Blackbird Lake (37 page)

Because
he
hadn’t kept his promise.
He
hadn’t been there.

He’d been too late.

He’d known in that moment that he had no damn business making promises to anyone. He’d failed the one time he’d made a commitment to a woman, and he hadn’t made one since.

Suddenly, watching the blond girl and her cowboy in the tan Stetson walk hand in hand toward a brightly lit diner, he heard a man’s steady voice behind him.

“Don’t let it get to you. You fall off a horse, you gotta get right back on. No ifs, ands, or buts. That’s how you learned to ride in the first place, right? So I want you to go in there tomorrow and give it another try. Or else you might never know…”

Jake slowed and watched as a stocky man of about forty walked past him, one arm slung across the shoulders of his teenaged son. He remembered the kid from earlier. Freckles all over his face, his skin damp with nervous sweat as he climbed into the chute and onto the bronc’s back. He’d tried bronc riding that day for the first time and had been tossed onto his butt in under three seconds.

Jake suddenly remembered something else. His own father’s voice, saying similar words to him when he first learned to ride. Or rather, when he’d taken a tumble off Dakota for the very first time.

You fall off that horse, Jake, you get right back on. Otherwise you maybe never will. You face it, see you can do it. Don’t be scared. Put your foot in the stirrup there, like I showed you. Get right back on…

He’d fallen off a dozen more times, but damn, he’d always swung right back into the saddle. And man, he’d learned to ride.

He halted in his tracks, stood stock-still. People in scarves and boots and light jackets dodged around him; there was chatter, horns honking; and he could smell barbecue and perfume and popcorn wafting from the rodeo stands. But in his mind, he was seeing something he’d never seen before. The one area of his life where he’d never gotten back on when he fell off.

He’d never made another promise to a woman since he
was nineteen—since he’d failed Melanie. He’d never made a commitment to a woman or even let himself get close to making one.

Hell, he’d never even had a relationship with a woman that was more than a casual friendship or a one- or two- or three-night stand.

All these years—not afraid of falling. Afraid of
failing.
Failing someone close to him. Someone who needed him.

He felt a jolt down to his bones as something seemed to burst free in his soul.

Later he didn’t even remember getting behind the wheel of his rental car. He pushed the speed limit on the drive to the airport and was the first in line to board the plane.

All he could think as the plane soared through the darkness was that he couldn’t wait to get to Blue Bell Drive. To pull up in front of that old Victorian, to see Carly and Emma, to hold them, touch them both.

It suddenly struck him like a truckload of bricks. He didn’t want to be away another minute.

He couldn’t wait to get home.

“Tell me about it. I know just how you feel,” Carly murmured as Bronco gazed at her morosely.

The dog was stretched out on the rug in her sewing room as she basted the layers of the blossom quilt she needed to finish before the fund-raiser. It was two days before Halloween, Emma was asleep, and she could hear a wicked wind snarling through the darkness outside the window.

“I miss him, too, but don’t ever tell him I said so. I’ll have to get used to it. And maybe you will, too. He could be dumping all three of us.”

She wondered if Jake would take Bronco on the road with him next time, now that he was back on the circuit. Or would he ask to leave the dog here with her and Emma?

Somehow, reluctantly, Carly had fallen in love with this big, scruffy dog. Emma adored him wildly and still called him “Bug” as a term of strongest affection, though she didn’t love even Bronco nearly as much as she obviously loved Jake.

But maybe having Bronco around while Jake was gone would help keep her from missing him so much. She was talking more every day, stringing two and even three words
together at a time—and lately, most of all, she’d been asking “Where Dada Shake?”

Where’s Daddy Jake, in Emma-speak.

How did I let this happen?
Carly wondered with a sigh. A knot suddenly tightened in the pit of her stomach. At first she’d been so careful, so resistant to letting Jake get too close. To Emma. And to her.

But these past weeks—since the break-in and the picnic at Blackbird Lake, especially—and since Kevin and his private detective had been booted out of town—she’d let her guard down. She’d let Jake in more and more—allowed him to get closer than she’d ever dreamed she would.

Jake and Emma were tighter than ever. And she and Jake—

He’d been staying here at the house every night—and not in the spare bedroom, either.

They’d made hot, intense love each night. And often fun, frisky love in the morning. Jake’s lovemaking left her glowing and fulfilled, but always, always wanting more.

They ate breakfast together every day, working together easily as he poured cereal and made toast, and she cut up fruit and put up a pot of coffee. Emma’s job, which she excelled at, was to make them grin as she chirped new words constantly from her high chair and fed Bronco bits of wheat toast and cereal from her chubby fingers.

Then Madison would show up, and Emma would shriek with excitement. While Carly headed to the quilt shop, Jake drove out every day to confer with Denny on the new guest cabins and the transition of his own cabin into a lodge. He worked the phone night and day, doing outreach, planning, and budgeting, bringing all aspects of his retreat for bullied kids together.

They’d often meet at A Bun in the Oven or the Lucky Punch for a quick lunch, then return to have dinner all together on Blue Bell Drive.

It was a wonderful routine they’d fallen into, filled with jokes and food, hugs and laughter. Just like a real honest-to-goodness family.

And then Jake had flown to Salt Lake City for the
commercial shoot and to Carson City for the rodeo. He’d only been gone a few days and had called her each night. When he returned, he seemed more than glad to be back.

But this time, when he went to Bismarck, he’d stopped calling on a regular basis. He’d called only the first night, but not the next. Or the next after that.

Carly had tried to reach him yesterday and left a message. But he hadn’t called her back.

She hadn’t had any contact from him since that one and only call—except for a quick businesslike text message:

Checking in, hope all’s well, see you soon.

What the hell was up with that?

Her heart had dropped. Her throat had gone dry. Anger had risen in her and tears had formed in her eyes as she deleted the text from her phone.

She knew there was a larger message beneath the distant politeness of his text. Jake was letting her know that he was backing off. He’d contacted her only out of a sense of obligation. He didn’t actually want to talk to her—or, apparently, to Emma. He was merely touching base in the most neutral, distant way possible.

Fine,
Carly had told herself, pale and composed the next day, after she’d cried her heart out into her pillow the night before.

It was time for a reality check.

This was over. Whatever she’d thought was happening between her and Jake obviously
wasn’t
. A leopard doesn’t change his spots and a cowboy doesn’t shed his wanderlust ways.

Jake was back in his cowboy-loner routine. He must be having such a good time on the road that boring family life with one woman, one kid, and a dog was just too tame for him. Perhaps he’d met another woman…or several women. A pack of rodeo groupies. Was there such a thing?

She felt the tears gathering in her eyes again and tried to blink them back before they overflowed. Then she heard a sound over the October wind. An engine…a car pulling into her driveway.

Bronco leaped up, let out a couple of excited barks. “Shhhh!” Carly hushed the dog, as she tossed aside her quilt and ran to the living room window. Before she could even process the sight of Jake’s truck on her driveway, a short knock sounded at the front door.

“I thought you weren’t coming back until tomorr—oh!”

Her startled words were cut off as he swept her into a tight embrace and kissed her. Standing in the doorway, the October wind whipping around them, he lifted her off her feet and caught her mouth with his in a kiss that was unlike any other they had shared. It was deep and powerful and urgent.

“Ohhhh,” was all Carly could gasp at first when he finally set her down. Gazing up into his eyes, seeing the way he was looking at her, she suddenly felt the world at once spinning and settling into its rightful place.

“What…took you so long?” Her throat filled with emotion as she lifted a hand to his cheek.

“I had a few things to figure out.”

“Such as?”

“Things like I missed you. And want you. And need you.”

Seeing that she was shivering in her sea blue sweater as the wind chased up the porch and whistled right past them, he drew her into the hallway and pushed the door closed.

He absentmindedly placed a hand on Bronco’s head as the dog finally stopped dancing around him like a drunken gypsy, then he led Carly into the living room.

With one swift movement he tossed his jacket onto a chair, then his arms snaked tightly around her waist so she was close against him as he kissed her tenderly on the lips.

“I couldn’t get home to you fast enough.”

Home?

“Jake…” There was a catch in her voice. She couldn’t speak another word, not now. She simply gazed into his eyes, searching. He had the most beautiful eyes. Dark as a midnight blue sky. And steady. So steady. There was a tenderness in them she’d never seen before.

“I don’t know why it took me so long to see it. I didn’t realize until I hadn’t talked to you for days and days.”

“Four days,” she whispered, smoothing his hair back from his brow. “You didn’t call for four days. And I left you a message—I didn’t even know if you got it—”

“I know, baby. I’m sorry. It will never happen again. I was an idiot. I was afraid we were getting in over our heads. That if I didn’t back off, I’d hurt you. But the only one I hurt was myself—by staying away from you. I don’t ever want to do that again. I
won’t
ever do that again. I’m keeping you close, Carly McKinnon. You and Emma both. Close by my side. And close to my heart. From this day forward.”

He kissed her again, a deep, hungry kiss that made her knees wobble. She held on to him and kissed him back, their kisses melting into each other like butter in the summer sun.

From this day forward…it sounded like a sacred pledge….

“What changed?” she managed to ask as they came up for air. As Bronco settled down near the fireplace, Jake drew her to the sofa and pulled her down onto his lap.

“I missed you so much I couldn’t see straight. And I realized…I’d let something from my past bar my way to the future for too many years. I started believing all that crap about myself that everyone says, that I always used to like to hear. That I’m a born wanderer and I’ll never settle down, that I’m not the marrying kind.”

He stroked a hand along her delicate jaw as she snuggled on his lap. He stared for a moment at their joined hands and then looked intently into her eyes. “I let someone down once, Carly, someone important to me. And I never forgave myself for that. I never let myself get in that position again—of making a promise. I cut off my options, until I suddenly realized that when it comes to you and Emma, I want all my options on the table. There’s only one hope for me to be happy now that I’ve tangled with you and our daughter. I need you, both of you.”

His voice thickened. “I want us to be a family. I want that more than any rodeo prize or any endorsement deal or
anything else. And I have plenty to do right here, getting the retreat off the ground. Running it, funding it. My traveling days are done, girl. Unless you and Emma come with me. Unless you say no…” His voice trailed off.

“No to what?” Cupping his face in her hands, she smiled, her heart full of love.

Jake suddenly shifted, settling her gently on the sofa beside him, then he knelt on one knee before her and seized her hands.

“Will you marry me, Carly McKinnon?” His fingers closed warm and tight around hers. “Will you make me the happiest man on the planet and give me a chance to reform my crazy cowboy ways?”

“You better believe it, Jake Tanner,” she breathed, and she slid down to sit on the floor beside him, hugging him close. In a flash he had pulled her down atop him and clamped her tight, her legs straddling him, and their lips fused in a long, sweet kiss that left them grinning goofily at each other.

“You promise?” Jake said. “No welshing, Carly. You’ll marry me?”

“I’ll marry you tonight, tomorrow, at dawn or midnight, whenever you say.”

“Damn! I don’t even have a ring!” Jake groaned. He suddenly scraped a hand through his hair. “Sorry. I figured a lot of this out right before I left for the airport and I didn’t have a chance to shop before I got on the plane—”