Her Cowboy Knight (13 page)

Cooper pulled the knife out and walked over to her. He cupped her head and kissed her lips. “Baby, that was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”

Gabby leaned into him. “What if I had missed? Oh, God, I could have gotten him killed.”

Cooper circled her with his arms. “You saved his life. We are too far from a hospital, and a strike to the head could have killed him. You did what you had to do.”

Gabby hugged him tight. “Thank God for Desdemona.”

He kissed her. “I agree. Thank God for both you and Desdemona.”

* * *

Gabby drove down the road, enjoying her first real taste of freedom in weeks. Cooper had managed to get her car back from the mechanic the day before. Having her car back meant a lot to her, just to be able to run to the store for a needed item when she wanted without asking someone for a ride.

Just as she passed the scene of her first unfortunate mishap in town, a brown streak ran in front of her car. She flinched, but held control of the vehicle. She squealed the tires, bringing the vehicle to a controlled stop by the side of the road and watched as the dagblasted goat—she’d taken to calling it that sometime in the last month—ran down into the field, then turned to look at her.

This was the best chance she might ever get. She climbed out of the car and reached for the supplies she had stashed in the backseat after reviewing an Internet how-to she had recently read. She took a deep breath and set out to catch a goat.

About an hour later, and a little more of a struggle than the Internet let on—she was beginning to distrust Google—she led a tired goat up Rufus’ driveway.

“Rufus?”

The older man came out of his shed, staring at her.

“Gabby? What in the heck have you done?”

Gabby offered the end of the rope in her hand. “I’ve returned your goat.”

Rufus just stood there, stunned. He opened his mouth once, closed it, then turned. “Well, bring her into the pen. We’ll need to tie her up for a little bit while I shore up the fence, I reckon.”

Gabby sat on the fence while Rufus worked.

Rufus spoke around a nail in his mouth. “How on earth did you do it?”

Gabby shrugged. “Anything is possible with the proper research.”

Rufus shook his head. “Well, you caught her, so I guess that’s all that matters.”

Gabby looked around and spied an apparatus behind the shed with a barrel suspended on four ropes. “What’s that?”

Rufus kept his eyes on his work. “Oh, that. That’s an old bull riding trainer I used in my rodeo days.”

Gabby asked, “You used to be a bull rider?”

Rufus crinkled his eyes. “I sure did. Back in my day, I could go eight seconds with the best of them. Now I just help marshal the field at the local rodeos or keep score.”

Remembering the dare Susan had issued, Gabby eyed the training apparatus. “Will you teach me?”

Rufus shot her a glance from under his bushy eyebrows. “Say that again?”

Gabby repeated her request. “Will you teach me? To ride a bull?”

Rufus looked back down at his work. “Girls don’t ride bulls.”

Gabby narrowed her eyes. “Why not?”

Rufus shook his head. “Why not, she says.” He looked up at her. “They just don’t, that’s all.”

Rufus moved to another spot in the fence.

Gabby jumped down and followed him. “Well, that’s silly. Why can’t girls ride bulls? They can ride horses, can’t they, and they can do all sorts of other things that men thought they couldn’t do before. It’s silly to think they can’t ride bulls.”

She pulled out her phone and entered a few keywords in the search engine. Sure enough, although there weren’t many, there were some women bull riders listed in the results. She read off their names.

Rufus turned around and pinned her with a look. “Cooper wouldn’t like it.”

Gabby looked away. “Well, Cooper doesn’t have much to say about it anyway.”

Rufus made a sound somewhat similar to her father’s Scottish hmmph. He kept working. “What about yer daddy?”

Gabby sensed that he was giving in. “Da has let me ride warhorses most of my life while carrying sharp objects. I hardly think he’s going to care about the gender appropriateness of the activity.”

Rufus sighed and leaned his arms on the top rail. “You’d have to do everything I said. I mean it, missy. I won’t have you getting gored or gouged or hammered or stomped or dragged on my watch.”

Gabby paled a little at the description of all the things that could happen to her, but nodded. “Anything. I promise. Oh, Rufus, thank you so much. I’ll work ever so hard. You’ll see.” She threw her arms around him in a huge hug.

Rufus stiffened in her arms and shook a finger under her nose. “We’ll see how much you thank me when you are bruised and battered, and your man catches wind of what we’ve done.”

Gabby twirled and came to a stop in front of him. “You’ll see, he’ll be so proud he won’t care. This is going to be so great. I just know it!”

Chapter Eight

Gabby’s life slipped into an uneasy rhythm. Her guilt over her trips to visit Rufus all but destroyed her former easiness with Cooper, despite the episode that day with Kwan and Michael. His work around the ranch kept him busy, so he didn’t ask any questions when she disappeared in the afternoon to train.

As guilty as she felt, she looked forward to that training more and more and progressed rapidly under the old man’s tutelage. It felt good to train hard for something again and use her skills. As she and Rufus got more comfortable with each other, their talk moved from bulls to more personal things. He told her of his days with her father and Jedidiah and some of the antics they got up to when they were stationed together. Like the other two, he never mentioned the bad times during the war, but the clouds in his eyes spoke volumes.

One day their conversation turned to Gabby’s current troubles with Cooper. “So what is it between you two anyway? I knew the minute you two met that there were sparks; what’s happened to make you so unhappy?”

Gabby shoulders slumped, and she shook her head. “I don’t even really know. I mean, part of it is that girl… the one I had a fight with that day I had the wreck here.”

“Susan Jacobs?” Rufus asked.

Gabby nodded, and Rufus said, “She’s had a hard go, that one has.”

Gabby’s head came up, and she sputtered, “She’s had a hard go? What about me? She’s attacked me every time I’ve turned around.”

Rufus asked, “How much do you know about the history between Susan and Cooper?”

Gabby said, “I know she’d sure like to get her hands on him. I know that much.”

Rufus shook his head. “Not that. I mean from when they were kids, when Cooper’s parents and Susan’s brother died.”

Gabby had a puzzled look on her face, so Rufus continued. “I was the first on the scene… going to the same rodeo, about an hour from here. I never will forget the sight.”

Gabby had a feeling she didn’t want to hear anything else Rufus was about to say, but he kept going anyway. “Little Susan was standing on the side of the road; she was the first thing I saw, and knew something was very wrong. I stopped, and I looked down where she was pointing. I saw the truck and horse trailer, with Susan’s parents trying to pull her brother and Cooper out of the wreckage. It was a God-awful mess. I don’t know how Cooper survived it, to be honest, but he was the only one who did. His parents both died immediately in the crash, and Susan’s brother was riding with them; he died two days later in the hospital. I ended up bringing Susan home with me while her folks took Josh and Cooper to the hospital. I doubt she even remembers that. It was… well, she didn’t speak the whole two weeks.”

Gabby felt nauseated by the end of Rufus’ story. “Oh, Rufus, I had no idea. I… I didn’t even know she’d had a brother.”

“After that, Susan just kind of thought of Cooper as hers. I mean, their families had always been close… God knows, Josh and Cooper had been like brothers, but after that, Susan tagged along after Cooper like a little lamb. Everyone just assumed she and Cooper would get together when they got older, Susan included, but Cooper had other ideas, saw her as a kid sister, of course.”

“How old was he when the crash happened?”

Rufus looked up, thinking. “Let’s see, I reckon Josh and Cooper would have been about twelve or so. Jed came home then, to run the ranch until Coop was big enough to run it for himself.”

“You mean Jed hadn’t always lived here?”

“Jed? Shoot, no. Jed was a rambler. He was a Marine, like I’ve said, then followed the rodeo, and when that didn’t pay he worked on the oil rigs as a demolition man. Jed was always a thrill-seeker, but all that changed when we lost Charles and Sarah. Jed came back and raised the boy and held the ranch together, and never said a word about it. But it was a lonely time for both him and the boy, and the Jacobses helped them both through that time. All I’m saying is just keep it in mind when you’re dealing with her. She’s had a rough go, is all.”

“Thank you for telling me, Rufus. I had no idea. It makes so much make sense.”

Rufus cleared his throat and shrugged a shoulder. “Yeah, well, don’t go letting on or anything. Anyway, it’s time to get back to work.”

Gabby set back to work, but she kept picturing a notebook with boyish handwriting in that old house back at the ranch.

* * *

Gabby sought out Kwan, the quiet ranch foreman, finally finding him in equipment shed, welding a piece of equipment. She averted her eyes as the sparks flew and waited until he lifted his visor and smiled in greeting. “What can I do for you, Gabby?”

Gabby took a deep breath. “Don’t say no.”

Kwan frowned. “Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?”

Gabby rushed on. “It’s about Josh.”

Kwan set down his things and turned off the gas to his welder. “How do you know about Josh?”

“That’s not important. I need you to take me to the old house.” She ignored Kwan’s adamant head-shaking and continued. “There’s a book there, a journal that I know is full of Josh’s sketches. Susan and her family deserve to have that book, Kwan.”

Kwan turned to look her straight in the eye then. “Since when do you care so much about Susan?”

Gabby colored. “Fair enough. I don’t, but if it were my brother, I’d want the book. Will you help me?”

Kwan cocked an eyebrow. “Suppose you’ll just go off on your own if I don’t.”

Gabby didn’t confirm or deny his statement, just awaited his pronouncement.

Finally, he sighed, “All right, but only to get the book, and then we come right back, understand? And no funny business while we are there.”

Gabby threw her arms around him. “Kwan, you really aren’t the stick in the mud I thought you were at first.”

“Yes, I am.”

She just patted him on the back and went to saddle Mayflower.

* * *

When they entered the old house, Gabby’s eyes couldn’t help but go to the old straight-backed chair in the middle of the floor. Her bottom tingled in remembrance of that spanking and in anticipation of the one she was sure to get when Cooper found out she had returned to this house.

Kwan, however, looked straight at the splintered staircase. “Gabby, how are you going to get up there to get the book without killing yourself… and me when Cooper finds out I’ve let you do it?”

“I’ve got it all figured out. I’m going to step on the outside edges of the steps that are still good, but I’ll hang onto the railing and kind of crawl instead of walking so my weight is more evenly distributed.”

Kwan sighed. “Seriously, this makes me nervous.”

Gabby patted him on the shoulder. “Honest. I’m really good at this sort of thing, but if anything bad happens, here’s my cell phone—call for help.”

Kwan gave her ‘the look.’ Gabby gave him a reassuring smile and turned to the staircase. She took the first two stairs standing up, then lowered to a crouch. As she made her way further up the staircase, the creaks and groans of the wood were the only sound in the house.

When she made it to the top, she said, “I’m here, Kwan, you can breathe again.”

“Very funny, Gabby. Just get the book, and let’s get out of here.”

Gabby found the book where she had left it weeks before and returned to the top of the staircase.

She lay down on her belly and tossed the book down to Kwan. “I hate to tell you this, buddy, but coming down the staircase is actually worse.”

“Now she tells me. I swear to God, woman, if you hurt yourself, I will never forgive you.”

Gabby smiled as she swung around into a backwards crawl position. “You know you like me, Kwan.”

She made it down the stairs without incident, with Kwan moving along beside her all the way telling her where to place her feet and which boards were missing.

When she reached the bottom, he jerked her up. “Never again. I will not aid you in these hare-brained plots ever again. Now let’s go home.”

Gabby stood on her tiptoes and kissed Kwan on the cheek. “I like you, too, Kwan.”

Kwan turned to her in all seriousness. “Gabby, I more than like you. Angelina and I owe you our son’s life. I would protect you with mine.”

She placed her hand on his shoulder. “Anyone would have done what I did.”

“But not everyone could have, and you did. You are a special woman, Gabby, and you are good for Cooper. I wouldn’t say that about everyone.” He grinned then, flashing white teeth in his tan skin. “But… you get to tell him what we’ve done here today.”

With that he turned and walked out of the old house, dismissing the matter as settled.

* * *

As Gabby and Kwan got close to the main compound of the ranch, Gabby started hanging back. Kwan smirked and looked back at her. “You know, I’m skilled at rounding up obstinate animals.”

Gabby stuck her tongue out at him. Kwan turned back around with a chuckle, slowed his pace, and drew even with her.

As they entered the yard and dismounted, Cooper stepped out of the barn. Gabby grabbed the book out of her saddle bag and stood in front of the hitching rail. Kwan dropped a brotherly arm around her shoulder. “Come on, kiddo, might as well get it over with, because you look guilty as hell anyway.”