Like making Meggie crazy, for one thing. Maybe just to taunt her into sticking around for the sake of that little girl who was in desperate need of someone to love. Though Tess hadn’t exactly warmed to him, he had to admit he had a soft spot for her.
The child had come from a background not all that different from his own. Whether she knew it yet or not, Tess had lucked out when her mother had dumped her on Tex’s doorstep. For all of his gruff demeanor, Tex was a man a person could count on. Losing him so unexpectedly and so soon had been a bad break. Getting Meggie for a mother, well, it remained to be seen how that would turn out.
While Megan went upstairs to clean up for dinner—and probably to gather her very rattled composure—Jake wandered into the kitchen, where he’d felt at home the very first time he’d walked through the door years and years ago. Mrs. Gomez had always fit his image of the perfect mother, such a far cry from his own that he thought she’d been conjured up straight out of a fairy tale. She was blustery and affectionate by turns, and she always had some treat in the oven.
“Sit, sit,” Mrs. Gomez encouraged now, waving him toward the table.
The aroma of sugar and chocolate competed with that of the chicken stewing on the stove. Unable to resist, Jake snatched a still-warm cookie from the baking sheet, then sat as she’d asked.
“How come he gets to have a cookie before supper and I don’t?” Tess demanded.
“Because he’s a grown-up and I can’t boss him around,” the housekeeper said.
“You can’t boss me around, either,” Tess said. “I’m not your kid.”
“No, niña, but you are my responsibility, and I will see that you do right, because that is what your father would have wanted.”
“Some father,” Tess muttered. “He didn’t even know I existed till I showed up here. I guess he and my mom weren’t real close.”
Jake caught Mrs. Gomez’s helpless look and stepped in. “He was here for you when it counted, wasn’t he? He took you in, made a home for you. The last few months haven’t been so bad, have they?”
Her bright green eyes shimmered with tears, reminding him of another little girl, another time. Tess’s lower lip trembled, but that O’Rourke chin jutted defiantly.
“Fat lot of good that does me now,” she declared. “He’s dead and I ain’t staying here with her.” She nodded toward the door to indicate the absent Megan, no doubt.
“I will be here, too,” Mrs. Gomez promised. “We will all get along just fine.”
“And I’ll be around,” Jake added.
“Over my dead body,” Megan retorted, striding into the room and heading straight for Mrs. Gomez, who opened her arms wide to embrace her.
“Ah, niña, it is good to have you home, but not so good that it is under these circumstances,” the housekeeper said. She tucked a finger under Megan’s chin and looked her in the eye. “You are holding up okay? Shall I fix you some tea? I have all of your favorites—raspberry, orange spice, whatever you like.”
Jake detected a hint of puffiness under Megan’s eyes and guessed she’d indulged in a good cry upstairs, where it could be done without witnesses. That had always been her way, ingrained in her by Tex, no doubt. Tex had been critical of emotional displays. Jake had seen Meggie swallow back tears no matter how much pain she might have been in, physical or emotional.
“I’m fine,” Megan insisted. Like Jake, she reached for a cookie and bit into it, oblivious to Tess’s expression of disgust.
“Geez-oh-flip, does everybody get to break rules around this place but me?” Tess demanded, scraping her chair away from the table. She shoved open the back door and disappeared into the gathering darkness.
“She does not have her coat,” Mrs. Gomez said worriedly, moving toward the hook by the door where the red, down-filled jacket hung. “It is too cold for her to be outside.”
“I’ll go,” Jake said, his hand on her shoulder. “You stay here with Megan.”
Glad of an excuse to escape the restlessness that seeing Meggie stirred in him, he grabbed Tess’s coat from the hook and flipped on an outdoor light as he went out. He spotted the child racing toward the barn, ducking into shadows. He suspected the new litter of kittens he’d heard about was at least part of the reason for her destination.
Sure enough, he found her kneeling beside a box that had been lined with an old flannel shirt, one of Tex’s favorites, if Jake wasn’t mistaken. He wondered if it had been confiscated for this particular duty before or after his death. Jake grinned at the sight of orange-and-white balls of fluff tumbling around inside the box, scrambling to get to their mama’s milk.
“They’re getting big,” he observed, hunkering down beside Tess. “Do you have a favorite?”
“Not really,” she said, but her gaze was fixed on the runt of the litter, who couldn’t seem to squeeze in to feed.
Jake reached down, picked the littlest kitten up and made room for it. “Looks like this one needs some extra attention,” he said, thinking it was a lot like Tess herself. Megan, too, though she would have hated the comparison.
“I suppose.”
“Maybe you should consider adopting it and taking it inside. It’s big enough now, especially if you bottle-fed it for a couple of weeks.”
“I can’t,” she said, though her expression was wistful.
“How come?”
“Tex said.”
“Did he say why?”
“He said he wasn’t having some damned cat bringing in fleas and tearing up the furniture.”
Jake held back a grin. He had a hunch she’d nailed the old man’s exact words. “You know what I think?”
“What?”
“That if Tex could see how lonely you’ve been feeling the last day or so, he’d change his mind.”
Her face brightened. “Do you think so?”
“I know so,” Jake insisted, because there wasn’t a chance in hell the old man could contradict him. Tess needed something weaker and needier to tend to right now. He doubted Mrs. Gomez would have any objections. He knew for a fact there were cats crawling all over her own house. She took in every stray that ever came to the door, him included. On more than one occasion, she’d been the one he’d run to when he couldn’t bear one more night in the same house with his mother and her “gentlemen callers.”
He glanced up from the kittens and caught Tess studying him intently.
“Can I ask you something?” she asked.
“Of course.”
“Is she going to keep me?”
“You mean Megan?”
Tess nodded, her expression bleak. “I don’t think she likes me much.”
“You just took her by surprise, that’s all. No one had told her about you.”
“Well, having her come busting in here like she owns the place ain’t no picnic for me, either.”
“She does own the place,” Jake pointed out gently.
“Then how come she doesn’t live here?”
“Because she’s got a job in New York.”
“That TV show,” Tess said, feigning disinterest despite the spark of fascination that lit her eyes. “Tex used to watch it sometimes. He didn’t think I knew that, but I did. Sometimes I’d hide out in his office behind that big old