She was, she realized, afraid of being grabbed. It wasn’t so much the crowding as the smell of champagne that was affecting her. The scent of alcohol had preceded some of the worst experiences of her life. As soon as she felt she decently could, she grabbed her jacket and slipped out the side door.
She was hurrying, not wanting to be stopped by anyone, and had her head bowed as usual. She didn’t see Hugh Gallagher until she plowed right into him.
He reached out swiftly to keep her from falling to the cold, hard ground. She felt his arms close around her and heard him say laughingly, “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”
In an instant, panic flared in her. She flailed against his restraining arms, and as soon as he released her, she backed up quickly, nearly falling again in her haste to escape him.
Some portion of her mind was screaming, “No! No!” even while another part was recognizing that he wasn’t coming after her. That in fact he had stepped back, as if recognizing her terror and wanting to soothe it.
She stood there staring at him with huge eyes, breathing in helpless gulps, and sanity hit her as suddenly as panic had, filling her with miserable humiliation.
The man called Cowboy stared at her, his mouth opening as if he wanted to ask but thought better of it. Finally he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his nylon jacket and took another backward step. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said.
“It’s not you,” she managed to say shakily but honestly. “Not you…” Her voice trailed away, a forlorn sound like the whisper of the wind on a frigid night. “I was just startled,” she added, afraid that he might ask her what had scared her so.
After a moment, he nodded. “You’re running away, too?”
Her heart slammed. How had he known? “Running away?”
“From the party. Stupid as it is, that basement gives me claustrophobia, and with all those people in there, I’d probably lose it.” He shrugged as if it were an unimportant thing, but Anna felt something inside her respond to his honesty.
“I know what you mean,” she managed to say, and wondered why she suddenly felt as if some little patch of ice inside her had thawed.
“You, too, huh?” He waited, but when she failed to respond he continued. “Are you leaving?”
“I thought I’d just go home. No one will miss me.” The words admitted more than she wanted to, but it was too late to take them back.
He nodded as if he understood. “No one will miss me, either. I’ll walk you to your car.”
Another flare of panic. “I didn’t bring a car.”
“Then I’ll walk you home.” He hesitated.
“You’re safe with me, but with most of the sheriff’s deputies at this shindig, I’m not sure you’d be safe on the streets.”
She hadn’t thought of that, and the night suddenly looked so big and empty. Frightening. Bad things happened at night. Weighing her options, she finally said, “Thank you.”
They headed east down Front Street, past some of the town’s most elegant homes. Anna’s little house, rented from the church, was farther out, in a less prosperous neighborhood–although it was far better than some of the neighborhoods she had lived in.
“Do you always walk to the church?” Hugh asked her.
“When it’s warm enough. It saves wear and tear on the car.” She kept her head down, studying the sidewalk ahead of them. Some dried leaves stirred on a breath of breeze and for a moment danced ahead of them.
“I hear you,” he said. “I walked myself.”
“Oh. Where do you live?” She wished she hadn’t asked. She didn’t want to sound interested. But surely he would take it as a polite question.
“The other way, over toward Snider’s Crossing.”
Near the railroad tracks, she thought. One of the least pleasant neighborhoods in Conard City. But Sheriff Tate and Reverend Fromberg both liked this man, she reminded herself. They wouldn’t feel that way if he was a bad person.
“Not a very good neighborhood,” he said as if reading her mind. “But it’s cheap. I’m saving every dime I can make to put into the ranch.”
“The ranch?” She felt him glance down at her, but she didn’t look up. It had been a very long time since she had felt comfortable meeting a man’s gaze.
“I bought a piece of land out by Conard Creek, up near the Morrison spread. It’s not much for raising cattle for profit, but it’s good for what I want.”
“And what’s that?”
“Well, I really haven’t discussed it all that much with anybody except Nate and Dan.” Nate and Dan being the sheriff and the minister respectively. “But I’m hoping to open a ranch for troubled kids. A place where they can get out of their lousy homes and neighborhoods and start getting it together.”
“That would be really nice.” She meant it sincerely. It was not at all what she would have expected from this rough-looking man with his uncertain background. “Did you grow up in a bad neighborhood?”
“Oh, yeah.” He gave a little laugh. “I just moved from one war zone to another when I joined the army.”
“I never thought of joining the army.” Once again she had spoken without thinking, and wished she could snatch the words back. They revealed far too much.
“You, too, huh?” He let it go. “Well, with all the work you do with kids, you probably see how much trouble at home affects them.”
“I certainly do.”
“So…well, I kinda figure that if I can give them a place away from those problems and influences, most of ’em would straighten themselves out.”
“A lot of them just need an opportunity.”
“Exactly.”
“Would you take only children from around here?”
“Maybe at first. At first I wouldn’t expect to be able to take too many. I mean, there’d just be me, basically, and maybe a couple of other people. Gotta start slow.”
Anna nodded, her gaze still firmly fixed on the sidewalk. “I know of a few who could sure use a place like that.”
A car beeped cheerfully as it drove by, and they both looked, waving when they recognized Emma and Gage Dalton.
“They’re leaving early, too,” Hugh remarked.
“Gage’s back is giving him fits lately,” Anna explained. “He says it’s the change in the weather.”
“Most likely. And boy, did it change fast. Here we were having this incredible Indian summer, and now it almost feels like winter is coming.”
“It is.”
He laughed quietly. “That it is, Miss Anna. That it is.”
She flushed a little, realizing she had stated the obvious in response to his jesting remark. The tendency came from dealing with children so much of the time. In addition to her work with the church youth groups, she tended the church nursery during services. After a while with children, you got to taking everything literally. “I’m sorry. I get so used to talking with children.”
“Don’t sweat it. You’re just so all-fired serious, it’s hard not to pull your leg.”
She didn’t know how to respond to that. She didn’t think of herself as being serious, but she supposed she was. There wasn’t a whole lot in life worth laughing at or getting overjoyed about. Life was a serious business.
“Anyway, the sheriff thinks the ranch is a