For a man his size, Rio could move exceptionally fast. Before anyone realized what he was doing, his hat was on the floor. The fingers of his right hand closed around Bull’s thick throat in a grip that had grown strong from years of clenching the leather rigging on bulls and broncs, a grip that had been all that had stood between a broke and desperate cowboy and the hard, unforgiving ground of a rodeo arena and the final indignity of failure.
Bull gagged and glared up at Rio with so much malice he could feel the hate emanating upward in invisible waves.
Thrusting his face close to Bull’s, he said, “Don’t ever call my wife a name again, you sorry excuse for a human being. As a matter of fact, don’t call her anything except Mrs. Langley, ma’am, and then only if you’re spoken to.”
Rio released his hold on Bull and bent to pick up his hat. When he straightened, Bull’s glare was still fixed unwaveringly on him, while he massaged his throat with a hand that trembled the slightest bit. Rio combed his fingers through his dark hair and settled his Stetson on his head.
“I’ve got an even better idea,” he said in a thoughtful tone. “If you happen to be home when she stops by, why don’t you just make it a point to disappear? You’re not fit to breathe the same air she does. Is that clear enough?”
“You’re gonna be sorry you did this, breed,” Bull croaked through aching vocal cords.
“Yeah, well, we all do things we’re sorry for, and we all make mistakes, Bull,” Rio said, heading for the door. “But if I were you, I’d be real careful about making any more. I think your luck just ran out.”
He turned and headed for the door. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow afternoon,” he said to Rick. “Same time.”
Nodding, Rick followed Rio out the door, a combination of awe, admiration and fear in his eyes.
“You step a foot on this place again, and I’ll kill you,” Bull screamed after him. “I may kill you, anyway.” The sound of the whiskey bottle shattering against the door punctuated the threat.
Rio hardly heard. A final rush of adrenaline carried him to his truck. He felt better getting that off his chest. He just hoped he hadn’t made things worse for Rick and Ada.
“You better not come tomorrow,” Rick said as Rio climbed into the truck’s cab.
Rio paused, his hand on the door handle. “You don’t want to work for me anymore?”
“I do!” Rick said. He shook his head. “You don’t know him. He gets crazy out of his mind when he gets really drunk. Does all kinds of terrible things. Then when he sobers up, he doesn’t remember half of it.”
“What are you trying to say, Rick?”
“I’ll meet you in front of the mailbox on the highway. If you come here, he’ll be primed and ready for you, and there’s no use asking for trouble.”
Rio nodded. “Will you and your mom be all right, or did I just buy you another beating?”
“You rattled his cage pretty good,” Rick said. “He doesn’t know what you’ll really do.” He shrugged. “I imagine he’ll just drink and worry on it awhile. We’ll be fine.”
Rio nodded. “If you need me, you know where I am.”
During the ride home, Rio’s thoughts were filled with his confrontation with Bull Farmer. He prayed he hadn’t made things worse for Rick, but if ever a kid needed some guidance and someone to stand up for him, Rick Farmer was that kid.
Rio rubbed a hand over his whisker-stubbled cheek and expelled a harsh sigh. Now he understood why Maggie was so down some evenings. He was always telling her to leave her work at the office, but after today, he could see how much easier that was said than done. The amazing thing was that she was able to stay as objective as she did.
Rio’s heart lifted when he saw her car in the driveway, but he had a few more chores to do before he could call it a night. He stopped by the trailer to visit with Jeremy’s wife and baby daughter and check with Jeremy to see how the broncs had settled in, but Tess said he’d driven in to town to pick up some hamburgers for supper.
Having his recently discovered younger brother and his family on the ranch was a pleasure Rio was glad he hadn’t missed. As he did often of late, he wondered if the man who’d fathered them both was lonely, and if he was sorry for the world of distortion he’d built, now that it had collapsed on him.
He knew Jeremy missed his dad—and probably the easy lifestyle he’d grown up with. But he was a stubborn kid, and he was still mad and hurt to the bone by John Hardin Westlake’s scheme to separate him from Tess and their unborn baby. Tess’s father and Westlake had constructed a web of lies that put the two young people’s love to the test. Only a miracle had brought them all together. A miracle and a woman named Maggie, who’d been willing to put her job on the line.
As Rio played with six-and-a-half-month-old Emily, he tried to imagine what his life had been like before he’d found her on his front doorstep. Lonely. Empty But Emily’s appearance had brought Maggie back into his life, and eventually Jeremy and Tess had come, too. And suddenly Rio had found himself with a real family. It was nice, he thought. Real nice.
After giving Emily the attention she considered her due each evening, Rio checked Babydoll again and gave his gelding a rubdown and a handful of sugar cubes. Something about the mundane tasks was calming. It didn’t occur to him that the small everyday chores were a validation—maybe even a celebration—of his own life and happiness.
When he stepped through the door of the house he shared with Maggie an hour and a half later, the aroma of baking apples and other mouthwatering scents wafted through the air to tickle his nostrils. He smiled. She had cooked up a storm—with apple pie for dessert. He wondered what he’d done to deserve it. He wondered what he’d done to deserve his sweet, sweet Maggie. The sheer rightness of his life banished the last lingering thoughts of Bull Farmer from his mind.
He hung his Stetson on the antique hall tree and took off his boots in the entryway. Maggie got a little testy if he tracked up her floors. Considering the time she spent keeping the place clean, he couldn’t say he blamed her.
“Maggie!” he called, padding toward the living room in his stocking feet.
“In here!”
Rio made his way through the house toward the sound of her voice. He stopped just inside the dining room. The room was dark, except for the flames of literally dozens of candles—tall, squat, thin, fat—a re-creation that was poignantly reminiscent of their wedding night.
Maggie stood by the window, her head tilted slightly to one side as she arranged flowers in a crystal vase. She wore a dress he’d never seen before. He knew he’d never seen it, because it wasn’t the sort of dress a man would easily forget, a shimmering, satiny, peach-colored number that gathered at the neck and revealed most of her shoulders. The hair that tumbled over her bare, fair shoulders shone as brightly as the copper kettle her Aunt Hattie had given them at their kitchen shower. She looked up at him, a single long-stemmed rose in her hand.
“Hi.” She raised the rose to her lips, her green eyes twinkling over the petals as if she had a secret too delicious to keep.
She dropped the flower on the table and reached out a hand toward him. Dazed, Rio, his movements slow and careful drew her into his arms, feeling, as he always did in her presence, big and clumsy and unworthy of a woman like her.
Their kiss was long and slow. When she drew away, his heart was galloping in his chest.
“My sweet, sweet Maggie,” he said in a husky voice as he rubbed his thumb over her bottom