Page 105 of Texas Glory
“It seems to be taking Dr. Freeman a long time,” Dee said softly.
Dallas turned from the window and looked at his wife. He had propped pillows behind her back so she could sit up in bed. He was bringing her meals, making certain she had plenty to drink, and had started reading to her in the evenings. She seemed to have little interest in anything but the welfare of the boy, and it had taken Austin two days to find him.
“It just seems that way because we’re waiting. Time passes differently when you’re waiting.” She still looked so pale. “Want me to brush your hair again?”
“No.” She studied her clasped hands.
She’d barely looked at him since she had lost the baby. He couldn’t blame her. He hadn’t listened to her father, hadn’t believed she was delicate. He had let her walk out of the hotel room unescorted while he had lain in that bed thinking about what he wanted to do with her body when she returned.
Shame rose within him. He hadn’t held her as precious as he should have, and his lack had cost them both, not only a son, but a chance at a future together. She had wanted to give him a son, and for a short time it had appeared that she had wanted him as well. She had laughed so easily while she carried his son, glowed with anticipation, and smiled constantly.
Late into the night, they had whispered silly things: the books she would read to him, the ranching skills Dallas would teach him, the building skills Dee would share with him. They would take him to the top of a windmill and teach him how to dream—big dreams.
So many planned moments that in one night had crumbled into dust to be blown over the prairie and lost.
The door opened, and Dr. Freeman poked his skeletal face into the room. “Dallas, I need to speak to you for a moment.”
Dee furrowed her brow. “Is Rawley hurt?”
“He’s fine,” Dr. Freeman said. “I just need to talk to Dallas.”
He disappeared into the hallway. Dallas walked out of the room and closed the door.
Dr. Freeman was standing beside a window, looking out, his hands balled into tight fists at his side. “There are times when I regret taking an oath to cause no harm,” he said through clenched teeth. “That boy has more scars than the parched earth has cracks. Do you know what he thought I wanted to do?” Dr. Freeman shook his head fiercely. “No, of course you don’t.”
When he turned, Dallas was surprised to see tears shimmering in the man’s eyes.
“I think that sorry excuse of a man who calls himself the boy’s father has been selling him.”
Dallas jerked his head back. “Selling him? To whom?”
“Men. Men who prefer boys to women.” Dallas’s stomach roiled. “Are you sure?” “I can’t swear to it, but I’d stake my life on it.” “In Leighton?”
“Perversion doesn’t come garbed any differently than you or me. You can’t look at a man and tell what’s in his head or on his mind. I have seen the most upstanding men in other communities do things that would turn your stomach, and I only learned about them because they went too far and needed my services.”
Dallas felt the impotent anger swell within him. “Is there anything you can do for the boy?”
Dr. Freeman shook his head. “The hurt he’s had on the outside is healing, but it’s the deep pain that he’s gotta be feeling on the inside that concerns me, the scars he’ll carry with him for the rest of his life.”
“I won’t be taking him back to town,” Dallas said with determination.
“I’ll let his father know—”
“You leave his father to me.”
Rawley Cooper knew he had made a big mistake. All the doctor had wanted to do was look at him.
Rawley couldn’t remember what he’d said, but he knew the exact moment that the doctor figured out what Rawley thought he wanted to do to him.
He’d thought the skinny man was going to puke on the floor, and Rawley knew they wouldn’t let him see the pretty lady now. They knew he was dirty on the inside and out.
He heard the door open. He bundled up his shame the same way that he’d bundled up his clothes. He turned from the window.
Mr. Leigh filled the doorway. “Put on your clothes, boy.”
Rawley nodded and did as he was told. He’d thought about putting them on before, but the doctor hadn’t told him to so he’d decided to wait. He was forever doing what he wasn’t supposed to do.
When his fingers had skipped over the two buttonholes in his shirt that no longer had buttons belonging to them, and he had buttoned the top button at his throat, the button that nearly gagged him but made him feel protected, he lifted his gaze back to the towering man.
