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  “Pretty rumbly.”

  Meredith plunked a basin down on the bed beside him, saying sternly, “No arguments. I don’t want you getting out of this bed without help again. I’ve seen lots of men throwing up, you know.”

  “Not your father,” Wes grumbled.

  “Dad, that’s what I’m here for,” Meredith pointed out. “And I am a nurse, you know.”

  Sighing, he nodded. “I know.”

  Briskly, she set about filling a syringe from a tray on the bedside table. “I’m going to give you an injection now to settle your stomach. Then I want you to eat something before the medication knocks you out. All right?”

  “Grandma sent over some jars of chicken soup,” Dean said helpfully.

  “I’ll heat some up,” Meredith volunteered, lifting the sleeve of Wes’s T-shirt and wiping his skin with an alcohol swab before injecting him with the medication.

  “Maybe Dean...will stay...and help me to the table,” Wes said.

  “Be happy to,” Dean replied at once.

  “You can eat on a tray here,” Meredith argued, but Wes gave her a hard look.

  “Table,” he insisted.

  Meredith rolled her eyes and pointed at the wheelchair. “As long as you use that.”

  Wes sighed. “Fine.”

  Meredith quickly finished up and left the room. Ann didn’t feel that she should leave their guest, especially after he’d helped them.

  “Betty sent some other things, as well, Dad,” Ann said, nodding at a chair for Dean. He walked around the bed and sat down.

  She perched on the side of her father’s bed and smiled at Dean as Wes said, “Good of her.”

  “She’s glad to do it,” Dean told him. “Anything we can do to help.” Wes put out his hand and Dean took it, saying, “Maybe you’d like to pray before your meal gets here.”

  “Please,” Wes replied, closing his eyes.

  Dean braced his elbows on his knees, Wes’s hand clasped in both of his, and began to pray, quietly, calmly, competently.

  Ann noticed that Dean’s hands very much resembled her father’s. Both were square-palmed and long-fingered, large and capable. These were the hands of working men, men who used their backs as well as their brains, strong, masculine, sure of their purposes and their abilities.

  Suddenly she thought of Jordan’s soft, well-manicured hands, and a shiver ran through her, something that felt terribly like revulsion. But that couldn’t be right.

  She loved Jordan.

  Didn’t she?

  Chapter Six

  By the time Meredith had their father’s lunch ready, Wes’s stomach seemed settled and his strength somewhat restored. He didn’t complain when Dean helped him into the wheelchair, and he managed to eat a fair-sized bowl of Betty’s rich chicken soup with some hot bread that Meredith came up with from somewhere. His eyelids drooping, he began to nod off even before Ann had served up plates of meat loaf and green beans for herself, Meri and Dean, even though Dean protested that he’d already eaten a sandwich before coming over.

  Wes insisted on staying at the table until Dean had finished his own meal. Ann had never seen a man make food disappear so fast—or been so grateful for it. He was wheeling her dad back into his room within minutes. Ann went with them and watched gratefully the careful, respectful manner in which Dean shifted Wes back into the bed, allowing him to do as much for himself as possible. She didn’t have Meri’s gift for caring, but Ann did her best to make her dad comfortable, kissed his cheek and left him drifting into slumber after hearing Dean promise to come again.

  They returned to the kitchen to find that Meredith had dished up some ice cream for Dean. Chuckling, Dean sat down to the table again.

  “You Billings women act like Grandma doesn’t feed me,” he joked, lifting his spoon.

  “We just want to thank you for your help today,” Meredith said, smiling at Ann.

  She and Meredith finished their lunch while he polished off his ice cream. Then Ann walked him to the front door, Meredith calling out her thanks to his grandmother for the food.

  “She’ll be pleased to have been of service,” Dean told her.

  “I don’t know what we’d have done without you,” Ann began when they reached the front door, suddenly choking up. She could usually put her dad’s illness out of mind and carry on, but today it had hit her especially hard, and she felt tears fill her eyes again.

  “Mind a bit of advice?” Dean asked.

  She shook her head, knuckling moisture from her eyes. “Seems like I’m always coming to you for advice.”

  “Don’t let him see you cry. When my grandfather was ill, what worried him, what hurt him most, was seeing my grandmother’s grief and fear. I realized that the best thing I could do for him was to hide my tears and allow him as much dignity as possible. Wasting away is hard on a proud, strong man.”

  Before she knew it, tears streamed down her face, and she couldn’t stop them. She realized that she’d instinctively been holding them back, and now she knew why.

  “Here now,” Dean said softly, pulling her into his arms. “I shouldn’t have said anything. Wes isn’t wasting away. He’s fighting. This isn’t the same at all.”

  “It is,” she whispered against his shoulder.

  “No, no. Grandpa had lots more against him than cancer. He had a bad heart, and he couldn’t put down the cigarettes. His lung cancer was too far gone when they found it, and that was ten years ago. They’ve improved treatment since then.”

  “You’re right, though,” she said through her tears. “We’ve been trying to baby him, and no father wants to appear weak in front of his daughters. On some level I knew, but...he’s my dad.” Her voice thinned and broke on the last word.

  Dean’s big hand cupped the back of her head and his strong arms just held her as she struggled to pull herself together.

  “It’s okay,” he crooned. “Wes is going to be okay.”

  “I know,” she managed after a long, tearful moment. “I believe that. I really do. It’s just hard to see him this way.”

  “I understand.”

  She nodded, sniffed back the last of her tears and began to pull away. “I’m sure you do.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Dean loosened his embrace and shifted back. “Better now?”

  Smiling, she wiped her face with her fingertips. “Yes. Thank you.”

  “No problem.”

  She finally met his gaze. “No, seriously. Thank you for everything.”

  He lifted his hand and gently cradled her cheek. “Anytime, Jolly. Anytime at all.” Dropping his hand, he briskly added, “See you tomorrow.”

  Briefly touching the wet spot on his shoulder, she nodded. “Yes. Tomorrow.” Chuckling, he turned and opened the door. “Say hello to Donovan for me.”

  “Promise.” He went off with a wave, fitting his hat to his head.

  Ann reluctantly closed the door and leaned her shoulder against it, wondering what was happening here. Just a few days ago, she’d felt nothing but disdain for Dean Paul Pryor. Now...now she felt a warm gratitude, a great respect and a good deal of liking.

  She looked at the ring on her finger and frowned. More liking than seemed wise. She didn’t even mind when he called her Jolly anymore.

  Troubled by her thoughts and feelings, Ann found a few minutes, later that afternoon, to call Jordan. He answered the phone after only a few rings, which told her that he wasn’t especially busy. At times he had to let calls go to voice mail and get back to her when he wasn’t dealing with hotel issues. She felt a good deal of relief at the sound of his voice.

  “Well, hello there, Oklahoma. I was just thinking of you.”

  “That’s nice to know,” she told him, “especially after the day I’ve had.”

 
“Rough going?”

  “Dad’s very sick. I guess it’s to be expected, but it’s really hard to watch.”

  “How long do you think he has?”

  Stunned by the casual manner in which Jordan had tossed the question out there, Ann gasped. Then she got angry.

  “Jordan! How dare you say such a thing? He’s not dying.”

  “You said—”

  “He’s going to beat this, Jordan. He’s fighting, and he’s going to beat this.”

  “Of course he is,” Jordan said soothingly. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. It’s just that I miss you and can’t help but wonder how long we’re going to be apart. That’s all I meant.”

  But was it? And why didn’t Jordan’s reassurance comfort her as much as Dean’s had?

  She told herself that it was all about proximity. Dean was here; Jordan was a hundred and fifty miles away. Dean could see what was happening with her father. Jordan’s reality was the hotel and its myriad problems and details. He had only secondhand information about what went on at the ranch, so how could she expect him to understand her fear and pain?

  The vision of Dean sitting at her father’s bedside quietly praying came to her, and she knew that Jordan would not even begin to do such a thing. He’d likely be horrified if asked to. Not so long ago, that idea wouldn’t have bothered her a great deal.

  Now, somehow, it did. Very much.

  * * *

  Once he started praying, Dean couldn’t seem to stop. He’d only been fifteen when his grandfather had died, but he remembered those dark days all too well. The shock of learning of his grandfather’s illness still reverberated through him whenever he thought of it. Within a very few months—weeks, really—a seemingly strong, almost invincible, man had weakened, shriveled, faded and quickly passed from this life to the next. The family hadn’t even had time to adjust to the idea of his illness before he was gone.

  Dean didn’t want to see that happen to Ann and her family. He hated the very thought of Wes’s suffering, and Ann’s tears made him want to storm Heaven’s gates on their behalf. After leaving the Straight Arrow, he tried to turn his mind from their situation, but the feel of Ann in his arms, the dampness of his shirt, the cracking of her voice all weighed on his mind. Yet, what could he do other than pray?

  He did so silently and often throughout the rest of the afternoon and evening, and Grandma somehow knew it. She came to him as soon as Donovan was tucked up in his bed for the night.

  Dean sat on the stoop in the corner of the porch that wrapped around the front of the two-story, white-clapboard, T-shaped house. Grandma dropped down beside him, pulled her knees up and hugged them. She didn’t beat around the bush.

  “How bad is Wes?”

  Dean shrugged. “I don’t know. He looks bad. No hair, pale, thin. But I can’t say whether he’s going to make it or not. The chemo is obviously pretty rough, but I doubt even the doctors know what the real status of the disease is yet.”

  “Well, treatment has improved a lot.”

  “That’s what I told Ann.”

  Several telling heartbeats later, Grandma asked oh-so-casually, “How is she?”

  Dean tried to sound just as casual. “Worried. Broken up. She tries to keep it together in front of him, but she and Meredith both need to back off a bit and let him do what he can for himself.”

  “I don’t suppose you told her that.” Dean shrugged, and Betty patted him on the knee. “You did tell her that. Well, don’t take it so hard. She’ll think about it and realize you were trying to help.”

  “No, it’s not like that,” he said. “It’s just that I upset her, made her cry. I brought up Grandpa and scared her.”

  “Hmm.” Grandma touched the faint stain on his shirt. “Cried on your shoulder, did she?”

  “Now, don’t make more of it than there is,” Dean warned. “Her dad’s ill. She was upset.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And she’s engaged.”

  “Engaged isn’t married,” Grandma said, getting up to go inside. “Just saying.”

  “And I’m just saying that you’re being silly,” Dean told her as she walked across the porch.

  “Well, if I’m silly, we can both laugh about it later,” she drawled. “Good night, hon.”

  “Night,” Dean muttered as she went inside.

  She was being silly, Dean told himself, very silly. And so was he.

  Once he’d had Ann in his arms today, he hadn’t wanted to let her go. He’d wanted to sweep her up, carry her off and promise to make everything okay. He’d wanted to kiss away her tears and return that saucy, bring-on-the-world smile to her face. He’d wanted...all sorts of things to which he had no right and for which he had no hope.

  And so he prayed. For Ann. For her dad. And for himself.

  In the end, he decided that the best thing he could do was keep his distance from Ann Billings. It wouldn’t be easy, given the situation, but it would be wise. So that, ultimately, became his prayer.

  Lord, make me wise.

  * * *

  By the time Ann arrived in the field on Monday morning, Dean was already hard at work. She waved, and he waved back but didn’t stop the combine or try to speak to her. Donovan ran up, his dog on his heels, to give her one of his body-blow hugs and a smile as wide as his face. Seeing that he was essentially alone in the field while his father worked, she offered to take the boy back to the house with her, but he claimed that his dad “needed” him to watch the water cooler that sat on the open tailgate of the truck until he was “needed” in the cab of the combine.

  Ann had to admire Dean’s parenting skills. He kept the boy close and taught him responsibility by giving him small jobs that he could perform while playing. One day Donovan would realize those jobs were imaginary, but hopefully by then he’d also realize how deeply and skillfully his father cared for him.

  She let the happy boy show her how Digger drank from the stream of water that fell from the spigot of the cooler when he turned it on, then she left him to scamper around with his dog until Dean took him up into the cab of the harvester. No doubt Donovan would grow bored shut up inside the cab of the harvester all day. This way, Dean broke up the monotony for him while keeping him within sight and allowing him a certain freedom.

  Only as she drove back to the house did she wonder if Dean might be avoiding her, but she had no real reason to think that. Telling herself that she couldn’t trust her feelings just now, she pushed aside the suspicion and focused on what needed to be done. Fearing that she was becoming too fond of Dean, she didn’t go out to the field the next day. After all, if she couldn’t trust him to do what needed to be done by now, she’d know it already. On Wednesday morning Dean called to say that he’d finish the oat harvest and would be delivering the fodder to the appropriate new storage bins later that afternoon.

  Wes felt well enough to watch from the living room window as Ann went out to oversee the delivery. She hadn’t expected Dean to have extra hands with him, but the oats arrived in a pair of two-and-a-half-ton trucks. Dean, Donovan and the dog rode in the first; two other men came in the second. Well past trying to impress Dean, Ann had dressed simply in a lightweight, long-sleeved top, tied at her waist, work jeans and her new, plain boots. With her hair caught in a ponytail low on the back of her head, she’d crammed her old baseball cap onto her head before going out to wait for them.

  Dean got the first truck into position, and the men were hauling out a huge vacuum hose to siphon the oats from the truck bed into the storage tank when Donovan and the dog came to greet her. As usual, Donovan nearly knocked her over with his hug. Laughing, she bent and scooped him up against her before setting him down again, Digger barking and scampering around them happily. The kid was surprisingly heavy, a solid hunk of boy. Dean left the truck and walked over to them,
smiling.

  “Well, look at you,” he said, stripping off his sunglasses. “You’ve turned into the best-looking ranch hand I’ve ever seen.”

  As soon as he said it, he ducked his head, as if embarrassed, but Ann had never felt so flattered. Glancing around, she muttered thanks and caught the other men sneaking looks at her. Suddenly feeling a bit self-conscious, she turned and moved a little distance off. After a moment Dean followed, sliding his glasses back onto his face.

  “Everything go all right?” she asked casually.

  “It’s a good harvest. Oats are in excellent shape. Wes should be pleased.”

  Ann nodded. “I’ll tell him.”

  “We’ll get started on the mixing station in the morning. Once the sorghum is in, you’ll be able to mix your feeds right here.”

  “I’ll make sure Dad and Rex know where we are with the schedule. I assume you’ll be wanting a check now.”

  “It can wait until tomorrow. I won’t pay these men until then.”

  “All right.”

  He stepped off, waving for her to follow and slapping his billed cap onto his head. “If you want to come over here, I’ll show you where the mixer will stand.”

  “Sure.”

  Rex had given her a good idea about it all, but Dean explained in detail. The whole thing made perfect sense now that she fully understood. Suddenly the dowdy, dusty old ranch where she had grown up was starting to feel like a thriving, modern business, not that it had ever been failing. Her dad had kept the ranch in decent shape financially, but she knew that he had worries now that the medical bills were stacking up. Even with insurance, the bills came in with dismaying regularity. With Rex pumping new investment and energy into the place, though, she didn’t doubt that the Straight Arrow Ranch would quickly be more prosperous than ever. Ann sensed that her dad was eager to get out here and be part of it all again; she prayed that would soon be the case.