Home on the Ranch: Her Cowboy Hero

by Pamela Britton

  “You look beautiful.”

  “Don’t cry.”

  “I can’t help it. You’re like a fairy princess. And you’re marrying a prince. Well, okay, Texas royalty, but it’s damn near the same thing.”

  Was it? She supposed so. She and Paisley had been overwhelmed the first time they’d visited Colby’s dad’s. Paisley had walked inside the three-story mansion and said, “Mommy, is this a castle?”

  Which had made her laugh and think that with its marble floors and Texas-sized backyard, it was just about.

  She clutched the flowers Patty handed her, took a deep breath. In a few minutes she’d be getting married. She’d peeked out the windows earlier, at the backyard and the massive tent beneath which sat the crème de la crème of Texas. A few people in the crowd were her friends, plus Jax and Naomi and their kids. And more than a few were her family. But not her dad. She inhaled sharply. She’d invited him, had hoped...

  “Are you ready to go down?” Patty asked.

  Ridiculous. She should have known he wouldn’t come. Reese Gillian was nothing if not stubborn.

  She refused to cry. Preferred instead to focus on the present, and so she left the bedroom and headed downstairs. She’d never been one for big homes. They’d only agreed to hold the wedding in Texas for Colby’s dad, a man who’d worked hard to try to make amends. They’d made progress. Slowly, but surely. The wedding today had been a huge concession on her part. She’d wanted to get married in Via Del Caballo, among friends and family, but something had told her to agree to a ceremony in Texas. It’d been the right thing to do, the planning having pushed her future husband and his dad closer together. She didn’t know if Colby would ever fully forgive his father, but he might come close, and she wanted that, for Colby’s sake and for the sake of their unborn children. That particular thought had her blushing, because tonight was the night. They’d made the decision early on to wait until they were married to consummate their marriage. She had no idea what Colby had planned for this evening, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t get much sleep.

  “You look beautiful, JayJay.”

  She stopped dead in her tracks.

  Her dad stood at the foot of the stairs, tears in his eyes. “You didn’t think I’d miss this, did you?”

  Her shoulders started to shake, and she realized it was because she’d started to sob. He was here. He’d come. And then she was taking the remaining few steps two at a time, falling into her dad’s arms as if they’d never been mad at each other.

  “I’m so sorry, JayJay,” he murmured in her ear. “I’ve been a stubborn ass.”

  She leaned back. “Yes, you have,” she said, sucking in a breath and hoping like heck she hadn’t ruined her makeup.

  “Can you forgive your old man? Maybe let him walk you down the aisle?”

  She saw it then, the sadness and the sorrow and the regret. And the tears. There were tears in Reese Gillian’s eyes. It’d been so long since she’d seen him cry. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  “Let me see that makeup,” Patty said. “Oh, dear. Hold on a moment.”

  They used tissue to repair the worst of the damage. Patty helped her pull a gauzy veil over her head, one that reached past the sleeveless gown that hugged her upper body and flared at the waist. Outside Aunt Crystal waited with Paisley, their four-year-old flower girl who was getting bigger every day and couldn’t wait to watch her mommy get married in “the circus tent.” Aunt Crystal smiled when she spotted her dad, and Jayden knew who she had to thank for getting him there.

  “Thank you,” she mouthed.

  Crystal’s eyes filled with tears. Jayden had to look away. She’d already ruined her makeup once today.

  “Oh, Mommy, you look so pretty.”

  Coming from a four-year-old, it must be the truth, and so she smiled, but her lips trembled when she met Aunt Crystal’s gaze.

  “You look just like your mom.”

  The words robbed her of breath. How she wished her mom were here to see her today.

  “Are you ready?” her dad asked, echoing Patty’s words.

  “Beyond ready.”

  And she was. She couldn’t wait to get this over with. Couldn’t wait to marry the man of her dreams, the man who’d been so remarkable with Paisley, who’d shown her through his actions the meaning of forgiveness and love and what it meant to give selflessly to others. He’d decided to use some of his trust fund money to open up a second Hooves for Heroes, this one located just down the road from his dad. They had officially turned over the care of Dark Horse Ranch to Derrick and Bryan. Yes, Bryan Vance, who’d moved to Via Del Caballo to be closer to Chandra, Jayden’s schoolmate who’d taken her place, and to manage Hooves for Heroes with a little help from a few other veteran friends.

  The sound of the wedding march rang out from the back patio. She’d descend a massive brick terrace into the garden proper, as Colby’s dad called it, a place framed by rosebushes that released a fragrant scent into the air. Her dad let her go at the end of the aisle, and she smiled and leaned into him. Colby caught her gaze and glanced at her dad, and Jayden smiled. They’d have some catching up to do when all this was over, and she couldn’t wait for her dad to meet her new husband.

  Husband. Colby. That was what he’d be.

  Her breath caught as she took his hand. He wore a tuxedo with cowboy boots, although he’d left the cowboy hat at home. He stood next to Jax, his best man, Patty taking her place opposite him across the aisle. And as she turned toward the minister she clutched his hand. He turned to look at her and mouthed, “You look beautiful,” and she beamed.

  The ceremony could have been spoken in gibberish for all she’d remember. All she knew was that she was marrying her love with her daughter standing beside her and family and friends who meant the world to her at her back.

  So when the pastor said, “You may kiss the bride,” she almost didn’t realize what had been said. Only when Colby pulled back her veil, kissing her softly on the lips, did it finally register she was now Mrs. Jayden Kotch.

  “Woo-hoo!” screamed her daughter, rose petals spilling out of her basket when she jumped up and down.

  The audience broke into laughter and then applause, and Jayden felt like her face might split in half, she smiled so hard.

  “You have a big night ahead of you, Mrs. Kotch,” Colby said with a wag of his eyebrows.

  “As do you, Mr. Kotch.” She gave him a kiss, and then they were laughing, too, a sign of things to come. So much laughter and joy at their reception, and then later, when at last they became husband and wife in the truest sense of the word, more laughter, and tears, and a quiet joy in their hearts, a joy that would last.

  * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Home on the Ranch: Wyoming Cowboy Ranger by Rebecca Winters.

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  Home on the Ranch: Wyoming Cowboy Ranger

  by Rebecca Winters

  Chapter 1

  Whitebark, Wyoming

  Lily Owens hurried into the physiotherapy clinic at Whitebark Hospital, where she’d been working for the last three months. She hated to be late for work, but one of the mares on her parents’ ranch had gone into labor and she’d stayed to help until the vet arrived.

  “Hi, Lily! Mr. Harrington is in the examining room.”

  “Thanks, Cindy. Any messages?”

  “Not yet,” the receptionist responded.

  Lily went down the hall to the closet for her white lab coat. She slipped it on over her short-sleeved yellow top and cropped white jeans. On the way to her office, she passed the recently divorced head of the physiotherapy clinic, Dr. Matt Jensen, who was already busy at work. He stopped to talk to her before going into another examining room.

  “I’m glad I caught you before the day got away from us. How would you like to join me for dinner and a movie next Friday?”

  Caught was right. Matt was nice-looking and friendly, but she wasn’t attracted to him and needed to think fast. “Matt? I’m flattered that you would ask me out, but I don’t think it’s a good idea since we both work in the same clinic.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No, but please don’t take it personally. I once made the big mistake of getting involved with someone in the workplace. It was a disaster and I vowed never again.”

  “That’s too bad. I think we could have a good time.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” she replied with a smile. “But I learned my lesson.”

  He nodded. “Fair enough. Have a nice day.”

  “You, too.”

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she headed for her next appointment. “Good morning, Ben,” she said to the older gentleman as she entered the examining room. “How are you feeling?”

  “Better now that you’re here.”

  “I’m sorry you had to wait. One of our mares decided to have her foal this morning. I stayed until the vet arrived.”

  “You know how to deliver, too?”

  Lily laughed. “All I could do was gentle her so she wouldn’t panic.”

  “You’re good at that, young lady, and beautiful, too. How come you’re not married yet?”

  There was an answer for that. But it was one she hadn’t cared to think or talk about in years. “All the good ones like you are taken.”

  A chuckle escaped his lips. “One day some cowboy’s going to stagger in here for help. He’ll gaze into those periwinkle-colored eyes and fall head over heels. That’s a promise.”

  She smiled indulgently. “Sounds good, Ben.”

  The sixty-two-year-old feed-store owner had been brought in two months ago almost crippled from mechanical back pain. After examining him, Lily had to train him how to lift and lower grain bags and other inventory that had caused his trouble over years of doing it wrong.

  Lily patted the table. “Come on up and let’s see how your exercises are progressing.”

  “You’re going to be proud of me.”

  “I’m impressed how well you’re moving.” She put him through the procedures they’d been working on to strengthen his lower back. “Any pain?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “All right, you can get down.” He sat up the way she’d taught him and got off the table. “If all goes well and you remember what you have to do, I won’t have to see you again.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that. I’m going to miss you.”

  “You’ve been a terrific patient. I wish they were all like you. Good luck, Ben, and take care from now on.”

  “I intend to,” he answered.

  After he donned his Stetson and left the room, she disinfected the padded table and washed her hands to get ready for Janie Waters, her next appointment.

  The thirty-five-year-old laundry worker suffered from mechanical back pain similar to Ben’s. Because she’d always favored her left leg, which had once been broken, she’d created stress and needed to relearn movements to get rid of the pain while she was on her feet four hours a day. Once you broke or fractured a bone, you had to retrain the body how to move.

  At eighteen, Lily had learned that lesson the hard way during the Vancouver Olympics, where she held a world downhill seventh ranking. Tragically, she’d crashed on the course and had to be airlifted to a local hospital. Not only did she have a compound fracture of the tibia, but she’d also jarred her back. The injury was called an acute facet spinal joint dysfunction.

  After undergoing surgery, she’d been transferred to the University of Utah Hospital in Salt Lake City for expert treatment. Over the months that followed she started to recover, but not without a lot of therapy and a warning that another injury to her spine joint could cause paralysis.

  The thought of never being able to walk again warred with her desire to start ski training again. As for getting pregnant one day, her doctor told her that pregnancy might bring on paralysis. That had been the other bad news. She’d discussed it with an obstetrician brought in for consultation, but it wasn’t an issue in the foreseeable future.

  At her lowest ebb, her parents had arranged for a psychiatrist while she was undergoing the rest of her therapy. The doctor wanted her to consider the possibility of finding a new career if she decided not to train again for the Olympics.

  Though a cowgirl to the core, skiing had become a huge part of her life. She couldn’t comprehend giving up her skis to attend college. After talking it over with her parents, she settled on getting her degree at the university in physiotherapy to help other injured athletes.

  Interestingly enough she’d been introduced to hippotherapy on the back of a Missouri Fox Trotter kept on a ranch outside Salt Lake City. Known for its smooth gait for those suffering back pain, she and another patient had been elated with their results and had developed a passion for them during long comfortable rides.

  After receiving her postgraduate degree, she returned home to Whitebark at twenty-six and went to work at the hospital. To her amazement, her parents purchased some Trotters they kept and bred on the ranch. She worked out an agreement with the hospital to assist some patients with hippotherapy at the ranch. A day didn’t go by in this job that she didn’t thank heaven for her parents. She could never repay them for all their love and devotion.

  They’d arranged to give her an area at the back of the ranch house, where she could see patients young and old who needed this specialized therapy away from Whitebark Hospital. Lily derived a lot of satisfaction from helping injured teens performing in the junior rodeo who’d needed help with their pain before getting back to the sport they loved.

  “Dr. Owens?” Her next patient’s greeting from the doorway jarred her from her thoughts.

  “Janie—how many times have I told you to call me Lily? I’m not a doctor. I’m a physiotherapist trained to help people overcome movement disorders.”

  “You’re a damn good doctor to me!”

  Lily chuckled. Janie Waters never minced words. “That’s very nice to hear.”

  “It’s the truth. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to work at my job again until you helped me.”

  “So you’re honestly doing better?”

  “You’d know about it if I weren’t.” She got up on the table with ease and they went through some exercises together.

&nb
sp; “I’m thrilled you’re moving so much better.”

  “Yup. I’m up to three hours a day at work now.”

  When their session was over, her patient got off the table by herself.

  “At this rate you’ll be putting in your four hours in another month. Keep up the great work, Janie.”

  “I’m thankful for you, girl. See you in a week.”

  “You bet ya.”

  As Janie left, Lily went through the process of disinfecting the table and washing her hands again.

  “Lily?” She swung around to discover Sharon Carter, a nurse from the orthopedic wing of the hospital, had just walked in. “I’ve brought you a new patient. Here’s his file and X-rays. He came in on an emergency. Nothing’s broken, but he’ll need therapy. A word to the wise. He’s upset to have to be in here,” she whispered. “Have fun, anyway.” Her eyes danced.

  “What do you mean?” she whispered back, but Sharon had already gone out to wheel her patient into the room.

  “This is Ranger Ewing with the US Forest Service at Bridger-Teton,” she announced. “Day before yesterday he was thrown from his horse in the middle of the night and had to wait hours for help. He was flown in by helicopter last evening and will tell you exactly what happened.”

  Sharon turned back to the patient and spoke in a soft, placating tone.

  “Mr. Ewing? This is Lily, the physiotherapist who’s going to help you get better. After you’ve had your consultation, one of the staff will wheel you back to your room.” She pushed him over to Lily’s desk.

  “How soon can I be released?” The man’s deep voice reached right through to Lily’s insides.

  “That depends on your therapist’s diagnosis. I will now leave you in her care.” Nodding briefly at them both, she walked out of the room and quietly shut the door behind her.

  Lily found herself impaled by a pair of blazing dark brown eyes set in a face bronzed by the sun. He needed a shave and had a bruise on his right cheekbone. However, even in the robe-style blue hospital gown, or perhaps because of it, the blond-haired ranger had the kind of rugged good looks that could blow away every Hollywood heartthrob.