The Sweet Spot (23 page)

JB walked to the door of the mudroom but then turned back. “You coming, Ben? We can’t
do this without an expert.”

Smiling big, her father scrabbled out of his chair like it was on fire, and snatched
his hat from the counter. “We’ll teach this Yankee whippersnapper a thing or two,
JB, see if we don’t.”

She caught Jimmy’s eye as he settled his hat on his head and mouthed
Thank you.

He shot her a shy grin, winked, and walked out.

Danged if she hadn’t always been a sucker for that grin.

J
B pulled open the door to Keller’s Western Wear. “No one’s going to throw you out
for being a poser.”

“But I don’t need a cowboy hat.” Travis hovered, scanning the shop window.

JB let the door fall closed. He looked at the faded, saggy-crotch skater shorts and
dingy T-shirt, not wanting to imagine this kid’s home life. Travis had gobbled lunch
at the diner so fast it had him wondering when the boy had last eaten. “Come in and
look, that’s all I’m saying. Believe me, I’m not wasting money on a hat you’re not
going to wear.”

A frown creased Travis’s brow, but he followed. JB’s boots made a satisfying hollow
thumping sound on the old wooden boards as he took in his favorite smell: the heady
scent of new leather and saddle soap.

Hats hung on the back wall, their brands conjuring the history of the American West:
Resistol, Bailey, Stetson.
“A straw hat is more practical.” JB reached for a pinch-crowned Panama in natural
ivory. “It’s going to get dirty, and these are pretty easy to clean. See how it’s
ventilated? Not as hot that way.”

Travis grimaced and looked away. “Isn’t there something not so… old?”

JB scanned the merchandise. “Well, in case you hadn’t noticed, cowboys aren’t real
big on change.”

“Duuude!” Travis hurried away, focused as a hawk spying a rabbit kabob. JB trailed
him to a sale table tucked under the stairs to the second floor. There, on top of
a stack of boxes, sat a hat. But it wasn’t like any cowboy hat JB’d ever seen. The
black felted wool had been airbrushed with a pale gray skull and iron cross on the
high crown and front brim. A hand-painted red flame circled the crown, and the black
leather band sported silver studs protruding a good half inch. Travis lifted the hat
off the pile as if it were a crown.

JB snorted. “That’s not a hat. It’s an abomination.”

Travis walked to a full-length mirror, settled the hat on his short white spiked hair,
and grinned ear to ear. “Maybe. But it’s me. See? It fits.”

JB had to admit it matched the kid’s look, but he was going to get stares wandering
around town in that thing. “Damned thing’s wool, Travis. It’ll be hotter’n the firebox
on a steam train.”

Travis removed the hat and looked inside. “It’s marked down to twenty dollars!” He
ran his finger reverently over the airbrushed cross. “Can you believe that, a piece
of art like this?” He looked at JB, little-boy want on his face.

“Yeah, kid, you can have it.” Travis’s whoop fired a warm spot in JB’s chest as he
pulled out his wallet.

A few days after their trip to the store, JB sat leaning on his saddle horn, watching
Travis practice. “God dang it, Kid, how many times I gotta tell you? You’re looking
off again!” It had been a long Sunday afternoon, and they were only an hour into it.
Travis seemed distracted and out of sorts. The humidity was up today, and JB could
feel the sun burning his skin, right through his shirt. A veil of dust hung in the
air, stirred by bull’s hooves.

JB nudged his horse to the bull’s side, hazing him to the exit. When the animal cleared
the gate, he closed it and trotted to the center of the corral. Travis had picked
himself out of the dirt and was dusting himself off. “You do that every time you get
in trouble. I keep telling you, you go where your eyes look. If you’re staring at
the dirt, you’re sure’n hell going to end up there.
Before
the buzzer.” He dismounted.

Travis pulled off the helmet and pulled out his mouth guard. His lips twisted in a
pout, he frowned and looked away.

“At this rate, you won’t be ready when the season starts. Is that what you want?”
Travis shrugged. JB’d had it with the sullen attitude. “I’m out here sweating my guts
out because you asked for my help. I’m not wasting any more of my time on someone
who doesn’t care.” He spun on his heel. “I’m done.”

Ben’s sharp voice brought him up short. “Now you just hold up a minute, JB.” Ben stalked
toward them, bent, bowlegged. Angry, from the look.

“Ben, I’m sorry to drag you into this. It’s been a waste of our time. The kid’s too
scared to make a bull rider.”

“Well, good on him. Shows he’s got some sense. More’n you, I’d wager.” Ben smacked
dirt from the sleeve
of the Western shirt JB had loaned the boy. “You’re doing fine, son. Any bull rider
who isn’t afraid is either loco or headed for a box in a hurry.” He cut his eyes to
JB. “And I seem to remember you, standing in this corral, bottom lip a-wobblin’ and
me telling you the same thing.”

His icy blue eyes burned right through JB’s anger. He
did
seem to remember…

Ben turned to Travis and grasped his shoulder. “You’re trying to think of too many
things at once and not getting any of ’em done. Forget about looking pretty up there.”
He drilled JB with another disgusted stare. “Just forget all that crap.” He fingered
the whistle hanging from a hank of twine around his neck. “We’re going to a ten-second
ride instead of eight. Your job is to stay ’holt of that rope till you hear the whistle.
The only thing you have to remember is to keep your hand shut.” He shook Travis’s
shoulder. “I don’t care if you’re hanging down, up close and personal with that bull’s
gonads, as long as you have the tail of the rope in your hand when the whistle blows,
the ride counts. See?”

Travis, frowning in concentration, nodded.

“Style points don’t count for spit if you don’t make the whistle, and no kid on that
team is going to look down on you for having bad form if you get a score.

“You’ve got grit, kid. Don’t you doubt it.” Ben patted him on the back. “JB, you go
run another bull under this cowboy.”

The kid’s shoulders straightened and his head came up. As JB mounted, Travis looked
up at him like Benje used to, expression hopeful, trying to gauge his mood. JB wasn’t
blind. He knew the kid looked up to him and was turning himself inside out to please.
Guts twisting, he
wheeled the horse away with a snort of self-disgust. What kind of man lost sight of
that?
A sorry excuse for one, that’s what kind.

Outside the corral, he dismounted, tied the horse, and walked the pole fence to the
holding pen. Gorge rose, and he tasted bitter regret on the back of his tongue. Why
was he like that?
Push, push, push; nothing’s ever good enough for JB Denny.

He didn’t need a head-shrink to know that his parents dying young and him taking responsibility
for his grandparents had something to do with that relentless push. Palming the Hot-Shot
from his back pocket, he prodded the two young bulls into the alleyway.
This isn’t about Travis, you idiot. It’s about you.
It seemed he’d always had that twitchy drive and the whisper in his brain, telling
him he needed to be in charge, so he could keep control of his world.

He remembered the morning of his wedding day to Charla, feeling he’d won something
far more precious than the lottery, because her strong, loving family came as a dowry.
The drive hadn’t lessened after their marriage; if anything, it pressed harder at
his back. Every success upped the stakes, giving him that much more to control. That
much more to lose.

Drive wasn’t all bad, was it? He’d used it to become a champion bull rider. He worked
his ass off to learn the bull business, then to grow his own operation. And, dang
it, he was proud of his job as PBR announcer. He liked the spotlight. What was wrong
with that?

Lots.
The raw truth stopped JB in his tracks. Wrapped in a self-woven blanket of glory
and ego, he’d let that drive push him too far. JB’s pride leaked into the dust with
every dragging footstep.

It pushed him to put his son off, when all he wanted was for his dad to build him
a tree fort.

Pushed him away from his wife, who needed him, and into the arms of a hero-struck
young girl.

Pushed him to put
his
wants above his family’s needs.

Isn’t that what Char and Jess had been telling him, each in their own way? He glanced
through the pole fence to where Travis and Ben stood, heads together in the arena.
There they were—the past and the future—and JB fell somewhere in between. What would
life be like when he was Ben’s age?
No way to know.
He urged the first bull into the chute, then climbed the fence and dropped the narrow
gate behind him.

He did know one thing, though; if you were busy looking back, regretting the past,
you weren’t planning for the future. JB pictured himself, old and bent, sitting under
a lap blanket, in a generic facility somewhere.

Alone.

Gooseflesh ripped across his skin, and he shivered in the sweltering heat, contemplating
the rest of his life without Charla Rae in it. What would be the point?

Travis strode toward him, eyes steely with resolve.

There’s no way to change the past, JB. Time to put it down and start shaping the future.

His family’s future.

It might be battered and besieged, but the Enwright family was his, right down to
the blonde whirlwind at its center.

It was time to stake his claim.

JB turned the truck into the driveway of the old Koehler place, Russ and Bella’s new
home.

Funny how time works
, Char thought. As a little girl, she’d made this trip, Mom in a flowered dress for
visiting, her purse perched on the seat between them. Later, after they’d married,
she and JB had come to pick up her mom from her visits with Mrs. Koehler. Now here
she sat, on another trip to the Koehler place; everything familiar yet so different.

She glanced across the seat at Jimmy. The years had etched lines in his ruggedly handsome
face, but other than that… The veil of time thinned to gossamer and Char felt as if
she could tear it away, returning to a better time when Benje had lay cradled, safe
in a child’s seat behind her. A strangled sound escaped.

Jimmy whipped his head around, fear in his eyes. “You okay?”

She cleared her throat. “Just swallowed wrong. I’m fine.”

His frown looked doubtful, but he turned his attention back to the task of parking.

They emerged from the car, Jimmy carrying the butcher paper–wrapped steaks and the
wine. She carried Bella’s house-warming present. They wandered up the walk to the
open front door.

Char stood at the door’s threshold and called out, “Anybody home?”

Bella’s face popped around the doorway to the kitchen, her curly hair so out of control,
it defied gravity, floating almost straight up. With a huge smile, she stepped into
the hallway, gesturing them inside. “Welcome to Casa di Donovan, such as it is.” She
yelled over her shoulder in a New York truck driver voice, “Hey, Russ, the cavalry
is here!”

Bella looked like a ranch wife in her Wranglers, boots,
and Western shirt. Well, almost. Her Wranglers fit like skin on a slim sausage, and
bangles clinked on her wrists. It was still Bella, after all.

JB urged Char forward with a touch at her back, then reached around her to shake Bella’s
hand. “I guess I’m going to have to start calling you East Texas now. Welcome to ranch
ownership, Bella.” He handed her the bottle of wine and the steaks. “May you find
it as rewarding and wonderfully exasperating as we have.”

Bella raised an eyebrow at the “we,” but thank God Russ lumbered into the hall, filling
it, deflecting her attention. Char shot JB the same eyebrow, but if he saw it, he
ignored it, stepping forward to shake Russ’s hand. “JB Denny. Proud to finally meet
you, Russ.”

“We appreciate you coming out.” They walked the short hallway to the living room,
empty save boxes jumbled everywhere on the hardwood floor. “As you can see, we can
use the help.”

Char handed the brightly wrapped package to her friend. “Welcome home, Bell.”

Bella wiped her hands on her blue jeans and took the package. “Ooh, I love presents.”

She tore the paper and opened the box, letting it all fall to the floor, revealing
the black and hot pink tiger-striped bibbed apron. With ruffles.

“Oh, this is
so
me!” Bella squealed. “I love it! Where did you ever find this in Fredericksburg?”

Char snorted. “I made it, silly.” She mimed a needle pulling through material. “You
know, sewing?”

“I think that’s our cue, Russ.” JB tipped his hat back. “This is about to become a
hen convention. Let’s go speak of manly things.”

Russ said, “I’ll get us a beer and I’ll show you the… spread? Is that how I say it?”

JB clapped him on the back, dropping a wink at Char. “This may take a while. If we’re
not back by sundown, send out the dogs.”

As the men walked out, Char lifted the apron over Bella’s head and stepped behind
her to tie it.

Bella smoothed her hands over the fabric. “This is a perfect gift, Charla Rae, thanks.
I’m going to need it soon. Russ asked me to marry him.”

“What?” Char spun her friend around to face her. “You mean you weren’t—”

“Are you kidding?” Bella put her hand on an outthrust hip. “Honey, I’m Italian. I
had the obligatory white wedding, complete with two hundred guests, six bridesmaids,
and full mass, for cripes’ sakes!”

“Then what are you talking about?”

Bella fingered the rings on the delicate gold chain around her neck. “Russ figured
the only way he’d get these off me to get them sized is to have a priest there when
he put them back on.” Bella gazed out the window, a sweet smile quirking her lips.
She looked like a bride; in the soft light, her face glowed in fragile luminosity.
“And he was right.”