The Cowboy Code Read Free Page B

do everything possible to help her.
    He felt like he already knew her—at least, Maggie the performer. He knew she’d won a Tony award and had appeared in numerous musicals and even on TV.
    He also knew things had been going fine with Danny up until his mother’s death two years ago. Then Danny started running with a bad bunch of kids. The probation officer who investigated the situation felt that Maggie’s rehearsal and performance schedule left Danny alone much too often, and that he needed more supervision.
    On one of those nights when he’d snuck out of the apartment, Danny had been arrested.
    In a phone call from his old college buddy, JudgePat Cunningham in New York City, Joe had learned that Maggie had to give up rehearsals for a new show in order to participate in Cowboy Quest. Pat felt bad about that, but knew that it was important for Maggie to spend time with Danny, to bond and rebuild the stable home environment he so desperately needed.
    Her intentions were admirable, but Joe hoped that it wasn’t too late. Why had she let things come to this?
    â€œLook at all this counter space,” Maggie said, running her hand along the emerald-green granite. “I never have much time to cook, but I love it. I tape all the cooking shows and try different recipes whenever I can.”
    Maggie suddenly froze in place, then slowly turned to him. “Whoa. Am I supposed to cook for everyone in the program?”
    He stifled a smile. “Well, you said you liked to cook.”
    When her eyebrows shot up in shock, he chuckled. “I was just kidding. The ranch has a cook, and he always loves the challenge of a dozen more mouths to feed—a baker’s dozen, counting you.”
    â€œJoe, am I the only parent or guardian who’s participating?”
    â€œYes.”
    She looked like she was about to hit the panic button. “Just me?”
    â€œWe have other counseling components for family members set up post-Cowboy Quest, but you are it as far as an adult and as a female who’s going to actually join the cattle drive.” He grinned. “Twelve teenage boys, six cowboy counselors and you.”
    Maggie raised an eyebrow. “Why am I the only one?”
    â€œJudge Cunningham asked me to make an exception for you, so I did. Now let me show you to your room.”
    â€œI’m sure it’ll be fine.”
    And it was. He could tell that Maggie appreciated the view of the mountains from the guest bedroom, the balcony off the room with several lawn chairs and a table, the big log bed and the brightly striped Hudson’s Bay blankets that he’d acquired over the years.
    There were several items handed down from his grandparents—his mother’s parents—that impressed her. He’d carefully preserved them in shadow boxes that he’d made and displayed them throughout the house.
    His grandmother’s baskets and several pieces of clothing with her original beadwork, medicine bags—none of it escaped Maggie’s attention.
    â€œAnd these photographs…fabulous.” She seemed to be talking to herself, then she turned to him. “Who is the photographer?”
    â€œMy dad. My mother is a travel reporter, and my father was a rancher and a stock contractor. I learned the business from him. But on the day I graduated from college, he drove up the driveway with a mammoth motor home, handed me the keys to this house and said that all five thousand acres were mine—and he was going to see the world with my mom.”
    â€œFive thousand acres?” Her eyes grew wide. “He just walked away from all of this?”
    â€œAfter I tried to talk him out of it, he confessed that he liked being on the road and seeing the world with my mother, that he’d grown tired of the ranch. And of course my mother was thrilled.”
    He’d thought three people loved the ranch as much as he did—Ellen and his parents.
    Damn, had he been