The Ranch

“Was he…” he hesitated, wanting to reach out to her, but not sure how to, “was he very young when he died?” he asked cautiously, wondering if he shouldn't mention it at all. But he wanted to know more about her. Perhaps that was why she had come here. Perhaps he had died in an accident with the father… or perhaps she was still married. There were questions he wanted to ask her. After riding with her all day, he felt as though they were friends now. They were so isolated from the world they knew, in this remarkable place, thrown together for only moments. If they were to become friends, they had to learn everything about each other very quickly.

“Todd was twenty when he died,” she said quietly, trying not to see the little boy beyond the window. He was still chatting with Zoe and Tanya. “It was last year,” she said, looking down at her hands for a moment.

“I'm so sorry,” Hartley said softly, and dared to touch her hand for an instant. He knew only too well the pain of loss. He and Margaret had been married for twenty-six years when he lost her, and they had never had children. She couldn't. And he had accepted that. In some ways, he had always thought it brought them closer. But now he looked at Mary Stuart and could only glimpse what she had gone through. “It must be terrible to lose a child. I can't imagine it. It was bad enough when Margaret died. I really thought it would kill me. I was surprised when I woke up every morning, I kept waiting to die of grief, and was stunned that I didn't. I've been writing about it in my new book all winter.”

“It must help writing about it,” she said as they sat down on the couch in the living room. The other two were still outside talking, but she couldn't see the boy now. “I wish I could write about it. But it's better now. I finally put his things away a few weeks ago, before I came here. I couldn't bring myself to do it before that.”

“It took me nearly two years with Margaret,” he said honestly. And he had only been out with two women so far and hated both of them for not being her. He knew all about the pain of adjusting. At least she didn't have that to deal with, though he still didn't know about her husband. “It must have been very hard on your husband too,” he said, fishing for information, but she didn't understand that. He had seen the narrow wedding band, but the way she spoke didn't confirm that she was married,

“Actually,” she decided to be honest with him. “It was hard on him. Our marriage didn't survive it.”

Hartley nodded. He knew about that too, though not firsthand, but from a cousin who had been through it. It was not surprising. “Where is he now?”

“In London,” she said, and he nodded. It was what he had wanted to know. And he assumed that meant Bill lived there. Mary Stuart didn't understand why he had asked her and just thought he was being friendly. It had been a long time since a man had shown an interest in her, and she didn't fully comprehend that that was the case now with this one. For the moment, she just thought they were fellow riders, although she liked him immensely, and was amazed at how easy he was to talk to.

He asked if they would join him for dinner, and she said she'd ask the others, and he left her to do some work, and read his mail Like many of them, he was managing to maintain contact with his office from a distance, and he was planning to do a little work here. He promised to see her at dinner, and when the others came in, she told them about the invitation. And predictably, they teased her, especially Tanya.

“Quick work, Stu! I like him.” She was smiling at Mary Stuart and Mary Stuart threw a small cushion at her in outrage.

“Oh, for Heaven's sake, he invited all of us to dinner, not just me, you dummy. He's lonely. He lost his wife, and he has no one to talk to.”

“He seemed to be doing fine with you.” Tanya pursued her mercilessly, and Mary Stuart told her she was silly.

“He's very nice, very intelligent, and very lonely.”

“And very interested in you. I'm not blind, for Heaven's sake, even if you are. I think you've been married for so long, you don't even see it when guys look at you.”

“And what about you and the wrangler?” Mary Stuart teased her right back. They were like freshmen. “He seems to have overcome his speech block. You even had him smiling.”

“He's a real character. He lives here alone in the winter, in twenty feet of snow.” She didn't tell them that he listened to her music. But there was certainly nothing romantic between them. Just horses.

“I think you're both blind.” Zoe addressed both of them. “Hartley Bowman looks like he's crazy about Stu, and unless I've lost my touch entirely, I'd say by the time we leave here, our wrangler is going to be head over heels for Tanya. I predict it for the yearbook.” They both laughed at her, and Tanya raised an eyebrow. It was so outlandish, she didn't even bother to comment.