” His mouth twitched. “I took one look and told myself I’d be crazy to waste my time trying to put together a deal that didn’t have a chance in hell of getting past a reputable loans officer.”
She must have looked bewildered because he chuckled. “I quoted him a down payment that he could afford, made up the difference from my own pocket and swore Charlie Too Tall down at the bank to secrecy.”
“You did what?” she blurted out, her mug frozen halfway to her mouth.
“I took a calculated risk, nothing more.”
She blinked, trying to understand. From the family room came the sound of music. Vivaldi, she registered absently. “Why?” she asked finally.
“Now, that’s a question I asked myself a lot during that first year when it came time for him to make his monthly mortgage payment.”
“He was late?”
Frank shook his head. “Not once, but I suspect there were a lot of months when he had to choose between eating and meeting his obligation.”
She stared at him, seeing the kind eyes and the strong features. “But the risk…you must have had a reason.”
“He had hungry eyes.” Something flickered in his own eyes, and for an instant, his jaw tightened. “Nobody had to tell me he’d had a rough time as a kid. Or that he was desperate for a place of his own, a piece of earth and sky and security where he could put down roots, a place no one could take from him.” His smile was sad. “It’s hell growing up knowing no one wants you.”
“Oh, Frank,” she whispered, deeply touched, for him, for Cassidy—and more than a little confused. “Does Mother know what you did?”
“No one knows, except Charlie and me—and Cassidy.”
That threw her. “When did you tell him?”
“I didn’t. He found out a few weeks before you two were married, when he went to the bank for a second mortgage in order to finance some renovations on the house.”
“He was angry?”
“You might say that, yeah,” Frank drawled before lifting the mug to his mouth again. “Had this notion I felt sorry for him, and his pride wouldn’t let him accept charity.”
Karen rubbed her toes along the chair rung. “Men and their pride.”
Instead of grinning as she’d expected, Frank responded with a frown. “Sometimes, when a man’s had a lot to overcome, pride’s the only thing holding him together.” Absently he rubbed at a thin white scar along his jaw.
“Did you feel sorry for him?”
“No.” She heard the trace of annoyance in his deep voice and knew he’d put it there deliberately. “I told you I understood him, but what I told him was the truth, too. What he got from me was a loan, nothing more—with enough interest tacked on to have him sucking in hard.”
I’ll bet, she thought, seeing Frank in a new light. “And?”
“And he chewed on the furniture for a while, added a couple of points to that interest and told me to write it up as a separate note.” He grinned. “Made me a tidy bit of change on that cowboy of yours.”
She smiled, but it seemed he wasn’t finished. “I’ve made a fortune on reading people—what they say they want and what they really want. Cassidy wants you. I’d stake every penny I made on that.”
She held the mug to her cheek and wondered if she would ever be able to talk about her failed marriage without feeling sick inside. “Then why am I sitting here talking to you instead of out at the ranch where I belong?”
He arched a brow. “Good question. Got an answer you’d care to run by me?”
“A lot of them, some that even make sense.” She took another sip and held her breath against the intoxicating heat sliding down her throat. “He just wore me out, I guess. I got tired of defending myself for wanting to do what I could to make the world a better place.”
He nodded. As practically a member of the family, he knew all about the problems that had led up to their separation.
“I have pride, too, Frank. Maybe more than I should, but I simply couldn’t stay with a man who held me and my goals in contempt.”
“Are you so sure he did?”
“He…he told me I reminded him of his mother and that he hated her.” She felt her stomach lurch as she revisited the scene in the den in her mind. “He used our daughter as a weapon to blackmail me into doing what he wanted, and when that didn’t work he threatened to take my daughter away from me.”
“And you can’t forgive him for that?”
“No. Yes.” She frowned. “I don’t know.”
“Poor kid, you’re really hung up on the guy, aren’t you?” He slipped the words out so softly that it took her a moment to react.
When she did, it was with a bleak smile. “Does it show?”
“In neon lights.”
She drew a shaky breath. “All I was asking was that he bend just a little,” she said in a small voice.
He regarded her in sympathetic silence for a long moment, then picked up both mugs. “It’s just an observation, Kari, but it seems to me Cassidy was doing nothing but bending from the moment you decided to go back to med school. And he’s been bending ever since.” He paused by her chair to drop a kiss on her hair. “You might want to think on that some when you get to feeling lonely.”