The Cowboy’s Secret Babies (The Careys of Cowboy Point #3)

Chapter Eight

M arch blustered along, though Ryder barely felt the cold. Like everyone else, he got a little too excited when there were a couple of nice days or even a lovely afternoon, but this was Montana. Winter always came back, and it usually came back hard.

One day, after Wilder and Ryder made a run down into Marietta for some supplies, they stopped at Mountain Mama Pizza on the way back. The last time Ryder had been in town, the rambling yet cozy pizza place had still been trying to hold on to the fleeting promise of good fall weather. They had still had their patio open with strands of lights strung all around and the doors wide open to welcome in the outside.

But it was March now, and fully winter no matter how close the so-called official first day of spring was. All the outside parts of the restaurant were closed up tight, leaving only the warm, bright interior that felt comfortable rather than crowded, even when it was full.

There were no free tables and only a few extra chairs at one. But as that one happened to be where the three Stark brothers sat, Ryder was already figuring that they’d get their food to go.

Wilder, naturally, had other ideas. He went, grabbed a seat, and plopped himself right down amongst the Starks as if he couldn’t see the looks on their faces.

“Gentlemen,” he drawled. “Maybe you haven’t heard, but I single-handedly ended the feud between the Careys and the Lisles. I’m not in the mood to pick up another one. Get over it.”

Ryder took the seat next to him, smiling blandly at Rosie’s cousins.

For a moment, they all sat there, like they were waiting to see if their genetic links to old West varmints and vagabonds might take them over… but no. They were Montanans, sure, and that could mean a hardheaded feud.

Today it trended more toward a grizzled practicality that came of long winters that could take anyone out in a moment of indecision. Better to keep your affairs in order and your enemies so close they really were friends.

Or something like that.

“The thing about Rosie is that she was supposed to do huge things,” Logan said, breaking into the silence at their table, though Fleetwood Mac was encouraging everyone to go their own damn way from the speakers.

“I’m sorry that you don’t find my children to be enough of an achievement,” Ryder replied, blandly enough.

Logan muttered something under his breath. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Tennessee and Dallas Lisle were not exactly overjoyed when they discovered that I was dating their sister,” Wilder said, almost offhandedly, though there was nothing offhand about the way he looked from one Stark brother to the next. “I thought there might come a time they wanted to punch me in the face. But they didn’t.”

“You boys can try to punch me in the face,” Ryder offered. “That might be entertaining.”

“I would like to know your intentions,” Noah said formally, looking at Ryder intently. “I would like you to tell us all, right now, what your intentions are toward Rosie and those boys.”

“Our boys,” Logan said.

“Stark boys,” Wyatt added, clearly just to be provocative.

Ryder decided not to give him what he wanted. He didn’t rise to the bait, little as he liked his sons being called by a name that wasn’t his—not that this was the time to worry about that little detail. “My intentions are none of your business,” he said, but without any heat. “Given that this is a family situation, here’s what I’ll tell you. Those are my sons. I intend to be in their life for as long as I draw breath. That’s what you need to know.”

The three brothers glanced at each other, and looked like they were about to start talking again.

Ryder got there first. “Whatever happens between me and Rosie, or doesn’t, is our business. Though I appreciate you all looking out for her. I’m not sure why you let her drive around in that death trap of a hatchback for so long when she needed new brakes, but still. I’m glad somebody is looking out for her in some capacity.”

As intended, that started up a hot debate amongst the Starks about who had failed Rosie in regard to her vehicle. When his phone buzzed, he knew who it was. He looked down and Wilder’s text was on his screen. Nicely played.

He nodded at his brother, but kept his eyes on Stark brothers.

After they ate, and some form of peace accord had been brokered—enough that everyone was talking about grabbing a drink at the Copper Mine at some point to celebrate the end of the hostilities—Wilder wanted to head down the snowy street to the new medical clinic, where Cat was managing the office for the new doctor in town, Ramona Taylor.

“Who I’m pretty sure is dating Knox,” Wilder said as the two of them stood outside in the bitter cold, stamping their feet to encourage them to warm up. “Or was. He definitely was at some point last fall.”

“I thought you said she was a doctor,” Ryder said. When Wilder nodded, he grinned. “I thought doctors were smart.”

Wilder laughed. “You haven’t seen this doctor. Knox is an idiot to let her get away.”

Ryder nodded. “Knox is an idiot, yes.”

When Wilder headed down toward the clinic that was in a renovated old house that had belonged to a man he’d once thought was the local boogey man, he crossed over toward the general store. Now that he wasn’t rushing to leave, he found that spending time in Cowboy Point made him feel good.

Ryder didn’t know why, but suddenly, nostalgia didn’t make him feel restless.

He liked seeing the Copper Mine, where he’d spent more than a few misspent nights on his rare visits home, tucked back on the other side of the creek. The creek was frozen now, and if Ryder remembered it correctly, that added a whole other level to the typical foolishness that went on there. He’d slid down it a time or two himself, in a less-than-coherent state.

Then there was the general store itself, the supposedly purloined building that had been the source of strife between his family and the Lisles for ages. He could see lights on in the diner next to the store, where, rumor was, Tennessee Lisle served up a mean breakfast and a good lunch when he was in the mood. Not that Ryder would know, having historically never darked the door of a Lisle establishment unless forced to use the store in a snowstorm or some such event. If he looked up, he could see that ridiculous lighthouse up on the top of Lisle Hill.

Today it made him smile.

He ducked into the feed store, thinking that he could find something fun to give the boys to play with, and found himself abruptly face-to-face with a woman he had the immediate feeling that he ought to recognize. Though he didn’t.

“Ryder,” she said in an ingratiating tone.

She reached out and put her hand on his arm, which he found he didn’t like at all. He moved away, but kept a smile on his face, because there was no reason not to be polite in a small town. It always came back at you.

The woman searched his face, and then laughed. “It’s me. Gwen Sheen. You remember me. I was this close to asking you to go to the Sadie Hawkins dance that year.”

Ryder did not remember Gwen. Not the way she meant. She had rounded eyes that protruded slightly, a lot of wavy brown hair, and was only because of the older woman back behind the counter that he realized that he certainly knew her mother. And that he recognized the name.

Of course, this being the tiny town that it was, recognizing a name and being on nodding acquaintance with the person’s mother meant that he knew everything there was to know about Gwen whether he remembered her or not. If she’d been anywhere near to asking him to anything, he’d never had a clue. Still, other details about her dropped into place anyway, like the words to a song he hadn’t sung in ages.

He knew that she was younger than him and Wilder and he had a strong feeling she was somewhere between Boone and Knox. She was Marla Sheen’s daughter, which meant that when good old Bear Sheen, the town drunk, drank too much to take himself indoors that one winter, Gwen had lost her father. He could tell from a glance that she’d never left Cowboy Point and had no intention to. That wasn’t a value judgment—it was more like a filing system. Things a person could know about another, just like that.

When she moved forward once again, and replaced her hand on his arm, he knew more.

“I just want to tell you that I’ve been thinking about you,” she said, lowering her voice. “Everyone feels so badly for you, Ryder.”

He had no idea what she was talking about. He moved his arm again, and didn’t smile quite so much. “I sure appreciate that, Gwen. But I’m fine. More than fine, really. Thanks, though.”

“It’s okay,” she said, and did something with her face that made him think that if he had been even slightly smaller, she would have attempted to pat him on the head, or something equally inappropriate. “You don’t have to pretend. I’m an old friend. It’s just really , really impressive, and so honorable that even though she trapped you, you’re making the best of it. Honestly, you’re an inspiration.”

“It was a pleasure to see you, Gwen,” Ryder lied.

He walked away from her, shaking his head, and decided the boys were fine without something from the feed store.

Later that evening, he and Rosie sat in the living room while Matilda wafted around the house, picking up and dropping the threads of the stories she was telling them the same way she did with the layers of her outdoor clothing.

She was banging around in the kitchen now, throwing together a late dinner for herself. Rosie had just recently stopped insisting that they needed to keep a stern distance between them, and was sitting next to him on the couch.

Not exactly cuddling, but touching.

These were the kind of baby steps he liked.

Matilda liked to watch anything featuring animals, so that was on the television while Rosie read her books. Every time he came over, she was into a new one. He didn’t think he’d ever met anyone in his life who read as fast or with as much delight as she did.

Earlier, after he’d gotten back to the ranch with Wilder, unloaded their supplies, and checked in on his father, he had gone back down to Rosie’s. She’d told him that the boys were going straight from nursery school to the library with her cousin Sara Jane, who was holding the monthly read-along for the little kids.

When he got to her house, she was just getting out of the shower, preparing to go and catch the end of story hour.

They’re with your cousin , he said. You can be a little late.

He’d picked her up, so hot and damp from the shower, and carried her into her bedroom. Then he’d spread her out on her queen-sized bed and followed her down onto the mattress.

After all the times in the truck, or quick and dirty moments in the bathroom with the lock thrown, it felt like an upgrade.

It was like paradise to have all of her like that. He exulted in it. It was possible he lost his mind a little, in the joy and endless magic that was Rosie.

You made me very late , she told him when she got out of the shower a second time, but she was smiling. And she’d run out the door, yelling over her shoulder that he should stay for dinner.

While she was gone, he’d changed the sheets and made her bed. Then he’d gone down to the living room, and picked up the paperback with the cracked spine lying there on the coffee table. He’d started reading the first chapter and it wasn’t until the boys came running in, shouting Daddy , Daddy , because they’d seen his truck in the drive, that he realized that he was entirely content.

So far from trapped that he hardly knew what the word meant.

But now, after the usual rounds of dinner and baths and books, he worried that Rosie was maybe not so content.

After all, she’d had to do this on her own. He’d had her here for the beginning of his participation in their children’s lives, guiding him along the way. So when Matilda looked at her phone—bolting up and knocking her bowl of popcorn onto the floor—then announcing she had to go save a cat, Ryder took it as an opportunity.

“Do you feel trapped?” he asked.

Rosie froze. She had been walking back into the living room after dispensing with Matilda’s popcorn, and she stopped as surely as if he’d plunked a wall down in front of her. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about this. Us.”

“You’re going to have to be more specific,” Rosie said, carefully.

He leaned back against the couch and regarded her closely. “You came home that summer from college. Everything changed. Do you resent that?”

“I love those boys more than I ever thought it was possible to love anything,” she told him immediately, low and intent.

“That’s not what I asked you.”

She looked away, then back at him as if she wasn’t sure what to make of him, or this. She loosened up enough to come closer and sit down on the couch, curling her legs beneath her.

Still looking at him, she started to say something, then stopped.

But he didn’t jump in.

He let her think it through, and eventually, she let out a small sound, like a sigh. “I know what you’re asking, but I’m not that girl anymore. Do I mourn her sometimes? I guess. But everyone has to grow up sometime. Maybe it doesn’t look the way I imagined it would, but what life does? Any time I try to take a tally, my blessings outweigh my challenges.” She nodded, as if putting some punctuation on that statement. “I have to take that as a win. I do.”

“Are there dreams you wish you could have pursued?”

“Of course there are,” she said with a laugh. “Doesn’t everybody have dreams they’ve outgrown? I love dancing. Watching it, I mean. I like to think that if only this was different or that was different, I could have been a phenomenal dancer, but I doubt it, because I never practiced. And every time I’ve been forced to dance against my will, I’m pretty sure I’m entirely made of left feet. So sure. That’s a dream I’ll never realize in this lifetime.”

“One of your cousins told me today that you were going places. I guess I’m just sorry that it’s my fault you ended up back here.”

“Ryder. I like it here.” Her eyes moved all over him, and it felt like some kind of caress, even though she was sitting on the next sofa cushion over. “I’ve always liked it here. I think that I’ve built the boys and me a pretty good life. It’s sustainable. It’s dependent on me, so if this never happened—” she gestured awkwardly between them, and he found that charming “—they’d be good. I’d be good.”

“So what do you dream about now?”

It wasn’t just a casual question. Maybe he was a little more attached to her answer than he meant to be, because, as it happened, he was in the process of changing up his life, too. Maybe he really wanted to hear that the things she dreamed matched his.

Maybe all of this was a lot more emotional than he wanted to admit.

“Books,” she said at once, grinning as if they were playing a game. “I would love nothing more than to open up a bookstore right here in Cowboy Point. Nothing’s worse than wanting new books and being snowed in up here. And yes, I know we have a library, and I know the librarian personally, but I still do have to give those books back.”

Ryder leaned forward, and took her hands in his.

“Baby,” he said. “Why don’t you do it?”

She looked startled. “What? How would I do it? I have two little boys. I clean short-term rentals.”

He gestured to the bookcases on all the walls. “You could turn your living room into a bookstore. All you need is a cash register.”

She looked around. “First of all, those are my books. They’re like friends to me. I will not be selling them, thank you. But also, I can’t just… open a bookstore.”

“Why not?”

Rosie focused on him, and she was frowning. “Because… it’s a pipe dream. That’s what pipe dreams are for. You dream of them while you do other things. Practical things. Things like being a mother and doing your actual job.”

“I’m pretty sure there are people who think running a bookstore is an actual job,” he countered. “Not that I’m an expert on bookstore owners, but that’s always been the impression I got.”

She pulled her hands out of his. “Those people probably have a lot more money, and two fewer toddlers than I do.”

“I have money.”

He didn’t mean to say that. It was true, but money was the kind of thing a man learned pretty quick not to talk about too much, because people got funny about it.

And he watched as Rosie, it turned out, was one of those people.

“I’m happy for you that you have money, Ryder,” she said after a moment. “But I don’t know what that has to do with anything.”

“Well.” And he knew he had to be careful. He tried. “Right off the bat, I’d say that since you’re the mother of my children, it should interest you. You don’t have to worry so much. You don’t have to pay for everything.”

“This is just…” She shook her head. “I know you mean well, but I can’t—”

“Rosie. I understand how hard you’ve worked, and how much you’ve sacrificed to get this far. It doesn’t have to be that hard, that’s all. They’re my kids too. If you don’t want to clean rentals, you don’t have to. If you want to open up a bookshop, you should. I’ll give you the money to do it.”

She scrambled back on the couch, then got to her feet, looking at him as if he’d hauled off and slapped her.

This suggested he hadn’t been careful enough.

“This is too much,” she said, in that shut down sort of voice he hadn’t heard from her in a while. Since he’d turned up out of the blue, in fact. “This is too much, and it’s not right. We have to draw some boundaries. Everything has been… it’s been a lot. Maybe it’s too much. We have to be very careful, Ryder, and we really have to make sure that we’re starting out as we mean to go on, and that really means that the only possible solution here is to take a break—”

But Ryder understood now. He saw the thing that had been in front of him the whole time.

The only possible solution, and it was perfect.

He was sure she’d see that too.

“Or,” he said, getting up himself and moving closer to her, so he could take her hands again, “we could do this right. We could get married.”