Walk Away Joe (4 page)

She’d stripped for him, for God’s sake. She’d all but begged him to take her to bed. Worst of all, she’d let him see how vulnerable she really was.

“Nice work, Stewart,” she muttered under her breath. “Puts the phrase
getting caught with your pants down
in a whole new light.”

Her stomach rolled again. She didn’t admit to many weaknesses. That Lambert had seen her in the grip of a monster one made her sick with self-loathing.

“There’s one thing about it,” she acknowledged with false brightness, “at least when you screw up, you have the pleasure of knowing that nobody does it better. Queen of the screwups, that’s you. High priestess of the royal foul-ups. And champion staller,” she added, admitting that this little bit of wordplay was just another ploy to postpone the inevitable.

Nobody could say she didn’t own up to her mistakes. With that in mind, she drew a deep breath and walked across the courtyard. Lambert might have been a reluctant knight errant, she had to admit that, but tarnished armor and all, he’d saved her sorry hide last night. Whatever his reasons, she owed him for that; and she was a woman who settled her debts.

Though part of her still wanted to hate him for the humiliation, a bigger part thanked God he’d scraped up enough integrity to walk away from her.

Grateful for the dark glasses that covered her eyes and the shadows beneath them, she forced herself to keep walking. The Texas soil dusted her boots with each step. The summer sun, already hot and high, beat down like a furnace on her actively pounding head.

She felt like one big, throbbing nerve. Even without a hangover, this confrontation with Lambert wouldn’t have been easy. Facing a lynch mob would have been less painful than doing this with one. To add to her misery, every muscle in her body tightened like a noose knot when she walked into the horse barn and spotted him.

He was standing outside a box stall on the other side of the sawdust-covered floor of the central alley, bridling one of the horses. When he heard her, he glanced her way. After giving her a pensive, assessing once-over from beneath half-lowered lashes, he went back to what he was doing.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Tag bolt out of the tack room, a saddle hefted over his shoulder. When he saw her, he stopped dead in his tracks. With a wary glance from her to Tucker, he very discreetly turned on his worn boot heel and headed back where he’d come from.

Great, she thought. Just great. At least she didn’t have to wonder anymore if Tag and Lana knew what had happened last night. It had been a long shot, anyway. The Lord had seen fit to bless her with a great set of pipes. Her threats and screams had probably carried all the way to San Antonio.

Dragging in a bracing breath, she walked the fifty yards in grim silence. Stopping beside the stall, she watched Tucker work a flashy little bay gelding’s forelock through the bridle.

When he neither acknowledged nor seemed to notice her presence, she tucked her hands into the hip pockets of her jeans and cleared her throat.

When he still didn’t bother to look her way, she lifted her chin and tried not to sound miffed.

“I came to apologize.”

The only sign he gave that he’d heard her was a slight pause of his hands before he finished buckling the strap beneath the gelding’s jaw.

“I was out of line last night,” she continued, determined to tough it out. “I’m sorry I put you in an uncomfortable position.”

Without ever looking her way, he ran an assessing hand along the colt’s withers. “Yeah, well, I figure we’ve both got a few things to be sorry about.”

She closed her eyes and let out a deep breath. If he sensed her relief that it was over, or how hard it had been for her to face him in stark, harsh daylight, he didn’t let on.

He could have thrown what she’d done back in her face. In fact, she’d expected him to. But for some reason, he’d chosen not to. Just as he’d chosen not to take her up on her offer last night. On both counts she was grateful. On both counts she was surprised.

More than that, in that moment she thought it might actually be possible to like him for what he’d done. But only a little, she warned herself. Tucker Lambert hadn’t gotten his reputation out of a box of cereal. He’d earned it with his fast-and-loose life-style and his don’t-give-a- damn ways.

He was a demon in blue denim, a bad seed, she reminded herself as she looked his long, lean frame up and down. Dressed in blue chambray and faded jeans, a light layer of Texas dust coating his leather chaps, he looked too gorgeous for his own good. It was biology, not benevolence, she reminded herself, that flecked his flirty blue eyes with enough dazzle to charm the sun from the Texas sky— or a yes from the woman he chose to turn it on.

Thank God she’d never been a sucker for a killer smile or bought into the line that all a bad man needed was a good woman to straighten him out. Tucker Lambert needed more than a good woman. And whatever he needed, it was a cinch he wasn’t going to get it from her. According to Karla, he was beyond redemption. No romanticizing about his uncharacteristic nobility last night was going to make that fact go away.

But she still owed him, and now that the lines of communication were open, all the words she should have said when Karla and Lance left her at Blue Sky tumbled out in one big, massive breath.

“Look,” she began, determined to make things right, “I know the way the wind blows. I know Karla and Lance sprung me on you and for some reason they’ve got you up against the wall on this one so you had to let me stay. You don’t want me here. I appreciate that. I don’t even blame you. I wouldn’t want me here, either.”

She paused for a deep breath. “On top of it, I know I haven’t exactly been the model houseguest. Lana has gone out of her way to make me feel comfortable, and I’ve gone out of my way to be distant.”

He finally met her eyes. “Seems to me you ought to be saying this to Lana,” he said, then turned away again as he hooked a stirrup over the pommel and tightened the cinch strap.

She felt the light sting in his subtle reprimand, but knew she deserved it, and more. He was right. Lana was young and sincere and sweet. As Tag’s wife and the only woman in residence on the ranch, Lana took pride in her unofficial role as hostess. She had repeatedly tried to coax Sara to join them for meals. She’d shut off Lana’s efforts with stilted no-thank-yous and a depression-induced aloofness. Finally, Lana had quit asking. Sara didn’t blame her. But she did blame herself for being so distant. From the beginning she’d felt guilt over that.

“I intend to tell her,” she said softly. “Just as soon as I speak my piece to you.”

She drew another fortifying breath. “I know you’re caught in the cross fire here. That never should have happened, since the plan was to let me drop out of the real world for a while.”

He cast her a considering look that gave her the courage to continue.

“Lucky you,” she said, with a grim smile. “You just happened to be the drop-off point. For what it’s worth, I appreciate that you’re putting up with me. And if it makes you feel any better, I could cheerfully strangle Karla and Lance for putting us both in this position.

“It’s not fair to you. I never intended to drag you into my problems. I never intended to drag
anybody
into my problems. I don’t like it much—this notion that my friends feel I need their help. I like it even less that I added insult to injury with that...” She paused, not wanting to put it into words, but knowing she had to. “That stunt I pulled last night.”

She swallowed hard as the shame momentarily outdistanced her resolve. She looked away, closed her eyes and collected herself.

“You hadn’t bargained for that,” she said, making herself meet his eyes again. “You haven’t bargained for any of this. And you shouldn’t have to. You weren’t supposed to be any more than a distant spectator in my little...” Again, she hesitated, then made herself continue.

“In my little breakdown—or whatever the hell it is that’s happening to me.”

Her breath stalled under the crushing weight of that statement, and she realized that she was shaking. She’d just voiced a concern she’d only last night given up avoiding. With the help of her friend Jack Daniel—or, when the bottle ran dry, too many cool six-packs—she’d managed to deny that she wasn’t coping any more.

The brutal reality that she’d just admitted to that ugly little truth aloud—and to Lambert, of all people—sent a chill through her blood that even the heat of this scorching summer day couldn’t temper. With the chill, came the fear. She really didn’t know what was happening to her. It scared her half to death.

She didn’t like being afraid. During the long hours of last night, alone and shocked painfully into sobriety by that cold shower and her shame, she’d decided she had to face her fears. She couldn’t run away from them anymore.

At the heart of it all, she didn’t like the person she’d become—a woman who would throw herself at a stranger as a substitute for a solution. She didn’t like the face she saw in the mirror. It was haunted and haggard, flushed from the abuses she’d inflicted on herself, stressed with guilt, and now with the humiliation of knowing she’d offered herself like used goods in a pathetic effort to combat her sense of failure.

She became aware, suddenly, of the silence. And of the tightness in her chest, and of the tears stinging her eyes.

Lowering her head, she blinked them back—then almost gave in to them again when Lambert’s soft and oddly comforting gaze touched hers.

“For a woman who hadn’t strung much more than two words back-to-back since you’ve been here,” he said, flipping the stirrup down then regarding her again over his extended arm, “you sure as hell figured out how to put them all together.”

A slight wry grin tilted one corner of his mouth as he smoothed an assessing hand over the gelding’s hip, then made a final adjustment on the bit.

She looked at him as the urge to smile worked at tipping up one corner of her mouth.

So, she was supposed to think he figured that last night’s performance and her soul-spilling speech were no big deal, she thought, processing his words. At least he was trying to convince her it wasn’t a big deal. It was a nice thing for him to do. From all she’d been told, it was totally out of character. Just as he’d ducked out of character when he walked away from her last night.

She was beginning to wonder if maybe there was more to Tucker Lambert than his full-of-hell grin and take-no-prisoners reputation suggested. After all, the only thing she really knew about him was what Karla had told her. And Karla had told her to keep her distance.

But for the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt a true smile coming on, over his generosity—and over the pleasant prospect that Tucker Lambert might just be more than met the eye.

“Yeah, well,” she said, taking the olive branch he’d offered, trying to cover her embarrassment over baring her soul with a flipness she didn’t really feel. “This station is back on the air. I’m talking again, Lambert, so be warned that your reprieve is over.”

He looked her in the eye then. The punch that look packed was as explosive as his next words. “Does that mean
your
reprieve has finally begun?”

She sobered abruptly. He wasn’t referring to the fact that she’d broken her silence. And while he might not know the full extent of what he was asking, she did.
Are you finished beating yourself up over things you can’t control? Are you through blaming yourself for the sins of a society run amok? Are you ready to face the truth of your life and deal with the downside? Are you ready to go back to the job you were trained to do?

The questions still scared her. She still didn’t know the answers. She only knew she didn’t like where she’d been heading to find them... or to avoid finding them. While she didn’t intend to retrace the path she’d been following, she still didn’t know what direction she needed to take to work this through. Not completely.

“Well, let’s put it this way,” she said, confirming one decision she had reached last night. She and Jackie D were going to part company. It was the first of many overdue steps toward getting her life back together. “From this point on, your virtue is safe from me. You don’t have to worry about getting accosted by moonlight again.”

A curious mix of approval and pride softened his eyes before he swung into the saddle. But when he’d settled his weight and looked down on her, his devastating grin, full of mischief and impossible to resist, was back in place. “I knew there was a downside to this.”

She couldn’t stop the laugh from bubbling out. He was working awfully hard at downplaying what was in all probability the most embarrassing night of her life. She wanted to like him for that reason alone. Right or wrong, she decided to let herself. She’d been dodging her gut instincts for too many years. Once the decision was made, it felt good.

“Lambert,” she said, stopping him as he gathered the reins. She wanted to tell him how much she appreciated the effort he’d thrown into taking some of the sting out of this for her. But for all the words she’d spouted earlier, the only one she managed now was a soft “Thanks.”

 
He simply nodded, touched his fingers to his hat brim and rode away.

 
There was nothing simple, however, about her jumbled thoughts as she stood there and watched him go.

3

………

T
UCKER HAD FELT AS MEAN AS A RATTLER
and just as low when he crawled out of the sack at five-thirty that morning. His black mood hadn’t eased by eight, when he was saddling his second mount and was getting ready to put the flashy three-year-old through his paces.

Then
she’d
shown up. If she’d hit him with a brick, it couldn’t have stunned him more than her apology. Before he recovered, she’d slammed him again with her haunting self-assessment.

For a moment, he’d felt like he’d been cheated. He’d known there would be a confrontation between than. He’d been cruising for a knock-down-drag-out. At the very least, a good yelling match.

He’d been ready to lay down the law:
Stay out of my way. Stay out of my life.
But with quiet, sincere words she’d cleared the air and shown him a strength he hadn’t wanted to give her credit for possessing.