Cassidy Harte and the Comeback Kid (12 page)

Zack had finally struck out on his own when he was just fifteen, although he had never told her why he dropped out of high school or left his father somewhere in Montana.

He had mentioned one time, almost in passing, that his father used to drink too much. She wondered now if his father had been a mean drunk. If he had taken his frustrations with life out on his son.

Was that the reason Zack had preferred the hardscrabble life of a rambling cowboy to staying with his father?

She wanted to rub a hand at the sudden ache in her chest for that young boy. He had passed a high school equivalency test before she met him, she knew, but it had still bothered him that he hadn't graduated in the traditional way or gone on to college.

He had considered himself uneducated, rough.

She thought of what he had said the night before, that he hadn't been the kind of man she deserved a decade ago.

She hadn't cared a thing about his education level or his bank balance. She had loved his solid core of decency, his honor and his sense of humor. His inherent kindness. The way she always felt cherished and protected in his arms.

A hundred things about him were far more important than what he had or had not accomplished with his life.

But with stunning clarity she finally realized that the things she had considered inconsequential had been anything but to Zack.

She jerked her attention back to Amy Carlson and her recital of his success.

“But why am I telling you this?” Amy said with a rueful smile. “You probably know all about the mysterious Zack Slater.”

Ten years ago she thought she knew him. Now she wasn't so sure. “Why would you say that?”

Amy sent her a knowing look. “The two of you have something going, right?”

More heat soaked her cheeks. “What do you mean?”

The other woman grinned. “I have the two eyes God gave me, sugar. I saw the way you two were looking at each other this morning before breakfast. You were both putting out enough heat, I was afraid for a minute there you were going to start a forest fire. Besides that, the man hasn't stopped watching you for longer than a few minutes this entire trip. I'll tell you, there are plenty of days I'd trade both my twins plus my left arm to have a man like Zack Slater looking at me like that.”

Cassie barely resisted the compelling urge to see if he was watching her now. “You're mistaken. We don't have a relationship. We…knew each other a long time ago. That's all.”

“Well, if I'd had half a chance with a man like him before I met my Paul, you can bet I would have grabbed hold with both hands and not let go for all the pine needles in Wyoming.”

That's exactly what she wanted to do, she realized
with sudden panic. He was asking for another chance. And, heaven help her, she wanted desperately to give it to him.

But how could she? She wasn't that heedless, optimistic eighteen-year-old anymore—that girl who was confident that everything would work out exactly as she wanted.

Ten years ago she had gone after what she wanted with single-minded purpose. She'd decided she wanted Zack Slater, and she hadn't been about to let anything stand in her way.

Not even him.

She had pushed them both into a relationship, then into an engagement. Maybe if she hadn't been in such a headlong rush—maybe if they had taken more of a chance to build a stronger foundation—he wouldn't have run.

She had been a different person then. What had happened to that reckless, spirited girl who took chances, who embraced every day with boundless excitement and joy?

A few weeks ago she might have said Zack Slater destroyed her when he left.

Now, as she rode along the trail lined with towering spruce and ghostly pale aspen, she faced some grim facts about herself. She had let that girl wither away, until she had become a cold shell of a woman afraid to take any chances for fear of something going wrong.

So terrified of being hurt again that she never let herself dream.

That's why she hadn't made an offer on the café in town yet. Heaven knows, she had enough money from her share of the Diamond Harte revenue over the years
that she could have paid cash for the café the day she moved away from the ranch.

Taking the job at the Lost Creek had just been a stall tactic.

She sat a little straighter in the saddle, stunned by the realization. She forgot about the raw beauty of the mountains around her as the cold truth settled in her chest. She had been too afraid of failure, of taking chances. Zack hadn't done that to her. She had done it to herself.

No more. She wasn't going to hide behind the past anymore. Excitement began to churn through her like the creek still swollen with runoff. She was obligated to stay at the ranch for another few weeks, but after that she would start negotiations with Murphy. By the end of the summer she would have her own restaurant.

After her brother's wedding in a month, the cute little rental Sarah lived in would be available. Maybe she could take over Sarah's lease—or even make Bob Jimenez an offer to buy it.

Suddenly the day seemed brighter, the air more fresh. She could do this. She wanted to be that fearless girl again.

And Zack. Did she dare take a chance with him, too?

With her heart pounding hard, she thought of the sweetness of his kiss that morning, the thick emotion in those green eyes. He hadn't been lying when he said he still cared about her.

Trying again with him would take a huge leap of faith. Could she trust him to catch her on the other side?

 

Zack sat on his favorite chair on the porch watching the stars come out one by one and trying like hell not
to spend too much time watching the windows of the cabin next door for an occasional shadow to move past the closed curtains.

What was the matter with him? He was turning into some kind of sick and twisted voyeur, hoping to catch even a glimpse of her. Where was his pride? His dignity?

He didn't have much of either left when it came to Cassidy Jane Harte.

Going along on the cattle drive the day before had turned out to be a complete bust. He was no closer to regaining her trust today than he'd been a week ago when he first arrived at the ranch.

He sighed into the darkness and thought of the stacks of messages Jean Martineau had handed him as soon as they rode back to the ranch. Claudia, his very competent assistant, was frantic to have him back in Denver, with a dozen projects needing his urgent attention. He couldn't keep putting off his return to real life.

He hated to admit defeat at anything, but he was beginning to think this was a battle he couldn't win.

The thought left an acid taste in his mouth. The future stretched out ahead of him, stark and lonely and colorless, but he didn't know what else he could do to change it.

If only he could find Melanie. But one of the messages from Claudia contained another worthless report from his P.I. So far it looked as if the woman had either changed her name and moved out of the country or had been abducted by aliens.

He was betting on the aliens at this point.

Either way, he figured he was damned. If he couldn't find her, Cassie would have to take his story on blind faith. He couldn't see that happening anytime soon.

The only bright spot about the cattle drive had been the way she'd responded to his kiss that morning. He had seen awareness and some deeper emotion flicker in her eyes before she had shielded them with her lashes and surrendered to him.

He shifted in the chair, remembering the sweetness of her mouth and the fluttering of her hands against his chest. She hadn't been exactly bubbling over with enthusiasm during the kiss—hadn't participated much at all, really—but she hadn't poured hot coffee on him, either. That had to count for something, right?

And a few times on the ride down the trail, their gazes had met and he thought he saw something else there besides anger and disdain. A different light. Softer, somehow.

No. That was probably only wishful thinking on his part. He hadn't seen her since they arrived back at the ranch several hours earlier, when she had treated him with the same cool reserve.

Her porch light suddenly flickered off, leaving only a soft glow through the window. Damn. Now she was going to bed before he had a chance to come up with any kind of half-rational excuse to knock on her door in the middle of the night.

He should do the same. He hadn't slept much all week, and his muscles ached from two days in the saddle. Still, something kept him planted here, watching the stars and regretting the past.

With a sigh he planted his hands on the armrest of the old rocker and prepared to rise, when he suddenly heard the squeak of hinges. An instant later his breath caught and held somewhere in the vicinity of his throat as she stepped out onto the porch.

Though her porch light and his were both out, he
could see her clearly from the soft light still on inside her cabin. Her hair was damp around the edges as if she had just stepped out of the tub, and she was wearing a loose, flowing white cotton robe that glowed iridescent in the moonlight.

He opened his mouth to greet her, then paused for just a moment, struck by the stunning picture she made. Sensual and sweet at once. Wistful and wanton. As he watched her move to the porch railing, he couldn't seem to remember how his voice worked. All he could do was stare, his throat dry, as she leaned out and gazed up at the vast glittering night sky, her attention fixed on the same stars he had watched appear.

What was she wishing for? he wondered. He would give anything to know, to be the man she shared her secrets with.

He couldn't sit here like this, lurking in the corner and watching her in such a solitary moment. Remaining silent was an unconscionable invasion of her privacy.

“Hey,” he finally called out, his voice sounding rough and ragged to his ears.

She froze for an instant, then turned toward him with something like resignation in her eyes. “Zack. Isn't it past your bedtime?”

“Probably. The night was too gorgeous to ignore.” And so are you, he thought, and unfolded his length from the rocker to go to her. When he joined her at the railing, he was heartened considerably when she moved aside to make room for him.

For a moment they were silent, both contemplating the mysteries of the heavens, then she sent him a sidelong look. “Why do we always keep meeting in darkness?” she murmured.

He was going to say something flip, but stopped and
gave her question a little deeper consideration. “Maybe it's easier facing each other and ourselves at night than in the harsh glare of daylight.”

She lifted one slim, dark eyebrow. “That's very philosophical, Slater. And surprisingly insightful.”

He shrugged. “I'm just chock-full of surprises, Cassidy Jane.”

“Yes. I'm beginning to see that,” she murmured.

Just what did she mean by that? he wondered. Before he could ask, she spoke again.

“I heard quite an earful about you today from Amy Carlson on the ride down the mountain. She read all about you in the business section of one of the Denver papers, apparently.”

“Oh, no.” His oath was low and heartfelt.

Her soft laugh drifted over him like imported silk. “It was very educational, I must admit. I never would have pegged you for such a philanthropist.”

“Have I just been insulted?” he asked, with an inward curse at the business reporter at the
Post
for being so damned good at his job and ferreting out that closely held secret.

She laughed again. “I don't know. Maybe. Sorry. You know, in all these years, I just never pictured you as a pillar of the community, giving bundles of money away like some modern-day Robin Hood.”

He couldn't control the sudden tension rippling through him. He hated talking about this. What the hell was the point of giving anonymous donations if they weren't going to stay that way?

So what if he contributed to a few causes he cared about? That didn't make him any kind of hero. Just a man with astonishing good luck in a lot of ways that
seemed hollow and unimportant unless he could share that luck.

He blew out a breath, turning away the conversation before it became any more uncomfortable. “How did you picture me?”

“Oh, plenty of ways. All of them very creative, you can be sure. I believe staked out naked on an anthill somewhere with buzzards circling around your head was always a personal favorite.”

He heard the humor in her voice. But he also heard the thin thread of pain woven through it, like a pale, out-of-place color on a rich tapestry. Regret washed over him again, bitter guilt that he had been the cause of that pain.

He shifted to face her, leaning a hip on the railing. A wild yearning to reach out and caress that face, to touch her soft skin, welled up inside him. He almost did it but checked himself at the last moment, afraid she would shy away from him like an unbroken colt.

“I never meant to hurt you, Cassie. I should have hightailed it out of Star Valley the minute things started to get serious between us. Before everything went so far.”

She didn't answer him, just watched him out of those solemn blue eyes that had always seen deep inside his soul.

“I thought about leaving a hundred times but I couldn't do it. For once in my godforsaken life, something right had happened to me. Something real and beautiful. I was too selfish to give that up—to give you up—even though I knew I would end up hurting you in the end.”

“But you did give it up. You left and you never looked back.”

“I left,” he allowed. “But I've spent every day of the last ten years looking back, Cassie. Knowing I made the biggest mistake of my life walking away from the only woman I have ever loved. And wondering how I could ever make it right with her again.”

After he finished speaking, her eyes turned murky and dark. A second later one fat tear slipped out. Dismayed, he stared as it caught the moonlight, wanting to call back whatever he'd done to make it appear.