Laura reached for a piece of toast and took her coffee with her.

She had an hour before the first guests would arrive, and she was going to enjoy it with Cody and Johnny.

Johnny insisted on putting on his cowboy boots and his cowboy hat. He said that he wanted “to look just like Mr Masters.”

Oh, you do, my little boy. You do.

Laura walked past all the tables with Johnny. She had to admit everything looked beautiful. Where she would be sitting, at the head table, she’d have a perfect view of the barn. Maybe she could catch glimpses of Cody and Johnny during the riding lesson.

As Laura and Johnny approached the barn, Cody appeared, leading Pirate into the corral.

Johnny waved excitedly. “Hi, Mr Masters. Hi, Pirate.”

“Hello, son,” Cody replied, and Laura’s heart did a flip in her chest at that simple greeting, which had much more meaning now.

* * *

Gold Buckle Cowboys: They’ll steal your heart in eight seconds!

The Rancher’s Surprise Son

Christine Wenger

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHRISTINE WENGER has worked in the criminal justice field for more years than she cares to remember, but now she spends her time reading, writing and seeing the sights in our beautiful world. A native central New Yorker, she loves watching professional bull riding and rodeo with her favorite cowboy, her husband, Jim. You can reach Chris at PO Box 1823, Cicero, NY 13039, USA, or through her website at www.christinewenger.com.

For all cowboys and cowgirls everywhere—in the country, the suburbs and in the city.

(You know who you are!)

Contents

Cover

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

As far as Laura Duke knew, no Duke vehicle had ever left a tread on the Masters family’s Double M Ranch...until now.

It started out to be a perfectly normal day, whatever “normal” meant. Since nothing had been normal for the past several years, Laura was enjoying the quiet respite of visiting with her son Johnny’s babysitter, Cindy Masters, at the nearby Double M.

In a cloud of Arizona desert dust, one of the Duke Ranch’s white pickups came lumbering down the road.

“That looks like one of your trucks,” Cindy said. “I’ve always loved the crown on the side. I told my mom that the Double M needs a cool logo like yours.”

“A crown for a duke,” Laura answered. More like a king, she thought. Since my father rules the entire county.

Laura loved Cindy and so did Laura’s son, Johnny. Cindy was a wonderful babysitter, but Laura asked her to sit only when she was in a jam, like this Friday. She had to speak at an awards luncheon, and her parents would be out of town. Clarissa, Johnny’s nanny, had that day off.

“Sure. I’d love to watch Johnny again,” thirteen-year-old Cindy said. “He’s the cutest.”

Laura was relieved, but if her parents knew she was at the Double M and Cindy was babysitting Johnny, there’d be hell to pay.

Laura’s heart raced thinking that if her parents even suspected that she was good friends with Georgianna Masters, Cindy’s mom, and enjoyed her company, they’d really flip. Well, her mother would definitely flip, but her father seemed to have a well-hidden soft spot for Georgianna.

Still, Laura had her reasons for risking the wrath of her parents—good reasons—reasons that she’d been keeping to herself for a long time.

The screen door of the porch squeaked open, and Georgianna walked out onto the porch.

“Cody? Is that Cody coming in the Duke truck?” Georgianna asked, wiping her hands on a terry towel. “Oh, thank goodness. He’s finally here!”

The pickup was still making its way toward the front of the ranch house, and Laura found herself holding her breath.

Why on earth would Cody Masters be riding in a Duke truck?

More important, how did he get out of prison?

“Is it really him?” Cindy asked, straining her neck. “Three years. I haven’t seen my brother in three years.”

Three years and four days, to be exact.

Georgianna took Cindy’s hand. “It sure is Cody, sweetie. He’s home.”

Laura’s heart beat wildly in her chest. She felt warm, then chilled, then as if she was frying under the desert sun in spite of the shady roof overhead.

She knew that this day would come sooner or later and dreaded it—yet she couldn’t wait to see Cody again.

So many secrets. So many lies. So much heartbreak.

Georgianna and Cindy took off at a run to meet the truck.

Laura stayed in the shade, holding back. The scenario that she had planned when she first talked to Cody—really talked to Cody—seemed ridiculous now. She needed to think!

The pickup slowed, and then stopped. Laura willed herself to run, to hide, but she was rooted in that spot. She needed to delay seeing Cody until she had a better plan—and it sure as hell had better be a great one.

Procrastination might as well be her middle name.

Holding back, she mentally called herself a supreme coward, and watched as Cody swung his long legs from the passenger side of the pickup, stood, then swept his mother into his arms. He swung her in circles as she shrieked in happiness.

“Yee-haw!” Cody’s deep voice echoed across his mother’s little pie-slice of property that was smack-dab in the middle of the Duke holdings.

Cody finally put his mother down, walked over to Cindy and hugged her close. “How’s my little sis?”

“Oh, Cody! I’ve missed you. Have you been okay in jail? I mean, really okay? I can’t believe you wouldn’t let us visit you.”

“It wasn’t a place for ladies, but I loved your letters. I looked forward to them every day. You’re quite the writer.”

“I know,” Cindy said, grinning. “I want to be an author when I’m older.”

Cody kissed her on the forehead. “You can do whatever you want, sis. Don’t you ever think you can’t.”

Tears sprang to Laura’s eyes. She wished her family could be this close, but it never seemed that her father, the rich and powerful J. W. Duke, had time for her or her mother. The only one who he dropped everything for was her son.

She couldn’t stop staring at Cody. He looked older and pale. The slump in his shoulders made him seem...defeated, maybe. Or sad. Or maybe he was just tired.

The foreman of the Duke Ranch emerged from the driver’s side of the pickup. She’d always liked Slim Gonzalez. He was one of the few who could handle her father.

“I’m supposed to take Cody straight to the Duke Ranch,” he said with a slight accent. “But I thought he should stop here quickly to see his family and get a change of clothes.”

Cody clamped Slim’s shoulder. “Let me take a shower. I promise I’ll hurry. I need to get this jail stink off me. Por favor, mi amigo.”

“Okay,” Slim nodded. “But hurry up. Remember that you and I have an appointment with J.W. and your parole officer in J.W.’s office.”

Georgianna suddenly turned toward her. “Oh! I forgot. Laura is here.” She waved at her, and Laura lifted her hand in return.

“Hi, Cody. Welcome home,” Laura said, trying to keep her voice calm and even, but she could hear her anxiety in those four short words.

Cody turned toward her, and she knew the second his turquoise-blue eyes found her on the porch. Those eyes could turn as cold as the sky on a frosty day or as warm as a hot day in summer.

Today they were warm.

“Laura.” He smiled. “It’s really good to see you.”

She knew she was staring at him, but he was staring at her, too. He didn’t move, and didn’t say another word.

Laura remembered the shirt and suit that he was wearing now. He’d worn it on one of their last dates at the fancy restaurant in town and again on that horrible day in county court when he was sentenced and two burly deputies took him away in it.

It was way too big on him now.

Laura had never thought he was guilty, never. Her Cody wouldn’t hurt a fly. He was gentle with both animals and children, and he was sweet to Cindy and protective of Cindy and his mother.

But the criminal justice system proved her wrong and had found him guilty. Maybe it was because he wouldn’t defend himself, even when his public defender pointed out that he couldn’t provide him with adequate representation. Cody remained mute throughout the proceedings, insisting that he just wanted to plead guilty and do his time.

He’d gotten his wish. Now Cody was a felon. He’d been convicted of some kind of manslaughter for killing Georgianna’s second husband, Hank Lindy.

The same smarmy Hank Lindy who hit on her during a shopping trip to his store while he was married to Georgianna.

The slime. Of course, she never told Georgianna, but she had avoided Lindy like the Ebola virus.

In her heart of hearts, she still believed her Cody would never kill anyone, but she wanted to hear it from him—and soon. He just had to be protecting someone, but whom?

Just like before, Cody might not talk about what had happened that awful night when Hal Lindy had been fatally shot, even though Laura had begged him constantly to defend himself. All her pleas fell on deaf ears.

But now that he was released, maybe she could talk him into giving up his secrets.

Slim cleared his throat and broke the silence, along with their eye contact. “You’d better get a move on, Cody.”

Cody nodded and slipped one arm around his mother and the other around Cindy. Everyone would have to go past Laura to enter the ranch house. She couldn’t escape now.

Cody reached out and was about to touch her hair, but he stopped. “Laura, can you stay for a while? Can we talk?”

It’d been years since the prison officials took Cody away. No matter how much she begged, he wouldn’t put her on his visitors’ list. She wasn’t much of a letter writer, but she’d sent him one a week at first, telling him about how Georgianna and Cindy were doing, hoping to ease his mind about them.

But after a while, there was nothing she’d wanted to say, so she wrote less frequently.

God help her. She wanted to run to Cody and feel herself in his arms again. She’d always felt safe with him and always loved.

Safe? With a killer?

Instead, she shook her head and prayed that Slim wouldn’t tell her father that she’d been at the Double M. “Sorry, I have to get going.”

“Will I see you soon?” Cody asked quietly. “Our place?”

She nodded. He did the same. That was all she was going to get for now, and that simple gesture was all she could give in return.

Georgianna gave Laura a quick peck on the cheek. “Come and visit again,” she said, following Cody inside.

Cindy turned back and waved to her as she walked on the squeaky, splintered boards of the porch. “Bye, Laura. See you on Friday when you drop Johnny off.”

Laura’s breath caught in her throat at the mention of her son. She hoped Cody hadn’t heard what Cindy had said, not until she had a chance to think things through.

She’d thought she’d had another two years before she had to worry about telling Cody about Johnny.

But her time was up. Cody wasn’t stupid.

She was hard-pressed to make something positive out of this situation that had suddenly been thrust upon her. It was easier to procrastinate and believe that Cody’s felony conviction and incarceration hadn’t happened.

Laura waved goodbye to Cindy and noticed that Slim took a seat on the rocking chair on the porch to wait for him.

“Slim, what’s going on?” Laura asked when the Masters family was inside the ranch house. “I didn’t know that Cody was being released today.”

“I just found out, too. Your father apparently arranged for his early release. This morning he told me that Cody was going to get out early and to go pick him up at the correctional facility.”

“Wait a second.” Laura raised a hand like a traffic cop. “My father helped to get Cody out on parole?”

“Sí.”

“I don’t understand. My father was never a Cody Masters fan.”

Slim removed his straw hat and hung it on a knee. “That’s putting it mildly. All I know is that Georgianna Masters—er... I mean, Georgianna Lindy—paid the boss a visit, and soon the parole people were talking to J.W. So this morning, J.W. told me that after I pick Cody up, he’s going to be working at the Duke Ranch as part of his parole.”

Interesting, Laura thought. I wonder what Daddy is up to.

“But Cody’s own ranch needs a lot of work,” Laura said. “It’s been going downhill since he went to prison. He should be able to work his own property, not my father’s! Georgianna is struggling to keep it up herself, and Cindy has to go to school.”

“Cody’s worked both ranches before.” Slim shrugged. “And from what I understand, the wages that he earned at J.W.’s back then went toward fixing up the Double M. As long as prison didn’t break Cody’s back, he can do the same again.”

The Dukes had always had so much, and the Masters family barely scraped by. As far back as Laura could remember, it had been like that. To make things worse, her father enjoyed constantly riding Cody, telling him that he, Georgianna and Cindy would be better off if they sold their ranch back to J.W.

Maybe for once her father was right.

It’d be difficult avoiding Cody because, as exes, he knew they had things to discuss, but she’d have to avoid him as much as possible until she figured out a plan.

“Slim, what will his duties be?”

“According to J.W., I’m to treat him like a typical greenhorn. He can start by mucking out the stalls.”

Laura sighed. It wasn’t just Cody that her father disliked. It always stuck in his craw that Mike Masters, Cody’s father, had won his little pie-slice of land, along with a decaying farmhouse from J.W., in an all-night drunken poker game.

Subsequently, J.W. had devoted his life to getting the land back.

To that end, he was probably going to use Cody somehow. Maybe use him to influence Georgianna Masters to sell out. That was the kind of man J.W. was. It was his way or the highway.

Secrets. She’d have to keep hers as long as she could.

* * *

Cody shook off his rumpled suit and hurried into the shower, letting the water sluice over him. It couldn’t be hot enough, as far as he was concerned.

A private shower—what a luxury! He fingered the vinyl curtain with a school of tropical fish swimming over a coral reef. He laughed at the design on a curtain in the middle of the damn Arizona desert.

As the bathroom filled up with steam, he took a deep breath and poured shower gel all over himself. Then he found a pink loofah and scraped his skin with it until it tingled.

As soon as he had a block of time, he’d head up into the mountains—to Saguaro Canyon—and soak in the cold rushing water. He knew just the spot, too. It was a favorite of his and Laura’s.

They used to sit in the creek for hours at a time, his arm around her shoulders and her head on his chest. They’d relax in comfortable silence, just enjoying each other’s company. Sometimes they’d talk about the future. It had always been their dream that somehow he’d make his mark in the world and then he’d ask J.W. for her hand in marriage.

But now he was a jailbird, a convicted felon. No one in their right mind would hire him, much less let him marry their daughter, but he knew he’d made the right decision, and he’d have to live with the consequences.

He supposed he should be grateful that he had a paying job at J.W.’s ranch and that he got out of that hellhole earlier than he’d thought he would, even though he’d planned on serving his whole sentence. There were just some things that a man had to do to protect those he loved.

He soaped up again and kept scrubbing with the loofah. Then he washed his hair with mango-coconut shampoo that must have been his mother’s or sister’s, digging his fingernails into his scalp.

For the next several minutes, he just stood under the spray, letting the hot water cleanse his body, cleanse his soul.

With a sigh of regret, he turned it off.

He couldn’t stall any longer. He was burning daylight.

He’d just spent three years out of five for involuntary manslaughter, and he owed the parole system two more years. That meant two years working as an indentured servant for J. W. Duke.

In his wildest dreams, he could never imagine that he’d be working for J.W., and that he’d even pull some strings and get Cody out of jail early.

He sighed. The fact that his stepfather, Hank Lindy, would never hurt another woman again was one of the things that had made Cody’s incarceration tolerable. If there truly was a heaven and hell, Lindy’s soul was in the special kind of hell reserved for those who hit women, nearly killing them, and who preyed on young girls.

From all appearances, Hank Lindy, the owner of a feed and farm equipment store, was the epitome of a model citizen. That was the Lindy that his mother decided to marry. Cody never asked her if she’d really loved him, or just thought that he’d be generous and help get the Double M back into the black.

Georgianna had been very wrong.

While incarcerated, Cody had met a handful of genuinely great guys. Guilt, innocence or hard luck aside, they became his salvation. They got him through three damn years of hell, and he couldn’t have survived without them.

Nor could he have survived without the picture of Laura Duke that he’d taped to the filthy cinder-block wall in his cell. The picture reminded him of better times—riding horses with her through the fields, Laura cheering for him at high school football games, going with her to the junior and senior proms.

Of course, they’d had to sneak around to see each other, and Cody hated the deception, but J.W. had forbidden his beautiful daughter—his only child—to date him.

Even though they’d grown up next to one another and had gone to the same schools, Cody Masters had never been good enough for Laura in J.W.’s mind. He didn’t come from a well-off family and he wasn’t connected financially, socially or politically.

Then there was the fact that he was the son of Mike Masters.

The bad blood between J.W. and Mike Masters was legendary in Duke Springs. Rumor had it that years ago, J.W. wanted to marry Georgianna, but Mike had beat him to her. His mother always had a special feeling for J.W., Cody knew that, but she always denied that she would have married anyone but Mike Masters.

And when J.W. had lost the land in that drunken poker game and had wanted to buy it back throughout the years, well, their feud became epic.

Cody flashed back to the summer day, years ago, that he’d first worked up enough courage to ask Laura to go riding with him. He was about Cindy’s age at the time.

“Cody, I want to talk to you.” J.W. had sat him down on a hay bale in the barn and had pointed a finger at him. “You have nothing to offer Laura. I don’t want you to knock on the door of my house until you do, and even then, I might not open it to you. And if I find that you are sneaking around behind my back with her...well, you’d better be prepared for the consequences.”

But he’d gone against J.W.’s wishes and went behind his back to see Laura, just as he always had. In school, it was easy. Out of school, they both had to be even sneakier, and it went against his moral grain.

He remembered moving Laura into her dorm room at the University of Arizona in Phoenix. She’d been excited and eager to start her new life away from the Duke Ranch and away from her father’s immediate control. She’d had the sweet taste of freedom on her soft, warm lips and hot body, and they’d made love for the first time.

It was a day he’d never forget.

And he’d never forget today, either, seeing Laura for the first time in three years. Damn, she looked better than ever. She’d let her blond, silky hair grow and it fell over her shoulders in shades of gold. Shiny bangs tickled her eyebrows, but it was her eyes that told him everything. As he passed by, they looked him over, from the top of his cowboy hat to the bottom of his old boots and the silly suit he wore. He could see the sadness in her eyes.

Did she still love him?

Her letters had been his lifeline. At first, she’d written him every day, begging him to let her visit him, but he steadfastly refused. He didn’t want her to see him in there, but more importantly, he was afraid that she’d catch him at a weak moment, and he’d spill his guts.

She’d been mad, and her letters only came once a week. She claimed that she was hurt and claimed that there was nothing happening to tell him.

He always wrote her back immediately, but he’d sent the letters to the Double M. He knew that his mother would see that Laura got them, just as sure as he knew that J.W. or Laura’s mother, Penny, would destroy them.

He and Laura had made such wonderful plans for their future, but there was no chance now, no future for them.

He didn’t want to saddle Laura with a jailbird.

Before everything happened, they’d had plans to leave Duke Springs and relocate to escape the long-reaching claws of J.W.

As he toweled himself off, Cody looked out the window. His gaze was drawn to the logo of the Duke Ranch on the side of the white pickup. J.W. had a fleet of new white vehicles. The Double M had a beat-up ten-year-old Dodge Ram that was on a respirator. Once red, it was now pink from sunburn.

Cody stared at the crown—a perfect representation of J.W.’s character. Along with the Duke Ranch, the man owned all of Duke Springs—the bank, some clothing and shoe stores, the grocery, the feed and tractor store. Everything was a spoke in J.W.’s far-reaching wheel.

Everything, except the Double M.

As Cody slipped into a pair of worn jeans he’d found in his dresser and an equally worn black T-shirt, he found himself itching to get back to ranch work. But he wished it was his own property that he’d be working on. The Duke Ranch wasn’t where he wanted to be. Not today. Not any day.

He had to admit that at the Duke Ranch, he could see Laura from time to time. That was something to look forward to, but they’d have to be careful and tiptoe around so they could talk, catch up and maybe salvage some of their plans.

That is, if Laura still wanted him. He couldn’t read her today. She seemed shocked to see him. Hadn’t J.W. told Laura that her father had helped to get Cody paroled?

He wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t want anything to do with him. At the start of his incarceration, her letters told him that she still loved him, but the frequency of her letters had faded. When she did write him, it was mostly about his mother and sister and nothing personal about Laura herself.

He told himself for the hundredth time that Laura must have moved on and that anything between them was over.

He didn’t blame her one bit. He’d told her to forget him and find someone else.

But damn, he’d really hoped she hadn’t listened to him.

Chapter Two

“Laura’s little boy, Johnny, is a hoot. He’s going to be quite the cowboy when he grows up.” Slim Gonzalez handed Cody a pitchfork later that afternoon in one of the huge barns on the Duke Ranch. “You should see the little guy on his pony, Pirate.”

Cody’s mouth went dry. He plopped down on a hay bale before he fell over. Grabbing a bottle of cold water from his small cooler, he took a long draw, then poured the rest over the back of his neck.

Cody turned toward Slim and braced himself. He wanted—no, needed—more information.

“Laura has a son?” Cody’s heart thumped as he spoke to Slim and one of the other Duke Ranch hands listened in. “Tell me more.”

“His name is Johnny. He’s three, maybe almost four years old.”

Why didn’t she wait for me?

Cody took another long drink. He didn’t want to ask his next question, but he had to know. “Did Laura get married?”

“To a guy she met at college. From what I hear, it didn’t last long. Too bad. She deserves more.”

Cody tried to let that all sink in. Laura got married and had a son with her husband. He fumed at another man touching her, making love to her.

He’d always thought of Laura as his. She gave her virginity to him in her small dorm room on a twin bed, and she’d told him that she’d loved him since first grade. He’d echoed that same statement, and told her that someday he’d make her father proud. Someday he’d make something out of himself and could date her out in the open, not sneak around behind J.W.’s back.

It was selfish of him, but even when he told her to forget him—to find someone else—he’d hoped like hell that Laura would wait for him until he was released from prison. Three years was probably a long time, but here he was, ready to pick up where they’d left off.

Shoot. She must have found someone right away.

For a second, he wondered if the little boy was his, but then shrugged it off. In her letters, Laura certainly would have told him that he was going to be a father. Wouldn’t she? Of course she would!

Cody couldn’t wait to see Laura alone and ask her about the college dude. He wondered if she was divorced or still married to the guy.

Dammit, why the hell did she marry someone else?

He had to leave, get out of here. The huge barn felt as small as his jail cell. He jogged outside and sat on an overturned barrel behind the building, gulping the hot desert air.

Where was Laura? He had to talk to her.

* * *

Laura, her mother, J.W. and Johnny sat on designer chairs on the flagstone patio that was surrounded on three sides by the wings of the Duke ranch house. They were shaded from the hot sun by a large pergola, rich with bright fuchsia bougainvillea and surrounded by natural desert flora and fauna.

Laura loved moments like this—nice and easy, when she could enjoy the company of her family—that was, until someone started a fight.

She took a tray from Clarissa, Johnny’s nanny and all-around helper, which contained a frosty blown-glass pitcher and four matching pale green glasses that she’d bought on a trip to Mexico. Laura had always loved the set, and liked looking at the tiny bubbles that seemed to be trapped inside the thick glass.

“Thanks, Clarissa,” Laura said then turned to her father. “I hear you hired Cody Masters, Dad.”

He took the pitcher from the tray and poured the lemonade into a glass. “News travels fast.”

“Did you also help him get out on parole?” Laura asked, trying to be nonchalant.

“I did.” He tickled Johnny, and the laughing boy climbed out of his booster seat and got comfortable on his grandfather’s lap. J.W. hugged him tightly.

Johnny just adored his grandfather, and Laura could tell by J.W.’s various questions and comments to the boy that the man was training him to take over the Duke Ranch.

Johnny was the son that J.W. had never had.

“What your father didn’t tell you was that Georgianna Lindy walked over here and asked him to get Cody out.” Her mother glared at J.W. “The man killed someone, and your father gets him out of jail because she came and smiled at him.”

Her mother’s old wounds never healed. Penelope Belcher Duke had always despised Georgianna Masters Lindy. The story went way back and added to the long discord between J.W. and Mike Masters.

The truth was that J.W. loved Georgianna first, but she’d picked Mike Masters over him, and Penny never stopped feeling like second best.

“That’s enough, Penny,” J.W. said between gritted teeth.

“Grandpa, can I ride Pirate now?” Johnny asked.

“No. Not right now, honey,” Laura answered. “It’s time for your nap.”

“Grandpa, I want to ride my horse!”

“Aw, Laura, let the boy ride. He’s a genuine Duke,” J.W. said. “He loves horses.”

“As opposed to a counterfeit Duke?” Laura said under her breath. “Dad, remember that I’m Johnny’s mother, and what I say goes. Please don’t interfere.”

“Oh, all right,” J.W. snapped at her, then turned to Johnny and tickled him. “Do what your mother says.” J.W. lifted Johnny and set him on the flagstones. “Take your nap, partner, and then you can ride your horse.”

Just as Laura stood up to take Johnny to his bedroom, Clarissa appeared and extended her hand. With a glance back at J.W., Johnny put his hand in Clarissa’s. “I’ll be right back, Grandpa.”

J.W. grinned and lit a cigar. “Sweet dreams, Johnny.”

Sweet dreams? Too bad she’d never heard J.W. say that to her when she was Johnny’s age. Laura followed Clarissa and Johnny toward the ranch house, feeling like a third wheel.

J.W. reached out and clasped Laura’s wrist. “Wait a minute. I want to talk to you,” her father said in the gruff tone he reserved for Laura and her mother.

“Yes?” Laura anticipated a pounding headache and sat back down. She looked to her mother for assistance, but Penny was busy typing something on her cell phone.

J.W. took a long pull on his cigar and blew a stream of stinky smoke into the bougainvillea. “I want to talk to you about Cody Masters.”

“I figured you would, sooner or later.” Laura knew the drill. “I’ll avoid him as much as I can, Dad, but what do you want me to do? Cody’s working here at the ranch, and I live and work here. I take Johnny to the barn to ride and out for walks. I’m bound to run into Cody.”

“You know what I mean.”

“You’ve been telling me the same thing since I was a kid. Cody Masters isn’t your enemy. Even Mike Masters wasn’t your enemy. He was your good friend at one time.” She turned to her mother. “Georgianna Masters was your friend at one time, too.”

“That was long ago.” Penny never looked up from her cell phone.

“Life is short.” Laura tapped a finger on the patio table. “All the more reason why you should mend fences.”

“Georgianna’s the one who should mend her fence. It looks horrible. It’s all falling apart.”

That was her mother’s attempt to change the subject and zing Georgianna at the same time, but Laura wasn’t going to fall for it.

“Mom, stop.”

“It’s not my fault that she can’t afford to keep up her so-called ranch!” her mother said.

J.W. put his cigar down. “That’s enough, Penny.”

“Not before I remind you that we lost that land because you got drunk and failed to win a poker game against Mike Masters. I still can’t believe it.”

Same old same old.

Her mother never missed an opportunity to bring up J.W.’s fateful Texas Hold ’em game thirty-something years ago. It was like a recording that played ad nauseam.

A bell on Penny’s cell phone rang, indicating a text message. Penny picked up the phone, punched some buttons and read the screen.

Her mother had always been unhappy, and a lot of it had to do with the Masters family, but even more had to do with J.W. Laura always wondered why her mother didn’t just didn’t pack up and leave, but Laura knew that Penny just loved being the Lady Astor of Duke Springs.

Penny pointed at the Double M, just beyond the tree line to the west of the ranch house. “That place is an eyesore.”

“Mom, maybe she doesn’t have the money or the help to fix it up.”

J.W. rolled his cigar tip on the lip of an ashtray. “Then she should sell it back to me. Matter of fact, I suggested that when she came to see me about getting Cody out.”

Laura’s stomach lurched. She knew the power that J.W. wielded. “Dad, you didn’t get Cody out on the condition that Georgianna sell the Double M to you, did you?”

Penny’s face lit up like a Christmas tree. “Did you do that, J.W.?”

He took a long draw on his cigar. “I have some scruples, no matter what you both think.”

Laura’s face flushed with guilt. Her parents didn’t have a clue that the Duke Foundation had provided Georgianna with money to do some repairs to her ranch house.

And Laura was in charge of the Duke Foundation!

There would be hell to pay if one of them ever found out, but Laura was satisfied that she’d covered her tracks. Also, Georgianna didn’t know that she was getting Duke money, or she’d definitely have refused it. Laura convinced Georgianna that she was receiving grant money earmarked for the preservation of historic ranches, and the Double M qualified.

Stubbornness. Who needed it?

Laura shifted in her chair. She didn’t like all the deception, but what else was she to do? She wanted to help Georgianna. Indirectly, she was helping Cody and Cindy.

“Cody’s back, so he’ll help his mother get the ranch going.”

“Oh no he won’t. I’ll keep him so busy, he won’t have time to work his ranch,” J.W. hissed.

“Dad, how can you be so hateful?”

“The boy will be so damn exhausted, he’ll realize that he can’t handle both.”

Laura felt tears of frustration stinging her eyes. “He’ll quit here to work the Double M. I would.”

“But he can’t.” J.W. grinned, balancing his cigar between his teeth. “It’s a condition of his parole that he works here. I own him for two years. If he screws up his job at my ranch, he goes back to prison.”

Penny reached over the table and placed her hand on J.W.’s. Her bright red, glittery nail polish gleamed in the light. “Now, that’s the J.W. that I know! Cody certainly will fail. Georgianna will have no choice but to sell.”

“That’s my plan,” J.W. said, reveling in Penny’s admiration. Laura knew that he didn’t get much of that from her, so he aspired to get attention and adoration from his peers and maybe from some of his ranch hands.

Laura stood. “I can’t believe how cruel you both are. Cody will collapse with all the work he’ll try to do. And where will Georgianna and Cindy live if you take away their home? How can you both plan something like that? Forget the stupid poker game. Forget about the Double M. Put up a fifty-foot fence if it bothers you to look at it, for heaven’s sake.”

Her headache was in full force and the lemonade sat sour in her stomach. How could her parents be so loving with Johnny and so hateful to the Masters family?

* * *

Laura walked toward the barn. Maybe she’d run into Cody, or at least catch a quick glimpse of him. They had so much to talk about, but first she had to warn him about her father’s plan to work him to death with the hope that Cody would fail.

Although he had probably figured that out already.

She thought about her mother. Why couldn’t Penny be more like Georgianna Masters Lindy? She was the grandmotherly type: loving, nurturing and so sweet to Johnny. Whenever she brought him over, Georgianna spoiled him too much—but in a good way. Laura had no doubt that Penny loved Johnny, but she didn’t really show him. Laura sniffed. That was how she had been raised—at arm’s length. Why should she expect anything more from her mother?

Cody and Cindy both showed love and care to Georgianna. They were three of the best people she knew. Cody and Cindy would do anything for Georgianna, and she’d do anything for them.

Laura had never been sure that her parents loved her. Her father had wanted a son to carry on the Duke Ranch legacy, so her gender was a strike against her. Instead of teaching her the ins and outs of running the ranch, her father had made sure that she did so-called “girl things” in school: ballet, baton, cheerleading. And he brought in people to give her facials, and then there were personal shoppers, and yoga instructors to teach her how to relax, but she was bored out of her mind.

J.W. was convinced that his own mother, her grandma Sarah, died from overwork. He often told stories that when his parents, Sarah and Walter Anthony Duke, first came to Duke Springs and farmed and made a ranch out of the Arizona dust, the work just killed her.

It didn’t matter that Sarah died at age sixty from cancer. J.W. was convinced that it was the hard work that killed her.

J.W. took that original ranch and made it into the showplace that it was today through his own hard work and determination. He hadn’t wanted Penny to work the land, cattle and horses as he had. Instead, he insisted that she occupy her time opening dress shops and gift shops—ladies’ shops. Still, he didn’t want his “two ladies”—neither Penny nor Laura—to ever remember how the original Duke Ranch had begun.

Laura had wanted to learn how the ranch operated, and wanted J.W. to teach her. They’d fought and fought over the years, with her father insisting that she do “woman things” instead. Fighting over this had stopped when she had Johnny. J.W. wanted a rough-and-ready boy that he could train to take over the Duke Ranch, and that was going to be her son.

Laura knew that she had to keep Johnny—and herself—away from J.W. a bit so he would not completely take over their lives.

And when she wanted to use her degree in finance to work on Wall Street, J.W. asked her if she’d run the Duke Foundation instead. He didn’t want her in New York City because he’d preferred his grandson right by his side so he could make Johnny into the next version of himself.

Over her dead body.

It wasn’t exactly brain surgery to give away money and let the world know that J. W. Duke was benevolent.

Actually, he was! She’d insisted that she had to live away from the ranch house, so J.W. built a cottage on the property for her and Johnny. All right, she could save money that way.

So, she’d stayed in Duke Springs, not because J.W. had asked her to, but because she’d thought that Johnny should know his family—and that included Georgianna and Cindy.

Family was everything, and she’d wanted family around Johnny.

As she walked, she remembered the original Big Upheaval. That was when she’d sat her parents down one day in the family room and told them that she was pregnant by a man at college.

Then she’d braced herself for their barrage of questions. Yes, they eloped to Vegas. No, she wasn’t going to tell them his name, but he was out of the picture. Yes, she would raise their grandson alone if she wasn’t welcome at home. Yes, she’d filed for divorce.

The fact that she purposely said the word grandson had mellowed J.W. considerably. Telling him that she was going to name the boy John Wayne Duke after him had J.W. purring like a kitten.

Laura had told them point-blank that she’d move and take Johnny away if they tried to find Johnny’s father—that he wasn’t in the picture at present.

But they still brought it up from time to time, and always a fight ensued.

She’d given serious thought to moving away from Duke Springs after one nasty fight with her parents that had to do with her getting support for Johnny from the man they referred to as her “college husband.” Even though they believed he had run out on her, they insisted that he should be held responsible.

She told them adamantly that she wasn’t going to pursue financial support and that she could provide for Johnny herself. Even when J.W. ordered her to give up his name so he could sic his lawyers on her “college husband,” Laura kept reiterating that she didn’t want to talk about it, or that she would move and take Johnny with her.

That never failed to quiet them down—for a while, at least.

Finally, after a particularly overwhelming fight, she’d made up a name with more vowels than consonants, and said that Johnny’s father had moved to Dubai, that he wanted Johnny and her to move there to live with him.

Her parents had never brought the subject up again.

Laura stopped and looked around at the extensive Duke Ranch that went on as far as the eye could see. Little did her parents know, she could never take Johnny from them now. The little guy would miss his horse, miss the beautiful pool, the big playground made just for him and the ranch hands that just adored him. She could never take him away from her parents, from Georgianna and Cindy and now Cody.

Cody had yet to meet Johnny.

She wiped the moisture off her face with a handkerchief, took a breath and resumed her walk to the barn. To escape the tension at home and the tension churning inside her, she visited Georgianna and Cindy Masters as much as she could. It was calm at the Double M, like shelter in the middle of a storm.

* * *

As Laura turned right to the path that led to the barn, she had to admit yet again that the Duke Ranch was breathtaking in size and scope. It was surrounded by several mountain ranges, and she loved the huge saguaros that lifted their arms to the sky. She loved the lumpy prickly pear cactus with their red berries on top and the coo of the mourning doves.

The horses and cattle that dotted the hills and valleys of the ranch were prime stock, and she enjoyed looking at them.

She thought she’d seen Cody go behind the barn. Maybe, just maybe, they could have a quick conversation. She hurried down the path, watchful of her mother and father.

She needed to see him, touch him and run her fingers through his pitch-black hair that was a bit too long. She wanted to feel the warmth of his skin and feel safe and secure in his arms once again. She wanted to breathe in the special scent that was his and his alone.

It had been a long three years.

When the judge gave him five years for involuntary manslaughter, Laura gasped. Cody turned to her and said that he’d be all right.

Then she’d hurried to the ladies’ room and vomited.

Walking around to the back of the barn, she saw Cody. He was just...pacing.

He must have sensed that someone was near, as he whirled around, poised for fight or flight.

“Laura?” he whispered. “Damn, don’t sneak up on me like that!” He dropped his hands, hands that probably had defended him in prison. “Laura, I’m so sorry...”

Tears sprung to her eyes. “Cody. I—I... You— I...”

“I’ve missed you, too.” They always could finish each other’s sentences. “How’ve you been? You look...even more beautiful than...”

“I wish you would have let me visit you.”

“I didn’t want you to see me in there.”

Laura couldn’t wait any longer. She ran toward Cody, and he enveloped her in his strong arms.

Finally!

“Aw...don’t cry.”

“I’ve missed you, Cody. So very much.”

“What about your husband?”

She went stiff in his arms. “How do you know about him?”

“It seems to be common knowledge among the ranch hands.”

“I don’t want to talk about that now, Cody. Just hold me.”

“And you have a son?”

She moved back, out of his arms. She wanted to talk about her son, but not just yet; she just wanted Cody to hold her, to get to know him again. “His name is Johnny.”

“Johnny.” Cody nodded. “What’s his last name?”

“Johnny Duke. I named him Duke.”

“Did his father like that?”

“His father wasn’t around when he was born, so I gave him my last name.”

“I see.”

“Cody, I have so much to tell you.”

He looked at the mountains in the distance as if lost in his own thoughts. “I told you not to wait for me, but I was hoping you would.”

“Let’s not talk about that now.” She touched his arm. “Let’s meet. Usual place. Usual signal. Tonight. Okay?”

“I’ll be there.”

“Johnny and I are living in a cottage that’s to the left of the main house. The window on the right will be our signal now.”

Their sign was always the half-open shade of her right bedroom window in the main house.

Actually, since the date he was sentenced, she’d never pulled the shade down on her bedroom in her cottage again. It was always raised because she was always waiting for Cody.

She’d have to be careful. She didn’t want her parents, especially J.W., to find out that she was meeting him. It would be a disaster.

Besides, she didn’t want to give her father any reason to send Cody back to prison.

Chapter Three

Cody slowly walked back to the remuda barn, which housed the mounts—mostly quarter horses—of the ranch hands and the Duke family.

He might as well get back to work and think about what he would say to Laura tonight without putting her on the defensive.

He probably blew it with his pointed questions, but they didn’t have time for a lot of polite conversation.

He looked over into the stall of Johnny’s horse, Pirate, a cute little black-and-white pinto pony. He could almost picture Laura’s son sitting in the tiny saddle as she led the horse around the paddock.

Cody wondered if the boy looked like her.

The Duke Ranch had four more barns with twenty stalls each, most of which housed prize Arabians, the best of which belonged to J.W.

The Dukes boarded Arabians for others and had an indoor and outdoor show ring for dressage competitions, auctions and some smaller rodeo events. The Duke Arabians attracted interest from all over the world, and “special visitors” were housed in guesthouses on the property.

He could never give something like this to Laura.

The fancy Arabian barns had their own staff for mucking out stalls and keeping everything spotless, but Cody knew that he’d be expected to fill in as needed. Or maybe not. If it got around that he’d murdered someone, even if they knew it was done to defend his family, it might send the exclusive clientele galloping away faster than their horses.

The thought of gathering a quarter ton of manure this afternoon with a pitchfork and shovel, loading it onto the honey wagon that was attached to a powerful ATV truck and then dumping it bored Cody to no end. He’d rather be training J.W.’s magnificent horses.

Cleaning the stalls was backbreaking work, but he was up for it. Yet he kept looking up at the ranch house, hoping to catch a glimpse of Laura. There was quite a distance from the patio to the remuda barn, but he could spot her anywhere. Laura had a special walk, a kind of bounce in her step, and she always held her head high. Wherever she went, people gravitated to her sunny nature and quick smile. Her eyes sparkled as if she knew a special secret—a good secret—that she was just dying to tell.

But he hadn’t seen that Laura yet. She’d appeared briefly at the Double M this afternoon when she’d first seen him, but then that Laura had faded almost immediately.

Obviously, his questions bothered her, but at least she was going to meet him at the creek tonight.

He wanted to find out everything she’d been doing for the past three years, no matter how trivial or insignificant she might think it was. Just the sound of her voice would calm him, might convince him that they’d someday have a chance together again.

And what about the college guy? Did he visit Johnny? Did he take him riding and play with him?

He and Laura had been talking about running away together since high school, but it had been only a hopeful dream. With his mother and Cindy needing him, he couldn’t have just up and left.

Georgianna had married Hank Lindy, thinking that they’d all be financially secure forever. His mother assured Cody that Hank would be a good partner for her. He made her laugh. He owned the Duke Springs Tractor and Feed store, and wooed Georgianna with expensive gifts—not jewelry, but farm equipment and feed and grain for the ranch. She was enthralled with Lindy, who had been wonderful and attentive to Cindy...until that fateful night when he stepped over the line and began to knock his mother around until he drew blood.

Then Lindy was going to start with Cindy.

What a beast Lindy had turned out to be, and he’d ruined all their lives.

His and Laura’s hopeful dreams had turned into a hopeless mess.

Cody shook off the bad memories and drove the honey wagon to the manure pile, more like a manure mountain, and unloaded, then went back to reload.

Slim whistled sharply and motioned for him to hurry. Cody jogged over to him. “What’s up?”

“You’re supposed to meet with your parole officer and J.W. in J.W.’s office.” Slim lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. “He wants to see you immediately.”

Cody had expected a summons sooner or later, but was hoping that it would be later.

“Where?” Cody knew that J.W. had an office at the ranch house. If the meeting was to be there, maybe he could see Laura again.

“In A-2.”

Cody forgot that J.W. had another office in the Arabian-2 barn, which was far from the ranch house.

“I’m on my way.” Cody hurried away from the smoke of Slim’s cigarette and headed down the gravel path leading to A-2.

Cody was in no rush to talk to J.W. or hear about his conditions of parole again from his parole officer. He was instructed on each of them at length before he was released from prison.

He slowed his progress through the desert to J.W.’s office, hoping that his new parole officer would be a decent guy and easygoing. As he walked, he enjoyed the occasional rush of a family of quails in front of him, as well as the dash of a roadrunner.

It was a great day to be free, and it’d be a great night with Laura.

Hawks looped above, black feathery kites against the turquoise sky. He’d like nothing better than to take a long hike through the mountains and connect with the land again. He’d missed being able to do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted to do it.

Freedom would take some getting used to, but then again, he still was tethered to J. W. Duke.

On the left side of the low, grayish barn, the door to J.W.’s office was open, but Cody knocked on the door anyway. No one answered, so he paused in the doorway, taking in the scene before him.

J. W. Duke sat in an oversize black leather chair behind a huge, gleaming desk. J.W. was bigger than life and so was his gut. An unlit cigar stub stuck out of the corner of his mouth, and he was shouting into the phone in his usual gruff voice.

J.W. motioned for Cody to take a chair in front of him, but Cody decided to wait outside instead. He couldn’t stand breathing in the same air as J.W. any longer than he had to.

“Masters, I’m ready for you!” J.W. bellowed, slamming down the phone.

“I’m here. No need to yell.”

“Take a seat.” J.W. didn’t even glance up at him.

“I’ll stand.” Cody didn’t want to sit in front of the oak desk as if the other man was his parole officer.

Where was his parole officer anyway?

Although Cody should be grateful for whatever J.W. did to get him out of prison, he didn’t want J.W. adding his own spin to his conditions of release.

“Suit yourself, but at least stand where I can see you.”

Cody walked to the front of the desk. He liked this vantage point, looking down on J.W. as the man often did to others. The only other man who had always stood toe to toe, belly to belly with J.W. was Mike Masters, Cody’s father. The two had had a dislike/respect relationship, if such a thing could exist.

“I thought my parole officer was going to be here,” Cody said.

“Something came up. He won’t be at our little meeting.” J.W. looked him over, then chomped down on his cigar stub. “You got skinnier in jail.”

“Not a lot of good food in prison, but I’m sure you didn’t bring me here to talk about my diet. Why did you bring me here?”

“What do you mean? Bring you to the Duke Ranch or to my office?”

“Both.”

J.W. grunted. “I brought you here to work your ass off and to try and convince you every damn day to sell your sorry ranch to me.”

“I figured as much.”

“And all you have to do is give me a reason, and I’ll send you back to do your other two years with a smile on my face.”

Cody grunted. “I figured that, too.”

“And no one else is going to give you a job, and you can’t leave the county.”

Cody shrugged. “Why isn’t anyone going to give me a job?” He knew the answer to that, but he wanted to hear it from J.W.

“Because I’ll blacklist you, and because you’re a murderer.”

“I pled to involuntary manslaughter. Not murder.”

“I don’t care what fancy thing you call it. Your stepfather turned up dead, cowboy.”

Cody made as if he was checking his watch, a watch he’d pawned years ago. “Are we almost done here? I have manure that I’d rather shovel.”

“I’m not done yet.” J.W. took his unlit cigar out of his mouth and set it down on a stack of papers. He pointed his index finger toward Cody’s face. “If I catch you near my daughter or my grandson, I’ll find a way to send you back. I don’t care what I have to do. I have twenty hands who’d swear to whatever I told them to say.”

“I’m bound to run into Laura and your grandson. It’s a small world, Duke, and I’m working here. What do you want me to do?”

“Run—don’t walk—the other way.” J.W. snapped his fingers, then spoke as if he were thinking out loud. “I could always send them both to my sister Betty’s in Boston. There’s a nice military school nearby for Johnny when he gets older.”

Cody remained silent until he said, “All this is about you getting the Double M?”

“Mostly.”

“What’s the rest of it, Duke?”

“That’s Mr. Duke to you, convict.” The cigar stub returned to his mouth, and he picked up the stack of papers, tapping them on the desk to straighten them. “We’re done here. Get back to work.”

Outside, the wind had kicked up and so had the dirt, but it was still better than being cooped up with J.W. Cody lowered his hat and bent his head to shield his eyes and nose.

Slim met him in the barn just as he was about to pick up the pitchfork.

“Go home, Cody. You’re off the clock.”

“What?”

“That’s enough for your first day. Hit the trail.”

“Thanks, Slim.”

“Do me a favor and hurry. I don’t want J.W. to see you leaving, so while he’s at A-2, take off.”

Cody slapped his friend on the back and hurried off to the fence line to cut through to the Double M. He couldn’t help looking back at the ranch house to see if there was the usual signal from Laura.

The shade on her right window was open halfway, but she didn’t live there anymore. Now, he’d have to look at her cottage for their signal to meet.

Both shades were open. Laura still wanted to meet him tonight at their usual spot.

God help him, he was going to be there.

* * *

Laura flinched when she thought of the horrible discussion she’d had with her mother at lunch. Thank goodness Johnny wasn’t there to hear what had transpired.

Mike Masters, J. W. Duke, Georgianna and Penny had once been friends who did everything together. Then the page had turned, and the two women soured on each other, then the two men. No. Maybe it was the other way around.

“Mother, that’s unkind,” Laura had said after her mother’s particularly venomous outburst about Georgianna. “You have no right saying things like that about her or anyone else, for that matter. What are you thinking?”

Penny was silent for a while, then snapped, “No right? You don’t know what you’re talking about. I have every right.”

“Mother, that’s ancient history, for heaven’s sake. And you’re still not over it?”

“I never will get over it. I loved Mike Masters back then, and Georgianna took him away from me. She said she was pregnant, so he had to marry her. But she wasn’t. That was a dirty trick.”

Laura sighed. She’d heard this all before, several times.

“But you ended up loving Dad and marrying him.”

“But it was still a dirty trick. And Cody is the son of the man who got away.”

“And you got stuck with a daughter when you and Dad both wanted a son.”

Her mother furrowed her brows. “We love you. That’s why we want the best for you, and Cody Masters isn’t the one for you.”

“Mom, why can’t you let me be the judge of that? And why can’t you just let the past go? It all worked out, and everyone married who they loved...eventually.”

Penny stared in the direction of the Double M. “And then Georgianna went and married that crazy Lindy guy. Too bad she didn’t get a dime after Cody killed him.”

“Cody didn’t do it! I know he didn’t.”

“So what did he spend three years in prison for? Jaywalking?”

“Mom, I know Cody didn’t do anything wrong. He wouldn’t hurt a fly.” Laura felt a pang of guilt. In her heart of hearts, did she really know that?

Penny’s fist came down on the table. “Don’t you dare try to defend Cody. He was found guilty in court. He went to prison. And as we always told you, you can do better than Cody Masters. And if I find that you’ve been seeing him, I’m going to file for custody of Johnny due to the fact that your judgment is impaired and that makes you an unfit mother. I don’t want Johnny in the company of a murderer.”

Stay away from Cody.

Cody will never amount to anything.

He’ll never be more than dirt poor, scratching out a living.

She’d heard it numerous times in her life, but that didn’t keep her and Cody from becoming friends, then lovers.

But this time, her parents had more ammunition. Cody was a murderer.

I’ll file for custody of Johnny...unfit mother.

“Don’t you dare do such a thing. You couldn’t be that cruel.”

“I can and I will. And you won’t be living here on the ranch anymore.”

Laura bit her tongue from screaming at her mother—it wouldn’t do any good—but before she changed her mind, she turned and walked away. She didn’t want her mother to see her cry. She had to be strong—like a Duke should.

Then she’d regroup and come up with a plan.

This time, the stakes were higher. Laura knew that she shouldn’t dare meet Cody, but she couldn’t help herself—and she needed to find out the truth from him.

* * *

Cody paced by the stream that ran from high in the mountains down to the boundary between the Double M and the Duke ranches. Now, during the monsoon season, spring to September, it could turn into a raging torrent of water. However, now, during the beautiful month of July, it was reduced to a stream—until the next monsoon.

He took a seat on his usual rock, but kept his flashlight on so he could see Laura approaching and she could see him. He didn’t like her having to come out this late at night. She could come face-to-face with coyotes or wolves or any of the nocturnal animals of the desert, any of which could be deadly.

Laura was an Arizona ranch gal, however. She’d carry a gun, especially at night, and had a knife in her boot at all times.

Cody was forbidden to carry a weapon. It was a condition of his parole that he couldn’t. He was a convicted felon now, so he’d lost that right. He’d also lost the right to vote and who knew what the hell else.

He smiled, thinking that Laura would have to protect him. Then he frowned, feeling like half a man for the same reason.

The sound of gravel being scraped snapped him to attention. He stood, almost falling over in his haste.

“Cody?”

“Laura?”

“Yes.”

Cody sloshed through the stream in his haste to get her into his arms. She was running, too, and didn’t seem to care a whit if her expensive boots got wet and muddy. They embraced in the middle of the water.

“Laura... Laura.” He couldn’t hold her tight enough.

“I know. I know.”

He buried his face in the curve of her neck and inhaled her perfume. He was expecting gardenia, and he wasn’t disappointed. It was her scent.

When they kissed, Cody felt as if he’d really come home. Home was Laura.

Their kiss was tentative at first, just a taste, but then he couldn’t help himself. He pulled her toward him and when his lips finally touched hers, he released all his frustration, all his loneliness and all his longing for a future with this remarkable woman.

Her straight hair, like spun gold in the moonlight, brushed his arm, and he couldn’t stop touching it, threading it through his fingers to enjoy its silkiness.

Cody kissed her forehead, her eyebrows and her neck. Then did it all over again. His hands ran over her back, her shoulders—wherever he could reach without releasing her from his arms, just to make sure she was real.

“You feel so good. Do you still love me, Laura?”

“Of course, Cody. Of course!” She covered him with kisses, devoured his lips, lifted his T-shirt and ran her hands over his chest.

He was ready and certainly willing to make love to her, but alarms went off in his head. He shouldn’t even be here, nor should Laura. To make love with her would be...heaven...but maybe now wasn’t a good time.

Cody suspected that there wasn’t going to be a good time in their future.

Should he give in to what they both wanted?

Laura stepped back, but held on to his biceps. “I think we need to take things slow. We have to get to know each other again.”

His heart took a dive in his chest. “You’re right. It’s been a long time. And a lot has happened. You got married. You had a son.”

“My father has talked to you, hasn’t he?” Laura studied his face.

“Yeah.”

“He threatened you?”

Cody shrugged. “That doesn’t bother me. It’s what he can do to you and Johnny.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Such as?”

“He could send you away. He said something about your aunt Betty in Boston. He said that there was a nice military school for Johnny there, too.”

“I am not going to Boston, and Johnny isn’t going to some military school. We are staying right here in our pretty cottage. Besides, this is where you are.”

“And I can’t leave for at least two years, but I doubt that I can turn around the Double M by then. I don’t know if I could ever make it real profitable. We’ve all tried throughout the years.”

Laura moved away from Cody and crossed her arms in front of her chest. It was her turn to pace. “If anyone can turn it around, it’s you.”

“It takes money, Laura. The place needs an overhaul, and there’s none.”

“We can never have peace in Duke Springs, Cody. Never. I thought that having a grandchild would mellow them both, and it did to a point, but sometimes it made things worse.”

Cody could see the tears swimming in her emerald eyes, and he hugged her to him.

“Oh, that didn’t make any sense.” She sniffed. “But J.W. would never send us away. He’d miss Johnny too much. My mother had a better threat this morning. She’s going to file for custody of Johnny if I consort with a known felon such as you.” Cody handed her a red bandanna and she wiped her eyes. “Maybe we ought to stay away from each other. You have too much to lose. So do I.”

Cody swore and was just about to punch a saguaro, spikes and all, when Laura closed her hand over his fist and helped him to relax.

“Just tell me, Cody...once and for all, tell me that you are innocent. Tell me that you didn’t kill Lindy. Tell me, for heaven’s sake.”

He pulled his hand away from hers and swore. “I can’t. I can’t say anything. If I did, all that time I spent in prison would be for nothing.”

“Who are you protecting, Cody?”

No answer.

“I need you to tell me, or I can’t see you anymore. I might lose my son. Don’t you get that?” She was gritting her teeth.

“I didn’t kill Lindy!” Cody shouted. “I didn’t kill him, but I wish to hell I did.” He turned away from her and Laura could tell that he was trying to compose himself. “There, I said it. I finally said it.”

She wrapped her arms around him from behind and let her wet cheek rest on his back.

“Who killed him, Cody? Your mother? Cindy? It has to be one of them who did it. You wouldn’t go to jail for anyone else.”

He turned around and pulled her tight to him. “Please, Laura. That’s enough. I shouldn’t have even told you what I did. But when you said that your parents—or at least your mother—might try taking Johnny away from you...well, I had to tell you the truth.”

“I am so relieved! I mean, I knew you were protecting someone. Why else wouldn’t you defend yourself?”

“Please, don’t ask me anymore. I can’t tell you. If it gets around...”

She kissed him to assure him that he didn’t have to speak further. She didn’t need to know anything more.

“And I can’t sneak around with you forever, Laura. I love you. We’ve always wanted to get married.”

“I know, but can you accept Johnny, too?”

“I admit that I was shocked, and even disappointed, that you slept with someone else, and that you even got married—”

“I never got married, Cody. That was something I just told my parents. They couldn’t cope with me having a child out of wedlock. I just told them that I eloped with a fellow student to Vegas so it would make them feel better.”

Cody felt the tension slip out of his body. “I’m glad of that. But did you love him? Johnny’s father, I mean.”

“Yes. I loved him very much, and I know he loved me.”

Cody felt sick to his stomach. Why had he even asked that question?

Laura took his hand. “You never answered me. Could you accept Johnny?”

“Of course!” Cody answered almost immediately. “You didn’t even have to ask me that. I can’t wait to meet him.”

“You will—someday.”

“And I don’t care who the college dude is.” Cody couldn’t get the picture of Laura sleeping with someone else out of his head. Aw...hell.

“Johnny’s the light of my life.”

“He should be.”

“I don’t have any regrets, not one,” she said strongly. “Well, maybe one.”

“What’s that?”

“That Johnny’s father doesn’t know he’s the father of such a wonderful boy.”

“He doesn’t? Then you should tell him, Laura. A man has the right to know.”

“I’ll tell him.” She remained silent for several heartbeats. “When some important matters get resolved. I don’t want Johnny stuck in the middle of a power struggle. Anyway, when the time is right, I’ll tell Johnny’s father about him.”

“When the time is right?” Cody shook his head. “How old did you say Johnny was?”

“He’s going to be...uh...four.”

“That’s a long time to keep a boy from his father.”

“I know, Cody. I know. But there are circumstances...”

“Like what?”

Cody had such strong feelings about this. He found it hard to understand why Laura wanted things to stay as they were.

“Let’s just drop it. I’ll take care of Johnny’s father in my own sweet time.”

“You’ve already wasted four years of two lives. If I was a father, I sure as hell would want to know, and would want to participate in raising my child.” Cody shook his head. “I don’t understand you, Laura.”

“Some guys are not like you,” Laura shouted, wondering where her anger came from.

“If the college dude doesn’t want Johnny, I’ll help you raise him. I’ll raise him as if he were my own.”

“And risk me losing him altogether because you have a criminal record for killing someone, even though you didn’t do it?” A fresh gathering of tears glinted in her eyes, and she closed them and let the tears fall. “It’s all such a big mess.”

“We can’t let anyone take Johnny away from you. We just can’t.”

She liked how he said “we,” but it was really all up to her. She had to handle her parents even more carefully now that Cody was out of prison.

Yes, it was all a big mess, and Laura wondered how to make things neat and tidy.

But that was impossible. They all were headed for a big explosion, and there’d be no turning back.

Chapter Four

Cody took her hand and started down the path that led to the Duke Ranch and her cute little cottage. He must have seen the surprise on Laura’s face because he shrugged and said, “What? Do you think I’d let you walk home alone? This entire area is loaded with parolees.”

She chuckled. Cody never stayed mad for very long—at least when it concerned her.

“I wish you could come inside and see my home, mine and Johnny’s.”

“I’d love to, but I don’t dare.” He sighed. “I was kind of surprised that you weren’t staying in the ranch house.”

“Johnny and I need our space.”

“Good idea.”

“But we’re up there a lot,” Laura explained. “Johnny has a room there for naps and all. Besides, Clarissa and my parents are built-in babysitters when I need them.”

She could feel pain radiating from him like a living thing. It was the same pain she felt. They were both trapped in Duke Springs, at least for the next two years.

“J.W. will blackball you from working anywhere around here, even after you are done with parole, unless you sell the Double M to him.”

“That’s pretty much what I figured out, and that’s why, if we have any chance of happiness together, we’ll have to move far away from his tentacles. Maybe Washington State or Oregon. Montana. I was even thinking of Canada.”

“That’s really far. I don’t know.”

But she did know. No matter how much she loved Cody, she couldn’t take Johnny away from her family and friends.

“A picnic,” she blurted, stopping in her tracks.

“What?”

“Let’s take Johnny on a picnic.” It was time for something fun.

“How are we going to pull that off?”

“Easy. This Sunday is the annual church picnic, and I am going to present a check from the Duke Foundation to go toward a new roof and steeple. They are having an old-fashioned box-lunch auction. If you win the auction on my box lunch, you get to have lunch with me.”

He shook his head. “You and I having a picnic together? That’ll get back to your parents within seconds.”

“My parents will be at a horse auction in Gila Bend. Besides, the box lunch is supposed to be anonymous, but mine will have a red, white and blue ribbon on it. Bid on it, and keep bidding, no matter the cost. I know you haven’t gotten paid yet. I’ll give you the money.”

“I earned some money in prison. Making license plates doesn’t pay as well as it did before, but I have twenty-three whole bucks, so don’t worry about it.” He was joking, but it saddened Laura to think of him inside doing that instead of working with horses and being on the Double M.

He dropped her hand and stuffed his into the pocket of his jeans. “Laura, it’s not going to work.”

“Of course it will. If my parents find out, I’ll just explain that there was no way you knew that box was mine, and that I had to have lunch with you due to the rules of the auction.”

“Sweetheart, I can’t go to the picnic. I’ll get the big snub from the good folks of the church. I don’t think you’re ready for that, and I don’t want to subject Johnny to any talk about his mother being with a killer.”

Laura looked deep into Cody’s eyes. By the light of the full moon, she could see the pain in them. “I’ve thought about that, Cody. But these people are your friends. A lot of them stood by you in court.”

“A lot of them wanted my head on a platter,” he snapped.

She took his hand. “We’ll go off on our own to have lunch—me, you and Johnny. I don’t care about people talking about us, but if we’re far enough away from people when we have our picnic, Johnny won’t hear anything.”

“I don’t know, Laura.”

“Let’s try it, Cody. You have to go out in public sooner or later.”

“I was hoping that it’d be later, but okay.”

“See you Sunday, then?” she asked.

“Sunday.”

She leaned forward, resting her head on his chest. “Two days.” Stepping back, she ran her palms down his cheeks to see if he was real and to make sure that this wasn’t a dream. Taking his face in her hands, she pulled him toward her for a kiss—a long, sensuous kiss—full of longing, hope and a wish for a quick solution to all of their problems.

* * *

Finally, it was Sunday, the day of the church picnic. Cody did enough work at both ranches to merit a long soak in the creek.

So he sat in his favorite spot with his back against a rock letting the cool water rush around him, thinking.

It felt strange to just relax and have an unstructured day. He still hadn’t shaken off the institutional mentality of schedules and timetables, and caught himself checking for a clock on numerous occasions, thinking that it was time for his cell block to line up for lunch or shower time, or for an academic or training program.

He couldn’t wait to see Laura again and meet her son. He wondered if he could see Laura’s face in the little boy, or if he looked like the college guy. He wondered about Johnny’s personality and what the little boy liked to eat and watch on TV. He didn’t know what cartoons, which were a big favorite of the inmates, or shows were out these days. Instead of TV, Cody kept busy reading and doing work for his bachelor’s degree, which was how he got the nickname Professor.

His graduation at the prison was a small affair—about a dozen inmates and a handful of dignitaries from both the University of Arizona and the prison. Following that, there was a little reception in the prison library with punch and cake.

So now he had a bachelor’s degree in American history because animal husbandry wasn’t offered. Not that he’d be able to do much with an American history degree—no one would ever hire him to teach in their school—but he’d always loved history and because school passed the time.

He’d have to tell Laura someday. She’d like that he got a degree. J.W. wouldn’t give a damn—it wasn’t a degree in business or finance or ranch management. Cody decided to keep his mouth shut. J.W. took too much pleasure in employing ranch hands with degrees who couldn’t find jobs in their academic fields, and Cody didn’t want to give him any more reasons to be amused at his expense.

Cody pushed away all thoughts of J.W. He planned on having a great day at the church picnic.

He hauled himself out of the water, sloshed to the bank of the creek and wiped himself dry with his T-shirt. In the Arizona heat, his jeans would dry before he hiked back to the Double M.

He’d take a decent shower then. He couldn’t get enough of long, hot showers.

Draping his shirt around his neck, he slid into his cowboy boots and began walking. He could walk the way in his sleep, and so could Laura. He wondered why no one had discovered this part of the creek—although he doubted that J.W. and Penny would step a toe in it, since it was on Masters land. By the time it meandered to Duke property, it was nothing more than a muddy trickle.

The creek would come with the Double M, if his mother ever decided to give up the fight.

Although he’d like to think that it was his blood, sweat and tears that made the Double M what it was, his mother was the one who had kept it going for the three years that he was gone and just after his father died.

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