The Cowboy Way: A Creed in Stone Creek / Part Time Cowboy

“No,” Matt replied, without hesitation. “Do you?”

Steven sighed. “No,” he admitted.

“Because a Creed never gives up, right?”

Steven didn’t answer.

“Right?” Matt persisted, through a yawn.

“Okay,” Steven said. “Yes. That’s right.”

“And you’re going to ask Melissa to go out with you, right?”

Steven stopped the rig near the tour bus, shut off the engine and turned in his seat to look back at Matt. “If I say yes, will you shut up about it?” he asked, not unkindly.

Inside the bus, Zeke began to bark.

“Yes,” Matt said, and Steven thought his expression might have been a little smug, though that could have been a trick of the light.

“Promise?”

“Promise,” Matt confirmed. “But you have to promise, too.”

Steven got out of the truck, went to open Matt’s door and began unhitching the kid from his safety gear. “All right, I promise. But if she says no, that’s it, understand?” He lifted Matt into his arms. “You don’t get to pester me about it until the crack of doom.”

Matt squeezed his neck. “Melissa won’t say no, Dad,” he said. “She likes you, remember? She kissed you.”

Steven sighed. It sure felt good to be called “Dad,” though.

Reaching the bus, he opened the door and stepped aside just before Zeke shot out of the interior like a hairy bullet.

“One other thing,” Steven said.

Matt yawned again, watching fondly as Zeke ran in widening circles, barking his brains out. “What?” the boy asked, sounding only mildly interested.

Steven set him down, and they both waited for the dog to do his thing.

“When it comes to dating,” Steven said, “three’s a crowd, old buddy. You’ll have to stay home with a babysitter.”

Zeke raised a hind leg and christened the left rear tire of Steven’s new truck.

“Okay,” Matt agreed solemnly. “It’s a deal.”

When the dog was finished, Steven reached to switch on a light. Then the three of them went into the flashy tour bus with a silhouette of Brad O’Ballivan’s head painted on the side.

Within a few minutes, Matt was washed up and in his pajamas, his breath smelling of mint from a vigorous tooth-brushing session at the bathroom sink. Steven tucked the boy in and pretended not to notice when Zeke immediately jumped up onto the mattress and settled himself in for the night.

Smiling slightly, Steven stepped out of Matt’s room, remembering his own childhood. In Boston, he wasn’t allowed to have a dog—his mother said the antique Persian rugs in Granddad’s house were far too valuable to put at risk and besides, animals were generally noisy—but on the ranch outside Lonesome Bend, the plank floors were hardwood, worn smooth by a century of use, and the rugs were all washable. Nobody seemed to mind the occasional mess and the near-constant clamor of kids and dogs banging in and out of the doors.

There had been a succession of pets over the years; Brody and Conner each had their own mutt, and so did Steven. His had been a lop-eared Yellow Lab named Lucky, and when he arrived in the spring, right after school let out, that dog would be waiting at the ranch gate when they pulled in.

The reunions were always joyous.

The goodbyes, when the end of August came around, and it was time for Steven to return to Boston, were an ache he could still feel, even after all those years.

Of course, Brody and Conner had looked out for Lucky while he was gone, but it couldn’t have been the same as when Steven was there. Brody had Fletch and Conner had Hannibal, and that made Lucky odd dog out, any way you looked at it.

Summer after summer, though, Lucky had been there to offer a lively welcome when Steven came back, and the two of them had been inseparable, together 24/7.

His throat tight and his eyes hot, Steven tried to shake off the recollection of that dog, because he still missed him, no matter how much time had gone by. Lucky had been one of the truest friends he’d ever had, or expected to have.

Steven cleared his throat, then set about locating the drawings he’d been working on intermittently since he decided to buy fifty acres, a two-story house and a wreck of a barn outside Stone Creek, Arizona. Over the last several weeks, he’d redesigned the house a couple of times, and come up with what he considered a workable plan for the outbuildings, too.

Looking at the sketches, all of them scrawled on the now-scruffy yellow pages of a legal pad, Steven figured he was ready to hire an architect and start getting estimates from local contractors. Not that there were likely to be all that many in a community the size of Stone Creek.

He flipped through the pages, checking and rechecking. Somewhere along the line, he’d learned to multi-task—a part of his mind was still back there on that sidewalk in town, face-to-face with Melissa O’Ballivan, who might as well have zapped him with a cattle prod as kiss him, even quickly and lightly, the way she had.

The effect had been about the same, as far as he could tell. On the other hand, he figured a real kiss probably would have struck him dead on the spot, like a bolt of lightning.

And then there was Matt, campaigning to marry him off ASAP, preferably to Melissa, but if that didn’t fly, the kid was bound to zero in on another candidate without much delay.

Roses and limos and engagement rings offered on bended knee indeed, he thought, smiling.

A ringing noise jolted Steven out of his musings. He checked the caller ID panel on his cell phone—he didn’t recognize the number—and answered with his name.

“This is Brody,” replied his long-lost cousin. Brody’s voice was so much like his twin brother’s that Steven might have thought the call was from Conner, if it hadn’t been for the opening announcement.

Relief and temper surged up in Steven, all tangled up. “Where the hell are you?” he demanded, in a ragged whisper. If it hadn’t been for Matt, he probably would have yelled that question.

“It’s good to talk to you again, too,” Brody said, employing the exaggerated drawl he used when he didn’t give a rat’s ass whether he pissed off whoever he happened to be talking to. Which was all the time.

Steven let out a long breath, and he had to press it between his teeth, since his jaw was clamped down hard.

“You still there, Boston?” Brody asked.

The old nickname, once a taunt, enabled Steven to relax a little. And relaxing made it possible to work the hinges on his jawbones so he could open his mouth to answer.

“I’m here,” he said. The second time he asked Brody where he was, he managed a civil tone.

Brody chuckled before he replied, “Now, cousin, if you followed the rodeo the way you used to, you’d know I’ve been out there on the circuit. In plain sight, you might say.”

Steven’s anger revved up again, like an engine locked in Neutral and pumped full of gas. “Dammit, Brody,” he growled, braced on one elbow, with his fingers spread out wide through his hair. “I did follow the rodeo, online and sometimes in person, and I didn’t hear your name or see your face even one time.”

“I might have been in Canada for a while there,” Brody allowed.

“Or doing time somewhere,” Steven said, voicing his second worst fear. His first, of course, had been the distinct possibility that Brody was dead.

Brody laughed, and there was something broken in the sound. “I’ve been tossed into the hoosegow once or twice in my illustrious career,” he replied. “But I’ve never served a stretch, Boston, and I don’t mind admitting that I’m a little indignant over your lack of faith in the quality of my character.”