A Girl, A Guy And A Lullaby

Chapter Two

The truck’s headlights detected little movement as Tom drove out of town. An occasional larcenous raccoon was the only night-life in Brushy Creek. The beer joint locked up at ten o’clock during the week because good farmers went to bed with the chickens. Even the convenience store closed at nine.

“Must feel good to sit down.” He was still trying to figure out the logistics of carrying that belly around.

“Yeah. Haven’t done much of that lately.”

“The bus?” He decided pert best described her features. Disheveled summed up her appearance. Her personality was pure spunk with generous helpings of sass and vinegar.

She shuddered dramatically. “Have you ever ridden a bus?”

“Just to school when I was a kid.”

“Oh, no. That doesn’t even begin to count.”

He stole another glance. Despite her tart tongue and bossy manner, she looked incredibly young and vulnerable. The thought of her making a long trip alone aroused feelings he’d forgotten he had. Protective feelings. When was the last time he’d been tempted to reach out to a woman? And why was he so tempted by this little bouncing ball of trouble?

Before long they were riding through rolling hills. The Department of Tourism called this northeastern corner of the state “Green Country.” Tom had traveled extensively on the rodeo circuit, all over the west and north to Canada. He’d seen a lot of fine country, but always figured someday he’d settle down in Oklahoma, close to his roots.

In his big-money days, he’d bought eighty acres of prime grazing land a few miles south of town. There was a pretty, wooded knoll on the property, and he’d dreamed of building a log home on top of it. One of those sprawling, lodge-pine jobs like he’d seen in Colorado. He thought it would be the perfect home for Mariclare. For their children.

Besides kids and dogs, he planned to raise and train horses. Turn his acreage into a tidy little quarter horse operation. Someday.

He never quite pinned it down, but someday was always that time in the vague future when he’d made enough winning rides. When he’d worked the rodeo out of his system. When he could retire from the circuit and never look back.

He’d learned the hard way that it was a mistake to put dreams on hold. They had a short shelf life. He’d postponed until everything was gone. Rodeo. Mariclare. Kids. All of it. Maybe he was a clabberheaded fool. He should have seen it coming. She’d begged him to quit and he’d kept riding.

Since he was unwilling to choose real life over rodeo, a wild-eyed bucker had chosen for him. Ten charmed years with no injuries more serious than sprains and scrapes, and he’d ended his career with a bang.

A concussion, two compound fractures, and three broken vertebrae. Multiple surgeries to repair the damage. Weeks in rehab. Months of casts and canes. Bottles of pills for the pain and inevitable depression.

It had taken a year, but he finally looked whole on the outside. Inside, something vital had been severed. And that wound wasn’t even close to scabbing over.

“I’d forgotten how far it is to Birdie’s.” Ryanne was not as comfortable with quiet as the strong, silent cowboy beside her. He watched the deserted road like a freeway at rush hour.

“As they say around here. It’s a ‘fur piece.’”

Light from the truck’s space shuttle instrument panel cast a greenish glow over his face. She’d been eleven the last time she’d seen Tom Hunnicutt. It was in the café, the day he left for New Mexico State on a rodeo scholarship. He’d been excited. His parents had been proud. Heck, the whole town had been proud. Local boy makes good.

He’d been a lanky, smooth-cheeked teenager then. Now a mature thirty, he’d finally grown into his masculinity. Strong chin, straight nose. Couldn’t beat a combination like that. She couldn’t see his eyes, but recalled that they were so dark pupil and iris were one color. A boyish dimple and a crooked grin wrapped up a very appealing package.

She might be eight months pregnant, but she wasn’t quite brain dead. Or body dead, for that matter. Her pheromone receptors were alive and well and capable of going on full red alert. But she’d made a decision during the grueling bus ride. She didn’t need another man in her life. She needed to learn how to enjoy being alone. All urgent twinges would henceforth be ignored. They were nothing but trouble.

Giving in to twinges, urgent and otherwise, was what had set her on the fast track to disaster. It would pay to remember that.

“What were you doing in town so late?” she asked.

“I was driving back from Tulsa. When I saw the bus pull out and you standing there all alone, I thought I should do something.”

“Do you always brake for damsels in distress?”

“No,” he admitted. “But you seemed to be in a bit more distress than most of the damsels I run into.”

And he had a killer smile. Which she would also ignore along with all ensuing twinges. She sighed. Good thing she was enceinte and he had The Clairol Girl.

The truck hit a hole in the road and bounced Ryanne’s head to the top of the cab. “Ow!” Startled by her yelp, Tom slammed the brake and she pitched forward.

“Jeez, Louise!”

“Are you all right? I didn’t see that pothole.”

And she thought he was watching the road. She grasped her belly with both hands. “Are you prepared to midwife, cowboy?”

“You mean you’re—?”

“No, I’m not in labor. Just don’t hit any more of those craters.” She frowned at his queasy expression. Big, strong men were so squirrelly about childbirth. “Good thing males don’t bear children or the human race would be extinct.”

“If men had babies,” he said as he accelerated, “we’d have figured out a better way to do it by now.”

She laughed at his serious tone. “Something less time consuming, perhaps?”

“And not so messy.”

“You have strong opinions. Which are based, I assume, on your extensive experience with…”

“Dogs and horses.”

The truck rounded a curve and trapped a deer in its headlights. The animal froze in the classic pose and Tom tapped the brakes to give it time to gather its wits and leap into the underbrush.

“It’s been a long time since I saw a deer in the road,” she said quietly. It gave her hope that the world was not such a bad place, after all.

“So tell me about Nashville,” he said. “I was in town the summer after you left and I remember Pap moaning about how his favorite waitress had lit out to make a big splash in the country music business.”

“You know what they say about best-laid plans,” she muttered.

“What is it you do again?”

Maybe it was unreasonable, but the question hurt her feelings. And was just a smidge irritating. In a town where everyone knew everyone and their business, evidently her life was of little consequence.

“I play the fiddle and sing.” She tried not to sound as defensive as she felt. “And write songs.”

“So did you make a big splash?”

Ryanne rubbed her belly. “Not really. I neglected to check to see if the pool was filled before I jumped in.”

“Half-cocked.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Pap said something about you tearing off half-cocked.”

“Remind me to thank Pap for the vote of confidence.” She knew very well that impulsiveness was her downfall. Hell, half-cocked was her modus operandi.

“Don’t take it personally. He just hated to lose a good waitress.”

“Being a waitress, even a good one, was never my primary career goal. However, the way things are going, I can’t rule it out.”

“You didn’t have any luck in Nashville?”

“Luck is relative. If they paid musicians to audition, I’d be rich. Actually, I got pretty close a few times.”

“Real close from the looks of you.”

“I was referring to breaks.” It came out as cool as she intended. She didn’t need the local cowboy to remind her that if she’d concentrated on her music and ignored those pheromone twinges, she wouldn’t be in her current predicament.

“Mmm-hmm. I see.”

“What do you see? A big fat pregnant failure running home like a whipped pup?” Ryanne’s anger swung out of left field, surprising even her. But he’d blundered into sensitive territory, and she needed to use the damned bushes again.

“I figured you came home to be with Birdie.” He looked concerned. “For the baby.”

The tears came fast and hard. Six terrible months, capped off by two horrible days, finally caught up with her. “Never mind that I’m broke, or that my husband deserted me.”

Ryanne gripped the seat. Uh-oh. She was in for another ride on the old estrogen roller coaster. “Did Birdie mention I got fired because itty-bitty cocktail waitress outfits don’t look perky on pregnant ladies?” Sniff. “Or that I got kicked out of my room because I was three months in arrears? Or that the bank repossessed my car out from under me? I guess what you see is, if it weren’t for Birdie taking me in, I’d have to whelp in the street like a stray dog.”

Ryanne ended on a high, damp note. She hated crying. It was not her style to wallow in self-pity or inflict her troubles on others. Damn the hormones that jerked her around like a mindless puppet.

Tom took the sandblasting in silence, his strong profile set in stone. She should be ashamed of herself. She’d really unloaded both barrels this time. And on a poor cowboy trying to do a good deed.

But, Lord, it felt good.

Tom drove quietly during the minitirade. What kind of loose cannon had Ryanne Rieger turned out to be? Mood swings were one thing, but he wanted no part of her emotional excess.

The louder she got, the tenser he became until his jaw ached and he white-knuckled the steering wheel. It had been a year since a woman had yelled at him like that. He had not missed the experience one damn bit.

Ryanne sniffed some more and wiped her leaky eyes and nose with the back of her hand. “So now you know. I’m a failure. Down and out and knocked up.”

Tom kept his eyes on the road. He didn’t want to careen through any more potholes, and he didn’t want to look at the girl weeping beside him. As long as he didn’t, she was just a noisy distraction. He didn’t want to glance over there, and see some wrung-out kid who needed him to make her feel better. He was out of the feel-good business.

“You’re not a failure.” He didn’t mean to sound gruff.

“I didn’t do what I set out to do. I’m divorced, broke, homeless. Last I looked, that wasn’t a recipe for success.”

“You tried, didn’t you? Failure is not trying. So your dreams didn’t come true. Get over it. Then try again.”

She leaned back and folded her arms over her belly. “I am in no mood for sensible advice.”

“You’ll survive. You’re the feistiest little pregnant lady I ever met.”

She succumbed to mirthless laughter. “Oh, brother. What a thing to say. Feisty little pregnant lady? Damn!”

“Maybe you can start a club.” Tom watched the road, worried she might go off on another crying jag.

But the next time she laughed, it was real. “Or a twelve-step program.”

“There you go.” He let out a slow breath.

“Hey, that gives me an idea for a song. ‘I ain’t got nothin’ left but spunk/ but I can’t get far on that.’ What do you think?”

Tom smiled in the darkness. Good thing she had a sense of humor; she’d need it. He made the mistake of looking at her. Her wide eyes reminded him of the frightened doe.

Damn. He didn’t need this. And he didn’t want it. “It” smelled too much like involvement.

“Or how about this? ‘I don’t have a husband/ I don’t have a home/ but I’m gonna have a baby/ so I won’t be alone.”’

“Sounds almost pitiful enough to be a hit.” He found it hard to resist her ability to act up, even when she was down.

“You think?”

“It’d be better if your dog died. Or you maybe drove an eighteen-wheeler.”

“I’ll work on it.”

He turned to her after a few minutes. “Feeling better?”

“Yeah. I’d forgotten how good it feels to have someone to talk to.”

Yeah, right. If she wanted a sympathetic ear, she was barking up the wrong cowboy. According to Mariclare’s exit speech, he was incapable of listening. Too wrapped up in himself to care about others. What was it she’d called him?

Oh, yeah. An emotionally unavailable, self-centered SOB.

The accusations had cut deep. He’d had a lot of time to think about them. He knew she had her reasons, but he could never quite reconcile the heartless man she’d described with the one whose face he shaved every morning.

Tom stuffed those feelings down and concentrated on maneuvering the curves. Ryanne was humming now. Like she was testing out an elusive melody heard only in her head. She’d been through a lot for someone so young. He didn’t want to add to her pain.

And he did not want to share it.

“I don’t know what happened to me back there,” she said. “It was either a fleeting episode of temporary insanity or a really bad case of bus lag.”

“I reckon you just needed to let off steam.”

“You reckon?” She laid her head back on the seat. “Just don’t think I’m a high-strung, world-class hysteric. I’m not. Normally I’m pathologically stoic.”

She made it sound like she cared about his opinion. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. “You’ll be home soon.”

“Home. You don’t know what that means to me.”

But he did. He’d come home to lick his wounds, too. To find comfort in the familiar world of his childhood. To slip back into the skin of the nice guy he’d once been. The man he’d been when he left Brushy Creek. The one his hometown thought he was. “Home is the place you can’t appreciate until you leave.”

“That’s pretty poetic for a cowboy.” For once she sounded sincere.

At least she’d calmed down. He wasn’t up to handling raw emotional upheaval in any form. With his own future so uncertain, he sure as hell didn’t want to get involved in anyone else’s life right now.

Especially not the overwrought, messed-up life of an abandoned fiddle-playing wannabe country singer who looked like she could give birth and/or have a nervous breakdown at any moment.

In his heart, that hollow place he’d boarded over when Mariclare walked out, Tom knew Ryanne needed reassurance that things would be all right. But understanding the problem and taking responsibility for it were two different things.

No way would he volunteer for any comforting jobs. He had enough problems, without letting some little gal get under his skin.

Ryanne let out a sudden squeaky yelp.

He resigned himself to another outburst. “Now what?”

She grinned and patted her belly. “Tom Hunnicutt, meet the future clogdancing champion of the world.”

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