The years, his marriage, Hannah—they changed nothing. He wanted Allie Lassiter. She’d stood there in ragged, dirty clothes—worn deliberately, he’d bet—her nose pointed snootily skyward, her eyes dark with annoyance, and Zane had wanted to send Hannah to the house and throw Allie down in the dirt and make mad, passionate love to her.
He had to be content with Allie’s agreeing to come to the ranch and help the filly. The animal had enough problems to keep Allie coming for a long time.
But was it long enough for Zane to break through the fences she’d erected around herself? Fences for which he’d supplied the barbed wire and poles.
The reason he’d betrayed Allie came padding on bare feet down the stairs. “Daddy?”
No, he hadn’t betrayed Allie because of Hannah. That he had a daughter was the result of his behavior, not the cause. He smiled at her. “Ready for a story before bed?”
Hannah crossed the room and eyed him solemnly. “How come Allie talked mean to us?”
“Allie didn’t talk... well, I suppose it sounded that way to you.” He scooped his daughter up on his lap. “Sometimes when people get hurt, they sound angry.” Before Hannah could ask where Allie hurt, Zane quickly steered the conversation away from Allie. “Remember when you stubbed your big toe on the footstool the other night?”
Hannah nodded. “It hurt really, really bad and I cried.”
“You were grouchier than a hungry bear. You growled and growled, like this.” Zane made growling sounds and pretended to bite her neck.
Hannah squirmed around until she faced him. “No, no! I growled like this.” She roared at the top of her lungs.
Zane laughed and hugged her tightly, breathing in the smell of baby shampoo. Holding her close, he stood. “C’mon, little bear, time for your prayers and a story, then beddy-bye.”
On the side of her bed, Hannah curled in his lap, squeezed her eyelids tightly shut and pressed her palms together. “Hi, Mommy. Daddy and I played bear.”
Zane didn’t know how Hannah’s nightly prayers came to mean chatting with her mother, who was no one’s idea of an angel or a saint. His book on how-to-parent hadn’t covered how one explained to a toddler the death of the mother she’d barely known. Kim hadn’t been much of a mother, but he hoped her daughter never learned that.
There was so much he hoped Hannah would never learn about. War and hate and pain and betrayal. Zane smoothed a hand over his daughter’s soft, rumpled curls, knowing he couldn’t protect her forever. Horses broke legs, dogs bit, kids at school said cruel things, animals and people you cared about died.
Heading the long list of bad things in the world were people who betrayed you. How did a parent protect a daughter from a man like him?
Mary Lassiter hadn’t been able to protect Allie.
Copper greeted Worth with a nicker as he walked up to the horse trailer. Her brother scratched the crest of the elderly mare’s mane and smiled at Allie. “Need any help?”
“If that’s your subtle way of asking why I’m loading Copper and where I’m going with the horse trailer, I told Mom.”
“Zane called this morning and told me you’re going to help him with a horse.”
Finished loading the mare, Allie gave Copper a pat on the rump and closed the back of the trailer. “I’m not helping him anything. I’m helping the filly.” She stepped around the greyhound at her heels.
“Do you want to talk about it? I never knew what you and Zane fought about that night he went to the bar.”
“What we always fought about. I felt he sometimes acted too much like Beau, irresponsible, not ready to settle down.” Allie gave a bitter laugh. “I didn’t know how close to the truth I was.” She hadn’t known then, or when Zane had come back two days later, an apologetic smile on his lips, a bunch of hothouse flowers in one hand, and her ring in the other. She’d accepted all three because she’d loved him and because she’d believed him when he promised to grow up.
Allie rubbed her bare finger. He’d neglected mentioning that he’d gone straight from their argument to a local bad where, to celebrate his liberation and to prove what a big boy he was, he’d gotten roaring drunk. He’d also neglected to mention the sympathetic bartender who’d taken him home to her bed.
“That was five years ago,” Worth said. “Zane wasn’t much more than a kid. A man can do a lot of growing up in five years. You have to admit, he took responsibility for his actions, and didn’t look for the easy way out. Zane could have supported the child without marrying Kim.”
Allie carefully placed her gear in the trailer’s storage area. “Is that what you would have done?”
“No. I’d have married her. Nothing against Mom and Grandpa and their raising of us, but I resented Beau for being a father in name only. I’d never allow a kid of mine to grow up without me there.”
She shrugged. “It’s all water under the bridge. There’s no going back.”
Worth shook his head in amusement. “You sound like Yancy. Grandpa always said the situation didn’t exist that couldn’t be covered by a well-worn cliché.”
“He was right.” She reached for the door handle.
Worth beat her to it and opened the door. “Now that Zane’s a widower, you two could try again.” He moved aside as Moonie slid around him and leaped into the SUV.
“Not interested,” Allie said flatly, climbing behind the steering wheel.
Without comment Worth stepped back and waved her on her way.
Driving down the highway, Allie thought darkly about Worth’s tendency to view his younger sisters as about ten years old. “He’d better not be planning on playing matchmaker,” she said to the greyhound looking out of the passenger window. Moonie turned and lay down, his head resting on Allie’s thigh. She stroked his head. “Who needs a man when she has a dog?” A gentle snore met her rhetorical question.
Males. You couldn’t count on them for anything. Except to let you down. In all fairness, she had to exempt her grandfather and her brother from the category of worthless males. Beau always said Worth fit his name. A person could count on Worth.
Turning off the highway, Allie wished her brother hadn’t brought up the past. No one could resurrect what had been—Allie corrected herself—what she’d thought had been between her and Zane. People didn’t mourn a one-sided love affair. Especially if you’d been the stupid one in love.
Worth talked about the difficulty of Zane’s choice. At least Zane made his choice. Allie had been given no choice.
She cringed to think how gullible she’d been. How she’d seen Zane’s exemplary behavior in the weeks before their upcoming wedding as proof he’d matured. Now she knew he’d been feeling guilty because he’d slept with Kimberly Taylor.
Five years later Allie still didn’t know if she would have accepted back the ring if she’d known he’d slept with another woman. She told herself she wouldn’t have, but she’d been young. And in love. The question would never be answered.
An aspen tree, its leaves gleaming with gold, caught her eye. The aspens had been green then, the green of spring and promise. She’d been sitting on the porch waiting for Zane, her mind jumbled with last-minute wedding plans. The memory of his face, pale with eyes almost black as he told her, superimposed itself on the ribbon of highway ahead of her.
“I slept with another woman. Kimberly Taylor. She’s pregnant, Allie, so I’m going to marry her.”
Her ears heard the words, but her mind refused to take in their meaning. “What