Dan (Texas Rascals Book 9) Read online

  Slowly, she raised her eyes, met his, and saw confusion written on his dear face. It would be so easy to let herself love him. Too easy.

  “Maybe this has nothing to do with my past, Dan. Maybe I just don’t think we’re right for each other.”

  “Nice try, sweetheart, but I’m not buying it. When we kiss, I feel something potent, and I know you feel it, too. That’s why you’re fighting so hard. You’re terrified. I get it. I’m scared too. But wouldn’t you like to exorcise the ghosts that haunt you? Wouldn’t you like to be free to love again?”

  “If I tell you, will you stop badgering me?”

  He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

  She sighed, then spoke in a rush, as if saying it fast would get the pain over with. Ripping the Band-Aid off a wound. “My mother died when I was twelve. My fiancé died when I was twenty. My pa died earlier this year. I’m tired of everybody I love dying, so I figure I won’t love anybody else. End of story.”

  “Whoa, slow down.”

  Rolling her eyes, she crunched a piece of bacon between her teeth. “I knew you wouldn’t quit bugging me.”

  “I’m not trying to make you miserable,” he said. “But I have a feeling that until you grapple with your past, you can’t embrace the future.”

  She knew that, better than he did.

  “How did your mother die?” he lowered his voice.

  “In a house fire.” Again, she’d said the words as fast as she could, hoping to blunt the gut-wrenching impact. But it did no good. Guilt, heavy as a goose-down quilt, enveloped her.

  He waited. Said nothing.

  Taking a deep breath to control her emotions, she closed her eyes and slowly told him how she’d taken Caleb to the park while her mother napped off a migraine. When they’d returned, she’d found their house engulfed in flames. Raleigh closed her eyes against the agonizing memories—the acrid smell of smoke, the wailing of sirens, the stark terror she’d felt as she’d screamed for her mother.

  Survivor’s guilt had plagued her for years, invading her nightmares as she wondered why her mother had been taken, while she’d been spared.

  Opening her eyes, she discovered Dan studying her with compassion and kindness so strong it robbed her lungs of air. Maybe he was right. Maybe talking about it would help. Keeping silent certainly hadn’t.

  “Oh, Raleigh, I can’t imagine how much you have suffered.”

  “It gets worse,” she mumbled, lowering her eyelashes. “Are you sure you want to hear this?”

  “Yes,” Dan said.

  “I haven’t talked about it since it happened. Not to anyone.”

  He reached across the table and took her hand again, and she didn’t tug it away. “If it’s too hard for you to talk about, you don’t have to. I’m sorry I pushed you. I shouldn’t have pushed you.”

  Being with him felt so safe. He made her feel safe. His strong, quiet patience let her know it was okay.

  But the pain she clung to was powerful. The guilt even more so.

  “You don’t owe me an explanation.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” she said. “I owe you everything. You rescued me when I needed help most.”

  “You saved yourself,” he corrected. “I just lent a hand when you needed it. I’m so glad I could be there for you.”

  Raleigh looked into his tender eyes and knew he would not judge her, even as she judged herself. She gulped against her fears, against the cold shivers shaking down her spine. “It was all my fault.”

  “What was all your fault, sweetheart?”

  “Me. I caused it.”

  “Caused what?”

  “I’m the reason Jack is dead.”

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  “I can’t have love.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m jinxed.”

  “What?” Dan clenched the edge of the table with both hands until his knuckles whitened.

  Once she started talking, Raleigh couldn’t stop. He had prodded her into this, and now she would find out for sure if he really did want to share her burdens and nightmares.

  “Jack is dead because of me.”

  His face blanched white. “What do you mean?”

  “I need to start at the beginning.”

  “I’m listening.”

  She twisted up a paper napkin around her index finger until the tip turned blue, then unfurled it. “When I was sixteen, I fell in love with the most popular guy in high school, Jack Carter. He was so handsome; I couldn’t believe a guy like Jack asked me out.”

  Dan leaned forward, all his attention trained on her.

  “Jack was class president,” she continued, “prom king, and captain of the swim team. We dated for three years and got engaged when he turned twenty-one and I was twenty. That summer, we spent every weekend at Lake Rascal. Jack was dedicated to swimming. He had dreams of Olympic gold, and for me, being with him eased the pain of losing my mother.”

  “What went wrong?”

  Raleigh took a deep breath. “Jack had a great-paying job working in the oil fields, but he wasn’t satisfied. He wanted bigger and better things—fame, fortune. He was always swimming. He vowed to win the gold and make millions from product endorsements. He wanted to get us both out of Rascal.” Raleigh stopped, the words freezing in her throat.

  “Go on,” Dan murmured. “When you’re ready.”

  “We were alone at the lake one weeknight night after Jack got off work. He’d had a couple of beers.” She took a deep breath, remembering.

  It was past midnight. There was a full moon, and the water shimmered inky black. In her memory, she heard frogs croaking, the smell of honeysuckle choking the night air. They had spread a blanket on the shore, and Jack had been chattering about the Olympics again.

  “He wanted to impress me with a new swimming technique he’d developed. He couldn’t stop talking about it. He wanted to show me his technique right then.”

  As she spoke the words, Raleigh felt her mind detach from her body, as if the events she related had happened to someone else. She stared down at her hand and realized she had a death grip on the napkin. She dropped it, then immediately felt rudderless without something to cling to.

  “I tried to get him to wait until morning to demonstrate his new skill, but Jack was insistent.” Taking a sip of her now-cold coffee, she looked at Dan.

  He sat as if hypnotized, eyes fixed on her face, waiting for her to continue.

  “Lake Rascal is treacherous. Lots of tree stumps and undercurrents. Even in daylight, it’s dangerous to swim there. To Jack, that was part of the appeal.”

  Dan nodded, folding his hands into fists, the color draining from his cheeks.

  “I asked him not to do it,” she whispered. “But Jack loved to show off.”

  “You poor kid.”

  She shook her head. There it was. Pity in Dan’s eyes. She hated that. “Please don’t feel sorry for me.”

  “How can I not? Raleigh, I know you’re proud, but you shouldn’t be ashamed.”

  “You haven’t heard the rest of the story.” She gulped. “I told Jack that he didn’t have anything to prove to me. He had been drinking, after all, and I was worried. He called me a ‘fraidy cat,’ kissed me, stripped off his shirt, and dived in.”

  Dan hissed in a breath.

  “I stood on the bank watching him in the moonlight. He looked so graceful, so perfect, how could anything bad happen to someone so young and strong?” Raleigh paused, grappling with the emotion flooding through her.

  “Raleigh?”

  “I’m okay,” she said at last, lifting a hand to her throat.

  “You don’t have to say any more. I can guess where this is going.”

  “No. You’re right. I haven’t spoken about it since it happened. I need to get it out in order to fully let him go.” Her voice echoed in her own ears, hard, cold…dead. She’d gone dead inside when Jack died.

  “But you didn’t kill him,” Dan argued.

  “Not dir
ectly, no. But I was responsible. See, I can’t swim, at least not very well. Jack was halfway across the lake when he suddenly disappeared.” The memory that had haunted her for years made her want to sob—but she couldn’t cry. Hadn’t cried since she’d lost her mother.

  “At first I thought he was teasing me,” she continued. “Horsing around. Jack was a cut-up. I waited one minute. Two. Three. Then I panicked.”

  “I can’t imagine what you went through,” Dan murmured.

  “I yelled for him. There wasn’t even a ripple on the water. But he could hold his breath for a long time.” She shuddered. Her eyes felt as raw as if they’d been rubbed with sandpaper. Even at the time, she’d been unable to mourn for Jack with proper tears. “I splashed in waist-deep, but I was too scared to go farther. I knew I would drown, too, if I tried to save him.”

  “And you were only twenty?”

  She nodded. “Jack’s parents found me at dawn, still sitting on the bank. I was rocking back and forth and babbling about Jack and how he was going to win the Olympics.”

  “It wasn’t your fault, Raleigh.” Dan stroked the back of her hand. His touch soothing her more than she ever thought possible.

  “Jack’s parents blamed me. They said I was responsible. If he hadn’t been out with me in the first place, it wouldn’t have happened. I let their son go in. I didn’t stop him. I didn’t run for help. I just sat there like an idiot waiting for him to come back.”

  “You were barely more than a kid. You were in shock. They had no business blaming you.”

  “Jack was their only child. They needed to ease their own grief, so they lashed out at me. I realize that now, but at the time I believed them.” Her bottom lip trembled.

  “Dang, Raleigh, how on earth did you survive?”

  “Pa and Caleb pulled me through it. I had nightmares for months. But then Pa made me his partner, got me focused on doing something I loved. Shoeing horses was my therapy, my salvation.”

  “I’ve never known anyone who had to face such terrible catastrophes at such a young age.” Dan clicked his tongue in sympathy. “Your mother, your first love.”

  “It wasn’t long after Jack’s death that we found out Pa had kidney failure. His illness really took a toll on me. I was the one who drove him to dialysis in Rascal three times a week.”

  “Life has thrown you far more than your share of curveballs.”

  “Oh, Dan, it’s not just fate.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s me. I’m a jinx.”

  “Raleigh, you can’t blame yourself. These things happen. It’s unfortunate, but nothing was your fault.” His fingers curled around her arm. “You’re not a jinx. There’s no such thing.”

  “How else do you explain it? Everyone who loves me dies.”

  “Caleb didn’t die.”

  “So far,” Raleigh muttered. “I live with the constant fear of losing him.”

  “Sweetheart, your fear is irrational. We all lose those we love. That’s life. If you avoid love, you avoid life.”

  “Intellectually, I know that. But inside?” She tapped her chest over her heart. “I’m terrified to let myself love again. What if I am a jinx, and I let myself fall in love with you, and I lose you?”

  “That’s not rational.”

  “Is that a risk you’re willing to take? Because I’m warning you, if you dare to love me, you’re taking your life in your hands.”

  Her anguish caused him physical pain. Dan absorbed her tragic story, felt sympathy burn his gut as if he’d consumed a thousand chili peppers. More than anything, he wanted to ease her grief. He longed to take her into his arms, keep her safe for the rest of their lives.

  “Raleigh,” he said. “Please let me help.”

  She jumped up and started clearing the dishes off the table without answering him.

  Dan stared down at his hands. How to reach her? How to let her know he wanted to love her no matter what the risks, real or imagined?

  She truly believed she was a jinx, and he could see where she might have assumed that crazy notion. He needed to convince Raleigh to trust him, to free herself from guilt’s restrictive shackles.

  Dan resisted the urge to shake some sense into her, to tell her he loved her. He knew he must proceed with extreme caution if he ever hoped to capture Raleigh’s heart.

  “Will you take me back to the hospital now? I’ve been away from Caleb too long,” she asked when they’d finished washing the breakfast dishes. Her gray eyes were red-rimmed, and she looked worn to a frazzle. She held herself ramrod straight, as if she bore the weight of the world on her fragile shoulders.

  “No,” he said firmly. “You need to take a nap first.”

  “Okay, then I’ll drive myself.”

  He pulled the keys from his pocket and dangled them in front of her. “I’ve got the keys.”

  “Then I’ll drive my truck.”

  “I don’t want you on the highway in that rattle-trap heap.”

  “Well, it’s not your decision to make, is it?” She sank her hands on her hips and flashed him a feisty look of warning.

  Even exhausted and defiant, she was beautiful. He admired her resilience, her sense of responsibility, her fierce independence. Yet those were the very same qualities that separated them. Winning Raleigh’s love might prove to be the biggest challenge of his life. But Dan never backed down from a challenge.

  “Let’s compromise. I’ll call the hospital and check on Caleb, and we’ll both take a two-hour nap. Then I promise to drive you back to Rascal. You can’t help your brother if you’re on the verge of collapse.”

  “I can sleep on a cot in his room.”

  “Dang it, Raleigh, be sensible.”

  “He’s my brother, my responsibility. Caleb’s not your problem, Dan, so get out of my way.”

  Goaded, he threw caution to the wind. He had to make her understand. “Don’t you get it, Raleigh? I want your problems to be my problems. I want to share everything with you. Joys, sorrows, ups, downs. I want to be with you. Care for you. Love you. Will you let me?”

  She put her hands over her ears. “Stop it, Dan. I don’t want to hear this.”

  He tugged her hands from her ears. “Well, you’re going to listen to me, because what I have to say will affect both of us for the rest of our lives.”

  “No,” she whimpered. “Please don’t say it.”

  Fire blazed in his dark eyes. A corresponding rush coursed through her veins. Tension screwed the corners of his mouth into a tight grimace. “Raleigh, you’re tired and upset. We can talk about this later and work everything out.”

  “Why did you say it?” Distressed, she hopped from foot to foot. “Now I have to move and find another job.”

  “For heaven’s sake, why?”

  “I can’t stay here,” she said, claustrophobia settling over her. She felt trapped, cornered.

  “I don’t understand why you feel you have to leave.” He inclined his head.

  “I told you. I’m a jinx, bad luck.”

  “I promise not to hurt you.”

  “Don’t you get it? I’d be the one hurting you.”

  “That’s skewed thinking.”

  “I can’t risk it.”

  “You’re hardheaded.”

  “Stubbornness is the only thing that protects me,” she said.

  He reached for her, but she shied, almost stumbling in her haste to get away.

  “Please don’t touch me, Dan.”

  For years, she’d held back her feelings, denied most emotions except anger. One way or another, she had to convince him to leave her alone. She was deathly afraid she loved him too. What if she surrendered and allowed herself to love him?

  She shuddered, imagining how she might lose Dan. Would he be kicked by a horse? Ground under the wheels of some machinery? Or maybe something as innocuous as pneumonia? Raleigh knew she couldn’t survive the loss of another loved one. Already she’d been so knocked around by life, she couldn’t cry, co
uldn’t let herself care. How could she knowingly ask for more sorrow?

  “Raleigh? Answer me,” Dan insisted. “I’ve got to know. Why won’t you put the past to rest and take a chance on us?”

  She had to do something, had to get rid of him before she lost control and threw herself into his welcoming arms. To save herself, to save Dan, Raleigh told the biggest lie of her life.

  “Because,” she lied, “I don’t love you!”

  Shocked, Dan stared at her wide-eyed. His body jerked as if controlled by marionette strings. He plucked his cowboy hat off the kitchen table and squeezed it between his fingers.

  He felt used, dirty, betrayed by his own heart.

  She ducked her head. “Caleb and I will be leaving the ranch, of course. We can’t stay here under the circumstances. As soon as he’s healed, we’re gone.”

  Dan’s mouth dropped open. He’d thought she’d been falling in love with him as he’d been falling in love with her. He’d been foolish. Had someone smashed him in the head with a two-by-four? Had the world stopped spinning? Here he’d been thinking she just needed a little time, some space and reassurance. He hadn’t realized she didn’t have the same feelings for him that he had for her.

  Numbed, he felt dead inside. “Where will you go?”

  “That’s really none of your concern, is it?”

  “Raleigh…”

  “Please go.”

  Mentally kicking himself, Dan spun on his heel and left her standing there, not knowing what else to do. He left the cabin without looking back. A dark sucking chest wound had taken the place of his heart.

  He stalked across the exercise yard, kicking aside litter and debris left from last night’s party. Had it only been half a day since he’d held Raleigh in his arms in the back of the trailer? Dan winced. Was he doomed to keep loving women who couldn’t love him in return?

  Dan stalked into the main house as his cell phone ring. Saw his father’s name on the caller ID. He cringed. As usual, his father’s timing was lousy.

  “What do you want?” he answered curtly.