Texas Trouble

She looked at Sean, but he deliberately turned his head, just to show how unimpressed he was.

She smiled at Logan apologetically. “If it’s not too much trouble, that would be very cool.”

The clinic was small, more like a condo kitchenette than a vet’s office. When all four of them bundled inside, and Logan made quick introductions, there wasn’t much room to spare.

She usually avoided being this close, physically, to Logan. She never sat next to him at meetings, or gave him the same casual hug she might have given any other acquaintance she met on the street.

It was partly because of Harrison’s suspicions. But it was also a self-protective choice. As absurd as it sounded for a thirty-two-year-old housewife, Logan Cathcart gave her butterflies.

She wasn’t really sure why. Though he was amazing to look at, with his dark hair, his intense blue eyes and his six feet of lean muscle, she was completely immune to a hundred men equally well-endowed.

But Logan’s masculinity obviously transmitted on her frequency, and she wasn’t sure she ever completely concealed the jitters. The best bet had seemed to be maintaining a cordial distance.

Today, though, in such cramped quarters, she didn’t have much choice. And, with her emotions so caught up in Sean’s problems, anything as frivolous as butterflies seemed unlikely. She just tried to stay out of anyone’s way.

“Kind of messy, isn’t it?” Sean let his scornful gaze drift over the cupboards and bookshelves that lined the walls, overflowing with medical tomes and binders from various federal and state agencies.

“Sean,” she said, her voice stiff with warning.

Logan chuckled as he took the phone from Dolly. “Yeah, it’s a mess, all right. Maybe that would be a good job for you tomorrow.”

In the corner, hand puppets that looked like birds had been tossed into a basket. Sean went over to inspect them, but tossed each one back indifferently, as if they didn’t pass the test. Dolly ignored him, fiddling with instruments that looked like tiny forceps.

Logan’s phone call was brief, a few monosyllabic words that seemed to indicate satisfaction. Apparently the vet’s news was good, though Nora wondered how often that was the case. Surely not all the birds brought here found happy endings.

She looked at Sean, his tense, bony shoulders and his unruly red hair that stood up in a tuft at the part. For a minute she saw him as another of Logan’s wounded birds, and wondered whether he would be one of the lucky ones.

“Sorry about that.” Logan joined them at the counter. “The vets we use are all volunteers, so I had to catch him while he was free. Dolly, I’ll weigh Gulliver today. If you could make sure the status sheets in the pens are ready, that would be great.”

The young woman, whose hair was brown with purple tips, and whose nose was decorated with a serious piece of hardware, smiled amiably.

“Sure thing, boss,” she said, waving at Nora and Sean before skipping out the door and down the path toward the larger enclosures.

Logan moved to the farthest countertop, where cages stood in rows next to large scales and microscopes and first aid supplies.

“Gulliver is one of the birds we’re going to use for education,” Logan said as he opened a large gray cage and peeked in. “Hey, buddy,” he said to whatever occupant waited inside. “Time to see how fat you’re getting, living the life of leisure.”

He put his hand in slowly, and when he pulled it out, he held the most adorable piece of brown-and-white fluff Nora had ever seen. She smiled instinctively, and when she glanced at Sean, she saw that his scowl had deepened, which she knew meant he was working hard to suppress his curiosity.

“Oh, how darling,” she said. “Sean, look! It’s a baby owl!”

Sean moved dramatically away, sighing to communicate his boredom. But he remained angled, so that he could still glimpse the little bird out of the corners of his eyes.

Of course he was fascinated. How could he not be?

The owl was so cute Nora had to laugh. About six inches long, it fit neatly in the palm of Logan’s large hand.

And then the hand itself was almost too much of a distraction. It was definitely not a rancher’s hand, with its graceful, long lines. She was surprised to see the elegant fingers tipped in calluses.

Sean made an impatient sound as he toyed with the instruments on the counter.

“I thought,” he said, “that you weren’t supposed to let them see people much, so that they don’t imprint on humans.”

Nora gave her son a hard look, and she was glad to see that he flushed, obviously aware that his tone had been out of bounds. What made him think he could teach Logan his own business?

“Been reading up?” Logan nodded, as if he approved. “You’re right. For a baby, we’d have to wear the puppet, or even the whole outfit. But Gulliver here isn’t a baby. He’s a fully grown Eastern screech owl, and unfortunately somebody already let him imprint on humans before he got to us.”

“But he’s so small,” Nora said. “He’s fully grown?”

“I know.” Logan scratched the side of the bird’s head. The owl seemed quite content to lounge in his hand, blinking its large, shiny eyes at him sleepily. “They don’t get much bigger than this. And they don’t screech, either. Weird, huh?”

Sean was no longer pretending not to watch. His hands were fisted at chest level, as if he had to force himself not to reach out and touch the intricately patterned feathers.

Nora met Logan’s gaze over her son’s head. She wondered if he knew how embarrassed she was by Sean’s behavior.

Or how worried.

But she couldn’t read anything in Logan’s blue eyes except a polite patience.

“I should probably get going,” she said.

She should. She had a million things to do, and she was postponing the moment when Sean would have to adjust. Maybe, when the safety net that Mommy provided was gone, he’d settle down and behave.

If he didn’t, she knew it wouldn’t be long before Logan kicked his surly attitude out of here. Two Wings wasn’t occupational therapy for bratty boys. This was, as she’d observed earlier, a mission.

Logan Cathcart cared about this place and these birds. He wouldn’t waste much time on a nasty kid who didn’t understand that.

So she needed to let them get to work.

She moved toward the door.

“I’ll be back at eleven, Sean, all right?” She put her hand on the knob.

“I guess.” Sean stood stiffly.

She opened the door, looking over her shoulder. To her surprise, Logan was watching her, his hand gently holding the ball of fluff in place on the scale.

When she hesitated, his eyes softened, and he nodded briefly. The gesture was oddly comforting.

It’ll be okay, that nod seemed to say. I’ll take care of him.

She might be imagining it. God knew she’d imagined a lot of things about Logan Cathcart over the past eighteen months. Things that weren’t real, and never would be.

But, as she let the door shut behind her and made her way back to the parking lot, she realized she felt a whole lot better anyhow.

SEAN’S FIRST WEEK was a disaster.

It was a battle to get him to Two Wings every time. He complained bitterly, inventing a hundred obstacles. A test he absolutely had to study for. A blistered finger. An extra Little League practice.

Somehow, Nora held her ground, though when she presented him to Vic Downing, who seemed to have taken over nanny duty, she felt as if she were handing off a piece of dynamite, set to blow at any minute.

She never saw Logan, though she would have liked to thank him, and get his read on Sean’s chances of settling in.

Logan’s absence had to be deliberate. She assumed he didn’t want to have to say things that would hurt her. And he didn’t want to have to lie.

Every day when she picked Sean up, then drove him home in sour silence, she expected a call from Logan before the night was over.

He might try to gloss it over, if he felt kind. He might create some excuse that didn’t sound as if he were rejecting her son.

Or maybe he’d just tell it straight. They couldn’t handle Sean’s tempers or his arrogance.

Either way, she couldn’t blame him. Sean’s behavior had never been worse. He obviously hated the menial tasks Logan assigned him, and he resented being bossed around by the senior volunteers.

But, amazingly, the call never came.

The following Monday, when the boys were at school, she headed into town to proof the programs she’d designed for Jolie’s spring concert.

Because Harrison had insisted she stay at home with the boys instead of working, Nora had always been vigorously involved with the PTA. Over the years, she’d become fairly decent at designing flyers, newsletters, brochures and concert programs. The other parents considered her the go-to person for such things, and she welcomed the creative outlet.

Jasper’s was the only printer in Eastcreek proper, so she knew she might have to wait in line.

But she hadn’t expected to see Logan Cathcart standing at the counter.

She spotted him through the window as she fed the parking meter. In the past, she probably would have walked on by, and come back for the programs another time. Avoid those butterflies, whenever possible.

But she’d waited too long to find him, to thank him for giving Sean a chance. She pushed open the door. The tinkling sound of the bell caused both Logan and Jasper, who were studying something on the counter, to look up.

“Hi, Jasper,” she said. And then there were the butterflies, right on cue. She took a breath and smiled. “Hi, Logan.”

Though Logan smiled back, he looked oddly tense. She advanced toward the counter, telling herself not to take it personally. She didn’t know what had put that stiffness in his posture. It might have nothing to do with either her or Sean. Maybe something had gone wrong with his print order.

“You here to proof the programs, Nora?” Jasper, ordinarily the most laid-back of men, looked a bit distracted, too.

“That’s okay,” she said. “No rush. I can wait until you and Logan are finished.”

Jasper shrugged. “We pretty much are finished, I’m afraid. I’m sorry, Logan. I should have called you when Nell’s file didn’t show up.”

The printer looked back at Nora. “Is Nell Bollinger okay, do you know? She was supposed to send over a flyer for Logan’s open house, but it never came. I’ve been trying to call her, but I just get voice mail.”

“I haven’t talked to Nell in a while,” she said. She wasn’t surprised, though, that Nell was volunteering for Two Wings. Nell had spent her life working for worthy causes, and even at eighty she wasn’t slowing down. “I’ll try to find out, if that’ll help.”

Logan shook his head. “It’s no big deal. I’m sure I can patch something together.” He patted the countertop. “I’ll e-mail you later in the week, Jasper. Good to see you, Nora.”

And just like that, he was headed for the door.

She didn’t have time to think it through or worry whether she looked a fool. If she was going to talk to him, she was going to have to chase him out onto the sidewalk. And so she did.

He turned when he heard her footsteps behind him. His face was, as always, polite but remote.

“Logan,” she said. “I’m sorry to hold you up.”

“No problem.” He didn’t wear a cowboy hat, as so many of Eastcreek’s men did. He faced the sun, which turned his eyes the incandescent blue of a butterfly wing. And speaking of butterflies…

She was suddenly trying to swallow past a swarm of them. How did he do that to her? He wasn’t flirting, and neither was she. And yet suddenly the air hummed with awareness.

“I wondered if you could tell me how Sean is doing,” she said. “I’m trying to let him handle his responsibility to you on his own, but naturally I’m concerned.”

He hesitated only a second or so. And then he shrugged. “He works hard. I can’t say he seems thrilled about it, but he does it.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” she said. “I wondered, because, at home, at least, he’s still a little…lukewarm about it.”

He chuckled. “He’d have to go a way to reach lukewarm.”

“I know.” She sighed. “But that first night, when you brought him home, he seemed almost enthusiastic. I was disappointed that his attitude changed so much.”

“Me, too.” He had his keys in his pocket, and he shifted them, making a jingling sound that hinted he had somewhere to be. “Look, I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Nora. He’s insecure. I guess that’s to be expected.”

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