A Texas Kind of Cowboy by Delores Fossen

CHAPTER FOUR

DAXTRIEDNOTto dwell on what he’d just said to Lorelei, that by morning he’d know if he was a dad or not. No, he couldn’t dwell on it. This was a situation where he just had to go through the motions, one step at a time and not think about the possible “big picture” outcomes.

Sort of like a bull ride.

He mentally went through those steps now to keep himself grounded. Climbing into the chute and onto the bull, wrapping his hand in the rope and going through the routine of getting a solid grip. Leaning forward. Positioning and bracing himself. Then, holding the hell on.

This DNA test was sort of like climbing on the bull, a maneuver where Dax was still full of hope that his ass would stay on the non-ass-friendly fifteen-hundred-pound bull from hell for the entire eight seconds. Now, he was full of hope that his DNA wouldn’t be a match to Stellie’s.

Of course, if he didn’t match, that would be the end of the need for his grounding steps. But it would leave Lorelei with a puzzle and perhaps a whole crapload of trouble from Valerie’s husband. If that happened, then Dax figured she was going to have to come up with some grounding steps of her own.

“Well?” Dax prompted when Lorelei didn’t respond to what he’d just said. He waggled the test box again because she looked like a woman who’d just slumped into a deep trance. Or maybe she was in shock.

“Yes,” she finally said, which in no way answered anything. However, she also added a nod to it, which gave him hope that she might soon get the rest of herself moving, too.

In his mind, the sooner they got this DNA test done, the better, but Lorelei might not be ready to face that just yet. Unfortunately, she wasn’t going to have the luxury of putting her head in the sand because that sooner was almost certainly going to include some kind of communication from Valerie’s family once Matt told them about her untimely death. If Lorelei didn’t have paternity tests ready, the husband and her parents would no doubt order it to be done.

“I can go with you to do the swab on Stellie,” Evangeline offered.

“Me, too.” That came from Nola, which meant Wyatt would also be in on it since he wasn’t likely going to let his pregnant wife out of his sight until he knew she wasn’t stressed out about this.

“It’s all right,” Lorelei tried to assure them. “It’ll be Stellie’s nap time soon so it’s probably best if she doesn’t get overstimulated with visitors.”

Dax wasn’t sure if Lorelei included him in that visitor’s status or not, but then she motioned for him to follow her. “I can drive,” he offered, mainly because she didn’t look steady enough to do that.

She apparently didn’t feel steady enough, either, because Lorelei didn’t nix the idea. Nor did she suggest they walk even though her house was only about four blocks from Nola’s workshop. The last nixing had likely been because she hadn’t wanted to face people and their questions during that short trip. In Last Ride, you could run into a lot of people in four short blocks.

Dax was right there on the same page with wanting to avoid running into people. He didn’t want to talk about DNA, paternity or the way this could turn both Lorelei’s and his lives upside down and inside out. So, he stayed mum on the way to his truck.

Lorelei, however, didn’t.

“Do you have any children that you know of?” she asked, her question tentative, as they got into his truck that he’d parked right outside Nola’s workshop.

Another zinger, and Dax knew this was payback for all those years of screwing around. “I could answer that with a simple no or say that no, I don’t have any children that I know of because my go-to response during sex isn’t to knock someone up.”

“The first response is fine,” she remarked.

And there it was. The “ice princess” tone. Of course, he’d provoked it, but this was the Lorelei he knew. Well, sort of knew. Most of what he knew about her was through her reputation, which meant the info might be as skewed for her as it was for him. Past deeds and reputation were the gifts that just kept on giving. In his case, people thought the worst about him. In her case, people thought she was uppity.

Since there wasn’t a normal everyday reason for the two of them to be in a truck together, they no doubt created a whole bunch of speculation from the folks who watched them drive away. Tongues would be wagging a mile a minute, and while Dax had no intention of spilling squat about this, it would get around.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I know I’m being rude, but I can’t seem to stop myself. I’m just so...so...terrified.”

Dax figured she could have filled in that particular blank with some other words. Like pissed off. Sick to her stomach. But terrified definitely worked, and it reminded him that he needed to cut Lorelei some slack. His part in this might end with the DNA results if they came back without a match, but it would be just the start for her. Maybe a very ugly start that could get uglier if Valerie’s family objected to the adoption.

“434,” Dax threw out there. He was speaking more to himself, but he thought it was a stat Lorelei might want to know, and it could possibly give her a little peace of mind that he wasn’t Stellie’s father. “I dated a grad student once who was researching the odds of a guy knocking up a woman.”

That got her attention. Lorelei angled herself in the seat so she could look at him. “And it’s 434?”

“According to her, it is. Condoms are ninety-eight percent effective when used properly so I sure as hell learned to use one properly. Then, there’s the timing of a partner’s ovulation. Six days out of the month, which means one-fifth of the time. Anyway, the grad student said a man could have sex 434 times before the odds were optimum for getting a woman pregnant.”

Lorelei stayed quiet a moment. “Are you saying you think Valerie might have been the 434th?”

“No, I’m saying I haven’t reached that 434 number.” Which, of course, was stupid logic since pregnancies happened after having sex just one time. Still, the odds were on his side that the condom hadn’t failed and it’d been the wrong time of the month for Valerie.

And, yeah, he was trying to convince himself of that.

Dax took the turn onto Parkman Row, passing the houses that managed to look both massive and claustrophobic at the same time. The one exception was the small fairy-tale looking cottage that Nola owned. She no longer lived there since after their marriage she’d moved in with Wyatt at his ranch, but Dax doubted she’d sell it because it had once belonged to her father. He’d heard her say she might give it to their daughter, Marley, so she’d have her own place when she came to Last Ride for visits. That would keep the cottage in the family.

He parked in front of the other house that had also once belonged to Lorelei’s parents. From what he’d heard, it had been where Evangeline and her husband lived at the start of their marriage, but once Lorelei had finished college, Evangeline had given it to her and moved into the apartment space above her counseling office. Apparently, Evangeline wasn’t into massive houses or those on Parkman Row.

Lorelei’s house definitely wasn’t an apartment or cottage but rather a two-story white Victorian that looked as put together as Lorelei usually did. Dax wasn’t sure how a person could breathe, though, with so many houses within spitting distance, but apparently it suited her since she’d been here for over a decade.

“Stellie might be scared of you,” Lorelei muttered as they made their way to her front door. “She’s going through this stage where she cries when a stranger tries to talk to her.”

All right, so he’d hang back since he didn’t want to have to deal with a crying baby any more than he had to deal with her crying mother. Thankfully, Lorelei’s eyes were dry for now.

“I try to introduce Stellie to people by name,” Lorelei went on. Not quite babbling but close. “I know it might not sound logical since she’s just a baby, but she’s learning to talk, and I think it’s important for her to understand that people have names just like things such as toys and books. Anyway, would you like me to introduce you as Dax, Mr. Dax or Mr. Buchanan?”

There was only one of those options that worked for him. “Dax is fine.”

She made a sound of acknowledgment and unlocked the door. They stepped into the cool marble foyer that was surprisingly cluttered with a stroller, a baby seat, a diaper bag and a basket filled with little hats, windbreakers and sunscreen.

“Hilda?” Lorelei called out. “It’s me.”

Hilda Barney, the nanny. Dax knew her because her son, Will, also did the rodeo circuit. Another example of those minimal degrees of separation.

“Back here,” Hilda answered, and the woman came out while drying her hands on a dishcloth.

She was in her early fifties and had salt-and-pepper hair that she’d pulled back in a ponytail. She offered them a thin smile that showed nerves. Which meant someone had already texted her that there was a problem with Lorelei.

“Stellie fell asleep while I was reading to her so I went ahead and put her in the crib,” Hilda said, her attention volleying between Lorelei and him. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Lorelei opened her mouth and then closed it. She sighed. “Keep this to yourself for now, but Dax is here to get a DNA swab from Stellie.” She paused. “He, uh, knew Dana Smith.”

“Oh.” Hilda’s eyes widened, a reaction Dax figured he’d be getting a lot in the next couple of days. Because despite Lorelei’s request for Hilda to keep this to herself, word would get out. And folks wouldn’t be using the word knew.

Swallowing hard, Lorelei turned to him. “Do you think we can do the swab while she’s asleep?”

“Sure,” he said, though he didn’t have a clue if that was true. He knew squat about sleeping babies. But he also wanted to get this over and done since the courier would be arriving any minute now and texting Dax for instructions.

Lorelei nodded, not looking at all convinced of, well, anything, and she led him through the main living areas of the house. Again, there was lots and lots of baby stuff. Toys, activity mats and a playpen filled with even more toys.

When they reached a back hall, Dax spotted what he thought was the main bedroom on the right, and directly across from it was the nursery. Since the door was open, he had no trouble seeing the baby sleeping in the crib. Each wall of the room had a different theme. One for outer space that had some astronauts, another for a construction site and one for an artist studio. The fourth had a ranching theme, complete with cowboys, cowgirls and livestock.

“I wanted to expose Stellie to lots of possibilities,” Lorelei muttered when she saw his attention sliding from one wall to the other.

“Well, you managed it,” he muttered back, keeping his voice at a whisper.

Dax figured the ranch wasn’t because Lorelei had sensed the baby had any connections to that particular profession but rather because her sister Lily was a ranch owner.

He didn’t move closer to the crib until Lorelei did, and he peered down at the baby for a closer look. Of course, he was combing over that little face to see if she resembled him. She didn’t. Well, other than the dark brown hair, but lots of babies had that.

“Her eyes are green,” Lorelei whispered.

Okay, that was a bit of a gut punch since that meant Stellie and he had hair and eye color in common. Again, that meant nada. He hoped.

Dax wished his hands were a little steadier when he took out the swab. He moved it closer to her mouth, pulled back and tried to figure out the best way to do this. After a few moments of his awkward fumbling, Lorelei took the swab from him, eased it into Stellie’s mouth and rubbed it around. The baby stirred, her forehead bunching up in a gesture that nearly made Dax smile.

Nearly.

But then he remembered this visit wasn’t about admiring a cute baby with a cute expression. This was about learning if it was his DNA that had helped create all that cuteness.

Once Lorelei had finished, she handed him the swab and leaned down to brush a soft kiss on Stellie’s forehead. Then, she brushed her hand over the halo of little brown curls. Since it seemed like an intimate mother-child moment, Dax busied himself with putting the swab in the plastic bag that had come with the kit. He sealed it up and then texted the courier with Lorelei’s address.

“The courier will be here in about ten minutes,” Dax relayed when he got a response.

Lorelei nodded in a resigned kind of way, and after kissing her daughter again, she led Dax back out of the nursery. He was trying to figure out what to say to her when the doorbell rang. No way could it be the courier that soon so he didn’t go to the door. Hilda did, and he heard the woman have a short, muttered conversation before she came back to Lorelei and him.

“It’s Derwin Parkman,” Hilda explained, her attention on Lorelei. “He says he has to see you.”

Lorelei groaned and pushed away a strand of her long blond hair that had landed on her cheek. Dax was groaning, too, because he knew that Derwin was head of a group called Sherlock’s Snoops. Detective wannabes with way too much time on their hands.

“Derwin wants to volunteer, again, to help you with the research on Dana Smith,” Hilda added. She rolled her eyes, and it was obvious the woman didn’t approve of this kind of intrusion, especially since her employer was clearly having a hard time.

“Tell him no,” Lorelei grumbled, and the temper lit in her eyes. Temporary temper, but then she must have rethought the being rude approach—which Dax approved of. “Wait, tell Derwin that I’m not available.”

“He’ll just want to know when he can come back,” Hilda pointed out. “You know what a pest he can be.”

Apparently, Lorelei did know because there was another spark of temper that she expressed in some muttered profanity. Dax was surprised. This wasn’t the G-rated stuff at all and not what he’d expected from “typically calm and collected” Lorelei.

“Derwin’s already been digging into Dana Smith,” Lorelei murmured to him. “And he and the Snoops found nothing. Derwin wants to keep rehashing that nothing because it’s the only active case the Snoops have right now.”

Her voice cracked, probably because it hit her that there was, indeed, something to research now that they knew Dana was actually Valerie. Once the Snoops latched on to that, they would continue to bug Lorelei. Dax figured he could nix some of that just by having a chat with Derwin. Not now, though. Now wasn’t a good chatting time.

“Well?” Hilda prompted. “What do you want me to tell the pest?”

“Tell him that I might have a highly contagious disease and he’ll catch it if he comes near the house again.” Lorelei stopped, sighed and let go of the temper once again. “All right. Just tell him I’m not available.”

Hilda sighed and shook her head, probably because she’d wanted her employer to add some more bite to that, and the woman walked away, no doubt to deliver the wishy-washy excuse. Derwin or one of the other Snoops might try to pay him a visit, too, but as a general rule, most people treated him more or less like a rock star. A local celebrity who shouldn’t be bothered. Of course, that hadn’t applied to Tiffany Carver when she’d shown up at the party doling out those edible red panties.

Lorelei stayed put, but at the front of the house Dax could hear Hilda giving Derwin a polite “get lost.”

“I should be doing my own dirty work of getting rid of him,” Lorelei grumbled. She kicked the baseboard. “But if I burst into tears again, Derwin will make sure everyone in town knows.”

“True,” he confirmed.

But he didn’t point out that Derwin likely knew about her crying already and would spread that around, anyway. Along with pestering Lorelei about Dana. Dax suspected the man had gotten wind that Dana had something to do with Lorelei’s crying, and that it had something to do with Dax and his trip to her house.

It wouldn’t take long for the speculation to go in the most obvious direction, especially since Dana hadn’t named the father of her child before she’d died. And that speculation would be that he was the father and that he was breaking Lorelei’s heart because of the claim he’d have on the baby.

The baby who might or might not have his eyes.

And his hair.

And damn it, possibly his coloring.

Since Lorelei hadn’t buried her head in the sand, she could no doubt see all of those things, too, and it was breaking her heart. Dax sure as hell wasn’t immune to that.

“Look, no matter how this turns out,” he said, “if there’s anything I can do to help just let me know. I sort of owe you.”

Her eyebrow lifted. “How do you figure that?”

Dax shrugged, pulling up a childhood memory that he wished he hadn’t had to pull up. “When I was eleven and in an after-school program that my guardian forced me to go to, you stopped some of the older boys from picking on me.”

Lorelei certainly didn’t ask him what the heck he was talking about, and he could tell from the look in her eyes that she remembered, after all. “The boys were being idiots.”

“Yeah, they were,” he agreed, “and the trio of idiots had been taking both verbal and physical jabs at me because I’d been trying to make friends with Kayla Dayton. The trio claimed I had no right to talk to her and that no girl would ever want me. You heard what was going on and told them you were my girlfriend.” He grinned. “That shut them up.”

Her face relaxed a little, but her smile was way too weary. “I probably shouldn’t have said that, but I didn’t like what they were doing to you.”

“Yes, I didn’t care much for it, either, and that’s why I owe you. You really made them green with envy.”

Dax wouldn’t spell out the other details about this trip down memory lane, but that act of kindness had given him a serious crush on Lorelei. Her looks had helped with that. All that blond hair tumbling past her shoulders, and she’d had that amazing curvy body.

Still did.

No. There was no need to spell out those kinds of details especially since that crush was long gone, and their lives had gone in two entirely different directions. Except maybe their two entirely different directions had circled around to put them on the same path again.

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re trying to make this easier for me, and I appreciate it.”

He nodded, worked up a smile and was beyond thankful to see that she was starting to steel herself up. The steeling went south, though, when the doorbell rang again. No anger this time. Just the bone-deep weary sigh of a person who couldn’t take anyone or anything else adding to that weariness.

“It’s probably just the courier,” Dax reminded her.

So that Hilda wouldn’t have to deal with that, he headed to the front door just as the nanny was opening it. But it wasn’t the courier. It was Matt, and judging from the sheriff’s serious expression, this wasn’t a social visit.

Hell.

Apparently, Lorelei was going to have to face another addition to the weariness, after all.

“How bad is it?” Dax immediately asked.

“Not sure,” Matt answered, scrubbing his hand over his jaw. He glanced down at the test kit Dax was holding. “How bad it is for you?”

“Not sure.” Dax looked over his shoulder to see Lorelei walking toward them. “But it’ll be worse for her.”

Matt made a sound of agreement, causing every muscle in Dax’s body to tighten. “Lorelei,” Matt greeted. “I spoke to the Fords and to Aaron Marcel. They want to talk to you. And see Stellie.”

“Do they have a right to demand to see her?” Lorelei asked, and the tremble was back in her voice.

Matt nodded. “I sent them a photo of Valerie, and all three of them made a positive ID.” Matt paused, shook his head in what seemed to be frustration. “They’ll be here in Last Ride first thing in the morning.”