back to the stable, hoping Rory’s lame leg wouldn’t require more than some TLC and rest. He knew the vet would come if he called, but it sat wrong in Cage’s belly to keep looking at the balance of his bill with the man, knowing he wouldn’t have it paid off anytime soon.
Naturally, the music grew even louder the closer he got to the barn and it showed no sign of abating even after he’d tended to Rory. He strode inside, only to stop short at the sight of Belle and Lucy. His daughter was lying on the incline bench. Not an unusual sight. But she was laughing, her head thrown back, blond hair streaming down her thin back, her face wreathed in smiles.
And Belle was laughing, too. She sat on the floor in front of the bench, her legs stretched into a position he thought only Olympic gymnasts could obtain, and she was leaning forward so far her torso was nearly resting on the blue mat beneath her. The position drew the tight black shirt she wore well above her waist, and for way too long, he couldn’t look away from that stretch of lithe, feminine muscle.
Neither his daughter nor Belle noticed him and he felt like an outsider all over again. He liked it no more now than he had the previous day.
Then Belle turned her head, resting her cheek on the mat, and looked at him.
Not so unaware, after all.
“Come on in,” she said. And even though she hadn’t lifted her voice above the music, he still heard her. Her brown gaze was soft. Open.
She didn’t even flinch when Strudel bounded over to her, snuffling at her face before hastily jumping over her to gleefully greet Lucy.
Safer to look at the slice of Belle’s ivory back that showed below the shirt than those dark eyes. Maybe.
He deliberately strode to the boom box and turned down the volume. “Trying to make yourselves deaf?”
Lucy rolled her eyes. “It wasn’t that loud.”
He wished for the days when she hadn’t yet learned to roll her eyes at him. “I’m going in to get your lunch.”
“Belle already did.”
At Lucy’s blithe statement, Belle pushed herself up and drew her legs together, wriggling her red-painted toes. He saw a glint on one toe. She wore a toe ring. Figures.
“We left a plate for you,” she said, apparently trusting that he wouldn’t lecture her about her “place” in front of Lucy.
In that, she was correct. For now, at least. He eyed her for a moment. “Then I’ll go down to get the mail.”
Lucy ignored him as she flopped back on the slanted bench. Belle’s gaze went from him to Lucy and back again. “If you have some time this afternoon, maybe Lucy could show you a few of the new exercises we’ve been working on.”
He nodded and resettled his hat as he left. In the seconds before someone—his daughter probably—turned up the volume of the music again, he heard Lucy’s flat statement. “He won’t show. He never does.”
It was an exaggeration, but that didn’t stop the words from cutting. But he was only one man. As he’d told Belle, he couldn’t do it all. Keep the Lazy-B going and spend hours with his daughter when he’d already hired a therapist for her for that very purpose. He whistled sharply and Strudel scrambled out of the barn, racing after him. The dog might have promise, after all.
He drove the truck down to get the mail. There was a cluster of boxes belonging to the half-dozen folks living out his direction. His place was the farthest out, though. The box was five miles from the house. Usually, he swung by on Rory. Not today.
Back in the house, he dumped the mail and the morning paper on the kitchen table and yanked open the refrigerator door. Sure enough. A foil-wrapped plate sat inside. The woman made pizza with whole wheat. Whole wheat? He wasn’t even aware that he’d had any in his house. Either she’d brought it in her suitcase, which was entirely possible since she had no qualms about thinking she knew best where his family was concerned, or the stuff had been lurking in his cupboards courtesy of Emmy Johannson, who periodically brought groceries out for him.
God only knew what lurked on that plate under the foil. He ignored it and made himself a roast-beef sandwich, instead. He was standing at the counter eating it when he saw Belle through the window over the sink striding up to the rear of the house. He turned a page of the newspaper and continued reading. Something about a chili cook-off.
It wasn’t engrossing stuff, but it was better than watching Belle. The woman had a way of moving and it was just better off, all around, if he didn’t look too close. He didn’t like her, or her family, and she was there only out of his own desperation. So he needed to get over the fact that she turned him on and he needed to do it yesterday.
The screen rattled as Belle pulled it open and popped into the kitchen. His gaze slid sideways to her feet. Scuffed white tennis shoes—a different pair than the wet blue ones the day before—now hid the red-painted toes and the toe ring. He looked back at the newspaper and finished off the sandwich.
Only Belle didn’t move along to the bathroom, or to do whatever it was she’d come in the house to do. She stood there, her arms folded across her chest, skinny hip cocked.
He swallowed. Finished the glass of milk he was drinking.
She still hadn’t moved.
He sighed. Folded the newspaper back along its creases. Crossed to the table to flip through the mail. Too many bills, circulars advertising some singles’ matchmaking network, an expensive-looking envelope with an all too familiar embossed return address. He folded the envelope in half and shoved it in his back pocket. “What is it now?”
“I noticed that Lucy is still depending exclusively on her wheelchair.”
The one remaining nerve not gone tight at the sight of the envelope now residing next to his butt joined the knotted rest. He opened a cupboard and grabbed the bottle of aspirin that had been full only a few weeks ago. He shook out a few, the rattle of pills inside the plastic sounding as sharp as his voice. “And?” He shut the cupboard door again only to find her extending a condensing bottle of water toward him.
“And it concerns me, because it’s encouraging her to keep favoring her injury.”
“She’s not supposed to use her leg, yet.” He swallowed the aspirin.
“She’s not supposed to use it completely,” Belle countered. “But she should have been up on crutches weeks ago, yet since I’ve been here—”
“Twenty-four hours now?”
“—I haven’t even seen a pair of crutches. She does have them, doesn’t she?”
Cage strode over to the tall, narrow closet at the end of the kitchen and snapped open the door. Inside, along with a broom and the vacuum cleaner, stood a shining new pair of crutches. “Satisfied?”
Her lips tightened. She flipped her long ponytail behind her shoulder and brushed past him to remove the crutches. He looked down at her, clutching the things to her chest. The top of her head didn’t reach his chin. In fact, she wasn’t much taller than Luce.
The realization didn’t make Belle seem younger to him. It only made his daughter seem older.
He pushed the closet door shut and moved across the room. “She says that she still hurts too much to use ’em.”
Belle nodded. “I understand, believe me. But getting on her feet with these is a major component of her recovery. And the longer we wait, the more it’s going to hurt. You’re going to have to get over trying to protect her, Cage. Her recuperation is not going to be pleasant all the time, but she does have to work through it before it’ll get better.” Her hand reached out and caught his forearm, squeezing in emphasis. “And it will get better.” Then, seeming to realize that she was touching him, she quickly pulled back.
“Easy advice,” he said flatly. “You ever watch your child trying to straighten or bend a leg that doesn’t