Her Man On Three Rivers Ranch. Stella Bagwell

room furnished with a dark red couch and matching stuffed armchair. A glass coffee table was covered with books and DVDs, while a television spanned a far corner of the room. Beyond a picture window framed with cream-colored drapes, a view of the desert almost made him forget the house was situated on the edge of a residential area.

      “You can sit anywhere you want,” Nick instructed before he disappeared through an open doorway.

      After taking a seat in the armchair, Blake settled back and allowed his gaze to wander around the room. Almost immediately his attention was caught by several framed photos resting on a wall table off to his left. With only a span of a few feet between him and the photos, Blake could see the majority of the images were of Nick captured at different stages of his young life. There was also an enlarged snapshot of Paulette Anderson with another woman, most likely her sister. He also recognized one small photo of Katherine’s brother, Aaron. The fact that there were no images of her late father or husband stood out like a weed in a rose garden.

      Considering what Joseph had told him about Avery Anderson, Blake could understand why she might not want to be reminded of her father. But what about her husband? Was losing him still so painful she didn’t want to look at his image?

      The sound of footsteps had him glancing around to see Nick entering the room.

      “Mom says she’ll be ready in five minutes,” he announced. “But if I was you, I’d be ready to wait another ten. She’s just now doing something to her hair.”

      The boy walked over to the couch and plopped onto the end cushion. Blake noticed he was wearing a black T-shirt with his school’s name printed across the front, along with blue jeans and high-top basketball shoes made of black canvas. In a few short years, he was going to be a very good-looking teenager, Blake decided. No doubt Katherine would have her hands full trying to keep him on the right path. Unless she married in the near future and then Nick would have a stepfather to help guide him into manhood.

      Shoving away that uncomfortable thought, he asked, “What grade are you in, Nick? The fifth?”

      He nodded. “I’m ten. I’ll be eleven in three months, though.”

      “Hmm. I liked being eleven,” Blake commented. “It’s a fun age.”

      “I wouldn’t know about that. I’m not eleven yet.”

      Before he could stop it, Blake was laughing and the sound must have eased something in Nick, because he suddenly laughed along with him.

      “Are you really a cowboy? Mom says you run a big ranch that has lots of cows and horses.”

      “That’s right. It’s called Three Rivers Ranch.”

      His interest piqued, Nick squared around on the cushion so that he was directly facing Blake. “I guess you know how to ride a horse and all that kind of stuff. Can you rope a bull?”

      “I can. But it’s not something I do very often. It’s pretty dangerous. Especially when they have long horns.”

      Nick thought about that for a moment. “Yeah, guess it would be. Those long horns are pretty scary. When Gold Rush Days was going on, Mom took me to the rodeo. It was exciting. I liked the bucking horses best.”

      “Then you’d like my brother Holt. He rides bucking horses practically every day.”

      Nick was clearly impressed. “Really? Wow, he must be a tough guy.”

      “As tough as they come,” Blake agreed.

      “You have brothers and sisters?” he asked.

      “Three brothers and two sisters.”

      “Gosh, that must be great. I don’t have a brother. Or a sister. I wish I had some. But I don’t think I ever will.”

      Blake had expected Katherine’s boy to utter a few stilted words, then disappear into another part of the house. The fact that Nick seemed to want to talk, especially about such personal things, touched a soft spot in him.

      Doing his best to sound casual, Blake asked, “Why do you think that?”

      Exasperation twisted Nick’s young features. “Because Mom don’t like men much. She don’t even like to talk about my dad.”

      Blake wasn’t sure what Nick meant by that statement and he was hardly going to pump the boy about Katherine’s private life.

      “Well, she must like some men,” Blake reasoned. “She agreed to go on a date with me.”

      Nick scooted up on the edge of his seat and leaned closer to Blake. “Yeah. And that’s got me stumped. I’ve been thinking she’s gotten sick or something. When Mom walks in here, you take a real close look and see if anything looks funny to you.”

      Struggling to keep a straight face, Blake said, “Don’t worry. I’ll study her close.”

      Nick started to make some sort of reply when his mother suddenly appeared in the open doorway to the living room.

      As Blake slowly rose to his feet, he realized his promise to Nick was going to be mighty easy to keep. Dressed casually in a red-and-white-flowered sundress with skinny straps and her long hair pinned behind one ear, she looked like an exotic flower in the middle of a jungle.

      “Good evening, Blake. Sorry for keeping you waiting.”

      “No problem,” he assured her. “Nick and I have been using the time to get acquainted.”

      Her skeptical gaze traveled back and forth between him and her son. “Really? Nick isn’t much of a talker around strangers.”

      “We’re not strangers now, though, are we, Nick?” Blake looked over at the boy and winked.

      Grinning, Nick immediately jumped to his feet. “Gosh, no!” He turned his attention to his mother. “Blake’s been telling me about his ranch. And he has lots of brothers and sisters. Did you know that, Mom? And one of his brothers rides bucking broncos! Isn’t that something?”

      Katherine’s brows inched upward as she darted a look of surprise toward Blake. “It’s something, all right,” she told him, then gestured over her shoulder. “Go get your backpack. And be sure you have your toothbrush and pajamas.”

      After Nick disappeared from the room, Blake said, “I hope you’re not making Nick stay overnight at the sitter’s on my account. We can be back early if you need to pick him up before bedtime.”

      Katherine shook her head. “Don’t worry. It’s no problem. Nick is staying with his best friend, Shawn. His dad, Lash, loves for Nick to stay overnight. And Shawn stays with us quite often. Lash is a single parent like me, so it helps both of us to switch off with the babysitting duties. The Ralstons live just down the street, so it’s not out of the way.”

      A single dad with a son the age of Nick? Blake wondered if he should be jealous of Katherine’s neighbor, then promptly scolded himself for being such an idiot. Just because she’d agreed to have one date with him, didn’t mean he had exclusive tabs on the woman. She had the right to go out with whomever she pleased.

      Shoving away that disturbing thought, Blake said, “It’s good you have someone so trustworthy to watch Nick. And by the way, your son is quite a boy. You must be incredibly proud of him.”

      A faint smile touched her face. “He’s everything to me. Without him...well, these past years would’ve been even harder to get through.”

      Blake expected her to make a comment about Nick taking after his father in certain ways, or how she hoped he’d grow up to be like the man she’d married, but she didn’t. And suddenly Blake was wondering if Nick had been right about his mother not wanting to talk about her late husband.

      Before Blake could think of a suitable reply to her remark, Nick bounced into the room with a backpack hooked around both shoulders.

      “I got everything, Mom. And don’t worry. Lash will make sure we brush