Next Door Daddy (17 page)

He hadn't been expecting to fall in love. So he understood her reaction. He'd struggled with it for a few days, even getting irrationally mad at her when she'd fussed over him about his eating habits. But then he'd realized that he could no more deny his love for Pollyanna than he could deny that he'd loved Kayla.

He hadn't expected Gil to get sick. Watching her with Gil, standing in that room, had felt so much like they were a family….

She'd been upset after the kiss and asked him to leave. When he'd called the next day she'd told him that she thought it would be best if they didn't see each other for a while.

When he'd asked what “see each other” meant, she told him there was no easy way to say it but that if he was looking for a new wife she wasn't going to remarry.

Clenching his fist, he struggled with the emotions that stirred anew.

“If you have feelings for her, don't let her go,” Dan said.

“Mind your own business,” Nate snapped. “And stay away from Pollyanna.”

Dan busted out laughing. “Man, you've got it bad. And you can't hide it even if you wanted to.”

“Back off, Dan,” Nate warned.

“It's been three years. Three years, buddy. Kayla, the Kayla we all loved, isn't here anymore. But you are. It's not going to hurt you to admit you have feelings for someone else.”

If he only knew. “That taken from a guy who dates like there's no tomorrow,” he goaded, needing someone to take his frustrations out on.

Dan slammed his toolbox shut. “Well, seems to me you, more than most, would know that what time we do have is precious. I like to live, Nate. Maybe it's time you started again. And even if you don't want to, maybe it's time for someone, maybe me if you aren't up for the job, to help that pretty neighbor of yours start living again, too.”

Nate took a step toward Dan. They might be friends, but Pollyanna wasn't ready for that kind of pressure. Her reaction to him proved it. “Leave her be, Dan. She doesn't need you dictating to her what living is. And frankly, neither do I.” Nate stared at the other man long and hard, certain his message was clear, then he strode toward his house. Madder than he'd been in years.

“You know the way out,” he called over his shoulder but didn't look back, even though he knew Dan was still watching him, a big wolfish grin on his face. Who'd Dan Dawson think he was?

Your friend.

Rationally, Nate knew Dan was pushing him because they were friends…but he wasn't thinking rationally at the moment. Hadn't been for a few days now.

Pollyanna had turned his world upside down when he'd knocked on her door to take her to the wedding. Even now, he couldn't stop thinking about how she'd looked at him when she'd opened the door and found him standing there. Pollyanna McDonald had looked at him the way a woman looked at a man, with longing, not the way she would a friend. And in that one look, she'd knocked the breath out of him. He'd felt like he'd hit the ground after being bucked from a wild bronc.

He loved her. And he would move heaven and earth to set Pollyanna's world right.

He just wasn't sure if he could. She'd said all along that she wasn't going to remarry.

And he had a sick feeling that she'd been telling the truth all along. He just hadn't been listening.

S
am's was fairly empty as Polly walked through the swinging door. It was just after ten, so it was to be expected that the general population would be out in a pasture somewhere with a bunch of cows instead of sitting inside the diner. She knew it was a busy season for the cowboys, Nate included. It had made avoiding him easier than she'd thought it would over the last week and a half. Avoiding everyone else was a different story.

“Mornin', Pollyanna,” Applegate called from his seat at the window where he and Stanley were bent over their morning checkers game.

“Hello, fellas, how's it going this morning?” Holding her head up and smiling, she slipped into a booth to wait on her friends.

“Not so good,” Stanley said from beneath bushy eyebrows. “App just beat me.”

Applegate snorted and spat a sunflower husk into a spittoon. “He acts like it ain't never happened before.”

“It doesn't, you old coot,” Stanley grunted, and immediately jumped a couple of App's checkers.

Applegate scowled and scratched his head. “Well, ya didn't have ta be so mean about it.”

Polly laughed just as Sam came out from the back. “Thought I heard voices. Other than them two. They're regulars in my head, and I tend ta try 'n' ignore 'em. What kin I do fer ya, young lady?”

“I'm here waiting on your wife and the rest of the gang. I'm just early.”

“That's fine. How's about a cup of coffee and maybe some eggs and bacon?”

“Oh, that sounds lovely. You are a man after my own heart.”

Grinning, Sam set the cup he was carrying on the table and filled it with dark, rich-smelling coffee. “My heart belongs to another, but I'm purdy certain thar's someone around here who'd be more'n happy to steal yers if ya want him to.”

“Yep, we seen you and Nate together at the wedding last week,” Applegate said. “Y'all looked right smart together.”

“Yep,” Stanley said, jumping another checker. “Our Nate, he ain't been one to come out too much on his own, and since you come to town, we're seeing him actually comin' round without somebody draggin' him up.”

Polly took a sip of coffee, praying the conversation would go in another direction. But obviously the good Lord had other plans, because Applegate jumped a checker then turned suddenly serious eyes on her. “Take it from me, little darlin', you're too young to be sittin' around out thar at yor house all alone. And the same goes for Nate. I lost my sweet Birdie six years ago, and thar ain't a day goes by that I don't miss her. But the Lord gave us many a good year together. It was a good life. Now, take you and Nate…”

Polly just wished someone would shoot her now. But she couldn't really be too upset. After all, Applegate had lost his wife. He knew.

“You two are young' uns. You both need to be lookin' out fer someone new to share yer life with.”

“App's right. My Elisa Jane' she and me had forty-two years, six months and two days together,” Stanley said. “Twern't long enough by my way of thankin', but them's the breaks. I was blessed to get what I got. Now I'm left sitting here across from App's ugly mug whuppin' him at checkers every day. 'Course, I don't know what I done to rile the good Lord bad enough to give me this punishment.” He spat a husk into the spittoon and grinned. “The thang is, you and Nate, y'all got a whole life ahead of you. And then thar's the boy. He needs a dad.”

She'd entered the twilight zone.
Please, Lord, have mercy and save me from this.

“You know Nate. He took it really bad when his wife died. It was a sorrowful thing watching that spunky little gal wilt like she did.”

“That cancer, it ain't a respecter of nobody. Young, old, it don't matter. Our boy Nate's a good man who deserves a second chance for happiness,” Applegate said, rubbing his jaw. “He was blest ta have a good woman once. Which means it ain't just any woman that will do this go-around.” Applegate's thin face drooped into a deep frown as he looked at Polly. “It'll take someone special. Like you.”

She wanted to crawl under the table. Instead, she clutched the hot coffee cup and prayed hard that the Lord would calm her. She'd worked herself to the bone over the past week. It had been good for the bed-and-breakfast because she was basically ready to open, and all because she'd been trying to avoid thinking about Nate. Or Marc! Her heart had suddenly become a jigsaw puzzle tossed into the air and now lay scrambled at her feet.

When Nate had kissed her…emotions she'd thought she could only ever feel for Marc had come to life. She hadn't known what to do with them or how to handle them. She still didn't.

She'd been avoiding Nate ever since. Gil, however, had gone over to see him almost every day. Returning to the house hours later percolating with stories of what he and Nate had done together. There was no escaping that Gil had given his heart over to Nate Talbert, totally and completely.

Before she had a chance to think more about it, Sam brought out her plate of eggs and the diner door swung open and the ladies burst into the room, Esther Mae in the lead.

“I tell you it'll be a really interesting twist or a pure disaster,” she was saying.

“True, but if it's a disaster it'll be interesting. Howdy, Pollyanna,” Norma Sue sang out, sounding like Minnie Pearl.

Greetings were volleyed from all directions as Norma Sue slid into the booth beside Polly. Esther Mae slid into the bench across from her, leaving room for Adela. She detoured to the back to see Sam while Lacy grabbed a chair and turned it around so she could face everyone. Sheri trailed in behind them, her fancy cowgirl boots clunking on the hardwood floor as she grabbed the chair beside Lacy.

Applegate and Stanley seemed to lean out from their checker game, almost as if they were joining in on the meeting from across the room.

“So let's talk more about the new addition to the festival. Pollyanna, what's your take on this bike situation?”

All eyes turned to Polly. “The bike situation?”

“Yes,” Esther Mae said, her eyes bright from barely contained excitement. “It's your idea, after all. So we thought you could be in charge of getting it going.”

“You can do that, can't you?” Lacy said. “I would, but I have my hands pretty full already. We've been tossing the idea around ever since you brought it up. The girls bring their bikes…and maybe we can have like a drawing of some sort to figure out who races with whom.” She gasped suddenly and clapped her hands. “Auction! We could have a bachelor auction to see who rides bikes together.”

“Or…” Sheri interjected, her tone dry as usual. “Here's an idea. Maybe we could just let people team up on their own. I bet they could do it.”

Lacy whacked her on the arm with a rolled-up napkin. “Har-har.” She laughed.

Polly hoped Sheri's idea stuck. She'd only mentioned the bike race and now they were all expecting her to elaborate.

“Are the men going to ride the women on the handlebars?” Esther Mae asked. “You know my Hank and I used to do that.”

Norma Sue's mouth dropped open. “How'd you get up on those handlebars? I know Hank didn't lift you up there. Maybe with a crane.”

Esther Mae harrumphed indignantly. “My Hank could if he'd wanted to.”

“Yeah, but the question is if he wanted to.” Norma Sue grinned, her smile wide at her wit, while Esther Mae looked equally perturbed by it.

Lacy chuckled, waving her hands. “Okay, you two, cut it out. Poor Pollyanna's going to think y'all are serious.”

Esther Mae harrumphed again. “And what makes you think we aren't? My Hank could pick me up and set me on those handlebars if he wanted to. I only climbed on a chair to get up there because I didn't want him to hurt his back.”

Norma Sue coughed and looked down at her butterball figure. “It's okay, Esther. I was only teasing you. Even if I'd been able to climb onto the handlebars by myself, my poor Roy Don wouldn't have been able to hold the bike up under this weight. Even with help!”

“Now, that paints some picture, Norma Sue.” Sheri laughed.

“Don't it, though,” Norma Sue chortled huskily. “That man loves me, though, and he'd try if I asked him.” She looked at Pollyanna. “And you know that's all that counts.”

Pollyanna smiled with a mixture of relief and respect. She was glad she'd moved to Mule Hollow and had these dear women to be around. They were funny, and fun, and yet there was love here. She envied them their long and happy marriages. She thought of Marc and missed him so. Nate moved into her thoughts and Marc faded to black. The very idea caused her to lose her breath.

“I could hear you girls all the way in the kitchen,” Adela said, sitting primly down beside Esther Mae.

Adela was also a widow. It hit Polly that maybe Adela would understand these emotions that were tearing her apart. Maybe she needed to talk with her. Maybe she could help her understand what was wrong with her. Because despite trying to avoid it, there was no denying that she needed help.

She'd avoided Nate, but avoiding all the troubled thoughts churning around inside her head was a little harder to accomplish with each passing day. She needed to talk to someone. And though she'd been praying, God had been silent.

She realized as she looked around the room that maybe the Lord hadn't been silent after all. Maybe he'd just been waiting for her to utilize the help He'd already given her.

 

Nate had a load of feed to pick up at Pete's Feed and Seed and decided to swing by there on his way home from the cattle auction. He'd had a flat on the way in and had had a time changing the tire. He was tired and dusty as he backed his truck up to the loading dock. When he looked up, the last person he expected to see was Pollyanna coming out of Sam's.

His heart started thundering automatically at the sight of her. By the look on her face when she saw him, he was the last person she'd wanted to run into.

He'd almost had her agreeing to ease their relationship to a notch above friendship and then he'd gone and rushed her. Made her as skittish as a colt after a bad fall.

After all she'd said how she hated cowboys flirting with her…if she hated that, then she'd sure hate to hear one had fallen in love with her.

“Hi,” she said, stopping a couple of feet in front of him. She had her hair loose today, no ties or ribbons holding it back, and the breeze caused it to flutter around her face. She looked tired. Lovely, but tired.

She wasn't sleeping. It didn't take a detective to figure it out, but he also had a spy. Gil had told him that his mom had been working at night. Nate translated that as she wasn't sleeping. He'd also told Nate that she'd cried two nights ago. Nate's gut constricted when he thought about her crying alone behind closed doors. He'd caused this.

But he'd tried to help Gil. They'd talked a long time yesterday as they'd fed cows. Nate had felt like he'd been able to relieve the boy's worries some. He'd made certain that Gil understood that he could always come to him with any worries or problems. But he wasn't so sure Pollyanna would want to know that Gil was so worried about her.

“Hi,” he said lamely.

“Hello.”

She threaded her fingers absently through her hair. Nate wished he were the one doing that.
Like she'd welcome that, cowboy.

“Gil said you and he had a long talk yesterday.”

Nate's antennae went up. “Yes, we did,” he said cautiously. How much of their conversation did Gil tell her about? “How are you feeling?” he asked, wondering if she would open up to him like she used to.

Her gaze skittered away from him down Main Street. “Fine. Look, about the other night.”

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I didn't mean to kiss you. To rush you like that. We've both stepped out on black ice here.” He hoped that eased her mind some. Maybe set them back on firmer ground. Gave him somewhere to build a new foundation from.

She nodded and took a deep breath. “I know. Did you hear,” she said suddenly, “I'm heading up the bike race at the fair day.” She smiled too brightly.

He smiled back, glad to get a smile any way he could. “How'd you get roped into that?”

“Well, you and I did inspire it. And honestly, did I really have a choice after the ladies decided for me?” She smiled again, and this time it was relaxed and real. It instantly transformed the mood.

“I see what you mean,” Nate said, seeing a ray of sunshine and a moment of opportunity that he wasn't about to pass up. If the Lord was giving him a heads-up on all his prayers, he wasn't about to pass it up. “That's going to be a ton of work. And the clock is ticking down fast.” That was an understatement. The ladies had put out the word and called everyone to get ready to work. Next weekend all the decorating would start and it would go on all week until vendors started showing up. The place would be packed because Mule Hollow's calendar of fun events was a hit with the ladies and also with families and other tourists. At least, he'd heard everyone talk about them. He as of yet hadn't actually attended any of them.