Reclaimed (18 page)

“How often do you work together?”

“At least once a week, if he’s up for it.” A hint of sadness tethered Kelsey’s voice.

Compassion flooded Suzanna’s heart. Disappointment was something she knew well. “It must have been hard when he had his stroke.”

Kelsey plopped onto her bed. “Yeah. I had a really hard time with it. At first, we thought he was going to die, and I was so sad. He’s my best friend. But then, when he didn’t, things got hard. He’s not the same anymore.”

Her eyes searched Suzanna, begging for understanding. Suzanna dropped beside her, silently waiting for Kelsey to continue.

“I hope you don’t think I’m selfish. I mean, I’m glad he’s alive, and we still have fun. He’s just not the same though. I miss who he was.”

Suzanna brushed the hair out of Kelsey’s face. “I know exactly what you mean, and I don’t think you’re selfish.” She swallowed as a rush of emotion nearly overwhelmed her. “I knew someone like that once. Well, sort of. He got sick, too, and he wasn’t ever the same again. It was really hard. When you love someone, and you lose them, or even part of who they were, it hurts.”

Kelsey’s eyes came to hers and held fast. Tears pooled, making them shimmer and tugging at the ache Suzanna tried to keep smothered.

Kelsey sniffed as a tear spilled onto her cheek. “I’ve never talked to anyone about it.”

Wrapping an arm around her, Suzanna pulled her close. “Me neither, Kels.” She clamped her jaw and forced her own tears back. “I guess that makes you my new best friend.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Paul tugged on the reins, pulling Bronco to a stop. He smacked his gloved hand against his thigh and pushed his phone harder against his ear. “Why do you keep pushing us to arm’s length?”

Silence. Suzanna refused to meet his challenge. He sighed.

“Listen, it’s not that far away, only an hour and a half, and you might enjoy seeing how some of this life works. We’ll head back home that same evening. What do you have to lose?”

“I don’t want Chuck to think I’m afraid of him.” Suzanna’s tone bit when she pronounced his name.

“Who cares what Chuck thinks?” Paul dismounted near the trailer. “He’s going to do whatever he’s going to do, whether you’re there or not. So you might as well be here.”

Paul thought he could hear her sniff, though it sounded like she muffled it with a hand over her phone. Something clenched around his heart, and he pulled in a breath. “Suz, what did I say?”

“Nothing.” She sounded rushed. “Why would you ask that?”

“Because…”
Because I want to know why you suddenly shut down. Why some of the things I say and do push you to tears.
“I’m sorry, Pickle. I guess I’m being too pushy. I just thought you’d like it. It’s pretty here, and I know Dre really would like for you to come with her, but no one will be mad if you don’t.”

A quiet pause hung between them, and Paul wished he could see her face. Not that seeing her was a guaranteed help. Suzanna was pretty good at keeping feelings shrouded when she didn’t want her heart exposed. But maybe he’d know where he went wrong; maybe he’d understand her withdrawal.

“You’re not too pushy.” Suzanna let loose a long breath. “Truth is, I’d like to come. Kelsey showed me one of your dad’s paintings of the river. I’d love to see it. I just don’t want to intrude on your family. You’re all so generous, and—”

“You’re not an intruder.” Paul cut her off. He waited for her to respond but was met with nothing. “It’s not intruding to take someone up on an invitation. You’re invited, Suzanna. I’d like you to come.”

Bronco nudged his shoulder, impatient to be free from the saddle. Paul rubbed the horse’s neck and counted the seconds before Suzanna spoke again.

“When did Andrea want to leave?”

A grin split his face. “Early. She’s already called the school to excuse the kids. She’ll hit the road before sunup.”

She’d have to put in some work hours on Sunday. She was short by at least eight for the week. Maybe she’d have to miss Sunday dinner, but as the sun crested the eastern horizon, highlighting the ripples of water with white-gold, Suzanna was certain it was worth it.

They’d driven southwest for over an hour, trekking almost to the Colorado state line before Andrea made a ninety-degree turn north. A mile off the highway, the sprawling plains transformed into a narrow cottonwood forest. They crossed the Republican and turned left onto a rough drive that curved through the trees before it gradually twisted its way up a hill. The trees thinned again, and as they reached the apex, Suzanna’s breath caught.

The river had once bowed at this point, and though it now ran a straighter course, it had left a crescent-shaped body of water nestled against the hill. An ox-bow lake. Standing as a sentry, a small house rested below the top of the rise, protected from the northern winds.

Who would have imagined this little slice of rural paradise? Suzanna had detected nothing of it from the highway, or even as they approached the south side of the river. Paul’s secret little haven was the kind you’d have to know about, and know how to get there, to ever see it.

“It’s something, isn’t it?” Andrea’s smile made her voice dance.

“Wow.”

“Is it like what you imagined from Grandpa’s picture?” Kelsey whispered from the back seat.

“Not at all.” Suzanna turned on her hip to face her young friend. “I thought it was the river, and I was trying to remember passing a section that was as wide as the one in the picture. But this is what he’d painted, isn’t it?”

Kelsey nodded with a grin. “There’s a little inlet over there.” She pointed southwest. “That keeps the water from going green and slimy. And Uncle Paul keeps the outlet clear so the water will drain downstream.”

Suzanna turned back. It wasn’t really a lake, but it seemed too large to call it a pond. “Is it all from the river?”

“No, there’s a spring.” Andrea pointed toward the house. “Just like Rock Creek. My great-great-grandparents settled here. We’re on the west side of the Old Texas Cattle Trail. They did pretty well raising beef. Over the generations, the land has been held, added to, and kept in good condition.”

Andrea drove around the northwest side of the water’s edge, approaching the house as the sun began to warm the earth. Paul appeared in the doorway, his grin reminding Suzanna he’d wanted her to come.

A surreal feeling overtook her as they pulled to a stop. She belonged. This family, these friends were
hers
, and they embraced her with sincere kindness. She’d felt that only with Jason, and even then, it was a lonely comfort. He was her real family, and even in the first few months of their marriage, she knew belonging would be a fleeting vapor.

He would go. They both knew it. He was sick, and a matching donor was a long shot. When the doctors found a partial match, five out of seven points, it was a last-ditch, slim-hope chance. They’d known the narrow odds, and he didn’t survive them.

Suzanna’s tongue pressed against the roof of her mouth as she pushed back emotion.

Andrea and the kids popped out of the truck as soon as she cut the engine. Suzanna stalled, trying to right her world. She couldn’t, not completely, before Paul opened her door.

“What do you think, Pickle?”

She stepped out of the truck, forcing her mind back to the present while she watched Andrea’s kids scramble down a dirt path toward the water. Keegan yelled something about fish, and the girls followed him, their giggles filling the chilly autumn morning.

“It’s beautiful.”

All of it. Not just the setting, which was, in fact, picturesque, but the moment. Kids secure in everything that surrounded them, running and laughing without burdens eating away their innocent joy. Andrea trailing after them—a lovely woman, a kind friend, and the sort of mother Suzanna had longed for during her own childhood. And Paul…

He’d slid a hand to her elbow as she stepped down from the truck. It still rested there, warming her arm and bringing that secure feeling back.

What if it lasted?

“I’m glad you came.”

There was nothing intimate about his voice, but something inside latched onto his words. They set off a battle. Suzanna forced a smile and tipped a nod, but her spirit wrestled fiercely as she weighed comfort against agony. Pain always followed momentary happiness.

But maybe this time it would be worth it.

Suzanna looked cute in mud.

Standing in the middle of the working pen, surrounded by young steers and armed with a prod, she was caked from the knees down to her boots. Her hair was tied back and covered with a worn University of Northern Colorado ball cap. Andrea had lent her a flannel-lined denim coat, and her hands were safely covered with leather. Only the skin on her neck and her face were exposed, and they were streaked with filth.

Paul turned his back and moved toward the chute as a chuckle tickled his throat. His memory drew up an image of her sitting in mud several weeks ago. If he’d been honest with himself back then, he’d have thought the same thing. She was an attractive mess.

He stopped his stride next to the truck just as the steers started passing through the ramp. Loading cattle was a noisy affair—cowboys hawed as they sorted the herd, wood and steel rattled as the animals were loaded, and mamas called from the fence line, and the steers bawled back. It always touched a little sadness in Paul’s gut, but it was part of the job.

He wasn’t a disconnected supplier in the beef industry. He worked his cattle personally, whether he was down on the river property or up at his home base. When he lost a newborn calf, he felt genuine grief. When he had to put a sick cow down, he regretted more than the financial loss. And when he listened to the bawling echoes of mamas separated from their babies, he appreciated the sorrow of their sacrifice.

This time of year, and this event in particular, always stirred reflection. As the air filled with the chaotic orchestra of cows and cattlemen, Paul’s mind drifted to a specific sacrifice. One made for all men. Necessary, and yet infinitely more grave than anything he’d witnessed on the ranch. God’s Son, the jewel of heaven—rejected, beaten, and slowly put to death.

So men might live.

Stuart Townend’s “How Deep the Father’s Love For Us” rolled through Paul’s heart. Not the song of a clichéd roundup. Maybe he wasn’t the typical cowboy.

Dre’s voice brought life to the melody in his mind.

Paul turned, catching Dre’s smile as she continued to sing near the opening of the chute. He hadn’t realized he’d been humming, but as Cal, a devout Christian man, added his tenor to her soprano, Paul continued to support their lyrics with his baritone. The kids, all three, joined on the parts they knew, making a choir out of his work crew.

They finished the song, and Cal moved into “Amazing Grace.” They came to the end of the first verse before Paul realized Suzanna had moved to the far corner of the working yard, alone in her silence. He caught her staring, but she dropped her eyes as soon as their gazes collided, hiding them under the brim of her ball cap.

Moving toward her would embarrass her—and probably make her mad. She turned, her booted feet mucking farther away. Paul could almost read the invisible sign written across her stiff shoulders:
I don’t want to talk about it.