The Cowboy's Courtship (11 page)

And women. None of them knew him. They knew that he was a bull rider. They loved the excitement at an event. They wore little tops, tight jeans and polished boots, but they didn’t care about him, about his life.

Some of that was his fault. He’d never really cared to share his life with any of them.

Alyson walked next to him, back to the barn. Sometimes she felt like a complication. Sometimes she felt like the best thing that had ever happened to him. He shook
his head, because never in a million years would he have dreamed up this scenario.

But God had. Jason wouldn’t have been home when she showed up if it hadn’t been for the accident. He nearly stopped walking when that thought shifted through his mind.

“You’re good with these kids.” Alyson pulled him back to a hot summer day and her presence next to him.

“I enjoy working with them.”

“More than bull riding?”

He glanced down, wondering how she could do that, how she could know what he was thinking. Of course she didn’t. It was coincidence.

“I don’t know. Bull riding has always been my career. It’s been in my blood for a long time.”

“Are you going to compete again?”

She was so formal about it. He wanted to laugh, but he didn’t. Instead, he led her into the stable and they stood back and watched as Trent took care of his horse.

“I’m scheduled for an event in a month. I’m going to Clint’s to get on practice bulls tomorrow morning.”

“Is that dangerous?”

“No, not really. Come with me. I’ll show you.”

As soon as the invitation was out, he knew that it changed everything. He knew that it made her someone he wouldn’t walk away from before it hurt.

Alyson walked past the chapel on her way to the dining hall. Jason was still in the stable, helping a few of the younger children learn to pole bend. She’d watched him set up the poles, spacing them a short dis
tance apart in the arena, making a line that the horses would run through, weaving back and forth through the poles. She didn’t quite get it, but he’d promised to let her try it tomorrow.

On a horse. She could ride one around the arena, or through the field. But around poles?

As she passed the chapel, she heard the piano. She glanced in and saw a few of the children gathered around it. They plunked at the keys and managed something that sounded like “Twinkle, Twinkle.” Turning off the trail that led to the dining hall, she walked over to the chapel, through the open door at the end.

One of the girls looked up, eyes wide. “We were just playing.”

“That’s okay, keep playing.” Alyson walked down the center aisle between the two rows of pews. There were four girls and two boys, Jenna’s twins. She smiled at Timmy and David and they smiled back—big smiles that lit up their smudged faces.

“We were just playing the piano,” said a smaller girl. She had curly brown hair and big brown eyes. “I’ve never played one and Timmy said we could touch this one.”

“You can touch it.” Alyson walked up behind the group. “Would you like for me to show you how to play?”

They all nodded. David’s smile grew. “’Cause she’s a professional piani…” He scrunched his nose. “Pianoist.”

“Something like that. A pianist.” She ran a hand over his blond head. His hair had been buzzed short and his feet were bare. “Where are your shoes?”

“Lost. The dog took ’em.”

“Oh.” She sat down and the children circled around
her. Her heart pounded, but this time it wasn’t fear, it was something like being filled up. She smiled and touched the keys, running her fingers over them and getting a thrill that had been missing for a long, long time.

What made it different?

She played a few children’s songs, including “Twinkle, Twinkle.”

“Don’t you need a book?” The little girl with curly hair had settled on the bench next to Alyson.

“No, I don’t. I play by ear.” The songs had always been in her head. It was hard for anyone to understand. She could hear a song and know how to play it.

“Can you play the song ‘In the Garden.’” The older girl that had originally explained their presence in the chapel moved forward. “I love that song.”

“Can you hum it for me?”

The girl, in a sweet alto, sang the song. As she sang, Alyson started to play. The song was beautiful, the melody pure. The words, about walking in the garden with the Savior, reached deep into Alyson’s heart, to her soul.

She had a savior. Tears clouded her vision as she played and the young girl sang about Jesus telling her she was His own.

The song ended and the girl leaned and hugged her close. “Are you okay, Miss Alyson?”

“I’m fine, sweetie. You know what I think? I think we should practice a song that you can do this Sunday.”

The children nodded. One of the girls suggested a song that they all knew and Alyson listened to excited chatter. As they talked, the bell rang, signaling lunch.

The children scattered. David, one of Jenna’s twins,
was the last to leave. Before he turned to run after the other kids, he hugged her tight. And then he was gone.

Alyson wiped her tears and took a deep breath. Her fingers moved to the piano keys again. She played the song and this time she sang the words that she remembered.

Jason stood on the trail and listened to the music that drifted from the chapel. Sun beat down on his back and he moved into the shade of a tree and leaned against it for support. The song was “In the Garden.” He closed his eyes and listened to a child singing the lyrics. And he knew that it was Alyson playing the piano.

His mother’s song. They had even played it at her funeral.

The child’s voice faded as the song ended. He stood there, listening to the children talk, and Alyson laughing to something they said. The lunch bell rang and the children ran from the chapel, up the hill to the dining hall. That had been his destination, too. He just hadn’t made it.

Before he could step away from the tree, the piano picked up the tune again. This time it was Alyson who sang the words.

He walked down the trail to the chapel. This was different than the last time, when she had picked out the words to “Jesus Loves Me.”

This time she was singing about something personal.

And he knew he should walk away. He had experience with walking out the door, not with staying to feel the pain. He liked his life uncomplicated.

It had been anything but since Alyson showed up at Etta’s.

That should scare him, but it didn’t.

She stopped playing and looked up, her gaze connecting with his. She closed the piano up and stood, no longer a woman from the city. She had transformed herself into what she wanted to be, a Forester.

Who was she really? He didn’t think she had an answer to that question. As much as she wanted this transformation, he had to wonder if it was that easy to shed who she had always been.

“You’re missing lunch.” He stood at the back of the chapel and she walked down the aisle toward him. The sun peeked through the leaves of shade trees that had been left standing around the chapel. The golden beam found her, catching the blond of her hair in its light.

And Jason felt a tingle of fear, because of this woman, walking up the aisle of the chapel to join him. He swallowed hard and tried to think of something funny to say, and he couldn’t get the words out, couldn’t shove them past the lump in his throat.

“I was heading for the dining hall when I heard the children on the piano,” she admitted as she got closer to him.

And then they were standing there, at the back of the chapel, and his eyes ached because of sunlight and because she had consumed the air around him.

Man, she obviously didn’t get that he had a reputation for not getting trapped in relationships.

“I’ll walk up with you,” he offered. “You might have to pull me up the hill.”

She glanced down, at his swollen knee and she shook her head. “You’re a lost cause.”

“Not too much.” He hooked his arm through hers. “They’re having a bonfire for supper tonight.”

“I know, hot dogs.”

“And s’mores.” He leaned a little toward her, because her hair smelled like coconut and her lips sparkled with pink gloss.

“So, will you go with me?” he asked.

She shot him a look. “You’re that cheap? You want me to accept an invitation to a bonfire that I’m already attending?”

He shrugged. “I did promise you a bonfire. This one is already being built and I don’t have to do the work.”

She looked up at him, smiling. That pink gloss was more temptation than any man could handle.

“That’s pretty cheesy.”

He pretty much agreed, but he didn’t have anything better. He thought he could go for the broken cowboy routine. He’d had experience with that, and it had a way of working on women.

But Alyson was different, and he couldn’t play those games with her.

“I’ll pick you up at seven?” They were already at the dining hall and kids were filing in.

Alyson nodded a little, and he wasn’t even sure if she was agreeing. But he planned on knocking on her door at six-thirty.

A
ndie knocked on the frame of the open door of the bedroom and Alyson turned away from the mirror. Andie stepped into the room. She had a backpack flung over her shoulder and she’d been rushing through the house all afternoon, getting ready to leave.

“I’m outta here.” Andie plopped down on the chair next to the window. “And you look like a woman getting ready for a date, not a bonfire at a Christian camp.”

“Will you be back next week?” Alyson shifted the conversation, she hoped, to something neutral.

“Probably. Are you going to be here?” Andie propped booted feet on the window seat.

Would she be here? Alyson sat down on the edge of her bed and slipped her feet into flip-flops. “Of course I’ll be here. I’m working at the camp. I’m not going to walk away from that.”

She had talked to Jenna about working with the children, teaching them a few songs that they could sing. They were thinking of bringing these kids back for the
fund-raiser, so they could participate. The kids were begging their own church to let them return.

“Alyson, can I give you a little advice, if it isn’t too late?”

“Do I have a choice?”

Andie laughed. “Actually, no, you don’t. I was just going to remind you to be careful with your heart, sister.”

Jason. Of course that’s what Andie meant with that advice.

“My heart is still intact. I’ve already been dumped and I’m not about to go through that again.”

“Yeah, but I don’t think you loved that guy.”

“No, I probably didn’t.”

Andie dropped her feet to the ground and stood up. She leaned to kiss Alyson on the top of her head. “See you soon. And I don’t want a message on my voice mail telling me you’ve eloped with a cowboy.”

“That isn’t going to happen.”

As Andie walked out the door, she laughed. “We’ll see.”

Alyson mumbled that she didn’t have to see, she knew. But because of Andie, she found herself thinking about Jason, and a night that felt like a first date.

She thought back, to dating Dan. It hadn’t really been dating. He’d taken her to dinner twice a month. That had been their schedule. And each date had ended with a friendly kiss that hadn’t shattered anything more than her dreams of what love should feel like.

Now she knew the truth. Dan had been comparing her to her sister, to Laura’s more dramatic beauty. Laura had dazzled him with her bright laughter and easy personality.

Alyson hated that she understood. She’d always been slightly dazzled by Laura, too. But she still loved her sister.

A truck rumbled down the road outside Etta’s. Alyson listened as it turned into the driveway and pulled up to the house. He hadn’t forgotten. She smiled, because she had hoped, just a little, that he might forget.

Instead, he was knocking on the front door and Etta was yelling up the stairs that her date was here. Her date. Alyson was twenty-eight and she felt like she was going to the prom.

It wasn’t the prom. It was hot dogs and a bonfire at Camp Hope. She stood up, shot a quick glance at the mirror, and walked out the door. He was waiting at the bottom of the stairs and for a second it felt like the prom. Except that she was in shorts and a T-shirt, he was in jeans, but tonight, no hat. He wore an unbuttoned short-sleeved shirt over a T-shirt.

He smiled up at her, and her heart tumbled down the stairs. She grabbed the rail to make sure she didn’t follow and reminded herself that this was one night, and not forever.

“Ready to go?” He winked and she wondered if he had a clue how nervous she was.

“Of course.” This was the new, stronger version of herself. Like a new computer program, updated and more sophisticated. Her less confident self reminded her that new programs were always full of bugs and tended to crash often. “Of course I’m ready.”

She had reached the bottom of the stairs and he reached for her hand. “You’re driving.”

“I can’t drive a truck.” She glanced at Etta. “Tell him this is a bad idea.”

“Of course you can. You need the practice.” He handed her the keys.

“See you kids later.” Etta was pushing them to the door, like they were sixteen. “Have fun and stop worrying.”

And then the door was closing behind them. Jason took hold of her hand and held it tight as they walked to the truck. This had nothing to do with her needing experience driving a stick shift. She considered asking him the real reason, but he was as entitled to his secrets as she was to hers.

He stopped at the driver’s side of his truck and opened the door for her. She climbed in, but she didn’t let him close the door.

“We could take my car,” she offered.

“Nope, not into the field.” He closed the door and walked around to the passenger side. “Put your foot on the clutch and the gas, make sure it’s in first gear and start your engines.”

“No race car analogies, please.”

Alyson started the truck, and that proved to be the easy part. Shift, clutch, brake, gas, shift, don’t forget the clutch, grinding gears, man next to her mumbling under his breath and then trying to smile. On the highway outside of Dawson it got easier. She could put the truck in fourth gear and drive like a normal person.

“As we get close to the camp entrance, slow down, use the clutch and shift to Third. Then slow again, clutch, shift to Second.”

“Okay.” But it wasn’t okay. Her hands, legs and insides were shaking.

He laughed. “You’re doing great.”

She shifted once, twice and on the third shift the truck bucked, jerked and died.

“Oops.” She shifted into First and started it again.

He leaned back in the seat. “Up the driveway to the barn.”

“And then you can take over?”

He shook his head. “You’re doing a great job.”

The gate was already open. She drove through, afraid she’d hit the truck against the posts on either side. And from the way he sucked in a breath, he had to be thinking the same thing.

In the distance she could see a stand of trees and a group of people. The fire was already burning, smoke swirling into the air and kids standing around it. The truck bounced as she drove across the field toward the group of people who had already gathered.

“Park at the end of the row.” Jason pointed. There were several trucks and a tractor attached to a trailer. That was for the hayride they planned to have.

She parked the truck and started to turn the key, but Keith Urban was playing on the radio, and she liked his music. Jason opened his door and got out of the truck.

Alyson left the music on and stepped out. She started to reach in the back for their lawn chairs and the blanket Jason had brought along, but she didn’t. Jason stood at the back of the truck, a hand on the tailgate and his head down.

She walked back to him. He opened his eyes and smiled, winking as if nothing had happened.

“You’re not okay.”

“Of course I am.” He slipped an arm around her waist and walked her around the truck to where she’d left the chairs and blanket. Keith Urban was still singing and Jason swayed a little, catching himself on the side of the truck.

She started to comment, but he stopped her with a look.

“I think this song might be my favorite.” He moved closer. “What about you?”

A love song, sung in pure Keith Urban style, twirling a woman’s emotions. Alyson pretended the song didn’t matter, and that this moment with the sun setting behind the dark green of the trees, turning the sky a brilliant orange and pink didn’t matter. She was standing in a field with a man whose smile touched deep inside her and she really wanted it to not matter.

But it did.

Nothing had ever mattered more.

As he pulled her close, she no longer felt like a person coming unraveled, losing herself. For that moment, with Keith Urban singing and a cowboy holding her close, she felt the promise of a summer night.

He leaned, kissed her cheek and then whispered in her ear, “We’d better join the group before we forget why we’re here.”

“For s’mores,” she whispered back.

“Exactly.”

But she was breathless and his hand lingered on hers for a few seconds more.

Jason carried the chairs and walked next to Alyson, not reaching for her hand as they neared a group of people who wore openly curious expressions. He wasn’t going to satisfy their curiosity. And he wasn’t going to fall on his face from the bout of dizziness that had hit him about the time he left his house for Etta’s to pick up Alyson.

He was waiting for the medication to kick in and praying it wouldn’t take long.

He wasn’t going to be able to keep making excuses, like telling Alyson she needed to practice driving. And then holding on to her instead of falling.

Alyson opened her chair and then she walked away, drawn to the rope swing the kids were using to swing out over the swimming hole. Some took longer to let go than others. Jason watched, laughing because the girl on the swing had been over the water twice and she was still hanging tight. Adam and Jenna were standing nearby, encouraging her to let go.

Let go. Jason shot a glance in Alyson’s direction. She knew about letting go. When he’d held her in his arms, she had let go. He’d seen it in her eyes, that she was beginning to see who she was. She was Alyson Forester, from Dawson.

She was good at being that Alyson.

Not that he minded the Alyson who wore cashmere.

She probably wanted that cashmere right now, he thought. It wasn’t cold, but she hugged herself as if she were chilled. He thought about offering the jacket he kept behind the seat of his truck, but knew she wouldn’t take it. She wasn’t cold, just trying to pull herself together.

He understood.

He could barely remember the first day he met her, but he knew that the shreds of memory he had retained meant something. He couldn’t let go of seeing her standing at the edge of Etta’s lawn, staring at him, at that big house, as if she’d just entered another dimension.

Or found something she’d lost.

And maybe she had lost something—herself. But he
thought she was finding that person again. He also thought that when she found herself, she’d leave. Once her confidence was back and her life wasn’t about fearing her gift, or fearing rejection, she’d return to the life she’d left behind.

He walked to the edge of the creek bank where she was standing. She glanced at him and then back up, at the rope swing.

“You should try it,” he suggested, and she shook her head.

“I don’t think I’m dressed for plunging into a creek.” She watched as the next teenager took the rope, walked back and then glided forward, swinging over the water. This kid dropped on the first try. “Is it deep?”

“It’s over their heads.”

“I’d like to come back and try it. Someday.” She sighed and didn’t look at him. “Before I leave.”

“Are you planning to leave?” Why did that question land somewhere in his gut?

“Eventually.” She was still watching the kids on the rope. “I have a schedule that I can’t walk away from.”

“Yeah, I get that.”

This time she looked at him, her blue eyes bright. “I knew this was temporary.”

He nodded, because he’d known it, too. She should be easy to let go of. He’d go back on the road, back to riding bulls. She’d go back to her world.

Jenna called out for the kids, telling them it was time to eat. They walked out of the creek and hurried back to the fire, flinging towels around their shoulders. Alyson reached for his hand.

“Stop pretending.” She spoke so softly he barely caught it.

“What?”

“You, acting like you’re okay, like you just wanted to let me practice driving a stick shift.”

He smiled and winked, because he didn’t know what to say to someone who saw way too much.

“How do you like your hot dogs?” he asked as they got closer to the fire, to the group of people already shoving hot dogs on sticks. A few were standing close to the fire with sticks held close to the flames.

“Well, since I’ve never had one roasted on a fire, I’ll let you help me with that. And I asked you a question.”

He laughed. “I never thought you’d be this stubborn.”

“You don’t know me very well.”

He looked at her, at a woman with a soft smile and blue eyes that held his attention. He knew her better than he had planned on knowing her.

“Then I guess I’ll have to get to know you better.” He moved a little closer and she stepped back, her eyes bright with laughter and her hair coming loose from the clip that held it in place.

She was definitely determined to get under his skin.

“Not so fast, Cowboy.” She was still teasing, still smiling. “I have questions.”

He shrugged. “Yes, I really am naturally this charming and cute.”

“Oh, so you really are one of those love ’em and leave ’em types?”

He laughed. “Yeah, honey, that’s me.”

And it had been, for a long time.

“Funny, but I don’t see you that way.” Her smile dissolved and her eyes studied him, holding his gaze until he felt fifteen and unsure.

“How do you see me?” This wasn’t working out the way he had planned, as a way to distract her.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to know how she saw him. And really didn’t want this conversation to take place with an audience. He smiled across the fire, at Willow and Clint, holding the little girl they’d adopted from China.

“I see you as a guy who is always laughing and smiling so he doesn’t have to deal with how much he hurts on the inside.”

“I think we should roast hot dogs.”

“Exactly my point.” And she took her roasting stick and walked away, leaving him as unsure as he’d ever been in his life.

From across the fire he saw Clint Cameron laugh and sign something to his wife. They were looking at him. Willow signed back and Clint nodded.

Married couples. They thought everyone should follow their example.

Alyson had joined Jenna on the lawn chairs a short distance from the fire. He thought about joining them, but instead he went the opposite direction, finding a place with a group of teenage boys who were intent on discussing the steer riding they would do the next day.

That was a lot safer than any other conversation Jason thought he could have at that moment. And definitely safer than spending too much time with Alyson.