The Cowboy's Enemy Read online

  Her jaw jutted out. “That’s the way you’re civil and ‘act like an adult?’ By throwing up everything I’ve ever done and rubbing my face in it? Or you just want to make sure I know where I stand, and it’s well below you.” There was tension in every line of her body. “I know it, Abner. If you only came here to tell me what an idiot I am, you can stop wasting your breath.”

  Why did he do that?

  He knew. Because keeping his mouth shut wasn’t something he normally had a problem with. Nor was being nice. And the Amish took pride in their humility. Ha. A contradiction, sure, but true nonetheless. It’d been beaten into him from a young age.

  He hadn’t learned the lesson as well as he thought.

  So, he’d do the hard thing.

  Oh, but it grated. Because she’d never apologized to him.

  “I’m sorry. You’re right. Those were fighting words.”

  Her head snapped around at his apology. Too bad he couldn’t get the expression on his face to match his words.

  Yeah, she saw the anger. Her eyes narrowed.

  “Forgiven,” she said with a slight tilt of her head that said plain as an interstate billboard that she was totally adding his fake apology to his list of faults.

  Which made him even angrier. She was the one with the long list of faults. He’d been clear about his intentions.

  He swallowed his anger. Again.

  “What’s up with my mom?”

  “She’s an alcoholic. She’s not interested in treatment, and I believe until she wants to quit, there’s no point in me fighting her about it.” Cora stared straight ahead, her arms crossed like a shield, her words as clipped as her twang would allow.

  “So you just let her sit on the couch and be drunk all day?”

  “I let her?” Cora turned on him. “Me? This is my fault?” Her eyes widened, and she huffed out a breath. “Where have you been the last nine years? Out being the morally righteous ringleader far away from anyone who would consider you family? Now all the sudden, you give a crap?” She shook her head but didn’t pause long enough to give him a chance to respond. “That’s rich. You’ve ignored her for nine years, and it’s my fault she’s an alcoholic.” She spun. “I’m sorry. I can’t have a rational conversation with someone who can’t take responsibility for his actions and casts blame wherever there’s a convenient body.”

  She strode to the door, her hand out for the knob.

  He couldn’t touch her. He’d end up strangling her. Or worse, kissing her.

  “I didn’t mean it like that, and you know it. You’re just taking it as wrong as you can because you have some crazy bug up your butt that probably has to do with guilt and the female tendency to convolute logic until it’s unrecognizable as anything but bs.”

  If she wanted to leave, he wasn’t stopping her. He wasn’t getting any useful information out of her anyway. He’d go to the viewing tomorrow night and the funeral the next day then blow the joint.

  His mother had never given a crap about him. Why should he care about her now?

  But it didn’t matter. He did and he would and all the other stupid things his conscience wouldn’t let him out of.

  “Well, with that chauvinistic attitude toward women, it’s no wonder you’re not married.”

  “How do you know the frig I’m not?” he spat out, more angry than he could remember being since the last time he saw Cora.

  “Oh, I suppose you are the kind of man who would leave his wife at home while he went to his grandmother’s funeral and take his wedding ring off while he was doing it. Classy.” Her eyes snapped, but there was a vulnerability to her that could melt his anger away, if he’d let it. He couldn’t.

  “Classy?” She was accusing him of not being classy? Seriously? “I guess I’m just not up with the times where having six kids to three different men is the new classy.”

  “Shut up, jerk.” She shoved the door open. Either she was almost as angry as he was, or she lost her grip on the doorknob, because it slammed against the wall with a crack and thud. Guess he should have bought a doorstop at the hardware store, too.

  He was so furious his hands shook, rattling the plastic bags he held, but he wasn’t so angry he missed his opportunity.

  Stepping into the house while she was still fumbling for the door in the dark, he walked past her, through the pitch-black hall, and into the kitchen. As he passed the entrance to the living room, the TV screen blinked, but it was muted. It looked like his mother had passed out on the couch. He could hear her uneven snores as he walked by.

  “I am not going to allow you to sleep in this house,” Cora hissed in a whisper behind him.

  “That’s fine. I’m not asking for your permission.”

  “I’ll call the police.”

  He laughed. “Really? I’m the son of the owner. They’re more likely to throw you out.” He almost added another, worse insult, but he bit it back. “I don’t know what the problem is anyway. We both know I never touched you. Not tempted to now, either.”

  Lie. It was such a lie.

  He’d always had a good poker face, but it was fortunate he had his back to her. A lie that big, she’d have to know it.

  “Right. We already established that you’re perfect and I’m not. You can keep rubbing it in, but no one’s listening.” Her voice had softened. Not sure what that meant. But it made him a little sad. She’d obviously had some hard knocks, but she hadn’t quit fighting. He could admire that.

  He set two of the bags he carried on the table. “You’ll want to do something with these before they spoil.”

  He wasn’t tired, and he had a few things he wanted to do with the stuff in the other bags, but he figured he needed to stake his claim.

  “You can sleep in the recliner, and I’ll take your bed, or I’ll sleep in the recliner. Your choice.” He walked to the hall doorway and paused, his back to her. Waiting for her to tell him to sleep in the recliner.

  Finally, she said softly, “Your mother’s room is the door on the right at the top of the steps. Claire is in there in a play yard. The rest of the children sleep in the other room. The recliner is where I always sleep.”

  Something tightened in his chest. He didn’t want to feel it, and he steeled himself against it. “I’ll sleep in the recliner.”

  Another drawn-out silence like she was weighing her words.

  “There’s a pillow and blanket folded up behind it,” she said begrudgingly.

  He turned.

  She held up her hand. “Don’t. Whatever you’re going to say, don’t. You’re here because I can’t throw you out. That’s the only reason. And I’m staying because I can’t leave my children. There’s no need for us to talk to each other.”

  His brow twitched at that. “So, we’re not fighting now; you’re just giving me the silent treatment?”

  Her lips flattened and pulled back, but she didn’t say anything.

  “Thought that was something that only happened to married men. How did I get so lucky?”

  “Maybe, it’s you,” Cora suggested in a fake-helpful way.

  “Do I get a point every time you talk? Maybe a point for each word? If so, I’m up by three.”

  He had to turn and walk out of the kitchen. Otherwise, he was going to laugh at her balled hands and red face.

  Chapter 4

  After a restless night, Cora came down the stairs early the next morning, Claire in her arms and Luna holding on to one hand.

  It was Friday, but she wasn’t going to make her older children go to school. They hadn’t gone for the last two days. Not since the woman they called Grammy had passed of an apparent heart attack. Aunt Sandy wasn’t much of an adult figure in their lives, but Grammy, her mother, had been like a grandmother. The kids had taken it hard. Like children, they were fine one minute, playing and fighting, and the next, they were all crying and trying to pile in her lap.

  Next week was Thanksgiving, and they’d have the holiday and extra time off for hunting season to cat
ch up on their school.

  Although Aunt Sandy had said she planned on leaving at the end of the month. That had been before her mother died. Grammy had told Cora not to worry, that they’d figure out a place for her to go.

  Cora didn’t really believe Aunt Sandy anyway. Pretty much every month last year from November to March, Aunt Sandy said she was moving someplace warmer. It hadn’t happened. Cora had stopped worrying about it.

  As she hit the last step, she realized that she’d been smelling coffee for a while. Had to be Abner. Aunt Sandy wouldn’t be up for hours.

  After looking in the living room and seeing her aunt lying on the couch on her stomach, her hand still gripping the neck of an empty bottle, Cora decided she might not be up at all. She hoped Aunt Sandy was sober enough to go to the viewing tonight.

  That was a long time away. She had a whole day to get through and a man to deal with, and she’d not gotten much sleep. She had another two, maybe three hours before her current project of designing a website for a garbage-hauling company in New Hampshire was complete. Hopefully tonight. Then it had to be approved before she received the other half of her pay. It wouldn’t be enough for a security deposit and a first month’s rent, but maybe she’d find a place that would forgo the deposit.

  She’d think about that later, too, she decided as she stepped into the kitchen. Abner stood at the counter, cracking eggs into a bowl. Brown eggs. Not the cheap white ones she always bought.

  Last night, he’d bested her, and they both knew it. She needed all the brain she had left to try not to get as soundly beaten again today. Too bad he didn’t mean it when he suggested they try to put their differences aside and act like adults.

  But he thought she’d lied about him on purpose to hurt him, and he’d left her when she most needed him. How could they ever get past that?

  Claire waved her hands and smiled at Abner, even though his back was to them. That was odd since Claire seldom wanted anyone but her.

  Cora ignored her and helped Luna into her booster seat.

  “Morning.”

  How could she hate him and yet his voice still caused her heart to flip?

  “Hello.” She couldn’t bring herself to say good morning to him. Was it a good morning when the person she hated most in the world was in her kitchen?

  Okay. There were a few people she disliked with more intensity than Abner. Andrew’s father, for example. But not many.

  Maybe if she kept telling herself that, it would become truth. There was a way Abner carried himself, a look on his face that bespoke honesty and integrity. They hadn’t seen each other for a long time, but that hadn’t changed. She admired it back then, and she valued it even more now, knowing how rare it was.

  She carefully opened the cupboard door to grab a cracker. Then stopped short. Her eyes narrowed. She moved the cupboard door back and forth. It was the same door, but it now moved with ease. Two hinges were perfectly placed, and the one she’d nailed in had been removed.

  Pursing her lips, she angled her eyes over. Abner held the spatula in his hand, watching the eggs cook.

  “You fixed this.”

  “Thought I was getting the silent treatment?” He looked up, serious. “That’s seven points for me.”

  “I have six kids in this house. I don’t need you acting like one too.”

  “Oh? And it’s mature to not talk to someone because you’re mad at them?”

  She gritted her teeth together and turned away, grabbing the crackers and telling herself she didn’t care that he’d fixed the cupboard door. What did it matter if he was going to be a jerk?

  He turned the eggs over easy, and her mouth watered. She normally fed the kids oatmeal for breakfast. It was cheap and fast.

  But he’d brought groceries home last night when he’d come in, and he’d commanded her to put them away. She’d done it, more because she couldn’t see the food going to waste than because she wanted to do anything nice for him. But she hadn’t bargained on him eating his food in front of her and the children.

  The toaster popped up. Cora tried to breathe through her mouth. It smelled like a real breakfast with coffee and eggs and toast and that expensive, exotic food...bacon. She hadn’t had bacon in forever. When he opened the oven door, the smell of smoked meat saturated the kitchen, and she almost considered trying to be nice to him. But if he gave her a piece, she’d have to share it with her kids, and she’d end up not getting any anyway.

  She tried to think about moon landings and Elvis impersonators and whether or not she had enough clean underwear for all the kids for the viewing tonight. Not about bacon. The crispness and the greasy goodness and the smoked meat flavor. How if it was cooked just right it snapped and almost melted in her mouth. Bacon and eggs. Bacon and toast. Bacon and ice cream. Bacon could even make turnips taste good.

  She had Claire in the highchair and had turned to get a pot out of the bottom cupboard, shoving bacon out of her mind and hoping Abner would be done at the stove soon so she didn’t have to stand beside him and cook. She didn’t want to stand next to his bacon either. Didn’t he know how rude it was to bring his own food into her house and cook it in front of her?

  Behind her, she could hear him buttering the toast. She bit the insides of her cheeks and slipped around to put water in the pan.

  A plate clanked on the table. Then a second one.

  “You usually feed the baby off your plate?” he asked.

  She swallowed before she started drooling—he cooked himself such a large breakfast it took two plates?

  “Yes,” she said, without even really thinking.

  “Can Luna feed herself?”

  She shut the water off and turned. What in the world?

  “That’s for Luna?”

  “Yeah. Can she eat some bacon if I break it into small pieces?”

  She put the water on the stove. “Yes, she can feed herself, and yes, she can have small pieces of bacon.”

  “That plate’s for you. Eat it while it’s hot. How soon ’til the rest of the kids come down?”

  He’d made her a plate. Full of all the things he was cooking. The eggs had been for her. There was buttered toast. And bacon. Two pieces.

  Her heart warmed, and she stiffened. No. She couldn’t let herself soften toward him. She’d fallen for him once, and he’d believed the worst of her and left without a word. Not happening again.

  But she could be polite. For bacon.

  “Thanks.” She set the pan of water on the stove without turning it on and moved to the table, sitting down beside Claire’s highchair and looking at the plate heaped in front of her. “I wasn’t going to make the other kids go to school today. But if you’re cooking breakfast, I can go get them up.”

  He poured more eggs into the skillet, and they sizzled. “No, don’t do that. I’ll eat these, then we’ll cook more when they come down.” He shook the skillet a little and looked over his shoulder. “Those groceries were for you.”

  She looked down at her plate, guilty. Why did he have to be nice? How was she supposed to keep hating him when he cooked for her and fed her children?

  Without looking up, she said, “Thank you.”

  He set a plate on the table and sat down across from her. “I’m sorry. Truly. Maybe we can’t be friends, but we can at least set a good example for your kids.”

  There he went again, making her feel bad. Only he didn’t know it this time. What kind of example had she been for her kids? Especially the three oldest ones. She was a mess.

  Was. In her past. She’d decided to do better, and she was working toward that. Working toward being a better mother, being more patient, and putting her children first. Resisting the lure of strong arms that would make her feel good for a night. Ignoring alcohol’s siren call. Working on her design business. And, lastly, not falling for a man like Abner who would never get over the past.

  “Thank you,” she said, taking Claire’s little hand in hers. “Would you say the blessing for us?” There. It
wasn’t hard to be nice. She forced her lips to tilt up.

  Abner stared at her. “No,” he finally said.

  Her eyes widened. Questions swirled through her head, because she was sure, she remembered distinctly, that Abner had been a churched man. His actions, his speech, the stand he took. She remembered it clearly.

  “I do, Mommy,” Luna said.

  “Sure, baby, you pray for us,” Cora said, bowing her head and closing her eyes. Knowing her children would do what she did, even though Claire was too young to be told.

  Luna mumbled words that were unclear except for the “amen” at the end.

  Cora repeated the word and lifted her head, composed. Abner had bowed his head, but he hadn’t repeated the “amen” and didn’t look at her as he picked up a piece of Luna’s bacon and started crumbling it.

  “Thank you for fixing the cupboard,” Cora said as she fed Claire a bite of egg.

  “I’m gonna tackle that hole in the wall soon as we’re done here.” He put a few pieces of bacon on Luna’s plate before using his fork to cut up her egg.

  He was such a natural with children that she had to ask. “Do you have children?”

  “No.” He didn’t look up.

  The silence between them felt awkward as she gave Claire one more bite of egg and picked up a piece of bacon. It was too pricy, and she never bought it. She was going to enjoy it.

  “Would you tell me about my mom?” he asked. Several beats passed before he said, “Please.”

  He sounded humble. She tilted her head at him. Looked it too. “About her drinking?”

  “Yeah. Is this normal? Is she just mourning her mother?” He blew out a breath and looked across the room. “I want to fix it. I feel like I can’t leave with my mother passed out drunk on the couch every day.”

  Cora waited until he looked back over at her. She wanted him to know she was being sincere. “It’s been worse the last few days. She doesn’t usually drink the hard liquor. But there are four cases of beer on the back porch, and she cracks a can at breakfast.”