The Reluctant Cowgirl

by Christine Lynxwiler

  She made a face. “It wasn’t exactly my doing.”

  Okay, anyone else could see that. He, of all people, knew that love really was blind sometimes.

  “Although he did want me to take him back, even after I caught him with my roommate...”

  “Ouch.”

  “At least I had sense enough not to consider it.” She plucked a piece of grass up and examined it, then tossed it five feet short of the water.

  “That’s smarter than I’ve been at times.”

  “Oh, hey”—her eyes softened and she touched his arm—“has there been any word about your daughter?”

  He flinched. “No.”

  “I’m sorry.” She fiddled with the grass blades as if searching for exactly the right one.

  He cleared his throat. “Thanks for thinking about her.”

  “I bet you get tired of people asking.”

  “Not really.” He shrugged. “Sure it hurts, but that way I know I’m not the only one who remembers she’s missing.”

  “You’re definitely not.”

  “So does your family know? About Brad?” Jeremy asked, as much to change the subject as anything.

  “Huh-uh.” She jerked her head from side to side quickly. “I hate the idea of them thinking I got my heart broken and ran home.” She cut her gaze toward him. “Because that’s not true.”

  “What would you like for them to think?”

  She seemed to consider his words. “That I came for a surprise visit.”

  “So not only do they not know you’re here, they don’t know you’re coming?” he asked.

  “Right.”

  “Then I’d say this counts as a surprise visit, wouldn’t you?”

  “And you really think I could pull that off?”

  He grinned. “You are an actress, aren’t you?”

  Actress or not, her smile was one of the most genuine he’d ever seen.

  “Thanks.”

  He pushed to his feet and offered her a hand. “Anytime.”

  “Anytime? You may regret saying that when I call you at three in the morning to dump my problems on you.” She slid her tiny hand into his, and he lifted her effortlessly to her feet.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Three in the morning, huh? I’m usually awake around then anyway.”

  Sympathy flitted across her face again, and he regretted his words.

  He pushed his hat down tighter on his head. “I’d better get going. I hope you have a good visit with your family.”

  She glanced back at the river as if drawing strength from the steady stream. “Thanks. Me, too.”

  He stood still for a few seconds, waiting for her to move or speak, but she’d apparently forgotten him. Or dismissed him.

  “Bye.”

  She jerked her attention back to him. “See you.”

  He walked out into the field, squatted down, and brushed back a little dirt. A tiny blade of grass poked up right below the surface. As he looked closer, he could see several green sprigs already breaking the surface around him. His shoulder muscles relaxed. He hadn’t planted too early. Future weather cooperating, Jonathan would have a good stand of hay in this field.

  As he started back to Nacho, he saw Crystal getting in her car. Even though Jeremy had only met her once, he was surprised he hadn’t recognized her immediately, even from the back. Her breathtaking beauty and poignant grace made it hard to mistake her for anyone else.

  He climbed astride the horse and settled into the saddle. As he watched the cloud of dust Crystal’s car stirred up, he considered their conversation. He, of all people, knew how deceptive beauty and even sweetness could be. He’d do well to remember that this was just another girl who went her own way without regard to others’ feelings but came running back to safety when her heart was broken.

  “As long as I don’t forget that, we’ll be fine,” he whispered to Nacho. “Let’s go.”

  The horse broke into a gallop and, for the next few minutes, Jeremy cast his cares to the wind.

  ***

  Crystal guided the tiny rental car into the first driveway, parked out by the barn, and killed the motor. Her eyes closed and she fell back against the headrest as she mentally chided herself.

  Why had she even stopped at the river? If one place summed up everything she’d lost, everything she’d run away from, if all her happy childhood memories could be rolled into one location, that swimming hole would be it. When she stood on the bank, she hadn’t seen placid water and an old rope. She’d seen tan legs and arms and white grins, heard loud yells and laughter, and felt overwhelmed by a mixture of nostalgia and grief. So why hadn’t she driven on by?

  At least then she wouldn’t have spilled her guts to a cowboy. Jeremy Buchanan seemed genuinely nice and, what with his ex-wife stealing their daughter, he’d obviously seen his share of pain. But that was no excuse for telling him all about Brad. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d done something so out of character. Unless it was throwing Brad’s stuff out the window. She smiled. That was pretty different for her.

  Her cell phone rang. She glanced at the caller ID and tensed. It was Brad. Without waiting for it to stop ringing, she hit Ignore. She had nothing to say to him. Amazingly, she didn’t even feel red-hot anger when she thought about him. She just felt ... nothing. And right now she had bigger fish to fry, as her granny used to say. She had to face the family.

  Jeremy had at least given her a good idea. She flipped down her visor mirror and scrutinized the tense face staring back at her. Could she convince her family that this was just a happy surprise and not have to bare her fresh wounds for everyone to sympathize with? The idea had merit.

  She took her compact out and touched the sponge to the puffy circles under her eyes. A dab of color on her lips and, ta-da, she was ready to see the family. Her legs wobbled as she climbed out of the car and started down the pea gravel path to the house.

  Who was she kidding? There were hundreds of highways she could have taken after she rented the car at the Memphis airport. And right now, she was having to force herself to keep from running back to the car as fast as her high heels would allow and peeling rubber to the nearest road out of Shady Grove.

  When she stepped up on the back porch, the laughter and loud conversation drifted out, pulling her forward. She’d missed them so much. For a few seconds, she stood at the door and listened, not for distinct words but just to the timbre of the familiar voices. Her daddy’s deep rumble. Her mama’s softer alto. And unless she missed her guess, the teasing tones belonged to the twins, Kaleigh and Chance. Even though they were in their early twenties, the two redheads never missed an opportunity to give each other a hard time.

  She started to knock, but then she twisted the old metal doorknob instead and pushed the door open.

  Everyone stopped talking, and she knew instantly what they were thinking. Since they were all there, who could be coming into the house unannounced? A pang sliced through her heart that she’d let herself become so distanced that a stranger would be more expected than she. She stepped inside and smiled at her family gathered around the long kitchen table.

  Nine pairs of eyes were fixed on her. Beside the stove, her mama gasped, and still holding a spatula, ran across the room to pull Crystal into her arms. “So good to see you,” she whispered against her hair.

  Crystal nodded, blinking hard against the tears she’d thought she’d banished. “You, too.”

  Over her mama’s shoulder, she could see Matthew waving.

  “Hey.” Luke saluted her with a forkful of gravy and biscuit. “Good to see you, kid.”

  Luke never missed a chance to rub in the fact that he was a few months older than she. He’d been twelve to her and Cami’s eleven when their parents had adopted him. For some reason he’d been a little in awe of Cami, but he’d loved to tease Crystal and had claimed a whole year on her and called her “kid” ever since.

  “My turn.” A smile teased the corners of her daddy’s mouth. His blue eyes
sparkled. Her mother reluctantly released Crystal, and her daddy folded her into his big embrace. She breathed in Old Spice and Coast soap and smiled.

  “Hey, Crys,” Aaron called from the end and gave her a thumbs-up. “Glad you made it.”

  Beside him, his wife, Bree, waggled her fingers and grinned.

  Lynda McCord spun around to face her oldest son. “You knew about this?” She waved her spatula at him. “You rascal.”

  Everyone, including her daddy, turned to stare at Aaron. Just as he’d known they would. Crystal gratefully took the opportunity to breathe.

  Aaron shrugged and put his arm around Bree. “Would I spoil a surprise?”

  A smile split Crystal’s face. He’d make a great houseparent. Honest but diplomatic.

  Kaleigh’s fiery red ponytail bounced as she pushed her chair back and stood to hug Crystal. “Glad you’re here,” she said. “PM in the pole barn after breakfast,” she whispered.

  Crystal nodded. PM had always been their signal for a “private meeting,” usually in the largely unused pole barn farthest from the house. “Private” as in no parents allowed. Thanks to Aaron’s e-mail, Crystal knew that this particular meeting was about the newlyweds’ immediate opportunity to move to Chicago and how that would affect their parents’ planned Peru mission trip and the subsequent second honeymoon in Rio de Janeiro that the kids had given them last Christmas.

  Crystal released Kaleigh and reached down to tap knuckles with Chance.

  “What’s up, sis?” he said softly, part greeting and part true question. Concern clouded his green eyes.

  She forced a grin and shrugged. Chance had been the one she was most worried about fooling. There was no chance that Aaron wouldn’t know something was wrong, since they e-mailed almost daily. The others she could keep the truth from for a while. But at twenty-three, even though he was a joker, Chance was intuitive and sensitive to his brothers’ and sisters’ feelings. Crystal knew from experience that being tuned in to a twin’s emotions made it easier to pick up random signals from the rest of the family, too.

  Before Chance could question her further, Elyse rose gracefully from the chair on the other side of him, her cream-colored broomstick skirt swirling above her ankles. Crystal studied her sister with pride. Officially a dog trainer, unofficially, according to local legend, a “dog whisperer,” the tall brunet had no idea how beautiful she was. Painfully shy when the McCords had first adopted her fourteen years ago, Elyse was finally almost as at ease with her own family as she was her four-legged friends. But she’d still predictably waited to be the last one to greet Crystal. “You staying with me?”

  “Where else?” Crystal said it as a quip, but everyone in the room, with the possible exception of Bree, surely realized that since Luke was living in the small barn loft apartment, Elyse’s place was her only choice. Unless she wanted to try a bed-and-breakfast in town. And she thought that would surely force her mama into pushing the issue of her not staying in the house.

  She smiled at Elyse. “If you think the newest member of your family won’t mind company. I can’t wait to meet her. Aaron says you have her eating out of the palm of your hand. Literally.” She refrained from saying that Aaron had called the recently rescued bichon frise “that vicious little ankle biter.”

  Elyse’s brown eyes widened, but a soft grin played across her sculptured lips. “He’s exaggerating, believe me. I’ve almost gained Nikki’s trust, but I’m still not quite there. If you come over to the cottage in a little bit, I’ll introduce you and you can unload your stuff.”

  Crystal nodded. Of course, her one satchel might give away the fact that this was an unplanned trip.

  “So how long are you staying, kid?” Luke drawled from across the table, a smile splitting his unshaven face.

  “Just a few—”

  Mama neatly scooted his elbows off the table as she walked by and handed Crystal a full plate. “Right now, we’re just glad she’s here for breakfast, Lucas.”

  Crystal stared at the plate. Her stomach growled a noisy greeting, and her mouth watered. She hadn’t eaten a bite since she’d thrown Brad out of the apartment last night. Actually since a couple of hours before the play. The smell of homemade biscuits and gravy mixed with bacon and eggs drove every other thought from her mind.

  “Thanks, Mama.” She took the plate and sank into the empty seat next to Elyse. “I’ve been dreaming about your breakfast.” She smiled at the others. “I’ll do the dishes, since I didn’t help cook.”

  “You heard her,” Kaleigh said with a sassy grin. “I’m off the hook.”

  “You’re off, I’ll give you that,” Chance teased.

  Everyone laughed, and Crystal relaxed her shoulders. The hardest part about coming home was always the awkward first few conversations. Usually she barely stayed longer than that.

  For the next half hour, she ate and drank quietly and listened to her family, so different yet so close. When she and Cami were eight and her parents had decided to first foster then adopt Aaron, the idea of getting a big brother had been exciting. The reality had been a little different, especially when five more kids had been added to the family over the next few years.

  But her love for them had grown every day they were together, and in these past few years they were apart, it hadn’t faded any. If anything, she felt more attached to them because she didn’t take their existence for granted.

  CHAPTER 5

  Crystal clutched the large, rough, wooden, rectangular “button” on the barn door and took a deep breath. How many times had she made the trek through the field from the house to this old barn? She looked down. Never in high heels. But she’d been here more times than she could count. For her and Cami’s ninth birthday, Daddy had built them a stage in this unused barn. A simple wooden platform running the length of the far wall, with steps going up on each side, the “stage” was humble. But the twins had soon filled it with players, some willing, some not so much. She smiled at the memory.

  She dropped her hand, suddenly unsure she could go in, even though she knew she was late for the meeting. She’d accepted the fact that she couldn’t bear to go into their old bedroom, but would this be what her visits to the ranch would always be like? Standing outside familiar doors, afraid to go in?

  Sudden anger flared up inside her and she yanked on the unlatched wooden door and it swung open. Inside, she squinted. Sunlight filtered in through the eaves and dirt-covered windows, but it took a few seconds for her vision to adjust.

  “What took you so long?” Kaleigh asked from her perch on the bare stage. “The dishes were almost done when I left.”

  Crystal glanced around at her other brothers and sisters already settled in on the mishmash of old chairs and sofas arranged in front of the platform stage. She plopped down beside Matthew on the nearest couch and waved away the dust that rose in the air. “I’m guessing y’all haven’t had very many meetings here since I’ve been gone,” she coughed out. She didn’t wait for an answer because a part of her didn’t want to know if they’d gone ahead with the family tradition without her. “Mama changed her mind about going into town with Daddy.”

  A collective groan murmured through the room. Their parents had gone into town every Saturday after breakfast for as long as anyone could remember. It was a tradition rarely broken.

  “I insisted she go with him, but I finally had to go settle in for a nap on the couch before Mama would believe it was okay for her to leave.”

  Matthew shook his head. “After all those Saturday morning meetings we had when we were kids, wouldn’t it be funny to get busted for them now?”