Only Hers (25 page)

“He hit you with a hammer?” the woman next to her asked in horror.

“No, I did that myself.” Maybe she was laying it on a bit thick. “Matt took one look at my bruised thumb and sent me back to the ranch. He cares for his people very well. Wade was justifiably proud of him.”

All around people murmured their agreement. The women resumed gazing adoringly at Matt. He pulled his hat from her hand. His face was smiling, but his eyes promised retribution.

“If you’ll excuse us, we have to be going.” Catching Shannon’s arm, Matt started out of the church. Sneaky.
Nobody seemed to notice that flaw in her character except him.

“Matt, Pastor Billows and Sister Price want to meet Shannon,” Octavia called.

Matt clenched his jaw and halted. People clustered around and waited. He cast a sideways glance at Shannon and saw her smiling. Sneaky as they come.

Octavia quickly made the introductions, beaming at Shannon as if she were her own child. “Shannon’s the head nurse now in the ICCU unit where Wade was a patient. You can tell just by looking at her what a warm, gentle lady our Shannon is.”

There were several loud amens. All from men.

“You only see the goodness in people because you’re so nice,” Shannon said. “Pastor Billows, I really enjoyed your sermon, and Mrs. Price, you touched my heart.”

Pastor Billows stuck his chest way out. His round, dark face glowed with pleasure. “I’m but the instrument of God.”

“I give all praise and glory to Him,” added Leola Price, glancing around the audience as if to let them know she was taking account as to who agreed and giving them a second chance.

Women took the hint and sent out another chorus of amens and praises for Leola’s voice.

Matt had had enough. “Octavia, we need to be going.” Thanks to Shannon he still hadn’t updated the ranch accounts.

“Any chance of you staying with us permanently, Miss Johnson?” Pastor Billows asked.

Matt wasn’t the only one who stared at the pastor. Tall, midforties, widowed, and handsome, he had the respect of the entire congregation. Matt always admired him for his ability to keep so many women in the church happy and willing to work.

Shannon moistened her lips before answering firmly. “No.”

“That’s a pity. We need someone of your obvious experience in our community. Our only doctor retired last month and referred all the patients to a colleague forty-five miles away. It’s tough on our senior citizens getting there.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m only here for a short time,” Shannon told him.

“How long?” Leola asked. “Maybe you could help out while you’re here.”

“I don’t have the authority to practice nursing in Texas,” Shannon explained with more calm than she felt.

“Is taking a blood pressure practicing nursing?” asked a frail woman holding the hand of a equally frail man. “My name is Rose Badget and this is my husband, Henry.”

Shannon said how pleased she was to meet them.

“I bought that pressure thing, but I can’t hear the sound. Now I have to drive my Henry every week to the doctor because he has glaucoma and they have to watch the medicine he takes for his pressure. The traffic and the drive are a bit much for me, Henry, and our car.”

Shannon saw the desperation in the woman’s face, felt her need. Dressed in a print cotton dress and small straw hat, she appeared to be in her early seventies. Henry wore a crisp khaki shirt and pants. Her grandfather had been seventy-two when he died.

“Couldn’t someone in the church or in your family take his blood pressure for you?” Shannon asked hopefully.

“The doctor has to regulate the medicine sometimes and he says he won’t take the responsibility unless it’s taken by someone he trusts or a professional person,” the woman said. “Our daughter lives in Atlanta.”

“I’m sorry.” Shannon crossed to the older woman. “Then that means I would be acting as a RN because I would report directly to your husband’s doctor. For that I’d need reciprocity.”

“Reci—what’s that?”

“Validation of my nursing license to work as a RN in
Texas, since I took my nursing exams in Missouri. I’m not even sure how long that takes.” She rushed on at the woman’s crestfallen expression. “I’d be happy to come over and I’ll try to help you learn to take your husband’s blood pressure.”

The woman looked away, then back at Shannon. “I spent two hours trying already with those double things where the nurse and I both could hear the sounds.” She blinked. “We’ll make it. Have a nice stay, Miss Johnson.”

Helpless to stop them, Shannon watched them leave. Callused fingers curled around her arm. She didn’t have to glance up to know it was Matt.

“We’re leaving.”

This time no one tried to stop them. Once in the truck, Octavia spread her handkerchief in Shannon’s lap.

“I’m sorry.”

Octavia patted Shannon’s knee. “Ain’t your fault, child. Nobody’s blaming you. We know you’d help if you could.”

But she could help . . . if she wasn’t afraid of falling apart again.

“You think I’m a coward, don’t you?”

“What I think doesn’t matter,” Matt said and braced his shoulder against the trunk of an oak tree. “Dinner is ready.”

“I’m not hungry.” Arms clasped around updrawn legs, Shannon laid her cheek against her knee.

She was hurting and he didn’t know how to help her. Shannon might be a lot of things he hadn’t figured out, but mean wasn’t one of them. As soon as they had reached the ranch house, she had gone upstairs.

She had passed him going back downstairs as he was going up. Wearing the same yellow T-shirt and shorts as when they met and carrying her quilt, it wasn’t difficult for him to figure out where she was headed.

After changing, he told Octavia to eat without them. Now that he was here, he didn’t know what to say. After
his divorce, his family telling him to get himself together hadn’t helped him a bit. He had to work through his anger.

The land had been his salvation. He wasn’t sure if it was Shannon’s. He looked around the flower-strewn meadow, saw a jackrabbit scurry for safety, heard a blue jay in the trees.

It was a peaceful place, but sooner or later you had to leave. And when you did, your peace had to come from within. He knew that better than anyone.

“Did you really enjoy Leola’s singing?” Matt asked.

“Yes.”

He picked up a rock and threw it in the direction of the stream. “Those high notes of hers always remind me of a whooping crane.”

She lifted her head. The wind playfully tossed her thick auburn hair. “That’s not a very nice thing for you to say.”

“I’m not a nice guy.”

“Yes, you are. You just don’t like anyone to know.”

“How did you come up with an idea like that?”

“Wade. You helped. I didn’t mean for that lady to think you hit me with a hammer.”

“Forget it.” She was trying to comfort him again when she was the one in need of consolation. Lowering her chin to her knee, she stared out across the meadow. “You better go back and eat. You know how Octavia hates to rewarm food and there’s no one there to eat.”

“She knows we might be late.” Matt sent another rock toward the stream.

Her lush, plum-colored lips curved into an alluring smile. “I said you were a nice guy.”

Another rock went sailing. “Your grandmother give you that quilt?”

“My grandmother died before I was born. My grandfather gave it to me when I spent the night with him for the first time.” She looked wistful. “I was four years old. I had the chicken pox and couldn’t go on the family vacation to Disneyland.”

“He kept you by himself?”

“Yes.”

“Brave man.”

Shannon looked at him as if unsure if he was serious or joking. “Granddaddy Rhodes was the best. He wouldn’t like knowing his only granddaughter turned her back on people in need.”

“He’d probably understand better than you think.” Matt squatted down beside her. “People who love you are less judgmental than you are of yourself.”

Shannon wrinkled her small nose. “You haven’t met my parents or brothers. They all think they know what’s best for me better than I do.”

Matt tossed the one remaining rock in his hand. He wanted to ask if her ex-boyfriend was one of the things her family thought best for her, then discarded the idea. He didn’t want to become entangled in Shannon’s life any more than necessary. Trying to help her through this bad time was the same as he’d do for any of his other ranch hands who faced a problem.

He pushed to his feet. “Are you going to show them they’re wrong or sit here and feel sorry for yourself?”

Amber eyes glinted. “I take back what I said about you being nice.”

“You only have to decide one thing: can you live with yourself knowing you could have helped and didn’t? I don’t think you can. You had no control over what happened to your grandfather. You do over this. I’ll see you back at the ranch.”

He had gone only a short distance before he heard her say, “I don’t think I could, either.”

He turned to see her folding up her quilt. He waited until she caught up with him.

“Granddaddy Rhodes would have liked you.” On tiptoe, she kissed his cheek. “Thanks.” Getting into her car, she drove off.

It took Matt a full thirty seconds to realize he was smiling. The smile vanished in the next heartbeat.

She wasn’t adding him to her list of admirers. He had only done what was best for the ranch. She would be unable to do her job effectively if she was upset all the time.

Walking to his truck he ignored the voice that whispered, she might have left sooner if she was unhappy.

“Come in,” Matt called from behind his desk.

The door slowly opened and Shannon hesitantly stuck her head inside the room. “I know you’re busy, but could I talk to you for a minute?”

“What is it?”

“Stop frowning, I’m not going to ask for a raise.”

“Very funny.”

Shannon had thought this was going to be so simple, but the stern-faced man staring at her wasn’t the same compassionate man who had helped her in the meadow this afternoon. Matt looked at her now as if he didn’t care if she dropped off the face of the earth.

“Shannon, if you have something to say, please get on with it. I’m busy.”

“I wanted to thank you again for this afternoon. Octavia and I just got back from visiting with Henry and Rose Badget. They’re a wonderful couple.”

He tossed his pen down. “I’ve known them most of my life. You interrupted me to tell me that?”

No, I interrupted you because I just wanted to see you smile at me again. Maybe say I knew you could do it, Shannon.

“Octavia took me to meet two other elderly people. I’d forgotten how frightened of the unknown and doctors the elderly can be,” she confessed. “We’re going to see a Mrs. Snyder tomorrow. She’s recovering from a stroke, but she’s depressed and her daughter can’t get her out of bed.”

Heavy brows arched. “You seem to be jumping with both feet into something you were scared witless of a few hours ago.”

“I still am, but whenever it gets too much, I think of Granddaddy and thank God someone was there to help
him.”
Just as I thank God you were there to talk me through a difficult time just as Granddaddy did.

She stuck her hands into the back pockets of her shorts. “Like you said, I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t help.”

“What about reciprocity?”

“I talked with the director of nursing where I work in St. Louis and she doesn’t see a problem. Once I made a promise I wasn’t thinking of leaving, she was a lot of help,” she told him, becoming more animated. “She even thinks I’ll be able to take Mr. Badget’s blood pressure as a lay person, but because of my background, the doctor will probably accept the reading.”

He rocked back in his chair. “You seem to have it all worked out except when you’re going to have time for all this.”

Her smile faltered as she drug her hands out of her pockets. “I’m sure I’ll manage.”

“That’s your little spiel for everything, ‘I’ll manage.’ Now I see why you came in here.” He pushed to his feet and rounded the desk. “If you think I’m going to cut back on your duties so you can run around the countryside playing Shannon Nightingale, think again. Tomorrow you ride fence with Griff and you better remember to wear your gloves.”

Her chin came up. “I’ve never shirked my duties. You’re the one who assigned me to work around the house.”

“Consider yourself unassigned.”

“I don’t know why I’d thought you’d understand.” She left the room, slamming the door.

“What’s the matter, child?” Octavia asked as she stormed into the kitchen.

“He can make me so mad.”

The older woman chuckled and went back to readying the automatic coffee maker for Matt to use in the morning. “I get the feeling you do the same thing to him. Better to strike sparks than complacency, I always say. At least you know the person knows you’re around.”

Shannon grunted and picked up the plate of chicken and dressing with a huge wedge of lemon cake on the side. “I guess I’ll go take this to Cleve.”

“You’re gonna spoil that old rascal.”

“What about you?” Shannon asked with a smile. “I saw you add more food to this plate when you thought I wasn’t looking.”

“I’d just throw it out,” the housekeeper defended. “Now take that on over and be back before it gets full dark.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Still smiling, Shannon left the kitchen. Everyone was so nice to her. Why did Matt have to be such an obstinate . . .

Her shoulders sagged. It wasn’t Matt’s fault that she wanted more from him than he was willing to give—or could give for that matter. She wanted his trust, his laughter, his love.

She stumbled as the full impact of her words struck her. To want Matt’s love she’d have to care deeply for him. She’d have to be . . . in love with him.

She wasn’t. She wasn’t. Each way she tried to escape the truth, no matter how she ran, it was always there waiting for her.

She loved Matt. Wildly. Passionately. Endlessly. And he would never love her in return. Despair as deep as a bottomless pit swept over her. She had found the love her heart always knew was out there and it would only bring her heartache.

Matt didn’t trust her and showed no signs of changing his opinion. But then came those rare moments like this afternoon. She could see the tenderness in him, feel him reaching out to her, but then it would disappear behind a shuttered mask of indifference. It was almost as if he were
afraid
to reach out to her.