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He shot her a glance. She was smiling, as if she knew how his mind had segued from practicalities to imagination. Curious about how her mind worked, he asked, “With your camera, do you ever spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to best represent something?”
“Often,” she said. Then, with a wry smile, she added, “Sometimes I even succeed.”
“You certainly succeeded on that article Cody found.”
She sighed. “I had to. I just had to. It was so wrong, and I had to show it.”
“Because of your father? And your teacher?”
There was a moment of silence in the shadowed interior of the truck before she said, barely above a whisper, “The only love and caring I ever had in my life came from them. That article was the lie.”
On the edge of his vision as he drove he saw her take a swipe at her eyes. And it drove him to say, in all seriousness, “Then let me say, on behalf of all mankind, thank you.” Then, in a lighter tone, he added, “Not that all mankind deserves it, mind you.”
“Neither does all womankind,” she said, her voice steady now. And he wondered if she was thinking of the writer, or her mother. Maybe both.
When they got to the inn and went inside, to his surprise Kane Highwater was sitting at the desk in the lobby. The man grinned when he saw Ry’s reaction.
“Scary, ain’t it? But it’s Frank and Karina’s anniversary tonight, and he had a big night out in San Antonio planned. I’m just trying not to mess up too badly.”
He turned to introduce Kaitlyn to Kane but stopped when he realized she was gaping at the man. A spark of irritation flickered. Then he nearly laughed at himself. He’d been told often enough he was good-looking, but Kane was in another class altogether. Even Ry’s mother had called Kane uncannily beautiful.
But he was also lock, stock and barrel in love with Lark Leclair, the woman who had managed to bring the Highwater family back together again.
“You,” Kaitlyn said in a tone that matched her expression, “You’re Kane. I saw you at that show in Luckenbach last fall. Your voice…you were amazing.”
The man behind the counter looked suddenly shy. He still, Ry guessed, wasn’t quite used to the reaction his music got. “Thanks,” he said. “It went well that night.” Then, as if uncomfortable, he shifted his gaze to Ry. “You’re coming next week, right?”
He nodded. “I’m under orders.”
“See you there, then,” Kane said, grinning again as if he knew perfectly well whose orders. But then, he knew Maggie Rafferty. “Lark’s going shopping with Sage for something to wear.”
Ry nearly laughed at the idea of the delicate, uber-feminine Lark taking the rough-and-tumble cowgirl shopping, for clothes of all things. “That ought to be interesting.”
“How…fancy is this thing?” Kaitlyn asked, sounding a tiny bit alarmed.
“It’s a saloon,” Ry said, grinning himself now. “Slater doesn’t have a dress code, but he does require youbedressed.”Sadly.
He tripped over his own heated thought and was glad when Kane spoke lightly. “The Raffertys and the Highwaters, together again.”
“Just how many Highwaters are there?” Kaitlyn asked.
“We started with five, now soon to be ten of us,” Kane said cheerfully. And steadily, with none of the hesitation he’d once had in claiming that family as his.
“He’s come a long way,” Ry murmured as they started across the lobby to the stairs.
“That performance was stunning.”
“I’m sure. But I meant with his family. He was gone for well over a decade.” He looked at her then. “But that’s a long, sad story. And his story.”
She tilted her head slightly. “So the pain I heard in his music was real. Personal.”
“Probably.” As he walked Kaitlyn to the door of her room—it was the polite thing to do, after all—he asked, “Were you working that night, in Luckenbach?”
She nodded. “Another singer hired me for some publicity shots.” She gave a slow shake of her head. “She was okay, pretty good even. At least, it seemed that way until he—” she nodded back toward the desk “—came on and blew everybody else out of the water.”
“He was born with that voice. To him it’s just something he always had. I think he still doesn’t quite believe how good he is.”
She stopped at her door, then turned to look up at him. “Kind of like you?”
