When Baby Was Born. Jodi O'Donnell
Loren’s.
Only she didn’t remember Loren. She only knew him, Cade.
Loren’s scent surrounded her.
The questions flew at him like the millions of snow-flakes, confounding him. Then one in particular loomed in his mind: what had Loren told her about him, the kid brother he’d given up on seven years ago—and why?
He practically smashed his forehead into the side of the stable, Cade was so wrapped up in his thoughts. He definitely needed to get a handle on himself. Men had gotten lost and frozen to death mere yards from shelter in such weather.
Feeling his way, he located the stable door, pulled it open with difficulty, and slipped inside.
All three horses stirred, but only Destiny lifted his massive head and gave a snort of greeting into the dimness. Lord, he was one smart horse! Cade had only had him a few months and already the chestnut welcomed his particular presence.
“Damn if you’re not about the only one around here who does,” Cade said without rancor, making his way to the stall.
The gelding had been an indulgence, no doubt about it, costing upward of twice as much as Cade had planned to spend on a new cow pony. There’d been many a fine piece of horseflesh he’d looked at that could have done the job he needed just fine. Yet as soon as he’d seen the quarter horse in that pasture, head held high and the sun glinting off his chestnut coat the color and shine of a new penny, Cade had had to have him.
Up to then, he’d pretty much abandoned the dream of training horses for a living. But with one look, Destiny had sparked the hope to life again. He didn’t know how or when he might build such a business, given he was running a three-man spread with just him and Virgil, but for Destiny, he’d find a way.
Of course, if he wanted to free up some of his time, all Cade had to do was hire a second hand; it wasn’t as if the ranch’s income couldn’t bear another wage earner. The truth, however, was that he’d never hired anyone else because he’d always held a picture in his mind of how his older brother would look when he came back and discovered Cade had never given up on the ranch—or him.
And when he’d gotten Loren’s letter, it had taken somewhere in the vicinity of sixty seconds for him to play out the rest of that scene to where Loren asked if he could come back to the ranch to live—for good this time.
Now, though, the prospect of living here with Sara seemed more of a nightmare than a dream come true.
His ears were thawing out, and they itched like blue blazes. Rubbing one, Cade rested his forearm on the stall railing, hand dangling. The gelding snuffled his palm hopefully.
“Sorry, pardner,” he murmured. “No treats tonight.”
He gave the chestnut a scratch on the bridge of his nose instead, and the caress seemed to satisfy. Cade couldn’t help regretting all his shortcomings weren’t so easily compensated for.
Seven years. Seven years of living here with no family but Virgil, trying to run the ranch using his spotty know-how where in the past he’d always had Loren to know what to do. Loren had been the one who’d been born to ranch, the one who because of age and skill Granddad had groomed for the job from the first. And Cade had always been the younger brother meant to take the reins in a different arena.
Except their fate hadn’t played out that way. And both he and Loren knew the reason why.
Cade swung around, his gaze making a circle of the stable’s interior. It had happened here, actually. He could still hear his brother’s words ringing in the dusty air.
“You bastard! I can’t believe my own brother would do such a thing! You bastard.”
“But I didn’t do anything! Loren, you’ve got to believe me,” Cade pleaded. “What you saw, it’s not what you think!”
“The hell it’s not! Then why’m I standin’ here looking at you with guilt written all over your face?”
“I don’t know!” He shook his head, wondering himself at the guilt that pecked and gnawed at his insides like buzzards on roadkill.
Cade held out a hand in appeal. “Honest, Loren, I was just bein’ friendly. I mean, Marlene is your fiance´e! When she followed me out here to the stable, I thought she was just wantin’ us to get to know each other better, you know?”
Loren’s head had just about come clean off his shoulders at that. “And your idea of gettin’ to know her better was kissin’ her with your hands all over her like stink on a skunk?”
“It didn’t happen like that! I was tryin’ to push her
away. Good Lord, Loren, you’re my brother! I wouldn’t do you that way. Marlene’s the one that—”
That’s when Cade had seen the look in his brother’s eyes, begging him not to go there. Loren had been stone gone in love with Marlene Lane, in over his head and not even sane about it.
So Cade had shut up, because there was nothing on earth that could have made him do his brother that way.
Yet it meant Loren had gone away believing his only brother had betrayed him. He’d been wrong, though. Cade hadn’t betrayed Loren with the woman he loved. He hadn’t had the least interest in Marlene, had never felt for her anything more than brotherly affection.
That had been Marlene, however. Not Sara.
This time, his brother would have a justifiable bone to pick with him. And Cade couldn’t help feeling that this time, unlike the last, he’d of his own will brought such wrath upon himself.
He’d heard the warning about not tempting fate, but what were the consequences when fate tempted him?
Cade dropped his forehead to rest on the wood rail. A day ago, all he would have asked those fates for was one minute. One minute on either side of Loren’s appearance that day seven years ago—before Marlene had stepped forward and wrapped herself around Cade, or after he’d freed himself from her clutches.
And now? he wondered. What would he ask for now—with Sara?
Straightening, Cade made himself take a fortifying breath. He had to remember, nothing had happened—yet. And nothing would, he silently vowed. He knew better now, knew that he’d been a fool to hope he could have—even for one minute—the kind of love with a woman he’d pretty much resigned himself to not being in the cards for him this go-round on earth.
So. He would care for Sara, as Loren would want, until he came for her himself. Cade had to trust that the reasons his brother couldn’t be here were sound, and that Loren had known Cade would look after Sara and the baby’s every need.
The thought brought him up short. He was doing anything but looking after them out here.
Cade ran from the stable, lunging through the knee-deep snow, arms flailing in front of him. He was blind as a bat out here, couldn’t even see the lights from the ranch house. He might wander right past it and never find it.
He had to! He had to get back—back to Sara. He had promised to stay with her as long as she needed him, and he always kept his word.
When Cade came up against a car, he wasn’t exactly happy. It was just one more obstacle between himself and Sara. Muttering a curse, he started to feel his way around it when it occurred to him he might find more clues as to his brother’s whereabouts.
Or maybe he’d find more clues as to Sara’s identity, Cade thought. Maybe…maybe the woman who just gave birth in his bedroom wasn’t his sister-in-law. Because really, what was he going on so far but a four-inch-square piece of paper in his brother’s handwriting? She could have found it on the side of the road or left behind at the grocery checkout—neither of which she remembered, of course. And why didn’t she? What sort of blow had she suffered to make her lose her memory? Or was her amnesia all an act?
Barely considering that he was near to hoping he’d been duped by the woman