Chapter Twenty-One
“S o, can you do it? Sorry to ask, but now I’ve got this deal in Austin, and it was your idea after all.”
Tris sat at her kitchen counter, her coffee and toast forgotten, wishing she hadn’t answered her phone. But she couldn’t imagine anyone in Last Stand ignoring a call from famous artist in residence Rylan Rafferty.
“I…”
“Besides,” Rylan added, “you’re the only one I know who knows where his place actually is and how to get there.”
She shouldn’t have told him that, either.
But she had, which left her in the awkward position of having to say yes to his request or come up with some excuse she knew would sound beyond flimsy. Because it would be.
After the call, and her agreement to come by and pick up the sketch and notes he’d made and would leave with his mother at the main house, she sat silently for a long time. Thinking. As she should have thought when she’d been talking to Rylan that day, when she’d suggested Logan for this new task.
She had never planned on getting so…involved in this when she’d made the suggestion. But when Rylan had mentioned the idea he was wrestling with—of custom-designed buckles for his famous belts—the image of those drawer pulls had popped into her head and she mentally pictured them tugged into the shape of a buckle.
Well, hadn’t she been looking for a reason to talk to Logan again? And what better place than on his own home turf, where he might feel safe enough to talk? He might feel safe enough to tell her that story, as Lark had suggested. Not that he had to tell it to her, specifically. It wasn’t like she thought she was someone…special to him, but she had the feeling Lark was right. He needed to tell someone. He’d spent a lot of years with all that old pain bottled up inside, and while he’d obviously built a good, stable life for himself, it could be even better, if he could get rid of that old poison.
At least, she thought so. But what did she know? Who was she to decide that for him? But she hadn’t really, it had been Lark who’d suggested it. Lark, who did know. So it wasn’t really her, coming up with this idea. It was on the advice of an expert, wasn’t it? Maybe she should just—
She cut herself off mid thought, wondering when she’d turned into such an indecisive, hesitant creature. True, this was delicate territory she’d never trod before, but what was the worst that could happen? Logan would get mad and not want anything to do with her? So life would just continue the way it had been before. Six-plus weeks ago.
Only six weeks? She’d known him, at least by name and a casual nod of recognition, much longer than that. You couldn’t be in Last Stand long and not know about the horse whisperer. But somehow that day she’d bumped into him in the barn at the Baylor ranch seemed lodged in her mind as the start.
The start of what? You deciding you have to be the one to draw him out? Out of a shell it seemed he’d carefully built for himself? Draw him out when maybe he was better off left alone to live in the way he needed to?
Or the start of realizing maybe you weren’t as dead inside as you assumed?
And there it was, in so many words. Logan Fox had awakened her in ways she’d never expected to feel again. As usual, she shied away from the thought, much as one of the skittish horses he dealt with did.
She laughed out loud at herself, short and sharp. Had she really just likened herself to a spooked horse, needing to be calmed by one special human with some kind of mystical power?
Then again, Logan did seem to have a powerful effect on her. It just wasn’t calming. No, it was unsettling as hell, and she didn’t like the inward churning that went with it.
So maybe she did need to be…what, whispered?
That made her laugh again, and that in turn got her up and moving. But she still found herself thinking, about things she had avoided for a long time. Too long, probably. They’d told her at the time David had died that she, too, would feel as if her life was over. That it was a normal response.
But they’d also said it would pass, eventually. So why did she feel as if it hadn’t? Why had her brother managed to get through the same hell, and end up happy again, with Nic, while she seemed stuck in neutral at a never-ending stoplight?
She went and rinsed out her coffee mug, watching the water circle the drain and feeling a bit as if her life was in the same pattern. If Jackson could do it, why couldn’t she?
She stared down at the mug. With an effort she reached over and put it in the dishwasher rack. In the moment before releasing it and leaving it there a thought hit her, fast and hard.
Maybe you just haven’t let go.
She stared at the mug in the rack, feeling a little stunned. Maybe she hadn’t. She’d gone through the motions, taken most of the advice about moving on, but inside, in this hidden part of her brain that had just jabbed her with this thought, maybe she hadn’t let go at all. Of any of it. David, Leah…maybe she was still fighting the idea of their deaths.
Or denying it.
She did not like that idea. Did not like thinking she had shut herself, her true self, off that much for that long. And the fact that she disliked it so much told her that she needed to face it. And do something about it.
Feeling as if she’d made some major resolution, she grabbed up her keys from the tray she kept on the counter for the purpose. She paused at the door that led into the garage, looking at the light jacket that hung there, but today seemed to be a portent of what was to come, already being over seventy degrees. Soon they’d be in the eighties pushing to and past ninety almost every day of summer. With luck they wouldn’t spend too many days over a hundred this year.
Rylan had already left for Austin when she got to the Rafferty place.
“A meeting with the Arts Commission,” Maggie said. “There’s a push to make him a Texas state artist.”
“Wow,” Tris said. “That would be something. And more than well deserved!”
Maggie’s expression was beyond proud as she handed her the manila envelope Rylan had dropped off before he and Kaitlyn had headed out.
“I’ll get it to Logan right now,” she promised.
Maggie gave her a wide smile. “Say hello for me. And tell him I know this is going to work out splendidly.”
“I’ll do that.”
As she drove off, she was secretly grateful for the conversation starter delivering that message would be. She hoped.
It wasn’t as far from the Rafferty ranch as it was from the Baylors, so she was nearing the big oak tree after what seemed like only a few minutes. She slowed to make the turn, then slowed even more, telling herself it was because the long driveway—if you could even call it that, since it was more like a street of its own—wasn’t built for paved road speeds. But in truth she knew it was because she was nervous. She didn’t like admitting it, but she was.
When she got to the house, she thought perhaps all her nerves had been grated on for nothing, because he didn’t answer her knock. Or the next one. She pondered leaving the envelope at the door but didn’t like the idea. And his truck, his only vehicle, was over by the workshop, so he had to be here, even if the sliding barn-style door was closed.
She started toward the other building and before she’d taken more than a few steps, she saw that a side door she hadn’t noticed before was open. She walked that way. As she got closer she could hear music, and guessed that was why he hadn’t heard her pull up. And she smiled when she recognized the song and the voice. Kane Highwater, local legend and rapidly rising national phenom. That Logan was listening to him made her relax for some reason. Well, that, and that it was one of her favorite songs of his, about finding your way back to home and family.
And Kane would know.
But what about someone who never really had a family to get back to? She couldn’t begin to imagine. She’d been lucky in that respect. She and Jackson had had good parents, and for the too-short time they’d had them, loving spouses. Logan had had neither.
She sighed inwardly. If the opportunity arose, she’d take it. But if it did not, this time, she wasn’t going to push it. She didn’t think this was the kind of thing that could or should be forced. Not when she was only now facing the reason why it mattered to her. She cared about him, enough already that it made her ache a little when he pulled back. Which was a shock to her in and of itself. She felt a bit as if she were taking her first steps outside after being locked in a small room somewhere for far too long.
She stopped on the threshold, looking at the interior of his workshop with interest. It was much like a spacious barn, high-roofed—which she guessed was a help in the heat of the summer—with worktables along the wall to her right, the forge, fired up but banked low, against the far wall, and various other tools and equipment tidily arranged along the wall to her left. Pieces of tack and cupboards she guessed must hold materials were on each side of the doorway wall.
And, of course, there was Logan. Leaning over one of the worktables, studying something before him she couldn’t see from here. He was wearing a short-sleeved T-shirt in the warmth of both the day and the forge-heated space, and he’d apparently been at it a while because it clung to him slightly. And yet again her breath caught at the way this man was put together. And the work he did to stay in this kind of shape.
She hadn’t moved. She hadn’t spoken. Yet suddenly Logan stood up straight. His back was to her, so she could see him reach up to scratch the back of his neck, as if something had suddenly itched. And then, quickly, he turned around. And looked at her as if he’d already known she would be there. As if that itch had somehow been…her.
And he looked almost resigned. She didn’t want to delve into what that might mean. She dragged out her best official teacher voice, held up the envelope and said cheerfully, “I’m just here to deliver something for Rylan. He said you’d be expecting it.”
She saw his expression change, shifting to understanding. “Oh. Yes. He said he’d have something for me today.”
She took that as, if not an invitation, at least not resistance to her entering his workspace. Perhaps in part because she wanted to see it, this place where he spent so much time. So as she walked toward him, she looked around, taking in every detail she could put a name to, and making note of the ones she couldn’t so she could ask about them.
He met her halfway, and reached out for the envelope. His fingers brushed hers as he took it. “Sorry,” he muttered, pulling his hand back.
“For what?” For the electric shock I get every time we accidentally touch? For the stream of warmth every time you do it on purpose, even if it’s only to help me in that gentlemanly way of yours?
“My hands are…beat up. Rough. Too rough.”
He didn’t say “for you,” but she heard it as if he had.
“Your hands,” she said evenly, “are working hands. The kind that built this place, this state, this country. The kind we could use more of.”
For a long moment he just looked at her. Then, very quietly, he said, “I’ll bet you turn out some amazing kids, Teacher.”
Her cheeks heated. He couldn’t have said anything about her work that pleased her more.