Second Chances: Love in Juniper Ridge (Carver Ranch Book 1)

by Heather Tullis

  “And you’re still under age by about four years. You know what the district rules are. I can’t have you drinking if you want to play. You aren’t on the team now, so I can’t give you an official warning, but Craig, I don’t want it to happen again. It could jeopardize your whole future if you don’t play this season. You’re good, real good, and a college scout is going to notice you if we get to the playoffs. And we will if you boys can just keep your heads on and focus on the goal. We have a bang-up team this year, with or without you—but we’ll be better with you. Nothing going on with a girl is important enough to throw away your future.” It made Marsh angry to see Craig’s half shrug at that comment, but at least he made eye contact.

  “You’re right, Coach. I’ll do better. I won’t drink anymore until the season is over.”

  Marsh let out a huff of irritation. He recognized the restlessness in Craig’s shoulders, his dissatisfaction with life. Bo, Hank’s twin brother, had exhibited those same symptoms before joining the Army. At least Bo had channeled those feelings somewhere constructive. “You’d be smarter to let it go completely. Keep your eye on the goal, Craig. If you want out of this town, to have a chance at a better life, don’t let the goal get out of sight.”

  “But, you still live here,” Craig said, his forehead crinkling. “If it was so important to get out, why did you come back?”

  Marsh couldn’t help but smile at that. “This was home to me. I taught in Denver for a couple of years, but it wasn’t right for me. I needed to be in Juniper Ridge. Maybe when you’ve finished college and know what you want to be, you’ll choose to come back here too. In fact, I hope you do. But you need to give yourself a chance at a future first, give yourself options, so if you do return, it’ll be your choice instead of your only option, and you’ll have the skills to make a decent living doing something you love. Playing basketball could be your ticket to finding that future, but only if you don’t waste your chances before you get out of high school. And I mean cigarettes and drugs too, just stay away from them.”

  A smile slid onto Craig’s face. “Yes, sir. I’ll stay clean for the rest of the year. I promise.” He shook Marsh’s hand to seal the deal.

  “Good. Now get home and do your homework. You need to keep your grades up.”

  Marsh let the door fall closed behind Craig before going to the blackboard and erasing the class notes. He hoped Craig followed through. There was no doubt the kid meant his words, but peer pressure could be strong, and Marsh knew that the kid’s family life wasn’t exactly pretty. It was always a balancing act between being a concerned friend, someone the kids could trust, and being the authority figure they needed.

  He knew some of the kids on his team would probably dabble in contraband areas during the season and, more likely than not, wouldn’t get caught. He always hoped the teens would follow the rules because, if they broke them, he believed they should be caught and, if they were caught, he had to follow through with consequences. The previous year one of the girl basketball players had been dropped from the team for drinking. Marsh hoped they could get through the year without anything similar happening.

  Work at the local sheriff’s dispatch wasn’t much different than at Karissa’s old job, except that she would be the only one working much of the time, so she had to juggle the phones, computers, and radio traffic, rather than only being responsible for one part of it at a time. However, she didn’t expect it would be nearly as busy here as it had been in Pueblo, and she knew she was up to the task.

  The shifts were twelve hours each, which would be long, but on the months when she worked graveyard shifts, her son would be asleep through most of it. She hoped that would take some of the stress off of her parents.

  On Thursday evening—her first solo shift—Karissa was hurrying around the house, looking for loose shoes and making sure Paul ate some peas with his dinner, adding things to her to-do list, and wishing she had kept better track of time that afternoon. It was slightly after five and she needed to head into work in five minutes.

  When the doorbell rang she was partway through brushing her hair and had only one shoe on, but she hurried down to answer it. Her father was deep in farm chores, and her mother was cleaning up after supper. She rushed down the stairs, nearly tripping over her feet three steps from the bottom, then skidded across the polished hardwood floors of the entry, falling on her backside.

  She looked up to see Marsh watching her through the door glass, concern on his face. She pulled herself up, pushing the flyaway mess of hair away from her face, straightened her shirt, and took the two steps to open the locked front door. Her tailbone hurt, but she wasn’t about to show her weakness to Marsh.

  When she opened the door, she saw he was dressed down in jeans and a plaid flannel shirt; Karissa wanted to curse him for wasting her time and causing her bruised tailbone. “Yes?” She hoped the word sounded pleasant and friendly, but guessed it had probably come out harried and irritated when he lifted an eyebrow, then took in her state of dishabille.

  “Hey, Karissa, where’s the fire?” He ambled into the room without an invitation, stopping to move the area rug she’d slid on back into place with the toe of his boot. “You all right? You took quite a tumble.”

  Willing herself to stay calm, she took two last furious strokes on her hair with the brush that was still in her hand. “I’m running a little late.” She was afraid her cheeks were red, and she had to fight to keep from puffing breath in and out of her lungs from her hurry. “I’m not the athlete I once was.”

  His smile was warm and casual, but the glimmer in his eye made her tense before he even spoke. “You have filled out some.”

  Outraged, she turned to stalk up the stairs. “You don’t have to point out the extra pounds. I’m fully aware of them.” She had heard plenty of women refer to the ‘divorce diet’, where they lost weight due to stress, but that hadn’t happened for her. It would have been nearly the only perk of everything she’d gone through.

  Marsh placed a restraining hand on her shoulder. “Hey, that’s not what I meant at all. You were always too skinny.” He turned her to face him. “The extra weight looks good on you, makes you look soft and approachable.”

  She snorted. Soft and approachable, is that supposed to be a compliment? “With your skill at flattery, it’s amazing you haven’t caught yourself a wife yet.”

  He flicked a finger down her nose, ignoring the vitriol in her voice. “You were taken, and I’ve never met anyone else who can hold a candle to you.”

  Even more infuriated by his sarcasm, she pulled away. “What are you doing here?”

  “Hank mentioned he would be out of town and that your dad could use some help for the next few nights. I have some time and decided to stop by.”

  She waved a hand toward the back of the house, feeling the edge of her temper melt at the fact that he was here to help her family. With everything going on, her parents could use an extra hand. She dealt with the guilt of having caused them more trouble and tempered her tone. “Dad’s out in the yard getting ready. Don’t forget to stop in the kitchen on your way out and say hello to Mom. She’ll never forgive you otherwise.” With a roll of her eyes, Karissa turned and headed up the stairs.

  “Have a good night at work, Kar.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” She headed for her room, tossed the hair brush on her bed, and slid her second shoe on, praying that Marsh would be gone when she went down for goodbye kisses with her son.

  Why was it that he seemed to be everywhere she went? If it wasn’t bad enough that he spent so much time at the farm—something she really tried not to resent too much considering that he was helping her dad—she ran into him in town all the time as well.

  The grocery store, drug store, post office, and farm supply—none of them were safe. And he was never happy with passing with a hello and letting her get on with her errands—no, he had to stop and play with her son or give her a hand loading bags of chicken feed. He helped with her groceries and teas
ed her about being her parents’ errand girl.

  It was like he had a sixth sense about how and when to harass her.

  Though she’d noticed that other than the stupid comment about her weight making her soft and approachable—idiot—he had been oddly nice to her. She just wished she understood what was going through his head.

  Thursday morning, when Karissa got off of work, she was ready to drop from exhaustion. She had tried to stay up late Tuesday to prepare her body for the long night, but hadn’t been able to sleep like she had hoped with her son running around. And, while her dad took Paul out for a few hours in the afternoon, her nap had been less than satisfactory.

  She arrived home to find Paul up, eating pancakes in the kitchen with her parents. Her dad appeared to be just sitting down and already looked tired from his morning milking. “Things go okay this morning?” she asked.

  “Yeah. It’s right as rain. I thought I’d take Paul out with me on the horse to check fences this morning before he goes to kindergarten--guarantee you a little sleep,” her dad said.

  “That would be fantastic. I’m ready to drop.” It was a good thing she didn’t live further from work, because driving this tired could be dangerous. Karissa walked over and pressed a kiss to her son’s head. “You up for a long ride on the horse with Grandpa?”

  “Yes! He’s gonna teach me to be a cowboy! I need boots, Mom.” Paul was taking to country life like Karissa's brother Bo had—the love of farming was already in his blood.

  Karissa thought of her dwindling, nearly empty checking account and calculated how long it would be until her first paycheck. “In a few weeks, honey. Now, I’m going to go up to sleep. Do you think you can be quiet while you get ready to go out with Grandpa?” She noted that his Incredible Hulk pajamas were getting small on him.

  “'Course. I’ll be very quiet, Mom.”

  “Thank you, baby.” She looked at her dad. “And thank you for taking him out. He loves it here.”

  Her father’s smile was his only answer.

  “You know he loves having his only grandchild here to play with,” her mother said. “Are you hungry? Do you need something to eat?”

  “No, thanks. Since we’re housed at the jail, I get fed in the morning.” Karissa rubbed a hand over her stomach, which was still a little off from the greasy eggs and hash browns they’d brought her. She’d have to remember to bring something a little healthier with her that night.

  When Karissa awoke that afternoon, she heard her son yammering happily and loudly with Marsh. Her eyes widened when she glanced at the clock and saw it was half past three. Had she really slept eight hours? She had a vague memory of her son making a lot of noise a few hours earlier, and her mother hushing him, but that was it.

  Karissa pulled herself out of bed and slid her cell phone into the pocket of the sweats she’d put on before going to sleep. She stopped to comb her hair in the mirror and put on a little mascara and coral peach gloss before turning to go downstairs. Just because she didn’t have time to clean up the way she wanted didn’t mean she had to look like a total dowd.

  She found Marsh lying on the living room floor, her son on top of him, tickling the man for all he was worth.

  “Don’t tickle me, I won’t be able to stop you,” Marsh said, wiggling around as if the little hands were sending him into paroxysms of laughter.

  Karissa stopped and watched the scene for a minute before Paul looked up and grinned at her. “Hey, Mom. Uncle Marsh and me are havin’ fun!”

  Marsh looked up, appearing a little surprised at her entrance, and rolled over. He captured the little guy in his arms as he stood, hanging him upside down. “Hah, I caught you. Now who’s going to be the tickler?” he asked. He poked at Paul’s side a few times, sending him into fits of giggles. Still, Marsh watched her, not her son. “I’m sorry if we woke you. I didn’t realize we were being so loud.” He brushed back the brown hair from his eyes, grinning.

  “You look very repentant. But it’s past time I got up anyway. I can’t believe I slept so long.”

  Marsh turned Paul right-side up again and gave him one last tickle for good measure as he set him on his feet. “Hey, squirt, how about if you go tell your grandma that your mom is up.”

  “Okay.” Paul tore out of the room, and the front door slamming closed revealed where Beth had taken herself. She loved tending her front flower beds and had been talking about winterizing them.

  Karissa stuck her thumbs in her back pockets, not really sure what to do now that she had Marsh alone and he was looking at her so seriously. “Isn’t it a little early for you to be here? Milking won’t start for more than an hour.”

  “Your dad said he needed an extra hand fixing a fence in the back pasture, so I came early.” He chuckled lightly. “I got a little distracted by your kid. He’s a lot of fun.”

  “I think so.” Karissa tried to stop there but couldn’t quite hold her tongue. “Why are you here all the time, working on the farm? I mean, I know you practically grew up here, but you’re not really their son. You don’t owe them anything.”

  The warmth on his face cooled a little. “They make me feel like part of the family. You know mine’s in Vermont now. And basketball season starts soon, so I’ll soon be too busy to lend a hand. I’m sorry if I’m in your way.”

  He turned and stalked toward the back door.

  Karissa felt like a jerk, so she called out, “Wait, Marsh. I’m sorry.” She let out a deep sigh but was relieved when he stopped and looked at her. “I know I’m defensive when it comes to you. I’m having a hard time forgetting the way you teased me when we were growing up. It’s stupid. I know I’m overreacting.”

  “I don’t think that’s the only thing bothering you, but I really wish I could take back whatever I did to hurt you. The last thing I want is for you to see me as an enemy.” He took a step closer to her, then stopped, as if changing his mind, and grabbed up a large manila envelope, handing it to her. “I picked up the mail at the end of the lane to save you the trip.”

  Karissa saw the attorney’s office sticker on the top corner and held her breath as she turned the envelope over. She didn’t say anything, but her hands shook slightly as she opened it. The attorney had promised to have her staff send the divorce documents as soon as the judge made it official.

  She nodded slightly when she saw that it was over now. “Thanks. I appreciate it.” Several emotions rolled through her, from relief to sadness, that things had to end this way. The paper was a testament to her failure as a wife and her inability to make good choices where men were concerned. How was it she’d chosen a lying jerk, and why had it taken so long for her to realize it?

  “You okay?” Marsh asked.

  “Yes, of course.” Though she tried to sound bright and unconcerned, her voice was a little tight, belying her words. “It’s nothing I didn’t expect. So, you need to get out and help Dad. I better find my son before he harasses Mom to death.” She felt tears prickle at her eyes and sucked in a breath, just wanting him to go away.

  “Karissa.” His large hand slid onto her shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. “If you need anything—”

  “I won’t.” She shook off the hand. “But thanks for the offer.” She didn’t give him a backwards glance as she headed for the front door.

  The phone in her pocket started to vibrate before she even left the room, and she fished it out. “Hello, Dennis.” She swallowed back the emotions as best she could, hoping she sounded unconcerned about hearing from him.

  “Karissa, I know it’s short notice and it’s not my weekend, but since the divorce went through, Sheryl and I want to be married Saturday, and we’d really like it if Paul could be here. Jane said she’d drive out to get him tomorrow evening, keep him with her overnight, and bring him back Sunday morning. Again, I know it’s not my weekend, but we’d really like him to be part of this.”

  That brought on the tears, though Karissa fought to keep her voice even. “You’re getting married in two d
ays? The divorce documents just barely arrived.” He just couldn’t wait another week to make it official with his bimbo.

  “The baby’s not due for a couple more months, but Sheryl would rather get it done now, and there’s really no reason to wait.”

  Karissa stepped onto the porch, wishing she could just throw the phone and end the conversation. She wanted to say no way, that she didn’t owe him anything and it wasn’t his scheduled time, but…when Paul had his birthday a few months earlier, it had been Dennis’ weekend, and he had let her take her son for a couple of hours that day to celebrate with him. Despite everything else he’d been a jerk about, he had put their son’s well-being first. If she wanted that to continue, she needed to at least try to meet him halfway on this, even if it killed her.

  “Do you really need to keep him overnight? At Jane’s?” she asked.

  “Come on, Karissa. Jane’s already going to have a five-hour round trip each day. And she’d like to be there for the reception, which she won’t if she has to run him right back to you. If you want to bring him instead, that’s different. If you did, I’d pick him up and drop him off for my next visit.”

  He was right; she couldn’t ask his sister to do that much driving. “I work tomorrow night. It would be stupid of me to drive to Pueblo on two hours of sleep.”

  A hand slid onto Karissa’s shoulder, and she knew instinctively that it would be Marsh before turning to see him there, despite not having heard his approach. Why hadn’t he taken off out the back door to help her dad? She looked at him and saw the concern on his face. “Just a second,” she said to Dennis, then covered the mouthpiece. “Yes?”

  “You need to go to Pueblo Saturday? I could take you. I have a few errands anyway.”

  “You have errands in Pueblo?” She lifted her brow; no way was she buying that.

  “Well, I can do them there as easily as Denver.” He shrugged, looking a little self-conscious. “It’s your decision.”