A Girl Less Ordinary

by Leah Ashton

  Jake had. He’d known.

  He’d been right. She’d never stopped being Eleanor. Just back in Fremantle she’d been too scared to step out of the stereotype she’d been so firmly assigned in high school, even long after she’d left. She’d built up so many stupid walls to protect herself that even in Sydney, surrounded by people, she’d still been truly alone.

  There were no walls now. It still scared her a little, but there would be no going back.

  ‘Dancing would be fabulous!’ she said to Mandy, and they spent long minutes discussing their options.

  Mandy had been the biggest surprise. It had taken a heartfelt apology—and that was all—for Mandy to turn up at her doorstep, with chocolate chip cookies to supplement her woe-is-me ice cream. Ella seriously didn’t know how she would’ve survived the past two weeks without her.

  Or how she’d survived these past thirteen years without a friend like that.

  ‘Oh, look,’ Mandy said, nodding towards a couple who passed by the front of the café. ‘You’re still a semi celebrity.’

  Ella didn’t even cringe any more. After two weeks of people asking, ‘Hey, aren’t you that girl from the paper?’ she’d really had to get over it.

  So she smiled at the couple who waved at her. And then the group of teenage girls who’d for some reason pointed at her excitedly.

  So, yeah, it wasn’t so bad, and, besides, the number of people who’d felt the need to confide their similarly tragic high-school lives to her had been kind of wonderful. It was yet another reminder that she was definitely not alone.

  All that was missing was Jake.

  But if she tried, really hard, she only missed him a couple of hundred times each day.

  Out on the beach, yet more people noticed her. This time, a grey-haired couple, who smiled and waved in unison.

  ‘I thought it would’ve died down by now,’ she said to Mandy. ‘Surely I’m old news?’

  Mandy shrugged. ‘Apparently not.’

  Hmm.

  As she slowly drank her coffee a crowd began to gather along the beach. It was cool, not really a day for any but the most dedicated of swimmers. And besides, the crowd were mostly in jeans, not bathers.

  ‘I wonder what’s going on?’

  Mandy just shrugged. A newspaper had been folded on the edge of their table, and her friend reached for it, and settled in to read as Ella observed the carryings-on.

  The crowd continued to grow, and eventually Ella noticed a couple of television network cameras.

  She found herself peering out to the ocean, looking for something, anything, that could be causing so much fuss.

  ‘Mandy, you’ve got to look at this. It’s bizarre.’

  ‘Hmm,’ her friend said, patently uninterested. ‘Hey, I’m reading a really fascinating article. Do you want to have a look?’

  She shook her head. Honestly, whatever was happening out on the beach was far more exciting.

  ‘Ella, I really think you should read this,’ Mandy said, much more insistently.

  Ella glanced at her friend. ‘Give me the highlights,’ she said, then looked back out to the harbour. The crowd seemed to have congregated around something, about halfway between the shore and the boardwalk.

  ‘It’ll make more sense if you read it yourself.’

  As Mandy was as good as waving the paper in her face, she grabbed it with one hand, letting it fall open on her lap on the page of this, oh, so important article.

  But she kept her eyes on the beach.

  ‘Ella,’ Mandy said, ‘please read the article.’ A pause. ‘Now.’

  ‘What’s so interesting that I must read it right...?’

  Her voice petered off into nothing as the huge block capitals that took up a full page of the paper bounced off her brain.

  That could not be right.

  Ella Cartwright—meet me at Balmoral Beach. 9 a.m. I have something I want to ask you. Jake Donner.

  Ella realised her hands were shaking.

  ‘Honey?’ Mandy asked. ‘Are you okay?’

  She looked up, and Mandy stood beside her. She nodded.

  ‘Then you’d better get your butt down to that beach. You’re running late.’

  With legs as weak as jelly, Ella managed to stand. Around her, every single person in the café was watching her. Smiling.

  ‘You were in on this?’ she asked Mandy, trying to make head or tail of it all.

  ‘Uh-huh. But you’re on your own now.’ She gave her a gentle shove. ‘Go on.’

  Somehow, she managed to put one foot in front of the other, and was then out of the café, onto the promenade, and kicking off her leather sandals, stepping onto the beach.

  The sand was surprisingly warm beneath her toes, and her shoes dangled from her fingers, bumping in a regular rhythm against the fabric of her jeans.

  As she approached the dense crowd of people began to disperse, backing away just a little, but she still felt all their eyes on her.

  And then, from amongst it all, stepped Jake.

  In bare feet, faded jeans, and a white shirt, rolled up to his elbows. As he walked towards her, he just smiled. He didn’t seem to notice all the people, or the cameras that hovered only metres away. He had eyes only for her.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, a metre away from her.

  ‘Hey,’ she answered softly. It had been only two weeks since she’d last seen him, but still she drank him in. She’d missed him. ‘Um, Jake, what’s going on?’

  ‘I wanted to say I’m sorry. For being such an idiot.’

  ‘Okay,’ she said. Then couldn’t resist adding, ‘I’m sorry you’re an idiot, too.’

  He laughed, shocked, at first, and then real and genuine. Ella grinned right back at him.

  He reached for her, and her shoes dropped to the sand when he took her hands in his.

  ‘I love you,’ he said.

  She closed her eyes, not quite believing what she was hearing. It had been so, so long that she’d hoped. That she’d waited.

  He gripped her fingers tight. ‘Ella?’

  As if she’d ever let him go now.

  She opened her eyes, tilting her head up to look at him. The morning sun made her eyes squint, but she was well beyond caring what she looked like.

  ‘I love you too.’

  And he let out a breath he must have been holding. It made her smile, as if there’d ever—ever—been any doubt.

  ‘Well, that’s good news. This would’ve been rather embarrassing otherwise.’

  ‘You mean the advert in the paper, and the media?’

  ‘That too. You wouldn’t answer my calls.’

  ‘This seems a rather extreme solution,’ she pointed out.

  ‘And I wanted you to be sure I meant it. That I wouldn’t change my mind. And the funny thing was, for the first time in my life, I wanted everyone to know something about me. I want everyone to know how much I love you, and how lucky I am to have you.’

  Tears prickled, and she swallowed, desperately, then realised it didn’t matter. She had nothing to hide. Who cared if she messed up her mascara on Balmoral Beach on national TV?

  She was in love with Jake Donner, and he loved her. That was all that mattered.

  She could cry happy tears as much as she wanted.

  ‘What was the other thing,’ she asked, ‘that you said would be embarrassing?’

  ‘Oh,’ he said, with the most wicked of grins and a dangerous sparkle to his eyes. ‘That would be this.’

  And he dropped to one knee, and, miraculously, a velvet box appeared from his pocket. He snapped it open, and the sun made the diamond glitter in a million remarkable directions.

  ‘Ella, will you marry me?’

  And because her legs had lost all ability to hold her upright, she fell to her knees before him.

  And with tears in her eyes, she said yes.

  Then the ring was on her finger, and she was in his arms. Around them, the crowd cheered, and cameras flashed, but all she had eyes for was Jake
.

  ‘You’re so beautiful, Ella.’

  And even with mascara running down her cheeks and sand in her hair, she believed it.

  EPILOGUE

  LATE on a January afternoon, and without a film crew in sight, Ella walked towards the shade of a scribbly gum.

  The summer sun warmed her shoulders and the softest of breezes ruffled the fine silk of her ivory dress. In her hands she gripped her posy of tulips tightly—not because she was nervous, but to remind herself this was real.

  There was no aisle. No white carpet. No chairs, even.

  There was Mandy, gorgeous and smiling as always; and a friend of Jake’s, Paul, beside her, with Albert and Lizzie sitting neatly at their feet.

  Ella had discovered that Jake had managed to accumulate a friend or two over the years. All were either massive computer nerds like Jake—or massive fans of mountain-related adventure-type activities, also like Jake. Consequently, she liked them all.

  She thought she’d surprised Jake, too. Their arrangement, with Monday to Friday in the city—with Jake popping up to their mountain home during the day whenever he felt like it—then the weekends always up here, worked well. But while he’d accompanied her to the occasional dinner out with friends, and even one charity ball, reluctantly at first, slowly he’d loosened up. No, he was far from a social butterfly. But he was trying, for her, and he’d even admitted that socialising with her friends wasn’t completely miserable. She thought she’d caught him even having a good time—once or twice.

  Ella’s satin ballet flats were silent on grass that hadn’t yet baked to a summer gold, and it was suddenly so still she was sure she could hear the rapid beating of her heart.

  Ahead of her stood the celebrant, directly in front of the towering tree’s trunk, and to the right of her, in a shirt the same colour as Ella’s dress—but wearing no tie, of course—was Jake.

  He caught her gaze as she approached, and held it, tightly.

  When she finally reached him, she tilted her head up, drinking in the sharp angles and strong planes of his face, dappled in light filtered by gum leaves. She wanted to remember this moment, to capture it for ever in her memories.

  ‘You’re beautiful,’ he whispered. And Ella smiled.

  Of course she hadn’t stopped wearing make-up—she loved the stuff—but she’d toned it down, just a little. She didn’t need to hide behind it any more.

  ‘You’re not wearing jeans,’ she said. Instead he looked particularly gorgeous in black tailored trousers.

  He grinned. ‘Anything for you, Ella.’

  Anything, it seemed, was right. Recently, and only because she’d asked him, they’d started visiting his mother’s nursing home. Diana didn’t hate Jake. Even with her mind permanently damaged by drugs, it was obvious the opposite was true. No, things weren’t okay between them, and maybe they never would be, but it was a start. This morning, they’d had breakfast together. And as they’d told her about the wedding, Diana had smiled.

  Jake had noticed, too. Ella might have even detected the slightest sheen to his eyes.

  One of the dogs—Albert—barked, and Ella laughed, smiling up into Jake’s gorgeous blue gaze. Seemed the crowd was getting restless.

  Ella twisted to hand her bouquet to Mandy, then turned back to Jake as he gripped her hands in his.

  ‘Can you hear that?’ he said.

  She didn’t need to ask what he meant.

  So she listened to the silence. To the rustling leaves above them, to the shuffling noises the dogs made as they couldn’t help but fidget. And then beyond, to the distant call of a magpie. The creak and groan of surrounding bushland packed full of ancient trees. To the noisy silence of the mountains.

  Silence that didn’t scare her any more.

  She loved music, and movement and fun, but when it was just her she no longer needed noise to block out the truth.

  The truth that she was alone.

  Because she wasn’t alone. Not any more.

  She had friends, real friends, who loved her for who she was, not because she always said the right thing, or behaved the right way, or had amazing shoes.

  And she had Jake. And he had her.

  She nodded, smiling.

  ‘It’s perfect, isn’t it?’

  Then, ignoring the grumblings of the celebrant, who muttered something about doing things in the correct order...

  Jake kissed her.

  And Ella kissed him back.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt of The Cowboy Comes Home by Patricia Thayer!

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  CHAPTER ONE

  WILLIE NELSON’S “On the Road Again” poured out of the open windows of Johnny Jameson’s truck as he drove along the country road. It was January in Texas, but he was energized by the cold air, knowing the temperature would rise to triple digits soon enough come spring. No matter what the weather, he’d much rather be outside than cooped up indoors.

  He always liked to keep on the move. Never felt the need to stay at any one place too long. More times than he could count, he had lived out of his vehicle.

  He’d been lucky lately. The jobs came to him, and he could pick and choose what he wanted to take on. That was the reason he was coming to Larkville. He’d been intrigued when he’d heard the job description. Also because Clay Calhoun and his prize quarter horses were legendary in Texas. But before he got too excited, he wanted to assess the situation before he made any promises to the man, or to the job. If there still was a job, since the offer had been made months ago.

  He’d been delayed by a stubborn colt, but after he’d finished training it, the thoroughbred was worth what the owner had paid. When he’d called Calhoun to let him know he’d be delayed with previous commitments, he’d ended up talking to Clay’s son Holt, who’d explained that his father was ill, but assured him that the job would be there whenever he arrived at the ranch. Johnny had said to expect him around the first of the year.

  As it turned out it was the first of the year, and he was finally headed for the Double Bar C Ranch. He glanced in the rearview mirror at his trailer, and his precious cargo, Risky Business, his three-year-old roan stallion.

  His attention focused back ahead and on the southeast Texas landscape of rolling hills and pastures that had the yellow hue of winter. He looked toward a group of bare trees and a cattle water trough nestled at the base. There was also a visitor, one beautiful black stallion. The animal reared up, fighting to get loose from his lead rope that seemed to be caught on something.

  He glanced around to see if anyone was nearby. Not a soul. He pulled his truck to the side of the road and got out. After walking back to check his own horse, he headed toward the open pasture to hopefully save another.

  * * *

  Jess knew she was going to be blamed for this.

  Since her brother Holt was away on personal business, her sister, Megan, was away at school and her brother Nate was in the army, she was the one family member around to handle Double Bar C emergencies. Even though she really wasn’t involved in the day-to-day running of the ranch—Holt was in charge of that—she knew finding Night Storm had to take top priority.

  The bigger problem was, how do you find, much less bring back, a rogue stallion? No one but Clay Calhoun had ever been able to handle the valuable quarter horse. Now that Dad was gone, th
e question was what to do with Storm.

  The ranch foreman, Wes Brogan, had decided to let the animal out to the fenced pasture, but before Wes was able to transport Storm there, the horse broke away.

  When she’d gotten the call early this morning, she immediately went to the barn, saddled up Goldie and rode out to find Storm. She’d been on a horse since she was a baby, so there wasn’t any problem keeping up with the ranch hands. To cover more ground, the crew took off in different directions of the vast Calhoun land and so Jess set off on her own.

  The Double Bar C had been in the family for generations, and her father had worked hard so it would remain with the Calhouns for many more. Big Clay had loved his horses, especially this stallion, but there had been trouble since Storm had arrived at the ranch. The valuable horse had been mistreated in the past. Eventually Storm began to trust her father somewhat, but since Clay’s death a few months back, the horse’s behavior had gotten worse and no one had been able to handle him.

  She sighed, feeling the bite of the January cold against her cheeks. She slowed her horse as they came to the rise and suddenly caught a spot of black. Taking out her binoculars, she saw the welcome sight.

  “Hallelujah!” she cried out, seeing Storm. Then she looked again and saw a man holding on to his lead rope. She didn’t recognize him as one of the hands, then she spotted a truck and trailer alongside the road.

  “Oh, no, you don’t. You’re not going to steal Double Bar C property.” She kicked her heels into the mare and they shot off.

  * * *

  Johnny had worked with the horse for close to thirty minutes and had made some headway. The animal was still in distress, but at least Johnny had gotten close enough to loop a rope around his neck so he could calm the animal.

  And what a beauty he was. His glistening black coat looked well cared for, he thought as he kept the spirited stallion moving in a circle. He pulled the rope taut, knowing he would need an arena to truly work him.

  The horse got more agitated when he heard a rider approach, but Johnny couldn’t take his attention from his task.

  “What do you think you’re doing on Calhoun land?”