Chapter One
“Don’t do it, mutt.” Alex put his foot on the brake the minute he caught sight of the shepherd-collie mix at the side of the road up ahead. The dog looked dirty, disheveled and desperate...and not necessarily in that order. It just stood there, staring across the highway, not moving, but somehow obviously contemplating the crossing. Even from this distance, it was clear to Alex that the dog didn’t particularly care whether he made it to the other side. “Don’t do it,” Alex repeated, applying more pressure to the brake.
As the old pickup slowed, the motor sputtered and grabbed, choked down, then miraculously caught again and chugged on. Alex knew he was lucky the truck had made it this far without breaking down. The heavy horse trailer would have been a drag on the engine even if the truck wasn’t due a major overhaul and Lord only knew how many replacement parts. But it was more important that the horse travel in comfort, and after he’d spent so much money on the trailer, the ’80 model GMC was the best Alex could afford to pull it. Matt and Jeff would laugh themselves into next month when they laid eyes on the old pickup, but Alex figured they needed to know he could cut corners as well as anybody when he had to.
Besides, they’d quit laughing when they saw the horse.
Fifty miles more and he’d be in Bison City. Home, for the first time in six months. Home to stay ... and that was a first, too. Once he got there, the truck could die for all he cared. He just needed it to hold out for those last few miles, that’s all. Just ahead, the dog shook itself and took a couple of stiff-jointed steps onto the road, directly in front of the truck. Alex laid on the horn, and the dog jerked back, suddenly aware of the danger and trembling visibly. Or maybe Alex just had an overactive imagination when it came to animals. Either way, the noise seemed to pay off, because the dog retreated from the roadway and was standing several feet back when Alex drove past and lost sight of him. “It’s a good day to go home,” he said, offering a word of advice to the dog...or anyone who happened to be listening.
It was a glorious October day, all sun and sky and crisp autumn air, and it didn’t get much better than driving home on a long road with one elbow out the open window and one hand loosely guiding the steering wheel. He’d just pursed his lips to whistle “Home on the Range” when his pickup crested a small incline and met another vehicle, which flew past like a cat with its tail on fire. He heard the blast of a car horn, a screech of brakes, then the accelerating whine of the engine as the car resumed speed and roared on. Suddenly Alex imagined a whole other unpleasant scenario—the shepherd-collie lying crushed and suffering as the hit-and-run speeder flew on to parts unknown.
“Dang it,” Alex said aloud, pulling onto the shoulder where he stopped the truck and killed the engine. It’d be a miracle if the motor cranked up again...and all because he was a soft touch and had to go back to check on a dumb dog. Fifty miles, he thought. Give or take a couple. And he would walk every last one of them rather than call one of his brothers and ask to be fetched the rest of the way home.
Both Jeff and Matt were going to be real put out with him as it was, and he saw no need to let them get a head start on the dressing down he expected they were gonna give him. He’d talk them around, though. Sooner or later. Once he got them to take a good look at Koby, they’d understand bloodlines weren’t the only thing that counted in a good cutting horse. Once his brothers got used to the idea, they’d realize Alex did know his way around a training arena and that he was no greenhorn when it came to picking a winner.
Right now, though, he had to see about a dumb dog. Getting out of the pickup, he slammed the door and had to hit it twice with the flat of his hand to close it completely. He walked past the faded blue truck bed and the sleek new Silver-Stream horse trailer, stopping once to stick his hand through the open window and give Koby a reassuring pat. The quarter horse snuffled restlessly, and Alex headed on up the incline, hoping hard that the dog would be long gone by the time he reached the top. Even though there wasn’t a house within miles. Even though there wasn’t much of anything except grazing land and plains rolling off toward the Bighorn Mountains. Dumb dog. Why couldn’t he have stayed home where he belonged?
As Alex crested the hill, he took a deep breath, then let it out in relief when he saw the dog—still among the living—lying on his stomach beside the road, his head bent as he licked furiously at his front paw. Maybe the car had missed him altogether. Maybe he’d just picked up a sticker burr. Or had decided it was time to wash up. But as Alex approached, he saw skid marks and the drops of blood that led to where the collie now lay. “Ah, hell,” he said under his breath and moved closer to the animal.
“Hi-ya, fella.” Sinking onto his heels, Alex observed the dog from a reasonable distance. He didn’t want to get bitten and have to spend the rest of the afternoon at the small Bison City Hospital waiting for old Doc Wilson to wander in and give him a tetanus shot. “How bad is it?” he asked, running a calculating eye over the animal, deciding he was more collie than shepherd, more alive than dead—although that was purely a judgment call. The dog kept licking at the paw, but his eyes followed Alex with fear and pain and just a touch of melancholy hope.
“Mind if I take a look at that? I’ll do my best not to hurt you.” Alex scooted forward, careful to move slowly and to keep soothing the dog with the sound of his voice. “You can’t stay here, y‘know. Road like this is a dangerous spot for a guy like you. Not enough traffic to keep you on your toes. What are you doing out here, anyway? It’s gettin’ on toward supper time, y‘know. Time to be headin’ home.”
When the dog offered no challenge, Alex put out a hand and stroked the matted fur at his neck. He didn’t touch the leg. He didn’t have to. At closer range, it was easy to see the animal wasn’t going to shake off this injury and trot on home. The bleeding seemed to be coming from a superficial cut, but there could be internal injuries as well, and he was fairly certain the left front leg was broken. Add to that the fact the dog was as skinny as a toothless coyote, lost in the middle of nowhere, and looked for all the world like he was too depressed to care.
Alex stroked the collie’s head and felt him sigh beneath the gentle comfort. Then his fingers scraped across a worn leather collar buried beneath the fur, and there was the brief, unmistakable jingle of vaccination tags. This guy belonged to somebody. “All right, fella,” he said, carefully turning the collar until he could see the wording on the tags. The vaccination was current and listed a Sheridan veterinary clinic. “You’ve traveled a piece, haven’t you?” Either that, or someone had dumped him. Sad to say, there were still people that stupid. With a shake of his head, Alex got ready to scoop the dog into his arms and carry him back to the truck. “I know this isn’t going to be real pleasant for you,” he said, “but bear with me and don’t bite. You may find this hard to believe, mutt, but your luck just changed for the better.”
 
ANNIE HAD HER HANDS FULL of frantic cat.
“I never thought about him going in the laundry room there.” Hilda Lawson worked her hands like a wringer washing machine. “Why, those spider traps hadn’t been set out twenty minutes before I heard him yowl. You think you can get those off him?”
“Not without giving him a crew cut. Genevieve!” Annie yelled again for her assistant as she tried to keep the Lawsons’ massive tomcat from leaping off the examining table and climbing the wallpapered wall.
“Now, Samson,” Hilda scolded gently, all the while keeping a cautious distance from the scrambling mass of yellow fur and sharp claws. “You be still for Dr. Annie. She just wants to get those nasty sticky strips off you.”
Actually, what Annie wanted was to get Genevieve in here to help so she could put this muleheaded tom in a cage until he calmed down. As it stood, her hands and arms were already stinging from cat scratches, and it was all she could do to keep him on the table.
Samson was a prize fighter of a feline. Easily the heavyweight champ of all Bison City’s cats—with myriad battle scars to prove it. One ear was missing a chunk of flesh, and the other dipped toward his eye like a low-riding hat. His tail had a kink, he walked with a limp, and he had a chronic case of bad attitude. He hated the veterinary clinic and everyone in it. Annie wasn’t sure he really liked Hilda, but he was her baby and occasionally he allowed her to treat him like the petite pedigreed Persian she seemed to believe he was.
At least, Hilda claimed he loved her. Annie hadn’t seen any sign the cat would know affection from affliction—and she’d seen Samson on a fairly regular basis ever since June when she’d taken over most of the doctoring from her Uncle Dex. She’d treated the old cat for everything from constipation to snake bite and privately thought he had to be long into his ninth and last life. Today he’d tangled with several long strips of adhesive meant to trap spiders and other crawling insects. He was glued paw to ear and fur to fur, and this time Annie thought he might just have met his match.
“Genevieve!” She yelled again and tried to hold the cat, dab the glue strips with rubbing alcohol, and snip at the cat’s fur all at the same time. He broke free suddenly and leaped for the counter, where his three-legged scrambling scattered containers of cotton swabs and doggie treats. He sprang for the stainless steel sink and landed short, his claws frantically grabbing for a hold as he slid down the front of the cabinet.
“I got him!” Hilda yelled, although she made only a lame attempt to grab him. Her voice had an invigorating effect on Samson, though. He made a clumsy dive under the examining table and came out the other side, with an Ace wrap adhered to one of the glue strips still adhered to him. The bandage unrolled and trailed out behind him, like a long, ecru shadow, scaring him anew and sending him dashing around the table, then around the other side. At this rate he was going to either hang himself or wind up as a cat mummy. Which wouldn’t make a good reference for the doc who’d treated him.
Annie sighed and got down on her knees, holding on to the examining table to offset the imbalance of her protruding tummy. Dr. Elizabeth had warned her that work was going to get increasingly difficult as the pregnancy progressed, but moments like this one at least took Annie’s mind off her worries. And really, what was worse?—being an unmarried mom-to-be or being a cat who was about to lose a whole lot of hair? Maybe even a little hide, if he wasn’t caught soon.
Calculating the avenues for escape, Annie stalked Samson on her hands and knees and almost had him cornered by the door when Genevieve decided—with her usual dramatic timing—that she was needed in Examining Room One. She opened the door, and in a split second Samson spied the light of freedom, sensed salvation and made a mad dash between the newcomer’s hefty ankles. Annie had mere nanoseconds to make a decision and, with the faint comfort that Samson could handle most any patient awaiting him in the waiting room, she cut the trailing bandage to a less-cumbersome length and let him go.
“What in Sweet Pete is going on in here?” Genevieve demanded, hands braced on hips that had borne eight children and still carried a few pounds from each as a souvenir. Her stern gaze swept from the hand-wringing Hilda to the floor where Annie, still on all fours, looked up at her with sincere frustration. “What? You couldn’t wait a minute for me to get in here and help you?”
It was an ongoing battle between them. Genevieve had assisted Dexter Thatcher for forty-two years and figured she’d earned her degree in the school of experience. She didn’t trust anyone—namely Annie—who’d graduated college in the last decade to handle the paying customers, which Samson wasn’t, but Hilda definitely was. Since taking over at the clinic, Annie had done everything she could think of to establish her role as the doctor in charge. To date Genevieve remained unimpressed. She knew Annie couldn’t afford to fire her, and she knew she wasn’t about to quit. So here they were once again. Stalemate.
“Could you go get Samson before he does some serious damage?” Annie grabbed hold of the table and pulled herself upright. From the waiting room came the sound of the collar-and-leash display toppling, a cat’s meowwwlll, a terrier’s startled yap, the chime of the front door opening and closing, the deep vibrations of a male voice asking to see Dr. Thatcher. And it was only Monday.
“I’ll fetch him.” Genevieve turned in the doorway, not hurrying—never that—just eyeing the hallway before her and the archway into the waiting room beyond. “What in tarnation did you let that yellow son of Sam get into this time, Hilda?”
“Pest strips,” Hilda answered, worrying along behind Genevieve. “We’ve had a rash of spiders this fall, and Pete thought it’d be a good idea to put out traps, but I never thought about Samson gettin’ stuck on ’em.”
“Curiosity’s gonna kill that cat one of these days,” Genevieve pronounced as she plodded toward what sounded like a terrier and tomcat battleground. “And there ain’t gonna be ’nough satisfaction out there to bring him back.”
Annie sighed and leaned against the table. She knew she was lucky beyond belief that Uncle Dex wanted her to run his clinic. She knew she was lucky to have his long experience behind her when she needed it. She knew she was lucky to be practicing her calling in Bison City, where she had the support of friends and long acquaintances. But there were moments—this one a prime example—when she wished she hadn’t been so lucky as to inherit Genevieve.
“Get that cat out of my way, Hilda!” Genevieve bellowed suddenly. “Bring him on back here, Alex. Examining Room One.” She bustled into the room again like a drum major leading the parade, all pomp and circumstance.
Annie straightened. Alex? “What is it?” she asked, even as she tried to see around Genevieve’s efficient preparations to swipe the table with an antiseptic cloth. Then Alex was in the room, his dark hair disheveled, his blue eyes troubled, his strong arms burdened with dog. Injured dog. Annie took in the situation in a glance and, despite feeling as jumpy as a cat trapped in a room full of no-pest strips, she moved into action. “Put him on the table. What happened?”
Alex hesitated, then laid the dog on the metal table and stepped back. “Hit,” he said in a strange voice. “Car. Speeding. About fifty miles out.”
Annie heard the nuance in his voice, recognized that he was tense, distressed, upset, but her energy and skill was centered on the dog. She had to stay focused. There was no time now to worry about Alex. Or to wonder what he was doing here. Or to think about the last time he was home. No, she especially couldn’t afford to think about that. “How fast were you going?” She snapped off the question as her hands moved over the dog, checking vital signs, assessing the damage, calculating what needed to be done.
“I don’t know. Sixty, maybe. I slowed down when I saw him.”
“Her. It’s a female,” Annie corrected, wishing Alex wasn’t always speeding through life, slowing down only when he noticed he’d hurt something... or someone. “But you still hit her.”
“Yes,” he said, then, “No. No, I didn’t hit him—her. Look, could I talk to you a minute?”
She looked up, met his eyes, felt the jolt of awareness all the way to her toes...and these days it was a long way down there. “We have nothing to talk about except how this animal came to be injured.”
“You’re pregnant.” His voice was soft, hopeful, scared.
“Yes. And you’re in the way. Genevieve? I’m going to need a set of X-rays of this leg. I think she just had a glancing blow to that leg, but let’s test for internal bleeding.”
For once Genevieve did as she was told. She might be obstinate when it came to giving Samson a much-needed haircut, but she knew when to turn over the responsibility to someone else. This dog might have serious problems, might not make it...and Genevieve’s heart couldn’t bear to have any part in that. Annie glanced up at Alex, who was still in the room, still staring at her, his gaze roaming from her face to the rounded shape of her belly beneath the cat-and-dog-patterned fabric of her maternity smock. “Alex?” She waved him toward the door. “Would you go on out to the waiting room and see if you can calm Hilda down? You might tell Dinah—she’s the cute blonde at the front desk—to put the terrier in the other exam room or else try to get Samson into a cage.” He made no move to leave the room, and Annie tried again. “There’s nothing you can do in here, Alex. Nothing you even need to worry about. I’ll let you know how this little lady’s doing as soon as I know.”
“You’re pregnant,” he repeated, obviously stunned by the thought, by the fact of it.
And it was a fact. She was pregnant...and she’d known he’d have to find out about it sometime. Just not now. Not before the baby was born. Not until she had more time to prepare her story and strengthen her resolve that this time Alex wasn’t going to talk his way back into her life. This time she had someone else to consider. “Do me a favor, Alex,” she said firmly. “Go away. I am perfectly capable of handling this situation on my own.”
He held her gaze—blue eyes locked with green—and the question filled the space between them for what seemed like forever before he finally gave it a form. “Mine?”
She wasn’t ready for this. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Genevieve. “No,” she said, turning her attention back to the dog, burying her hands in the soft, dirty fur so that Alex couldn’t see how violently they trembled. “It’s mine.”
 
ALEX PACED THE WAITING ROOM like an expectant—Oh, jeez. He didn’t want even to think the word. But there it was, nipping his heels like a fleabitten pup. Distracting, distressing, and wondrously possible. Father. Father. Father. Annie was pregnant. She was going to have a baby. His baby? Of course, his. It had to be. Who else would she have—
The idea of Annie with another man wasn’t anything he was prepared to consider. She’d loved him since eighth grade when he’d told Jason Kettridge to quit harassing her. Jason hadn’t taken kindly to the advice and invited Alex to discuss it after class. In retrospect Alex supposed that the fact they both were suspended from school for a week for fighting probably did more to convince Jason he was in the wrong than any punch Alex might have landed. But the bottom line was Annie—and from the moment he’d challenged her antagonist, she looked at Alex with new eyes. She’d never had anyone much to stand up for her, and while Alex wasn’t exactly the ideal knight in shining armor, she didn’t seem to mind. Over the years he’d done his best to convince her he didn’t deserve her devotion, that she could do lots better than him, but the idea that she might have fallen in love with someone else simply wasn’t acceptable.
Plus, the timing was all wrong for that possibility. Not that he was an obstetrician, but he hadn’t exactly flunked biology, either, and from what he could tell by looking, Annie was about six months along. Which put the conception back to April, which would line up with Josie’s wedding, which would line up with the night he and Annie had danced at the wedding reception, which meant his theory was possible. Probable, even, considering that dancing wasn’t all they’d shared that night.
Alex paced some more and forced himself to think about other possibilities. Unpleasant ones, like the idea that she might be more than six months pregnant, in which case he couldn’t be the father. Or less than six months, which would also rule him out. Was he being just plain arrogant to think he was the only man she’d ever slept with? And that with only the one night of sweet communion, he’d managed to make her pregnant? That wasn’t just arrogant. It was a flat-out jump to conclusions, like a man who finds a shiny rock and goes right out and buys a Cadillac on the theory he’s discovered a gold mine.
But no matter how he tossed the possibilities, he kept coming back to the one that made him the father of her baby. It seemed, somehow, easier to deal with the sudden, surprising discovery that he was going to become a father than to face the possibility of Annie being pregnant with another man’s child. And it wasn’t like he wanted to be well on his way to becoming a father. Alex wasn’t sure he’d know what to do with a baby. It certainly wasn’t part of his plans for the next year. The next several years for that matter. At the end of December, at the Midwestern Cutting Horse Futurity, he had his first real opportunity to prove to his brothers that he wasn’t some ne’er-do-well, but a McIntyre through and through. Once Koby swept the prizes in the cutting division, Alex would be the most sought-after horse trainer in the country. With that one win, the breeding program at the S-J would jump from a minor part of the ranch operations to a viable money-maker.
Alex had planned for this opportunity a lot of years. He had things to prove to a whole bunch of people, but mostly he had to prove to himself that he could follow a dream through to the end of its rainbow and pat himself on the back for the accomplishment, no matter how it turned out. He wanted to stand shoulder to shoulder with Matt and Jeff, to finally feel as if he’d earned their respect, man to man. Annie being pregnant wasn’t exactly the way he’d hoped to begin the process, that was for sure.
It wasn’t the way he’d meant to start over with her, either. He’d thought he’d have time to do some proper courting, planned to show her over a period of months that he was home to stay, that he wanted the white picket fence and all the rest that made up the life she’d always, and only, wanted. He’d thought there’d be time to prove to her that beneath his rusty armor beat the heart of a gallant and responsible knight.
But a baby. Someone tiny and helpless and dependent. Someone for whom he’d be responsible. Someone who’d need him wholly. Not just when it was convenient, but every day for the rest of his life. Scary thought, that, even for a knight. A baby. Annie’s baby. His.
Okay, so he’d adjust. He’d overcome the obstacles. He’d stick with his plans. He’d finish Koby’s training, win the cutting futurity in December, garner a standing ovation from his family, and become a father. He could do it...easy. Well, it wouldn’t exactly be easy, but he could do it. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t done things the hard way before.
Strange, he thought, that no one had bothered to tell him Annie was pregnant. Josie, who announced to complete strangers that she’d gotten pregnant on her wedding night, who had kept him apprised of her own condition from morning sickness to stretch marks, had failed to mention that most interesting piece of information. On the other hand, the omission spoke volumes for his theory that he was the father. Josie would have told him if there was another man in Annie’s life. She knew their history, had told Alex times out of mind he was an idiot to treat Annie as if she’d always be there, as if she’d wait forever for him to come home. If Annie had fallen in love with someone else, Josie would have told him. She wouldn’t have let him come home without some kind of warning. So, since she hadn’t told him anything, the baby must be his.
Had to be his.
Fate wouldn’t take Annie away from him just when he’d finally figured life out.
A father.
Alex swallowed hard and paced the clinic floor, some more.
 
HE WAS OUTSIDE, walking a sleek bay stallion back and forth between the clinic and the stables behind it, when Annie came out. She stood at the door for a minute, just looking at him, feeling the familiar longing that crept over her like sunup after a really dark night every single time she laid eyes on this man. Alex McIntyre was wrong for her in more ways than she could count, and for years she had gone out of her way to be foolish over him. But no more. April had been the end of it. She had said her last goodbye to him then...and meant it. Alex was always leaving, was always going to be leaving, and she wasn’t going to spend another day waiting for him to drop in—and out—of her life. So she’d set her mind to it and determined to get on with life after Alex. That’s when she found out she was pregnant.
Fate, as it turned out, had a warped sense of humor.
Lifting her chin, Annie stepped off the concrete slab that served as the clinic’s back porch and walked out to meet Alex as he turned and started back toward her. The horse beside him tossed his dark head and pulled on the lead. Spirited. Annie could tell that by looking. Something about the straight-shouldered bay sparked her memory, too, but she couldn’t catch the thought fast enough, and it flitted away, undiscovered. She had not much idea what Alex was doing with the horse. From the trailer parked in the drive, she assumed he was taking the horse to the ranch. Or from the ranch. But she was certain Josie would have warned her if he was in town. On the other hand, Josie probably didn’t know he was here. Alex wasn’t a great one for letting people know his plans—even if one of the people happened to be his sister.
Josie had to suspect her brother had fathered the child Annie carried. Truth be told, most people in Bison City probably had a fair idea that Alex was the father. But none of them knew for certain, because Annie wasn’t telling. And that’s the way she meant to keep it, too.
“Flashy-looking horse,” she said as she fell into step with Alex and the bay. “Are you training or just transporting him?”
“All that and more. Meet Koby.” Alex patted the horse’s neck and offered Annie a slanted smile. “That’s short for Kodiak Blue.”
The fleeting thought dropped into place like a sledgehammer. She stepped back to give the horse a better look. “Alex McIntyre,” she said. “Don’t tell me this is that Texas twister of a quarter horse Trevor Hankins was talking about at last year’s Quarter Horse Congress?”
Alex winked at her. “You’re lookin’ at him.”
Annie couldn’t believe it. Matt would have conniptions if Alex came home with this horse. “You bought him?”
“Lock, stock and barrel.”
She rubbed the back of her neck. “You paid actual money for him?”
“A goodly chunk of it, yeah. He’s going to win the cutting division of the Midwest Futurity later this year. You can bank on it.”
Koby sidestepped restlessly, showing signs of the temperament that had earned him that bad-boy reputation, but Alex settled him down with words so soft Annie couldn’t even make them out. “Matt isn’t going to be happy,” she said, and saw by his expression that Alex was well aware of it.
“Matt’s never happy with much of anything I do. Jeff, either. But they’ll get over it. In fact, they’ll be eating their hats before I’m through. And you can bank on that one, too.”
Annie bit her bottom lip, hoping he was right, hoping this time Alex could turn a losing proposition into a winner. She could see where the challenge would appeal to him, knew he’d always thought he had something to prove to the world. Or to the world of the McIntyres, anyway. But that’s not what she and Alex had to discuss. “I think I’ll just keep my money in my sock,” she said, striving for a light tone. “No banks, no bets...no interest.”
Alex’s gaze dropped to her stomach, then returned to her face. “You might have told me before now, Annie.”
“Told you what?”
“That you’re...that we’re pregnant.”
“We’re not pregnant. I am.” She paused to let that soak into his thick skull. “And even supposing I had some overwhelming reason to inform you—which I didn’t—how would I have gone about doing that? Sent a postcard to General Delivery, Somewhere, U.S.A?”
“Josie knows where I’ve been. We’ve been on the phone to each other at least once a week these past six months. Lord knows, all she talks about lately is how much weight she’s gained and what she’s bought for the baby and something about starting some kind of contest. First Baby of Bison City 2000 ... or something like that. It seems sort of odd she never mentioned the two of you were running neck and neck to win that contest.”
“I doubt she thought you’d be interested, Alex,” Annie said bravely. “I’m a little surprised myself.”
“Like hell you are. That baby’s mine. I know it as well as you do.”
“Really? How do you know that?”
“Josie’s six months along and she got pregnant on her wedding night ... and if you’re both due at the same time...”
Annie had hoped he wouldn’t be quite so quick with the math. “Well,” she said, choosing denial as defense. “That’s an arrogant attitude, even for you.”
“Arrogance has nothin’ to do with it. We slept together after Josie’s wedding reception. Remember? You, me, acres of moonlight? Bein’ pregnant doesn’t wipe out your memory, does it? Or is it just selective moments you’re forgetting?”
“I remember just fine, thanks. And what I remember is that the night I got pregnant, you weren’t even in Wyoming. This baby is mine, Alex. Not yours, so you can quit shaking in your boots. I have no claim on you and neither does my child.”
Koby tossed his head, stamped a foot, pulled on the lead, and Alex stopped frowning at her long enough to turn the horse and walk him back toward the corral. Annie stood her ground, watching the worn and faded denim that cupped his butt and emphasized the long, muscular length of his legs, thinking about all the experiences she’d had watching him from this point of view. Walking away from her. Always walking away...even if now he was just walking to the corral to turn the horse loose inside it so he could come back and focus all his attention on arguing with her.
He closed the gate, stood there with one booted foot resting on the bottom rail, watching the horse run off some tension, and just when Annie thought he wasn’t coming back to her, he turned and approached her in a long, purposeful stride. “Let’s get this straight, Annie. Are you tryin’ to tell me I’m not the father of your baby?”
She kept her gaze steady on him, figuring that a lie said straight-out had at least a chance of being believed. “That’s just what I’m saying, Alex. This is not your baby.”
His jaw tightened, flexed, and she thought he’d probably benefit by a run in the corral, too. But she didn’t, of course, say so.
“Then, whose baby is it?” he asked. “And don’t say it’s yours, ’cause that’s not what I’m asking.”
“I know what you’re asking, Alex, and I’m going to tell you. So listen up and listen up good. The father of this baby is—” she sucked in a deep breath and felt the baby kick in protest “—none of your business.”
“You mean to stand there and tell me that I’m not the father, but you’re not telling who is?”
“I’m not telling you,” she stated firmly.
“So Josie knows? Your Uncle Dexter—does he know? What about Genevieve? Hilda Lawson? Doc Wilson? I’ll bet he asked and I’ll bet you told him, too, didn’t ya? That doctor-patient privilege thing?”
“I haven’t discussed this with anyone. And for your information, Doc Wilson retired two years ago. Bison City has grown some since the last time you paid any attention to things. like doctors and our little hospital. We’re getting right uptown around here, Alex. There’s a new GP, Dave Gardner, who moved over from Cheyenne a while back. I even have a female obstetrician—and get this, she’s pregnant, too. Maybe you ought to go down to her office and ask her who fathered her baby!” Annie hadn’t meant to get angry, hadn’t realized she was angry with him, but suddenly all the times he’d disappointed her welled up into this one worst-case scenario. He could disappoint her until the cows came home, but she’d never, in a million, trillion years give him the opportunity to disappoint her child. Breaking her heart was one thing; breaking the heart of her child was another thing altogether.
Alex took off his hat and dusted it across his thigh. Once, and then again. When he fastened his blue eyes on her, she could see that he was angry, too. Good. She could handle anger. It was sweet-talk she had trouble with.
He pursed his lips. “I’m only interested in what’s rightfully mine, Annie.”
Anger fled and fear replaced it. He didn’t get a say in this. She wouldn’t allow it. Not today. And definitely not later. He’d forfeited his right to anything of hers the last time he’d said goodbye. Make that the last three times. “Rest assured, Alex, that I have nothing of yours, except a dog. You’ll be happy to know that the dog you hit is recuperating and will probably be ready to go home day after tomorrow. Turns out her owner died, and the dog was lost. I told the vet at the Sheridan clinic that you’d be adopting Footloose just as soon as she’s well. Congratulations, you’ve escaped the bonds of fatherhood only to run smack dab into the responsibilities of pet ownership.”
Alex frowned. “Footloose?”
“The dog.” Annie had made up the name on the spot, and thought she’d been downright clever with it, too. “What a coincidence. Footloose the dog and Footloose the guy. Must be fate that brought the two of you together.”
“I can’t take care of that dog, no matter what its name is.”
My point, exactly, Annie thought. “Then I guess you’ll have to find somebody else to adopt her,” she said. “Considering you’re the one who caused the injury, I’d say that makes her your responsibility.”
“I didn’t hit her.” Alex shoved a hand through his tangled hair and slapped his hat back on his head. “Can’t you keep her?”
“No,” Annie said in no uncertain terms. “No. This is something you’ll have to take care of yourself. She’ll be ready to leave the clinic day after tomorrow, and I will expect you to be here to pick her up, Alex.” She turned to go back inside, more sure than ever that she was doing the right thing. If he couldn’t imagine taking care of a forty-pound dog, how could she ever let him assume any responsibility for a child?
Oh, yes, she was certainly within her rights to lie to him about the baby. And, all things considered, she thought she’d handled this first, difficult confrontation with poise and aplomb.
Even if all she’d really wanted to do, all she still really wanted, was to welcome him home with a kiss that would set his boots on fire.