Coulda Been a Cowboy. Brenda Novak

time she reached high school—already a legend, and the best and brightest Dundee had to offer. Until the car accident that had robbed him of his ability to walk.

      She remembered the details of that earlier visit as she carried Braden outside and walked around the property with him. Gabe had left her standing on the porch holding her cake, even though she knew he was home. She could feel him watching her from inside.

      His lack of response didn’t offend her, though. She hadn’t expected a warm greeting. Adamant that the doctors were wrong about the permanency of his condition, he spent every minute of every day doing therapy in his upscale weight room, and was scarcely willing to talk to his own family. So she’d set the cake on the patio table for him to enjoy when he felt safe enough to retrieve it, and hoped he understood the gesture for what it was—not the hero worship he’d encountered so often in the past, not the pity that others expressed in hushed tones whenever his name came up, not the gawking of those who remained fascinated by the tragedy, but rather, a simple, “I understand.”

      Their situations were very different—she had no idea how horrible it’d be to lose the use of her legs—but she could relate, at least to a certain extent, to what he’d been feeling in the months immediately following the accident. She’d had to put a brave face on her own misery. She was just less visible, which made it easier, and she’d been doing it longer. Experience had already taught her how to smile serenely to cover her pain: I’m fine. Really. We’re doing okay, don’t worry.

      “Da-da-da-da,” Braden cooed, shoving his fist in his mouth and gnawing on it.

      Dakota pressed her lips to the baby’s soft round cheek. “You are the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” she told him. His father wasn’t bad, either, but she admitted that only grudgingly. The rest of the world made a big enough deal about Tyson Garnier. Nearly six feet four inches tall, he had greenish-blue eyes, golden skin and dark brown hair with a cowlick that made it stand up on the right side of his forehead. But it was his high cheekbones and strong jaw that really set him apart. And his body, of course.

      She remembered the layout she’d seen in People magazine a year or so ago. Some movie director had been offering Tyson the lead in a romantic comedy, which had brought him into the Hollywood spotlight. He’d eventually refused—saying he was a football player, not an actor—but that only made this director, and others, want him more. The photographer had shot him on the beach, coming out of the surf like some sort of water god. His eyes, in stark contrast to the darkness of his hair and eyelashes, matched the green-blue of the waves in the background, and his teeth gleamed in the sun as he laughed. He looked like leading-man material, all right, and contrary to what Dakota had expected, seeing him in the flesh was no disappointment.

      But she suspected he wasn’t a very nice person. He seemed rather standoffish. And she’d read all about his situation with Rachelle Rochester. Because she couldn’t leave her father for any length of time, Dakota escaped the drudgery of her life through magazines—fan magazines, decorator magazines, food magazines, even science magazines. Most recently, she’d read an interview with poor Ms. Rochester in The Lowdown. Braden’s mother was upset that Tyson didn’t love her as much as she loved him. She also said she couldn’t believe how vicious he’d become during the custody battle: “How can I stand up against a man with the kind of money and influence he’s got?” At that point, according to the journalist doing the interview, she’d broken down in tears. “He won’t let me be part of my baby’s life. Can you imagine anything so cruel?”

      Dakota couldn’t. She knew Gabe liked Tyson, and she trusted Gabe’s opinion, but friendship could be as blind as love.

      Kissing Braden again, she shot a dirty look at the window to the office where she’d left Tyson a few minutes earlier. As far as she was concerned, taking a child away from a loving mother was unforgivable.

      “OKAY, OKAY—YOU WERE RIGHT,” Tyson told Gabe on the phone.

      Relaxed for the first time in three weeks, he leaned back in the leather office chair and stretched his legs in front of him. He’d considered going to bed—his eyes felt so grainy he could barely open them, and his knee was aching again—but he was afraid he’d encounter Dakota and Braden on the way. Then she might want to talk about what he expected of her, and how could he tell her when he didn’t know what a baby’s care entailed in the first place? Maybe, like the rest of the world, she understood that he was new to parenting Braden full-time. But Braden was nine months old. At a minimum, she’d expect him to be prepared for his son’s most basic needs.

      He just wanted her to keep Braden healthy and happy. That was all there was to it.

      He supposed he could say that much, but if she asked specific questions—what to feed the baby, how his meals should be prepared, what his naptimes were, whether or not she had his permission to administer medication if needed—he wouldn’t know what to tell her. They’d have to figure that out, as well as her hours and her duties, as they went along. He was enjoying this brief respite too much to risk losing it.

      “I knew she’d be ideal,” Gabe said. “Dakota’s great. And unusually smart. There’s no telling what she could’ve done with a college degree.”

      “She doesn’t have one?” Tyson doodled on the clean, white desk calendar, which was turned to February instead of May. According to Gabe, he’d been too busy to visit the cabin over the past few months, but Tyson knew his friend hadn’t worked since finishing coaching high school football last season. He’d been traveling all over the world, hoping to find a specialist who could help him regain the use of his legs—something no one had been able to accomplish yet.

      “Family problems.”

      Tyson drew a football in a man’s hand. He could understand family problems. Since his grandfather died, his mother hadn’t been the same. Neither was he. “She mentioned that her father is unable to work.”

      “He was in an accident something like fifteen years ago. She’s been taking care of him ever since.”

      “What kind of accident?”

      “Hang on a sec.”

      As Gabe took care of whatever it was that had called him away from the phone, Tyson added a Super Bowl ring to one of the fingers he’d drawn, and an arm tattooed with the words The Duke. Grandpa Garnier had loved the old John Wayne movies. Tyson was thinking of getting such a tattoo on his bicep in memory of his grandfather. Problem was, his grandfather had never really liked tattoos. “Why’d you do that?” he’d said when he spotted Tyson’s only tattoo—his jersey number etched on the inside of his forearm. “Think y’might forget?”

      The entire team had done it before a big game, but Tyson didn’t bother to explain. Grandpa Garnier didn’t understand following the crowd. He also didn’t understand why Tyson wanted to play football—something that would afford him such a short career—instead of becoming a cowboy like him.

      Some days, Tyson thought he would’ve been better off taking over at the ranch.

      “Sorry,” Gabe said, coming back on the line. “Hannah needed the car keys.”

      “You were telling me about Dakota’s father,” Tyson reminded him, still curious about his new nanny.

      There was a brief pause. “Actually, I think I’ll leave it up to her to tell you more about Skelton.”

      Tyson didn’t have high hopes about that. Dakota didn’t seem very forthcoming on the subject. “Did she crash into him with her car or something?”

      “No.” Gabe chuckled softly. “That’s my story, remember?”

      How could Tyson forget? Gabe had married the woman who’d crippled him, which was almost as shocking as what had happened to him in the first place. “Do you ever find it hard to forgive Hannah?” he asked. He knew he shouldn’t pry, but he’d been curious about it ever since Gabe and Hannah had gotten together. A lot of people were.

      “No,” Gabe responded immediately. “The accident wasn’t