A Willing Wife. Jackie Merritt

be best to get him used to being so far off the ground by having him first ride with me.”

      Maggie almost shouted, “No!” but a sudden burst of very disturbing knowledge stopped her. She could be as protective of Travis as she wanted, but the damage—as far as Dallas went—had already been done, and could very well be irreversible. Was there any point now in stopping Travis from learning to ride a horse, just because Dallas would be his instructor?

      A great weakness overtook Maggie. She loved riding herself, and it was only natural for a boy with Travis’s lively curiosity and imagination to be drawn to horses. She’d brought this on herself by bringing Travis to the ranch, even though she couldn’t possibly have predicted a relationship between her five-year-old son and one of the Fortune men.

      “Well?” Dallas said quietly, awaiting her verdict.

      Maggie didn’t want to say yes. She didn’t want Dallas to further encourage her son’s affection when she knew in her soul that Dallas was using Travis as an excuse to see her. Obviously Dallas hoped to wear down her objections to having an affair with him—she could see it in his eyes—and it wasn’t going to happen.

      “I want you to understand something,” she said bluntly. “Your phoney friendship with my son is not going to undermine—”

      “Phoney!” Dallas exclaimed heatedly, interrupting her. “Maggie, there is nothing phoney about my feelings for Travis!” Dallas looked off for a moment, then brought harder eyes back to her. “You’ve got me all wrong, Maggie. I caused it myself and I wish to hell it were possible to take back everything I said to you the first time I came here. Isn’t there some way we could start over?”

      “Nothing leaps to mind,” Maggie drawled. “I really wish—” The hurt look in Dallas’s eyes didn’t halt her little speech, but the sight of Travis peeking around the corner of the house did. Had he been eavesdropping all along? she wondered uneasily. He should be scolded for listening to a grown-up conversation, but she’d laid down so many new rules since they’d come to the ranch that his little head was probably spinning from them. Eavesdropping was something that had never come up for discussion in Phoenix—there’d been no reason—but there was no question that their acute change in life-style at the ranch had demanded a great many new rules.

      Regardless, Maggie suddenly felt sorry for her adorable little son. And guilty for denying him the pleasure of a ride on a horse, even if it was with Dallas. After all, she and Travis weren’t going to be here much longer, and once they left Travis would forget all about Dallas.

      “All right,” she said in a much calmer voice. “You may take Travis for a ride.”

      Dallas wondered what had changed her mind, but he wasn’t about to open that can of worms. “Thanks,” he said evenly. “And don’t worry about him. I’ll watch him like a hawk.”

      “Please do.”

      Dallas started to leave the porch, then stopped on the stairs to turn and look at her. “By the way, Rosita invited me to supper tonight. She said Cruz and Savannah would be here, and that you were making ribs. I’m looking forward to it.”

      How could her mother do that to her? But even while the nerve-racking question formed in her mind, so did the answer. Rosita would like nothing better than to see her daughter married again, and it would never occur to Rosita that a Perez wasn’t good enough for a Fortune. If she knew what was really brewing in Dallas’s mind, she wouldn’t be so quick to play matchmaker, thought Maggie.

      Silently, Maggie watched Dallas lift Travis up to the saddle on his horse’s back. Below his big hat, Travis’s little face was flushed and excited. Dallas mounted and nudged the horse into a walk.

      “’Bye, Mama!” Travis yelled.

      “Goodbye, sweetheart. You hang on tight!”

      “I will, Mama.”

      Feeling totally defeated, Maggie went inside. Dallas’s plans to eat with them tonight changed everything. Dinner was not going to be an enjoyable family affair.