The Cowboy's Homecoming (3 page)

She had been a pretty woman twenty years ago. Thirty-one years ago she had obviously turned some heads. He pushed that thought aside because now wasn't the time to get caught in the muck.

“Mom, we're going home.”

“Janie, my name is Janie.”

He grabbed her arm, loose flesh and bones. “Right, Jane.”

He hadn't called her mom since he was ten and he'd found her passed out in the yard when he came home from school. That had been enough to take the word “Mom” right out of his vocabulary.

“You don't have to hold me. I'm not going to run.”

“No, but you might fall down.”

She wobbled a little, as if to prove his point. “There's nothing wrong with me.”

Jeremy shot a look back at Carl. The cop stood behind them, sorry written all over his face. “Thanks, Carl. You're sure there weren't any expenses this time?”

“Not this time. Do you want me to call the hospital in Grove? Maybe she should be seen?”

“I'm fine, I said.” She jerked her arm free from his
hand. “I don't need either of you holding me or telling me what to do. I just need to go home.”

“I'll take her home.” Jeremy opened the door and motioned his mother through. “See you later.”

“Yeah, we'll see you around. Maybe we can meet for lunch at the Mad Cow tomorrow?”

“Right, and you can try to talk me out of what you all think is a big mistake.” Jeremy smiled, and Carl turned a few shades of red, right to the roots of his straw-colored hair. “I'll meet you for lunch, but if everyone was so worried about this church, why didn't you all do something sooner?”

“Yeah, I guess you've got a point there, Jeremy. Maybe we just thought it would always be there.”

“It would have fallen in, Carl.”

Carl stood in the doorway while Jeremy held on to his mother to keep her from falling off the sidewalk. “My grandpa goes up there once a month to check on the place. I think a lot of the older people in town would love to have it opened up again, but nobody had the money and the younger families have moved away.”

“Call me and we'll talk over burgers at Vera's.”

Carl nodded. “I'd appreciate that.”

Jeremy escorted his mom out the door and down the sidewalk. She weaved and leaned against him. Tires on pavement drew his attention to the road. Tim Cooper. Yeah, they'd have to face each other sooner or later. They hadn't talked since the day Jeremy learned the truth. The day Tim Cooper wrote him a check, because it was the right thing to do.

Jeremy opened the door on the passenger side of the truck. Jane wobbled and her legs buckled. When he tried to lift her up she swatted at his hands.

It took a few minutes but he got her in the seat and buckled up. They headed down the road, toward Back Street but then turned east. The paved country road led to a tiny trailer surrounded by farmland. It had two bedrooms and a front porch that was falling in. More than once he'd tried to get her to move. But this was her house and she didn't want his money.

It was the only thing she'd ever owned. This trailer was her legacy. He shook his head as he drove down the road. He thought about how he'd envied the Coopers and their big old ranch house.

His mom choked a little and leaned. Great. Her body went limp and she fell sideways. He eased into the driveway of the trailer and pulled the emergency brake. He put the windows down and waited while she got sick on the floor of the truck.

Maybe they would head for the hospital. He pulled her back in the seat and wiped her mouth with the handkerchief he pulled out of his pocket. “Mom, are you with me?”

She shook her head and mumbled that he was as worthless as his father. Yeah, she was with him. He shifted into reverse and glanced in his rearview window. A blue truck pulled in behind him. Great, what he didn't need was a big dose of sympathy in brown eyes that dragged his heart places he didn't want to go.

But that's what he was about to get.

“Leave me here,” his mom mumbled without moving from her prone position on the seat next to him.

“I can't leave you here. You need help.”

“Since when do you care?”

“I don't know, since forever, I guess.” And he'd
proven it time and again. His mom passed out as Beth rapped on his driver's side window.

 

Beth shouldn't have stopped but she'd seen Jeremy's truck at the police station. She'd watched in her rearview mirror as he helped his mother down the sidewalk. For a few minutes she'd listened to the smart Beth who insisted she should drive on home and forget it. But the other Beth had insisted she put her heart on the line. And that's why she was looking through the window of his truck into eyes that were slightly lost and a lot angry.

His window slid down. “Imagine seeing you here.”

“I thought you might need help.”

“No, we're fine. I'm taking her to the hospital.”

In the seat next to him his mother made a grunting sound that resembled a negative response. Obviously she didn't want Beth around and she wasn't interested in going to the hospital.

“Do you want me to ride over there with you?” She regretted the words the minute they were out. No one in their right mind would volunteer. But she had gone and done it.

His mother leaned to the floor again. Jeremy groaned and reached in the backseat of the truck for a towel that he tossed on the floor. “You wouldn't happen to have a bag or a bucket in your truck, would you?”

“Give me a sec and I'll check.” Beth hurried back to her truck. She pushed through the contents in the toolbox in the bed of her truck and found a small bucket, a roll of paper towels and a spray bottle of window cleaner.

She returned to the passenger side of Jeremy's truck
and opened the door slowly, carefully. Jane Hightree was passed out, leaning toward her son. Beth handed him the bucket and then she sprayed the floor down and covered it with paper towels.

“Beth, you don't have to do this.” His voice was quiet and a little tight with emotion. She glanced up as she pulled on leather gloves.

“I don't mind. I'm good at cleaning up messes.”

“Yeah, well, I usually clean up my own messes.”

She ignored him and cleaned, tossing it all in a bag she'd pulled out from under her truck seat.

“I appreciate the help.” Jeremy reached for the passenger seat belt, pulling it around his mother, even though she remained prone on the seat. “I'm going to take her to Grove.”

“Do you want me to go?”

He shook his head and then looked up, smiling at Beth. “I can handle this, but thank you.” He released the emergency brake and his hand went to the gearshift.

She nodded. “Let me know what happens with your mom.”

“I'll do that.”

Beth closed the door and walked back to her own truck. As she climbed behind the wheel he backed out of the drive and headed down the highway. Beth went the opposite direction, toward her brother's house because being strong on her own wasn't easy. When she'd confronted Jeremy at Back Street Church she had meant to talk him out of something, not put herself in his life. She had to keep her focus on what was important. The goal wasn't to get tangled up in his life, it was to save the church.

B
eth finished her phone call and sat down at the table with a cup of coffee. After helping Jeremy with his mother the previous evening, she'd had a long talk with her brother Jason about ways to save Back Street Church. Thanks to his wife Alyson they had a very clear idea of how to accomplish their goal. They'd learned that the building had turned 100 the previous year.

They were still digging but it was possible the building could be saved by having it listed on an historical registry. The phone call Beth had made would set the plan in motion.

And she didn't know how she felt about what she'd done. As much as she didn't want the church torn down, she also didn't want to hurt Jeremy.

It seemed that no matter what, someone would get hurt. Either Jeremy or the people in town who cared about the future of the church. He had plans for a business. Beth saw the church as a connection to her mother. Others in town had similar stories and reasons for wanting the building to remain standing.

She took a sip of her coffee and reached for the box sitting on the table in front of her.

Her dad had finally given it to her the previous evening after she'd gotten home from visiting Jason and Alyson. Now that she had it, though, she didn't know what to do with it. She'd left it sitting on her dresser last night, untouched. Thirty minutes ago she had carried it into the kitchen. She'd been staring at it while she ate her cereal and then made the phone call to the historical society.

She let out a shallow, shaky breath and reached for the box. It was just a plain metal box. Her mother had intended for her to have this eighteen years ago. Eighteen long years, with so many mistakes, so much heart-ache in between.

Would her life have been different if her mother had lived? Would Beth have made different choices, taken a different path? Those were questions that would never have answers.

She lifted the lid of the box and a sob released from deep down in her chest. Tears followed as she lifted her mom's Bible from the box. Her mother's most prized possession. Of course her dad wouldn't have wanted Beth to have that Bible. He would have seen it as the root of all their problems; the same way he blamed Back Street Church for her mother's death.

He had needed to blame something, or someone. He had picked the church Elena turned to when the doctors told her there was nothing they could do.

Beth opened the Bible and stared through tear-filled eyes at her mother's handwritten notes in the margins. Reading those notes, it was as if her mom was there,
teaching her about life. There were notes about faith, sermons, and verses that were her favorites.

She closed the Bible and placed it on the table. There were other things in the box. Her mother's wedding ring. A book of devotions. Her journal.

The journal was leather bound. The pages were soft, white paper that had yellowed with time. The writing had faded but was still legible. Beth flipped through the pages. The last half of the journal was blank. But the final entries, pages and pages of entries, were written to Beth.

She skimmed several but paused on the one dated August 5.

Dearest Beth, you're barely ten and I know this isn't going to be easy for you, but I want you to know that I love you and God has a plan for your life. Don't give up. Don't forget that your daddy, even if he's hurting and angry, loves you. And don't hurry growing up. It'll happen all too soon. Love will happen. Life will happen. Don't rush through the days, savor them. Love someone strong.

Love someone strong. Beth closed her eyes. She didn't know if she'd ever really been in love. Chance had been a mistake, an obvious mistake. He'd been her rebellion and a way to escape her father's quiet anger. Now she realized her dad had been more hurt than angry. But at eighteen she hadn't cared, she had just wanted to get away from Dawson and the emptiness of her life.

Her life was no longer about Chance. It couldn't be about what she'd been through. Instead it was about what happened from this day forward.

Jeremy Hightree didn't understand that. He still saw the church as a connection to his troubled childhood.

Maybe her mother's words could change his heart. She put everything back in the box but she didn't replace the lid. She wouldn't do that. It was a silly thing but she couldn't put the lid back on the box. Instead she carried it down the hall to her bedroom and placed the box on her dresser.

She walked out the French doors of her room, onto the patio that was her own private sanctuary. She stood in the midst of her flowers and the wood framed outdoor furniture that blended with the surroundings.

When she came home a short year and a half ago this had been her healing place. She'd planted flowers and she'd hidden back here, away from questions and prying eyes. In this garden no one questioned the jagged cut on her face or the arm that had needed to be reset.

This morning she was escaping from other emotions. Her mother's memory, Jeremy's plans for the church, her own fears.

She really needed to slow down. Everything was coming at her in fast forward. It was time to pray and plan her next move, before she rushed forward and did something she would regret.

 

At last she had fallen to sleep. Jeremy stood at the door of his mother's room and waited for her to move, to wake up and yell again. She'd done a lot of that since the previous evening when the hospital had transported her to the long-term facility a short distance from Grove, and only five minutes from Dawson.

She'd done so much screaming this morning that the nursing home staff had called him to see if he could calm her down. Surprisingly she had calmed down immediately when she saw him.

He sighed and turned to go.

“Jeremy, how are you?”

Wyatt Johnson walked down the hall. Jeremy shrugged one shoulder and turned his attention back to his mother's room, to the bed, and to the thin figure covered with a white blanket.

“Do you need anything?” The two had gone to school together. They'd ridden horses together and roped calves together. Wyatt's horses and Wyatt's calves. They'd been friends, even though Jeremy hadn't been a part of Wyatt's social circle. They'd traveled to rodeos together and fought their way out of a few corners together.

“No, we don't need anything. It looks as if she'll be here for a while.” For the rest of her life. Her liver was damaged from years of alcohol abuse. Her brain wasn't much better.

There must have been a time when she'd been a good person. He really tried to remind himself of that; of the reality that she had fed him and cared for him.

Or he liked to hope she had.

When he thought of gentle touches, it sure wasn't his mother he thought of.

“I'm sorry.” Wyatt leaned his shoulder against the doorframe. “Guess there isn't much more a person can say.”

“Nope, not much, but thanks.” Jeremy turned from the room and headed down the hall, Wyatt Johnson at his side. Jeremy stopped at the nurse's station. The woman behind the desk looked up, her glasses perched on the end of her nose. “I'm leaving.”

“We'll call if there are any problems.”

“Right.” He stood there for a minute, wondering if there was something else he should say or do. The nurse
continued to stare at him. She finally lowered her gaze to the papers she'd been reading.

He guessed that was his cue to move on. So he did. Wyatt moved with him. When they got to the door Jeremy punched in the code and pushed the door open.

“Wyatt, I don't want to talk about the church. Not now.”

“I hadn't planned on bringing it up.”

An alarm sounded. Wyatt reached past him and pulled the door closed. He pushed other buttons on the keypad.

Jeremy stared at the closed door, at his truck in the parking lot and then shifted his attention back to Wyatt. He couldn't be mad at a guy who'd gone through the things Wyatt had gone through; losing his wife, raising two little girls on his own. And then falling in love with a preacher's daughter. At least Wyatt's situation had a decent ending.

The single life was good enough for Jeremy. He dated women who wanted nothing more from him than a decent meal and a dozen roses to end things. That philosophy kept his life from being complicated.

He hadn't seen too many happy relationships in his life and figured he was a lot better off than the friends who'd started believing they needed to settle down and have a family. Wyatt didn't look too worse for wear, though.

“Looks like it might storm.” Jeremy nodded toward the southern sky. It was Oklahoma, so there was always a pretty good chance it might storm.

“Yeah, looks that way. We're under a tornado watch
until this evening. No warnings, yet.” Wyatt pulled keys out of his pocket.

“Yeah.” Jeremy ran out of things to say about the weather.

Wyatt grinned and tipped his hat back. “I know you don't want to talk about the church, but you bought it and you had to know that'd stir up a hornet's nest. I've known you a long time and you've always been fond of a hornet's nest if you could find one.”

Jeremy told himself not to respond to his friend's baiting. He smiled and kicked his toe at the ground. Yeah, he wasn't going to ignore it.

“Wyatt, the church was for sale and I bought it. If people in Dawson are suddenly attached to a building they've neglected for years, that's their problem. Someone else could have bought it.”

“Someone else could have,” Wyatt said. “No one did.”

“Right. I bought it and I plan on building a business that might give a few people in Dawson the jobs they need.”

“That's a decent idea. But you have two hundred acres across from the church. Why not build your business over there?”

“I'm building a house on that side of the road and I'm buying cattle.”

“Yeah, I saw that they finished framing the house yesterday. It's pretty huge for one guy. Are you actually going to live in Dawson?”

Jeremy stopped at the edge of the sidewalk. “I'm going to be here part of the time.”

“The church means a lot to a lot of people. I know it doesn't seem that way.”

“No, it doesn't and I kind of wonder why everyone suddenly realizes the church means something to them.” Jeremy glanced at Wyatt.

“Pastor Adkins kept me in church after my dad's big indiscretion. I guess Back Street is what got me where I am today.”

“Gotcha.” Jeremy processed the story with the others he had been told. “Sorry, Wyatt, I have to get back and get back to work.”

“Work?”

“Business doesn't stop because the boss is out of town.” He gave Wyatt a tight smile. “I'm managing my business from a laptop in the RV and trying to help Dane with a flaw in a bike we're designing.”

Jeremy had partnered with Dane Scott in team roping years ago. And more recently in the custom bike business.

“I'd like to come by.”

“If you want a cup of coffee or you'd like to see the bike we're building, stop by anytime.”

“And don't bother hitting my brakes if I'm there to talk to you about the church,” Wyatt added for him.

“Sounds about right.” Jeremy touched the brim of his hat and walked across the drive to his truck.

When he pulled up the drive of Back Street Church, Beth Bradshaw was sitting in front of his RV. He hadn't expected her to be the one pounding his door down trying to save this church. But why wouldn't she be the one?

Maybe, more than anyone, Beth needed to fight this battle.

He joined her on the glider bench outside his RV. She scooted to the edge, as far from him as possible.
He tried real hard not to let that hurt his ego. He figured she had a lot of reasons. One might be that she hated his guts.

That didn't sit well with him, the idea of her hating him.

He pushed the ground and the glider slid back and forth. Sitting there on the glider with her kind of felt like courting the old-fashioned way. The only thing missing was lemonade. She probably wouldn't see the humor in that, but he did. The two of them as nervous as cats sitting on a glider, what else could he think?

He had to lead the conversation in another direction, away from courting Bethlehem.

“I kind of thought you might thank me for tearing this church down, Bethlehem.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“It's your name.”

“No one calls me Bethlehem and you know it.”

He started to remind her that her mother had called her Bethlehem. Neither of them needed that memory. He glanced at the box on her lap. She had her hands around it, like a little girl holding on to a treasure.

She glanced at him, a cowgirl face with straight brown hair in twin braids and eyes that pinned him to the spot. She'd have him questioning everything about himself if she didn't stop looking at him like that.

“Why would you ever think I'd want this church torn down?” Her words were soft, matching the look in her dark eyes.

He shook his head and reined in the part of him that wanted to give her everything.

“I don't know, I guess I thought it was tied to a lot of memories that you'd want to be rid of, not memories
you'd want to hang on to.” He eyed that box again, wondering why in the world she'd brought it here and what it would mean to him.

 

Jeremy's words played through Beth's mind. She settled her gaze on the church. It was weathered and beaten down, forgotten. She'd been riding past this church her whole life, and since she'd come home from California those rides had resumed. Sometimes she even stopped and sat on the front steps.

As a teenager, when she'd felt the most alone, she'd found peace here. He wouldn't understand. He would think she was weak if she told him that she'd hidden here, trying to find answers, to find a way past the pain of losing her mom.

She cleared her throat.