The Cowboy's Sweetheart

A lot had happened. She turned over a bucket and sat down. She leaned against the stall door behind her and closed her eyes. Everything had changed. Most importantly, she had changed.

On a Sunday morning in a church service at the rodeo arena she had changed. It had started when she walked out of her horse trailer, a cup of coffee in hand, and she’d heard the couple who led the service singing “Amazing Grace.” She’d walked to the arena and taken a seat on a row of bleachers a good distance from the crowd.

During that service, God had pulled her back to Him. She had been drawn back into a relationship that she’d ignored for years. And it hadn’t been God’s fault that she’d walked away. It had been about her loyalty to Ryder.

She opened her eyes and looked outside, at a sky growing darker as the sun set. The days were cool and growing shorter. She wasn’t ready for winter. She definitely didn’t know how to face spring, and seven months from now.

How did a person go from turning back to God, to making a giant mistake like the one she’d made with Ryder? And what about God? Was He going to reject her now?

She’d had experience with rejection.

It had started with her mother. She squeezed her eyes shut again, and refused the tears that burned, tightening in her throat because she wasn’t going to let them fall.

“Forgive me,” she whispered, wanting peace, something that settled the ache in her heart and took away the heaviness of misgivings.

She stood and walked into the feed room to look at the calendar tacked to the wall. It recorded dates and locations of rodeos. She thumbed back to the month of the Phoenix rodeo and tried to remember. She leaned, resting her forehead against the rough barn wood.

For two months she’d told herself there wouldn’t be consequences, other than a little bit of time when they’d be uncomfortable with each other.

But she’d been wrong. There were definitely consequences, and this wasn’t going away any time soon. She picked up the pencil she used to mark the calendar and she went through the next few months, marking through events she’d planned to attend, but now wouldn’t.

Things had definitely changed.

Roping hadn’t taken Ryder’s mind off Andie and the possibility of a baby. His baby. He didn’t need proof of that fact because he knew Andie. As he drove through Dawson after loading his horse and talking for a few minutes with friends, his mind kept going back, to better choices he could have made. And forward, to how his life would never be the same.

Ryder drove through Dawson. It was Sunday night and that meant there wasn’t a thing going on and nothing open but the convenience store. A few trucks were parked at the side of the building and a few teenagers sat on tailgates, drinking sodas and eating corn dogs. Big night out in Dawson.

He turned left on the road that led out of town, to his family farm, and on past, to the house where Andie had grown up with Etta. He considered driving there and talking to her, trying to figure out what they were going to do. He didn’t figure she’d be ready to talk.

Instead he pulled into his drive and drove back to the barn. As he got out, he noticed Wyatt in the backyard with the girls. Wyatt was sitting at the patio table, the girls were running around the yard with flashlights. They were barely more than babies.

And Wyatt didn’t know what to do with them. That thought kind of sunk into the pit of his stomach. Wyatt had always been the one who seemed to know how to do this adult thing.

Ryder stepped out of the truck and walked back to the trailer to unload his horse. The big gelding stomped restlessly, ready to be out and ready to graze in the pasture.

“Easy up there, Buddy.” Ryder unlatched the back of the trailer. He stepped inside, easing down the unused half of the trailer to untie the animal and back him out.

When they landed on firm ground, Wyatt was there. Ryder smiled at his brother and got a half smile in return. The girls had stopped running and were watching. They weren’t used to horses. Wyatt had taken a job as a youth minister in Florida and they had lived in town.

“Long night?” Wyatt stepped back, watching.

“Yeah, kind of.” How did he tell his brother? Wyatt had always held it together. He’d held them together as best he could.

“What’s up?” Wyatt followed him to the gate, opening it for Ryder to let the horse out into the pasture.

“Nothing.”

“Right.”

Ryder pushed the gate closed and latched it. The horse reached for a bite of grass, managing to act like he hadn’t eaten in days, not hours. Horses were easy to take care of. They could be left alone. They didn’t make requirements. They had to be trained, but he was pretty sure they were a lot easier to train than a child.

He ranched. He raised quarter horses and black angus cattle. He didn’t raise babies.

Until now.

The girls ran up to them, tiny things, not even reaching his hip. He closed the gate and turned his attention to Molly and Kat. And boots. They were wearing his boots. The good ones that had cost a small fortune.

He glanced up, pretty sure that God was testing him. This was a lesson on parenting, or patience. He didn’t know which. Probably both.

“We like your shoes.” Molly grinned, and he was happy to see her smiling. But man, she was wearing his best boots.

The look he gave Wyatt was ignored.

“Boots.” Kat giggled. The pair she was wearing covered her legs completely.

“Yep, boots.” He scooped up Kat and snuggled her close. She giggled and leaned back. She looked a lot like her mom. That had to be hard for Wyatt. Kat had Wendy’s smile, her dimples, her laughter.

And she was a dirty mess. Mud caked her, and his boots. From the tangles in her hair, he guessed it had been a couple of days since it had seen a brush.

“You need a bath.” He held her tight as they headed toward the house.

Kids needed things like baths, and their teeth brushed. They had to be tucked in and someone had to be there for them. They didn’t need parents who drank themselves into a stupor and made choices that robbed a family of security.

He didn’t drink. He had one thing going for him.

Anger knocked around inside him. The past had a way of doing that, and a guy shouldn’t get angry thinking of parents who had died too young.

“If you need to talk…” Wyatt followed him up the steps to the back door, and then he shrugged. They’d never been touchy-feely. Sharing was for afternoon talk shows, not the Johnson brothers. They’d always solved their problems, even dealt with their anger, by roping a few calves or riding hard through the back field.

Every now and then they’d had a knock-down-drag-out in the backyard. Those fights had ended with the two of them on their backs, staring up at the sky, out of breath, but out of anger.

Talking about it didn’t seem like an option.

“Yeah, I know we can talk.” Ryder put his niece down on the floor and flipped on the kitchen light. Kat stomped around in his boots, leaving dirt smudges on the floor he’d mopped last night. “Did you guys eat?”

He looked around. There was an open loaf of bread on the counter and a jar of peanut butter, the lid next to it. He glanced down at Kat. She had a smear of peanut butter on her cheek. He twisted the bread closed.

“Did you feed the girls?” Ryder asked again when Wyatt hadn’t answered.

“Molly made sandwiches.”

“And you think that’s good?” A three-year-old making sandwiches. Ryder screwed the lid on the peanut butter because he had to do something to keep from pushing his brother into a wall to knock sense into him. “Girls, are you hungry?”

Kat grinned and Molly looked at her dad. Ryder exhaled a lot of anger. He didn’t have a clue what little kids ate. Wyatt should have a clue. If Wyatt couldn’t do this, how in the world was Ryder going to manage?

“Tell you what, I’ll make eggs and toast. Do you like eggs?” Ryder opened the fridge door.

“I can do it.” Wyatt took the carton of eggs from his hands.