Читать книгу Second-Chance Cowboy - Carolyne Aarsen - Страница 13

Chapter Four

Sepp looked up from scraping the deep fryer, glowering at Tabitha as she dropped a couple of mugs by the dishwasher. “Kind of dead this afternoon.” His voice was accusatory. As if it was her fault.

“For a Wednesday afternoon it sure is,” Tabitha agreed, reminding herself to stay pleasant.

“You may as well go home.” Sepp looked back at what he was doing. “No sense paying you to hang around if there’s so few customers.”

“Things might pick up,” she said, trying not to sound too desperate. Any tip she might get, any dollar she made, brought her that much closer to getting her kitchen finished.

“If they haven’t by now, they won’t in half an hour,” he snapped. She wanted to argue but she knew better than to contradict Sepp and cross him when he was in an ornery mood.

Instead she pulled off her apron and set it in the laundry bin, then took her backpack off the hook at the back of the kitchen. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, then.”

Sepp stood back from the fryer. “You don’t need to sound so testy.”

Tabitha pulled in a slow breath, seeing the banked anger in Sepp’s eyes. The past few days he’d been sniping and griping at her even more than usual.

“I’m sorry. I’m just tired.” She worked on the house until late last night again, putting in the last of the casings and baseboards to finish up the bedroom.

“Tired from hanging around with Morgan Walsh?”

She tried not to roll her eyes, but as she looked at him, she realized maybe that was his problem. He was jealous of Morgan.

“Morgan is the last person I want to be with on purpose.” That wasn’t entirely true. She had already spent a week working with Morgan, and each time she saw him it became harder to maintain her distance.

“So, you’re not seeing him?”

Tabitha blew out a sigh. “No. I’m not.”

He nodded. “So then, are you free Friday night?”

Tabitha could only stare, not sure which of his questions disturbed her more. The one about Morgan or the one asking her out.

“I’m busy. I’ll always be busy for you.” Too late she realized that she had overstepped a boundary she kept scrupulously in place. She had always been evasive with Sepp, cautiously refusing his advances. But she had never been this rude with him.

“Okay. Well, then maybe you don’t need to bother coming in for a while.”

Tabitha stared at him, suddenly tired of his machinations, his threats and his borderline obsession with her. As long as she kept turning him down it would never end. He would cut her hours back and back. And she was sick of it.

“Well, I won’t bother coming in at all, then. I quit.” She wished she hadn’t already taken her apron off. It would have given her the perfect dramatic exit. Pull off apron. Toss it aside. Turn and storm away without a backward glance.

Instead she shifted her backpack on her shoulder and strode away.

But as soon as the back door of the café slapped shut behind her, dread flooded through her. What had she just done? Quit the job that paid her the most money?

How was she supposed to pay for the rest of her house renovations now?

She leaned against the exterior of the café, the stucco digging into her skin through her shirt. Now what was she going to do?

* * *

“I’m sorry, but I’m wondering if it’s in Nathan’s best interests to be in school right now. It’s almost the end of the school year, so he won’t miss much.” The Grade Two teacher, Miss Abrams, gave Morgan a gentle smile, as if to soften her words. She glanced over at Nathan, who sat hunched on the cot in the school nurse’s office, his arms wrapped around his legs, staring out the window. “He’s had a lot to deal with the past few months. He’s a smart boy. In my opinion he might be better off to spend time with you at home.”

She sounded so reasonable and Morgan could hardly fault her for her advice. But how was he supposed to do that?

Morgan looked over at Nathan, who wasn’t looking at him. He wasn’t crying now but had been an hour ago. Morgan had been out of cell range, working in a farmer’s back field on a sow that had farrowed, and she and her newborn piglets had been attacked by a coyote.

By the time they got the sow fixed up and carted on a trailer with her piglets back to the farmer’s yard, he was back in service. Then his cell phone dinged steadily with messages from the school. He tried to call his father but he wasn’t around. Neither were Cord or Ella. So he told Dr. Waters he had to go to the elementary school, earning him a scowl and a slight reprimand.

He knew it didn’t look good. Barely a week on the job at the vet clinic and things were falling apart for him at home. But what else could he do?

“If that’s what you think should happen,” Morgan said.

“I do,” Miss Abrams said. “I know it’s not an easy solution, but Nathan needs some time with you more than he needs school right now.”

Morgan stifled another sigh. Part of him knew she was right, but he wasn’t sure how this was going to work.

“I’ll take him home,” Morgan said. He put his hand on his son’s shoulder and, to his surprise, the boy didn’t flinch away. He looked up at Morgan, looking so bereft Morgan knelt and pulled him into his arms.

Nathan stayed there a moment, resting his head against Morgan’s neck. His son, he thought, a rush of pure joy flowing through him.

But then Nathan pulled back, withdrawn again.

“We’re going back home,” Morgan told him.

“Which one?”

The question hit Morgan like a blow. He knew Gillian had moved around a lot. Had his son no sense of which place was home?

“We’re going to the ranch. Where Stormy is.”

His face lit up at that. “I really want to see Stormy again. I think she misses me when I’m in school.”

“Maybe she does.”

He picked up Nathan’s backpack and held out his hand, but Nathan jumped off the cot and hurried ahead of him toward the door.

Morgan thanked Miss Abrams and, as they walked back to the truck, Nathan smiled. “I’m excited to ride my mom’s horse,” he said, looking ahead as if imagining himself doing so.

“I’m sure you are,” Morgan said. The school counselor he had spoken to before he picked Nathan up had mentioned that the only time Nathan seemed to show any life was when he talked about his mother’s horse. She suggested that Morgan let Nathan fantasize about the horse and riding it. Affirming his comments, she said. Morgan wasn’t entirely sure how to go about that, so he figured he would treat Nathan’s suggestions like he had his twin sister Amber’s when they were growing up. Agree and nod and smile.

“But I can’t until Stormy is trained,” Nathan said.

“That’s true.”

Nathan said nothing. Instead he stared out the window.

“I have to stop by at the clinic for a minute,” Morgan said. He had forgotten to write down the billable hours for the call he did this morning.

Nathan just nodded. At least he wasn’t crying.

Morgan pulled up to the clinic, dismayed to see Tabitha’s truck parked there. What was she doing back here? He thought she worked at the café in the afternoon.

“Isn’t that the truck of the lady who almost ran over Brandy?” Nathan asked.

“Yes. It is,” Morgan said.

“Her name is Miss Tabitha, isn’t it? And she works at the café? She gave me a coloring book and crayons even though I’m not a little boy. But it was nice. And Grandpa Boyce says she’s the lady that trains horses.”

“Yes. Miss Tabitha does train horses,” Morgan answered. “But she’s very busy working for Dr. Waters and Mr. Sepp at the café.” Morgan hoped he got the hint as he helped him out of the truck.

Nathan walked ahead of Morgan, skipping a little, looking a lot happier than he had in a while. Guess sending him to school hadn’t been such a good idea after all. Guess he wasn’t much of a father for not knowing that.

Morgan opened the door and, as always, his eyes had to adjust from the bright summer sun to the windowless back room with its pens and gates. He wondered why Dr. Waters hadn’t at least put a skylight in here. Or replaced some of the penning. One of these days some animal was going to lose it in here and bust one of the rusted posts.

“Wow. What do you do here?” Nathan asked.

“This is where we work with cows and horses and bigger animals like that.”

Nathan nodded as he followed Morgan through another door and down the hall to the front office, checking out the posters of dogs and cats and various other animals lining the walls between rooms.

In the office, Tabitha stood by the desk, talking to Jenny, her one hand pressed to her cheek, her other clutching her elbow. She looked like she’d been crying.

“I doubt Dr. Waters will give you more hours,” Jenny was saying.

“Why should he? He barely gives Morgan enough. Dr. Waters is running around like a fool himself, losing business because he can’t keep up. Makes me wonder why he hired Morgan in the first place.”

“Are you kidding? Who in Cedar Ridge would ever say no to a Walsh?”

“And who would say yes to a Rennie? We both know what my father’s reputation has done for my sister and me. Now that I quit the café, how am I ever going to pay off my bills and finish that wretched house? And I still have a ton of cleaning up to do.” She stifled another sob, pressing her hand to her mouth.

Morgan held back, realizing he had stumbled into a very personal but potentially disturbing conversation. He gathered that Tabitha had lost her job at the café. But what surprised him more was his reaction to her tears. He wanted to rush into the room and pull her into his arms. Comfort her like he used to whenever she was upset.

He was about to back away and wait until those impulses passed, but Nathan had finally caught up to him. He saw Tabitha and went running past Morgan into the room.

“Hi! You’re Miss Tabitha, aren’t you?” he said, smiling up at her.

Tabitha’s reddened eyes grew wide as she looked from him to Morgan, who now stood in the doorway. She spun away, swiping at her face.

Morgan shot a warning frown at Jenny, who wasn’t looking at him either. He guessed she wasn’t too proud of her “he’s a Walsh” comment.

Nor should she be. Morgan liked to think that his high GPA, his stellar reputation at his previous vet clinic and his strict work ethic had been the reason Dr. Waters hired him.

Not his last name.

“Why is Miss Tabitha crying?” Nathan said, turning to Morgan. “Why is she sad?”

“I’m okay.” Tabitha sniffed, then turned back to Nathan.

“I was crying too,” Nathan said, looking back at Tabitha. “I miss my mommy and I want to ride her horse but I can’t.”

Tabitha gave him a wavery smile and touched his head lightly. “I’m sorry you can’t.” Then she looked puzzled. “And why aren’t you in school?”

He shrugged, suddenly very interested in the hem of his worn T-shirt. “School makes me sad,” he said, twisting it around his hand. He managed to poke a hole in it and wiggled his finger through it, making it bigger. “So my daddy says I don’t have to go anymore.”