All Things Considered Read online

  With time Lanni would come to appreciate this unorthodox man, she mused. She’d viewed the transformation between father and son. Judd and Stuart could talk now without arguing, and that was a good beginning. The icy façade Stuart wore like a Halloween mask the first days after their arrival had all but vanished now. They were all making progress—slow, but sure. Lanni had also come to realize that once Judd accepted that he deeply cared for his father, he’d experienced a sense of release. A freedom. Stuart had lived a hard life. The only real love he’d ever known had been taken from him. Stuart had never forgiven himself for Lydia’s death, Lanni believed, and had only recently come to grips with the pain of her loss. He didn’t want to see his only son make the same mistakes.

  Lanni was mature enough to realize that living on the Circle M in close proximity to Stuart was bound to create certain problems, but ones they could work together toward solving.

  For the first time in his life, Stuart accepted Judd for who he was. It didn’t matter that Judd hadn’t become an attorney or doctor the way Stuart had always planned. Stuart cared about his son, and together they would build a solid relationship.

  * * *

  —

  Judd woke Lanni early Thursday morning. The room was still dark, cloaked in the darkest part of the night that comes just before dawn. He knelt above her, fully dressed.

  “I’ll be leaving in a few minutes.”

  “Already?” Lanni struggled up onto one elbow in a half-sitting, half-lying position.

  “Jim’s going to stay here in case there’s any problem on the ranch.”

  Lanni nodded and brushed the wisps of blond hair from her face. “We’ll be fine—don’t worry about anything here.”

  Judd’s hand eased around the base of her neck. “I’ll miss you.”

  “It’s only two nights.” After all the weeks and months without him, she could withstand two lonesome nights.

  He bent his mouth to hers and kissed her fervently. “I wish I didn’t have to go.”

  Lanni giggled—she couldn’t help it.

  “What’s so all-fired funny?”

  “You. For years I couldn’t keep you home, and now I can’t get you to leave. May I be so bold as to remind you that this little jaunt is an important mission for the Circle M ranch? You’re going to bring back a sturdy bull to service all our female cattle so that we can have lots of little bulls and little cows and whatever else bulls and cows produce.”

  “You know why I find it so difficult to leave, don’t you?” His hot gaze rained down on her face in the moonlight—his eyes were smoky with desire.

  Lanni gave no thought to resisting him as she parted her moist lips, inviting his kiss. She moaned at the sensual pleasure he gave her, and her fingers stroked his hair, holding his head to her.

  He broke away from her just long enough to unhitch his pants, his gaze holding hers while his fingers worked at his belt.

  “Your plane?” she whispered, welcoming him. She pulled him closer, and arched her hips wantonly against his as their mouths feasted on each other.

  “The plane can wait.” He moaned, sliding into her until they were united completely.

  Lanni let out a deep sigh of pleasure and bit her bottom lip to keep from crying out.

  “But I can’t,” Judd finished.

  Their lovemaking was long and lusty, and Judd held her, their bodies still connected long after they’d finished.

  Jim honked the car horn from the yard below, and Judd pulled away reluctantly. “I don’t think that I can do without you for two nights.” He paused and kissed her hungrily. “Be ready for me when I arrive home.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain. Just bring back that famous bull.”

  “I’ll do that, love,” he told her, already on his way out the bedroom door.

  Lanni nestled back against her pillow and sighed her contentment. Not even the first weeks of the marriage had been this lusty. She didn’t know how long this honeymoon period would last, but she suspected it would be a very long time and she welcomed it just as she had her husband. There was little she could refuse him, her love was so great.

  Although she’d made light of the nights he’d be away, Lanni realized that they would be difficult for her as well. She was becoming accustomed to being well loved. At this rate, Jenny would be a big sister within the year.

  Stuart was waiting for her when Lanni came down the stairs an hour later.

  “Judd get off okay?”

  She nodded, pouring herself a cup of coffee. “This bull must be pretty darn special for him to travel all the way to Texas.”

  “He sure is. Good bloodlines are important.”

  Lanni pulled out a chair and joined her father-in-law at the table. “You look like you slept well.”

  Stuart snorted, then glared at her with a twinkle in his faded eyes. “It ain’t me who’s got rosy cheeks this morning, girl.”

  Lanni blushed and reached for a section of the morning paper, doing her best to ignore Stuart’s low chuckle.

  * * *

  —

  As she suspected they would, the days passed at a snail’s pace. The mornings and afternoons were long, but the nights were worse yet. She didn’t hear from Judd, but then Lanni hadn’t expected that she would. After all, he was scheduled to be away only three days and two nights.

  Saturday afternoon, Stuart, Jenny, Jim, and Betty all decided to take the drive into Billings to meet Judd’s plane. They made an outing of it, stopping along the way at a restaurant to eat dinner; Stuart kept Jenny occupied in the car with tales of his boyhood on the range.

  They arrived at the airport an hour before Judd’s scheduled flight, and Lanni bought a magazine to help fill the time. Betty took Jenny on a walking tour while Stuart and Jim swapped ranching stories.

  When Judd’s flight landed, Lanni stood and watched the plane taxi to the building and viewed the jetway fold out to meet the arriving passengers. Lanni was eager to feel her husband’s arms and stepped back, surveying each face as the people disembarked.

  “Where’s Daddy?” Jenny wanted to know, when Judd hadn’t appeared.

  “I don’t know, sweetheart.” The plane had been empty five minutes.

  Jim asked one of the flight attendants to check the roster and learned Judd had never been on board the flight.

  “Must have missed his connecting flight,” Stuart grumbled when Jim appeared.

  “You’d think he’d phone,” Betty said, carefully studying Lanni.

  Lanni gave the worried housekeeper a bright smile as synthetic as acrylic and murmured, “I’m sure there’s a logical explanation. There’s no need to fret.”

  “Right,” Betty confirmed. “I’m sure there’s no reason to worry; there’s a perfectly good reason why Judd wasn’t on that plane.”

  They waited around the airport several more hours until Jenny became fussy and overtired. What had been excited expectation on the long drive to Billings became eerie silence on the ride home.

  Lanni didn’t sleep that night. It seemed as if the walls were closing in around her. The disappointed tears she was trying to hold back felt like a weight pressing against her breast.

  Each time the phone rang the following day, Lanni’s heart shot to her throat. They were all on edge. Stuart turned taciturn. Jenny complained continually that Betsy needed her daddy back until Lanni broke into tears and held her daughter to her, giving way to her emotion.

  “I could just shake that boy,” Betty announced, bringing in a freshly baked apple pie. “I take it no one’s heard anything.”

  “Not a word.”

  “He checked out of his hotel room just when he was supposed to,” Jim said, following his wife inside the kitchen. “I can’t understand it.”

  “I can,” Lanni said softly.

  All four faces turned to he
r, wide-eyed and curious.

  “It’s happening again.”

  “What are you talking about?” Stuart grumbled.

  “He’s done it before, and although he promised he’d never leave me again, he has.”

  “I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Jim barked.

  “Judd will be back when he’s good and ready to come home. He’s gone.”

  “Gone? You’re not making any sense, girl,” Stuart shouted. “Of course he’s gone. He went to buy that bull from the Francos.”

  “No, he’s left us—all of us this time, and not just me. But I told him and I meant it. When he leaves, I do.” She lifted Jenny into her arms, “Jenny and I will be returning to Seattle first thing in the morning.”

  Thirteen

  “You can’t leave,” Stuart argued, looking lost and defeated. “Judd’s coming back. I feel it in my bones.”

  “Oh, he’ll be back,” Lanni countered softly. “He always does that, usually bearing fancy gifts as though that is supposed to wipe away all the pain and worry.” Jenny wiggled and Lanni placed the little girl back on the floor.

  “You mean to tell me Judd’s done this sort of thing before?”

  “Not exactly like this,” Lanni explained, her voice low and incredibly sad. “Usually when he left I realized he’d be gone a good long while. I imagine it’ll take him a month to find his way home, but who knows, it could be six.”

  “I don’t believe he’d do a thing like that,” Jim said, defiantly crossing his arms over his chest. “There’s too much at stake.”

  Silently, Lanni agreed to that. Their lives together. Their reconciliation. Their marriage. Everything was on the line. Lanni had trouble believing he’d do something like this herself. Surely he could find some way to get to a phone, no matter where he was. Although Jim had mentioned contacting the hotel, Lanni had already done that herself, in addition to every hospital within a fifty-mile radius of Laredo. Judd had disappeared. Oh, he’d show up again, Lanni was confident of that. In his own time and in his own way. But this time she wouldn’t be waiting for him.

  “Lanni, don’t do something you’ll regret,” Betty said, patting the back of her hand.

  “I won’t,” she concurred.

  The phone pealed and everyone turned and looked at it as if it were a miracle come to save them from themselves. It rang a second time before Lanni stood and reached for it.

  “Hello.” She tried to hide the expectancy in her voice.

  “Lanni, it’s Steve.”

  “Could you hold the line a minute?”

  “Sure.” Steve hesitated. “Is something wrong?”

  “No, of course not.”

  Lanni placed her hand over the earpiece. “It’s the real estate company where I work in Seattle.” There wasn’t any reason to irritate Stuart with the news it was Steve. “Apparently there’s a problem. I’ll take it in the other room.”

  Disappointment darkened the three adults’ faces as they turned back to their coffee. Gently, Lanni set the receiver aside and hurried into Stuart’s office. She waited until the other phone had been reconnected before she spoke.

  “Okay, I’m here now.”

  “I called to let you know the deal on the Rudicelli house closed. Your commission is here if you’d like me to mail it to you.”

  “Yes, please do,” Lanni said, forcing some enthusiasm into her lifeless voice.

  “Something’s wrong,” Steve said with such tender concern that Lanni felt the tears sting the backs of her eyes. “I can hear it in your voice. Won’t you tell me, Lanni?”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “You’re crying.”

  “Yes.” She sniffled. “I can’t help it.”

  “What’s happened? If that no-good husband of yours has hurt you, I swear I’ll punch him out.”

  The thought of Steve tangling with Judd, who was superior in both height and weight, produced such a comical picture in her mind that she swallowed a hysterical giggle.

  “As soon as the check arrives, I’m leaving. I told him I would and I meant it…” She paused and reached for a tissue, blowing her nose again.

  “Oh, Lanni.”

  “I know, I know. I’m such a bloody fool.”

  “You’re a warm, loving, tender woman. I wouldn’t change a hair on your head.”

  “Stop it, Steve. I’m an idiot; I haven’t got the good sense I was born with—all I want to do now is get back to Seattle. I swear I’ll never leave home again.” The longer she spoke, the faster the tears came.

  “Poor sweetheart.”

  “Do you think,” she said and sniffled, striving to find some humor in the situation, “that if I closed my eyes and clicked my heels together three times the magic would work and I’d be home in a flash? Seattle’s known as the Emerald City, you know.”

  “Problem is, Lanni—you could end up in Kansas instead.”

  “The way my luck’s been, that’s exactly what would happen and I’d end up there with a house on my head.”

  “Lanni, I wish I could do something for you.”

  “No, I’m fine, but do me a small favor, will you? Call Jade and let her know Jenny and I are coming home as quickly as we can.”

  “Consider it done. What are…friends for?”

  They finished speaking a couple of minutes later and, feeling both mentally fatigued and physically exhausted, Lanni trudged up the stairs. It took her only a half hour to empty the chests of drawers and neatly fold their clothes inside the suitcases.

  The following morning Stuart was sitting at the kitchen table when Lanni came down the stairs. She’d spent another sleepless night tossing, turning, and worrying. She could scratch Judd’s eyes out for doing this to all of them.

  “He’ll be here soon,” Stuart spoke into the paper.

  Lanni’s fingers dug into the edge of the counter so hard, she cracked three nails. “Will you stop saying that?” she asked him. “Every morning you make this announcement like you’ve been given some divine insight. Well, in case you haven’t noticed, he isn’t back yet.” She knew she was being unreasonable, but she couldn’t stop herself. “I’ve got to get out of here—I told him I’d leave. I told him.” To her horror, Lanni started to cry. Scalding tears seared red paths down her cheeks. She jerked around and covered her face with her hands, not wanting Stuart to view her as an emotional wreck.

  The weathered hand that patted her shoulder astonished Lanni. “Cry it out, girl; you’ll feel better.” It surprised her even more when she turned into Stuart’s arms and briefly hugged the old man. “I don’t know what any of us would do without you,” she told him, drying her eyes by rubbing her index fingers across the bridge of her nose and over her cheeks.

  * * *

  —

  By evening there was nothing left to occupy her time. She’d done so much housework that the place gleamed. Dinner dishes dried on the counter and the sun was setting in a pink sky. Betty wandered outside to weed the small garden she’d planted, and Lanni ventured out to help.

  Dust flying up along the driveway caused both women to sit up on their knees. Few visitors came out this far. Lanni’s heart went stock-still as she settled back on her haunches, afraid to hope. Each day she faced a hundred discouragements.

  A flashy red sedan pulled into the yard and Lanni’s hope died another cruel death. As soon as the dust had settled down, the driver’s side opened and Steve Delaney stepped out.

  “Steve.” Lanni flew to her feet, racing across the yard. She stopped in front of him, suddenly conscious of the mud-caked knees of her jeans and the fact she was without makeup and her hair was tied back in a bandanna.

  “Lanni?” Steve looked stunned. “Is that peasant woman inside those rags really you?”

  If she didn’t realize he was teasing, she would have been offended.
Steve’s humor was often subtle. “I don’t exactly look like a young business executive, do I?”

  “Not quite the Lanni I remember.”

  “Well,” she said, so happy to see him that she had to restrain herself from throwing her arms around him, “what are you doing here? How’d you ever find this place?”

  “It’s a long story to both, let me suffice by saying that I’m delivering the commission check in person and have booked three airplane seats for early tomorrow morning out of Billings. We’re headed back to God’s country—Seattle.”

  “Hello, Mr. Delaney.” Jenny joined Lanni, clenching her doll to her breast.

  “Could this sweet young thing be Jenny?”

  “Yup,” the four-year-old answered. “My daddy went away.”

  Steve squatted down so that they could meet eye-to-eye. “I’ve come to take you home, Jenny, so you won’t have to worry about your daddy anymore. Are you ready?”

  “Nope,” Jenny announced. “I want to wait for my daddy.”

  “That could be a very long time, Jenny, and Mommy needs you with her.” Lanni did her best to explain it to the child. She directed her attention back to Steve. “Give me five minutes to clean up. Do you want to come inside? I can get you something cool to drink while you wait.”

  Stuart appeared on the top step of the porch, glaring at Steve with a furious frown.

  “No thanks,” Steve said and ran a finger along the inside of his shirt collar for effect. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll be more comfortable standing here in the setting sun.”

  “Stuart won’t do anything,” Lanni sought to reassure him.

  “Nonetheless, I’d rather remain here. But hurry, would you, Lanni? I don’t like the looks that old man is giving me. I have a suspicion Custer’s men had much the same feeling riding onto the Little Big Horn as I did pulling into this driveway.”

  “Nobody’s going to scalp you.”

  “Don’t be so sure.”

  Lanni was halfway to the porch when the sound of a truck coming into the driveway caused her to whip around. Judd. She knew it immediately. He honked several times and stuck his hand out the side window, waving frantically.