Saving Cinderella. Lilian Darcy

the fence, he reined the horse in and Jill registered the unfamiliar sounds of creaking saddle and clinking bit and stirrups. She saw the way Gray’s thighs, clad in old blue denim, moved easily against the leather beneath him. It was as if he and the horse were one.

      The large chestnut brown animal whickered impatiently and shifted its hooves. Maybe it knew this wasn’t the place it and its rider were supposed to end up. It smelled pungently of oats and farmyard.

      “Hello, Jill,” Gray said in his gruff voice.

      “Hello.” She squeezed out a nervous smile as she looked up at him.

      “Uh, it’s good to see you again.” He took off his hat slowly, and set it on the high-pommelled Western saddle in front of him. The wind caught at once at his black hair, combing it back off his high, smooth forehead. “How’ve you been?”

      “Well, fine, I guess,” she said, as awkward as he was. “Not bad.”

      “That’s good. I’m glad to hear it.”

      “I rented a car in Trilby after we got off the train, but it broke down. I should have gone with one of the national companies. Mr. Thurrell offered to drive me from his garage, which was nice of him. He says he knew your father through some business dealings.”

      She gestured back at the classic Caddy, knowing she was babbling. Alan was right to have insisted that she come out here and deal with the whole thing in person. She had ghosts to lay to rest—the ghosts of foolish dreams and fantasies, six months old, which Alan had understood better than she had. Alan Jennings was a sensible man, with a cool head on his shoulders.

      That was why she planned to say yes, eventually, to his proposal of marriage. As soon as she’d dealt with just one small detail.

      “Sorry you’ve had trouble,” Gray said.

      He must know why she was here. There was only one possible transaction that could take place between them. But it was time to put it into words. She took a deep breath.

      “Gray, I’m sorry to bother you like this, when your letter said you were so busy, and all,” she said apologetically, “but I really need that divorce.”

      “Mommy…” came Sam’s plaintive little voice from the car at that moment.

      Both adults turned their heads.

      “That your little boy in there?” Gray asked. “Sam, isn’t it?”

      “Yes, that’s Sam,” Jill answered.

      Gray gave a short nod, then added with a note of reluctance, “He sounds tired.”

      “Oh, exhausted!”

      “It’s a long trip for a kid.”

      “We’re going to take a few days of vacation time on the way home.” Alan was hoping to fly out and join them in Chicago for two nights, if he felt that his fledgling sales business could spare him.

      “Okay.” Gray nodded again.

      Sensing his reluctance and interpreting it in the most obvious way, she said quickly, “I’m sorry just to show up like this.”

      “It’s no problem, Jill. Really. It’s my fault, far more than yours.”

      “You see,” she went on, waving his objection aside, “I couldn’t seem to track you down any other way. The phone number you gave me was disconnected. And anyway, I kind of thought I should come in person.”

      “We’ve rented out the main house now, and it took us a while to get the phone on down at the old place,” he explained.

      She sensed that there was more of a story to it than that, but kept her focus on the issue that concerned them both. “We need to discuss which state we’re going to file in, for a start,” she told him.

      “Sure.”

      “I’ve researched the options— I spoke to a lawyer back in Philly—and I’m happy to do all the paperwork. If I head back into Blue Rock now with Mr. Thurrell and check in to a motel, is there any way you could come into town later today so we can talk? It shouldn’t take long.”

      “Mommy…”

      “I’m coming right now, sweetie.” She turned back to the car, without waiting for a reply from the man who was—for the moment—her husband.

      Behind her, Gray dismounted. Then he looped the horse’s reins around the top strand of wire, pressed the second strand down with one hand, scissored his leg back and climbed through. He’d been climbing through fences on this piece of land all his life, and it only took him a few seconds. Then he stopped and watched.

      Jill had opened the rear door of the car and was leaning inside. This gave Gray a view of her neatly rounded behind that he didn’t want to think too much about right now. He heard her speaking to her son in soothing, tender tones, and remembered how much he’d liked her voice in Las Vegas back in March.

      There were a whole lot of things he’d liked about Jill Brown, when he stopped to think about it. One of the things he most definitely hadn’t liked, however, was sitting right there in the Cadillac’s rear seat. No ifs or buts, for a whole lot of reasons, he wasn’t interested in a woman with a kid.

      Even if he was married to her.

      The way he was reacting to that appealing view of her behind, it would be a good thing if he kept this fact firmly in mind, he decided.

      “I’m going to get you snuggled into bed as soon as I can, okay?” she said to her son. “We’ll find you some kids’ TV to watch, and some good food for you to eat.”

      “My head hurts.”

      “I know, sweetie. I have some Tylenol in our suitcase.”

      “Is he sick, or something?” Gray said, hearing the reluctance that thickened his voice.

      Jill would probably think he was a callous son of a gun. He liked kids. He just didn’t want one as part of a package deal, that was all. He hadn’t known Jill had a son when he’d married her. Hell, he’d only found out her real name when they spoke their vows! The Las Vegas emcee had just kept calling her Cinderella.

      Lord, thinking back, it had been a crazy setup, a crazy night, and the sooner they arranged their divorce, the better! She was right to have come out here, and he shouldn’t have blown off her letter a few weeks ago, the way he had.

      “H’llo, Gray.” Ron Thurrell twisted in the car’s front seat to acknowledge him with the muttered greeting, before returning to thumb through a mail-order catalog.

      It seemed to be a signal to Gray and Jill that he was minding his own business, but Gray didn’t trust it. He didn’t like Ron, and the feeling was mutual. Ron was the man who had found Gray’s father at the wheel of his car in Blue Rock’s main street last December, in the grip of a severe stroke, and he’d been the one to call the ambulance for help. This had done nothing to strengthen their connection, however.

      In fact, Gray was surprised that Ron had offered Jill a ride out here. Out of character, wasn’t it? As for the “business dealings” with Dad, which Jill had hazily mentioned, as far as Gray knew they’d only ever consisted of Thurrell filling the gas tanks of various McCall vehicles.

      Jill had turned at Gray’s question, and he saw how tired and stressed she looked. Her dark, pretty hair was untidy, with little strands fluffing around her face. The jewel green of her eyes was intensified by the reddened rims. Her silky skin looked papery with fatigue, and she wore no makeup. Not that she needed it. She was just as pretty without it. But that generous bow of a mouth was too pale. A slash of color might have made her look happier.

      She was ill at ease, too, which made sense if her son was sick and the only place she had to nurse him was Blue Rock’s one motel. Gray had had to go sober up a seriously misbehaving ranch hand at that establishment once or twice, and he knew it was no place for a sick kid.