Cowboys and Cabernet

“Ruth, the domestic wine market is expanding at a tremendous, unheard-of rate. There’s room for everyone, you know. We’re certainly not going to suffer from the competition.”

“I know,” Ruth said, her eyes dark with rebellion. “But it still doesn’t seem right to me. People shouldn’t go into the wine industry just to make a whole lot of money. They should do it because they love it.”

“That’s a pretty idealistic attitude.”

“Well, how are the McKinneys planning to go about this? Just buy the best equipment, pay all the best people to come work for them and then, every time there’s a problem, throw a whole wad of money at it?”

“That seems to be the Texas style, all right,” Don said with a grin.

“Maybe so, but it sure won’t work in this business. You’d better tell your friends that, before they get in too deep.”

“Why don’t you tell them?”

“Me?” Ruth asked blankly.

“That’s what I was thinking. Why don’t you just fly out there for a little visit, see how advanced their plans are and what advice you can give them about the business?”

“Did J.T. ask for me to come?”

Don hesitated, recalling his old friend’s troubled voice on the phone. “Not exactly,” he confessed. “Actually, I invited Tyler to come and stay here with us for a few weeks, have a look at our operation.”

Ruth shook her head. “That’s crazy, Dad. There’s nothing to look at at this time of year but a whole row of casks. And he’d get awful weary,” she added with a fond teasing smile, “of listening to that boring lecture you give the tour groups six times a week.”

“It is boring, isn’t it?” Don said cheerfully. “But the tourists seem to enjoy it.”

“Oh, pooh. They just enjoy the wine tasting. They’ll suffer through any dry old lecture to get their hands on those free samples.”

Ruth was silent a moment, obviously deep in thought. Her father waited for her to speak as he cleaned his plate with care.

“What’s the climate like in Texas?” she asked finally.

“Which part? Texas ranges from tropical seacoast and eastern woodlands to grassy plains and western desert. Take your pick.”

“I mean where the McKinneys live. Near Austin, isn’t it? I can hardly remember anything about the ranch, it’s been so long since I was there.”

Don nodded. “The Hill Country. It’s a nice area. Close to a region four, I’d say.”

Ruth looked at her father in surprise. “Really? They have a heat summation that high?”

“Oh, I’d think so. There’s a lot of hot sunny days in Central Texas.”

Ruth frowned in concentration. “If they’re region four,” she said slowly, “then with some hybrid plants along with vinifera they could choose between table wines or dessert wines, right? That degree of sugar content gives them a lot of options.”

Don nodded again. “A good portion of the Texas industry seems to be centered farther west around Lubbock, where it’s hard to assign a heat summation. But their wineries show a lot of flexibility, and Austin actually has a slightly more moderate climate. Certainly they have less danger of hail than over at Lubbock.”

Ruth nodded again, her brown eyes sparkling with interest. “Worse and worse,” she said. “That means the whole thing is actually feasible. What does J.T. think about this little project? Somehow I can’t imagine him involved with anything but horses and cows.”

“Well, he’s not wild about it,” Don said honestly. “In fact, he sounds quite reluctant. I guess his wife was too, at first, but apparently Tyler’s won her over and now they’re both pushing poor J.T. to get the project off the ground.”

Ruth grinned. “For the sake of your old friendship, I guess the kindest thing would be to give J.T. some support, right? One of us could go out there in a semi-professional capacity, throw all kinds of cold water on the whole proposal and then just come back home.”

“I think J.T. might be very grateful for that,” Don said with a solemn twinkle.

“So, why don’t you go?” Ruth asked.

“I don’t need a holiday,” Don said, topping up his wineglass. “I’m not the one who’s breaking up with boyfriends and grumbling about the weather all day long. Besides,” he added, “I have my tour groups six times a week.”

“I could lead the tour groups.”

“Certainly not. You don’t take it seriously enough.”

“Wine making? Come on, Dad. Nobody takes this business more seriously than I do.”

“No, I meant tourism,” Don said with a grin. “You don’t have the proper level of respect for the importance of the tourist, my girl.”

“Well, I can’t argue with that,” Ruth confessed. She was silent a moment, resting her elbow on the table, chin cupped thoughtfully in one hand. “Maybe I will,” she said at last.

“Go to Texas?”

“Just to see what they’re planning, and give your old friend some backup. Texas cowboys really shouldn’t try to make wine, Dad. I think I’ll just go out there and tell them so. Let the dragon lady know that I’m too full for dessert, okay?”

With a sudden rush of energy Ruth bounded from her chair and whirled across the room to drop a kiss on the top of her father’s head, then vanished down the hallway in a blur of faded denim and blue plaid, leaving Don gazing after her in bemused silence.

While the rain hissed softly against the tall, leaded-glass windows, Don Holden sat alone in the quiet dining room and sipped his wine, wondering ruefully if he’d done his old friend any favor by suggesting this little holiday.

THE HOLDEN HOUSE was built in the manner of a traditional Spanish hacienda, a low pillared square surrounding a central courtyard. The decor was cool and rustic, with dark polished wood floors, clean plastered walls and bright splashes of color in the woven Indian rugs and wall hangings.

Ruth’s rooms were tucked away in a quiet corner of the house—a bedroom, bath and small sitting room with glass doors opening onto the courtyard. She wandered into the sitting room and shut the door carefully, her burst of energy already fading, replaced by a flood of doubt and a fresh wave of the lassitude and depression that had dogged her so much of the time lately.

For a moment Ruth stood restlessly by the windows and gazed out at the flowing darkness, then looked back into the room as if seeking comfort. But for once the gracious furnishings, the carefully chosen watercolor prints on the walls and the beautiful Navaho rugs did nothing to lighten her mood.

She went over to punch a disk into her player, and the cool liquid sounds of classical guitar spilled through the quiet rooms. Ruth adjusted the volume, then looked around with a questioning air.

“Hagar,” she called, sinking down to lie full-length on her small couch. “Hagar, where are you? I need you, sweetie.”

Pleasantly muscle-weary from her long day of physical labor in the cold and rain, she propped her moccasined feet on the opposite arm of the couch and adjusted the pillows behind her head, then smiled as a huge orange Persian cat came padding out from the bedroom, yawning voluptuously.

Hagar was a big fluffy Viking of a cat with a wild russet cloud of fur that rayed out all around him in bright splendor. Ruth adored him, loved the regal air and noble carriage that hid an unusually gentle and loving soul.

Mrs. Ward, however, hated Ruth’s cat with cold passion because of the silky orange fur that he deposited everywhere. Frequently the housekeeper muttered dark veiled threats about Hagar’s personal safety, driving Ruth almost wild with protective outrage and causing even more conflict and tension between the two women.

“You know what, Hagar?” Ruth said, smiling down fondly into Hagar’s brilliant green eyes as he sat by the couch. “You really are a Viking, aren’t you? I should make you a little tiny hat with a pair of those Viking horns on it, shouldn’t I? That would really suit you.”

Hagar yawned again and leaped lightly onto Ruth’s stomach, pausing to turn around deliberately a few times and knead Ruth’s shirt with his gentle blunted claws before sinking in a huge orange mass on her abdomen and resting his chin on folded paws.

Ruth sighed in gratitude, stroking the comforting furry warmth of her cat and brooding about the way she felt these days. Even this beautiful suite of rooms, which had always been the place she loved more than anywhere else on earth, didn’t seem able to soothe her anymore. She felt so restless and agitated all the time, full of nagging doubts and strange nameless yearnings.

Partly this was because of the deteriorating relationship with Harlan, followed by its inevitable demise. Not that Ruth really expected to miss Harlan very much, but the breakup still tended to accentuate her solitude, and the terrifying swiftness with which her life was passing by.

Most of Ruth’s college friends already had growing children, mortgages, houses full of furniture and settled suburban lives. Ruth, on the other hand, still lived in the same place she’d spent her whole life, except for the year she’d been in Paris working on her master’s thesis. Her earlier studies had been at Davis University, so close to the Holden winery that she was able to come home every weekend.

She sighed again. Hagar glanced up at her, licked her hand with urgent sympathy and subsided once more, purring like a plump energetic dynamo as if hopeful that the sound might be soothing to his mistress. Ruth stroked his soft fur with a gentle absent hand, gazing at the ceiling and thinking about the McKinneys.

She didn’t really like J.T. McKinney, never had, though she was fair enough to recognize this as a completely unreasonable emotion. When her father’s old friend came to visit, striding through the quiet rooms of their house with his tanned handsome face, his rolling cowboy gait, his beautiful handmade riding boots and jaunty Stetson hat, Ruth always felt a small surge of resentment.

In J.T.’s presence, her own beloved father seemed to shrink mysteriously, to diminish somehow until he looked pallid and small. Ruth, who adored her father, felt a defensive flood of concern for Don whenever his colorful friend came to the West Coast, bringing gifts and laughter and rip-roaring stories of Texas past and present.

And now J.T. was planning to go into the wine-making business, to usurp the one area where her father held undisputed mastery. And with all that family money at his disposal, Ruth thought bitterly, he’d probably make a success of it, too.

She frowned, trying to recall what she knew about J.T.’s son Tyler, who apparently was the driving force behind this winery idea.

Like her, Tyler still lived with his father, fully absorbed in the family business, and Ruth was fairly certain that he’d never married. In fact, none of the McKinney children had managed to find partners yet. J.T. and Don frequently commiserated with each other about their backward offspring.

But Tyler McKinney hadn’t seemed all that backward on the one occasion she could recall meeting him, Ruth thought with a brief wry grin.

That had been about nineteen years ago, the summer she was eleven and Tyler was fifteen. Don Holden had accepted an invitation to spend a two-week summer vacation at the McKinneys’ Texas ranch, and Ruth had been allowed to take along her friend, a precocious thirteen-year-old with the unlikely name of Mimsy Muldoon. Mimsy’s parents operated a small winery just down the valley, and she and Ruth were passionate best friends for several years.

Ruth could still remember the pain of that summer, caused in large part by the burning envy she felt for the McKinney children with their warm happy family, and especially the gentle soft-spoken mother who loved them so much and treated them with such tenderness.

But worst of all had been Tyler’s attitude. A lanky brash adolescent, he’d been obviously charmed by golden-haired Mimsy, who had a ripely mature young body and a flirtatious manner beyond her years. Ruth had spent a lot of miserable afternoons watching the two of them frolic in the family swimming pool.

She remembered her suffering and embarrassment as she hid her own gangly undeveloped body under baggy T-shirts, huddled with her book in a poolside chair while handsome, dark-haired Tyler flirted with her best friend. Grinning boldly, he ducked Mimsy and chased her across the pool and pretended to be terrified of her swimming prowess.

With a sudden blinding flash of total recall, Ruth saw Tyler pulling his muscular young body out onto the concrete ledge, standing arrogantly with feet apart as he laughed down at Mimsy, throwing his dark head back to send sparkling droplets arching into the hot Texas sun in a shower of rainbows.

“Jerk!” Ruth had muttered under her breath, glaring up at him from behind the pages of her book.

Ruth smiled now at the memory and looked down at Hagar, whose emerald eyes were closing in bliss as Ruth stroked his silky ears.

“You know, Tyler McKinney really was a jerk, Hagar,” Ruth told her cat solemnly. “I wonder if he’s changed at all.”

Hagar yawned in drowsy contentment, revealing his sharp white teeth and the pink interior of his mouth. Ruth felt her spirits begin to rise a little. She gazed at her closet doors with thoughtful speculation, wondering what the weather was like in Central Texas these days and how many clothes she should pack.

CHAPTER TWO

WINTER SUNSHINE, as pale and sparkling as good champagne, spilled over the rolling hills and valleys of Central Texas. The cool afternoon light sparkled on the bustling city of Austin, glinted on lines of brisk-moving traffic and brightened the windows of downtown high-rise office buildings.

Inside Austin’s Mueller Airport Tyler McKinney shifted restlessly in a hard vinyl chair and glanced up at the arrivals board, checking on the business shuttle flight from Abilene. The plane was already a half hour late and the arrival time had apparently been shifted back again. Tyler muffled a groan, aching with frustration and impatience.

Of course, he told himself, trying hard to look on the bright side, it was probably better that the flight was delayed. This way, he wouldn’t have to search for ways to entertain the woman until it was safe to take her home.

“Don’t you dare turn up here with her before four o’clock,” Cynthia had warned him darkly, her beautiful face comically stern under the navy-blue bandanna that she’d tied over her hair. “If you do, Tyler McKinney, I swear I’ll skin you and set you out for the coyotes to finish off.”

“My, my! Such gruesome violence,” Tyler had teased her wickedly. “And from a Boston blue-blood, at that.”

“Oh, shut up,” Cynthia muttered, swatting his arm with a wallpaper roll and whirling off down the cluttered hallway.

Tyler grinned, remembering.

All the women were in an uproar over the renovations currently under way at the Double C. And, being women, they wanted to have it all. They wanted the place redecorated, but they also wanted to impress the visitor from California with how elegant and smooth-running the household was.

“But, darling,” J.T. had protested mildly over his breakfast coffee, “it just can’t be helped, can it? She’s bound to notice that things aren’t exactly neat as a pin around here these days.”

“I know that,” Cynthia said. “But if Tyler can hold her off till four o’clock this afternoon, at least the painters will be gone and we can lift some of the drop sheets in the lower rooms, get the paint cans out of the hallway and the ladders put away….”

Tyler grinned again. He couldn’t deny that it was entertaining to see his usually poised stepmother getting a little flustered. For some reason it mattered terribly to Cynthia, this hastily planned visit from Ruth Holden, who was the daughter of one of her husband’s oldest friends. There seemed to be something mysteriously female about Cynthia’s anxiety, some kind of need to prove herself as mistress of the place….

An expressionless, disembodied voice, announcing that the flight from Abilene would be slightly delayed, interrupted Tyler’s thoughts.

He groaned again and shifted his broad shoulders wearily, wondering if the plane had even left Abilene yet. If it hadn’t left, wouldn’t they know? And if it had, shouldn’t they know when it was going to arrive? Abilene, for God’s sake, was only a few minutes away by air.

Maybe the plane had been hijacked. Tyler chuckled suddenly, his quirky imagination supplying him with an image of a hard-bitten Texas farmer, calf halter in one hand and pitchfork in the other, holding the crew at bay and demanding to be flown to Fort Worth for the Fat Stock Show.

When he laughed, his tanned sculpted face lightened and his dark eyes sparkled warmly. Tyler McKinney was a tall man in his midthirties with a lean muscular frame, dressed in jeans, riding boots and tweed sport jacket over a casual open-necked white shirt. His pearl-gray Stetson lay on the seat across from him, and his crisp dark hair kept falling down across his forehead no matter how many times he brushed it back.

A small child wriggled quietly in the seat next to Tyler, a boy about three years old with a manly clipped haircut that was neatly parted and slicked back with a wet comb. The little fellow, waiting with his mother and baby sister in a stroller, was trying hard to be good, but Tyler could see that the long delay was starting to get to him as well.

The child gripped the metal chair arms with his small hands and slid way down on his spine, legs stiffly extended, seeing how low he could go without falling off the chair. His mother, who was busy with the baby, whispered to him sharply and he sat erect, peeking up at Tyler with cautious interest. Tyler grinned down at the child, slipped him a couple of peppermints from a roll in his jacket pocket, then returned to his thoughts.

His face darkened as he brooded over the impending arrival and what his responsibilities were going to be toward this visiting scientist. “You’ll pretty well have to take care of her,” his father had told him casually. “The girls are busy with all this damn decorating, so they won’t have much time to entertain her.”

“Me?” Tyler said blankly. “What am I going to do with her?”

“Well, talk about wine making, of course,” J.T. told his son impatiently. “You’re the one who wants to start this business, aren’t you? And she’s an expert. She’s a qualified chemist with a list of college degrees as long as your arm.”

“Oh, great,” Tyler had muttered rebelliously, feeling about eight years old. “That’s just what I need, to spend a week listening to some California scientist with thick legs and a mustache, lecturing me about temperature variations and pH levels.”

“I haven’t seen Ruth Holden for quite a few years,” J.T. said with an amiable grin. “But near as I recall, she didn’t have thick legs or a mustache.”

“I’ll bet,” Tyler said grimly. “I’ll just bet.”

He didn’t really know why he’d formed such a negative mental image of the woman. Maybe it was his recollection of that one time he’d seen her, years ago. He remembered her as a mousy quiet child with a skinny awkward body and teeth covered in ugly braces.

Of course, she’d really suffered badly in comparison with her friend. Tyler smiled, remembering the ripe body of that other girl, the silly blond one. Misty? Molly? Whatever her name was, she’d certainly made an impact on his raging young hormones.

No wonder little Ruth Holden, sulking in a chair behind a book, had seemed so homely and unappealing. Tyler could just visualize the kind of woman she’d turned into. He pictured her with thick ankles and a severe look, her colorless hair hanging lank and unwashed around her ears. She’d be wearing thick glasses and carrying a clipboard at all times, and she’d probably be dressed in a white lab coat over a baggy gray flannel skirt.

This image had grown so real to him during the past few days, ever since he heard about the woman’s impending visit, that now, as Tyler glanced frequently into the arrivals area, he expected to see her come marching up the ramp, clipboard and all.

But the lounge was mostly empty, except for a few long-suffering people who were still waiting for the flight from Abilene.

Tyler became aware of a small movement beside him, a sudden charged air of expectancy.

The little boy was gazing up at him with wide eyes, holding out his hand. A tiny object rested on the small damp palm, and Tyler bent closer to look. It was a futuristic warrior figure, beautifully detailed, complete with small swords and laser guns.

Tyler nodded solemnly and smiled down into the sparkling blue eyes, understanding that the figurine was just being displayed for his enjoyment, not offered as a gift.

“That’s real nice,” he murmured to the child, who grinned happily.

Tyler smiled back and dug into his jacket pocket again, taking out his keys and snapping a small object off the key ring. It was a tiny leather saddle, no bigger than the end of his thumb and intricately crafted with miniature swinging stirrups and a little horn and cantle. He placed the saddle on his hard callused palm and held it out for the child’s inspection.

The boy gasped and stared at this enchanting object, then looked up at Tyler again, holding his breath and putting two fingers automatically into his mouth.

“Take it,” Tyler whispered. “You can have it.”

His seatmate gazed at him with astonishment and growing wonder. A small hand crept out cautiously and touched one of the little stirrups in an agony of longing.

“Michael!” the harried young mother said abruptly, turning away from her crying baby in the stroller. “What are you doing?”

“It’s all right, ma’am,” Tyler assured her with his most engaging grin. “I told him he could have it.”

The woman glanced uncertainly at the tall, handsome rancher, then at her little boy, who was now holding the miniature saddle, his face pale with tension.

“Well, all right,” she said reluctantly. “Michael, say thank-you.”

“Sanks,” the child whispered, drumming his feet on the chair and gazing ecstatically at the tiny object in his hand. He balanced the saddle on one small finger and set the stirrups swinging gently, his pink face rapt with happiness.

“You’re welcome, cowboy,” Tyler said cheerfully. The woman smiled, then gathered her children and hurried toward a short cheerful man in a crumpled suit who stood waiting by the entry gate.

While Tyler watched, the young father gathered the baby into his arms, kissed his wife and caressed the shining head of the little boy, who was joyously hugging his legs. The man bent to hear what his son was saying, then knelt and studied the tiny saddle that was held up for his inspection. He listened, smiled briefly over the child’s head at Tyler and turned back to his family.

Tyler smiled automatically in return, feeling a familiar vague sorrow as he watched this small tableau.

Nobody would ever know how much Tyler McKinney longed for children of his own, how deeply he yearned for the love of a small son like that little fair-haired child. This emotion was something Tyler hid from everybody, even his family and closest friends, most of whom considered him ambitious, cold and clearheaded, probably even a little ruthless.

But Tyler knew himself better, knew that he had great depths of tenderness to give the right woman, though he’d never managed to find the one he dreamed of. Dark or fair, short or tall—her looks didn’t really matter—but she’d have a sweet voice and gentle hands and a tender caring manner similar to his mother’s. Tyler knew this was an old-fashioned picture, and that women just weren’t like that nowadays. But still, he longed to find a woman who fulfilled his fantasies, who’d give him love and support and some little children to hold.

But his soul mate never seemed to come along, or else he’d just never found time to search for her. Tyler had been so busy during his college years, driven by his need to excel both scholastically and athletically. Then there’d been the absorbing interest of his new position as a full partner in the ranch, trying to use his training in business to develop methods of making the huge unwieldy operation more efficient and profitable.