Stalked In Conard County. Rachel Lee
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she’d never forgotten. It would be easy to think the woman was always angry.
“You were thinking what?” Roger asked as he lifted half the huge sandwich in hands that were big enough to handle it easily.
“About you. We hardly know each other after all this time, but you were one of the bright spots in the summers when I visited Grandma. Awfully patient with a young girl.”
One corner of his mouth crooked upward and his green eyes crinkled at the corners. “First of all, I was only a few years older. That probably seemed bigger back then than it really was. And second, you were someone new, which was nice, and you were good at board games, which I used to love. Why wouldn’t I hang with you when I could find time?”
“You must have been working awfully hard with your dad, though. And how’s he?”
“Retired. He’s living in Oregon now with his brother Tim’s family, working a small horse-rescue facility.”
She laughed. “He calls that retired?”
“It’s different,” Roger pointed out, returning her laugh with a chuckle. “Now eat.”
She was only too happy to take a bite of the sandwich. It was every bit as good as she remembered, with impossibly tender steak. She had to grab a napkin as juice ran down her chin. “You must be awfully busy running the business by yourself now.”
“Not as busy as I could be, I guess. I get orders from all over for custom saddles these days. It depends on how much I want to travel and how long I want to be away. And that’s good because there are other things I like to do.”
“Like fishing?” she asked, and they both shared a laugh.
“Like fishing. Like hiking in the mountains. Sometimes I even want to go cross-country skiing. I can work those things in if I’m careful about the jobs I take.”
“So I take it there’s no one else you have to report to?” That was the most indirect way she could ask if he had his own family. A question that suddenly seemed of burning interest to her.
“Just myself. Only child. My mother died long ago in a riding accident. I don’t think you ever met her.”
Haley racked her brains while eating another mouthful of the heavenly sandwich. “If I did, I don’t remember.”
“She wasn’t easy to meet,” he offered. “She used to help Gideon Ironheart with training horses. That man’s a genius with it. Unfortunately, my mother decided to saddle-break a mustang, and the horse wanted no part of it. Or her.”
“I’m sorry.”
He tilted his head a little, a mild shrug. “It’s been a while.”
“I think I’m living proof that some things don’t stay in the distant past.” She looked down, wondering why she was casting a shadow over this meal.
“No,” he agreed, “they don’t.”
Change the subject, she advised herself. She could get gloomy later on her own time. “How’d you guys get into making saddles? It’s not the first occupation that would spring to the top of my mind. Of course, my dad was a wildcatter before he settled into contracting with larger oil companies, an independent who drilled exploratory wells, and I don’t suppose that would be at the forefront of anyone’s mind, either.”
He laughed. “Maybe in this part of the country it might. But as for saddles? Well, we get back to grandparents and even greats again. My family were shoemakers back East. My great-grandfather was a very young guy, maybe eighteen, when he decided he was bored with making shoes. He was working for his uncle, who reminded him that people always needed new shoes or shoe repairs, and thus there was always plenty of work. My great-grandad didn’t care. He wanted something different, maybe with a dash of adventure. So he apprenticed to a saddle maker, where his leather skills were useful. When he struck out on his own, he settled here, repairing saddles back in the days when ranches were thriving and there were plenty of cowboys. Eventually he found plenty of work making custom saddles and here we are. I repair them, I build them from the very bottom up, and make tack, as well. Keeps me busy enough.”
“I can’t imagine what goes into that.”
“Layers and layers,” he said jokingly. “If you have time one day, stop by. I’ve got three in the works right now.”
“Three?” The idea surprised her. She guessed she had imagined him working one from start to finish.
“All at different points in the process. More efficient if I can swing it. It helps to take my time, too. The most important thing is the horse’s comfort, so every fit is custom. If I hurry anything, I might blow it.”
“And when you finish one?”
“Me and the saddle pay a visit to the horse to make any adjustments necessary. Usually there aren’t many because I start off taking care with my measurements.”
That fascinated Haley. “I never thought of saddles as being a custom fit.”
“Any owner who can afford it, and who gives a damn about the horse, sees to it. Horses don’t all come in the same size, and an ill-fitting saddle can cause problems. But when the horse is no longer being ridden, for whatever reason, the saddle doesn’t have to be ditched. I can modify it to fit another equine.”
So complicated. Her initial interest had arisen from the unusual nature of his work. Now she began to imagine just how complex it could be, and how much knowledge might be necessary. “Like being a doctor,” she said slowly.
That caused him to laugh. “I don’t know that I’d go that far.”
After lunch, with their leftovers in insulated containers, they drove back to her grandmother’s house. The sun was still high, the day warm, and the streets active with kids and adults engaged in everything from play to shopping to yard work.
Bucolic. Perfect. She closed her eyes, breathing in the fresh air that blew through the window, and let her thoughts drift to dreams of staying here.
But as soon as they pulled into the driveway, all of that washed away. Little prickles of fear returned, but she tried to quash them ruthlessly. A stupid Peeping Tom. Was she going to let that pervert ruin everything?
No, she told herself. Absolutely not.
But the discomfort wouldn’t quite leave her. Even as she went back to looking through drawers and closets, it pursued her.
She hoped they’d catch the guy soon, or she might be hightailing it back to Baltimore. Even though she was now not at all sure that was what she wanted.
Downstairs in the basement, working on the last of the ducts, Roger thought over all he’d learned from Haley. Given that she’d been abducted through her bedroom window as a small girl, he was kind of surprised she wasn’t ready to pack and leave.
He hated to think of how she must have felt here alone in this house after seeing the peeper at her window. She sure as hell should have called the police rather than suffer through agonizing hours of memory and most likely overwhelming fear.
Anyone would have been unnerved but, given her past, it had to have been truly awful.
Just how awful had been revealed by her statement that reporting the matter to the police would make it all real. He wondered how hard she had clung to the idea that she’d imagined the man at her window. How much effort she had spent controlling her fear and trying to tell herself it hadn’t really happened, that it wasn’t going to happen again as it had when she was a child. That it couldn’t happen now that she was grown.
Son of a… He bit the cusswords back before they could begin to emerge. The idea of a Peeping Tom was bad enough. No one wanted to think their privacy was being invaded while they slept,