Hearts Crossing Ranch Anthology Read online

  “Cool. Miss Forrest?” P.J. asked, shy again. “You a teacher like Mr. Martin?”

  “Come on.” Kenn pointed up ahead. “Let’s get a move on. Ya’ll can chat while we ride. Remember, we have to ride back, too. Can’t be late for supper.”

  “Yeah, right. Mom’ll freak and think something’s wrong,” Mitchell said with a snort.

  “No. I’m a landscape architect.” Christy addressed P.J. whose horse greeted Sugarfoot with a happy whicker. The animals started a slow canter. Sugarfoot’s hooves across the gravel road were firm and secure, and Christy smiled. Already she’d gotten used to the saddle, completely at home.

  “What’s that? Like a gardener?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I design yards, gardens, parks. I try for xerographic gardening and the use of native plants.”

  She was sure boredom glazed P.J.’s eyes but he persisted, valiantly. “Try for what?”

  “Plants that use less water, and plants that are supposed to grow in the region. Southern California doesn’t usually get more than a foot of rain a year, sometimes as little as four inches. So I plant accordingly. What tree do you always think of in Los Angeles?”

  “Palm tree!” The twins said at the same time.

  “Right. Or I should say, wrong. There are thousands planted, but they don’t belong there. They’re not native. See that?”

  Kenn and the boys followed her pointing finger to a leafy plant with tiny daisy blossoms. A blue butterfly fluttered around the petals.

  “Yeah?” one of the twins grunted.

  “It belongs here. Nowhere else. That’s ‘pearly everlasting.’ Anaphalis margaritacea.”

  Mitch made a snoring sound and crossed his eyes. “Blah, blah, blah,” he said with a chuckle, then gave Christy a devastating smile. What a charmer.

  She laughed in delight. “Not so boring for the Native Americans who used it for medicine,” she said.

  “Cool.” Mitchell held his reins confidently, obviously impressed as P.J. asked, “You guys date, right?”

  The question stunned her, but no more than the bright look Kenn tossed at her.

  “Shut up, dude,” Mitchell ordered as he galloped off, a red-faced P.J. close behind.

  Ignoring the ridiculous question, she kneed her mount. “We daren’t let them get too far ahead,” she said to Kenn with a light laugh. “We can’t let Jennie have another fit.”

  But the ridiculous question didn’t leave her mind. Nor did Kenn’s smiling eyes.

  ****

  At the campfire later on, after a hamburger and hotlink supper, Kenn handed over harmonica duties and story-telling to his brothers and sat on a blanket next to Christy. The chilled night air surrounded them. Truly the day had felt like a date, and he didn’t want to leave her side. If the twins figured they were a couple, the grown ups must as well, and Kenn liked the idea more and more.

  Kelley’s glances all evening long had been full of I Told You So. And while they walked to the chuck wagon, as casual as can be, Christy had taken his hand. His heart still pounded just recalling her warm skin. He’d never actually been one to believe in love at first sight until it happened to him.

  Until now. Love at first sight? He shivered with delight and terror. Could it really have happened to him? But here she was next to him, smart and responsible, running her own business. She had a life and a career a thousand miles away and only mentioned having a family in a far-off nebulous way.

  “I’m so cozy,” she murmured into the night air, arms tight around drawn-up knees. At her smile, his breath caught, and reality smacked him in the head.

  Sure, she was sitting next to him like she belonged there, starting to hum a campfire song he’d sung his whole life. As he saw his face reflected in her eyes, the same coziness wrapped him in a warm satisfaction he’d remember forever. But he still had a mighty confession to make, a confession that promised to mess up everything.

  In the starless darkness, Kenn moved closer to her. The temperature had lowered some forty degrees since the heat of the day when clouds had moved in, and he braved wrapping an arm around her shoulders. Her warmth seeped into him and his heart thudded. What did he have to lose? They’d had one perfect day. Why not one perfect evening?

  Sadly, he knew it would all be over soon.

  “Tell us about Pecos Bill again,” Mitch urged over another specialty S’more.

  “No. Let’s hear about some brave frontier woman for a change,” Jennie called out to group laughter.

  Bragg, animated and bright-eyed, delved into a tall tale about such a character, spinning a yarn all his own about some place called Gingham Gulch with Miss Hollyhock Carouser, the dubious heroine on a broomtailed nag.

  “He’s good,” Christy said in a whisper. “Bragg so totally belongs right here. Just a man of the true western outdoors.”

  She squeezed Kenn’s fingers.

  “Yeah.” He squeezed back, but didn’t concur. Her assumption was completely wrong. And he had to tell her why. Tonight.

  “You need to write this down,” Christy persisted. “This is a good story. You could use it in your Lit unit on tall tales.”

  “You just wait.”

  With a wink at Kenn, Bragg drawled a shy thank-you to the applause, and started in on Miss Javelina Caskett, undertaker to all dear departed horseflesh in the Gulch.

  Christy laughed out loud and whispered, “Do you think he based his story at all on the dear departed Posy?”

  Remembering the mule’s grave and Christy’s pronouncements of a wedding grotto had him shiver with something not due to the chill night, and Kenn scooted a tad closer to warm them both. He had never thought much about weddings, but right before his eyes flashed someone looking like Christy draped in a white veil, walking up the misty aisle while he waited at some filmy altar. He smiled, meaning it.

  During the sing-a-long, Kelley and several of the ‘hands passed out tin cups of hot cider and cocoa, much appreciated on the cool night. Raising her cup high, Jennie Blake called out, “Here’s to many more nights just like this.”

  “Here, here.” Christy turned to Kenn with a wink that had his heart tumbling. Maybe God did have a plan for him and she was part of it. Just the fact that he considered such a thing could happen was a miracle. Warmth settled on him despite the chill.

  Just then Bragg met his eyes, hands on the harmonica. Kenn understood at once. It was his brother’s silent question: Did Kenn want to finish up with “Amazing Grace” tonight?

  With his new-found peace in the Lord, Kenn wanted nothing more and pulled out his own instrument. Tears misted Christy’s eyes as he played. A few of the folks sang along, but most listened, entranced.

  Thank you, God, for my talent, Kenn prayed silently into the notes. And when Bragg started on evening devotions, Kenn held Christy’s hand to keep her at his side.

  “’I will lift up mine eyes to the hills from whence cometh my help.’” Bragg gestured gently to the hills and mountains around them as he continued with Psalm one hundred twenty-one. It was one of Kenn’s favorite psalms. With shame, he recalled how long it had been since he’d read his Bible. But through it all, Christy’s hand held his tightly in a circle of prayer, and he reckoned it might always be like this, her by his side.

  If…he besought God and His ever-present help to those who trusted him. If Christy could get past his confession of negligence. Of how he’d stood by while Bragg ruined his life.

  Bragg’s fine tenor led the small group of worshippers in the haunting refrains of Vespers, and as the refrain, “all is well, safely rest, God is nigh,” lingered on the night air, Kenn tugged Christy’s hand and gently led her off while the rest headed toward their tents. He wanted to confess, but her eyes sparkled in the campfire glow, and he wanted to kiss her more.

  He knew the lay of the land with his eyes closed, but she was a tenderfoot, so with his flashlight, he led her gently toward a little stand of trees. When he stopped, she giggled.

  “Why, Mr. Martin, do you
want to kiss me?”

  He laughed softly. “I do, Miss Forrest. Absolutely. Maybe taste some of that cider.”

  Before the last syllable left his mouth, she stood on tiptoes, hugged his neck and placed her lips on his. His flashlight clunked on the ground. The only thing missing in the magical moment was moonlight. She still tasted of cider, sure, but more than that, she tasted like forever. And for a beautiful second, he believed it could be so.

  “I think it might be worth it, Kenn.” She stepped down, flat footed but with her arms still holding him close, and looked up at him earnestly while she ran her finger over his bottom lip. His chest heaved, and he could feel hers do the same.

  “What’s that?” He tried to still his shaking voice, but he couldn’t because he already knew. She was staying on.

  “Cowboy College.”

  He breathed in a sigh, wondering if she could sense why. The sigh wasn’t simply the aftereffects of the kiss.

  “I can’t think of anything I’d like more,” he murmured into the top of her head. “I think I’ve spent more time with you these two days, and more time in honest conversation, than during the two years I spent with Daisy. So I reckon my feelings are quick, but real. But…”

  At her swift intake of breath, he couldn’t decide what she was reacting to—his feelings or the cantankerous “but.”

  “But…” He forged ahead. The time had come. The dreaded, awful time. There was no avoiding it, no going back.

  “What is it, Kenn?” She still held him tight, tiptoed again, her lips whispering into his ear.

  With a deep breath, he held her off at arm’s length. The odd angle of the flashlight on the ground reminded him of childhood camp-out antics, and he wanted to forget the seriousness of the moment and laugh out loud. But her question was dead-on serious, too.

  “I’ve got something to say.” He stooped to pick up the flashlight and turning it off, pocketed it. Walking forward, he knew the way and if she followed willingly, wouldn’t that show she trusted him?

  “Kenn? What is all this about?”

  “Christy, there’s something you need to know.”

  “Sounds ominous.” Her voice turned dead serious.

  He took a deep breath. “Daisy hurt me, sure, but she didn’t ruin me. No matter what Kelley said. It was all the peripheral things. My first year at Mountain Cove High, I found out, had irrefutable proof, that the swim coach was doping his team.”

  “How horrible!”

  “I know. And I didn’t do anything about it.”

  “You didn’t tell anybody? Well…” She mused in the darkness and he felt her shrug against him. “Well, I can see it. You, a first-year teacher and all. Likely you weren’t sure where to turn, who to trust. I know from my dad. Politics and bureaucracy are powerful things.”

  “True.” He loved that she tried to comfort him, but his story was far from over.

  “And things can turn on you even when you’re right,” she continued.

  Now was the time. He couldn’t let her continue to think he had been guiltless and naïve. “It wasn’t quite like that, Christy. Coach O’Neal told me to back off, and that if I didn’t, he’d make sure I lost my job. I believed him. He had powerful friends on the school board who wanted a championship team.” Kenn looked away from her. “Worse, he hinted he’d get Bragg’s scholarship revoked.”

  “What?”

  Kenn nodded. “I caved. I couldn’t take the chance.” He shrugged, holding back a shudder. “With lingering drought and low beef prices and a ton of other things, we needed my salary. And that scholarship.”

  “Why, that’s extortion.” Christy’s voice rang with shock. Her hand tightened on his protectively, comfortingly, as if she just might understand. But she didn’t know the rest. “Well, Kenn. I—”

  He held up his hand to stop her. “Thing is, it was my first year at Mountain Cove High, but I wasn’t some greenhorn fresh out of teachers college. I’d gotten my masters, student taught in a tough inner city school outside Seattle. Helped set up a mission school in Costa Rica with my church group. I knew the ropes. And yet…”

  He couldn’t bear to look into her eyes.

  “What is it, Kenn? What else happened? What about the students?”

  Kenn’s heart threatened to hammer out of his chest, and his spirits deflated even more. Of course. Bragg hadn’t been the only one he should have worried about.

  “Well, at the time, there was only one kid I cared about. Bragg.” Now he tried to read her eyes in the darkness as he forced himself to continue. “Bragg was a phenom. Breaking records easier than a water balloon toss. He was headed for greatness. For Beijing. In my heart, I couldn’t be the one to destroy his dream.”

  For a long while, she was silent, and all he heard were their footsteps, and the lapping of the waves on the shores of Old Joe’s Hole.

  “So you never talked to your brother? Warned him about the dangers of doping? That it’s illegal?”

  He hesitated at the tautness of her words, but it was time. “No. O’Neal promised if I kept my mouth shut, he’d stop doping Bragg. I believed that, too. Rather, I wanted to believe it.”

  His breathing started up fast, and he struggled to say the rest of what he needed to. “It was so good to be back home earning some money. Teaching like I’d always dreamed. And Bragg was realizing his dream. I didn’t want to mess with a good thing.”

  She didn’t say a word but managed to stay beside him as he walked faster to a stump he could kick. “But it bit Bragg in the behind, sure enough. If only I’d stepped in, stopped all of it. O’Neal lied. He never stopped. And soon Bragg got emotionally dependent on performance enhancers. He might have achieved greatness all on his own, but I never gave him the chance. Oh, he was so good at lying, at faking tests.”

  For a long moment, Kenn peered upward as if trying to make out stars in the clouds. Then he said, softer than before. “He said later, he always had some tube of someone’s urine he could use. Sneezing, spilling, he’d distract witnesses. Until his shenanigans caught up with him and cost him the Olympics.” Kenn could almost touch the harshness in his voice. “So you see, Christy. I did just what that wife did to your dad. I could have helped Bragg and prevented something that changed a life. But I didn’t. Because I didn’t want to mess up my life.”

  He ran his finger across her lips, just like she’d done a few moments before. “I’m in love with you. I’m certain of it. But I’m the kind of person you can’t forgive. You said so yourself. So it might be best if you go on home.”

  With one last soft kiss, he handed her the flashlight and jogged back to camp.

  6

  In love with you? Still shaky from his kisses, Christy fought the urge to call out to him. Too many folks still busied themselves around camp, and she didn’t want to make a scene.

  Then a wave of anger engulfed her. The nerve of him turning his back on her. Tears came next, and she blinked them away as she found her tent, his flashlight pointing the way.

  “Help me, Lord. If he’s in love with me, that’s good, isn’t it?” She actually prayed out loud as she readied for bed. Of course things happened for a reason. The eulogies for her dad made sense now. The Lord in His wisdom had wanted to call her father home, and in His grace, had led Daddy to find faith prior to his death. Now, even in her grief, she could take comfort in his salvation. And his death had led her here, to Hearts Crossing. To Kenn. It wasn’t a random bunch of accidents.

  As for Kenn and his confession, well, the one he needed to confess to was Bragg. Then turn to God to ease his soul. It wasn’t up to Christy to judge and condemn him.

  Somehow finding peace, she cuddled inside the down sleeping bag, busy with deep-down prayers. Then she understood her tranquility as if a voice from heaven had spoken. “God, You’re letting me know, aren’t you? That I have forgiven the physician’s wife. These folks of Hearts Crossing have shown me loss is part of love and most times, the love, no matter how brief, is worth it. Thank you,
Lord, for bringing me here. And if part of it all is helping Kenn with his baggage, well, let me be an instrument of Your peace.”

  Suddenly she started to shiver. Tonight was much colder than last, but something else chilled her. Maybe Kenn didn’t want her help. Maybe his love, no matter how brief, would have to be enough. Her heartbeat dulled.

  She heard the harmonica start up, and from the slightly different version of “Amazing Grace,” she knew the little Hearts Crossing tradition was played by Bragg tonight, not Kenn. For a flash, she wondered where Kenn was. If he regretted walking away without waiting for her to speak.

  But then Bragg filled her thoughts as she hummed the hymn, and she recalled what she’d already told Kenn. Bragg was good, so much at home here at Hearts Crossing, as if he truly totally belonged. Maybe he hadn’t been meant for Olympic glory and fame and all its pitfalls after all. Then Kenn’s words rocked her world again.

  I’m in love with you. I’m certain of it. The memory of his kisses warmed her through, and she fell asleep with one last prayer, trusting God and the path He was setting for her, for Kenn.

  Dawn peeked through the tiny window screen of her green one-man tent, and Christy lay still for a moment, listening to bird twitter tickling the morning quiet and wind tumbling through the trees. Contentment filled her. Her way of life in California didn’t allow the nature she loved to fill her like this. Oh, she worked with it, designed it, dug and planted when need be. But far too often, sleep in her tidy condo was spoilt by road noise, daybreak ruined by a neighbor leaving for work on his noisy Harley. Everywhere hills and canyons were cluttered with expensive subdivisions and homely strip malls. Wild native animals like bears and coyotes and mountain lions were considered the intruders, trapped, euthanized. Seeing deer yesterday at Elk Grove with the Blake boys had been as miraculous for her as for the twins.

  For the first time in months, she had slept whole nights through, here at Hearts Crossing, covered as much in peace and quiet as with her sleeping bag. But, she grumbled as she crawled into her clothes, she had to face Kenn today. That just might ruin everything.