He eyed his own truck with the experienced eye he’d gained helping mechanics on his rodeo crew. A crushed bumper. Smashed headlights. Pushed-up hood. Otherwise, drivable. At least, he supposed so. Someone had moved it to the other side of the road.
“I’m sorry, Claire.”
Her shoulder bones moved restlessly under his touch. “This was my husband’s truck.”
Her admission went through Tanner like the punch of an electric fence. He knew she’d moved on. Married. Yet hearing it from her trickled cold oil down his skin. His pained gaze flew to her truck—her spouse’s truck—again. He could see it now. What he’d done... Sorry wasn’t enough.
“I need to get it fixed back to the way Kevin wanted.” Her last words ended on a watery gulp that made him step closer.
The officer handed them both tickets. Tanner scanned his. Driving without insurance. He winced. Rodeo travel. Road work meant irregular mail. His renewal must have come last month when he’d been laid up in a hospital, unable to remember his name and sure his career with the top thirty-five elite was over. His future a black hole ready to crush him.
“Running a red light?” Claire’s voice rose and Tanner glanced up at her. She was all patches of black and white, like an illusion. As though one blink would turn her into moonlight and grass.
The cop looked at Claire and pointed to a motorcyclist donning his helmet. “Got a witness statement. He rode up behind you and saw the red.”
Confusion sharpened Claire’s features.
Tanner moved, restless. He didn’t want Claire ticketed. “Might have been a mechanical failure, officer.”
The uniformed man slit his eyes at Tanner. “Are you taking back your original statement? The light wasn’t green?”
Tanner shifted in his boots. He wasn’t a saint, but he was no liar, either. “No,” he admitted, then glanced at Claire’s pained expression. How many wrongs would he do her before he’d make it right?
The cop’s face relaxed into friendly lines and he held out a pad and pen. “Now, how about that autograph?”
“Sure.” Tanner scrawled his name without looking and turned at a metallic squeal. A tow truck’s chains hoisted Claire’s pickup. It was beat up. Had some mechanical damage given the small fire...but it wasn’t totaled. Could be fixed.
Her small exclamation had his gaze swinging her way, his concern growing. She looked scraped right out. When she swayed, he slipped an arm around her and held her tight. She could squirm all she wanted, he wouldn’t let go.
“Where are they taking it?”
Tanner read the side of the tow truck. “Bob’s Auto Body. Not far.”
As their small town’s biggest repair shop, everyone knew Bob’s. Tanner had even applied for a job there, but had been turned down when, like most of the townsfolk, Bob had been leery of hiring the fatherless child of a drug addict who’d caused his own share of trouble growing up.
Good thing he’d been hired at a local ranch. The job had helped him support his single mother until he’d caught the rodeo bug. Found an outlet for the jittering energy that roamed through him like fire ants. Proved everyone wrong who’d sworn he wouldn’t amount to anything; that he’d turn out like his deadbeat dad and junkie mother.
Now that he faced the real possibility of a career-ending injury, his old neighbors might be proved right after all. Unless his last-ditch plan worked out... The one that’d brought him to Coltrane in the first place.
Claire waved away the hovering rescue personnel and turned on him once the cop drove off, the ambulance following.
“If you weren’t here, this wouldn’t have happened.”
“It wasn’t my fault, Claire.”
A wounded laugh escaped her. “It never is, is it? And you’re right, it’s not your fault. But somehow, whenever you’re around, bad stuff happens to me.”
Her slender back arched as she swung away.
“Let me see you home.”
At his offer, she turned in a quick circle, noticing, as he did, the taillights of the towing company disappearing around the road’s bend.
“I’ll walk.” Her uneven gait churned up road dust, her face wincing with each step on her wrapped right foot.
He reached her side then jogged ahead, stopping her. “Your ranch is miles away. Be reasonable.”
Her jaw jutted. “I’ll call home. My dad’s helper, Marie, might still be there. She could pick me up.” Her face froze. “My cell phone is in the truck.”
He handed over his phone and waited as she dialed and asked for Marie, then listened as she made reassuring noises before hanging up.
“She’s gone?”
“Yes.” Claire twisted her hair, her expression faraway.
“You didn’t tell your dad what happened.”
“I didn’t want to worry him.” She stared over his shoulders, a line forming between her brows. “I don’t have any other numbers memorized.”
“Claire, I’m not letting you stand out in the dark figuring out a ride when I can drive you myself.”
Her right eyebrow rose. “You stopped being able to ‘let me’ do anything ten years ago.”
He blew out a breath. Patience. He’d left when she’d given him the ultimatum: rodeo or her. Her ruffled feathers were justified. Still, he’d figured she’d have gotten over it by now. If he hadn’t given her father his word, he’d leave. Then again, where else could he go? With his invested winnings mismanaged and lost, and a forced retirement possible, he needed a place to figure out a new future. Fast.
“Claire. Please get in my truck.”
Her hands fisted on the slight flare of her hips. “And if I say no?”
“It won’t affect the outcome either way,” he said evenly, containing his rising temper.
Obstinate woman.
Her eyes roamed skyward and she spoke to the stars. “It’s taking you out of your way. Why bother?”
He cupped her jaw and looked her square in the eye. Truth time.
“I’m heading to your father’s ranch anyway.”
“WHAT? WHY?”
Claire stared at Tanner, her mind careening through the night’s twists and turns.
“I’ll tell you on the drive.” A broad hand gestured. “After you.”
She shook her head. Tanner’s take-charge attitude hadn’t changed a bit. Or the recklessness that’d propelled him through an intersection before noticing she was in it, illegally or not.
Same guy. Same story.
Some things never changed.
And now he might see Jonathan. What if he figured out her long-held secret? One he didn’t deserve to know. If he learned he was her son’s real father and asserted his rights, he’d destroy the stable life she’d reconstructed for her and Jonathan after Kevin’s death.
Tanner cared too much about rodeo—he wouldn’t stick around long enough to be a real father to her boy. And when he left, Jonathan’s shaky confidence would be damaged even further. She couldn’t let that happen.
She