Her Homecoming Cowboy (6 page)

Chapter Six

“H
e’s about the cutest thing I ever saw,” Norma Sue said on Sunday after church.

Annie stood behind the church with a group of ladies after the services were over. They were watching Leo play with some of the other children, and he’d run over and told all of them about getting to eat supper with Colt. Then, he’d run back to play with his friends, leaving her to deal with the knowing looks and smiles. Every eye turned immediately on Annie. Problem was she didn’t know if Norma Sue was talking about Leo or Colt.

“Yes, I think Leo is a pretty special little boy.”

“I think so, too,” Esther Mae said. “And he sure does look like Colt. Look at that, he’s even copying the way Colt stands. Now, that’s hero worship if I ever saw it.”

“Isn’t that something,” Norma Sue said, watching the way he stood with one knee cocked and his hand on his hip.

Annie’s breath caught at their words and her gaze met Gabi’s, who was among the small group. Gabi had sharp eyes that took in everything. Annie had learned during the few days they’d worked together that she was very good at noticing details. Annie got the weirdest feeling that Gabi had observed these similarities already. Watching Leo, she knew without a doubt that her days keeping this secret were numbered. And though the matchmaking posse might think the similarities they were seeing were from hero worship, she knew that Gabi would realize that she was seeing genetic traits rather than copied mannerisms.

She’d left Colt’s cabin the other day worried about the same thing. She was going to have to tell him, and she was going to have to do it soon.

“And y’all had dinner out there?” Norma Sue said, changing the subject from Leo. “That’s just wonderful. You know, that boy’s been through a lot. The fact that he’s socializing at all is a fantastic thing.”

“He’s needed something since that terrible wreck,” Adela said. “He suffered so much emotionally and maybe...” She turned her electrifyingly blue eyes to Annie and a gentle smile played across her features. Annie didn’t think she’d ever met anyone like Miss Adela. Goodness just seemed to radiate from her. “God is going to use little Leo, and you too, to help draw our Colt from the dark mire of guilt and grief that he’s struggling with.”

Esther Mae and Norma Sue immediately agreed.

“You don’t know, do you?” Gabi asked, realizing that Annie was clueless.

Annie shook her head. “No. I’ve figured out that something must have happened, during the time of the fires, when I didn’t have time to watch television or anything. The last time we watched the bull riding on television, he was competing and actually won. What happened to him? I just assumed that he got stomped by a bull.”

“You tell her, Gabi,” Esther Mae said, shaking her red hair. She fanned herself vigorously with the brim of her floppy straw hat. The cluster of daisies hung on for dear life. “It’s just too upsetting to me to talk about. Poor young man.”

Everyone else agreed and Gabi took a deep breath. “He was competing night after night. Some weekends he was hitting three rodeos—sometimes in different states. He was worn out from driving so hard. But his hard riding was putting him back on top of the ratings. He really felt like this was his year to finally win the National Finals Rodeo in Vegas. He’d come so close year after year that he had really been pushing himself this year to win. He was coming home to rest up a week before competing in last month’s second Mule Hollow Homecoming Rodeo. He was worn out. On the way home a drunk driver hit him and knocked him into the other lane. His truck hit a car with a young family of four. All of them were killed, including the drunk driver. Colt walked away with basically no injuries to speak of.”

Annie felt ill. She couldn’t believe it. What must he have gone through knowing he’d killed that family? The horror of it was too much to think about, much less live with. No wonder he seemed so lost at times. “I can’t imagine how he must feel.”

“We’ve all tried to tell him it wasn’t his fault. But he believes if he hadn’t been so tired he’d have been able to prevent the wreck.”

It all made sense. The ladies quickly told her how he’d tried to hide his grief riding bulls, but had then been stomped by a bull and forced to come home to recuperate. He’d holed up at his cabin alone for almost three weeks now.

And then she and Leo had shown up.

Annie left church with a lot on her mind. Only God’s timing could have brought them here when Colt needed his son most to help him overcome this horrible tragedy. Annie felt it in her soul that this was true.

* * *

Gabi and Montana were chatting in the kitchen when Colt knocked on the back door of Luke and Montana’s house. He’d agreed to come to Sunday-night dinner after Montana had dropped by and invited him personally, insisting that he come. His new sister-in-law was a force to be reckoned with. That was why Montana was ranking so well in the women’s barrel-racing standings. She was attacking her dream in the same way he’d been attacking his own. They’d hardly had any time to get to know each other, since both of them had been on the road hitting the rodeo circuits so hard. In town for only a short time, she wanted to cook dinner for Luke’s family.

So here he was.

“Colt!” Montana exclaimed when she pushed open the screen door. “I am so glad you came.” She pulled him into the kitchen and gave him a hug. “Luke will be so pleased. Look who’s here,” she said, turning to Gabi.

Gabi grinned. “You’ve made our evening by showing up.” She hugged him, too. His brothers had both done well when it came to finding the women they wanted to share their lives with. He hadn’t expected either of them to get married for a while, but Luke had fallen fast and hard when he’d met Montana. And Jess had done the same when he’d met Gabi. Their wedding was coming up in a few weeks and he was happy for Jess.

Colt’s head had been full of dark thoughts since he’d had Leo and Annie over. He’d gone from feeling a sliver of hope to taking a plunge into the guilt of having felt something other than disdain for himself. He’d recognized that being alone in the darkness wasn’t a good thing. Montana had shown up at the perfect time.

“The guys are in the living room talking about cows and lack of rain.” Montana pulled Colt over to the kitchen breakfast bar and pushed him onto the stool. “You need to stay right here for a few minutes and visit with the women in your life.”

He smiled at that. Smiles were coming easier these days and he knew that was good. He couldn’t continue to live in the dark hole that he’d buried himself in for the first few weeks after the wreck.

“That’s right.” Gabi pushed a plate of chocolate-chip cookies his way. “Is there anything we can do for you?”

Both women were watching him with compassion. His gut wrenched. “I don’t know what to say. I’m doing all right.” That wasn’t the truth, but he wasn’t sure how to voice the things that were going on inside his head. He’d never been real good at opening up.

He picked up a cookie, not because he had an appetite; he just needed something to occupy his hands.

“Hey, little brother,” Jess said, coming into the kitchen. Luke followed him. They made a beeline for the cookies.

“Glad you came.” Luke held the cookie up. “They made these for you and we couldn’t have any until you got here.”

Montana put her arms around Luke’s waist as he slipped an arm around her. “You should have seen your brothers.” She grinned at Colt. “They were pretty pitiful, trying to sneak some when they thought we weren’t looking.”

Jess finished his cookie and grabbed another. Gabi laughed, and he grabbed her, tugging her close. “Gabi’s too observant. I think she has eyes hiding under that ponytail at the back of her head.”

“I do, and don’t you forget it.”

Colt felt a stab of envy at the happiness around him. He was glad his brothers had found Gabi and Montana. Growing up, they’d been three kids just trying to get by. He’d hidden his emotions in dreams of becoming a rodeo hero, and as a youth he’d put all his energy toward making that dream come true. The idea of building hearth and home with someone was not even a blip on his radar, and any woman he met had to understand that.

In that moment, he thought of Annie. Of her sitting in his kitchen Friday night. His thoughts had been stuck on her and Leo ever since.

“I hope you’re going to reconsider and be in the wedding,” Gabi said, drawing his attention. “It would mean so much to us.”

Jess nodded, his blue eyes watchful. Colt knew they were all trying to gauge how he was doing. The room suddenly hummed with tension. “I’m not sure if—” The disappointment he glimpsed in Gabi’s eyes, when she knew he was about to tell her he wouldn’t, stopped him. “I’ll be in the wedding.”

Thankfully the room didn’t erupt into cheers. He couldn’t handle that kind of emotion right now and they knew it. Instead slow smiles spread across everyone’s faces as they all told him how glad they were that he would be there.

The sun was setting on the horizon about two hours later when they’d all eaten perfectly cooked steaks and baked potatoes. While the girls talked wedding plans, the guys gravitated to the back porch to talk about the ranch and the drought that was threatening everything they’d worked so hard for.

Jess and Luke had opted to sell some of the herd a couple of weeks back in order to make the hay last longer. They were being forced to purchase hay at an elevated price because of the lack of local hay. Colt had no real enthusiasm for the discussion now. His focus had never been on the ranch that Luke had wanted to own so badly. He understood his brothers’ need for a place to lay down roots—something they’d never known. His older brother had been driven to build something in order for his and Jess’s children to have a legacy. It stemmed from Luke’s role as the leader of the family, ever since he was a kid.

Colt felt no need to settle down. He’d always had a restless spirit and nothing had changed. He was here only because of circumstances that were out of his control. When his collarbone healed enough for him to climb back on a bull, he’d be gone again. After what he’d done, even if he wanted a family, he knew he didn’t deserve one. This ranch would be a legacy for Luke’s and Jess’s families. Not his.

“Colt, we need to talk to you about something,” Luke said after Colt saw him and Jess exchange one of their it’s-time-to-get-to-the-point looks that he’d begun to see often when the three of them were together.

He’d been expecting it all night long. Ever since Gabi had asked him about Annie and Leo coming over to his house for dinner. She’d heard about it at church today. He hadn’t said much, and though they’d all let the topic drop, something told him it hadn’t been forgotten. Gabi had seemed a little nervous to him tonight, and he’d attributed it to thinking about her upcoming wedding. When she’d asked him about Annie and Leo, he’d noticed she’d almost shredded her napkin picking at it.

“Yeah.” Jess joined in, scooting to the edge of his chair and leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees. Both of his hands were wrapped around his coffee mug when he met Colt’s curious eyes with his serious ones. Luke’s eyes were thoughtful, too.

Colt stilled himself for the talk about the wreck not being his fault and how he needed to pull himself out of the muck he was feeling and start moving forward. He was prepared for them to tell him they were glad he was spending time with Annie and Leo. It had occurred to him when Gabi had brought up the subject that the group would naturally start believing that was what he needed. Having Annie and Leo over opened the door for that kind of thinking. They were wrong.

“We, ah, we’ve noticed something,” Luke continued, his words uncertain.

Luke’s hesitation grabbed Colt’s attention. A glance at Jess told him he was just as reluctant to talk about whatever was bothering them. Colt crossed his arms and waited.

“We’ve noticed things about Leo that—well, frankly, they remind us of you.” Luke snapped his mouth shut, and tensed his jaw. Jess nodded agreement, his own jaw rigid as he watched Colt.

“Something about him reminds y’all of me?” He thought about that for a minute. “I’ve been thinking I knew them from somewhere, because something about them is familiar to me. But Annie said we’ve never met.” He looked from Jess to Luke. They were really acting strange.

Reminds them of me
. A picture of Leo holding his rope as Jess had showed him came into focus. Another picture of Leo, cocking his head to the side, jumped out at Colt. “Yeah, the kid copies me,” he said. “He’s been watching me since he was in diapers, I think. His mother must have been a real PBR fan to have plastered pictures of me all over the poor kid’s room.”

“Don’t you think that’s a little bit odd?” Jess asked.

Colt hiked a shoulder. He hadn’t really given it much thought. There were certain people, women especially, who were infatuated with him and his bull riding competitors. Some women seemed to be on the road from rodeo to rodeo as much as the riders themselves. He had let women like that distract him earlier in his career. But the last couple of years he’d barely given them a glance, hadn’t spent any time with them. He’d realized that to win the championship, he needed all his focus to be on the bull. Nothing else mattered. Until everything had come crashing down.

“Maybe his mother used to be one of those women that followed me around.”

Luke leaned forward and Jess straightened. Both brothers looked as though he’d just told them something they’d been waiting to hear. He studied them, his eyes narrowing. “What are y’all thinking?” He suddenly didn’t like the direction this conversation was taking.

Luke cleared his throat. “It’s understandable that you don’t see what we’re seeing. Truth is, me and Jess saw something that first morning. Then Gabi said something. And you know how alert Gabi is to detail.” It was true. Gabi had proved that when she’d headed up the search for what was killing their cattle a few weeks ago.

“Gabi came home the first day she met Leo and told me the kid reminded her of you. She didn’t think much about it at the time, because she didn’t know about Leo’s mother plastering pictures of you all over his wall. When I told her, she didn’t say anything except that it seemed a little odd.”