by Rose, Amelia
He looked at her sheepishly and conceded his mistake. “Best gift all year?” She shook her head slowly, pretending to glare at him. “How about all week?” She crossed her arms in front of her defiantly and playfully dared him to keep digging himself into a hole. He finally took the hint and wrapped her in his arms again.
“Being the most wonderful woman in the world and my wife is the best gift ever, and you give that to me every day. I love you, Miranda.”
+++
The dinner dishes had all been washed and the animals were bedded down for the night, and the cowboys who would keep watch over their herd that night were already in place. They were only a day’s ride from their destination, meaning the most important and highly trafficked part of the drive was still ahead of them. The riders and city people were gathered around the large campfire, swapping stories about their favorite parts of the drive. During a lull in the talking as the weight of a good kind of exhaustion began to take its toll, one man stood up and walked near the campfire, its light throwing his shadow out before him and making him look even larger than usual.
He carried his tin cup from his mess kit and banged its side gently with the back of his pocket knife’s blade, calling everyone’s attention to the center of their group. He cleared his throat, and waited for the conversations to die down.
Nearby, the young lady he’d just been sitting with looked up in wonder, waiting to see what he had to say. It had been a long drive, and they’d learned so much about each other as the miles passed under their horses’ hooves. They had talked about their goals for the future, the stories from their pasts, their families and friends, their triumphs and their fears. In just those few weeks, they’d learned more about each other than many people learn in a lifetime of companionship.
“If it’s all right with you guys, I’d like to say something. Right here, in front of all of you. You see, I came from very humble beginnings, and I like to think that I’ve worked hard, learned a lot, and really begun to make something of myself. And god willing, I’ll keep on growing into the kind of man who deserves to spend even ten minutes with a wonderful woman, let alone the rest of my life.
“So that’s why I need all of you to vouch for me. You’ve gotten to know me over the course of this adventure, and I like to think that I’ve made this trip that much better for all of you. I know each of you has made this the best trip I’ve ever taken. It’s been hard work, and there were moments when it got downright scary, but I’ve come through it a better person for it. A better man, even.
“So with your permission—all of you, that is—I’d like you to speak up for me, to explain to the one person whose opinion I care the most about in this world, that I’m a good man who will move mountains for her, or die trying.”
The group was silent as he spoke, then watched jubilantly as he walked forward and dropped to one knee. He reached into the pocket of his well-worn jeans, the dust and stains of the drive still marking the hard work he’d put into it, and retrieved a small velvet box which he held out to one very awestruck girl.
“Rose, I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?”
The crowd of cowboys who had worked side by side in the saddle with Mason for several years gasped, waiting as breathlessly as he did for an answer. The guests looked around the group in confusion, wondering if this was all part of the “cowboy experience,” or if they were being granted the gift of witnessing a genuine declaration of love.
Rose looked around at the others who were seated closest to her, watching them as they watched her for a response. They were as anxious as Mason for an answer, but no one had waited for this moment longer than she. She stood up and walked towards him, looking into his eyes to make sure he was serious before throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him.
“She said yes, in case y’all didn’t hear her say her line!” Mason called out over Rose’s shoulder as she hugged him. The group broke into applause, and Mason’s fellow riders yelled out their congratulations over the noise of the people cheering. Off in the distance, several members of the herd looked up at the sudden whooping noise coming from around the campfire, startled for a moment before returning to their rest.
The triplets, as they’d come to be called by more than a few of the cowboys over the course of the drive, looked on with their best attempts at smiles plastered in place. They clapped half-heartedly when the groups broke out in applause. One of the elderly women seated nearby looked over at them and called out for only them to hear, “That’s the kind of girl a real man marries!”
Her friends shushed her, shocked by the nerve it must have taken to put those three in their place, but the woman only sat back and looked around smugly. “What? Someone needed to tell them! It might as well be me. And seeing as how this is the last night, this is their only chance for someone to tell them to wise up and get with the program! Otherwise, they’ll spend the rest of their lives looking for someone to love them.”
From their vantage point near their families, Casey and Carey exchanged a knowing look. Both Mason and Rose had been working for them—and dating—for such a long time that it was often hard to forget they weren’t already officially signed and sealed. They shared a conspiratorial look, remembering how much the cattle drives of years past had played a role in their own happiness.
“You know, Rose being our first cousin and all and not having her own parents or brothers around to look after her, aren’t we supposed to do something awful to Mason for this?” Seamus asked, coming up between his oldest brothers and clapping his massive hands down on their shoulders.
“Hmmm, that’s not a bad idea. I certainly don’t recall him asking our blessing, or even asking permission to marry her. Heck, I’m pretty sure he never even asked our permission to date her.”
Casey chimed in. “Let’s give it a while. It’s always really fun to take someone out the night before his wedding and tie him naked to a fence post in the far pastures. If he really wants to get married to her, he’ll find a way to get home in time. We’re practically doing her a favor by making him prove how much he wants to be her husband.”
The three of them laughed as they plotted their fun revenge against their poor, unsuspecting ranch hand. Rose heard the sound of their maniacal glee and looked over at them, instantly curious and suspicious at the same time. She’d only know the Carsons for as long as she’d known Mason, but she already knew them well enough to know that something was up. They quickly turned serious and looked off in different directions, only adding to how guilty they looked instead of hiding it.
“Something’s going on, Mason,” Rose warned him through gritted teeth, keeping her smile in place as her cousins looked on. “I don’t know what they’re planning, but they’re certainly planning something!”
“Uh oh. I know those guys. It could be bad, really, really bad. Maybe I should rethink this whole thing…” He started to walk away but Rose grabbed his sleeve and dragged him back to her, securing him within her arms.
“Don’t worry, they’ll have to get through me to try anything. I can take on grabby black widow women, and I can take on a passel of cowboys intent on whatever it is they have in store for you.” She punctuated her promise with a kiss, much to the delight of the crowd still resting by the fire.
“Never mind them,” Mason answered with a gleam in his eye. “I’m so happy right now, I don’t care what they’re up to. Let ‘em try it, you’re worth plenty more than they can dish out!”
Carey watched the happy couple for a moment longer and turned to Casey, a whole new business venture for Carson Hill forming in his mind.
“Seeing as how this is… what… three, four couples who’ve tied the knot in some way on the drive, what do you think about a new marketing tactic for the city people: cattle drive dating service?” Carey asked, ribbing his brother good naturedly. Casey had been the first of their bunch to actually get married, which wasn’t all that strange seeing as how he was the
oldest, but the fact that he’d actually married his bride on the first night of the cattle drive with a fire lit ceremony under the stars brought back fond memories.
“I don’t know, I think that little bunch over there had that in mind when they signed on for this trip, and it doesn’t look like it went according to their plan. If memory serves, they actually had their sights set on that one first!”
“Yeah, predators always wait on the fringes to bring down the sick or weak ones first. As romantic as you are, it’s a wonder they didn’t try to get their teeth into you, too!” Carey chided, reminding his brother about his tearful reunion with their dad and his even more tearful show of thanks to his wife.
“Me? You didn’t even make it through the whole drive that year that your wife came out as a paid guest, or have you forgotten all about that? At least I married the woman who was already dating me, you met your wife during the first week of the drive and then you took off with her! We never heard from the two of you again!”
“What can I say? There’s just something about a handsome, rugged cowboy that drives a rational woman completely insane,” Carey added, smiling as he looked back at the happy couple.
+++
The van that would carry the fatigued travelers to the airport idled by the curb of the hotel where everyone had finally gotten a real shower, a real dinner at a real table, and a great night’s sleep in a real bed. Several of the guests were already seated in the van as though they couldn’t wait to get home and climbing aboard would somehow speed things up.
Axel helped Laney stow her duffel bag in the back of the van with the others’ belongings, then took her hand and led her to a small café table beside the ornate front door. He looked at her as though he didn’t know what to say, finally at a loss for words once.
“I’m really glad you were here,” he said, dumbstruck by the awkward uselessness of his words. “It was great to finally get to meet the real you.”
“You know, a month ago that would have really put me in a bad mood, but now I can honestly say that I deserved that. I am a whole different person now, and I want this version of me to be the real me, the one that everyone gets to know from now on,” she agreed with a knowing look before laughing at him. “And it was great to finally get to call you a jerk after waiting for such a long time. What was it, a week at most?”
“Hey! It’s not my fault you’re gullible!” He ducked as Laney bent to flick a piece of decorative gravel at him.
“You made me eat a scorpion, Ax! An actual scorpion! I don’t know about you, but I’d say that warrants being called a name or two, and you’re lucky I chose to go with ‘jerk.’ Believe me, there were a few other names I had in mind, but my brother was sitting right there.” She smiled at the memory of his prank, realizing that the old Laney wouldn’t have handled it anywhere near as well as she did now.
“I swear I remember reading that somewhere, that if you ate a scorpion it would protect you from the venom of a bite! It’s like getting a flu shot, how having it in your system makes you immune!”
“You’re making that up, and you know it!” she accused him, but deep down she knew it was funny, too.
“No, I really did read it somewhere. I just didn’t say it was in an actual, verifiable book. It might have been something I saw on the internet,” he replied, grinning wickedly. She intertwined his fingers with his and looked down at their hands, awed by the way their fingers fit together. She never would have imagined that someone like Axel and someone like her would be so right together.
“I’m gonna miss you when you go,” he said quietly, looking away after a moment.
“It’s only for a few weeks, and you’ll be so busy with your brother that you won’t even notice the time passing. I get to go back to civilization, and you get to haul all the horses back to Texas. Right now, I’m trying to figure out who the real winner is,” she said, thinking wistfully of what it would be like to repeat the life-changing trip they’d just made, wondering what other things she might discover about herself along the way. She looked back at Axel. “Besides, school will start in a month, and then you’ll be back at Pentian. You are planning to come back to school, right?” She waited nervously for his answer, all too aware that this may have just been a fun diversion while they were on vacation, and that neither of them had made the other any promises about the future. A month was such a short time, but it was the same amount of time they’d known each other, and she knew that people’s feelings changed all too easily. She was living proof of that.
“Absolutely! And you haven’t seen an annoying ‘jerk’ until I’m showing up on your doorstep at six in the morning, wondering if you’re ready to come out yet!”
Laney stifled a relieved sigh, not wanting to be the one to have read more into the relationship than he did, but glad to know that he cared about her in the same way that she cared about him. She stood up and pulled him to his feet before wrapping her arms around his neck. “I miss you already. Hurry back, okay?”
“Wild horses couldn’t keep me away?” he joked, then pulled her into his arms. He kissed her for what must have been ages, because it was the sound of the van horn that finally brought them back to reality. They looked over in surprise and saw Oren in the driver’s seat, pressing the button on the steering wheel and making a face at them.
“Oh no, you don’t!” Laney called out. “I’m not falling for that again! I am NOT letting you drive the van!” She kissed Axel one last time and raced to rescue her little brother, calling out her goodbye as she went.
THE END
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Copyright
© 2014 by Amelia Rose
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.
First Printing, 2013
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