A Pair of Second Chances (Ben Jensen Series Book 1) (15 page)

"You just build your fire Mr. I'll be more comfortable sitting if I'm not surrounded by all of... this... she said." gesturing toward the clutter with a thrust of her chin, and walking toward the door with her hands full. "Where do you put your trash?"

"Uh... there's a barrel at the end of the porch, that'll do for now." He just shook his head as she and Timmy went out the door with their load.

Ben stood and closed the door of the stove as the flames of his fire started crackling from the kindling up into the bigger stove wood he'd placed. He quickly added water to his pot... threw in some fresh grounds, and placed the battered old pot back on top of the equally battered old iron stove, just as Amanda and Timmy came back through the door, bringing along the second and last chair he owned, from the porch.

She set the chair by the table and told Timmy to sit there and wait while she went to the car to get him something for a snack.

Ben sat down across the table from the small, shy, scared little boy and just grinned at him. "Been kind of a tough morning, huh kid?"

Timmy, looked at him with wide eyes. "You were mean to those men!"

Ben tipped his hat back on his head and ran his hand over the stubble on his chin. "Well son, sometimes what looks like mean is just what ya gotta do. Most times... men like that have earned whatever they get. They were mean to you and your Momma weren't they?"

"Yes... they slapped Momma."

"Well kid... where I come from, a man ain't allowed to do that. Not without gettin' slapped back. You do wrong... ya get slapped. Do you understand little guy?"

"Yes... I think so..." Timmy replied, hesitantly.

"Well... I'd not worry about it much. Some things will just make more sense to you when you get older... and... some things will never make any sense... "

Amanda walked back into the cabin carrying some crackers, a small carton of chocolate milk, and a plastic cup. "Surprise Little Man! Chocolate milk for You!"

"Hooray Momma!" Timmy squealed.

"Well... it don't take much to make him happy, does it?" Ben commented.

"No... he's a good boy" Amanda replied as she poured his milk into the cup with one hand and tousled his hair with the other.

Ben stood and walked back over to the stove to check on the coffee... "Gonna be a few minutes... Takes a mite for the stove to warm up" he told her...

He walked back over to the table, dragging his cooler for a seat, and sat down. Amanda was just sitting, watching Timmy eat his crackers and drink his milk. The way her face changed when she looked at the boy didn't escape his notice. Just the same, it occurred to Ben that they had a pretty serious situation to deal with, and the sooner the better. Leaving some things untended to didn't bode well for a long and profitable future, was what he thought to himself. Looking around the room, and what he could see of his degenerating ranch, through the open cabin door made him laugh out loud. He was one to talk!

"What? What's so funny?" Amanda broke into his thoughts.

"Ah... nothing... just... Look here" he started; "I don't mean to pry or push... and you likely don't want to talk 'bout some things... in front of... uh... ever'body" he said, looking at the boy; "and maybe not even with me, but... I am, like it or not, involved in this now... and if we're gonna work around this lil' didoe you got goin' on... we, NEED to talk... I need to know just what, exactly, the hell is goin' on, and what I've stepped in to."

Amanda looked straight in to his eyes... and then out the door for long seconds. He could see her mind working. The longer she sat, looking out the door without speaking, the stronger his premonition that this was more than just some sort of lovers spat that he'd blundered into the middle of... there was a darker story here... and a meaner one... and one that was likely to get worse, before it got better... he could feel it... he could taste it... and the taste to him, was bitter.

While he waited for her response to his statement, he wondered impatiently about those men back in the campground. They sure seemed awful quick to go to guns. A small defiance in the voice of a cowboy and they started drawing weapons? What the hell!?

And, he thought about his horses and gear. He needed to get those horses back to the ranch and his packs. He needed to get sold what he could, ASAP, and he couldn't afford to lose that gear, worn out as it was. There wasn't anything to replace it with... but where were those toughs? If they'd chased her all the way from Chicago, they'd keep looking. He couldn't go after his gear, or his horses, until he knew what the hell was going on.

If they'd found her, way out here, even with the help of her betraying telephone, they had some skills. How long would it take them to identify him? How many ranches were there in the area for them to search? Time was not on his side, and he knew it. Her staying here, at the ranch, was not a way to hide. Once they ID'd him, and he knew they would... this would be the first place they'd come. He bore no illusions that his "Take her down to Red Lodge" would buy any more than a few hours at best...

Once they knew they'd been sent off down a dead end, they'd reverse direction and come back with a vengeance.

They'd been bruised and beaten... but deep down he knew that would only provoke their egos to seek vengeance. Ben had little intention of any of them being easy to find for that quest to be easily fulfilled. He knew that though he may have whipped them once, next time it wouldn't be so easy.

They were warned now. Next time they wouldn't be so cocky and arrogant. Next time, the advantage of surprise wouldn't be on his side.... his thoughts wandered... and he waited...

Chapter
16

Ben sat, sitting sideways to the table, one hand on the table, the other in his lap... and just stared out the door along with Amanda... lost as she, in his own thoughts, until...

"Timmy... let's get your paper and crayons out of the car, OK?" She stood and looked at Ben, then reached and took Timmy's hand, and led him out the door to the car. She put a little box of crayons and a small sketch pad together in a plastic case at the Walmart when she'd bought most of their camp goods. When she opened the door she told Timmy to; "Take your box and sit on the porch while Mr. Jensen and I talk, OK?"

Timmy grabbed his small box from the back seat and ran for the porch.

Amanda returned through the cabin door just as Ben finished pouring two cups of strong, black coffee.

She picked up her cup and took a taste, shutting her eyes and shaking her head with the first sip. "Wow!... uh... you're coffee is... uh... Not weak! is it?" She laughed.

Ben grinned at her and tested his own cup. "Gets the blood pumpin' for sure! and it'll put hair on your... uh... places you'd probably be best without it!" Grinning, he held his cup up as in a toast.

"Well... what are you willing to tell me?" he asked

Amanda took another sip of her coffee, her eyes staring across the steaming black liquid as she drank. Slowly, she set the cup on the table, holding on to it for a few seconds as if afraid if she let go, she'd lose her grip on much more.

Finally, she released the battered enamel cup and looked up at Ben.

"It's a long story. I suppose, considering what you've already done for us, and what you've had put at risk... you deserve to know it. I can't believe I'm telling you this... I don't know you... you're a complete and total stranger... and yet I have this feeling like I'm talking to an old friend... all at the same time. It's the strangest thing... considering I have so few friends... and none I'd trust with my son's life."

"Well girl... I don't mean it to sound corny... but... to whatever ability I have... I can promise you're safe with me... I might not be much... but there's no woman on earth ever had anything to fear from me..." Ben replied quietly.

Amanda took another drink from her cup... smacking her lips and shaking her head. "Damn! That... is Coffee!"

Ben liked the way her eyes lit up when she laughed... and noticed how the light faded so quickly... after.

"I ran away from home when I was 16. I got tired of getting beaten and... used... by my mothers "latest" husband. I didn't have anywhere to go and no money to get there with, but I figured anywhere, anything, would be better than that hell I was in... "

"Yeah... well... so much for figuring huh?" She laughed a dark and cynical laugh, and emptied the last of the coffee from her cup.

Ben said nothing, just stood up, walked over to the stove, picked up the pot and refilled her cup... and his own.

Amanda, thanked him and continued her story. "Homeless... messed up... on the street... and scared... I was fresh meat for a man like Tyrone." She looked up at Ben; "That's Timmy's father...

She looked down at her hands in her lap... He saw her eyes seem to get wet... but she blinked it away and raised her head with a small shake. When she looked back at him and continued talking, he noticed a hard, defiant edge to her voice; as if challenging him to judge her.

"He pimped me out for a little while." Her eyes flared. "Then decided to keep me for himself... most of the time."

"He beat me when I got pregnant... when that didn't work, he tried to force me into an abortion... I ran off and hid. I managed to hide long enough that time, that it was too late to do anything when they finally found me. But, find me they did and took me back to him. Since then, he's held me, by been using my son... Timmy."

She stood and walked over to the door, to look out at the joy of her life, quietly coloring in the noontime sunshine on the porch. With her back to Ben she said; "But now... I can't let what was done to me... get done to him."

Amanda turned and looked back into the cabin at the weathered old cowboy sitting at the even more weathered old table. Looking at him with the tears welling up in her eyes she simply said; "I can't."

"Well!" Ben spoke, sitting at the table, for the first time since she'd started her story; "It's sure then."

"Sure? What's sure? I don't understand" she asked him.

His words were spoken with a certainty and an icy edge that, after witnessing what this man was capable of, sent a chill up her spine; "Someone has to pay the debt."

"Debt? What debt?" Amanda asked, confused.

Ben stood and walked over to the doorway. Standing in the open door, he looked back at Amanda and tilting his head toward Timmy he said; "Someone does, what was done to him" and he jabbed a finger at the boy, his eyes flashing; "Done to you... there's a debt to be paid... Someone owes... someone... will... pay."

Amanda just looked at him. In her whole life she'd never seen anything like him. He seemed like the stuff of stories and legends... a real live Knight in shining armor... and she laughed... She couldn't help her self... she laughed.

She started laughing almost hysterically. Laughed so hard that Timmy got up from where he sat on the porch to look through the door into the small cabin to see what it was all about.

Timmy went back to his coloring, Amanda picked up her coffee cup and took another sip... still laughing... and Ben stood in the doorway wondering what in the hell was going on.

"What in the hell is so funny about Montana?" he wanted to know.

She held up one hand to him, to wait, covering her mouth with the other, while she tried to catch her breath. "It's not Montana Ben... it's you!" and she collapsed again into laughter.

"Me?! What have I done that's so damn funny?"

Amanda looked at the bowlegged cowboy with three days stubble on his chin, faded jeans with a hole in one knee, run down, patched boots, and wearing a sweat stained grey felt hat with a tear in the brim, standing in the doorway.

She laughed so hard her sides hurt. She laughed until she cried, as Ben stood in the doorway, exasperated and wondering if the woman's situation had just finally drove her mad.

She couldn't remember, ever, laughing that much or that long. It felt good. The fear and pressure she'd been under for days seemed lessened, lighter. She didn't know why really, but she felt like she had hope. She felt, for the first time in her life, like she could laugh without fear. Whatever had brought her to be able to let loose like that had to be good. Didn't it?

Finally the spasms of laughter subsided and she regained a small bit of composure; enough to speak. As her fingers wiped away the tears of laughter running down her cheeks she looked up at Ben; "You cowboy, don't look anything LIKE a knight in shining armor!" and she regressed into yet another spasm of laughter.

"Huh? What the... What are you talkin' about? who said anything 'bout knights? Wha.... aw hell... I've never understood a woman... never will!" he said with a flip of his hand, and walked over to pour himself another cup.

Ben sat back down at the table, sipping strong black coffee from his cup and watching the laughing woman. Finally, he asked her. "So... his dad is black? Thought so..."

Amanda's laughing stopped. Looking at the cowboy her face darkened.

"Ben... when you were beating that man... back at the campground... it sounded like you hate black men... my son is half black and..."

"Look lady" Ben interrupted her; "my first wife was an Indian... I hated her 'cause she was a Bitch! I don't give a good Gawd Damn what color, she, you, or that boy are!"

"Then, why were you so savage with him?"

Ben just sat looking at her for several long seconds. He took another drink of his coffee, looking at her silently over the cup, before he rose and walked to the door, stopped and turned back to her. "I was a boy one time..." then he turned back and walked outside and walked down to the shack he used for a pack shed.