Colter Gamblers: Gambling On A Heart Part 4

"Maybe he didn't want to cast a shadow on the day." Her mother bustled about, cleaning up empty plates. "Which was the polite thing to do."

Bobby, now finished devouring his breakfast, glanced up at Tracy. "The newspaper always makes everything sound so boring. Can I go outside?"

Tracy nodded and sipped her coffee. "Yes, you may go out, but don't get dirty. We'll be going to church in a couple of hours. And stay out of the ranch hands' way."

Bobby's response was his usual roll of the eyes. Why she bothered warning him was beyond her, but she had to try. Bobby missed living in town where he had friends, and she was secretly thankful the workers Bobby attached himself to didn't mind having the boy around.

When Dylan had invited them to live in the mansion on Oak Springs Ranch, she'd been thrilled to get Bobby out of town and on the ranch. She'd always loved the old house, which had been in her mother's family for six generations. It was a replica of the original plantation house where her great-great-great grandfather had been born before the Civil War. When he'd returned from the War Between the States, he and his two cousins headed west.

Tracy picked at her pancakes. "Zack sure has his hands full. He's still helping the Texas Rangers and the FBI investigate Leon's crimes, and now this."

Her mother stopped wiping the counter. "I heard yesterday from Winnie Cartwright that Leon's trying to plead insanity. He's pulling in doctors from all over to give credence to his claim because his father and grandmother had bi-polar disorders." Her blue eyes flashed and she huffed. "I'll tell you I can agree that Leon's crazy, but if my stepbrother tries to use that crock of cla.s.sic bull c.r.a.p to get off murdering his grandfather, his father and the mother of his daughter... Plus, the forgery of my father's will." She slapped a hand against the counter. "And he threatened the lives of my son and the mother of his unborn child. If he gets off, I'llI'll..." Her face flushed red as her shrill voice trailed off. She released her death grip on the dishcloth in her hand and ran the fingers of both hands through her short hair.

Her father grinned and raised a dark brow. "You'll what?"

"I'll raise Cain," her mother drawled with a jut of her chin.

Both Tracy and her father laughed. Picking up his empty mug, he stood and went around the island and kissed his wife on the cheek. "I'm sure you will do just that."

Tracy averted her eyes and focused on eating the now-cold pancakes on her plate.

"Mom! Mom!" Bobby ran into the kitchen from the mudroom with her mother's two yapping Yorks.h.i.+re terriers on his heels. "Mom!"

Tracy winced as Cinnamon and Ginger barked very time he called for her. "What?"

While her mother calmed the excited dogs, Bobby looked up with widened eyes from her to his grandfather. Before he could explain what the hullabaloo was all about, Tom Miller, the foreman of Oak Springs Ranch, and Zack Cartwright followed the boy into the kitchen.

Zack stood in the doorway, dressed in a tan uniform that looked too d.a.m.n good on his lean frame. He took in the entire room with one sweeping glance as he removed his Stetson. His eyes burned with something Tracy couldn't name when they settled on her. "Someone rustled forty-five Angus steers out of the southeastern pasture of Oak Springs last night. Who wants to break the news to the newlyweds?"

"Oh, no!" Eileen and Tracy gasped at the exact same time and both women covered their mouths.

Zack almost smiled at the reactions of the mother and daughter. He looked from Tracy to Bob and couldn't help slipping into a military stance with his arms at his sides. "Morning, General Quinn."

Bob's lopsided grin surprised Zack. "Relax, Zack. Last time I checked I'm not wearing a star on my shoulder. Good morning, Tom."

When the retired Army general moved around the counter to stand by Tracy, Zack blinked. The tough old general wore a pair of running shorts, a wife beater, and a pair of flip-flops.

"No, I suppose not," Zack said.

"Bobby, go up to your room and start getting ready for church," Tracy said.

Bobby started to protest, but when she arched a delicate dark brow, he huffed out a breath and headed out of the room.

She stood from the stool, the long pencil skirt hugging her slender figure as she moved. She tugged on the flouncy sleeves of her white blouse and looked from Zack to Tom. "Would the two of you like some coffee?"

Tom shook his head, but Zack could use a cup. He hadn't had more than a couple hours of sleep, and now his mouth was dry. "That'll be good. Thanks."

As Tracy headed for the coffee maker across the kitchen, Zack's gaze followed the sway of her slender hips.

"How do you know the cattle were stolen?" Bob broke into Zack's memory of what Tracy looked like without her clothes.

Zack cleared his throat and focused on business. "I saw the cut in the fence on my way to work this morning. The thief didn't close up the fence, and a few steers were out on the road. I stopped and got them back in and called Tom."

The foreman shuffled his feet and twisted his hat in his hands. "I drove out there with a few hands and verified forty-five of the steers are missing. I have the hands driving the rest into another pasture."

"How can you be so sure the fence didn't just break and the cattle got out on their own? Daddy used to have that problem all the time along that road." Eileen placed a creamer pitcher and sugar bowl near Zack.

Tracy returned with Zack's steaming black coffee. He set his hat on one of the stools by the bar and reached for the sugar bowl. "I already added the sugar." Their eyes locked as he took the mug from her. She smiled and shrugged. "Four heaping spoonfuls, just as you've always liked it."

Was she flirting with him? "Thanks." He took the cup from her. His fingers brushed hers and awareness buzzed through him as surely as the caffeine and sugar would, once he drank the coffee.

"It was cut," Tom said, reminding Zack that he had a job to do. "Dylan checked those fences Wednesday."

"I really don't want to ruin Dylan and Charli's honeymoon with this news." Eileen took a stool beside her husband.

Tracy glanced at her mother. "I agree. I think we shouldn't tell them unless something else happens."

Zack rubbed his chin and shook his head. "I can't do that. They own this ranch, and it was their property that was stolen."

"True." Tracy slid onto the stool beside him and leaned against the edge of the island, facing him. "But I live here, as do Dad and Mom. Dylan and Charli both left it up to us to make any decisions regarding the place while they were gone."

Zack considered her words. He knew they were true, but he also knew the law. As Tracy regarded him with big gray eyes, he gave in. He didn't want to ruin his friends' honeymoon any more than she did. "Okay. But if there's any other trouble, I'll have to call them."

She pushed off the stool and smiled at him. "Good. Now, I have to make sure Bobby is getting ready for church. See you around, Zack. Tom."

Tom nodded. "Have a good day, ma'am. Ah, tell Bobby I have a job for him when he comes home."

She smiled. "I will. Thanks, Tom, for putting up with him."

He shrugged and shuffled his feet. "Not a problem. He's a good help around the barn."

As she pa.s.sed Zack and headed toward the door, he glued his gaze to the swish of her long brown hair and the sway of her behind until she pushed out the swinging door.

"Cartwright, if you're done l.u.s.ting after my daughter, why don't you tell us exactly how you plan to catch these cattle thieves."

Tom Miller's chuckle punctuated Bob Quinn's amused words.

d.a.m.n, he needed a woman.

But that woman couldn't be Tracy, no matter how much he wanted her.

Chapter 4.

Tracy smiled at Henrietta Parker as she shuffled across the wood floor toward the salon sink, her cane making a jaunty tap-tap with each step. Although she was now stoop-shouldered and aged ninety-one, Henrietta was still famous around town for being a pilot during World War II. And up until six years ago, she'd flown her crop duster. Only her eldest son's taking the engine out of the old thing grounded her.

Henrietta pointed her cane at Tracy as she sat in the chair in front of the sink. "Haven't I told you a thousand times to get rid of those granny clothes?"

As Tracy took the old woman's cane and leaned it against the wall, she looked down at her favorite peasant blouse and long denim skirt. "I happen to like this outfit, Grandma."

Henrietta narrowed her sharp green eyes on her and shook her head. "Yeah, well, it makes you look like you're wearing a gunnysack. I don't get you, Tracy Caroline. There are women out there who starve themselves half to death to look like you. And make big money for their efforts." She pointed a k.n.o.bby finger at her. "Just the other night I was watching a television show about girls who want to be models and what they have to do to stay skinny." She looked Tracy up and down and frowned again. "How the h.e.l.l do you expect to catch a husband dressed like that?"

Tracy sighed and helped the woman lean back into the sink. "I'm not looking for a husband. I had one, remember?"

With a snort, Henrietta settled her head back. "And you did the right thing by dumping him. Now, you need a new one. That great-grandson of mine needs a steady hand. Jake is too much like his daddy. G.o.d rest Allan's soul, but he was the poorest excuse for a father put on G.o.d's green Earth."

Tracy sprayed the thin white hair with warm water. "Now, Grandma."

She turned in her seat and shook a finger at Tracy again. "Don't you 'now, Grandma' me. It's the gospel truth. If my son had been any kind of man, he wouldn't've beat his boys, and they may have turned out half-way decent."

Tracy grabbed a towel as water dripped from the woman's hair onto her embroidered Western s.h.i.+rt. She wasn't about to get into an argument about Allan Parker's parenting skills or those of his son, Jake. She grabbed a drape and put it around her ex-grandmother-in-law. "Jake isn't like Allan, and you know it."

Henrietta harrumphed and leaned back against the lip of the sink. "Maybe not, but it still burns my a.s.s that I've reached this age, and instead of my grandsons taking care of me, I'm still taking care of them."

Tracy lathered Henrietta's hair and worked her fingers through the thin strands to ma.s.sage four days worth of hairspray off the woman's scalp. Henrietta came in to the shop twice a week, Monday and Thursday for a wash and set and trusted Aqua Net and a sleeping cap to keep it looking good between those days. "Now, what did Brent do?"

"Well, let me tell you." She huffed and folded her hands over the drape. "He's been laid-off since the tire factory packed up and moved to China and has been freeloading off me or his mother ever since. But last week, he shows up with a brand, spanking new Silverado. I can't even get him to help me buy the grub he shoves into that big mouth of his, but he has money to get himself a fancy pickup truck." The many wrinkles around her mouth pulled down as she scowled. "h.e.l.l, what does he need a truck for? All he does is sit on my couch eating my food and watching my television set."

Tracy furrowed her brow. "Did he get another job?"

Henrietta threw up her arms. "h.e.l.l, no! Although he's been riding along with Jake in that truck driving gig he's got going, but he ain't makin' any money at it. Or so he says."

Tracy rinsed Henrietta's hair and patted the excess water out of it. "Did Sandy buy the truck for him?"

Tracy didn't care what her ex-mother-in-law did, but she sensed Henrietta needed to vent her frustration.

The old woman stood, and Tracy helped her shuffle across the floor and settle into the seat at the workstation. Henrietta waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. "You know Sandy doesn't have any money to buy a truck like that." She wrinkled her nose in disdain. "She may have been born with a silver spoon in her mouth, but that was taken away when that son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h John Blackwell disowned her for marrying my Allan."

Tracy retrieved a comb and picked out the knots in Henrietta's thin hair. Swallowing, she watched the woman's reflection in the mirror above the counter. "You're not giving him money, are you?"

Henrietta's green eyes narrowed again. "No. And before you go asking 'bout my savings. No one but my oldest boy, Charles, has access to 'em. I made sure my clock hadn't been cleaned, the moment Brent showed up with that truck." The old woman chuckled. "h.e.l.l, I know better than letting either one of those grandsons of mine know how much d.a.m.n money I have getting moldy over there in the Cattlemen's Bank and Trust."

Tracy smiled. Henrietta didn't get rich on her crop dusting service by not being a shrewd businesswoman. "Are you coming to Bobby's game Wednesday?"

"Wish I could. But that's my poker night with the Cartwright sisters. Those two old biddies swindled me out of five bucks last week and I want it back. Plus interest."

Tracy laughed and reached for the styling gel. Zack's great-aunts were in their eighties and two of the sweetest old ladies she'd ever met, and she couldn't imagine the spinster twins swindling anyone. "So, they take after the famed Cole Cartwright, do they?"

Henrietta tsked. "Hardly. Oh, they like to think they take after their great-granddaddy. But neither of them can beat me when I'm in my game."

Tracy applied styling gel to Henrietta's hair. The old woman watched the action through the reflection in the mirror for a few moments. "So, when are you gonna get yourself some help around this place? You don't need to be doin' hair now that you inherited all that money from your granddaddy."

With a shrug, Tracy reached for the tray of rollers under a cabinet. "I like what I do. Sure, I may not need the money, but I can't imagine not working."

"No one said you had to give up working, but if you hired another girl to work here, you'd have more time to do other things. Like go back to school. Get the education that no-good grandson of mine denied you of."

Tracy sectioned Henrietta's thin hair and then rolled the wisps onto the rollers. She'd love to have more time to spend with Bobby, but not being here every day for the women who depended on her?

Go back to school? She hadn't even considered the possibility before Winnie Cartwright mentioned it last week, then her Aunt Janet said the same thing at the wedding. Maybe now she should think about getting her degree. But in what? Going to medical school seemed as much a pipe dream as it always had.

Tracy smiled, but it was slippery and soon slid off her face. "I'm beginning to think n.o.body wants me anymore. A few other people said the same thing to me."

Henrietta turned and looked over her shoulder at Tracy. "You know better. You're ten times better at doin' hair than Sandy Parker ever was. But now, you could go to school. Become a doctor like you always wanted. Lord knows you've got the smarts for it. Besides, you've always said, if you could, you'd go back to school. Now's your chance."

Tracy shook her head and looked down into the tray of curlers. She gripped the comb in her left hand until her fingers hurt. "I have Bobby to consider."

"True. But think about how much your going to school will mean to him. Right now, all he wants to do is play football because that's what Jake's pounding in his head. The boy needs an education if he's ever gonna amount to anything."

Her new sister-in-law had been a drug addict, a teenage runaway and ended up serving a year in prison for a crime she'd been duped into committing, and now, she was happily married, pregnant and adopting a teenage daughter. But she was still taking cla.s.ses at the local college.

Danm, was that envy she felt? She licked her lips and rolled the last curler into Henrietta's white hair, suddenly anxious to get her out of the shop. "I'm too old to go back to school."

"Poppyc.o.c.k. You're what? Thirty-two? If I was your age, livin' in today's world, I'd be doing everything I could to be a pilot in the Air Force. Maybe even join NASA. Can't you see me flyin' one of those fancy s.p.a.ce Shuttles?" She laughed, but her misty green eyes betrayed more than a wistful dream as she stared at their reflections in the mirror. "You're too young with too many opportunities to just give up on your dreams, Tracy Caroline."

Zack read the report and looked up at the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers a.s.sociation agent standing in front of his desk. "Not a single clue."

Agent Herbert Milroy caressed his graying mustache. "Nope. d.a.m.ned frustrating, is what it is. But I haven't seen a rustler yet in my twenty years of being a TSCRA agent that didn't suffer the same disease: c.o.c.kiness."

Tossing the sheet of paper onto the jumble of traffic tickets and deputy reports covering his desk, Zack leaned back in his chair and tried to ignore the ache springing up in his temples. "I sure as h.e.l.l hope so. The Westcotts were already on the verge of bankruptcy. Losing forty-three prime steers didn't help them. And I'd hate for someone else as bad off to be hit next."

Milroy rubbed his hand across his nose and sat in the chair in front of the desk. He glanced at his hands before looking up at Zack, and cleared his throat. "I need to talk to the owners of b.u.t.terfly Springs Cattle Company."

Zack straightened in his chair. "They're on their honeymoon and left Tracy Parker in charge. If you need anything, she's the one to ask."

The agent seemed to consider his words before nodding. "Alright. I'll do this your way. I suppose Quinn and that sa.s.sy filly he married deserve to have a little peace after what happened at the Independence Day Charity Ball."

Herb Milroy was a local man and had been at the Gambler's Lake Country Club for the annual s.h.i.+ndig when Leon Ferguson had held Charli and Dylan at gunpoint. Zack still remembered the adrenaline rush when he'd pulled the trigger of his Glock from twenty yards away. He hadn't shot a man since his last tour in Afghanistan over two years ago. Although he hadn't wanted to kill Ferguson and had aimed for his shoulder, he now wished he'd saved the state of Texas and himself the trouble of wanting to try him for his various crimes. The businessman's lawyers were making Zack's life a living h.e.l.l. The thought of the meeting with the DA earlier that afternoon weighed on him, threatening to drag him under.

The slight ache in his temples turned into a bonafide throb.

"Thanks, I know Charli and Dylan will appreciate it." Zack focused on the puzzle currently in front of him and stood. "Want some coffee?"

With a wrinkle in his bushy brows, Herb glanced at the old, stained coffeemaker in the corner. "How old is it?"

Zack shrugged and poured himself a cup of the brew. It smelled as strong as it looked. One step up from road tar. "I made it at lunchtime." As he stirred four heaping spoons of sugar into the cup, he looked over his shoulder at Herb and caught his grimace. With a chuckle, Zack turned. "That was only four hours ago."

"Thanks. But no thanks," Herb muttered. "My ulcer hurts just thinking about drinking that swill. Do you know where I could find Miz Parker?"

Zack sat in his chair again and sipped from the cup Mandy had given to him for Father's Day last year. The old coffee hit his empty stomach with an unpleasant thud. Maybe he shouldn't drink the stuff. "She's probably at her hair salon. I'll follow you over there."