Lazy Days by Verna Clay

blue
awning after I hire a buckboard." He pointed across the muddy wharf road to
the weathered façade and overhang of a store whose sign, hanging at a
precarious tilt, simply said, "Outfitter."
    Having decided to continue her financial discussion
with Cooper later, Hallie opened her umbrella, acknowledged Cooper with a nod,
and grasped Timmy's hand to follow the Hankersons off the ship and across the
road.
    * * *
    Cooper watched Hallie's retreat. The diminutive woman
was certainly stubborn. He recognized the set of her shoulders brooked no
argument, but hell would freeze over before he'd allow her to shoulder expenses
for his horse. His first impression of her as a determined, although easily
manipulated woman, had been mightily disproved. From the look in her eyes, he
hadn't heard the last about her reimbursing him. He could only imagine her indignation
when he refused payment for his services at the end of the journey. When she'd
tried to pay him before leaving Jebson, he'd refused her money, pacifying her
by saying he wanted to be paid at the end of the trail, after he earned his fee
He chuckled because he knew holy hell was going to break loose at that
encounter.
    Most people considered him to be as poor as a church
mouse, which suited him just fine. In reality, he'd saved over the years and
made a few wise investments, but gambling winnings constituted the bulk of his
money. And because of the condition of the farm he'd purchased, the money
forked out hadn't set him back much at all.
    Cooper's amusement faded however when he
remembered the reason for his generosity to Hallie. He knew she would want an
explanation and he wasn't sure he wanted to admit his failure as a husband and father.
    Oh, Jake, I wish I'd been the kind of man your
ma could've counted on, even if she couldn't love me. I wish I'd been around to
see you grow up."
    Regret washed over Cooper more powerfully than the
sudden watershed from the dreary clouds. When Marybeth had told him she wanted
a divorce, he'd laughed. Divorce simply wasn't done. Once a man was married, he
was married for good. He'd changed his mind, however, but it wasn’t her tears
and pleas that did it; it was walking in on her in bed with the local banker.
He'd almost killed the bastard, but Marybeth's shrieks and determination to
protect him with her own body made Cooper realize something—she truly loved the
gray-haired banker with his handlebar mustache. In fact, the man's own attempt
to protect Marybeth at the cost of his own life was another jolt for Cooper—the
banker loved Marybeth just as vehemently. After that, there was no way they could
stay married. Hell, he hadn’t been a good husband or father anyway, what with leaving
for long periods to drive herds of longhorns along the Shawnee Trail from Texas
to Missouri. Although he always cared for the practical needs of his family,
emotionally, he hadn't been there for them.
    As for Jake, he loved the boy, but didn’t know
how to be a father, having been abandoned himself at the age of six by a
prostitute mother and raised by an uncle who already had ten kids he liked to
beat the daylights out of, with Cooper being his new favorite.
    When Cooper turned twenty and met Marybeth, a
pretty, black-headed gal with a voluptuous figure, he was smitten by lust…and
then love. Her being five years older didn’t bother him at all. In fact, it
added to her allure. She'd been married in her teens and widowed at the age of
twenty-two. To her sadness, she'd had no children with her first husband and
desperately wanted them. Cooper was more than happy to oblige, but never having
had a father, he soon felt weighted with the responsibility and found himself
on the range often. All Marybeth ever wanted was a loving family, and when he
thought about it later, he understood her unfaithfulness. The banker was
everything Cooper wasn't.
    That nasty encounter was the epiphany he needed
to give his wife her freedom. Lowering the gun he'd threatened