“Thanks so much.” It was all she could say. Somewhere in the crowd and the congratulations, Jared would be on his way to join her at the barn. She needed his arms.
She needed a place to hide. She wanted to run. It was the nightmare she’d lived once before. Love. Death. Loneliness. Terror. How had she let herself become vulnerable?
For years, she’d kept her heart safe and secure, comfortable with walls that protected her heart from feeling, her soul from wanting.
Yet Jared burst through those walls like sunshine on a fog-laden day.
She wanted now. She wanted him, the children they dreamed of making, the life they could see themselves living. She wanted. Love proved there was a difference between surviving and living.
But living was one heartbeat from…
Was it so wrong to want a promise that nothing else horrible was going to happen?
She hadn’t understood death then. But she learned. After Chase died, she felt she’d lost her father again.
“How could I stand it if I lost my husband?” She asked at the sweet-faced mare, leading Bhetami into her stall. The thought of almost losing Jared left her unable to breathe. She was terrified of what Sasha almost accomplished. What if her poison worked?
What if?
What if?
What if?
With just two words, Tyndal felt her life change.
The question spun around and around until she felt the nausea she’d fought after Chase’s funeral. There were no answers to the question “What if?” Somehow she had to accept the fact of that truth or turn tail and run. But where would she go?
All she wanted to do was curl up beside Jared, listen to his voice, love with him, laugh with him, live with him. She leaned her head against Bhetami’s shoulder and with the mare nuzzling her shoulder, tears held in for so long began to flow.
Jake laid his head on his big paws and closed his eyes.
Jared found her there, sobbing. “Tyndal, love.” He folded her against his chest.
She flung her arms around him and pulled him close as if for the last time.
“Tyndal, what’s wrong? What’s happened?”
She looked into his face, felt the evidence of the vital, tough strength of his life beating sure and steady under her hands. How could she tell such a man she was terrified? Afraid of shadows and things that might never happen? Afraid of things that might yet happen? He’d laugh at her fears and she wouldn’t blame him.
She managed a wobbly smile. “I’m being silly, I suppose.”
He tilted her chin so her eyes met his level gaze. “No, love, you’re not silly, but you are exhausted. You and Bhetami just gave several hundred people a night they’ll never forget. But it’s more than that.” His eyes gentled. “I offered you a white sand beach in Jamaica earlier today. I may take you there for a few days regardless.”
Just as she couldn’t admit her fears, she couldn’t tell him they’d never enjoy his beach. Every time she looked at him, she saw him hooked up to those IV’s pumping him full of fluids, desperate lifelines to save his life.
She saw Chase in the hospital bed. He died.
The accident she’d survived as a child. She lived. Her parents died.
Even Fionola, those machines and IVs stuck into her arms. Yes, she lived. But for how much longer?
Tyndal loved, and in each case…what if Jared had died?
She was going to end the dream. She had to. It was better that way. Better for both of them. “Jared.” She turned away from Bhetami and faced him straight. “I think you should go. Find your white sand beach and take a few days for yourself, but go without me.” She couldn’t help herself, she had to touch him. She lifted a hand to stroke his face, closed her eyes against the pain.
After a moment she continued. “Please know I’m sorry about this, more sorry than I have words to say, but I can’t marry you.” She pulled the diamond from her finger and pressed it into his palm. “After all that’s happened, seeing you in that bed, poison shutting down your system while you fought, hooked up to those fluids…Jared, I can’t risk losing you too. I love you. I’ll always love you. But I can’t marry you.”
She wrenched her eyes from his and turned, ran out of Bhetami’s stall and down the long corridor. She could hardly see for the tears that streamed from her eyes.
****
Jared remained where he was, his fingers wrapped around the diamond. Jake looked at him as if he were supposed to do something.
“Go after her, boy,” Jared said, envious as the dog tore off. “She loves me, but she can’t marry me.” Forming her words, he spoke to the silver mare. “Can you believe that?”
Bhetami nuzzled his hand. Not marry him? Not able to risk losing him? The woman was nuts.
Maybe nuts wasn’t the elegant term some fancy psychologist would put to it, but at the moment, it suited him fine. While she’d talked, he watched her eyes, watched them darken. He watched the light flicker out of them, leaving them empty and dull, devoid of their brilliant color. Then he watched as she ran away.
She ran from him, from the love they shared. But what did she run toward? From experience, he’d learned the only place that would welcome her was hurt, and more pain. What healing would she find? Life didn’t come with a guarantee.
Never had, never would.
But because he’d run from love once too, he knew her journey. Maybe he’d been young. But that boy had loved Tyndal with every bit of his heart. It took years, but he’d come home. Come home to her, home to Morgan’s Walk. Now she’d have to decide if she’d rather take the risk and love for as long as God allowed.
Or not.
While Bhetami licked up the last of her grain, he leaned against the wall, his eyes closed, and thought of the months he’d spent in the hospital, his soul as broken as his body. It was a surprise, he remembered, to find the healing of his body far less painful. Didn’t she know he’d understand? That he’d seen fear in her eyes? That he knew she didn’t believe in rainbows?
Not marry him, indeed.
Bhetami interrupted his thoughts, breathed into his hands, nuzzled him for attention. He picked up the soft brush Tyndal dropped and finished grooming her mare, thinking about what she’d said until eventually, he smiled to himself. “We’ll just see about that.”
He pocketed the diamond where it would remain safe and protected until he placed it back where it belonged. Tyndal thought she could make a life without him? Without love?
He’d give her a night and then she’d have to explain that one.
Come morning, she’d find she had more than just him to deal with.
A lot more.
Shortly after dawn, Jared walked out to a small pasture and whistled for Bahadur who, predictably, ignored him. Only Tyndal caught him easily. He was at the stage where he spent most of his time acting like an adolescent brat and had walked off before Jared sat in the grass. He made a show of removing several pieces of carrot from his pocket, snapped them in half.
Though the insolent colt tried to appear bored, listened and watched intently, and caught the scent of his favorite treat. His ears pricked forward. Jared grinned, took a noisy bite. Then another.
It didn’t take long for the attitude to disappear. Jared gave Bahadur the rest of the treats, then scratched behind his ears. The colt, with his sensitive nose, examined the texture of his jeans, the buttons on his shirt, and ruffled through the length of his hair.
“You know you deserve everything they say about you.” Jared slipped the halter over the colt’s head.
The woman was just as much trouble as her horse. She might not expect him on her doorstep, but so what? Like she could brush him off that easily.
She sat on a rock in her back yard, her face still and pale, a cup of coffee in her hand.
“Tyndal.” Jared led Bahadur across the yard and dropped his lead rope into her hands. “I suppose you’ll want to do something with him too.” Jared met her eyes, his voice low and grim as he took a st
ep back, and nodded at the colt. “He needs to go to someone who’ll give him the kind of training he’ll require.” Jared rubbed the black nose that nuzzled his pockets for more carrots. “And hopefully to someone with a lot of patience.”
Without another word, he turned and started for the barn.
****
Tyndal looked at Jared’s back as he walked away. “Wait.” She jumped to her feet, spilled her coffee. “I don’t understand. Why did you bring him here? This isn’t fair. I’ve made the best decision for all of us. Jared! Why did you do this?”
“Don’t you know? Think about it, Tyndal. It’s not that hard.” He’d almost convinced himself the best thing he could do was leave, to give her the space she seemed to want. But at the confused tears in her eyes, he felt himself soften. The flame inside lessened, gentled.
“Why? Because the logic that forced you to throw away our love, our future, our life together—that logic will require you to make the same decision for this one. He deserves more.” Jared moved to her side, stroked her face. He needed to touch her.
“Just in case you’ve forgotten, he could have died too. But he didn’t. Unfortunately he won’t be able to understand why you’d rather live with your fear than love him. Love, Tyndal, real love is tougher than you think. It lasts.”
****
He gave her a half smile, turned away, and headed for the barn.
She stood, with Bahadur nibbling on her jeans, nuzzling her hair. Surely Jared was wrong. She’d trusted love. It betrayed her. Love was the thing that always, irrevocably, disappointed her. Didn’t he know that?
Bahadur tugged on her hair, wanted her attention.
Her heart tugged on a memory, something Chase once told her.
She wanted to be left alone.
And neither of them—the colt or the memory—respected her wishes. She tossed the rope over Bahadur’s back. “Let’s go for a walk, guys. Maybe I’ll think a little more clearly by the time we come home.” Jake, as ever, walked beside her, the colt followed.
They made quite a threesome, the Pied Piper and her band. They crossed the far pasture; the only one who appeared to be having any fun was Bahadur. Jake ignored even his most outrageous attempts at play while Tyndal saw nothing but the ground.
The colt kept it up, a steady stream of nips and shoves and bumps until Tyndal, exasperated, stopped him with a sharp command. Then she flung her arms around him. She wept on his neck and he stood rock still, only his eyes giving any indication he listened. They mirrored her suffering.
Finally she sat on the ground, cradled her head in her hands. Jake pushed his big nose into her lap, and the colt, suddenly grown up, stood guard, protective of his companions.
“Why would he think I’d get rid of you?” She looked at Bahadur. “Why would he say such a thing? I don’t understand.”
Then she did.
She saw herself leaning over him that night in his stall as Sasha’s drug worked havoc in his system, as Seth, Fionola, and Jared—all of them—worked together to save his life. She remembered the details, the dazzling relief when it became clear the obstinate colt wouldn’t surrender.
Bahadur fought for his life.
Jared fought for his. Because of love.
The flooding memories poured through her. Memories of herself as a little girl chasing the wind with her grandfather, both of them mounted on flying horses, laughing as they raced tumbleweeds across the prairie. Chase finally pulled up, rested his horse and himself as the wind sent other weeds tumbling across the grass.
“Ah, sweet girl, this is life. Never be afraid to live it. Never be afraid to see where it takes you.”
Had she followed that advice?
She drew her knees up and rested her arms across them, closed her eyes as the sun warmed her shoulders.
“Tyndal, honey, are you okay?”
Startled, she looked up. “Oh, hi, Doc.”
Seth was on Raj.
“If you hadn’t spoken, I probably wouldn’t have known you were near.” Hoping to hide the tears, she rubbed at her face.
“Happens that way sometimes.” He dismounted, patted Bahadur and Jake, then made himself comfortable on the grass at her side. “I dropped by to check on everyone and the big guy seemed fairly disgusted at being in his stall. Since I was in surgery earlier this morning, I thought we both could use a little exercise. I’m surprised to find you out here all by yourself.”
Tyndal looked at Raj—at the man who’d always been a friend—and smiled. “Am I your next patient for the day?”
“Do you need to be? I’ll help if I can, honey.”
Tyndal let out a long breath. “Thanks, but I don’t know if there is any help. I feel lost.”
Seth nodded. “Sometimes life does that to a person.” He went silent, scanning the horizon, his eyes holding pain she seldom saw in him. “Have you talked with Jared?” he finally asked. “Or is this something you’re not ready to talk about?”
“I don’t know. Everything is jumbled up inside, I hardly make sense to myself.”
“If my daughter had lived, she’d be about your age right now. I like to think she’d be as pretty.”
Tyndal turned wondering eyes on him. “A daughter? I had no idea. I didn’t know you were married or that you have a family.”
“Past tense to both, honey. After our daughter passed away, things weren’t ever the same between my wife and me.” He paused, swallowed hard. “Well, anyway, it wasn’t long before she left. I heard she remarried a year or so later. The guy was a widower with a bunch of kids and she loved being a mother. I imagine she was happy again.”
“That’s so sad,” Tyndal said. “You hurt too.”
“Yes, I did. But sorrow doesn’t necessarily draw a couple closer. Sometimes it leaves a person numb. She accused me of hiding from it in taking on more and more patients. She said the way I dealt with my pain was to work 24/7. I thought she needed to stop turning our daughter into a saint and her room into a shrine. We both said hard things to each other.”
“What happened? I mean, how did she die?” Tyndal was listening closely.
“She was a high school sophomore and hung out with some kids from school that abused, of all things, prescription drugs. A few antidepressants, a few pain relievers, they made up some sort of God knows what concoction no one thought was lethal.
“No one knew what the combination of chemicals, when mixed with alcohol, would do either. Kellie had a bad reaction and by the time the kids noticed and called the paramedics, she’d slipped into a coma. She never woke up. Kind of like your mama. An accident, a coma, and then…” Seth glanced at Tyndal. “Her hair was as dark as yours, she had brown eyes though. And she was much taller. She loved to play basketball.”
“You never remarried? I’m sorry to pry; I didn’t know any of this. I thought I knew all about you.”
“I don’t talk about it much. It was a tough time. And no, to answer your question…” He grinned. “I never remarried. Chase pestered me for a long time to make the move out here, so one day a couple of years after our divorce, I took his advice. He already knew about Kellie and I think he may have told Fionola. Anyway, Fee’s said a few things over the years that clued me in to thinking she knows about my history. It’s okay, I’m not ashamed of what happened. It’s just one story among many. You, my dear, are writing yours as we speak. That’s why I’m telling you all this.”
Tyndal looked at him, not sure what to say.
“Honey, Chase was so proud of you. He appreciated the fact you dropped everything to come home when Fionola called after his first heart attack. She needed you then. But you gave them even more by going on with your life. He and Fee, they loved to hear about your competitions, about what you did. But more than anything, Chase lived. Honey, the man lived and loved and didn’t miss a moment celebrating his life, his love with Fionola. Chase Morgan enjoyed his friends, laughed at jokes, even the bad ones, and played a few pranks of his own.” Seth studied her face. “I wi
sh I had words that’d really help. After Kellie died, I blamed God. She was a good kid, so were the kids she was with that night. We knew most of them. None would have said they were into drugs. But they were curious. These were supposed to be ‘safe’ drugs and Kellie, I suppose, even though she knew better, went along with the crowd. She paid the price.” He let out a breath.
“I wanted to know why God picked on my daughter. Why not somebody else’s kid instead of her? Why did anybody have to die?” Anger and frustration flashed into his eyes.
“Yet you’re out here, talking with me, trying to help. You fight for life for all the creatures in your care. You go to church on Sundays. Maybe you haven’t said anything about it, but I think you’re in love with Fee.”
“Sure I am. I’ve loved Fionola for a long time. It’s just recently I’ve decided to do something about it. Chase was my friend too.” He stood, walked toward Raj. “My question is what are you going to do about your feelings for Jared? I know you love him.”
“I do. I was trying to decide if love is enough.”
“Guess you’ll have to figure out how much it’d cost you if you decide it isn’t. Regret isn’t something that just disappears, honey.” He gathered the reins in his hand, rubbed Raj around his ears. “Keep thinking, Tyndal.”
“See you at the house this evening?” Tyndal looked at the man who sat on the stallion as easily as her grandfather.
“Count on it.”
She sat where she was until the sun started to go down, and decided if she didn’t want someone out looking for her, she’d better head home. The last thing she felt like was dinner at Fionola’s. “Fine,” would likely stick in her throat. How are you? Don’t ask.
She wanted to be by herself. To go upstairs, crawl into bed and pull the covers over her head. Pretend to be somebody else. Somebody who knew what they were doing.
Regret? She hadn’t thought of that.
Every so many steps on their walk back to the barns, Bahadur bumped her in the back. Once she stumbled against him. The sturdy colt didn’t flinch at her weight. She pushed his head away. “You know you’re becoming awfully familiar with that nose of yours, don’t you?”
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