Fisher nodded and agreed. “I’ve seen the same kind of body language on fresh recruits. He’s definitely the one calling the shots.”
“It may be more than that. Sara had bruises on her arms and hands when she first got to the ranch. If Howard was responsible, Sara might feel powerless to say anything about the abuse.”
Fisher leaned back in his chair and rubbed his hand across his lips, thoughtful for a moment. “He’s wealthy and connected, so who would believe her?”
She nodded emphatically. “Exactly. And if he’s suing for custody of her—”
“He would have free rein to keep on abusing her.” Fisher shook his head, sat up in the chair and clasped his hands together tightly. “It’s sad that a father would do that to his child. That she feels there’s no one there she can turn to.”
“It’s probably why she came to the ranch.”
Fisher glanced up the stairs toward T.J.’s room. “Do you think he knows about the abuse? Is that why he’s protecting her?”
She thought of T.J. and how much he was like the man who had raised him. Tim had been good-hearted and prone to helping others. But also, deep within her son were the genes from the man sitting beside her. A man of action. A hero. Combine the two and it was starting to make sense that T.J. was somehow involved with helping the young woman.
“I think that T.J. believes he’s doing what’s right for Sara, but the best thing would be to tell us what’s happening so the authorities can handle this,” she admitted.
He nodded, but then his gaze dropped down at his hands for a moment before he faced her. “There are times when a man has to make his own stand no matter what the rules say about what’s right.”
She heard him, but couldn’t agree. Laying her hand on his tightly clasped ones, she said, “But he’s not a man, Fisher. He’s a boy. A scared and confused young boy.”
Fisher eased his hands away from hers and pointed to the monitor. “You said that the deputy mentioned that Sara had been at a place up on the highway before she came to the ranch. We should print out that picture of her and check out that honky tonk. She might have run back there again.”
She felt dismissed much as she suspected his men might feel when he gave them an order. She tried not to take it personally, telling herself that he was a man used to being in charge and making decisions.
But she was also used to being in control of her own life. Some might say she hadn’t done a good job of it—heck, she even felt that way at times—but she had tried her best.
Her silence must have registered with him since he shifted his attention from the monitor and the prints he was making and back to her.
The strain on Macy’s face was evident and Fisher struggled for a moment with a reason for it until it finally came. “Do you want to go that place on the highway or is there something else you think we should do?”
“I know you’re used to taking control—”
“It’s a hard habit to break,” he freely admitted. In his life a delay in decision-making could cost someone their life, but he understood this wasn’t the military.
“I didn’t mean to order you around only…I feel like you and T.J. are my responsibility now.” He paused as the strain on her face increased and sadness crept into her eyes. He wondered at it once again, although she was quick to make the reasons clear.
“Is that all we are? A responsibility?”
He mumbled a curse beneath his breath, regretting that his time alone and in the Army had seemingly cost him so many of his skills with women. Needing to reach her, both physically and emotionally, he cupped her cheek and tenderly ran his finger along the ridge of her cheekbone.
“I’m so not good at this, Macy,” he confessed.
“This? As in—”
“Family life. Personal relationships. I don’t know how to deal with the kinds of things you’ve had to handle. Difficult things like Tim’s death and T.J.’s problems.”
“I’ve done the best I could,” she replied, defensiveness in every line of her body and the tight tone in her voice.
“You have and asking for my help isn’t a bad thing…I don’t think. But there’s a lot I have to deal with also and I’m trying to do it the best that I can as well.” He couldn’t say it, but his reawakened feelings for Macy and the surprise announcement that he had a son were creating doubt within him. Doubt about the decisions he had made in his life. Doubt about the future he had thought to be fairly certain.
Now nothing seemed sure anymore except for the fact that he had to help Macy and T.J. His honor demanded it. He just hoped his heart would be intact when it was all over.
Macy nodded and after a shaky inhalation, her words came out on a rushed breath. “We’ll do the best we can together for now.”
Together for now. It seemed like the best thing they could hope for at that moment.
“Do you want to go to this honky tonk?” he asked again, trying for that togetherness.
The tension ebbed slowly from her body. “I think that’s a good idea. I just want to check on T.J. first. Is that okay?”
“That sounds fine.”
She laid her hand over his as it rested on her cheek, the action achingly tender and causing a funky tightening in his heart.
“Thank you for trying.”
He bit back the words he had been about to say—that it was the least he could do. He had never believed in doing the least of anything in his whole life and Macy and T.J. certainly deserved more from him. Instead he said, “I will give it my all to make sure this comes out right.”
A glimmer of a smile came to her face. “I’m certain you will.”
Her trust in him moved him once again, choking his throat tight. Unable to say more for fear of what he might say, he nodded.
“I’m going to go check on T.J. and then we’ll go, okay?”
“Okay,” he managed to eke out and returned his attention to printing out larger pictures of Sara, both alone and with her parents.
He heard the tread of her steps going up the stairs and past the whir of the ink-jet printer, the soft and loving way she called T.J.’s name. A moment later, she descended the steps again and reentered the kitchen carrying the tray with the empty plates and glasses with T.J.’s lunch.
“He’s sound asleep again. I left him a note that we were stepping out for a little while,” she advised and went to the sink to clean the plates.
“That’s good. It’ll give us some time to visit this place and try to figure out where Sara may have gone.” With a final thunk-thunk, the printer spit out the last sheet of paper with the photo of Sara.
He stood, picked up the papers, folded them neatly and tucked them into the pocket of his chambray shirt. Macy joined him just a second later.
“Are you ready to go?”
She nodded. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
The Amarillo Rose sat on one of the smaller county roads, but one well-traveled by truckers avoiding the sometimes more crowded state highways. Sitting smack dab in between Esperanza and another rural town, the location made it a great watering hole for the truckers who were headed from the Corpus Christi area to Lubbock or other northern cities.
The paint on the sprawling one story structure was a faded color which had probably