The Rancher Next Door. Susan Mallery

up in a definite smile. “You don’t have to justify anything to me.”

      “I know that. I’m simply pointing out that I’m paying my own way through life. No one’s taking care of me.”

      “I never said differently.”

      “Yes, but you implied they were. That I was living at my father’s ranch because it was easier than taking responsibility for myself and for Shane. I know how it looks from the outside, but you’re wrong.”

      He leaned against his truck. “All that from asking why you’d moved home?”

      She opened her mouth, then closed it. She replayed his question and her overreaction of an answer. “Oh.” She dropped her bag to the ground and planted her hands on her hips. “Okay, so I got a little defensive. What of it?”

      He looked her up and down. “You’re still a gallon of trouble in a pint-size container, Katie Fitzgerald. Ready to take on the world as fearlessly as ever.” He shrugged. “You don’t have to go explaining it all to me. I remember what it was like for you back when we were kids.”

      She knew he did. Everyone in town had known that Katie was a sickly child, not allowed to play outside as much as other children. As she’d grown, she’d gotten stronger but her parents had resisted letting her be a normal kid. Every inch of freedom had been hard-won. She wondered if he also remembered their long conversations after they’d become friends, when they’d talked about what they wanted for their futures. He was going to ride the rodeo circuit, and she was going to be a doctor. She’d wanted to be in a position of authority so she could tell parents of sick kids that sometimes it was okay for those children to play outside.

      “I’m sorry,” she said. “Being back in town makes it hard to act like an adult. I keep feeling like I’m sixteen again.”

      His gaze sharpened. “I guess you could pass for sixteen in a pinch, if it’s important to you.”

      She laughed. “It’s not. I’ve enjoyed being a grown-up.”

      “What do you like most about it?”

      “Being a mom. Shane is the best part of my life.”

      Jack’s posture didn’t change, but Katie could have sworn he’d just taken a step back. “He’s a fine boy. You have a lot to be proud of.”

      “Thanks. You couldn’t possibly know that after your short meeting with him, but it happens to be true. He’s a great kid. Smart, funny, caring. You’d like him.”

      “I’m sure I would.”

      Jack spoke politely, but she could tell he didn’t mean it. And why would he? Shane was living proof of her lies. Even as she told herself it was long over, she could feel her body reacting to Jack’s presence. Heating, readying. As a girl she’d wanted with an innocence that left her wondering what she’d needed. Now, as a woman, she knew. But Jack didn’t seem to be having the same trouble. It was as if she’d never mattered to him.

      She wanted to ask what had gone wrong between them, when had it all changed. But she knew the answer. She’d promised to love him forever. Within a year of that promise, she’d been married, pregnant and divorced. Jack wasn’t the kind of man who forgave that kind of betrayal.

      “I’m sorry,” she said before she could stop herself.

      “About what?”

      She shrugged. “All of it. Leaving. Coming home.” She looked at the stranger who had been her first love. “Are you happy, Jack? With your life, I mean.”

      “I’m content.”

      “They’re not the same thing.”

      “Close enough.”

      He straightened and headed for the house. When he reached the porch, he turned, tipped his hat to her and was gone.

      

      “We’ll be moving the cattle to the north pasture,” Aaron Fitzgerald said at dinner that night as he spooned a mound of mashed potatoes onto his plate. “Take advantage of the good weather.”

      Katie smiled at her silent son sitting across from her at the table. “The north pasture has a ring of trees around it. They draw the lightning away from the cattle.”

      Shane didn’t look the least bit impressed by the information. He kept his gaze firmly fixed on his plate. Katie supposed that cows and horses couldn’t compete with the wonder of video games and the Internet in a ten-year-old’s mind. Nevertheless, she tried again.

      “Did you know that all the white cattle are put in a different pasture?” she asked. “For some reason, the white ones attract more lightning than other colors.”

      Shane looked up, his expression haunted. “So they’re sacrificed?”

      “They’re cattle, son,” Aaron bellowed. “They’re heading for slaughter anyway. Of course we prefer to do that on our time rather than Mother Nature’s, but some things can’t be avoided.”

      Her son’s pale face blanched and he carefully pushed the slice of meat loaf to the far side of his plate.

      Suzanne, her stepmother, gave him a sympathetic look.

      Aaron continued to discuss the movement of cattle. Had her father’s voice always been this loud, Katie wondered as Shane winced at a particularly explosive description. She looked around the large oak table that could, at a pinch, hold sixteen. Tonight there were only the four of them. Blair and Brent, her two younger half siblings and the only ones still living at the ranch, were staying with friends for the evening. Normally their presence was a buffer between Aaron and Shane, but this evening there wasn’t anyone else to capture Aaron’s attention.

      Katie’s father was a big man—tall, barrel-chested, with the bowlegged walk of a man who has spent his life in the saddle. His blond hair had only recently started going gray at the temples, and his expression contained a permanent squint from days in the sun. He was loud, abrasive and about the most stubborn man ever born. Katie loved him fiercely, but watching him deal with her son nearly broke her heart. Shane hadn’t been born on the ranch. He was more interested in computers than cattle. That made him different, and Aaron didn’t take kindly to anything out of the ordinary.

      “’Bout time you learned to ride,” Aaron announced, his gaze drilling Shane. “You’re nearly ten. That’s practically too old to even start, so you’ll have to work hard to catch up.”

      “Doesn’t that sound fun?” Katie asked cheerfully. “You’ll enjoy being able to ride around the ranch.”

      “Don’t want to,” Shane muttered under his breath. He never looked up from his plate. He wasn’t eating. Katie’s heart went out to her son. She’d had no idea that living with her father was going to make Shane so miserable.

      Suzanne leaned toward the boy. “Horses are kind of big,” she murmured conspiratorially. “I was scared of them for a long time, but once I learned to ride, I found I really liked it.”

      “Quit coddling the boy,” Aaron instructed from across the table. He slapped his hand on the wood, making them all jump. “We’ll get you started this weekend.”

      Katie shook her head. “Dad, let him ride in his own time. If you force him, he’ll just hate it.”

      Her father glared at her. “You tellin’ me how to raise the boy? Between us, me and Suzanne have eight children. You have one.”

      Katie looked at her father and wondered when the man had changed. Her mother had died eighteen years before, the victim of a wild spring storm and the subsequent flash flood. Aaron had remarried within a year, taking gentle Suzanne, a divorced woman with two daughters, as his wife. Together they’d had two more children.

      Had the trouble with her father started with his first wife’s death? Katie didn’t think so. Aaron’s anger, his unyielding temperament, had existed