by Robyn Carr
They talked about this part of Northern California and its most desirable aspects, the almost intimidating beauty, the pristine wilderness, the wildlife and clean air. Clay said he missed the mountains and canyons around Flagstaff and this was a good substitute. He told her what he’d already discovered in some of the small mountain towns and she told him what there was to enjoy on the coast.
While he finished with Streak—putting him up for the night—they continued their conversation. Finally, chores done and Clay’s bag of ice warmed and reduced to water, he said, “My sister sets a big table every night—there’s lots of family and sometimes friends. You can follow me there, join us for dinner. You would be welcome, and you’d like them—they’re salt of the earth. Ursula is a teacher, one of the reasons I want Gabe living with them. He’s a good student, but she’ll make him better. And my brother-in-law is a police chief in a small town. There are kids—four besides Gabe still at home—and Tom’s parents live with them.”
She didn’t have to look at her watch to know it was dinnertime and she would spend it alone. She’d probably stop for a bean-and-cheese burrito to go, though really, she wanted nothing more than to sit down with Clay and his family; she’d like to know more about them. But she just wasn’t ready yet.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m tied up.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Maybe another time?”
“Maybe,” she said. “I’d better get going. And you should get to dinner.”
“One of these days, Lilly, you’ll take a chance on me.”
She laughed and gave him a dismissive wave as she headed for the truck, but inside she was thinking, I am taking a pretty big chance right now. For me…
Eight
At Annie’s request, Lilly saddled up Blue Rhapsody and joined her in the round pen for a little dressage instruction. Blue was wonderful; she could almost anticipate Lilly’s next move.
“How much dressage training have you had?” Annie asked her.
“None. Right before leaving the reservation, I’d started barrel racing. My grandpa said it took twenty years off his life.”
“You ride like you’ve done it forever,” Annie said.
Lilly was shaking her head. “I think it’s Blue,” she said. “Whatever life she had before, I bet anything she went to show. By the way, I think I’ve come up with a plan—if I help teach three yoga classes a week, I can afford her board. And I can get a deal on feed.” She grinned.
“What if I had a better idea?” Annie said. “Our training program is still small, but growing bit by bit. I could use someone like you to help me. If you’re interested.”
“Really?” Lilly asked. “I mean, really?”
“You’d be perfect,” Annie insisted. “How flexible are your work hours?”
“Except for the feed delivery, Grandpa’s easy to work with. I keep the books, Annie—the bills don’t go away at 5:00 p.m.”
“Kind of the way I ran the beauty shop,” Annie said. “I cut, colored and permed all day, kept the books at night. Let me see what it’ll take to bring you into the program and get your help. And maybe Blue’s help—I think she has a lot of talent and training.”
They talked a little bit about the many things they could accomplish with a riding academy, helping girls who wanted to compete, teaching them confidence and self-reliance. Annie and Lilly got to remembering what an important role riding had played in their early lives. Then Annie smiled lazily and said, “It’ll mean spending more time around here. Not that you haven’t been doing more of that lately.”
So, that hadn’t slipped anyone’s notice at all. That was the only trepidation she had, putting herself in Clay’s company more often. But hadn’t she been here every day, edging closer all the time? If he turned out to be the kind of man she feared, why couldn’t she kick him in the shins and avoid him forever? Or, she could tattle on him, tell Annie he was a louse and a jackass—and as Dane had said, Annie would shoot him or make Nathaniel fire him.
But if she was honest with herself, she wanted to be near Clay. When she was around him she felt good, she felt safe.
She stepped into the ring of fire. “It sounds wonderful,” she told Annie. “You see what you can do. I’ll see what I can do.”
“Fantastic,” Annie said. “In the meantime a friend of mine is coming over for a ride on Saturday. We’ll go out on the trail for a couple of hours. Join us?”
“Oh…I don’t want to intrude…”
“Don’t be ridiculous! Shelby is a new mom who just got cleared to ride. She’s been off a horse for quite a while and can’t wait. She’d love the company.”
So even though it was her day for chores and errands, Lilly cut a few hours out of her schedule to ride with Annie and Shelby. She shouldn’t have been at all surprised that not only the riding energized her, but the company she kept with these women. Lilly had girlfriends, but none of them shared her passion for horses, which meant she tamped it down, herself. And while Dane was a perfect best friend in every way, he was not interested in riding.
Out on the trail, away from the men and the barn, they traded girl talk and confidences. Shelby said that now that the baby was a couple of months old and Luke was invited to make love again, he was driving her crazy. “I think he was counting the seconds until he was cleared for sex.”
“Is that all they think about?” Annie asked.
“Not all,” Shelby said. “Just most of what they think about.” Then she grinned and said, “I have to admit, I was pretty anxious, too. Luke is hard for me to resist. Especially when I don’t feel like a pole that swallowed a watermelon. We had a long dry spell while I was horribly pregnant and then when I’d just given birth. You know what I mean.”
“I don’t know anything about that,” Annie said. “But I just found my Nathaniel last Christmas and I’m not tired of him yet. Not a bit!” Then she smiled. “You know what I mean, Lilly,” she said.
“I have no idea what you mean! It’s been so long since I had hot sex I’m not sure I remember how!”
“Well, there’s always Clay…” Annie teased. “I know you’re attracted to him.”
“Clay? The new vet tech?” Shelby asked. “How could you not be? Have you been seeing him?”
“As in dating him? No,” Lilly said. “He might be more than I can handle.”
“Chicken!” Annie said.
“Luke was more than I could handle,” Shelby admitted with a sigh. “But, boy, am I glad I took on the challenge! Lilly, Clay is so exotic, so beautiful. You must be tempted.”
It was fun to blush, to tell dark jokes about wild sex with one of those hot, irresistible, Native men. “Seriously, it’s really been a long, long time,” Lilly declared, and it was the understatement of the century.
“Bet it comes right back to you,” Annie said. “Just like the riding has.”
Then Shelby was asking her about her riding history.
“My grandfather had me on a horse when I was barely walking. I could master a thousand-pound animal by the time I was ten, and when I was twelve, there wasn’t a horse on the reservation I couldn’t ride. Our neighbors took all the little girls on trail rides into the mountains and canyons. We slept on the ground, under an endless black sky sprinkled with a million stars and it made me feel connected to the entire earth. By the time I started junior high, my confidence was at a peak. Once we moved here, moved away from the horses and riding, I struggled to find anything that made me feel passionate. I didn’t realize how much it would have helped to keep up with the riding. I didn’t know until very recently that I need that in my life.
“Annie’s invited me to work part-time at the stable. I’ll make a little money if there are plenty of riding students, but mostly I’ll get to keep Blue and board her at a discount. Annie and I were talking about doing trail rides for groups of girls—nothing gives a young girl a sense of power like taming a beast, like proving she’s capable of doing it on her own, without a parent’s guiding hand. You
can’t imagine, their grades in school even go up when they’ve mastered certain equestrian accomplishments, when they’ve camped in the wilds with just their horses and wits. I can’t wait to do it again! I can’t wait to take care of my own horse and have her depend on me while I depend on her. I can’t wait to teach it to girls—even very little girls!
“Of course, this will put me in very close company with the very Navajo man I’ve been trying to avoid….”
Annie and Shelby were quiet for a very long moment before they both burst out laughing. Then Annie said, “Give it up! You’re a goner.” And all three of them laughed some more.
Lilly accepted an invitation to the Toopeek household for dinner with Clay’s family just a few days later. It was a very big step for her. Since moving to California she’d been distancing herself from the whole Native community. But curiosity drove her because she’d grown so fond of Clay. She couldn’t help wondering what his people were like.
She hadn’t been at their table for fifteen minutes before she knew, as if she hadn’t known before, that her future was irrevocably changed. Or changed back.
“You’ll starve, eating that way,” old Lincoln Toopeek had said.
“Let her eat what she likes,” Ursula counseled. “She doesn’t look like she’s starving by any means. In fact, I might ask her about her diet. But not until after pie.”
“You should taste the pork loin,” Clay said. “It’s out of this world.”
“I’m a vegetarian,” she explained under her breath.
“Well, that explains the mushroom sandwich. Okay, if it works for you,” Clay said, putting a very large, juicy slab of meat on his plate.
“Those Hopi,” Lincoln Toopeek said. “They have strange eating habits.”
“My grandfather is a well established carnivore!” Lilly told him. “He sells feed to ranchers for cattle and sheep!”
The entire family—adults and children—laughed as the stone-faced, serious Lincoln was taken aback. He didn’t appear offended, just surprised. After all, he clearly believed he was right.
“Please, Lincoln, don’t start on her,” Ursula said. Then, turning to Lilly, she said, “He’s equally critical of the Navajo. He’s Cherokee and God knows only the Cherokee know anything!”
“I hope pie is on your diet,” Clay leaned over and said in a stage whisper. “You wouldn’t want to miss it.”
Family. Community. Camaraderie. Her grandfather had not been able to draw her back to the Native community the way this family had in fifteen minutes. She realized immediately, she had to risk letting them in. Letting him in.
She needed to be a part of something again, a community that understood her and whom she understood—tradition tugged at her.
By mid-September, Dr. Nathaniel Jensen’s new clinic and barn had opened for business. Lilly and Yaz were both there for the opening celebration, as were a number of folks from the nearby towns. The Jensen Stables were located down the mountain from Virgin River and somewhere between there and Grace Valley. Horse owners from all over who relied on Nate’s skills were all present, as were the owners of other livestock from near and far. Lilly helped Annie put plentiful food and drink out on a long trestle table that had been set up between the house and barn and watched with interest as Clay approached almost everyone who arrived, either greeting them or introducing himself to them. She spent some time helping Clay and Gabe saddle the Jensen horses for those who’d like a ride—something especially the children present took advantage of. Blue was exceptionally good with a young rider and it gave Lilly such pleasure to be the one leading her around.
To her surprise, Clay had invited the entire Toopeek family. Late in the afternoon he sidled close to her and pointed with his glass of lemonade at Yaz and Lincoln Toopeek, locked in a conversation that seemed to involve few words, bonding. Or arguing.
“See that?” Clay said. “That’s pretty much how my father and your grandfather will look when they meet—standing nose to nose and yet a hundred miles apart.”
“Do you think they’ll meet?” she asked.
“I’m counting on it,” he said.
Her world was going to get larger and she knew it.
When Lilly delivered feed on Thursday afternoon, she found Clay waiting for her. “I’m planning to watch my son play football tonight,” he said. “Would you like to come with me?”
“I wish I could,” she said sincerely. She was crazy about Gabe. “I have a commitment.”
“That boyfriend?” he asked with a smile.
“No,” she said, laughing. “I promised to help with a yoga class—it’s a little extra money, which I need for Blue.”
“Well, tomorrow night Gabe has plans with his friends and, you and I, we should spend an evening together. Not with the Toopeek family, but just the two of us, so we can talk. And not just about horses. Let me take you to dinner or something,” he said.
“I can’t,” she answered. “I have plans.”
“The boyfriend?” he asked.
“With a very close friend, and these plans were made a while ago. Sorry.”
“Cancel,” he urged.
“I can’t this time. Maybe another time.”
Friday was an extremely busy day for Lilly and for that she was grateful. She did in fact have plans with Dane—they were going out for a movie and a bite to eat. Of course, not only would Dane be completely fine with a cancellation, he’d probably cheer. He had been urging her to take the dating game seriously for years. But the fact was, a man who made that very idea tempting had just barely come along and she was moving as quickly as she could. She just wasn’t quite ready for the intimacy she knew was coming; she was serious when she’d told Annie and Shelby it had been a very long time.
She was getting closer to taking that step, however. Much closer. Thinking about it caused her to tremble.
Sometimes, if she could ignore the trembling, if she closed her eyes and was honest with herself, she could admit that since Clay had entered her life she’d hungered for the intensity of a night alone with him. She needed to be held, to be kissed, to be loved. And while his very power intimidated her, she didn’t want anything less.
Dane finally knocked on her front door on Friday evening and she was so glad to see him. He was so good for her; he propped her up when she was down, laughed with her when she needed to laugh, never failed to be there for her. And as always, seeing him filled her with a feeling of affection. She smiled brightly.
But her smile quickly faded. He looked awful. “My gosh, what’s wrong?”
Dane put up a hand as if to ward her off. “Don’t get too close, Lilly,” he said. “I thought I could ignore this, but I’m coming down with something. I feel terrible.”
She took a couple of steps toward him, frowning. His handsome face was in a grimace, his eyebrows furrowed. “What in the world is the matter?”
“It started out as a headache and a tickle in my throat. I thought a couple of aspirin and a good gargle would do the trick, but on the way over here it got way worse. Hit me like a ton of bricks. The tickle turned into razor blades, my head is clogged and pounding, I have a cough, my body aches. I think I have a fever.”
“Oh, Dane, lie down on the sofa. Take your shoes off. I’ll make you a strong broth, some green tea, dose you up with an anti—”
“I need to go home, honey,” he said. “I need my bed and I don’t want to give it to you. It could be the flu.”
“I’ll take my chances, Dane. I have a strong constitution—I never get sick. Let me do something to make you feel better.”
“You better knock on wood. This could be that ugly virus going around. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Oh, Dane, I really needed to—” To what? Talk more about her crush on Clay? The crush Dane kept telling her to make a move on? Oh, he must be so sick of her by now.
“We’ll do something later this week or next weekend. Ugh. I gotta go to bed….”
“I’m so sorry, Dane,” she s
aid.
He nodded, blew her a kiss and left her little house, the screen door shutting behind him as she stood at the open interior door.
“Crap,” she said aloud, watching him go.
She’d dressed up for her evening with Dane; she wore a cinnamon-colored silk blouse, beige dress pants, gold belt, low heels…but the evening was off. She went to her bedroom to change. She tossed her clothes in the chair that sat in the corner and found herself some comfy yoga togs.
Back in the living room, she sat on the floor to pick through her CDs. The early fall weather was so beautiful; she enjoyed an early evening breeze coming in the screen door. She put on some music, cranked it up real loud, and went to the kitchen to forage for food. She pulled out some vegetables and cheese; she’d make herself a big, fluffy salad and a whole wheat macaroni and cheese dish topped with a little tomato puree and black olives. She had the water for the noodles on the fire, some of the veggies sliced and was starting to feel like herself again when suddenly the volume of the music went down.
She whirled around. There, in her very small living room, stood Clay. He put up his hands and said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you. You obviously couldn’t hear me knock or ring the bell. If the door had been closed, I wouldn’t have walked in, but it was only the screen door, unlocked.”
She leaned against the sink, her heart hammering from the surprise. He was looking a bit different tonight; he wore navy blue slacks, low leather boots and a white long-sleeved shirt, sleeves rolled up and neck open. He held a sack in the crook of one arm. “What are you doing here?”
He looked around, then looked her up and down. “You don’t look like you’re going out. You said you had plans and I thought—”
“I’m staying in tonight.”
Clay craned his neck. “Where’s the boyfriend? What’s his name?”
She couldn’t help but smile at him. He was at least as much a brat as Streak. “He’s sick. Coming down with something so he canceled. Now, why are you here?”
