by Liz Isaacson
Much to his surprise, the grime came off, brightening the color of the glass. The water evaporated quickly, and he passed the cotton swabs to the man waiting a few steps from him. It moved from person to person down to the bottom, and a fresh one was wetted and passed up to him.
After twenty minutes, a whistle sounded. Landon nearly fell off the ladder, focused as he was on cleaning a section of green glass. Adrenaline spiked through his chest like lightning had struck his heart.
“Time to rotate!” Megan called from her position on the ground. “Everyone down. Everyone drinks.”
For someone who didn’t think she paid attention to details, Megan had organized this event to the minute. Landon obeyed her, descending the ladder and collecting a plastic cup of ice water.
People mingled and laughed, but Landon stood on the outskirts of the conversations. Megan migrated to his side. “How’s it going?”
“It’s working,” he said. “It’s just slow.”
“Slow I can handle.” She flashed him a smile. “You’re on cotton wand transfer,” she said before moving away as someone called her name. Landon watched her go, wondering if she meant more than she’d said. He’d been thinking about kissing her. He’d been thinking about it a lot, even after she’d told him about her ex-fiancé.
If things had gone according to her plan, he might have been reunited with her while she was home visiting with her new husband.
Husband.
The word caused a tremor to vibrate his muscles. He lifted his cowboy hat and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Carter North topped the ladder, and Landon took up his new duty. Hours later, the crowd dwindled as the window cleared. Eventually, the buckets found a home in the outdoor shed on the edge of the church’s property. The distilled water jugs got thrown away. The ladder folded and leaned against the shed.
Landon lingered on the lawn with Megan while she spoke to his parents. He approached them and caught, “Well, I’ll be going to Utah next weekend,” from Megan. “So I’ll need to reschedule the gardener’s meeting. Perhaps Monday would work?”
Landon froze as he realized what she’d just said. His mother’s gaze swept his way, but she didn’t say anything as his dad confirmed that Monday would work for their meeting. With the knowing look his mother gave him as she followed his father toward their car, Landon fully expected a phone call from her later.
“You ready?” he asked Megan as he pulled his phone from his back pocket. He silenced it so he wouldn’t have to ignore his mom when she called. He could simply claim he hadn’t heard the phone ring. Not a lie if his cell was silenced.
Megan turned toward him. “I’m beat. It’s been a long day.”
Disappointment knifed through Landon. “I’ll take you home.”
“I drove here.” She leaned into him, and he gathered her into his arms. “But maybe I’ll let you take me home anyway.”
“Can I stay?” Landon wasn’t sure where the question came from, only that he’d spoken from the barest place inside him. “You can fall asleep on the couch.” He touched his lips to her forehead, skated his lips to her ear.
She giggled and pulled away. “Will you buy me some Chinese takeout from that place over by Silver Creek?”
“All the way over there? Why can’t we go to The Shrimp Palace? It’s like, four seconds from your apartment.”
“The Shrimp Palace?” Megan wrinkled her nose and folded her arms. “That place should be shut down by the Health Department.”
“What’re you talkin’ about? They have fantastic coconut shrimp.”
“I don’t like seafood.”
Landon gaped at her, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You don’t like seafood? I think that’s criminal.”
“I want the string bean chicken from Pan’s.”
“Pan’s?” He lunged toward her, but she seemed to be able to anticipate his movement, because she danced out of the way. Her laughter floated back to him. “Pan’s!”
He caught her easily as she reached the sidewalk, and he tucked her into his side. “Fine, we can go to Pan’s.” He’d do almost anything for her, anything to make her happy. As he realized that, a thin skin of fear coated his euphoria. Thankfully, the warmth from the sun and from Megan’s skin as she stayed close to him warmed him.
Like she’d said, he didn’t have to decide their future right this second.
11
“Finished,” Landon declared late the following Thursday. “And I’m not comin’ in tomorrow, remember?”
Megan sat several paces away, her tablet on her lap. “I remember,” she said without looking up. “You’re getting ready for the trip to Utah.”
“Our trip to Utah.” Landon tossed the paintbrush in a can of cleaning liquid, which sat on the covered desk, and reached for a blue cloth to wipe his hands. “I’m pickin’ you up at six-thirty on Saturday morning.” He walked toward her and stopped when she finally tore her gaze from her device.
She tipped her head back to look up at him. “It should be illegal to be up that early on a Saturday.”
He chuckled. “You’ll have to go to bed at a decent hour.”
“Even when I try to do that, I can’t sleep.”
He crouched in front of her. “I know, sweetheart.” The smile he gave her felt wonderful on his face. Like everything between them could be contained by a simple smile. Last weekend, after they’d spent the day cleaning the stained glass window, she’d laid her head in his lap while he put on a movie. She hadn’t been able to fall asleep, and the next day at church she confessed she’d been awake until two o’clock in the morning.
He’d fielded a phone call from his mother, where he hadn’t bothered to hide anything. He was thirty years old, and responsible, and independent. His mother had asked three questions before running out, a new record for her. Probably because Landon had been so straightforward with her.
Her gaze drifted to his mouth, and Landon’s pulse picked up its pace. But he didn’t want to kiss her in the church’s basement. Or the chapel. Or her dad’s office, which he had just finished painting.
No, Landon wanted his first kiss with Megan to be magical. He felt himself falling for her with every passing day, and he hadn’t dared to hope that this next first kiss could actually be his last, but he wanted to do it right if it was.
“I’m assuming you’ll want to swing by the gas station for a soda,” he said, standing and putting distance between them.
“Of course.”
His stomach roared. “And I need to clean up, so we better get this show on the road before I starve to death.”
Megan had a particularly hard time sleeping that night. Not only because Landon stayed until midnight, and not because he left the intoxicating scent that belonged uniquely to him behind. Well, maybe partly because of those two things. But mostly because she’d be going on her first ever weekend trip with a man. Eric had claimed to loathe traveling, only doing it “for business” when he had to. Yeah, she now knew what his travels had been about.
She hummed to soothe herself as one a.m. approached and she still didn’t feel the slightest bit sleepy. She tossed her pajamas into her suitcase and topped them with her toiletries. No way she could get up in the morning and shower. She’d pile her hair on top of her head and swipe on extra deodorant and call it good.
Landon claimed to have a “fun-filled” day planned for them on Saturday in Salt Lake City. On Sunday morning, they’d drive south to meet the realtor at the ranch by two p.m. She hoped he’d scheduled a time and place to finally kiss her. For a moment there, when he finally rose from her couch, rubbing his eyes, she thought he’d give her what she wanted so badly. He held her hand. Held her close. But he hadn’t kissed her yet.
Bees buzzed in Megan’s blood. Ants crawled over her skin. Bats swarmed in her stomach. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to contribute to this trip. Did Landon want her opinion on the ranch? Or just company for the trip?
If it was up to her, she’d keep h
im right here in Montana. But he seemed called somewhere else, and she didn’t know what to do about that. She’d prayed morning and night for a solution, for a clear head, and no answer had presented itself yet.
So she zipped her suitcase closed and went down the hall to make herself a cup of hot chocolate. As she waited for the milk to warm, she sent a similar prayer up again.
Please help me to know what’s right. Guide my feet. Make the path with Landon Edmunds clear.
The microwave beeped, and Megan’s eyes snapped open. No revelations had come, so she stirred the chocolate powder into her hot milk and took her steaming mug back to her bedroom, where she turned on the TV and settled against her padded headboard.
Her alarm woke her before the sun claimed the day. She groaned as she realized she’d fallen asleep sitting up in bed. The TV still flickered, and her empty hot chocolate mug lay on its side halfway across the bed.
She stretched her back and neck before standing. Taking the mug with her, she hurried to the kitchen and put it in the dishwasher. She was ready when six-thirty came, and she opened her apartment door with her carryon rolling behind her.
Landon stood there, and she collided with him. He grunted as her shoulder hit him in the chest, and his hands came up and landed on her waist to keep her from falling back. “Whoa, there.”
Heart hammering from surprise as much as desire, Megan peered up at him. “Sorry.”
“Yeah, I don’t think you are.” He chuckled, released her—much to her disappointment—and reached for her suitcase. “This is it?”
“We’re going for two days. How much do you think I need?”
Darkness crossed his face, and he twisted toward the stairwell. “My last girlfriend would’ve brought a suitcase for each day.”
My last girlfriend.
The words sliced through Megan’s cheerfulness. Well, as cheerful as she could be at six-thirty on a Saturday morning. Landon lifted the luggage and took it down the steps, Megan following in his wake. She waited until they’d both settled in the truck before asking, “Did you take a lot of weekend trips with your last girlfriend?”
Landon flinched but recovered quickly. “Not a one.”
“Then how do you know she’d take a suitcase for each day of the trip?”
“That’s just who she was.”
Megan pressed her lips together, wondering how quickly he’d grow tired of her questions. “And who was she?”
He made a show of backing out of the parking stall, like it required his utmost attention and he couldn’t even spare the brain power to speak. Once he’d set the truck on the deserted road toward Missoula, he said, “Lauren Tuttle. We dated for a year before she ran off with another cowboy from the ranch.”
He delivered the words with precision, without emotion. His fingers remained relaxed on the wheel, and the only indication that he felt anything at all was the slight shift of his body against the seat.
“She didn’t grow up here.” Megan couldn’t remember a Tuttle family.
“She moved here with her mother after her father’s death a few years ago. Her mom lives in Monkeytown.”
“Oh, so north of the elementary school.”
“Right.”
“How long ago did she…leave?”
“Couple of years.”
Relief rushed through Megan, mostly because she didn’t feel the undying urge to ask him another question. Definitely because he didn’t seem haunted by the broken relationship. “One more question,” she said as it occurred to her.
“You can ask me whatever you want.” His hand dropped from the steering wheel and found hers.
“Have you dated anyone since Lauren?”
“You’d be the first.”
“So we’re dating?”
“That’s your second question.” He tossed her a grin. “And yeah, I think—I mean, I’m not seeing anyone but you.”
“And you hold my hand whenever you feel like it,” she teased.
“And you let me.”
“And you buy me dinner.”
“And—” He cleared his throat; his fingers tightened around hers. “And we’re goin’ on a trip together.”
“If that’s not dating, I don’t know what is.”
“Right.”
“So can I call you my boyfriend?”
“Third question.”
She laughed, snuggling in closer to him. But he wasn’t soft; his strong-as-steel muscles didn’t bend against her touch. He was kind, though, and gentle, and she thought sure if he would just kiss her, she could fall in love with him.
This weekend, she thought as the miles passed beneath his truck’s tires. If he didn’t kiss her this weekend, she’d kiss him before they came back to Montana.
Once on the ground in Salt Lake, excitement made Megan bounce off the plane. “We’re here. We’re here.”
“I thought for a minute there we weren’t gonna make it.”
“That was just turbulence.”
“Didn’t happen on my other trip.” Landon paused to wipe his face, and he still looked a bit gray. “I need something to drink.” They stopped at a fast food joint in the terminal so he could buy orange juice and water. He found an empty seat and guzzled the orange juice while impatience ate a hole in Megan’s stomach. She didn’t want to spend her weekend in an airport, but Landon was airsick and she wanted to be as attentive and patient with him as he was with her. So she sat beside him and laced her fingers in his free ones. Color returned to his face soon after he finished the juice, and he stood.
“For the record, that’s never happened before.”
“How often do you fly?”
“Not often.”
“Even for the rodeo?”
“I drove,” he said. “Big truck and a horse trailer. My manager drove the trailer we lived in. No airplanes.”
“And you didn’t get sick a couple of weeks ago?”
“I’m telling you, that plane we were just on was about to go down.”
Megan giggled and stepped closer to him. “So, what are we doing today?”
“I thought we’d check out some of the country here. There’s a pretty easy hike to a waterfall up Provo Canyon.”
She groaned and stepped beside him as he got in the line to get a rental car. “I shouldn’t have told you about hiking to Phelps Lake.”
“This is a walk,” he said, a chuckle close behind his words. “It’s on a paved path and everything.”
“Oh, well, okay.”
Provo Canyon turned out to be about an hour south of Salt Lake City, and Megan enjoyed the ride—though she wished she could sit right next to Landon in the SUV the way she did in his truck. It felt awkward to hold his hand across the console, and a sense of weariness pressed her back into her seat.
“Time to wake up, sleepy head.”
Megan woke with a start, her heart leaping to the back of her tongue. Sunlight assaulted her at the same time she realized she’d fallen asleep. She turned her attention to the handsome man sitting next to her. Landon gave her a gentle smile, his adoration for her evident in his expression.
Everything inside her softened, and she leaned her cheek against the headrest to return the smile—and the feelings. “Sorry,” she said. “I got up early.”
“You still wanna….” He nodded out the windshield.
“Yeah.” She unbuckled her seatbelt. “Yeah, I want to go see the waterfall.”
He joined her outside the truck, taking her hand in his as they moved toward the trailhead. “This is called Bridal Veil Falls. Then we can go to dinner, and I hope you brought your swimming suit.” He bumped into her in a playful gesture.
“I did not bring my swimming suit.” The very idea of donning spandex in front of him brought more horror than she’d felt in months. “You never said anything about swimming.”
“The hotel has a pool. It’s a given to bring a swimming suit.”
“Maybe for you.” The very thought of sharing a wall with him brought mor
e butterflies than she knew what to do with. Which was ridiculous. Just because he’d be sleeping in the room next door didn’t mean anything. She certainly wasn’t going to do anything improper with him, unless kissing was considered improper—and it wasn’t.
Too many people loitered nearby to stop him and kiss him right now. Her lips tingled in anticipation of when she could finally be alone with him. At the same time, fear struck her right behind her breastbone. What if Landon didn’t want to kiss her? Maybe that was why he hadn’t done it yet.
She fell silent as she lost herself inside her worries. Landon let her go, his quiet nature sometimes a curse. They reached the falls, and Megan pulled herself from her introspection. If Landon was going to move to Utah, she wanted to live in the moment with him while she had moments to spare.
12
The drive to the horse ranch took forever, in Megan’s opinion. And they’d left the last town of any decent size about thirty minutes ago. That’s not so bad, she told herself, especially because Landon turned onto a dirt road in the very next moment. Just like Horseshoe Home Ranch.
“Should be just down here,” he muttered. He’d turned mute for the past hour, but Megan didn’t mind so much. She felt near the edge of a cliff herself. She still wasn’t sure what he expected from her, and she wanted to give him the right reaction to the ranch.
The red and white striped rocks on the buttes surrounding them rendered her breathless, and she seized onto them for a conversation topic. “This is gorgeous country.”
Landon peered up and out the windshield. “It is.”
“I bet it’s super green in the spring.”
“Still pretty green right now.”
Megan nodded, ashamed of herself for bringing up the landscape. Though it was pretty, surely she and Landon could do better. The fact that he couldn’t spoke of his anxiety.
He pulled up to an all-brick house that sported three full-size garage doors. The grass along the front of the house practically shone like emeralds. The gravel driveway obviously had a dedicated caretaker.
