Off the Beaten Path (6 page)

“Agreed,” she said.

They talked while they ate about the valley and the people who lived in it. Kristin was truly fascinated about how and why people lived so far from town and what they did for a living, they couldn’t all be Buffalo Ranchers. Jack explained to her the wide range of characters that inhabited the valley. The people were as colorful as the valley
itself. The valley had its share of retired couples and families that worked the land it also had musicians, writers, and a couple of brothers that mined gold up Elk Creek.

Kristin watched Jack intently as he rocked back and forth with one boot planted firmly on the porch and one boot thrown across his knee. She tried to force her mind to think about what made Jack so......unique. What made him so appealing and handsome and funny? The word that defined Jack Evans hit her like a warm gust of wind. What made Jack Evans so real was the fact that he was in a word, real. He was not fake or phony, he was as real as it got.

Jack was right in the middle of telling her about one of the valleys most interesting characters when Kristin set down her plate and asked bluntly,

“Do you think we could work?”

Jack smiled at her as he took another sip of coffee, he asked, “What do you think?”

“We come from two different worlds.” she replied with a little sadness in her eyes.

“Do we?” he said, thoughtfully.

She waited for him to put in plain words what he was thinking. Jack polished off what was left of his coffee set the cup down on the table.

“Kristin, take a good long look at Buck and Sara, what do you see?”

She starred out at the two horses grazing in the pasture for a couple minutes. As she watched them it appeared to her that no matter what one of them did the other was not far away. The closer she studied them the more different they looked to her. Something about their manner suggested that under different circumstances the two horses would not have ever crossed paths except in this valley.

When Kristin finally spoke all she said was, “I’m guessing Sabrina Anastasia is not a native of these parts.”

“You would be guessing correct,” Jack said with a culpable smile.

“Let me tell you about Buck and Sara.”

Jack leaned back in his chair and told her about how Buck had been born right here on this ranch and had only been out of the valley for the yearly fourth of July parade and the occasional trip to the vet. Buck had been elk hunting with Jack and Ben for the last six years and had even been a pickup horse at the local rodeo a couple of times. Buck’s story was not very exciting some people might even say his story was downright boring. Sara on the other hand, up until three years ago had belonged to a wealthy family in Denver. The family’s only daughter of four children was very big into Hunter Jumper competitions. And until Sara sustained a Flexor Tendon Tear during a practice session she was being groomed as the family’s next big trophy winner.

Jack had done quite a bit of business with the girl’s father when he was an architect in fact the family loved to stop whenever they were going through Montana and spend a couple days at the ranch. The family tried everything they could think of along with a half dozen of the best veterinarian’s in the country to get Sara back into competition. The result was always the same Sara was still a great horse but she would never compete again. Jack had heard about the injury from the father the day after it had happened and he had followed the family’s efforts to repair the damage over the year that they tried everything. Jack was completely shocked when the father called Jack and asked him if he would buy Sara. Jack’s first response was disbelief. The man explained that having Sara around was just too painful for his daughter and when the family was deciding what they should do with Sara the girl asked if Sara could live on Uncle Jack’s Ranch. Jack explained to the father that he was honored that the family wanted Sara to live out her days on his ranch, but he was pretty sure that he could not afford the purebred mare. The father informed jack that the asking price was one dollar, cash. The family had decided that
they would bring Sara to the ranch themselves.
 

When they had arrived at the ranch pulling the four horse trailer with only one horse inside Buck ran up to the corral fence and pressed him-self as close as he could to the rail. After the hugs and handshakes they dropped the gate on the trailer and the father led Sara out into the yard. When Buck saw the black mare step out of the trailer he did something he had never done before or since that day. He backed up about twenty feet took a half a dozen powerful steps and jumped the fence without touching a rail. Then he walked over to where they were standing holding Sara’s halter and wedged himself in between Sara and the father holding the rope. The rope dropped to the ground and Buck nudged Sara toward the gate where the big buckskin looked back at Jack as if to say.

“Aren’t you going to open the gate for our new guest?” The two had been inseparable ever since that day.

When Jack finished the story he did not say a word he let the tale of Sara and Buck sink in real deep. Kristin’s could tell that Jack’s eyes were a little moist. Her eyes were more than a little moist. Jack handed her his napkin and went inside to get them each another cup of coffee. When he came back out to the porch he was wearing his full riding gear complete with chaps, spurs and an his best cowboy hat, the hat that he reserved only for the annual Fourth of July parade. He found Kristin watching the two horses with a greater intent than when he had went inside. Jack handed her the coffee and asked,

“Are you interested seeing for yourself what a great horse Sara is?”

“Absolutely,” she responded

“I will go saddle them up.”

He only made it half way down the steps when he heard Kristin say his name, He turned around.

“I like your riding gear,” she commented.

“I like yours better,” he said pointing at her robe.

“Well then I’m ready, let’s go,” she said as she stood up and walked to the edge of the porch stairs. Standing on the edge of the steps Kristin put her hands on her hips and let the robe fall open just enough so that he could see that the robe was the only thing she was wearing. He climbed up the stairs to the last step to meet her, he slid his hands under the robe and around her waist and pulled her as close to him as he could. After a long slow kiss she leaned away from him just the slightest and laughed.

“Your belt buckle is as cold as a doctor’s stethoscope,” they both laughed.

Kristin turned to go inside the house to get dressed. As she reached the front door and started to go into the house she let the robe fall completely off and left it lying on the porch. Jack looked down at Sam and gave a long-drawn-out whistle. Sam barked twice in agreement. Jack turned and headed for the barn to saddle the two horses; his knees felt week.

They rode out through the front gate and underneath the massive log arch that framed the entrance to the ranch. They crossed the dirt road that ran along the fence line to Jack’s property and stopped at the locked gate on the other side of the road. Jack climbed down off of Buck and took a key out of his pocket. He unlocked the gate and held the gate open for Kristin and Sara to walk through. After he led Buck past the gate he closed the gate and hung the lock over the latch. Kristin eyed him as he tucked the key back into his pocket, she asked suspiciously,

“Is this part of your ranch?”

“No, but I am very close with the owners.” He said.

Jack climbed back into the saddle and they turned the horses toward the gentle slope of the hill. It looked as if their current heading would take them past the foothills and straight up to the mountains beyond, there were no other fences for miles. For the first time Kristin noticed that Jack had stuffed a rifle into the scabbard hanging off the saddle,

“Is that for show,” she asked a little nervously.

“This is a JIC Rifle,” He said

Kristin understood immediately, “Just in Case,” she responded.

“Yep, besides I have a deer tag I haven’t filled yet, I might just get lucky today.”

She rode over as close as she could to him, leaned over and kissed him,

“In that case, you might just get lucky twice and you won’t need a rifle for that.”

They rode for the better part of the morning. Jack gave her the scenic tour of the valley; he pointed out and named every one of the mountain peaks around the valley. He showed her a hundred year old cabin down by the creek that had belonged to a fur trapper. He pointed out a family of foxes that lived in one of the ravines and a heard of elk that was resting along the tree line. He named wild flowers she had never heard of or seen growing on the side of the hills.

When they approached the crest of a hill before they could even see the ranch the two horses could tell that they were headed back home to the ranch. Their pace quickened and it took an extra effort to keep the horses from taking off at a full gallop in the direction of the barn. When they broke over the top of the hill they pulled the horses to a stop, they could see every detail in the valley including the ranch that had a single beam of sunlight shining through the clouds and pointing straight down on the house. It was Kristin’s turn to let out a long slow whistle. Jack uttered just one word as he crossed his leg over the saddle horn and looked out over his favorite view of the valley,

“Yep.”

After a few minutes they dismounted dropped the reins and walked to the edge of the hill. Despite the fact that Buck and Sara were not tied up and they could sense how close they were to home they did not move. Jack walked back over to where the horses were standing. He grabbed a blanket out of one of the saddle bags and the lunch he had packed along with a bottle of wine form the other saddle bag. He spread the blanket out in the tall grass and proceeded to fix lunch for the three of them complete with a bottle of wine and a couple of Sam’s favorite dog biscuits.

Kristin sat down on the blanket kicked off her boots leaned back on her elbows. She watched him go through the careful motions
of preparing their lunch. When Jack handed her the sandwich she said simply,

“Jack Evans, you are one of a kind.”

“Thank you,” was all he said as the cork popped out of the wine bottle. Sam ran off through the tall grass after the cork.

They ate their lunch in almost total silence. They watched Sam amuse herself by chasing grasshoppers and barking at the ones that got away. Kristin caught Jack looking out over the valley as if he owned every acre that he could see and it was his personal possession. Jack poured Kristin another glass of wine and moved his glaze from the valley to her the look of ownership on his face did not change. Kristin lay back on the blanket and starred up at the clouds Jack sat down on a rock at the edge of the blanket and asked her,

“Kristin, what do you want?”

She sat up straight and answered him without any hesitation like she had been thinking about his question for years.

“I want to wake up in the morning and look forward to the day ahead.”

“I want to feel the passion I used to feel for my work.”

“I want to look back on each day and know without a doubt that I accomplished something.”

“And most of all, I want to spend the day with someone I can trust.”

All Jack said was, “What’s stopping you?”

Her answer was as simple as his question, “The only thing stopping me is me.”

After a couple of minutes Kristin lay back down and looked up at Jack, she said to him,

“You haven’t always been this way have you?”

“What way?” He asked innocently.

She reached over and gave him a kick him in the shin with her stocking feet.

Jack polished off his wine and set the glass down on the edge of the blanket. He folded his hands together and leaned down in her direction.

“Kristin, I have drank more than my share of whiskey and I have been in a more bar fights than I can count. I have spent a good portion of my life mad at someone or something for what I thought at the time was a good reason. I have said mean things to people that didn’t deserve it and I have lied to people that trusted me. I have done things that only me and the good lord know about. One day I realized what an enormous amount of time and energy I was wasting trying to prove to myself that I was somebody.

“What made you come to that realization?” She asked.

“The day I found out that Angela had cancer.”

“Did she notice the change in you?”

“I would say she noticed almost immediately.”

“Was Angela one of the people you hurt?”

“I hurt her more than anybody else.”

“Did she forgive you?”

“I hope so I spent the last three years of her life trying to make it up to her.”

“Did you succeed?”

“I don’t know...... I hope so.”

Kristin could tell that it was painful for Jack to talk about Angela. She could also tell that no matter how painful it was he needed to talk about it. Kristin closed her eyes and felt deep warmth on her face; she wasn’t sure if it was from the sun or Jack looking down at her.

Sam took the lead running through the tall grass as the two of them led the horses down the sloping hillside toward the ranch. It was not a steep hill. They could have rode down the hill without any problem but there was something about the gentle slope of the hill the tall grass and the absence of any recognizable trails that begged to be hiked on foot. The smell of the purple and yellow wildflowers was so
powerful it was intoxicating. The feel of the tall grass against her jeans was like wading through a river of straw that could be brushed away with the lightest breeze. She could tell that Buck and Sara were restless to get back to the ranch but they were content to let their riders set the pace. As they reached the bottom of the hill and the land leveled off to a gentle slope leading down to the ranch they climbed back up on Buck and Sara for the last five hundred yards to the house. When Jack and Kristin were both firmly back in the saddle it was Buck and Sara that picked up the pace to a slow trot. Jack looked over at Kristin and asked,