On Her Way Home (12 page)

“I’m sorry, Jo,” Charlie mumbled through a mouthful of sweet roll, “they just looked so good; I couldn’t wait.”

Leif nodded his head, agreeing with Charlie and garbling out a “me too” between bites. Mac said nothing but leaned casually against the counter, taking huge manly bites from the second roll he had just swiped off the pan.
Baking for men is a joy,
Jo thought, smiling contentedly.

“Well, I made dinner too, if you are still hungry after your thievery,” she teased, waving them away from the oven door and taking out a steamy roast. The unconventional family gathered around the table, enjoying Jo’s tasty dinner while the rain pounded on the roof and turned the evening dark before its time.

After dinner, Jo, Leif, and Charlie retired to the parlor, sinking back into the huge sofas and visiting. Leif asked Jo if she’d enjoyed her day.

“I loved it,” she sighed contentedly. “I’ve always enjoyed baking for others. Watching you and Charlie devour those cinnamon rolls was the best part of my day.”

“Mine too,” Charlie added with a grin.

“So what other talents have you kept hidden from us?” Leif inquired, throwing a long leg over the arm of the chair and looking expectantly at her.

Jo laughed. “Well, I don’t really think baking is a talent. Any girl growing up on a farm with brothers learns how to do that.”

“Come on, stop holding out on us.” He winked at her. Lifting his fingers and ticking them one by one, he said, “You can ride. You work as hard as a man. You’re an amazing cook. What else?” Leif coerced. “Do you sing, dance, and juggle too?”

Jo’s catching laughter drifted across the hall to Mac, who was in his office, detailing expenses in his ledger and recording cattle records. He dropped the paper he was working on, distracted by the chatter, and loosely rambled into the parlor, taking a seat on the sofa across from Jo and crossing his large feet one over the other. He studied Jo who was curled on the sofa, her toes disappearing into the cushions. Her hair was pulled back in a loose knot with a few wisps playfully escaping to curl against her neck. Every minute or so, she would unconsciously wind the escaped tendrils around her finger, curling them even more. Mac was glad Jo had enjoyed herself today, and was surprised at himself for feeling so. His eyes dipped to the telltale smudges of flour across her blouse, directly over the swell of her chest. Swiftly, his gut tightened, and he tore his eyes away from her, staring across the hall to his office. He considered retreating to it, so he could finish his paperwork, but feeling contented where he was, he dismissed the idea. Mac hadn’t felt this longing for companionship in a long time, attributing it to the gloomy weather outside and the homey smells inside. He relaxed in his chair, letting the conversation flow around him. Leif was still trying to tease details of Jo’s life from her, but she turned the tables on him, asking him, “Why such a catch, as he proclaimed to be, wasn’t already spoken for?”

Playing with Jo, he replied, “Maybe I’m just waiting for the right girl to come along. I like brunettes with indigo eyes.” He grinned devilishly at her.

The conversation was starting to annoy Mac. “Pshaw,” he muttered, “you like anything with legs and a heartbeat.”

Jo thought that was a direct insult meant for either her or Leif but wasn’t exactly sure which one. Leif certainly didn’t seem to mind, laughing it off and agreeing with Mac.

“I really do prefer blondes,” he shrugged apologetically to Jo.

Wiping a hand across her brow, Jo kidded, “Phew, that is a relief. Now I can stop locking my door at night.” Her eye’s sparkled prettily as she delivered the jab.

Leif planted his hand across his heart and opened his mouth pretending to be offended. A tiny lift at the corner of Mac’s mouth threatened to break into a smile.

“You know,” Leif said, growing serious and stroking his jaw, “now that you mention it, Mac, I do recall curvy brunettes being more your preference.” The room stilled, everyone tense and anxious, awaiting Mac’s reply to Leif’s outlandish accusation.

As the only curvy brunette in the room, Jo squirmed in her seat, waiting for Mac’s flat denial. The clock ticked loudly from its spot against the wall. Leif cocked his head toward Mac, challenging him to get out of the sticky spot he had dumped him in. His brother had returned grim and serious from the war, and Leif was constantly goading him and heckling him, trying his best to resurrect the brother that had never made it home.

Mac reclined on the sofa, locking his knuckles behind his head and leaning his head back on the cushion as if he was going to nap. Closing his eyes, he muttered nonchalantly, “I only like curvy brunettes who can bake.”

Jo’s eyes widened at his reply. Out of all the things he could have said, she would have never imagined that to be it. Was he actually implying he liked her? That was shocking news. Just this morning, he had yelled in her face. He had glared at her yesterday and called her stupid. Mac was obviously jesting, but still, Jo couldn’t stop the spark of warmth from firing in her chest. Fervently dismissing Mac’s comment as merely a reply to Leif’s hounding, rather than an actual change of heart, Jo got to her feet, and wishing everyone a goodnight headed up the stairs.

When she was at the landing, Leif called to her, “Jo, tell me, what hidden talents are you planning to surprise us with tomorrow?”

Jo thought back to the hopelessness she’d felt yesterday; it had all but vanished. Smiling to herself, she called from the hallway, “I’m stubborn.”

Eyes closed, still reclined on the sofa, Mac smiled.

Chapter Fifteen

Jo was working alongside Leif, holding boards in place while he hammered nails into them. They were building a larger pen next to the corral and shoot that they could funnel the cows into, hopefully making the job of holding them in a group much easier. Five wranglers would be enough to round up the cattle if all of them were experienced, but Jo and Charlie had never mustered cattle before. Today they were doing everything possible to make the branding and steering run smoother. Leif wasn’t too concerned, already having noticed that Charlie and Jo were both fast learners, but there were a couple of ornery bulls and a few tricky brush patches to worry about.

Charlie was out in the field, stringing the last of the barbed wire, but Jo hadn’t seen Mac, Kirby, or Mattie yet. Kirby and Mattie must have returned home late last night because their car was parked in its usual spot this morning. Jo was anxious to see Mattie and thank her for the note and boosting her spirits with the thoughtful verse of scripture.

Yesterday’s storm had spent itself out, and today was bright and clear. Jo was thinking about Mac and the tiny spark of humanity he had shown last night, and it made her more curious about him. Working closely with Leif today, she steered the conversation in Mac’s direction.

“Mattie mentioned that Mac served in the war?” Jo stated as a question. Leif nodded his head, unable to speak as he held nails in his mouth. “My brother, Johnny, served in the war too. Did you?” she asked.

Shaking his head side to side to answer, Leif pulled a nail out of his mouth and hammered it into the post.

“When Johnny came back from the war, he was quieter for a while, kind of keeping to himself, but then he met Rebecca, and that all changed. I imagine once you’ve been to war, you can’t be the same person you were before,” mused Jo inquisitively.

Leif swung the hammer down and peered at her, catching on to the drift of her questions. Pulling the remaining nails out of his mouth, he quickly pounded them into the board. On the way to the barn to carry out more lumber, he said, “I suppose the war does change people, but it would be hard for me to say since I never served.” The words seethed through his teeth, coming out harsh. “I was fifteen when Mac left home and headed west. I worked with my dad and Kirby on their ranches until I was finally old enough to leave home myself and work in the copper mine with Mac. Just before I was set to leave, we entered the war, and Mac came back home, telling us he had signed up and would be shipped overseas to France in less than a fortnight. I was angry at him for volunteering without me and went to the draft board the next day to join, but Mac found me there and tried to stop me. Seeing that I was hell-bent on joining, he pretended to support my decision, but one week later my physical examination paperwork came back stamped, “denied for military service.” I knew I had passed that test, so I took the paperwork and charged down to the draft office ready to take it again. I spoke with the captain who administered it, but he wouldn’t allow me to retake it. Two days later, when I went back to press him again, I saw Mac leaving his office. It dawned on me that he had made an arrangement with the captain to prevent me from joining the army.”

Leif and Jo had reached the barn, and Leif paused in his story to pull boards from the lumber pile and load them onto the wagon. Leif’s face was pinched as he shoved the boards onto the wagon with unnecessary force, obviously still indignant at the memory of Mac’s sabotage. Jo helped him load the wagon, saying nothing but inwardly hoping he would continue on with his story.

When the first of the new boards were nailed up, Leif finally decided to speak again. Jo held the nails for him this time leaving him free to talk.

“Mac and I always bantered back and forth, and we wrestled or boxed for play, but that day I hated him. Barreling across the road, I tackled him with all the force I had, and I had a lot. I was angry as all get-out.”

Leif looked seriously at Jo. “If he were to tell you this, he’d say I sucker punched him, but I didn’t. He saw me coming and knew I’d figured it out. Three army officers had to break us apart. We stood there bleeding, swelling, and cursing at each other.” Leif stopped nailing and looked directly at Jo, bitterness raging in his usually cheery eyes. “I remember Mac wiping blood from his lip with the back of his hand, pretending that it was nothing. Then he mocked me, saying, “If that’s the best whipping you can give someone, it’s a damn good thing you’re not fit for service.’” Leif shook his head, disgusted at the memory. “I called him something that will shame my soul till the day I die and then lunged at him. I wanted to rip his throat out. Two soldiers grabbed me kicking and swearing. They hauled me across the road and tossed me in the dirt. Leif resumed his hammering. “I went home, packed my things, and lit out across the country. I didn’t even stop to tell Pa, Mattie, or Kirby goodbye. Mac left for France a week later, and we’ve never spoken of it since.”

Jo’s heart ached for Leif, for Mac. She couldn’t imagine loving a sibling and having that kind of pain between them. A fleeting picture of Krissy shot into her mind.
No, that’s different
, Jo told herself, dismissing her uncomfortable feelings regarding Krissy and their fractured sisterhood.

“If you’ve never spoken about it, how did you manage to mend it?” Jo pried.

Leif sighed heavily, forcing himself to release the remembered anger. “I received a letter from Pa one day notifying me that Tom Archer, Mac’s closest friend, had been killed in action. Tom and Mac had been friends since they were schoolboys. They went west together, opened the mine together, even joined the army together. I forgot my anger long enough to remember that it wasn’t just war; it was death too. For the first time, it occurred to me that Mac was trying to protect me. I tried to keep hating him, but when the war was over and I saw what it had done to him, I couldn’t.”

Jo rested a light hand on Leif’s arm, comforting him. “What did it do to him?” she asked, empathy clear in her voice.

Shaking his head and resuming his work, he said lowly, “You’ve seen him. He’s deadly.” Jo thought about Leif’s candid assessment of Mac. Deadly. Is that what she read in Mac’s eyes? She couldn’t disagree with Leif, remembering Mac’s stare when he had coldly told her she was “trespassing,” but by the same token she also remembered Mac’s tenderness when he’d bandaged her hands.

While Jo pondered, Leif stood up straight, gazing back at the ranch yard. A wide smile broke over his face, transforming it back into its usual jauntiness. Nodding toward the yard, he said to Jo, “There’s hope for Mac yet.”

Jo rotated to look where Leif gestured. She spied a small towheaded boy whooping around the yard, sunlight bouncing off his face. The boy caught sight of Leif and made a beeline in his direction. Running as fast as his little legs could carry him, he called, “Uncle Leith, Uncle Leith!”

Leif waved at the boy and jogged to meet him. Catching him up in his big loose arms, he swung him upside down and tickled his armpits. Flopping the giggling boy upright again, he turned back toward Jo and shouted, “Jo, this is my nephew, Sam.”

Jo was stunned. She’d been here two weeks, and no one had mentioned that Mac had a son or that he was married. She mentally tried to account for any mention of a wife or son but came up empty. An unexplained heaviness settled over Jo as she accustomed herself to the new idea of Mac as a father, a husband.

Walking to Leif and the boy, she smiled brightly hoping to hide her shock. Jo guessed the boy to be around four or maybe five years old. He had lively eyes and an adorably freckled face with a tiny dimple in each cheek. His white hair shot out at all angles from his head, clearly disheveled from a night’s sleep.

Gesturing to Jo, Leif introduced her, “Sam, this is Jo. She’s one of our new ranch hands.”

Sam leaned back into Leif, shyly looking at Jo. Innocently, he said to her, “You’re a girl. You can’t be a cowboy.” Jo laughed. This was unquestionably Mac’s son.

“Well,” she replied kindly, “I’m going to try my hardest to learn how to be one.”

The boy looked at Leif and then back at Jo. “Uncle Leif can teach you,” he assured her, his dimpled cheeks balling up into a contagious smile.

“I bet if he can’t, you can,” she grinned back at him. Sam nodded his head up and down agreeing with her.

“I missed you while you were away,” Leif told Sam. “I’ve got something to show you in the barn. You wanna see what it is?” Sam’s honey brown eyes grew round as he nodded. “I’ll be back in a minute,” Leif called to Jo over his shoulder as he spun toward the barn, setting Sam back on his feet and taking his hand. Sam was an adorable bundle of energy, running alongside Leif, tagging him all the way to the barn.

An inexplicable tightness weaved through Jo as she watched them walking together.
He is Mac’s son
. Trying to meld her previous experiences of Mac with the new information that he had a family was dizzying. She remembered him ogling her the day he had caught her swimming, his eyes slowly sweeping over her body. She cringed to her toes, recalling the slow circles he’d rubbed across her palm in the tight private bathroom.
He is married
! Surely, cleaning her hands had been merely a chore to Mac, but Jo and her heightened awareness of men had found it incredibly intimate. Now that she knew he was married, she felt guilty, ashamed at her natural physical response.

Agitated, she picked up the hammer and decided to work her frustrations out. She propped a board up against the post with her knee and nailed it in tightly. After three boards were neatly in place, she felt no better. Picking up a fourth and moving to the next set of posts, she saw Mac’s tall figure heading her way. She swiftly turned her back on him, avoiding eye contact so he wouldn’t come over to her. Propping the new board up with her knee, she started the nail, but in her rush she missed hitting it square on the head, and it fell to the ground. She tried again, but sensing eyes on her back, she wobbled, and the board slid from under her knee, narrowly missing her toes as it plunked on the ground. Mac came up behind her and picked up the board, holding it in place and quietly waiting for her to nail it in. Oh, she hated his help, knowing he was secretly critiquing her carpentry skills, which were obviously lacking. Once the board was nailed in place, Jo ignored him and reached for another.

An odd silence settled over them as they worked together to nail the boards up in the morning stillness. Finally, dropping the hammer to her side, Jo said, “I met your son.” She paused, letting the words dangle in the air. Mac went on hammering. Raising her eyebrows and looking at Mac, Jo said amusingly, “He told me girls can’t be cowboys.”

Mac scooped some nails from the can and placed them between his firm moist lips, holding them as Leif had done. Mumbling around the nails, he praised, “He’s a smart boy.” He glanced up at Jo, but her turbulent eyes skidded away from him.

“How old is he?” she asked.

Mac pounded the nail in with two solid thwacks. “Four.”

Quickly doing the math in her head, Jo figured he must have been born while Mac was gone to war. That must have been terrifying for Mac’s wife, expecting a baby and uncertain if his father would ever have the opportunity to meet him.

Cramming her muddled feelings back down and feigning a brightness she didn’t feel, Jo graciously offered, “Does Sam take after you or your wife more?”

Mac stopped the hammer in mid strike, peering up at Jo.

She gulped, fearing Mac saw through her unaffected demeanor. “With his white hair and brown eyes, I figured he must look more like his mother?” Jo expounded.

Through the nails in his mouth, Mac answered tightly, “I’m not married.”

Their eyes locked, understanding dawning on her. Mac was a widower. It unraveled the mystery behind his detached and stony demeanor. Watching him work, she felt a wave of sympathy flow over her. When Jo was thirteen, she had ranted to her mother about one of her friends, complaining that she didn’t understand why she acted the way she did. Her mother had wisely counseled her, “Jo, someday you will need to develop more compassion for others.” Jo had earnestly strived to do so, trying to look at both sides of an issue or erring on the side of mercy when it came to others, but with Mac she’d failed. She’d only seen his callous and unfeeling side, never considering what may have prompted him to act that way. Losing a wife and being left to raise a son on his own would undoubtedly account for his temperament.

Contritely raising her hand, she rested it on his shoulder. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Confused, Mac stared at the small, bandaged hand on his shoulder while he tried to figure out what she was consoling him for. Dumbfounded, he realized she was assuming that because he had a son, he was either married or a widower. Hooking the hammer on the top board so he could focus his attention on Jo, he stated clearly, “I’ve never been married.”

The words settled over Jo flatly, unashamedly. Mac’s son, Sam, was born out of wedlock. Mac wasn’t married to Sam’s mother. Her budding respect for Mac toppled and crashed. She remembered Mac accusing Leif of inserting her at the ranch so he could dally with her. Obviously, he had jumped to that conclusion, biased by his own immoral behavior.

She ached for Sam, with his cute little face and catching smile. He would be the “illegitimate child” in the classroom, with “unmarried parents.” Being a schoolteacher, Jo couldn’t lightly dismiss the stigma that would follow him. It was a supreme act of selfishness that after shamefully seeking his own pleasure, Mac would abandon Sam to be ridiculed by his peers. People would forever speak in hushed tones behind his back. Jo felt sickened, like when she had naively trusted Will and he had proved to be dishonorable. It appeared he and Mac were cut from the same cloth. Even more distressing was the tiny spark of relief that had charged through her when Mac had declared himself unmarried. There was no point in denying the truth; she’d felt an awareness of him, a pull toward him. The feeling had panicked her. Her involvement with Will had taught her that those sensations could be dangerous. She had been ferociously exerting effort to extinguish the attraction she felt toward Mac, even as cold and calculating as he was. Seeing him in this new light had successfully doused the flame, like pouring a bucket of water over a single ember. Jo would never be traitorous to herself again. She would never be blinded again.