The Cowboy Lawman (17 page)

Mia thought about finding an escape. Obviously, the very calm and comforting nurse could help Tina more than she could. But Tina held on tight and somehow Mia forgot that she wanted to leave, that she didn’t want to be in the middle of the birth of Tina’s baby.

When the baby came into the world, a crying mess, purple-red and fisting the air, Mia fell in love. She fell in love with the way that little boy’s eyes scrunched and then opened. She fell in love with the way Tina held him close and called him Alexander, Butch’s real name. She fell in love even deeper when the nurse wrapped him in a blanket and Tina closed her eyes and asked Mia to hold him.

She held that baby boy close and he made mewling sounds and cried pitifully for his mommy.

Tina opened her eyes, smiled and then cried. “Mia, I have a baby. What do I do with him, with my life?”

Mia placed the baby next to Tina. “You love him. You teach him about his dad. You stay in Dawson where you have people who will help you. And you find healing.”

“I haven’t felt so alone since the day they told me.”

“I know.” Mia sat next to Tina and held her hand tight. “I’m so sorry, Tina. I tried.”

“You have to forgive yourself. You didn’t do this. You couldn’t change it.”

“I wanted to.” Mia placed a hand on the baby. “But I’m here and we’ll get through this.”

Tina nodded, but her eyes were drooping. “Thank you.”

Mia walked out the door while the pediatrician examined Alexander and the doctor finished with Tina. She saw Slade in the waiting room with Jackie and Jason. He looked up and smiled a soft smile. She wanted to go to him, to curl into his hug and feel whole again.

But instead she walked down the hall away from him.

* * *

Slade left the kids with Angie Cooper, who had showed up at the hospital to check on Tina and Mia. It was Mia he particularly wanted to talk to at the moment. He hurried down the hall and out the side door that led to a courtyard.

She stood next to a fountain, the breeze blowing her hair. She held her right arm. The gun that had been in the holster was now locked in his car.

When he walked up beside her, she turned and smiled.

“It’s a boy. She named him Alexander. He’s beautiful.”

“You did good today. Other than that part where you put yourself in a lot of danger.”

“I had to protect her. I promised Butch.”

“But I have to protect you. I don’t want you hurt.”

She exhaled slowly and stared again at the fountain. “Slade, I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time.”

“Does that mean you can’t let anyone else take care of you?”

“I don’t know what it means. I do know that someone I trusted must have leaked information about Tina’s location.”

“That’s true. They arrested a guy in the Tulsa DEA office. It seems he might have had a guy inside Nolan Jacobs’s operation. The guy told him that Butch had met with Tina. When they got the chance, they stole Nolan’s money and blamed it on Butch. That’s why Nolan had his thugs come after the two of you. He was convinced one of you had his money.”

“That’s why Nolan wanted his money that day? Butch and I didn’t know what he was talking about. But he also knew that we were cops.”

“Yeah.”

“It makes sense, but I wish it didn’t.”

“Mia, I miss you.”

She smiled at him then. “I miss you, too. But Slade, who do you want me to be?”

“What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure who you want me to be. This is who I am. I’ve been on my own a long time. I can make a great salad. I have running shoes, not high heels. I stood in Caleb’s classroom and I felt like a fraud. I was the undercover agent posing as a class mom.”

“How did it feel, when you played that part?”

“It was a part, Slade.”

“How did it feel, Mia?”

She shook her head, refusing to answer.

He wanted to shake her to make her see sense. But he knew Mia. She had to wrap her mind around something. No one was going to push her to the right answer. As much as he wanted to pull her into his arms and convince her that what they had was real, and who she was in that classroom was real, he knew he couldn’t.

“Are you leaving?” He had to ask.

As much as he didn’t want to hear the answer, he had to know.

She stared at the fountain for a long time and finally she shrugged. “I don’t know. They offered me a new assignment.”

“New assignment where, Mia?”

“East Coast.”

“We’ll miss you.”

She looked up again, brushing her hair back from her face with her left hand. “I didn’t say I was going.”

“I’m going to be praying you make the right choice. And that you realize who you are to me.”

“Who am I to you?”

“The person I love.” He touched her cheek. “Who am I to you?”

She smiled. “The person I love. The person I’ve always loved.”

“Then why does this have to be so hard, Mia?”

“Because a little piece of me would always feel like I was stepping into Vicki’s shoes.”

“She wasn’t perfect.” He eased the words out, not wanting to sound as if he wasn’t loyal to the woman he had loved. “She couldn’t make gravy. She always made coffee too strong. And she didn’t like my job. But I loved her. She loved me. Neither of us was perfect.”

“I need time.”

“I’ll give you time.” He brushed his hand through her hair, feeling soft, silky strands wrap around his fingers. He inhaled her scent and then he leaned to kiss her. “I’ll give you time because both of us need time to deal with this.”

As he walked away, he wondered how it had happened that the woman who had been a pretty kid he’d spent his childhood with had become the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

He looked back before walking through the door. She had turned to watch him and she smiled.

He nodded and walked in as Jesse walked out, giving them both a look but not asking questions. Slade didn’t need more questions than the ones he was already asking himself.

Chapter Seventeen

T
wo weeks after Tina’s son was born, Slade watched as Mia left her house to go jogging. He waited until she was safely out of sight before he knocked on the door. Breezy let him in. She shook her head at the big box he carried in with him.

“You really think this is romantic?” She watched as he opened the box and took out the contents.

“I think it’s necessary.”

“You could sit on the front porch and tell her you heard she’s no longer an agent and maybe she’d like to, I don’t know, hang out some time?”

“That doesn’t sound much better than my plan.”

“Well, do what you have to do, cowboy. I’m just saying, this is corny. I’d try flowers and maybe a candlelight dinner.”

“Does that sound like your sister?”

She laughed and slipped her feet into sandals. “Nope. I’m going down to Vera’s. She’s offered me a job. Oh, and she’s going to have live music on Saturdays. It feels a little like charity, but since I love to sing, I’ll take the gig.”

“Breezy, thanks for helping out.”

“No problem, but don’t blame me if she shoots you. She’s getting pretty good at being a lefty.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

He watched as she headed down the sidewalk in the direction of Vera’s. He liked Breezy. He still wasn’t sure about her, but he liked her. He wrote it off to being a cop and always being a little suspicious.

Mia would be back soon. He knew that what he was about to do was bordering on corny, but a guy did what a guy had to do. And his son had informed him yesterday that he missed Mia and wished his dad would get her back before the next party at school.

Slade had promised to do his best.

He arranged everything on the coffee table, building something of a pyramid. When he saw her coming up the sidewalk, he touched his pocket and felt the ring. Myrna had insisted he take it. The ruby ring was what she’d wanted hauled out of her house. He’d expected an old appliance.

Casual. He wanted to be casual when she walked through the door. It was hard to be casual with sweaty palms and a rapidly beating heart.

The door opened. She paused when she saw him but then she walked in, staring first at him and then at his display. She shook her head and even smiled. After a few seconds she laughed.

“What are you doing here, Slade?”

* * *

Mia looked at the man standing in front of her, wearing his best jeans, a button-up shirt, with his cowboy hat in his hands. He looked as nervous as a kid on his first date. Not that she’d had many first dates. She hadn’t dated much at all.

She’d been waiting. Her heart skipped a beat and then raced to catch up. She’d been waiting for what she thought she could never have. And then she’d felt guilty for wanting what belonged to someone else.

She’d been waiting. She’d made a promise to God as a teen and she’d kept the promise.

“Mia.”

“Slade.

“I came here today to bring you some shoes.”

She had noticed. She smiled at him and then at the pyramid of shoe boxes. “That’s a strange gift to bring a woman.”

“I would have brought roses, but shoes seem to be the problem.”

“I don’t know what to do, Slade.”

“I do, Mia. I know what to do. I know that I thought my heart wouldn’t have room to love anyone else. And then you came back with your mule-headed independence.”

“That’s romantic.” She wiped at her eyes.

“You came back.” He stepped close, pulling her to him. “And you opened my heart up again. I realized that hearts don’t run out of room to love. God gives us new dreams, new plans. He sees our emptiness and knows exactly what it’s going to take to fill us up again.”

“I’m going to cry.” She touched his cheek and kissed him, sweetly savoring his taste.

Slade moved back just a step and smiled. “I brought you shoes. Every single pair is your size. Running shoes, boots, sandals, you name it, you can wear them all. There are some mom shoes, some wife-looking shoes. Some shoes that I think would be pretty sexy on your long legs.”

She started to laugh and he laughed, too.

“That’s about the corniest thing I’ve ever heard, Slade McKennon.”

“You were worried about filling shoes that weren’t yours. I wanted you to know that you aren’t playing a part, Mia. You’re everything. You are tough when you need to be tough, but you held my son and fixed him cupcakes when he needed that. And you knew what he needed when I didn’t. You are a woman worthy of many pairs of shoes.”

She laughed and sniffled. He offered her a tissue.

“I can do better than corny.” He reached into his pocket. “I can do romantic.”

“Can you?” She held her breath when he held out the ruby-and-diamond ring.

“I can.”

He kneeled in front of her and reached for her hand. He slipped the ring on her finger and it fit perfectly. “I want you to marry me. I want you to be Caleb’s mom and my wife, and I want to have more kids. With you. Because I love you.”

“Slade.”

He stopped her. “Mia, Caleb sent me on a mission today. He said I need to fix things before his next school party. So before you argue, I want you to realize that Caleb loves you, too.”

“I love you both.”

She curled her fingers around his and pulled him to his feet and then she walked into his arms. His lips claimed hers, searching her heart, searching for the love they both knew they shared. It was a gift, this love, and Mia would never take it for granted.

Slade whispered her name and then he kissed her a second time, stealing her breath, crashing her defenses, scattering all her doubts. His hands held her close and she felt safe.

“Marry me?”

She nodded and whispered, “Which shoes should I wear?”

“I like the idea of you barefoot.”

They laughed and kissed again.

Epilogue

T
he wedding march started to play. Mia stood next to her dad. Tim Cooper smiled, but his eyes watered with unshed tears as he lowered the veil to cover her face.

“This is it, honey. I pray for you a long life with Slade, with all of God’s blessings. Love each other well, forgive often and make me a grandpa again.” He kissed her cheek.

“Oh, Dad.” She couldn’t cry, she’d smear the makeup that Heather had so lovingly applied.

They watched as the bridesmaids, all of her sisters, and the groomsmen, led by Caleb, took their places at the front of the church. The bridesmaids were dressed in palest pink and carried white roses. The spring wedding seemed to call for simple elegance. Mia had surprised her sisters with that word.

Slade stood in the center of them, his smile reaching back to her as she started down the aisle on her father’s arm.

A moment later Mia joined him at the front of the church. He wore a Western-cut suit that made the best of his broad shoulders. She wore her mother’s wedding dress and Granny Myrna’s veil.

And no shoes. Because it had been their joke and she’d stuck with it. She was the barefoot bride. But in her suitcase, packed away for the honeymoon, were the shoes that Slade thought would look sexy on her.

The most amazing thing was the man standing in front of her. His smile captivated her heart. His love sealed the deal. She closed her eyes and said a silent thank-you because God had known and brought them together.

Next to her, Breezy sighed. It meant everything to have her standing with Mia’s other sisters. Caleb was the best man, in every way possible. He looked proud of his role and he’d informed them just a few days ago that he expected a little brother or sister pretty soon. He was going to be six soon and he didn’t mince words.

Mia smiled at Caleb as Slade recited the vows. He was the child of her heart. He winked at her and she winked back.

Minister Wyatt Johnson spoke the final words of the ceremony, pronouncing them husband and wife, then told Slade to kiss his bride. Slade grinned and pulled her close. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her cheek.

Mia growled a little warning. He kissed her other cheek.

She took matters into her own hands, pulling him close, holding him as she sealed their wedding with a kiss that made a few people gasp.

When she ended the kiss, Slade looked a little shocked. She leaned in close and whispered, “I’ve been waiting for you my whole life.”

“Mia McKennon, I’m so glad you waited.”

* * * *
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If you enjoyed this story by Brenda Minton,
be sure to check out the other books
this month from Love Inspired!

Keep reading to read an except from
Rancher’s Refuge
by Linda Goodnight