Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 70566 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70566 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
DeeDee looked over at me. “What?”
I gestured toward the one cow that had like twenty babies with her in the field just beyond the house. “Look at them. She’s not the mother of all of them. How do you think they assign babysitters?”
DeeDee looked contemplative for a long moment before she said, “Usually they foist their babies on the youngest mother. At least, that’s what I’ve found.”
“They’re so mean.” I snickered.
Dinner was finished, and the only thing that was left was a single enchilada, which I put on a plate in the fridge for Denver when he got home.
I stayed around his place for an hour after the girls all went to bed and eventually decided to head to my apartment.
As I did, I thought about leaving.
It made my heart hurt to think about that, but maybe that was what needed to happen. I mean, it wasn’t like me moving out to my own place would really be that big of a deal. Right?
I got ready for bed and tossed and turned for an hour before I fell into a fitful sleep.
At some point in the night, a warm body slipped between the sheets next to me, and I woke with a hand doing naughty things to my body.
Denver and I made love in the dark.
It was sweet and soft and everything that I never knew that I needed.
When I woke up the next morning, he was gone.
The stalls were cleaned. The horses were fed. And I felt like I had one reminder that I wasn’t necessarily needed here.
I didn’t like the feeling at all.
TWENTY-SIX
I remember being able to get up without making sound effects. Good times.
—Denver to Holly
DENVER
“Give her a reason to stay, Dad.”
I looked at my oldest girl and said, “Short of throwing myself at her, which she’s already indicated that she wouldn’t care for me to do, I got nothin’.”
That wasn’t completely the truth.
Neither one of us had discussed all that much of anything. Our relationship was a weird one. I expected her to be there. Sometimes she was. Sometimes she wasn’t. I went to her when she wasn’t. We spent the night together with her in my arms, and the next day she would see me and pretend that that night never happened.
Hell, this morning I’d woken up to get the horse stalls cleaned, thinking I was being nice by letting her sleep in, and she’d glared at me all morning before she’d left. Not saying a single word to me.
I didn’t know what I was doing wrong here.
“Give her something she wants,” she suggested. “And, maybe, eventually, she’d be open to dating you.” She paused. “Have you even discussed your relationship with her?”
She made me sound like such a catch. Not.
“Got any ideas?”
“I do!” DeeDee cried.
“What?” Joe and I asked at the same time.
“Well, she was telling me this story about when she was younger,” DeeDee spoke animatedly with her hands. “And she’s kind of sad, so I really started listening. She was talking about a horse.”
“A horse?” I asked, confused as to where this was going.
“Just listen,” she ordered.
The bossy kid.
“Okay,” I held up my hands in defeat.
“She was talking about her childhood, and what she missed the most.” She looked around her. “She said that, out of everything that she missed, there were only a few things she wished she still had. Her horse, her reading spot down by the river, and her dad. She can’t have her dad back, obviously. But she said that they had to sell the horse to pay for her dad’s cancer treatments. Her childhood best friend’s dad bought it from them. For, might I add, a song. I think they were cheated out of a lot of money. They’ve used that horse to breed for years. Don’t ride him. Don’t do anything but breed him. She told me that it made her sad that all he was to them was a stud when he was her best friend growing up.”
My mind was whirling. “Who’s the friend?”
“Her name is Callista something.” DeeDee tapped her finger against her mouth. “Callista Heart…Braveheart…”
“Heartsan,” I guessed. “The Heartsans own a ranch not far from here.”
An idea took root.
“And where’s this reading spot?” Joe asked. “I haven’t found anything like that.”
“You haven’t been down to the river, either,” DeeDee pointed out.
“I have,” Catalina said quietly. “I think I might know what she’s talking about. It’s pretty overgrown where I’m thinking it’s at. But I’ll bet that we can get a path down to it pretty easily.”
“All right, Dad.” Joe clapped. “It’s your turn.”
My kids were good ones.
“Would y’all be okay with me dating Holly?” I asked carefully.
It was a subject I hadn’t broached yet because I didn’t want it to be too soon.
But we were past hiding it.
They knew how I felt about her, and I felt like they liked her, too.