Cherished Love (Cherished Cowboys 1)

by Charlene Bright

  Her voice carried a sarcasm she hadn’t intended. She was having fun at his expense, and Colton was smiling too. He liked seeing Wade Williamson squirm as much as any guy in the county.

  “It’s not that. It’s just you’re all…I mean, you’re not…last time I saw you…Oh, my GOD!”

  Truly, this moment was bringing her back to the ground, and he was playing right into what she’d always hoped, but never expected.

  “Well, I have grown up a bit since then.”

  She turned around in front of him, letting him take in all that her mama had given her. Despite her work clothes, the younger Tisdale was a fine form herself, the Montana upbringing and the Chicago city life had put it all together in a head-turning package that no man would want to leave unattended. She continued her fascinating gloat-fest.

  “That’s something that does usually happen, you know.”

  Colton, whose face had begun to contort when Wade stopped walking, completely lost his composure. He snorted, looking at his sister fondly with a touch of exasperation and a knowing grin a mile wide.

  “That’s our Mallory. Always the one with the smart mouth.”

  Wade gaped at him, his mouth opening and closing in confusion.

  “What? Mallory was always so shy and quiet.”

  Colton’s brow raised in surprise. “Mallory? Buddy, your head must be as broken as your wrist. Mal could always talk her way into—or out of—anything. And now she makes a living out of it as the fastest-talking lawyer in the state of Montana.” Colton guffawed. “Shy and quiet indeed!”

  Mal’s realization that she had won the battle between her fear and fascination, goaded her to conclude the encounter quickly. “Um, well, it was good to see you again. Sure we’ll see each other around.”

  She turned abruptly, chewing her lower her lip uncomfortably, and headed on, knowing that her intense crush had always left her tongue-tied and quiet around the object of her girlhood affections.

  Stopping after a few steps, Mallory turned to her brother. “I’m going to check the cow-calf pairs in the northwest pasture. I’ve got the drug kit with me, Sandy said there’s a few of the cows with pink eye this season.”

  She swung gracefully onto her horse and rode off in the direction she had mentioned. As she nudged Dusty into a canter, she secured her rope over the saddle horn and breathed a sigh of relief to be away from Wade. Thank God I got through that without stuttering like a blushing school girl.

  She turned her horse along the fence line, checking diligently for breaks as she went, and relaxed into the rhythm of the ride, drawing in a few deep breaths of the clean Montana air. There was a reason she’d come back to Cherish, and it wasn’t just because of the raw natural beauty of the land. She knew this property, this land that was like nowhere else on earth; she scented the horse below her, the green freshness of the new spring growth, and the distant cattle on the brisk breeze. This, she knew without a doubt, was where she belonged, where she felt a deep tie to the land she rode over and the people who lived around her. She saw a cow-calf pair in the distance and encouraged Dusty into a run toward them, laughing at the sheer exhilaration of the speed and her harmony with the horse below her as she put Wade out of her mind and focused on the task ahead.

  * * *

  September 8, 2001

  When Colton and his friend got off the bus, Mallory could have died. As precocious as possible, the little dark-haired girl was doing what little sisters do; she was spying on them.

  Colton and Wade had just started their sophomore year. Just about everyone knew about the Williamsons. This was the first time she’d actually laid her eyes on him, and there was, in her little heart, a “click.” She knew this was the boy she wanted to get to know.

  Little girls with crushes can go one of two ways in a situation like this. They either go completely berserk, doing everything they can to draw attention to themselves, to try to get a reaction from the apples of their affection.

  Or they turn their emotions inward, writing down all their innermost feelings, their desires, their rational and irrational dreams. They write the boys’ names all over the place, in different ways and in different relationships with their own names. They hide and withdraw, dying every moment, because they cannot do otherwise.

  Mallory decided to go both ways.

  She found a safe place in the barn, and with her penknife she began, systematically, to use every inch of that flat space to write “Mallory + Wade” or “Wadeory” or “Mallory Williamson.” That weekend, she etched more than thirty iterations on that board.

  She also interfered, followed them around, and generally made a nuisance of herself. Wade was a gentleman (actually, she was invisible to him, since she was, after all, a child, but she just thought him even dreamier, because he was polite).

  At dinner, she offered to fix Wade his plate (Wade thought that was just a tradition in the Tisdale home, so he allowed it, not questioning the purpose). She was ecstatic, thinking he was wanting her to help him. When they sat down, she moved to the seat next to him (of course, he had no idea what she was doing).

  Whatever she was doing, it was to get Wade’s attention. Colton was apologetic, not understanding what Mallory’s problem was.

  * * *

  Wade shook his head in bemusement as he watched Mallory race off on her big gray gelding, moving like someone who had been born on horseback. Who knew his best friend’s little sister was such a natural horsewoman? It made sense in a Montana way; the families that came here were dedicated to a different kind of life than his friends who had raced to the city for schools, work and career. But inwardly, he kicked himself, because despite the wounded heart he was suffering, he could not help but notice that it wasn’t just her horsemanship and natural skill that he was interested in, impressive though it was.

  He turned to find her brother looking at him curiously, the wide, knowing grin still embossed on his face.

  “Are you okay? You look a bit stunned.”

  Wade looked at Colton, trying to figure out what he might have missed. “Oh, yeah. Fine, fine. The pain meds must just be wearing off a bit or something.”

  Colton grinned, patted his old friend on the shoulder, and guided him into the horse barn.

  The two men moved into the barns where Colton proudly showed off some of his prize horses. The Tisdale name had certainly been developing for some years. Colton’s parents were proud their son had continued their family work.

  The spread included one barn for the mares and geldings and one for the studs. Because of the Tisdales’ growing reputation, his herd was vibrant and growing as well. It seemed to Wade that the work would be incredibly difficult and time-consuming.

  “I’m impressed. You’ve really started to build up a great herd here. I’ve heard a lot of people on the circuit talking about your horses—not just the breeding but the training too. A Triple M horse is worth something these days. You’ve accomplished a lot in the past few years. But then you always did have an eye for good horseflesh.”

  Colton wasn’t about to downplay the difficulty of his career, but certainly wanted to share the credit for all they’d accomplished. He nodded in agreement with the slightly older cowboy.

  “It was a lot of hard work, and a good bit of luck too. To be honest, I could never have done it without Mal. We make a helluva team.”

  For the second time in their walk, Wade stopped up short.

  “Mal? Your sister Mallory? I thought you said she was a lawyer.”

  Colton laughed, putting his hand on Wade’s good shoulder.

  “Oh, she is, but she can’t help herself from sticking her nose in everywhere else as well. She handles the business side—she’s a corporate lawyer mainly, but she also does a lot of the training as well, mornings, evenings, and weekends. She says this way she gets to use her brains and indulge her passion too. And I’m thankful she does, but I do worry it means she works too hard.”

  About this time, Wade made a turn at the end
of the row of stalls, and something caught his eye. His own name, carved into a wooden slat at the top of an interior gate. Had he not come in at this hour, with so much ambient light, he would have missed it.

  Across its surface was his name, and Mallory’s. There must have been thirty examples of the carving. Wade was stunned. And humored.

  It was clear that this must have been done long ago, for the entire wooden slat had been painted since, the painted board only showing ghosts and shadows of the work done to mark it up.

  Realizing how old this must be, Wade was curious now, wondering what might still be. He noted that there hadn’t been a mention of a social life.

  “Hmm…doesn’t sound like she has much time left over for guys.”

  Colton turned to face his friend head on. The color left his cheeks, and a hardness that Wade hadn’t seen in Colton’s eyes burned into his chest.

  “She doesn’t. Not since she came home from Chicago. And you’re not to get any ideas about her either. I saw the way you looked at her just now, have seen men look at her that way before, and it can’t go any further than that. I love you like a brother, but I know the lifestyle you lead and the rate you go through women. I won’t have my little sister be just another notch on your belt buckle. Besides, you’re only going to be staying around here for a few months before you take off again.”

  Wade started to speak, but Colton continued, “I know you, Wade. I’ve seen your work and the carnage you leave behind. You would make her fall in love with you and then you’d leave for the rodeo without a backwards glance. Mal’s ballsy and independent, but she’s also open and loving, and you would break her heart. You need to put that idea right out of your head.”

  Wade stared at his dusty cowboy boots for a minute, acknowledging the truth in his friend’s words, before lifting his head and meeting Colton’s eyes. As a matter of fact, in his own mind, Granddad was already slapping at the back of his head, wondering how quickly he could possibly have lost the sting of the way Lilah had just treated him, thrown away what he thought they had together. He nodded in agreement and put out his hand to shake Colton’s.

  “I hear you, brother. You don’t have to worry about me. Mallory is strictly off limits.”

  Colton nodded, satisfied. He clapped him on the shoulders and turned him toward the house.

  “Good. Cause I would hate to have to pound your sorry ass into the ground. You are my oldest friend after all. Come on, let’s grab a beer and catch up. It’s been far too long.”

  Somewhere in the distance, a coyote’s sharp call noted the end of a long afternoon.

  Chapter 4

  The town of Cherish could have been any town, USA. The aging main street still had some thriving businesses, and a few closed doors—a sign of the times.

  Coming from the south, which just about everybody did when coming home to the town, the Cherish Community Cemetery was on the right. Like most small towns, there wasn’t a need for a fence around the cemetery; it only got larger incrementally, and there was still plenty of land to accommodate new burials. Its mute gateway sat across from the now-defunct Cherish Truck Stop and Restaurant. On the left side of the road, it had been empty and unused for nearly ten years, but since the family who owned it had done nothing with the land, nothing had changed.

  The next block was where you’d find the town’s movie theater, the grocery store, and Kitty’s Café.

  The theater actually shut down a few years back, for lack of attendance, but the high school drama club decided to try and save it. They had fundraisers, wrote editorial letters—the works. Eventually, they won and the town had to re-open the theater, but the kids got a surprise when they contacted the distribution houses for films. Since the maximum seating was only 40, the big box-office movies would not offer them first-run or special releases. That meant they were stuck running second- or third-run films. Still, in the name of keeping their school’s spirit high, it sold out every show.

  The grocery store still bore the logo and the feel of the old Independent Grocers Association–IGA. Though its formal name was “Talbert’s Grocery and Sundry,” most folks around still called it the “eye-jee-yay.” In truth, it acted more like a convenience store, since there was a Walmart in Deer Run and a Target in Douglas.

  The bank, post office, and county seat all occupied the middle block of the “active” part of downtown. Then there was the city park, with squeaky but serviceable playground equipment, which was quartered off by the three main religious stalwarts—Catholic, Baptist, and Church of Christ—and the volunteer-manned “City Librar” (it used to be a “Library,” but in 2005, some fool teenagers used a cutting torch and stole the “y”; ever since then, it had been known as the “Librar”).

  The center of all activity in Cherish was Kitty’s Café. Themed like a 1950s roadside diner—which it still was— it was the favorite café in town (to be honest, it was the only café/bakery/restaurant in town). Kitty’s family had been in Cherish since its founding, it seemed, and the smell of sweet rolls, maple bars, and all other kinds of baked goods wafted halfway through town every morning.

  Just about anybody who had a way to get to town stopped by Kitty’s for a bite to eat or at least a cup of coffee. The ambiance was steeped in cowboy history and hearkened back to the days of the city saloon.

  Though it smacked of “tourist trap” shenanigans, the owners put in a miniature player piano and a swinging saloon door that wanted customers to feel like they were in the “Wild West.”

  And during the county fair, local gun enthusiasts would host a “fast draw” competition, pose for photographs, and otherwise make like a Wild West saloon. Three weeks later, the festivities would be a memory for another year.

  Outside the café were six-feet-tall wooden paintings of a few standards of the American West: a gambler, a dancing girl, a cowboy, and a preacher. Without heads. Tourists, and rambunctious teens, were urged to pose behind the paintings, taking on the body, if you will, of these characters. Funny stuff.

  The original “Kitty” rolled into town in the 1940s, after the war, and her great-granddaughter (whose name was actually Katherine, but had been “Kitty” all her life) waved cheerily at Mal from behind the counter as she made her way over to her usual table at the window where her two friends were already waiting. She plopped rather frumpily into her usual seat, smiling sleepily.

  “You’re late.”

  Looking at her watch, Mallory was chastised by her friend, Cindy Bateman, a pretty petite blond with bouncing curls and a mischievous smile. Cindy’s flat tone wasn’t really her fault. Being the niece of the town’s newspaper owner meant everyone assumed she knew everything about everybody else. Not that being considered the town’s foremost gossip resource tends to drag one down, because if one didn’t know the latest before the conversation, one certainly would thereafter. Actually, she loved her role, but in the mornings, it just seemed far too much like work. She was the one to “discover” Mallory after she came back from the “City” (to Cindy, every place outside Cherish was a city). Cindy formally worked the reception desk at the hospital (the town’s one real source of revenue was the only medical facility for about as many miles as the school bus reached). The hospital had about twenty-six beds, and one wing acted as the county’s Skilled Nursing Center, dealing with the few old folks who still lived there.

  “Yes, late.” Sitting next to Cindy was her nearly constant companion, Tara Fisher, a voluptuous brunette. Tara drove the city’s one school bus that starts picking up in town and takes the kids over to Muddy Gap to the only school for almost a hundred miles. It was at least steady work. She was also half of the town’s Volunteer Ambulance service, so she stayed busy most of the year “standing by.”

  Mallory eyed them with exasperation, rolling her deep green eyes as she sank into her favorite chair. “I’m not late. It’s not like we have a date here at a certain time or anything. We’re just here every day because there’s nowhere else in town that does pastries
like Kitty does. Besides,” she said, consulting her watch, “it’s only seven minutes past six. That’s plenty of time before you two to head off to the hospital and I need to be at the rodeo grounds.”

  Tara nodded emphatically, then reversed herself and shook her head just as emphatically when she noted that Cindy disapproved of the nodding.

  “Well, yes, (nodding) but you’re always here by precisely six (shaking). You’re like a machine. In the two years since you’ve been home you’ve never been late. Not even once. We should know, we’re always here too (still shaking).”

  Cindy nodded in agreement (with the shaking—very confusing to an on-looker, but making very Cindy-and-Tara-like sense) and the two women leaned conspiratorially toward Mallory.

  “Well, what is it that made you so late and tired-looking? Was it a mystery man, keeping you up all night with hot, hot sex? Dish!”

  Mallory rolled her eyes. She had been home two years this month, true, but she had still not gotten used to the simple pleasures of small-town life, like knowing who was sleeping with whom.

  “Guys, chill. I was just up late trying to clear my plate a little so I could spend some more time training. It’s time to start breaking in the three-year-olds. Besides, if I was up all night having ‘hot, hot sex,’ you would probably know about it before I did. You know what this town’s like.”

  The two friends across from her looked at one another, shrugged in resigned agreement, and moved their attention on to the latest gossip between the doctors and nurses in the town’s clinic.

  Mallory squirmed a little uncomfortably in her seat. What she had told them wasn’t entirely accurate. She hadn’t been up all night with a man in her bed, but she certainly had one in her head.

  It wasn’t a physical attraction in particular that drew her to thinking about Wade. All her life, she’d known the Williamsons; most folks in town had at least a passing interest in the Williamson family—they were one of the biggest, most involved ranch families in the valley.