“I’m sorry,” she said, breaking the spell. She pulled away from me slowly. We walked off the dance floor but not immediately back to the table.
“No. My fault.” I never wanted her to be sorry for anything. “I thought I knew how Gabe led that step. I’ll have to get him to show me.”
Her eyes left mine and turned to the band as they wrapped up the song. I wanted her eyes back on me. I wanted her to tell me I wasn’t crazy. “They’re good,” she said, “but I like your version better.”
“My version?”
“You were singing the whole time.” Her eyes twinkled boldly. She leaned over and hesitantly placed a chaste kiss on my cheek. “Thank you.”
It wasn’t the kind of kiss I’d been thinking about, but it set my body on fire nonetheless. She was gone then, a flurry of goodbyes at the table while I stood stunned, feeling like the tilt of the planet must have shifted.
Chapter Twenty-One
That kiss, that simple chaste kiss, was all I thought about on Saturday. Every time I recalled her lips on my cheek, my stomach fluttered. I’d missed the tickle of interest. I called her that afternoon at the diner to tell her I’d be ready for book club Sunday if she was game. She didn’t hesitate, saying she’d drive out to my place at two.
I kept my place pretty tidy because I was always worried that Mrs. Owens was going to do a spot check sometime, though no one in the family had ever acted like I was a scrudgy renter. I alternated between cleaning and reading. Hope had not seen my house, and I wanted to make a good impression. I hoped my habitat came across as appealing and homey.
Sunday morning, after our breakfast meditation, I took Daisy out to explore some of the fire access roads Kristine had told me about. Shower, lunch and baking followed. I had to get my cranberry loaves out of the oven before Hope arrived. Plus the smell of baking bread always comforts me. Hope responded the second she walked in, breathing deeply. I wanted to hug her, but she passed right by me, beginning her assessment of the place immediately.
“Gabe’s had this place for years, but I haven’t ever seen the inside. It’s set nicely on the property, isn’t it?”
I agreed, pointing out that I could see Daisy grazing from both the living room and kitchen windows. I kept glancing back at her, and each time I did, her eyes were on me, not the field. “Feel free to give yourself a tour,” I said. “Through here is my bedroom, and you can circle all the way through the place.”
“Thanks, I will.” Before she left the kitchen, she hovered over the loaves cooling on the counter. “You made these from scratch.”
“You can tell?”
“I can smell a box mix from thirty paces,” she quipped.
I was still trying to factor our dancing, whether that had changed the course of our friendship, when she walked by me, playfully bumping my hip with hers. She left me tingling in the kitchen and passed quickly through my bedroom. There wasn’t much to see, neatly made bed and a few pictures on my dresser. An Ansel Adams print of aspen trees on the wall. She spent more time in my office and was still there when I set the sliced bread on the large spool that served as a rustic coffee table.
“Halley said you were an accomplished rider. I had no idea you had so many awards. What possessed you to leave rodeo?”
I leaned on the doorway following her gaze to the pictures of me and Daisy being awarded barrel racing titles all over the country and the belt buckles I’d collected.
“The dream I was chasing shifted direction. According to the country song, all you get from chasing rodeo is broken bones.” Gabe would have filled in that the song goes on to say you get a broken home too, which I had, even though I’d left rodeo.
“Sorry. I don’t see how teaching at a tiny college compares to all of this.” Her voice held some awe. I couldn’t resist sharing stories from some of my more exciting wins. In my defense, she kept asking questions, so I liked to believe I hadn’t bored her to tears. When I shared Daisy’s status on the circuit, she remembered Gabe talking about Kristine pressuring me to breed my mare to one of their donkeys, which got us talking about Kristine’s visit.
We eventually made it back to the topic of rodeo, and she asked if my family was upset with me leaving. I still felt sore with them for being relieved that I’d left something that made me happy. I didn’t know whether I wanted to get into all that with Hope, especially since it was all tied into Candy leaving me. Even if they didn’t agree with my choices, I wanted to feel like I had their support. “Not so much,” I said.
Wanting to shift topics made me realize how long we’d been hovering in my office, maybe because it felt safe there. I pushed off from the doorframe and with a tilt of my chin invited her to sit in the living room.
She accepted a warm piece of bread and took a bite. I waited, captivated by her expression of bliss, her eyes shut and slow, seductive chewing. When she opened her eyes, she smiled openly at my watching her. “You can bake for me any day. I can’t say that I’ve had better. Is there orange peel in there?”
“Zested it myself,” I said, pleased beyond measure. “I have water on for tea. I’ve got some red rooibos, some lemon, chamomile…” Coming to the end of my meager list, I worried that I wouldn’t have anything she liked.
“Lemon sounds nice,” she said.
I disappeared into the kitchen.
“So why weren’t your parents upset when you walked away from rodeo glory?”
Laughing, I placed a hot pad and then the pot and two teacups on the table. I sat down next to her on the couch, taking a slice of bread. Holding it up, I said, “I thought I’d distracted you with this.”
“Family is important,” she said, staying firmly on the topic.
“No, they weren’t upset. They never liked that I stayed in it as long as I did.”
“Really?”
“Mom, Dad and one of my brothers all work in banking. My other brother is an attorney. They never got the horse thing. I think they hoped I’d grow out of it.”
“What do they think about the job here in Quincy?”
“It makes things a little bit better. At least they can tell their friends that I’m a professor at a college. They don’t have to get into the specifics, that it’s a tiny college and an equine program.”
“Isn’t Texas full of cowboys and rodeo?”
“That’s what Hollywood projects, but there are plenty of folks who’ve never stepped on a ranch or made their fortune in oil. And rodeo isn’t their idea of prestigious. My family is that classic American Dream story. My grandmother’s parents emigrated from Mexico. She met a German working the fields, and they did all they could to educate their children, get them as far away from dirt as possible. My great-grandmother didn’t want to come. Her parents owned a ranch in Mexico, and she loved to ride. Do you know The House on Mango Street?”
“Sandra Cisneros. Are you trying to make this a more reputable book club?”
I smiled at her. “We should talk about the book. The third one is my favorite so far. But no. I brought up Cisneros because one of the characters, Esperanza, talks about her grandmother…” It wasn’t until I said her name that I remembered the English translation.
At the hiccup in my recollection, Hope stopped chewing.
“In Spanish, esperanza means hope.”
Hope held the moment between us and then swallowed. “What does she remember about her grandmother?” she asked with real interest.
“She says, ‘I would’ve liked to have known her, a wild horse of a woman…’ I feel like that about my great-grandmother. I would have liked to have talked horses with her. She would have understood me.”
Her eyes lingered on mine. I felt the moment extend between us, fanning the same spark I’d felt when we were dancing. She’d understood me when we were dancing. Maybe she understood more. Maybe we were discovering a deeper connection. I wanted to say something that would bend us in that direction, open the door to that conversation. With a horse, I knew intuitively how to communicate. Why
did I question myself with Hope? Before I could speak, she blinked away, releasing my heart from its hopeful dream.
“Now you’re trying to impress me, quoting literature,” she said, her voice rich and warm.
“Hey, I just told you I wasn’t raised in a barn. I went to university.” People dating tried to impress each other. Had she said that on purpose? Our afternoon tea and bread suddenly took on an unanticipated feeling of intimacy.
“My mother was a horsewoman too,” Hope said wistfully.
My eyes drifted to the curve of her inviting lips. I told myself to look away. What was I thinking fantasizing about kissing someone who had broken up with Gabe because of her faith? When I finally convinced myself to look up, I found that I’d lingered too long. Hope’s chin tilted slightly as my eyes met hers again. What had we been talking about? Her mother. I got the impression her mom wasn’t around but didn’t know how to ask. “Halley told me her boots were her mom’s.” I poured tea, giving us something to do with our hands, something else to occupy our mouths. We sat in almost companionable silence sipping the tea, my heart beating a little faster than it should.
Hope broke the silence, returning to the topic of her mother. “She died when Hallelujah was five. I was fifteen.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “That left a lot of the mothering to you, then?” I’d seen enough of her interaction with her sister to catch on to her role in the family and wondered if it extended to her brothers as well.
“It did. I would have liked to have known my mother better. I hang on really tight to the things I remember about her and the position it put me in, having to take over from her. Now that my brothers are grown, I’m starting to think I might be holding on too tight. It’s hard to know what I can let go of.”
“Is it hard to see Halley wearing your mom’s boots?” I asked, hoping I wasn’t intruding.
“No. It’s like having a piece of her back. Familiar sounds and smells that I had forgotten. It’s like being visited by her friendly ghost.” She talked a little bit about the horse her mother had owned and how Halley was the only one who seemed to have been bitten by the horse bug.
“Can I ask about the name Hallelujah?” I’d been curious ever since I’d seen it on my roster.
Hope laughed, a joyous sound that turned the tone of our conversation back to something more cheerful. “We all have H names. My brothers are Harrison and Hyrum. My mom was pregnant, and we’d been brainstorming names the whole time. One afternoon, we were all on our way to Reno. Before the school year, we would go to the department store out there—better than trying to get it all in Quincy. We were at Hallelujah Junction, and the whole family went quiet. We all just knew.”
“What is Hallelujah Junction?”
“If you’re heading out Route 70, that’s where it hits Route 395 heading toward Reno.”
“I have a hard time picturing your family in Reno,” I said, testing the water on the topic of religion.
“A little ironic, I agree. It’s not like we hit the casinos or shows,” she said. “You’ve been?”
“Women’s Pro Rodeo has an event there.”
“That you’ve won.”
I shrugged. “A time or two.”
Hope appraised me, and I needed to know in what capacity. The more time I spent with her, the more I found myself thinking of her as someone who could be more than a friend. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d spent the afternoon riding a conversation through twists and turns, never at a loss for what to say. Hope matched me in so many ways. Were it not for the question of religious roadblocks, I would have boasted about the hearts I’d won in an attempt to eke out some information about her dating history. Somewhat startled, I realized I’d have liked to make a run for her heart. She reached forward and poured herself more tea. She gestured toward my cup, but I declined. “I feel like a piggy eating up all your bread.” She helped herself to another slice.
“It’s a nice compliment,” I said, enjoying the way the afternoon sun warmed her face. I glanced at my watch, surprised at how much time had passed. “I’m afraid it’s all I have to offer as far as food goes though, and it’s heading toward dinnertime.”
Hope thought for a moment. “Let me check in with Halley. Sunday dinner is kind of a big thing.”
I nodded, surprised that she’d consider extending her visit with me, and at the same time exhilarated at the prospect. I left the room to give her some privacy, though the place was so small that I heard most of her conversation, the question about their dinner plans, the series of “Ohs,” that meant her sister was delivering answers that didn’t exactly please Hope. “He’s already there? Uh-huh…oh. Okay, I’ll be home in a bit then.” I heard disappointment in her voice, disappointment that I shared. I hadn’t wanted our afternoon to end.
She found me tidying the kitchen. “You’ve got to go.”
“My family…” she said as if there was more to say that she didn’t quite want to get into.
“I get it,” I said. “Family is important.”
She looked relieved and stepped forward to give me a hug. I savored the feel of her body next to mine. Hers was not a stiff-armed friends hug. She put herself where I could feel her heart beating against mine, like being in my arms was the only place in the world she wanted to be. “There were things I wanted to say,” she said, sounding tentative. I wished I could see her face.
My heart felt tight in my chest. I badly wanted to hear that her body had been talking to her when we were dancing or that she wanted to while away more minutes with me, even if we were just doing nothing. I wanted this woman to like me. If I was being honest with myself, I wanted more than that…which really scared me. If she stayed in my arms any longer, I was going to have to kiss her, but there was too much I didn’t know to risk such a gesture. I pulled out of the hug and said, “I promise we’ll stick to the book questions I prepared next time.”
Her eyes twinkled at me as she stepped away, all the more charming for the freckles that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed for so many months. I wanted to kiss each one of them.
“Thank you for this time,” she said.
“You keep thanking me.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t,” she said mysteriously. “We’ll see…”
Chapter Twenty-Two
For years, Sunday dinner had been a grounding point for Hope. It was a concrete thing she could keep the same as when her mother had been alive. She always prepared or helped her father prepare a roasted ham or turkey. She continued her mother’s tradition of using the good china, and there was always dessert. Being in the kitchen following recipes written in her mother’s hand never failed to make Hope feel close to her mother. Amid all the changes over the years, Hope prided herself in keeping that tradition, hovering over the younger children as she taught them to wash, dry and put away the special dishes carefully in the dining room hutch. Her mother had thought it important that everyone contribute to the meal.
Before Hope had left for Dani’s, she had done all the dinner prep and instructed Halley when to put various dishes in the oven if she was late. It had not occurred to her that she would still be at Dani’s when everything was coming out of the oven. Even more surprising was how easy it would have been to skip it all together. She’d enjoyed her afternoon with Dani that much.
On the drive home, she thought about the last time she had missed a Sunday dinner, when she was away at college. For the first time, family dinner felt like duty calling.
She walked into the house and took a deep breath, assessing the situation. The ham was out, and Halley already had the cherry-berry cobbler in. Her father loved fruit for dessert, and she’d splurged by pulling a few jars she’d preserved from the pantry as a winter treat.
“You got caught up at work?” Halley asked as Hope entered the kitchen, tying an apron.
“No, I called Michelle in today.”
“So you were…”
“Out,” Hope said evasively.
“
Are you dating Gabe again?” she whispered.
“No.” Hope shot down her question with a little more force than she’d intended. “Dani and I got together to talk books.”
“Wait. You and my professor read the same books?”
“I got her into the Mercy Thomsen series.”
“You’re joking. She reads that stuff?”
Hope shrugged. “She does now.”
Halley nodded appreciatively. “Did she say anything about the spring training class I’m taking?”
“She didn’t mention school. We were talking about books, remember?”
“How’d you even get on the subject of those books?” Halley asked.
Their father halted their conversation simply by stepping into the room. He rubbed his close-cropped beard. “That’s a long time to be talking about books if you were with her all afternoon, leaving Halley to prepare our dinner.”
Hope bit back a comment about how much she had worked on their dinner before she had left.
“Brother Weston is dining with us this evening. Would you be kind enough to join us?”
Hope met Halley’s eyes after their father stepped out of the room. Halley blew out a long, loud breath. “He’s an odd one. That’s why I was worried about getting through dinner on my own.”
“From our ward?”
“No. He was visiting last week. He’s on the high council and gave one of the talks. He lives in Portola.”
“Oh,” Hope answered, confused. More typically, her family invited the local missionaries or one of the officials from the church. The only time they had guests from outside their ward was when her father was playing matchmaker. She wiped her hands on her apron and joined her father and his guest in the living room.
“Brother Weston, this is Hope, my eldest.” By her father’s tone, Hope knew that this was something formal, that his leniency regarding her not attending church was not relevant while this guest was present.
The Right Thing Easy Page 11
