This Cowboy's Son

What she’d felt for Matt had only been lust. With Angus, it was different. They had respect and a deep affection. If her heart sometimes whispered that she wanted more than that, she ignored it.

Angus must have seen something disturbing on her face. He came away from the window and opened his arms. She rushed into them, burrowing against his big warm chest.

Hold me. Help me. Reassure me. I’m so scared.

“Why, Angus?” The question came out muffled, but she couldn’t pull away from him.

“Why what?” His voice echoed against her ear. “What’s got you so upset?”

“I don’t want Matt Long here.”

“Why not? I thought he was a friend of yours. I thought you’d be happy.”

“Why did you hire him?” she asked without answering his question.

“He owes me.”

Jenny pulled away to look at him. “Owes you? Because you were good to him when he was a teenager?”

“No. That was freely given. This is for paying the taxes on his land for five years while he was away. So he wouldn’t lose it.”

“You mean he still owns it?” That cabin she wanted to burn to the ground? The one that had witnessed the worst humiliation of her life? Part of her whispered, and the best night you ever had, but she suppressed it. The pain on the morning after had far outweighed the pleasure of the night before.

Angus nodded. “I’ve been paying his taxes, but now that you and I are getting married, I need to get my life in order. I’m organizing my finances and adding you and Jesse to my will.”

“So what if Matt owes you money? Why couldn’t he pay you back from Wyoming or wherever he was?”

Angus seemed puzzled by the stridency of her tone. “Ordinary is his home. He should have stayed here all along.”

He stepped away from her and led her down the hall to his office. “I’ll show you the paperwork. Matt’s going to work off what he owes me here on the ranch.”

“Didn’t you say once that he was doing well in the rodeo? Why can’t he pay you from his winnings?”

“He had an accident with a bull.”

What? Matt had been injured? By a bull? She’d always thought him…indestructible, but in confrontations between bulls and men, bulls always won. “How badly was he hurt?”

“Bad enough. Broken ribs. Ruptured spleen. Emergency surgery. His rodeo days are over for good. His winnings all went to pay his hospital bills.”

“You’ve been keeping track of Matt over the years?”

“Of course. He’s like a son to me.”

Angus sat at the desk while Jenny took a chair across from him. He stretched his arms and clasped his fingers behind his head.

“I don’t know what happened to make Matt leave Montana but he should have stayed and ranched that piece of land he owns.”

Jenny chewed on her lip.

Angus cast her a glance. “Looked like you two were fighting out there.” He gestured with his head toward the front of the house. “What was that about?”

She should tell him, now, while they were alone. It would take Angus only a fraction of a second to see the family resemblance when Matt and Jesse stood side by side. It was unfair to blindside him like that.

She took a deep breath and held it. Angus wouldn’t like this. Could she make him understand why she’d never told Matt about his son? Well enough that Angus wouldn’t hate her?

She couldn’t stand to lose his respect.

“I need to tell you something,” she said.

“Okay,” he murmured, sitting forward and releasing his hands.

“Matt is…” Oh, just spit it out and get it over with. “Matt is Jesse’s father.”

“Matt?” Angus fell back against his chair as if someone had hit him. His eyebrows nearly met his hairline. “Jesse’s father?”

“Yes,” she said. “Jesse is Matt’s son.”

“I never invaded your privacy, never asked who the father was,” he whispered, “but why didn’t you ever tell me this?”

Oh, Angus, don’t be disappointed in me. It hurts.

“Angus, I spend most days trying to forget it, forget that I ever had the poor judgment to get involved with him.”

Matt’s arrival on the Circle K changed so much for Jenny. Everything had been going along fine. She’d finally found the way to make her long-ago dreams of having a family and working the ranch she’d grown up on come true. She would finally have security for Jesse.

Angus scratched his head, as though he was having trouble taking it in. “I can’t believe Matt moved to Wyoming. Why didn’t he stay here and raise his boy?” His lips tightened. “I thought better of him.”

Angus stood and she reached a hand to stop him from leaving the room to hunt Matt down.

“I didn’t tell him.”

“What?”

Jenny stared down at her fist on her thigh, at the knuckles turning white, and whispered, “I never told him.”

Angus leaned forward to get a good look at her face. “Tell me I misheard you,” he said, his tone low and harsh.

“You didn’t.” She couldn’t meet his eyes. Sure, she’d had her reasons for not telling Matt, good ones, but Angus might not agree.

“You didn’t tell him he had a son and you don’t see what’s wrong with that?” The sharp edge of his voice grated on her skin. She’d never heard him so angry.

She lifted her chin defiantly. “No, I didn’t. I’m not proud of it, but I had to protect my son. I didn’t need Matt to be Jesse’s father. I didn’t want him to be.”

“Why not?”

“I couldn’t let him hang around for a couple of months or years and then abandon Jesse.”

“Matt is a better man than that.”