Wyoming Cinderella

At this choice of words, Hawk turned hooded gray eyes upon her. Ella seemed not in the least intimidated by his look of censure. She merely grinned as she stuffed his checkbook in the back pocket of a pair of cut off jeans that showed off the length and curve of legs that apparently remained stubbornly pale no matter how much they were exposed to the sun.

“Are you sure you trust me with several blank, signed checks?” she asked.

Hawk considered the question from a business perspective. If she ran off with his money or squandered it on luxuries for herself, it wouldn’t be the first time someone had tried to take advantage of his generosity and his means. What was it about those wide emerald eyes of hers that encouraged Hawk to put his faith in this indomitably perky young woman?

“If I trust you with my children, how could I not entrust you with my money when one is so insignificant compared to the other?” he asked honestly.

Startled by the sincerity and wisdom with which Hawk had responded to her inquiry, all teasing left Ella’s eyes. Had she so grievously misjudged him? She had been under the impression that he had been desperate enough that day she had stumbled into his life to hire anyone with a pulse. Perhaps the same instincts that made him an extraordinary businessman made him a good judge of character as well. It had never occurred to Ella that capitalists might be driven by anything other than a provable bottom line.

“I want you to get whatever you want at the store,” Hawk told her, ignoring the look of surprise on her pretty face. She looked utterly enchanting with her glorious mane of russet hair pulled back and captured by a green ribbon that matched her eyes. “Please don’t feel the need to pinch pennies. Buy whatever is convenient to stick in the oven. We’re not picky eaters. Make things easy on yourself.”

Ella fingered the coupons in her front pocket. Never before had she had carte blanche with someone else’s money. She wasn’t sure whether she was capable of shopping without mentally tallying the bill as she put each item into her cart.

“Go ahead and take my car,” Hawk said, tossing her the keys.

Ella looked at him doubtfully. She had seen that expensive foreign job parked out front and wasn’t convinced she wanted to be charged with such responsibility. Realizing that Hawk probably didn’t think her rusty, old pickup was reliable enough transportation for his children, she bit her tongue. He was probably right. Ella’s mechanic maintained the only thing holding the vehicle together was bailing wire and a prayer.

Reading the doubt upon her features, Hawk assured her, “Don’t worry. I’m amply insured.”

Ella gave him a grateful smile. His red sports car was parked out front. The epitome of opulence in sports cars, this particular model nonetheless held four comfortably. She loaded the children into their seats, buckled them safely in, and turned the ignition. It purred like one could only imagine Hissy Face might some day under perfect conditions. The seats were low to the ground and took some getting used to. Settling down into the butter-soft leather upholstery, Ella told herself that given half a chance she could easily adjust to such luxury.

Hawk walked out to the car and answered any questions Ella had about how the BMW sports car handled. Like a dream, she suspected. It didn’t take long for Hawk to familiarize her with all the buttons and gadgets on the dashboard. As the children blew their father farewell kisses, Ella rolled down her window and tried to look at ease behind the wheel of a fifty-thousand-dollar vehicle.

Hawk thought she could have well posed for a glamour shot sitting behind the wheel looking as lovely and carefree as someone born to such extravagance. In her worn cutoffs and sleeveless cotton shirt, she looked the fresh-faced all-American girl. That her makeup was minimal simply added to her allure. Physical attributes aside, Hawk decided, it was Ella’s animated response to life in general that made her so appealing. Looking back on it, he couldn’t believe he had found her less than stunning the first time he’d set eyes on her. Just remembering her ragtag appearance of flaming hair and righteous outrage that day was enough to make him smile.

Glad to see the genuine affection between Hawk and his children, Ella returned his smile. Having spent time in any number of homes, she knew how truly rare such demonstrations of love were. Indeed, experience had taught her that sometimes the most elegant homes housed the coldest families.

Nonetheless Ella could not keep the look of chastisement from her face as Hawk gave his children twenty dollars each for whatever “trinkets” they might find on their excursion in town. She had definite ideas about spoiling children and teaching them the value of hard work by attaching it to earnings. It was her considered opinion that most parents needed to spend less money and more time on their children. While it may be spare change for Hawk, the forty bucks with which he’d just parted was more than Ella had in her own purse at the moment. Luckily, her employer had given her a check in advance for her services, and she was as eager to put that substantial amount in the bank before any of her bills came due.

The thought of pulling up in front of Phoebe’s apartment in this extravagant contraption caused the corners of her mouth to tug into a smile. All she was missing was glass slippers and an elegant ball gown to complete the picture. As Hawk placed a parting kiss atop Sarah’s golden head, a careless thought flitted through Ella’s mind as she imagined him stopping by her open window, bending down, and kissing her farewell, too. The thought sent blood pumping through her body in hot spurts that caused her to blush unaccountably.

When Hawk did saunter over to her window to offer his parting remarks, Ella was aware that her face rivaled her hair in its damnable shade of red. His suggestion that she pick up some sunscreen while in town only caused her to glow a deeper crimson. She hoped he was distracted from the glow by his children hollering, “See ya later alligator.”

To which, Hawk dutifully responded, “In a while crocodile.”

He stood in the driveway a long time, staring after them, eating the dust of their departure. He wasn’t quite sure how she managed to do it, but somehow Ella was able to make even a trip to the grocery store into an exciting adventure. He used to look forward to the one day a week when the previous nanny had taken the children off the ranch and out of his hair for an afternoon of shopping. Rather than that familiar sense of relief, Hawk trudged back to his workstation feeling oddly bereft.

The house was blessedly quiet. Nothing was stopping him from catching up on a truckload of work this afternoon. Nothing but the sense that he was being left out of his children’s lives and the vague memory of once upon a time knowing how to have fun himself.

Three

Ella quickly discovered that shopping with money was a whole lot more fun than her usual forays into the discount world. Under normal circumstances she left shops feeling emotionally beaten and harried. What a change to point her nose disdainfully in the air as she passed the “day old” bread and loaded her cart full with what she considered to be extravagant items. The foremost among them was a big bottle of bubble bath and a very small bottle of the most sensual perfume she had ever smelled. Not wanting to give her employer any reason to find her unworthy of his trust, Ella paid for these two indulgences out of her own pocket. The rest was going to bills and straight into her college fund.

Her first night at Red Feather Ranch had felt like a stay in a sumptuous hotel. Compared to her old feather bed, the new mattress and springs in her room were heaven. Next to the forced air heater which would keep her toasty warm on long winter nights, the undisputed best thing about her new living quarters was the attached bathroom complete with a shower and tub, which she wantonly had filled to the brim with steamy hot water. It had been in that deliciously relaxing bath that Ella had decided to add bubble bath to her shopping list.

Ah, the comforts that so many people dared take for granted, she thought to herself taking an appreciative sniff of the peach bubble bath she had selected from the store shelf. Still, old habits die hard, and so it was that Ella could not actually bring herself to buy the myriad of expensive gourmet brands that she had always fancied. She did, however, yield to the children in their choice of cold cereals with “fabulous prizes” inside, as well succumbing to the charm of a bouquet of fresh-cut flowers for the kitchen table. They would make a lovely still life if she ever found the time to capture it on canvas. Before leaving, she gave Sarah and Billy each a gleeful turn on the antique horse that had sat at the front of the grocery store for as long as Ella could remember. Lurching drunkenly in place, poor old Bullet bore the weight of multiple generations upon its worn saddle. He stoically endured the bit attached to the real leather reins which youngsters pulled on while slapping his paint-flecked rump urging him to gallop. For the price of a single penny, it was assuredly the best ride in town.

Just as Ella had feared, the children blew their money on useless junk that she knew would likely be broken or discarded before they even got back home. Her suggestions that they either save their money for a big ticket item or invest in rainy day art supplies was met with all the resistance two preschoolers with forty dollars between them could muster. In the end, Ella had surrendered to their wishes, reminding herself that it was neither her money nor they her children. A somber thought reinforced by past experiences reminded her to keep her emotional distance lest her tender heart be hurt again.

The first thing she did upon depositing their purchases into the trunk of the car was stop by Phoebe’s house. Both the fancy car and her friend’s good fortune overwhelmed the lively blonde. Phoebe purported that the only people who owned such cars were old goats trying to reclaim their youth and as such, she remained skeptical as to the owner’s real identity. As they all piled into the BMW sports car and headed to the Dairy Palace for ice cream, Phoebe made Ella promise to introduce her to the “hottie” aristocrat her best friend claimed as her boss. If indeed William Fawson Hawk III was too stodgy and business oriented for Ella’s freewheeling taste, Phoebe said she wasn’t above falling in love with a rich, handsome tycoon.

Before stopping for ice cream, they hung a couple of Mains on Lander’s major thoroughfare with their state-of-the-art stereo system turned up loud enough to make the children squeal with delight as they joined in on loud off-key choruses. Parking the car away from other vehicles that might cause a scratch or door ding, they stopped for ice cream. Outside, the sun was warm and the air pleasantly still. Sitting beneath the yellow-and-white awning of the old-fashioned ice cream parlor watching the traffic go by added to the charm of what seemed to be a town that time forgot.

Phoebe pasted a disgusted expression on her face. “One of the horses in this two-horse burg must have died last night.”

She made no secret of the fact that she was looking forward to shaking the familiar dust of her hometown from her feet, the sooner the better. Once she got her computer certification from the nearby community college, Phoebe Tyler was bound for more glamorous destinations. Convinced of her friend’s artistic talents she took every opportunity to encourage Ella to come along with her. After all, discovery by the art world in Lander, Wyoming, was about as likely as winning the state lottery—odds lessened considerably by the fact that the state didn’t have one.

Savoring her strawberry ice cream, Ella refused to be ruffled on such a glorious day as this. A country girl at heart, she felt no need to run off to the big city looking for fame and fortune. This quaint little town was as cosmopolitan as she needed, nestled as it was at the base of the mountains that held her heart. She wiped matching chocolate ice cream mustaches from the children’s faces with a napkin. They didn’t put up much of a fight when Ella announced it was time to go home. All in all, they seemed to have had a wonderful time sampling the sweetness of the day.

Promising to see each other at their art class Wednesday night, the two old friends departed. The sun was sinking low in the sky when Ella turned on a soothing CD in hopes of combating all the sugar racing through the children’s systems. It wasn’t long before their heads were bobbing and they were out, soundly napping for the duration of the ride home. She found them undeniably beautiful in their sleep. Billy with his thick mop of dark hair and open gray eyes was the very image of his father physically, though Ella doubted whether Hawk had ever displayed his son’s wonderfully mischievous, playful nature. More than likely, William Fawson Hawk III had been a serious and intent child whose favorite pastime was a Monopoly game. Ella assumed Sarah got her pretty blond curls and blue eyes from her mother. Having glanced at the pictures on the mantel in their home, she ascertained that the gorgeous creature enshrined there had to be their mother. Or a movie star.

Those pale reflections of what Mrs. William Hawk had been in the flesh were chilling reminders of how dearly missed she was by every member of this fragile family. And how hopelessly plain and boring she must seem to them. Despite Phoebe’s determination to make her life into a fairy tale, Ella knew better than to waste her time dreaming of men like Hawk ever paying her the slightest bit of attention as anything other than a paid employee. Sighing, she squinted against the setting sun and promised to buy herself a pair of funky sunglasses on her next trip to town.

Having had a whole, rare uninterrupted day, Hawk was surprised how difficult it had been to concentrate in all that solitude. After an hour or two of truly productive work, he found himself actually turning on the television set just to have the comfort of its droning noise in the background. Though a poor substitute for the sound of his children’s chatter, it was notably better than the silence for which he had so foolishly been longing. At odd times he would look up from his computer screen as if straining to catch pieces of conversation between his absent children and their new nanny. He had purposely positioned his desk against a blank wall so as to minimize distractions, but after a miserable lunch of potato chips and pop, decided to move it next to the window so as to have a better view of the backyard. Images of Ella casually dressed in cutoffs came unbidden to him throughout the day, disrupting his concentration and his peace of mind. He certainly hoped she took part of her advance paycheck and invested in more suitable attire.

Hawk became so bored and lonely that he actually sought out Hissy Face’s dubious company as comfort. He received a nasty scratch on his arm for his efforts. He wasn’t sure why he secretly liked the cursed animal—other than the fact that he felt somehow connected to a fellow creature who desperately wanted to be loved but was afraid of allowing anyone to do so.

By the time his dust-covered BMW sports car pulled into the driveway later that evening, Hawk was unaccountably irritated by the sight of three sunburned beauties bearing cold burritos and exciting tales of the day’s adventures. Despite Ella’s assurances that she was perfectly capable of bringing in the groceries herself, he allowed her to carry only a couple of smaller bags. She offered to heat up Hawk’s dinner in the microwave while the children filled him in on all the details of their day.

As excited as they were, one would have thought they’d just returned from an amusement park instead of a jaunt into town. It had been a long time since his children had displayed such enthusiasm for sharing much of anything with Hawk, and he was happy to take advantage of the opportunity to get close to them. He couldn’t shake the feeling that they somehow distrusted him after their mother’s death. Not that they blamed him for her demise or anything so sinister, it was just that it seemed a stranger had waltzed into their lives trying to take their mother’s place. And doing an abysmal job of it.

Hawk deeply regretted the way he had so neatly compartmentalized his life before Lauren’s death. That was as much her choice as it had been his. Still, that knowledge was of little solace to a man trying to piece his life back together like some gigantic three dimensional puzzle strewn over years of mistakes. Though not a particularly warm woman, Lauren had loved her children in her own way, setting them up to have the best of everything from designer clothing to prestigious preschools. Her insistence that Hawk’s primary obligation to his family was to provide them an income adequate to support her considerable tastes was something that had caused him a good deal of emotional turmoil in the past as well as the present.

Lauren had been from the kind of old and, unfortunately, dwindling money lines that understood children were to be molded into a commodity to advance one’s standing in society. To her credit, she had done an admirable job sorting Billy and Sarah into fashionably regimented activities that ensured they caused their parents as little trouble as possible. At the time of her death she had been determined that their children would attend one of the most touted boarding schools available.

That Hawk had hired a nanny who not only played with them but also encouraged them to get dirty would have surely horrified his elegant wife. As would Ella’s choice of casual attire and the unabashed exuberance with which she attacked each day. Hawk smiled. Because she was quite the opposite of his departed wife, his parents would love Ella. In the brief time the children had spent with their grandparents while Hawk was getting his life in order, they had begun shedding layers of inhibition. Like Ella, his parents didn’t prescribe to Lauren’s “children should be seen but not heard” philosophy.

As tempting as it would have been to leave Billy and Sarah in their grandparents’ care indefinitely, Hawk didn’t want to strain their failing health any more than absolutely necessary. Besides, he truly wanted to be part of his children’s life. Sadly, ever since he’d uprooted them and transplanted them to the Wyoming backcountry, where he himself had grown up so long ago, he’d gotten the feeling that they’d rather be anywhere but with him on a full-time basis. Perhaps they had simply become far too comfortable with the good-time dad image he’d portrayed for so long—that of the absent father who showed up between mergers to shower them with gifts, hoping to make up for the time he couldn’t afford to give them. Such tactics had extracted a heavy toll on his marriage as well as on Hawk’s relationship with his children. There was so much he regretted, so much he blamed on himself alone.

“Anyone up for a Candy Land game?” Ella asked, carrying a huge bowl of freshly popped buttered popcorn into the room along with a platter of reheated burritos for Hawk.

Immediately the children began clearing a space at the table. Famished, Hawk dug in.

“May I play?” he asked, halfway through his first burrito.

Startled by the request, the children looked at him as if he were a complete stranger to them.

“Certainly,” Ella interjected into the noticeable silence. “But I have to warn you, I am the Candy Land champion of the world.”

The children booed, promising to best both of the adults present. Ella was pleased that Hawk had asked to join in. She found him to be surprisingly patient in playing the child-centered board game. He really had a nice smile when he used it. Something about the curve of those sensuous lips made her go quite soft inside, and she quickly bent her head over the game when Hawk caught her gawking at him.

Ella was impressed by the fact that he was trying so hard to connect with his children. Her mother maintained that Ella’s father had been a magician. When she told him that she was pregnant, he disappeared. Ella had to admire a man who cared enough to stick around and see his children through the tough times. She found herself wondering if it wasn’t so much that William Fawson Hawk III was aloof, as he was simply ill at ease in the role in which fate had cast him. She wondered if his gorgeous wife had ever included him in such simple pastimes. The thought of the four of them nestled in front of a roaring fire made Ella’s stomach twist. Doing her best to dismiss the fear that she would never find such cozy contentment in a relationship, Ella turned over a card that allowed her to skip way ahead in the game.

Throwing a wink in Hawk’s direction, she said, “I told you I was lucky.”

A flicker of something dangerous danced in slate-colored eyes. “I think we’re the lucky ones,” he told her.

Ella cursed herself for blushing like a schoolgirl with a crush.

“You are very lucky to have each other,” she said, meaning it.

Despite her efforts to lose to one of the younger players, Ella was the undisputed winner of the evening. The children scampered off to brush their teeth as the grownups promised to put away the game. As she was clearing the board, her hand inadvertently brushed against Hawk’s. She flinched as if she had just been shocked by a stun gun. The tingling in her hand extended all the way up her arm, settling deep inside her in the most private places.

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