The Cowboy's Courtship (6 page)

And now, Alyson knew that she was the one who wasn’t supposed to be here. Andie sighed and held her horse close. Andie, who had had this life, these people, their father, the horses and a childhood.

“Andie, I’m glad you’re home. I’ve been hoping…” Etta started.

Andie shook her head. “Right. I need to put my horse up. He’s had a long trip.”

Alyson made a move to follow her sister but a hand
on her arm stopped her. Jason’s hand. “Give her a few minutes alone. You’ve had a few days to adjust. She needs a little time, too.”

“Okay.” Alyson watched Andie walk through the doors of the barn and disappear into the darkness.

And she knew what her sister was feeling. She knew the emptiness. She knew betrayal, and the feeling that everyone knew something she didn’t. It was a deep down hurt. Alyson felt it, too.

“How about a cup of coffee, Jason?” Etta, quick to get it together again. Her outfit today was jeans and a tie-dyed T-shirt. Her lavender/gray hair was held back with a scarf. “Did you already eat?”

“I had coffee, but I need to head out to Camp Hope.” He pulled a notebook out of his pocket and Alyson smiled as he read it off to them. “Camp Hope, a bridle that Dad ordered, and dog food. If I don’t see you all today, I’m sure I’ll see you at church tomorrow.”

Church. Alyson watched him walk away and she had another moment of not knowing what to do. Church? She glanced from her grandmother to the barn. Her sister did needlepoint verses. She probably understood faith.

Jason pulled out of the drive, waving as he took off down the road. Andie was still taking care of her horse. Or maybe waiting it out until they were gone.

Etta looked at the barn, and then back to Alyson. “We might as well go inside and wait. I guess I should have left a message on her phone, but I didn’t want to tell her like that.”

Alyson nodded because she didn’t know what to say. She followed Etta to the house. Her grandmother had
stirred up bread dough earlier and now she dumped it out on a cutting board. Alyson was pouring herself a second cup of coffee when Andie walked through the back door, the screen banging softly as it closed behind her.

Etta turned to smile. She was kneading the dough, the white glump sticking to her hands and the cutting board. Alyson sat down on a stool to watch, and to wait for her sister to say something.

Andie poured herself a cup of coffee, spooned in several spoons of sugar and looked from her grandmother to Alyson. She shook her head and then took a sip of the coffee.

“So, you’re back.” Andie set the cup down and backed up to the counter. With hands braced on the edge of the countertop, she hopped once and sat. Etta shot her a look that didn’t seem to stop her.

“I guess I’m back. It happened suddenly, finding out about my family here. And then learning that I had a sister, too.” She had learned that from Jason.

“What does that mean?” Andie reached for her coffee, and Etta supplied the answer, dough sticking to her hands.

“Alyson didn’t know about us. She found out by accident.”

“She didn’t tell you about us?” Andie stared, and then she shook her head. “She didn’t tell you that she took the perfect kid and left behind the defective one?”

“That’s enough.” Etta shot Andie a look. She was pulling dough off her hands. Finally, she walked over to the sink and used her arm to turn on the water. “We’re family and we’re going to treat each other with love and respect.”

“Fine.” Andie sighed. “Fine.”

“I’m not sure what to say to you.” Alyson wasn’t sure how to take a deep breath, how to move forward. “I don’t know why you’re angry with me.”

“Because she chooses to be.” Etta picked up a towel and flipped it at Andie’s arm. “Choosing to act like this is all about her. And I’m telling you right now, Andie, you’re twenty-eight, not eighteen.”

“Fine, it isn’t all about me.” Andie smiled a tight smile.

Alyson couldn’t smile. This was the rejection part she had feared. “I didn’t do this to us.”

Andie jumped down from the counter, landing on the floor. When she smiled this time, it was a little softer. “No, you didn’t. You had no idea. How’d you finally find out?”

“I was looking for my bankbook. I’d left it on the desk in my,
our
mother’s office.”

“And you found us in the desk?”

“I found a box that contained my real birth certificate, adoption papers and a couple of other papers.”

“Wow, our mother is a piece of work.”

“She…” How did Alyson defend their mother after all that she’d done to them? How did she tell Andie that the person who had given birth to them had gentle moments, sometimes.

“Don’t defend her.” Andie’s smile faded. “Don’t do that, not after everything she’s done.”

“I’m not defending her, Andie.” Alyson stood up. “I’m not her. I’m your sister. I came here because I wanted to know my family.”

“Fine, you know us. This is it. It isn’t fancy. We’re just country people and we go to church on Sundays.”

Etta cleared her throat.

Andie laughed, real laughter, and it shifted her features. Her blue eyes danced. “Etta goes to church on Sundays. I’m the rebel. If you stay, you can’t have that position in the family. You’ll have to find your own niche.” Andie looked her over, top to bottom. “I think you’re probably still the good one. And I have chores to do. So if you don’t mind, I’m going to get busy and when you’re tired of pretending you’re one of us and ready to
be
one of us, you let me know and I’ll find something for you to do.”

Andie walked out and Alyson stood there with her cup of coffee, watching out the window as Andie walked across the lawn to the barn. She was long legged, taking long strides. She was a part of this place in a way Alyson only wished to be.

She rinsed her cup and set it in the sink, ignoring Etta’s knowing smile. “I’m going outside to help my sister with the chores.”

When she reached the barn, Andie was waiting. She was leaning against the support post in the barn, messing with her fingernails. She looked up and smiled at Alyson.

“I thought that would get under your skin.”

“Does this have to be our relationship?”

“Alyson, I got left here because you were the good one. You were the easy child. You didn’t make messes. You probably even learned to read and I bet you can do long division without a calculator.”

“Of course I…”

Andie looked away and Alyson got it. “She rejected me because I wasn’t the perfect child. I don’t think she
could have known about my dyslexia, because my teachers didn’t figure it out for years. They thought I was rebellious in school. But she knew that you were going to be special. You’d already proven that. And I’ve spent my life hearing it from everyone who met you—the sweetest toddler in the world. I can’t live up to their perfect memories of my perfect twin.”

Alyson reached for her sister, but Andie shook her head. “Don’t. I’m not ready to hug you.”

“Can I just say…”

Andie shook her head. “No, you can’t. And even though I baited you to come down here, I don’t want your help. I’m just cleaning out the trailer and I can do that alone. I need to be alone and I think Etta is probably ready to drive out to Camp Hope. Go with her.”

Andie walked away and Alyson stood in the yard, watching her go. “I was just going to tell you that you had Etta. You had our father. And I’ve never been perfect.”

But Andie didn’t hear and Alyson didn’t know if she’d ever listen. She turned back to the house, and Andie had been right. Etta was waiting.

J
ason walked through the stable, amazed by what Adam and Jenna had built in one year. They had built a place where dreams came true for kids who wouldn’t ordinarily get to attend a summer camp, not one like Camp Hope.

And they wanted him to be a part of it.

In a couple of days a group of kids would arrive. He could stay here and teach those kids to ride, barrel race, rope calves and ride bulls.

He obviously wasn’t going to be riding a bull for a while. So maybe it was worth thinking or praying about. Adam came out of the office, distracted.

“What’s up?” Jason walked through the double doors and into the arena.

“I don’t know. I’ve been trying to get hold of our accountant about some bills and a few checks from donors that haven’t cleared.” Adam shoved a few letters into his shirt pocket. “It’s okay. Let’s talk about camp.”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“It’s a big commitment.” Adam at least acknowledged that.

“Yeah, it is. And I haven’t really thought about ending my bull-riding career this way.”

“I get what you mean.” Adam pointed to the mechanical bull at the end of the arena. “Were you wanting to try that thing out?”

Jason remembered Adam mentioning it. That was a huge improvement. “Yeah, I do. Give me a minute to stretch.”

“Take your time.”

Jason walked over to the mechanical bull. He would have touched his toes, but he couldn’t manage it just yet. He raised his arms and swayed to the left and right. He bent his right knee, but the left pulled. He squinted against the sharp pain.

“Is he going to ride that?” It was Alyson’s voice.

He turned and lifted his hat in greeting. “Yes. Do you want to give it a try?”

“Sorry, I’m pretty sure I’m not a bull rider.”

He laughed at the look on her face. And then he remembered Andie.

“Andie came home, right?” He held his arms out and twisted right, and then left.

“Yes.”

“You okay?” He stopped stretching and she nodded. “Sure you are.”

Alyson approached, staring at the mechanical bull, and then turned her attention to him. Blue eyes caught and held his, and he forgot about pain.

“You’re okay to do this?” Her gaze slid back to the bull.

“I’m good.” Or at least he was about to find out if he was.

He climbed onto the mechanical bull and wrapped the leather around his hand, tight. He lifted his left arm and nodded once. Adam turned the machine on and controlled its moves. It bucked up and down, and then around.

Jason moved with the movement of the barrel. He kept his left arm up and his chin down. It wasn’t easy, not as easy as it should have been. A mechanical bull didn’t move like a real bull. It could do the unexpected, but it didn’t take steps forward. It didn’t come off the ground, all four legs in the air. It didn’t land with a jarring thud that rattled a guy’s brain.

But it did work him out. It did spin. It did buck. It didn’t manage to unseat him. When it slowed to a stop, he climbed off. He stood there for a long second, waiting for the world to stop spinning. The vertigo shouldn’t have lasted as long as it did.

Alyson headed his way. “Are you okay?”

He took off his hat and took a step toward her. “Of course. Do you want to give it a go?”

“Ride it?”

“That’s what I mean.” He liked the way she bit down on her bottom lip and studied the mechanical bull, her eyes narrowing as she considered his offer.

She nodded. “I think I can do that. You make it look easy.”

He laughed. “It isn’t easy.”

He pulled off his glove and handed it to her.

“Do I put this on?”

“That’s the idea of it. And when you get on that thing, you hold with your legs. You keep your head down and you don’t let your right arm get straight on you. The
momentum can fling you off the back end if you let yourself get pulled back.”

“If I ride this, I can be a bull rider?” She said it with a smile that made his head stop spinning for a second.

“Yeah, you can be a bull rider. Come on, let me help you get your hand tied in.” Jason took her hand and led her across the padding that surrounded the mechanical bull.

She stopped before they reached it. He glanced sideways and she was breathing in, eyes closed. He held on to her hand and her fingers squeezed a little. “I can do this,” she whispered.

“Of course you can. It’s a mechanical bull. We’re controlling it and we’re not going to let it go crazy on you.”

“I know.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I do have to.” She opened her eyes and managed a smile. “I’m ready.”

She climbed on and he helped her get settled. She met his gaze and her eyes were bright, sparkling like blue topaz. He really wanted to kiss her. He wanted to pull her close and undo the clips that kept her blond hair in a tidy little knot at the nape of her neck. Instead, he pulled a few tendrils loose to frame her face and he stepped back.

He didn’t know if he could get far enough away from her to feel safe.

“Remember what I said,” he warned as he moved away.

“I can do this.”

He nodded and walked away, because he understood. It was something she had to do. He glanced toward the box with the controls, ready to give Adam the signal. Adam was gone.

The two of them alone shouldn’t have been a problem for Jason, but suddenly it was. Walking away from her, he battled a strong urge to hold her close and kiss her. He let out a sigh as he stepped behind the controls of the bull.

“Ready?” He smiled as he looked up at the woman on the back of the mechanical bull, her smile teetering on the edge of tears. But her chin was set at a stubborn angle. “Tuck your chin and put your left hand up. Use it for balance. And don’t worry, I’m not going to let that bull get you down.”

“It isn’t a real bull.” She called out and she did what he’d told her to do. Head down, hand up. “Go.”

She was ready for this. Alyson’s heart picked up speed as the bull started to move, and she had to focus, to concentrate on the way the thing moved. That was hard to do when her brain seemed to suddenly warp out, sending her mind on a field trip of some sort.

She couldn’t stop thinking about a cowboy who had smiled at her, winking when she felt the most fear. She had never felt stronger.

She could do this.

Her brain whirled back to center, back to the task at hand. She could ride a bull. It jerked and spun. She kept her head down, but her arm above her head flung back, threatening to take her with it. She leaned a little, pulling it back.

“Don’t touch the bull or you’re disqualified.” The words of warning came in wafts as she spun and she couldn’t nod to let him know that she’d heard.

The mechanical bull, a barrel with a head and horns, twisted and bucked.

And then it stopped, and her heart was racing and her legs shook. It took her a few minutes to adjust to the end of the ride, to where she was. She was sitting on a mechanical bull. The big, open arena enclosed them, but outside was the vastness of the Oklahoma countryside.

“You okay?”

She turned and gave a short nod of her head. “I did it.”

She slid off the back of the bull and her legs buckled a little. He was there to reach for her, his hands steady on her arms.

She knew how to anchor herself. She knew how to stay grounded and steady. But at that moment, reasoning fled. Grounded and steady were the last two things she wanted to be. She didn’t want to be the person who planned every moment of her life—not today.

She wanted to experience life. And she wanted to experience what it was like to be held by a cowboy.

She looked into deep-brown eyes and he winked. She’d seen movies and read books. She played country music when no one was around to listen. Cowboys were good at holding a woman. She ignored other thoughts, that they were also good at breaking hearts, good at leaving, and not good at staying.

The cowboy standing toe to toe with her believed she was strong. He had allowed her that moment, to prove it to herself.

As she tried to get her thoughts together, his hands moved to the clip at the back of her neck and her hair came loose. He clipped it to the hem of her shirt and then his hands moved to the back of her neck, winding through her hair.

She could have stopped him, but she didn’t. Instead, she leaned a little toward him, breathing in deep of a cowboy who smelled like soap and leather. His hands were gentle but calloused, brushing her neck.

“I like it better this way,” he whispered as he leaned in.

And she felt everything, all at once. She wanted to tell him to wait, to let this moment be one she’d never forget, because she’d never really been kissed, not like she knew he would kiss her.

And before she could tell him, his lips touched hers and she was lost. He held her close, and everything changed, because she could only think about him, not anything else but being in his arms. She sighed and stopped thinking.

He whispered something she couldn’t understand, and then he kissed her again.

Bull riding was nothing compared to that moment in the arms of a cowboy.

“I…” Jason didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t planned that.

He hadn’t realized that it wouldn’t be enough, that he wouldn’t want to let her go. Ever.

That was a new experience for him, not wanting to let go.

He slid his hands around her back and drew her to him, holding her in a loose hug, and resting his cheek against the blond hair that he’d released from its clip.

He thought back to the kiss. He’d felt undone in a way he hadn’t expected, in a way he’d never experienced.

He stepped back. She looked up at him, blinked a few times and then shook her head.

“I don’t think we should have done that,” she whispered.

“I know.” But he really didn’t know. He knew less at that moment than he’d ever known. He had just kissed a woman, the kiss had been the sweetest, the most innocent and the most memorable. And by tonight, he probably wouldn’t remember.

He let out a sigh and repeated to her that he knew.

He let the memory of the kiss replay in his mind. He replayed it more than once, wanting to keep it in his memory, and angry deep down, because he hated being weak, he hated not knowing.

“I should go.” She slipped away and he didn’t stop her.

He went back to the mechanical bull and climbed on, pretending for a few seconds that this was two months ago, he was still at the top of the world standings, and he still knew the name of the woman who had just changed his life with a kiss.

“Want to try it again?” It was Adam’s voice, and at first Jason didn’t know what he meant. Try what again? Try to kiss her again? Try to remember her name?

Ride the bull. He secured his hand, because the deep down anger needed to find a release. He pounded the leather over his hand, like this ride was for real, like the eight seconds would count. As if his career wasn’t over.

“Go.”

The mechanical bull didn’t leap from the gate, shuffle and start to spin, like the real thing would have done. Instead, it twisted and turned, but always stayed in one
place. It wasn’t the real thing, but it boosted his confidence. When he got off, his head didn’t pound and his vision was clear, even if his left arm did feel like spaghetti.

“Feel okay?” Adam called out, past the fog of memories Jason was trying to recall, trying to keep tethered in his brain so he wouldn’t forget.

A kiss. A man should never forget a kiss that shifted his life in directions he hadn’t expected.

“Jason?”

“Yeah, great.”

“Want to talk about it?” Adam flipped off the power switch to the bull and waited for him. Jason walked over and dropped the glove on the shelf.

“Not much to talk about.” Weakness wasn’t cool, wasn’t easy to admit to.

“Look, Jason, this can’t be easy for you. I’ve had to let go of a career. I get it. I get it when things are out of your control and you can’t do a thing about it.”

Jason shrugged it off.

“I’m trying to make sense of it, to see what God has planned. I’m not letting go of my career until I absolutely know that I have to. But if I do…That’s life.”

He was used to letting go. He’d walked out of his mother’s room, refusing to watch as they turned off the life support that had kept her breathing for days after hope was lost.

It had been easier to walk out of the room than to watch her leaving them.

He knew how it felt to open the door one morning and find his little sister standing on the porch, her jaw bruised and swollen, a parting gift from the man that seven years
earlier she’d thought was a handsome prince with a Harley.

He had wanted to kill that man. Beth had just wanted a place to heal. She was still healing. He was still letting go of being angry.

He could at least say that he’d found faith, found a way to forgive himself and to overcome the rocky moments that had gotten him to this place in his life.

But no one liked to feel like they’d lost control, that they couldn’t make choices for themselves the way they had always made choices.

He wanted to be the guy that slammed a fist into the wall, the guy that threw something. For a moment, just long enough to let go of the frustration that sometimes built up inside him, he wanted to be that guy.

Instead, he did what their pastor had taught them, more than once, because it wasn’t an easy lesson. Jason let God…

Whatever God was doing, Jason knew enough to let God do it.

Through the open doors of the arena, he could see the retreating back of Alyson, nearly to the picnic table where her grandmother was sitting with a group of women who had worked in the kitchen that morning. Let God. He thought she probably didn’t know how.

If he could remember, he would help her in that journey. And then he’d do what he did best, walk out of the room before it got too tough, before letting go wasn’t easy.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” He walked out of the arena, not sure where he was heading, or why. As he crossed the
large expanse of lawn that led to the dining hall and dorms, he saw Etta and Alyson getting in Etta’s car, leaving.