The Nine-Month Marriage Read online

  She watched the deep sadness that clouded his eyes, a sadness that matched her own. “Ty,” he said with quiet regret.

  She nodded. Abby’s father, Ty Heller, had been top hand at the Bravo family’s ranch for almost thirty years. Two months ago, he had rolled his ancient pickup down a ravine and broken his neck. Abby still had trouble believing that he was really gone.

  Cash took a step toward her. “Abby…”

  “Don’t.” She threw out a hand to ward him off.

  He stopped, though his eyes pleaded with her. It had been the night of Ty’s funeral when Cash had come to her, to offer comfort. To be comforted himself….

  “Try to understand.” Her voice was hardly more than a whisper. “I need some time here in Denver. On my own.”

  “Abby…”

  “Let me go, Cash.”

  She saw the change in him as he accepted her will. He had a young man’s face as a rule; a boyish look about him that women loved. But right then, he looked older than his thirty-six years.

  “All right,” he said flatly. “Breakfast. We’ll talk a little more. Then, if you still want me to, I’ll go.”

  At a coffee shop a few blocks from Abby’s apartment, Cash ordered a western omelette and a stack of pancakes.

  “I’ll have a bran muffin,” Abby said.

  Cash took her menu from her. “You need eggs.” He aimed one of his knock-’em-dead smiles at the waitress. “She’ll have eggs. Scrambled. With sausage. Hash browns, sourdough toast and—”

  “Cash.”

  “—a large milk.”

  “Just tea and the muffin,” Abby said to the waitress.

  The waitress looked at her patiently. “But, honey, he thinks you should have—”

  “Tea and a muffin,” she repeated through clenched teeth.

  Cash said, “You’ll want those eggs the minute you get them.”

  “For the last time. Tea. A muffin. That’s all.”

  The waitress looked at Cash, a rueful, “what shall I do now, master?” sort of look. What was it about the man? All he had to do was smile at women, and they forgot that they had the right to vote now.

  “It’s my breakfast,” Abby insisted.

  “You need protein,” Cash said.

  She slapped her palm on the table. “Stop.”

  He widened those baby blues. “Stop what?”

  “I can order my own food. You back off. I am not kidding.”

  For a suspended moment, they stared at each other, eye to eye and will to will. And then, elaborately, he shrugged. “You want to starve yourself I guess that’s your business.”

  “You bet it’s my business.”

  He turned a sheepish smile on the waitress. “Sorry, ma’am. I guess she just wants that muffin after all.”

  “Oh, it’s no problem. Really. Is that all, then?”

  “Yeah, I think that’ll do it.” He glanced at her name tag and then zapped her with another smile. “Betty.”

  Blushing prettily, Betty finished scribbling the order. Then she trotted away to do her master’s bidding.

  They got their food quickly, which was par for the course with Cash. He had a talent for making others want to please him. Women—and men, too—seemed to fall all over themselves seeing that his needs were met. And really, Abby thought, it didn’t surprise her that people responded to him. He was generous and kind. And he gave others the feeling that he really saw them and cared about them.

  He dug right in when Betty set his plate before him. Abby ignored her muffin and watched him, feeling fond in spite of herself, thinking how handsome and healthy and fine he was, even after a night spent drinking too much. A gorgeous man, all the way around.

  He looked up from his plate to catch her watching him. She instantly dropped her gaze to her untouched muffin.

  “You eat that,” he commanded. She picked it up and began peeling off the paper muffin cup. She had popped a bite into her mouth and was chewing obediently, when he asked, “You will come home and see your mom before school starts again, won’t you?”

  She sipped tea, stalling, wishing he’d asked just about anything else but that. Abby loved her mother, but the two of them rarely saw eye to eye on anything. It had been Ty who understood her. And she didn’t even want to think about what would happen when Edna Delacourt Heller learned about the baby.

  So she wouldn’t think about it. Not for a while yet, at least. And as far as the fall semester at C.U. went, well, she doubted she’d even be going. Right now, she needed to earn and save money. To that end, she was working two jobs. She served cocktails all night, which Cash had discovered. What he didn’t know was that from nine to three, Monday through Friday, she waited tables at a coffee shop much like the one they sat in right now. She spent what spare time she had in search of bookkeeping work, which she prayed she would find before she got too big to be on her feet day and night.

  Cash was watching her, waiting for an answer. “Well?”

  She broke off another piece of muffin. “I’ll try to get home for a visit as soon as I can.”

  He made a sound in his throat, an impatient sound. “Your mom needs to see you. You’re all the family she’s got now. And she’s still grieving, with your dad gone.”

  “I said I’ll try, Cash.”

  He dropped his fork, hard enough that it clattered against his plate. “Just say when you’re coming. I’ll make arrangements not to be around. How’s that?”

  “Stop.” She aimed a look at him, a look as fierce and fiery as she could make it.

  Carefully, he picked up his fork and finished his omelette.

  Half an hour later, they arrived back at her apartment. She tried to tell him goodbye at the door, but he refused to take a hint. He pushed past her and gained the sanctuary of her room.

  “One more thing,” he announced, as he felt for the inside pocket of his western-cut suede jacket.

  She knew what was coming. “Do not get out that checkbook.”

  He ignored her. He went over to the table, pulled out his platinum Cross pen and scribbled out a check. “Quit working at that bar.” He ripped the check from the book and held it out to her. “This should hold you over until you can find something worth your while.”

  She remained at the door, her hands behind her back. “I can manage on my own.”

  “I’ll just leave it right here.”

  “No.”

  Shaking his head, he put the check on the table. Then he slid the checkbook back to his pocket and put his pen away. “Well, I guess there’s nothing more to—”

  Before he could get the rest out, she marched over, picked up the check and tore it in half, then tore the halves in half. After that, she threw the pieces in the air. Together, they watched them drift to the carpet at their feet.

  He looked down at the torn remnants of his generosity. “What the hell good is that supposed to do?”

  “What part of no was unclear to you?”

  He pushed back the sides of his jacket and braced his hands on his lean hips. “This is stupid. Pointless. I’ve always helped you before. I’ve paid for half of your education, and you were never too proud to let me.”

  “Things were different then. You were investing in me. The more I learned in college, the more use I was to you.”

  “And now you’re not?” He loomed closer, his voice rising in volume with his frustration. “What are you telling me? Are you saying that you’re never coming back to work for me because I blew it and took you to bed?”

  “Quiet down.”

  “Then answer me.”

  “All right. I’m saying I don’t know. I’m saying I need time. I’ve been saying that all morning. But you’re a pigheaded man. And you just aren’t hearing.”

  “You’re never going to forgive me, are you?”

  “It’s not a matter for forgiveness.”

  “That’s what you say.”

  “Because it’s true.”

  He took a step closer, so he was looming
above her. “Then if you don’t have to forgive me, why won’t you—”

  She cut him off. “I mean it, Cash. I am not coming home. You just have to let me be for a while.”

  “Abby, you have to listen. You have to see—”

  “No.” She tried to back away.

  “Don’t—” He reached out and grabbed her, his big hands closing on her upper arms.

  She froze, sucking in a shocked gasp.

  “Abby…” The word was an agony. And also a caress.

  For a moment, she forgot how to breathe. Images of that night in April flashed through her mind.

  Sorrow; he had looked at her with such sorrow. Sorrow for Ty, who had been like a father to him, and sorrow for her, too. In Cash’s eyes that night she had seen all the sadness of the world. At first. But then, as she watched, that sorrow had changed to something else altogether.

  She had felt as if her heart were lifting, rising to meet the look in his eyes. She had surged up, to press her open lips against his neck—to taste him with her tongue. He had made a sound then, an urgent, hungry sound. And reached for her. His mouth had covered hers, hot and consuming, tasting slightly of whiskey and the cigarettes he kept swearing he was going to give up.

  After that first burning kiss, he had pulled away, looked down at her. His warm breath came ragged against her face. “Abby?” A question. A plea.

  “Cash,” she had answered, and dragged his head back down so that his lips could meet hers once more.

  Abby closed her eyes, shutting out the sight of him now—and the memories of him then. Very gently, Cash released her.

  “See?” she whispered, making herself look up at him again. “It can never be the same.”

  He stepped back, away from her. “You find a way to see your mom,” he commanded harshly. “She hasn’t been herself since your dad died. She needs you.” And then he turned and went out the door.

  Chapter Two

  Cash flew his little Cessna four-seater out of Denver into Sheridan. From there, he got in his Cadillac and headed for home, which was Medicine Creek, a town with a population that hovered just below the thousand mark, not far from the eastern slopes of the Big Horn Mountains in northern Wyoming.

  Medicine Creek looked like any number of small towns in the West. Its Main Street consisted primarily of flat-roofed buildings made of brick. The buildings housed bookstores and gift shops, a couple of diners and a couple of pricier restaurants. There was a new library, with floor-to-ceiling windows in front and a pretty good selection of books inside. There was the Oriental Hotel, which the Medicine Creek Historical Society had succeeded in having declared a historical building a few years before; both Teddy Roosevelt and the Sundance Kid had slept there—Sundance reputedly with his lady love, Emma Pace.

  Cash lived in a big house of slate and brick on North Street. It was a nice, quiet street lined with cottonwood trees. He’d had the house built to his own specifications a decade earlier. As a rule, he enjoyed the large, airy rooms and vaulted ceilings. He was a man who liked lots of space. But that day, the damn big rooms seemed to echo. The house felt too empty.

  He picked up the phone and called the ranch. Edna answered on the third ring.

  “Rising Sun Ranch.”

  She sounded tired, he thought. He knew her so well. She’d treated him like her own when he’d come to live with his grandparents all those years ago; a ten-year-old boy who’d needed someone to mother him, though nothing would have made him admit it at the time.

  “Edna?”

  He knew she was smiling even before she said his name.

  “Cash. I was hoping we’d hear from you today.”

  He also knew she was hoping he’d have something good to tell her about Abby.

  So much for Edna’s hopes.

  “What’s for dinner?” he asked.

  “Oh, roast chicken. Oven-browned potatoes. Snap beans with bacon. Fresh-baked bread, gelatin mold salad….”

  “I’ll be there in an hour.”

  They sat down to eat around seven. There were just three of them: Edna, Cash and Zach, Cash’s cousin. Zach Bravo had been running the Rising Sun since their grandfather, Ross Bravo, had died five years before.

  The table seemed even bigger than usual, with only the three of them. But Edna liked to eat there. She’d assumed the role of hostess at Bravo family events almost a quarter of a century before, after Cash’s grandmother, Matty, passed away. Then, five years ago, after Ross had been laid to rest beside Matty, Zach had invited the Hellers to move out of the foreman’s cottage across the yard and into the main house. Edna had quickly agreed.

  But even before the Hellers actually moved in, it had always seemed to Cash as if the house belonged as much to them as it did to the Bravos. Edna kept the rooms smelling of lemon wax; she hummed in the kitchen while she cooked for the family and the hands. Ty used to sit out on the wide front porch of an evening, his boots up on the porch rail—a man who felt himself at home. And whenever Cash came out from town, they all ate together, as a family: Zach, Cash, Ty, Edna—and Ross, before his death. Nate, too, whenever he showed up for a visit. And Abby…

  It caused a tightness in Cash’s chest to think of her. But he couldn’t help himself, sitting here at this table, where she’d eaten pretty much all of her dinners for the first eighteen years of her life.

  Abby had been born at the ranch, over in the foreman’s cottage, during a spring blizzard when there’d been no way for Edna to make it to the hospital in Buffalo. Cash had been scared to death for Edna, since his own mother had died in childbirth. But Edna had lived. And produced the miracle of Abby. They hadn’t let him in the cottage during the birth. But not long after, as soon as mother and child had been cleaned up, Ty had come out and found him skulking around the front door, scared to death of what might be happening inside.

  “Get your butt on in here, boy,” Ty had commanded. Inside, Ty had let him hold Abby, so tiny and red faced.

  Right now, it seemed to him that he had sat at this table and watched her grow up. He could see her as if she really were there across from him, at about three years old—the age when Edna had declared her ready to eat with the big folks. She’d thrown a handful of boiled carrots across the table and been sent to her room in disgrace.

  He recalled her at six—or was it seven?—wearing jeans and a T-shirt, her mouth set in a mutinous line—just before Edna sent her away again, because she had dirt under her nails and Edna wouldn’t stand for that. And at eleven, all dressed up for some reason in a pretty blue dress. And at fifteen, when he’d noticed she was wearing eye makeup. Cash had frowned at her, wondering why she thought she needed to wear makeup. She had stuck out her tongue at him. And by then she’d been smart enough to wait until Edna couldn’t see.

  “So how’s Abby doing down there in Denver?” Zach asked into the silence that had settled over the table. Zach was like that; sometimes they all wondered if he thought of anything but cows and bulls and the land he loved more than the average man could love a woman. But then he’d open his mouth and out would come exactly what everyone else was wondering about—but didn’t have the nerve to mention.

  Cash shot a glance at Edna. She seemed composed, though she’d set down her fork and her smile looked pinched at the corners.

  “Yes,” Edna said, sounding too polite. “How is Abigail?”

  Cash recalled dark circles under hazel eyes and a fleabag one-room apartment strewn with clothes and books. “She seemed…okay.”

  Edna waited, still smiling her pinched smile at him. Zach waited, too, watching Cash, wearing one of those completely unreadable Zach-like looks.

  “What?” Cash said, as if he didn’t know.

  “‘Okay’ doesn’t tell us a hell of a lot,” Zach said dryly.

  “All right.” Cash had the urge to loosen his collar, a stupid urge, since his shirt was already open at the neck. “I’m getting to it.”

  They went on watching him.

  “She’s working
a lot. She’s real busy. She seemed…tired.”

  “Where is she working?” Edna asked.

  “Mac’s Mile High, I think it’s called.”

  “Mac’s Mile High what?”

  He coughed. “Saloon. Mac’s Mile High Saloon.”

  “A bar.” Edna put her slender, work-chapped hand over her heart. “Why is she doing this? What has come over her?”

  Her father’s dead. And on the night of the day that they put him in the ground, I took her virginity out in the barn, Cash thought. That’s why she’s doing this. That’s what’s come over her.

  “She should be here, at home,” Edna said. “Working for you. The way she’s always done since she was sixteen.”

  Cash said nothing; he just sat there, despising himself.

  “That’s what I really don’t understand,” Edna went on. “Of course, we all know that Abigail and I have our differences. And I can almost understand that she might want to take off on her own for a time, after…losing Ty. But that she’d do this to you, Cash. That she’d not show up to handle your office, when you were counting on her. After all you’ve done for her, it just doesn’t—”

  Cash couldn’t take any more. “Edna. The office isn’t a big deal.”

  “Oh, you say that, but still—”

  “I mean it. It’s nothing. I hardly use it anyway. It’s just an address to put on my letterhead. And Renata is there. She can handle the phones and the mail.”

  “It’s not the phones. Or the mail. And I know that you are the heart of Cash Ventures, Incorporated, that it’s your charm and your willingness to take a chance, not to mention your good sense for a strong investment, that makes you a successful man. But I also know how you and Abby are. Always with your heads together, always making plans. And she has become quite useful to you, since she’s learned so much about number cracking and all.”

  “Number crunching.”

  “Yes. Exactly. Did you tell her to call me?”

  Had he? In so many words? He couldn’t exactly remember.

  “You didn’t tell her to call me?”