“Because it could be yours too?”
Luke winced. “No, actually it can’t be mine.”
“How are you so sure?”
“Because when I was fourteen I got gored by a steer. Let’s just say they were able to patch me up outside, but not inside.”
“Oh shit, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be, it’s not your fault. But the thing I wanted you to know is this, Brad really, really likes you. I’ve never seen him like this about any other woman. My little brother attracts women like flies, and since he was eighteen years old he’s gone through them like water. He’s been a player, albeit a player with a heart. I’ve never known him to be mean or mistreat any woman, and although we have our differences I have a lot of respect for him as a man.
“But the thing about those women is that he never wanted to keep one of them. He never had the kind of light in his eyes that he gets when he talks about you, and he’s never looked at any of them the way he looks at you. Karli is a bartender with a drinking problem, and she also attracts men like flies. She loves the attention, and she was going to cheat on me whether it was with my brother or someone else. The truth is I believe Brad wasn’t the only one she was with while we were supposed to be together. So until that baby is born and a DNA test is done, there is no proof he’s the daddy.”
“What do you expect me to do with this information, Luke?”
“Just please don’t give up on him is what I’m saying. He’s racking his brain trying to figure out how to have a relationship with you. He wants you, and he will treat you like a queen. Please don’t punish him for something that happened before he ever met you.”
She wasn’t thinking of punishing Brad, but she had to think of herself. She wasn’t ready to be with a man who had a newborn baby and eighteen years of being connected to the baby mama who sounded like a walking drama. Just figuring out how to sustain a long-distance relationship was stressing her out. The thought of leaving him behind to deal with a woman carrying a baby she said was his and knowing he’d have to be involved in that somehow while she was thousands of miles away … it was too much. She looked at Luke. “Thank you for telling me.”
“What are you going to do?”
She didn’t answer him. She just stood up and said, “Goodnight, Luke.” He watched her go inside, and she closed and locked the door and leaned against it. She was tempted to slide down to the floor and cry once again, but she didn’t let herself go there this time. Instead, when her legs felt like they would move, she went into her room and packed her things.
CHAPTER EIGHT
ONE YEAR LATER
Stephanie juggled the groceries in her arms as she tried to put the key in the lock of her apartment door and grab the mail out of the mailbox all at the same time. She was about to drop the bag when she felt someone take it out of her hands. Before she could see who had taken it, the bottom of the bag broke, and her apples and canned goods rolled all over the hallway and down the stairs.
“Oh, Jesus, I’m sorry.” She jerked her head up at the sound of the voice. Reed McMurtry was standing next to her, cowboy hat and all.
“Reed, what are you doing here?”
“Hi, Stephanie, sorry about the groceries. I guess I’m as much of a klutz as my little brother.”
“Is Brad okay?” She hadn’t seen or heard from Brad in months, eight to be exact. She’d tried to reach him at first but to no avail. It was like he’d fallen off the face of the earth. When she first got back to New York from Texas, they had spoken on the phone every day. He told her everything about himself and his family, and she did the same in return. He made her laugh and made her believe in herself. He told her that just thinking about her made him happy, and they’d planned to spend Christmas together in Manhattan. She felt like she knew him better than she’d ever known any other man, and when he called her the night before he was supposed to get on a plane to come see her, he said, “Stephanie Reynolds, I love you. I’m going to marry you one of these days.”
She was overwhelmed. She loved him too. She wasn’t sure if she always had, but she was sure she always would.
She had all kinds of things planned for when he came to see her for Christmas. She’d taken extra care decorating her tree and had bought him way too many presents. She arranged a night for them to ice-skate at Rockefeller Center and a carriage ride through Central Park. She planned out the menu for the meal she was going to make him on Christmas Eve and learned how to make biscuits and gravy so she could make him his favorites on Christmas morning.
She hadn’t seen him in four months, but the anticipation of seeing him as they grew closer with every phone call made her happier than she’d ever been. Then suddenly, nothing. She worried about him at first, so much that when he wouldn’t answer his phone, she called the office at the ranch. That phone call was what finally made her accept that he’d moved on. The girl who answered the phone was unfamiliar to her, and when she asked for Mrs. McMurtry, the girl said, “She’s going to be out indefinitely. I’m her daughter-in-law, Karli. Can I help you?” Stephanie hung up the phone and never called back.
She’d slipped into a depression, and over the course of the next few months, gained about thirty pounds. She felt like such a fool, and she’d lie awake at night and picture him with a faceless Karli and a cute little infant, warm and cozy by the fire. It drove her crazy, but she couldn’t stop. That was when she finally reached out to her friend Maggie and accepted the help that she’d been offering all along.
With her best friend’s help she’d begun seeing a therapist to deal with her body image issues and the closure she felt she needed from Brad. She started getting out more and walking every day in Central Park for the fresh air and exercise. The weight started coming off, and thanks to the therapy, her heart began to heal.
When summer came around, she was finally beginning to see light at the end of the long, dark tunnel she’d found herself in. Now as she looked into his brother’s face, she wondered if she’d been too hasty in her decision to write him off. Reed looked worried, and just by virtue of the fact that he was there told her there was something terribly wrong. Instead of answering her question, he bent down and began gathering her groceries.
He had his hands full of apples when she spoke. “Reed! Just tell me what’s wrong, please.”
“He’s not okay, Stephanie. He was building a house on the ranch. Every spare minute he had he put into that thing. He wanted to do as much of it himself as he could. Luke and I helped him some, but he was stubborn about it. He wanted to be able to say that he built it himself.” He stopped there and stared at the apple in his hand like maybe it was going to finish the story.
“Reed?”
“He fell through the roof and broke his back. He can’t walk, Stephanie. He’s in a wheelchair.”
“Oh, my God! When was this?”
“Right before Christmas.”
“Why didn’t he call me? Why didn’t someone call me?”
“He was in the hospital for a long time. He had a head injury too and they weren’t even sure if he was going to wake up. Ma was a mess. The community stepped up, and people volunteered to help around the ranch because she wouldn’t leave his side. Luke stayed out in the fields working twelve hours a day, and I spent my time when I couldn’t see him or I wasn’t working, trying to fix up the house so when he got out of the hospital it might be finished for him.”
“Did he marry Karli?”
Reed looked at her like she had two heads. “No, why would you think he married Karli?”
“When I was trying to reach him I called the ranch. Karli answered and she said she was the daughter-in-law. Did she marry Luke?”
“No, she’s delusional. She volunteered to help like everyone else. She thought that when the baby was born, Brad would marry her, so she went around telling everyone they were already married. He wasn’t ever going to marry her, and as soon as the baby was born Luke swabbed the baby’s mouth himself and had the DNA test
done. Brad was being released from the hospital the day the results came back that he’s not the father. My mother was furious, and let’s just say, I don’t think Karli will be back any time soon.”
“When did he get out of the hospital?”
“March, I guess.”
“March, that was five months ago. Why hasn’t he called me?”
“When he was able to, he told us that he never wanted you to know about his accident. He was afraid that you’d want to give up your life here to take care of his stubborn ass. He decided that since none of us had spoken to you, it would be better not to contact you at all.”
Her head was spinning. This was way too much information at once. What the hell was Brad thinking? Of course she would have been there for him. “Why now, Reed? Does Brad know you’re here?”
“No, he’d be pissed if he knew. The thing is he built that house for you. He bought a ring and everything and was planning on proposing to you when he was out here for Christmas. We all kind of figured what the house was for, but Ma found the ring a few days ago and confronted him with it. She wanted to call you right away, but he begged her not to. He told her you would just get hurt all over again because he wasn’t going to ask you to marry half a man.”
“So you came to see me on your own?”
“No, Ma sent me. She said he has no idea what the hell he’s talking about. The doctors say he can still have kids and he’s only twenty-five years old and, who knows, he may be able to walk again someday. She told me to tell you that he loves you still and if you love him too, she’d be appreciative if you’d come back … if only for a visit.”
“No, I can’t go back there for a visit.”
He looked torn between sympathy and anger. “Why not?”
She smiled. “Reed, can you help me arrange something?”
*****
Stephanie could only see the roof of the house and the pitch of the chimney from the window she stood in front of, but the sight filled her chest with happiness. Brad had built it for her with his own two hands, and she wanted to live in it forever.
“Sweetie, where do you want these?”
She turned and saw Maggie holding three bottles of champagne. “Just set them on the buffet table. Is everything ready?”
Maggie gave her a thumbs-up. “You look so beautiful.”
Stephanie promised herself no tears today. She smiled at her best friend. “Thank you. Thank you for being here.”
“There is no place I’d rather be.”
“Is he here?”
“Reed went to get him.”
The music started, and Maggie picked up her flowers and then gave her friend a peck on the cheek. “Here we go,” she said. She looked beautiful too. Stephanie was surprised they’d been able to pull this all off in such a short time. She only hoped that it was still what Brad wanted. She saw Luke poke his head in the little room just about the time she thought he may have changed his mind about coming.
“Wow, you look amazing.”
She smiled at him. “Thank you, so do you.”
“You ready to do this?”
She nodded. She was so excited that her stomach hurt from all of the activity going on in there. “I’m a little bit nervous.”
“Nothing to be nervous about,” he said, holding out his arm for her to take it. She linked hers through his. “Just don’t drink too much whiskey tonight.”
She was laughing as they stepped through the door and out onto the path lined with white cobblestones that had been created just for this occasion. She could see Maggie and Reed up front, and every chair was full as another row of guests stood behind each one of those. She knew they were there in support of Brad, and it made her heart happy to know so many people loved him. She was a little worried when she saw his spot next to Reed still wasn’t filled. She leaned and whispered to Luke, “Where is he?”
“Maybe Mick went to get him.”
She put her hand to her stomach and felt it rolling again. When they got to the front, Luke planted a kiss on her cheek and said, “Welcome to our crazy little family.”
“Thank you for helping with all of this.”
He shrugged. “No matter what, he’ll always be my baby brother. And, here he comes now.” She looked up in time to see Mick push Brad’s wheelchair to the end of the long aisle. It broke her heart that he couldn’t walk, but at the same time it gave her heart wings to just lay eyes on him. She wasn’t sure where they’d told him he was going, but he had on a brown sports jacket and a tan Stetson hat. He had a confused look on his face until he saw her. For several seconds he just stared at her, and then suddenly a smile spread across his handsome face and he began rolling toward her.
“I was wondering if you wanted to marry me.”
He laughed. “More than anything in the world.”
She leaned down and kissed him, and that earned them lectures from those in the audience who thought they should save it for the ceremony. With a smile on both of their faces, she pushed his chair to where they’d set up an arbor covered in wildflowers. The preacher presented them with a traditional ceremony, but when he proclaimed that the groom may now kiss the bride, Brad said, “Hang on.”
The crowd was silent, and all eyes were on him as he set the brakes on his wheelchair and used his strong arms to stand himself upright. Stephanie had tears in her eyes that threatened to ruin her makeup, but she didn’t care. Brad was standing as he turned to her and said, “I will spend every minute of the rest of my life making you happy, Stephanie McMurtry.”
She smiled through her tears. “I love you, Brad McMurtry.”
The sound of cheers and applause was deafening as the newlywed couple kissed for the first time as husband and wife.
~ The End ~
Read about Reed McMurtry finding love in To Love and Honor a Cowboy.
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Charlene Bright is the author of several contemporary western romance novels. She’s a lifelong resident of the American South and currently residents in southern Oklahoma on a family-owned cattle ranch. She greets each morning with a hot cup of coffee and an optimistic smile. Traveling to America’s national parks is her favorite pastime.
To Have And Hold A Cowboy (Cowboy Nuptials Book 1) Page 6
