The Rancher and the Event Planner

Chapter Nine



Regret and guilt rose inside Rafe like a rain swollen river about to breach its banks. He clasped his fingers around hers, lowered their hands together. He studied her slender, feminine hand resting in his big paw. He would never hurt her physically, or any woman for that matter, not in a million years and he never wanted to hurt her emotionally but if he allowed her to keep believing they had a chance, she would definitely end up being hurt in the end. He had to tell her the truth about his marriage to Caroline so she understood how wrong he was for her, how wrong he was for any woman.

He heaved a breath and began. “I met Caroline at a rodeo in Houston where our ranch was one of the main sponsors. She was a beauty queen, sexy and beautiful. When we met it was like a box of firecrackers exploding. Then one day she told me she was pregnant. So I did the right thing and married her.”

He rose from the bench, walked to the edge of the stream and turned. Jennifer sat on the bench, her face pensive and calm, waiting for him to continue, no judgment in her gaze. “I was determined to make the marriage work for the baby’s sake. The old man never liked her, neither did mom. They both thought she was a gold digger. She did try to make herself liked around town but she became obsessive with her love until I felt like I was choking on it, like I couldn’t breathe.” He raked a hand through his hair, pressing the tips of his fingers into his scalp as if he could erase the memories. “Then the jealousy started. She saw a rival in every woman I spoke to. She had crying jags, she whined and pleaded and clung to me like a spider’s web. The doctor said it was probably hormones and told me to be patient with her. So I tried to spend more time with her and I indulged her every whim and for a while our life smoothed out a bit. But then Molly was born. I was so excited about being a father. It felt like I’d swallowed the sun. But Caroline became even more possessive and didn’t trust me out of her sight. Life with her became a living nightmare. One day I’d had it and asked her for a divorce. She flew into a rage accusing me of being involved with another woman. Angry, she jumped in the car, had a wreck and was killed.”

He walked back to the bench and sat beside Jennifer. “So, you see now how wrong I am for you.”

Jennifer laid her hand on his arm. “Look at me.”

He gazed into her beautiful, amber eyes wishing, hoping that she understood but at the same time regretting he couldn’t try to find happiness again with her.

“Caroline’s actions weren’t your fault. She had emotional problems that had nothing to do with you.”

“You don’t understand I never loved her.” Just saying the words made his soul feel lighter. “For me, it was nothing but an intense physical relationship. I was in lust, not in love. When she told me she was pregnant I felt trapped like a caged animal. I wasn’t ready to be a father or a husband and never wanted to marry her, but I couldn’t walk away. I had to stand up for my responsibilities and try to make things right.”

“And you did.”

He kept his gaze on the stream. “No, I didn’t. I was never the husband that she needed. I think she knew I didn’t love her or want to be married to her that’s why she was so jealous all the time. And she ended up paying for it.” He clenched his hands into fists. “The worst part of the whole mess was that when I found out Caroline was pregnant I didn’t want Molly.”

“Daddy.”

Shock expanded through his body in a frigid wave, his pulse sliding on all fours to a halt. Did she hear what he said? Please, God, no. He glanced at Molly over his shoulder. With tears spilling from her bright, green eyes and her lower lip trembling, Rafe’s worst fear punched him in the gut.

“You didn’t want me?”

***

JC stepped up on the spacious front porch of the ranch house. Two huge urns sat at the top of the front steps overflowing with cherry red verbena and snapdragons accented with purple petunias. She wondered who had planted them. Humidity dripped from the sultry air, and JC sighed with gratitude for the shade of the porch while cicadas sang from the trees.

JC pressed the doorbell and waited. She wanted to find out how Rafe and Molly were doing after what happened at the barbecue and to make sure they were okay. Molly’s stricken expression, tears streaking her cheeks and the misery in her eyes had ripped at JC’s heart, not to mention the gut-wrenching pain on Rafe’s face.

The door opened and with it the sound of laughter. Rafe filled the doorway in sublime glory, his long legs swathed in faded jeans and his feet bare. Visibly straightening his shoulders, his lips thinned in a grim expression. “Jennifer, what are you doing here?”

She shrugged off his cold reception. Bad days affected everyone. “Hi Rafe, I came to check on you and Molly.”

Molly appeared at her father’s side and exclaimed, “JC!” After jumping over the threshold, she hugged JC’s legs. Then Molly grabbed JC’s hand. “Come inside.” She led her through the open door past her father, who gave JC the stink eye before firmly shutting the door behind her.

What was his problem? She’d done nothing wrong. She came to make sure the two of them had moved past the debacle at the barbecue.

Molly led her down the wide entry-way with a cathedral ceiling into the family room with a massive stone fireplace. The delicious smell of cookies baking filled the air.

“Come and see my doll house.” Molly dropped JC’s hand and ran to the doll house sitting on the family room floor.

Rafe sat in a chair close to Molly’s doll house, leaning forward with his arms on his thighs and his hands clasped together. He glanced at JC with the same grim set to his mouth then focused on Molly.

“JC,” Linc said from the doorway. He walked toward her dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, wiping his hands on a kitchen towel. His chestnut hair was neatly combed, his blue eyes filled with welcome. At least two people in the family were glad she was here.

“I’m glad you dropped by because I just made Molly’s favorite treat, chocolate chip cookies. As soon as they cool, the three of you come into the kitchen and have some. Now I need to hose down the kitchen after the mess I made.”

After he left, JC sat on the sofa in front of the cold hearth, which boasted a fan-shaped fire screen. Molly chatted happily to her dolls, sitting Barbie in a porch chair while Ken lounged on the steps. Rafe remained silent, barely casting a glance her way. Molly seemed fine, but she wasn’t so sure about Rafe. She didn’t want to bring it up again in front of Molly and Linc gave her an easy out. “Molly, I bet Uncle Linc would love for you to help him clean up the kitchen and I bet he’ll even let you have a cookie.”

Molly jumped up from her spot on the floor. “Sure,” she said and skipped from the room. As soon as she left, JC turned toward Rafe who had risen from his chair, and stood perusing titles on one of the book shelves.

“Rafe, I dropped by to see how you and Molly were doing and to say how sorry I am about what happened. I’ve been very worried about both of you.”

He pulled a book halfway off the shelf then shoved it back into its slot. His hard blue eyes pierced her. “I trusted you,” he said in a soft, steely voice. A quake of anxiety trembled up her spine. “Thanks to you, Molly was hurt.”

She straightened on the sofa. “What happened was nobody’s fault. Neither of us knew she was nearby.”

He walked slowly toward her with his eyes focused directly on her. Sitting on the edge of the coffee table, the size of a lake, he cupped his knees with his hands, his knuckles strained and white. A vein throbbed in the side of his neck. His scent of soap, aftershave and fresh laundry set up tingling in the pit of her stomach.

“If you hadn’t convinced me to spill my guts, my little girl would never have known how I felt about her in the beginning before she was born.”

Her anger rose to meet his. “Why are you blaming me? I didn’t hurt Molly on purpose and neither did you. You were sharing a heart-wrenching moment with me and—”

“Do you know how long it took before she stopped crying? My baby cried her heart out. She cried so much she made herself sick. Do you have any idea what it’s like to see the person you love the most in the world torn apart, knowing no matter what you say the words are forever branded on her heart and there’s nothing you can do to change it?”

“No, I don’t and I’m sorry. I would do anything to take back what happened, but it was a terrible accident, no one’s fault.” She tried to touch him, but he jerked away, causing a needle of pain to poke her in the stomach. They’d formed a bond that afternoon, sitting by the stream, and their relationship had moved forward in a positive direction.

He’d held her in his arms, he’d kissed her with a passion she’d never known from any man, and now he rejected her coldly, cruelly. Despite the hard lump growing in her throat, and the pressure to release the ache in a flood of tears, she refused to give in to them. She was a grown woman, she took responsibility for her actions and offered an apology when needed, but she’d really done nothing wrong.

Rafe walked to the hearth, turned and looked down on her. She’d seen that look before too many times in the past, but she’d never seen that look from Rafe, until now. One look, one searing look from Rafe and he catapulted her back to her past, where she experienced yet another snub, only this time the slight lashed deeper because the censure belonged to Rafe, a man she’d grown to care more about and respect.

For that reason, she refused to sit there one minute longer allowing him another moment’s reproach. JC stood and looked him dead in the eyes. “I love Molly. I have from the first moment I met her. How could I not? She is the sweetest, most loving little girl on the planet. I would have to be a cold-hearted monster not to love her. I came here because I care about her and about you very much and if you can’t see that, you’re not the man I thought you were. It gave me no pleasure to see either of you hurt, especially sweet Molly.” Anguish squeezed her heart and tears pooled in her eyes. He’d brushed her off and hurt her as if her feelings meant nothing to him. She shouldn’t have come here.

JC turned to leave and glanced at Rafe. She noticed a change in his expression, a softening of his features. The anger and condemnation burning in his eyes dimmed like a storm passing. Hope ignited. Maybe she had a chance after all. “I was thinking maybe the two of you would enjoy a night out in Dallas tonight. You might even have a good time. What do you say?”

He swiped a hand over his head. “Jennifer, I appreciate you coming here to check on Molly and me, I really do. I never want to see her hurt like that again. I have watched her from the moment she met you. She likes you, even loves you, I think. She asked me the other day if she could invite you for a sleep over.” He smiled and shook his head.

Gratitude and love spread through JC’s body. “A sleep over, how sweet. There’s nothing I’d like better than a girl’s night with Molly.”

The amusement slid from his lips. “Unfortunately, a sleep over is impossible.”

“Impossible?”

“Yes.” He lowered his hands to his sides and stared directly at her. “Molly could get hurt again real easy. She’s like a skittish puppy that’s been kicked hard and often. She has no strength to defend herself and as her father it’s my job to protect her. I hope you understand.”

A crippling ache throbbed inside her chest. She wanted to cry out, to wail against him, to tell him he was wrong.

She understood a father protecting his daughter. If the situation was reversed she would do the same thing, anything to protect her child. But the worst part, Rafe didn’t want her around spending quality time with his daughter or him and there was nothing she could do about it.

* * *

Rafe watched from the window as Jennifer embraced Molly and gave her a kiss on the cheek. Molly waved goodbye with a see-you-next-time, not knowing her father wished that Jennifer would leave town at that moment.

Disappointment and hurt had shone in Jennifer’s eyes, but there was nothing he could do. Molly came first, last and always. He didn’t want to hurt Jennifer and if their conversation at the barbecue had never taken place, none of this would have happened.

Molly came into the house and ran straight for the kitchen. He listened to his brother and Molly chatting as she settled at the breakfast table with a glass of milk and some cookies. He said something to Molly, making her giggle. Gratitude and joy filled him. It was good to hear Molly laugh again and to know that she understood now why he’d said what he did and that he loved her beyond anything and wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anyone or anything in his life.

In a few minutes, his brother walked into the den. “Jennifer left already? I was going to invite her to stay for dinner.”

Rafe slumped into a chair. “I asked her to leave.”

His brother’s blue eyes, so like his own, widened and his lips parted in shock. He sat on the arm of a chair. “Why would you do that to Jennifer? We’ve known her practically our whole lives and besides she adores Molly.”

He looked at his brother, the most decent man he knew. “I blame her for what happened at the barbecue. If it hadn’t been for her, Molly would have never found out the truth.”

Linc huffed out a breath and moved next to him.

Rafe stared straight ahead.

“Rafe, look at me.” Here it comes. The big lecture.

Reluctantly, his eyes met his brother’s.

“Caroline is still making your life a misery.”

Shock rippled through him. “What do you mean?”

His composed features held a faint hint of amusement. “She made you miserable when you married her. You did everything you could to make her happy but she saw deception at every turn. She clawed and scratched at you like an angry pole cat.”

Rafe’s body stiffened and he pressed his lips into a hard line. “I made her miserable no matter what I did. I tried to keep her smiling and happy, but I couldn’t make it happen. I’m no good at relationships with women. I tried not to be unreasonable or thoughtless or selfish, I wanted the marriage to work, I really did. I wanted Caroline and me to be a team. Molly is my little girl and I’m going to be the best dad in the world to her or die trying.”

He nodded. “Yes, but Caroline ripped you apart. She corrupted your marriage and ruined any chance you might have had at true happiness.”

Rafe looked away, knowing he couldn’t argue with the truth. He gave in to her demands for more of his time, for more of his attention until she destroyed any feeling he ever had for her. “Where’s Molly?”

“She went down to the barn to see Lucy.”

“You want to know the real truth.” He swallowed while guilt and regret lacerated his insides. “The day of Caroline’s funeral, I thanked God she wouldn’t be raising Molly with her ranting and raving one minute then all lovey-dovey the next when I was giving her what she wanted.”

Linc clasped a hand on his shoulder. “Me too, because she was always unhappy and it overflowed into the family. But what about Molly?”

He glanced at his brother. “What about her? She’s fine. She has a wonderful life here with me and you.”

He nodded. “That’s true, but Molly loves Jennifer. It’s obvious every time I see them together and I know Jennifer loves her, too. The woman is a natural with kids. She’s kind, considerate, smart and extremely pretty which I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I’ve noticed.”

“How are you going to tell Molly you don’t want Jennifer hanging around so much?”

He shrugged. “I wasn’t planning to tell her exactly, just figured she’d forget about Jennifer after a while and stop asking.”

“I understand you’re Molly’s father and want only what is best for her. You worship that little girl and God knows she loves you, but don’t you see Molly will be hurt either by you shrugging off her pleas to see Jennifer, or by Molly wondering why Jennifer isn’t around?” He rose from the chair. “Think about it.”