The Maverick's Return Read online

  It was a rite of passage, Anne thought sadly.

  She was just about to turn on the TV and call her daughter into the family room when she heard the doorbell.

  Someone was at her door.

  Anne looked at her watch. Ordinarily, she would be still at the animal clinic at this time. Her friends all knew that, which meant that this wasn’t a social call. And it was way too early for Hank.

  Maybe one of her neighbors had seen that her car was in the driveway and was bringing over their beloved dog or cat for some free medical advice. For some reason, some of her neighbors thought that just because she worked at the vet clinic, she knew everything that the vets did.

  Only one way to find out who was at her door, she thought with a resigned sigh.

  She went to the door, preparing to dispatch the neighbor and their pet as quickly as possible.

  Opening the door, Anne said, “What seems to be the problem?” before she actually looked at the person who was standing on her doorstep.

  The word problem came out as more of a squeak than an actual word.

  Her heart was suddenly pounding in her ears. Anne blinked, just in case she actually was seeing things.

  The person on her doorstep didn’t vanish, didn’t change.

  She had imagined this very scene so many times in the last dozen years, she couldn’t even begin to count them. Now that it actually seemed to be taking place, she felt as if her entire body had been dipped in glue, then held fast against some invisible canvas. She was unable to move.

  Unable to even breathe.

  All she could do was stare at him in complete disbelief.

  Slowly, she fought back from the emotional paralysis that held her in its grip, struggling to say something, a sentence, a word.

  A sound.

  “Hello, Anne.”

  His deep voice rumbled, the sound echoing within her very chest, interfering with the beat of her heart, or what might have passed for a beat right now if it wasn’t as paralyzed as the rest of her.

  Finally, with the inside of her mouth drier than the desert and swiftly turning into sand, Anne forced herself to say something.

  Or rather, to say a word. A name.

  His name.

  “Danny?” she asked hoarsely, her throat all but closing up.

  She saw a smile, that same faint, funny little smile she had loved so well, curve his lips just before he confirmed what she was asking.

  “Yes, Anne, it’s me.”

  The moment he said that, she felt them. Felt the tears that she had been harboring within her for the last twelve years, tears she’d forbade herself to ever shed, even once. She had been able to maintain almost superhuman control over herself, afraid that if she ever allowed herself to cry, to shed so much as a single tear, then there would be no way to stop the flow.

  Twelve years’ worth of tears.

  Anne bit her lower lip, desperately trying to prevent them from falling. Struggling to keep from losing the battle she felt she was doomed to lose.

  And then she heard him hesitantly say her name again, the name he used to call her, when the world was so full of possibilities and their love was brand-new.

  “Annie?”

  Chapter Four

  In the minutes before he’d knocked on Jamie’s door, anticipating the end of a twelve-year separation, Dan had experienced a strong bout of nerves. But he realized now that that had been a piece of cake in comparison to what he’d went through just before he finally rang Annie’s doorbell.

  For one thing, he hadn’t been sure who would be on the other side of that door, Annie or her husband.

  Jamie hadn’t told him about Annie’s marriage when he’d urged him to go see her, but he’d known about Annie’s marriage to Hank for a long time now.

  He wasn’t quite as technologically backward as everyone obviously seemed to think. During one of his bouts of homesickness, he had availed himself of the computer in the ranch town’s library and poked around on social media, searching for information about someone he knew.

  About Anne.

  He himself wasn’t on any websites, but that didn’t keep him from looking for information about Anne.

  And he’d found it.

  He found several photos of Annie, her husband and her little girl posted. He remembered the first time he saw the photo of Annie and Hank. It felt as if someone had taken a jagged knife to his chest and savagely carved out his heart. It was also the last time he looked at that site. It hurt too much.

  But then he told himself that he had no right to feel that way. He’d left her life; there was no reason to believe she would spend her days pining away for him. He’d left town—and Annie—because he felt he was unworthy of her, felt that he didn’t deserve someone as good and pure as her.

  That meant that she was free to go on with her life, to marry anyone she chose.

  And he was happy for her, happy that she had found someone to love, someone to take care of her. Someone who had obviously started a family with her. He had no right to feel as wounded as he did.

  Nonetheless, wounded was how he felt.

  And after all these years, there was no denying that he still loved her.

  Dan had thought twice about just turning up on her doorstep.

  And then he’d thought some more.

  However, his need to see Annie again, to just look at her outweighed his fear that she would see right through him and guess how he still felt about her.

  But that was his problem, not Annie’s, and for her sake, he intended to keep his guard up and maintain a tight rein on all those feelings. Above all, he didn’t want to risk making her feel uncomfortable in his presence, not for anything in the world.

  Annie stared at the man on her doorstep. A thousand questions instantly sprang up in her head, crowding out one another. A thousand questions that she wanted to put to him. But giving voice to any of them would only tear at the scabs that covered wounds which had taken so very long to heal.

  And then there was the little girl who was only two rooms away.

  Danny’s little girl.

  It was one thing when she couldn’t find Danny to tell him that he was a father, but it was entirely another thing when all that separated Danny from finding out that he was a father was her sudden, very strong onslaught of cold feet.

  It went beyond cold feet. Telling him wouldn’t just upend Danny’s world. Finding out that Danny was Janie’s father instead of Hank would cause total chaos in her world, as well.

  And then there was Hank to think of.

  He’d been good to her. Good when he didn’t have to be. She couldn’t allow him to be on the receiving end of such a blow. For all intents and purposes, Hank had been Janie’s father from the moment the little girl had been born. She hadn’t forced the role on Hank; he’d taken it on gladly.

  Hank loved their daughter and Janie was their daughter. He had raised Janie with her for five years. And then, even after they had gotten a divorce, he hadn’t divorced himself from Janie, hadn’t taken himself out of her life. He considered himself to be Janie’s father even after Anne had told Hank who Janie’s real father was. She couldn’t just pull the rug out from under him now, not without giving him fair warning.

  A lot of fair warning.

  And yet, here he was, Danny Stockton, like some ghost out of the past, standing on her doorstep. If Janie came into the room, all he would need was to take one look at the little girl and he’d know she was his.

  She could feel her stomach tying itself up into a knot.

  “What are you doing here?” Anne heard herself finally asking, feeling as if she was trapped in some sort of a surreal dream.

  All this time and she hadn’t changed a bit, Dan thought, trying not to stare at her. If
anything, Annie was even more beautiful than he remembered.

  “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d drop by,” Danny answered glibly. “No?” he asked, seeing the look on her face. He shrugged, feeling awkward, something he’d never felt around her before. “Well, it was worth a shot. The truth is, I saw a clip on TV a month ago. Jamie and his triplets were in it. After the program was over, I couldn’t stop seeing their faces. I knew I had to come back to Rust Creek Falls to see them.”

  You had to come back to see them. But not me. “Oh, I see,” Anne murmured, her voice stilted.

  “And you,” Dan added awkwardly, realizing his oversight. “I wanted to see you.” He blew out a ragged breath and then asked, “Can I come in?”

  For a moment, it looked as if she was going to say no. But then she stepped back and gestured for him to enter the house.

  “Mom?” Janie called out. She ventured into the living room and looked uncertainly at the stranger talking to her mother.

  For the second time in as many minutes, Anne felt her heart lodge itself in her throat as she all but stopped breathing.

  Could Danny see it? Could he see that Janie was his daughter?

  She slanted a hesitant look in his direction. Danny was smiling broadly at the little girl.

  “Hi. You must be Janie,” he said. There was clearly awe in his eyes.

  The picture of confidence and self-assurance, Janie raised her chin. “I am. Who are you?” she wanted to know.

  “Janie,” Anne chided her daughter for responding so bluntly.

  “No, that’s okay,” Danny was quick to tell her. “She’s being direct. That’s a very positive quality to have.” He turned his attention to the little girl. “I’m Daniel Stockton,” he told her. “I used to live in Rust Creek Falls.”

  “And you were friends with my mom?” Janie asked, curious.

  Anne felt a sharp pang in her heart, afraid of saying anything. Afraid of giving herself away.

  He looked at Anne for a moment before he answered. “Yes,” he replied quietly. “I was friends with your mom.”

  “And my dad?” Janie wanted to know, probing further.

  “No,” Dan answered truthfully. “I’m afraid that I never met your dad.”

  Growing progressively more apprehensive, Anne didn’t want this exchange to go any further. Not until she set a few ground rules to make sure that nothing was exposed ahead of time.

  Until then, she needed to keep Janie and Danny away from one another.

  “Did you finish your homework, young lady?” she asked her daughter.

  “No, not yet,” Janie began. “But—”

  Anne cut her off. “Then I suggest you go back and finish it. That’s what we agreed to, remember?” she reminded her daughter.

  Janie made a face. “I don’t remember agreeing,” she protested. “You just told me to do it.”

  “Same thing, puddin’,” Anne told her daughter affectionately. “Now go,” she said, pointing toward the rear of the house where Janie’s room was located, “and don’t come back until you’ve finished doing it.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Janie sighed with a pout. Turning, she dragged her feet as she went to her room.

  “She looks like you.”

  So worried that he’d see himself in their daughter, Anne didn’t hear him at first. And then his words replayed themselves in her head. She turned around to face Danny, a little stunned.

  “What?”

  “I said she looks like you.” There was no missing the fondness in his voice. Or the wistfulness. “A miniature carbon copy of what you looked like at that age. She’s what, about nine, right?”

  Nine would make her safe, Anne thought. If Danny thought that Janie was nine, then he’d definitely believe that the little girl was Hank’s daughter and that would be that. Fear of discovery would be taken off the table once and for all.

  But saying yes would be lying, Anne thought and somehow, she just couldn’t bring herself to lie to Danny after all these years.

  The word stuck in her throat like a fishbone that had been accidentally swallowed.

  Rather than say yes or no, Anne focused on something else he had just said. “You really think she looks like me?”

  “Absolutely,” he assured her. “Right down to her stubborn streak.”

  “What does a stubborn streak look like?” Anne asked wryly.

  Dan smiled at her, fighting a very strong desire to touch her. Not in the intimate way he used to—after all, she was another man’s wife now—but just to put his hand on her shoulder, to connect with her for the smallest of moments.

  “I’m looking at it right now,” he told Annie. And then his smile faded as he grew serious. “When you opened the door just now, you asked me what I was doing here.”

  Anne inclined her head, slightly embarrassed. “Not exactly the politest way to greet someone after twelve years,” she admitted, then went on to say, “but in my defense, you did catch me by surprise.”

  Lord, but she looked good, he couldn’t help thinking, all but devouring her with his eyes. “You know, I didn’t exactly tell you the truth when I said I was in the neighborhood.”

  “I had my suspicions,” she replied with a soft laugh. Rust Creek Falls was in no one’s neighborhood. “So why are you here?” she asked.

  Dan cleared his voice before saying, “I came to apologize for leaving you the way I did.”

  Stunned by his admission, Anne looked at the man she had once thought of as the love of her life. It took her more than a moment to find her tongue.

  “You know, over the last dozen years, I must have imagined this scene a hundred different ways. The only thing all those scenes had in common, besides your apology, was that I always felt relieved when I heard you apologize. I felt somehow vindicated.

  “But I’m not vindicated, not relieved,” she told him with feeling. “I’m just...sad, I guess. Sad about all the years in between that were lost. Why did you leave like that?”

  Dan shook his head. That was something he didn’t want to get into. It was a secret he would most likely take to his grave rather than burden someone else with.

  “I didn’t have a choice,” was all he allowed himself to say.

  Anne frowned ever so slightly. That excuse just didn’t hold any water for her. “Everyone always has a choice,” she told him.

  “I didn’t,” he replied.

  There had to be more, something he wasn’t telling her. “But—”

  Dan changed the subject. “I also wanted to tell you that I’m happy for you.”

  For a moment, still trying to understand what Danny wasn’t telling her, she was caught off guard. His last words completely confused her.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said I’m happy for you,” Danny repeated. “Happy that you’ve moved on. That you found someone you cared about and got married. That you went on to have a beautiful daughter.”

  She’s your beautiful daughter, she thought, an unexpected wave of anger filling her.

  Anne continued staring at him. “You’re happy for me,” she repeated in disbelief, like someone who didn’t quite understand the gist of the words she was saying.

  Dan nodded, forcing a smile to his lips. “Yes, I am.”

  Did he even have a clue how much it stung to hear him say that to her? How much it actually physically tore her apart?

  Why didn’t you come back to me? Why didn’t you show up on my doorstep years ago and tell me that you couldn’t bear to live without me? Why did you just vanish out of my life without a trace, leaving me to face being pregnant all by myself?

  But she couldn’t say any of that, couldn’t risk him knowing the truth, at least not yet. Perhaps not ever. There were other people to consider.

  S
o, instead, she asked, “Where were you all these years?”

  Anne struggled to keep the accusation out of her voice, doing her best to sound like just an old friend trying to catch up with another old friend instead of a spurned lover who’d given her heart away and had it torn in two more than a decade ago.

  Dan looked at her, wondering how to reply to her question. There wasn’t that much to tell her, really. For all intents and purposes, his life had ended the day he had left town with his brothers.

  “Wyoming first,” he finally said. “Then Colorado.”

  She could almost picture him going to Wyoming if she tried. But not Colorado.

  “Colorado?” Anne echoed. “What did you do there?” she asked.

  “Actually, I’m still there,” he told her. “I look a temporary leave of absence to come out here,” he said, then went on to answer her question. “I’m a sales manager for an exclusive dude ranch.”

  “A dude ranch?” It seemed like such an unlikely place for him to land, Anne thought. “What does a sales manager do at a dude ranch?”

  He laughed dryly. “Mainly I put together vacation packages for burned-out city slickers who think that riding around on a horse for a couple of weeks, pretending to be Roy Rogers, is guaranteed to make a whole new man out of them.”

  The mocking tone of his voice had her wondering other things. “Are you happy?” she wanted to know.

  He shrugged and smiled. “It’s a living.”

  “That’s not what I asked,” she told him, wondering if he was purposely trying to be evasive. Was he unhappy? Had he been as unhappy as she had?

  “The pay’s good and the dude ranch reminds me of the Sunshine Farm,” he told her, referring to the ranch where he and his siblings had lived while growing up—before his parents were killed.

  “Are you going back?” she asked him. “To the dude ranch,” she specified when she realized that she hadn’t been clear.

  He hadn’t worked that out in his head yet. He still had his job waiting for him and part of him had every intention of returning to Colorado. But seeing Jamie and his family—seeing her—had caused all sorts of doubts to spring up in his head.