not beating the books. And, anyway, those kids are what, six and seven years old?”
Boone favored his friend with a reproving glance. “Thank you for your profound wisdom, Professor Carmody,” he drawled. “I guess if I wanted to raise a couple of cowboys, that approach would suit me just fine. It just so happens that I don’t.”
“What’s wrong with cowboys?” Slade interjected, being one.
“If you wanted to raise Griff and Fletch,” Hutch retorted, leaning forward to show Boone he wasn’t cowed by his tone or his badge, “they’d be living with you, like they should.”
Boone flushed from the base of his neck to the underside of his jaw. “Opinions are like assholes,” he told Hutch, in a terse undertone. “Everybody has one.”
Hutch grinned, picked up his coffee cup and raised it to Boone in a sort of mocking toast. “Good thing you went to college, Boone,” he said. “You might not have such a good grasp on human anatomy if you were, say, just a cowboy.”
Slade chuckled, but offered no comment. By and large, he wasn’t much for chitchat. He’d said his piece, about Shea and the water tower, and now he was probably done talking, for the most part.
Boone huffed out a breath, plainly exasperated. “Tell me this,” he demanded in a hoarse whisper. “Why does everybody in this blasted county feel obliged to tell me what’s best for my kids?”
Slade and Hutch exchanged glances, but it was Essie, back to refill their coffee cups from the carafe in her right hand, who actually answered.
“Maybe,” she said crisply, “it’s because you can’t seem to figure it out on your own, Boone Taylor. Those boys need their daddy.”
* * *
KENDRA, MADISON AND Daisy passed the fairgrounds on their way to the community center and preschool, and Madison could barely contain her excitement. The carnival was setting up for business; banners flew in the warm breeze and a Ferris wheel towered against the sky. Carousel horses, giraffes, elephants and swans waited to take their places on the merry-go-round, hoisted there by teams of men in work clothes, and cars, trucks and vans were parked, helter-skelter, outside the exhibition hall where vendors and artisans from all over the state were getting ready to display their wares. The Fourth of July weekend was a big moneymaker for practically every business in town and it was coming up fast.
“Look, Mommy!” Madison called out as though Kendra could possibly have missed the colorful spectacle taking shape on the fairgrounds. “It’s a circus!”
Kendra smiled. “Actually, it’s a carnival. And we’re going there on Saturday, remember?”
“Couldn’t we go now? Just to look?”
“No, sweetie,” Kendra responded, signaling for a turn onto the street that led to the community center. “It’s time for preschool. Besides, the carnival isn’t open for business yet.”
“When does it open?”
“Not until Friday afternoon,” she said. “That’s two days from now, so it’s three days until Saturday, when we’ll go to the rodeo, and then the carnival, and then the fireworks.”
“Mr. Carmody is going to ride a bull in the rodeo part,” Madison said, mollified enough to move on to the next topic. “We get to watch.”
Kendra swallowed. She didn’t know which scared her more, the prospect of letting Hutch slip past her inner barriers again—he was bound to score, eventually—or the thought of him riding two thousand pounds of crazy bull, risking life and limb.
And for what? A fancy belt buckle and prize money that probably didn’t amount to the cash he routinely carried in his wallet—if he won?
He was wild and reckless, a kid in a man’s body. Mentally, she added bull-riding to the long list of reasons why Hutch Carmody was her own personal Mr. Wrong.
She made the turn, headed toward the community center.
Glancing into the rearview mirror, she saw Daisy standing with her paws on the back of the seat, gazing out the rear window as the fairgrounds disappeared from view.
“Does Daisy get to go to the rodeo, too?” Madison queried, from her safety seat.
“That wouldn’t be a good place for her, sweetheart,” Kendra explained. “She could get lost or hurt somehow and, besides, all that noise would probably scare her.”
“Won’t she be scared if she’s all alone at home?” Madison fretted.
“She’ll be just fine,” Kendra said gently.
They’d reached the community center by then, and a little girl immediately broke away from the crowd of children on the grassy playground, running to greet them.
“That’s Becky,” Madison said, delighted. “She’s my best friend in the whole world!”
Kendra smiled, watching as Becky, a