One Fine Cowboy
Page 31
Epilogue
Sam shook her head, and the carefully arranged flowers decking her hair tumbled to the floor for the third time.
“Oops,” she said.
“Sam!” Phaedra gathered the flowers and set them aside, then smoothed Sam’s hair with a comb and rebraided it. “Sit still,” she said to the fidgeting child. “You want to look nice for the wedding, don’t you?”
Sam sighed and nodded, banging her feet against the rungs of the kitchen chair she’d been forced into when she’d snuck out to visit Peach and streaked dirt on her lacy pink dress.
“I wish Mom could have come,” she said.
“She had to work,” Phaedra said. Sandi had gone to beauty school after all. Sam went down to Denver every other weekend and “helped” her in the salon she shared with three other graduates.
“I know. It’s okay,” Sam said. “She likes her job a lot better than she likes the ranch anyway.”
In the next room, Nate shifted his weight nervously from one foot to the other and picked at a loose thread on the sleeve of his black dinner jacket.
“Leave that thing alone,” Taylor said. “You’ll have the whole thing unraveled if you don’t watch it. I’m not standing up as best man to a naked cowboy, I can tell you that. That’d be sure to hit the tabloids.”
Nate grinned. In the year they’d been in business together, he and Taylor had built up a solid friendship—a friendship, not a partnership. He hadn’t really needed Taylor’s money. One trip to a lawyer had revealed even more lies on Sandi’s part. There was no such thing as common law marriage in Wyoming.
Sandi didn’t have any claim on the ranch at all.
But Charlie had talked him into teaming up with Taylor anyway, and it had worked out fine. Together, they’d trained a half-dozen reining horses for film work, and Taylor had kept a steady stream of actors, friends, and wannabe wranglers coming to the clinics.
Then there were the kids. Nate felt like a father to every one of the long parade of high school misfits that had arrived at the ranch, their spirits broken and bruised. Every one of them had left stronger—not healed, not totally, but well on their way.
Who knew you could care so much about kids that weren’t your own?
Charlie. She’d known. And she’d taught him, and enriched his life beyond anything he’d ever dreamed of.
“How’s the work on the house going?” Taylor asked. Nate knew Taylor was just trying to distract him. He didn’t know why he was so nervous. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to marry Charlie. The past year had been perfect—except that they hadn’t had time to make their relationship official. Nate wanted everything nailed down so their life together would never change.
“It’s going okay,” he said. “Charlie won’t let me change that wallpaper in the kitchen, though. Or the cabinets.”
Taylor shook his head. “That is not a normal woman you’ve got there,” he said.
“Nope,” Nate said. That was the best thing about Charlie. He couldn’t believe he’d ever thought of her as girlie. Working by his side in her battered Wranglers and ripped T-shirts, her hair grown long and her nails cut short, she looked like she’d been ranching all her life. Beautiful still, but healthy and wholesome. The perfect rancher’s wife.
He wondered how she’d look today. The gown had been guarded like a state secret.
An organ chord resounded through the church. Nate licked his lips and straightened his tie.
“Here we go,” Taylor said. The two of them covered the aisle in seconds; Purvis’s tiny church wasn’t exactly geared toward long processions. Taking his place before the daisy-decked altar, Nate turned to watch as the organ reeled into the “Wedding March” and Sam trotted out of the apse strewing flowers from a woven basket. Behind her walked the most beautiful creature Nate had ever seen.
Charlie had brought the best of her old Jersey girl self back for the wedding. The gown was a fitted white sheath that hugged every curve. Her hair was up in an elaborate ’do that brought to mind her old, spiky style, and she’d painted her lips scarlet and made her eyes look smoky and mysterious. He was reminded of the exotic creature he’d first seen standing beside the crippled Celica, but the smile tilting her lips was a far cry from the scowl she’d worn that first day.
The woman beside her was smiling too. It was a hard-won smile. Mona Banks hadn’t been pleased when her daughter gave up her education to “play cowgirl,” but a visit to the ranch had changed her mind.
It had changed the ranch too. Charlie’s mother had fussed so much about her daughter’s cooking that Nate told her to do it her own danged self, and she’d gone and done just that. She was the center of the household now, ruling the ranch kitchen, churning out massive amounts of food that kept the clients almost too full to ride. She’d outlawed sugary cereal for breakfast, but she’d made up for it with fluffy omelets and the best pancakes Nate had ever had.
She’d never pull another waitress shift in her life if he had anything to say about it.
The preacher was talking. Charlie’s mother was giving her away, but all Nate could do was stare at his wife-to-be through a haze of happiness. Charlie stepped up beside him, and he couldn’t stop smiling. He probably looked like the dumb cowboy she’d taken him for that first day. Well, now she was taking him again, for better or for worse. For richer or for poorer.
Forever.
His soon-to-be-wife lowered her lashes modestly, then glanced up at him and smiled.
“Love me?” she asked, cocking her head to one side.
He nodded.
He’d always been better at nonverbal communication.
THE END
Acknowledgments
It’s a good thing I had a two-book contract, so I can thank all the people I left out of my first attempt at acknowledgments. Practice should make perfect, but I still feel like a drunken starlet blinded by the bright lights at an awards ceremony.
It takes six things to make a romance writer: a supportive family, a critique group, good friends, a brilliant agent, a great publisher, and a heart-stopping, samba-dancing, rock-’em, sock-’em relationship for singin’-hallelujah, take-your-breath-away inspiration.
I covered that last item in the dedication. Now for the other five:
My family: My parents, Don and Betty Smyth, gave me the support I needed to finally, finally become a writer. My sister, Carolyn Smyth, inspired me with her creative spirit. Web genius Scott McCauley proved you can combine family and work. And Alycia Fleury and her family have continued to enrich my life.
My writing groups: Thanks to Jeana Byrne, Mary Gilgannon, Heather Jensen, Liz Roadifer, and Mike Shay, who helped me through some tough times and offered the perfect balance of advice and encouragement. I love you guys! And to the Saturday Writers—Amanda Cabot, Tina Forkner, Pam Nowak, and Marjie Smith—I admire you all so much, and your support means everything.
My friends: Belated thanks to Cheyenne’s illustrious Barnes & Nobility, including Linda Herget, CRM extraordinaire, as well as B2 and the entire management crew for putting up with my whining. And to the staff and the regulars—thanks for making my first publishing experience such an event! I’m also grateful to Laura Macomber and Jeff Brown for their never-ending support, and to Mike and Amy Bell for their friendship.
My brilliant agent: Thank you, Elaine English, for always being there when I need you. And thank you to Naomi Hackenberg and the fabulous interns, for making this very solitary job feel like a team effort. If you’re a writer, trust me—you need an agent, and if you’re lucky, you’ll find one like mine.
My great publisher: Editor Deb Werksman, publisher Dominique Raccah, and publicist Danielle Jackson. You are an awesome all-girl A-team of publishing superwomen. Thank you for helping my books be the best they can be.
Okay, I know I said five. But evidently, I’m still in drunken starlet mode because I forgot what is possibly the most important element of all in any writer’s success: the readers. Thank you, thank you, thank
you to all the readers and reviewers who helped make Cowboy Trouble a success. I hope you enjoy this next book, and the one after that—because really, they’re for you. And if there’s anything else you want, let me know at www.joannekennedybooks.com.
About the Author
After dabbling in horse training and chicken farming in Pennsylvania, Joanne Kennedy ran away to Wyoming twenty years ago and was surprised to discover that real cowboys still walk the streets of Cheyenne. Her fascination with Wyoming’s unique blend of past and present leads her to write contemporary Western romances with traditional ranch settings. She lives in Wyoming with two dogs and a retired fighter pilot. The dogs are relatively well-behaved.
Joanne loves to hear from readers and can be reached at joanne@joannekennedybooks.com.
Table of Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Table of Contents
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Cover