Delivery to the Farmhouse (Havenwood Cowboys Romance #4)

Chapter 29

Chapter Twenty-Nine

T he drive back home took less time than the drive out had, yet it felt like it was a month longer than it needed to be. Probably because of the urgency coursing through me with every mile.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just snap our fingers and get to a destination rather than having to cross every inch of the way?

I stopped for the night—at the same hotel in Cedar City once more—not because I wanted to. But because I didn’t want to risk driving drowsy. The minute my eyes opened, it was too early for continental breakfast. I didn’t care. I was rested enough.

The road was barren at this early hour. The best part, though, was that I got to watch the sunrise. I stopped for some breakfast and headed back out, listening to audiobooks and chomping at the bit.

Finally, I crossed the border back into Idaho. The minute I did, the dark clouds I’d seen looming on the horizon unleashed their fury. The rain picked up, pouring down and making me need to turn on my windshield wipers. I also begrudgingly slowed my speed as well, just to be on the safe side.

It was still about an hour from here to get to Bridgewater, but I called Belle. I wanted to surprise Colton—but I didn’t actually know where he lived.

Might be a problem.

She sent me the address along with a little heart emoji.

Me: Thanks. Don’t say anything. I want him to be surprised.

Belle: You got it.

Soon enough, the terrain grew more and more familiar. I wove on the roads twisting through the south hills. I crossed the bridge over the Snake River. And then there was the exit to Bridgewater.

Gray clouds still shrouded the sky, and soft moisture drizzled against my windshield. With my heart slamming on the gas, I followed the GPS directions out to his house. For some reason, I thought of the drive I’d taken to Belle’s. Maybe it was the mud, though his road wasn’t nearly as bad as hers had been.

The day Colton and I got stuck in the mud was uncanny. I couldn’t help but wonder again how that package had ended up in my car that day.

What if we were placed where we could do the most good? Dad never got packages wrong. The fact that he put Belle Holden’s package in my car could have been a mistake—but as the postmaster, he was trained to catch those mistakes and had been doing so for years.

What if it had been no coincidence? What if that had been God’s hand guiding me in subtle ways? Unfolding His plan for my life after all?

Being there for Dorothy and Harold, even bringing cookies to the guys on the crew, my road trip with Colton where I learned that I didn’t need to go any farther than my own backyard to find my purpose in life—those were no accident.

How often did we mistake things as coincidence and not realize it was God putting answers to prayers in motion all along ?

Even as I had that thought, it didn’t ease the worries in my mind where Colton was concerned. My palms grew clammy against the steering wheel. I wiped them against my jeans one at a time, and I talked myself through next steps.

“It’ll be fine,” I told myself. “He’ll be there.”

But what if he was out in the field? What if he was on the site with Bryce?

I probably should have texted first. The truth was, the same old worries I’d had all along came flaring back up again:

What if I’d blown my chances with him? What if he’d give my heart the old one-two by rejecting me like I’d done to him?

I guess I hadn’t really rejected him. I’d only rejected another road trip with him.

That was forgivable, wasn’t it?

Please let it not be too late.

I passed farmland and several tractors, and despite the gloomy cloud coverage overhead, it was beautiful and green. The windmills that were usually in the distance came a little closer, and I followed the GPS as it told me to turn left.

On the edge of the corner pivot stood a little house with columns out front. Stucco slathered the house’s upper half while its lower half was covered in stone.

“Cute,” I said to myself. Colton’s house was quaint and sweet, not nearly as big as the house the guys had given Debra.

Situated beside it, the shop was larger than the house was. Its main door was wide open, granting me a view of the tractor inside. My stomach cinched just a little.

Colton stepped out of the open doors, and then I went tight all over.

Every part of me flared to life, and it was like my body couldn’t handle so much awareness all at once because my temperature spiked and heat flooded my cheeks.

He wore a tank top, jeans, and cowboy boots—no wide-brimmed hat this time. But I didn’t mind. That allowed his hair to sway in the breeze, giving him a roguish, farm boy baddie look.

He led a bicycle out of the shop, and I watched as he loaded one into the bed of his pickup. Then he stalked back inside the shop, past the tractor, either not seeing me drive up or wanting to hide.

Hopefully not the hiding option.

Trying to get a grip on my raging pulse, I pulled up next to his pickup, shifted into park and stepped out of the car. The afternoon was slightly cool, and my shoes sank into the softer ground. A slight breeze swept the smell of dirt and grease toward me from the direction of his shop.

As he led a second bike outside, he stopped. And so did my heart.

He finally saw me.

I couldn’t take the time to wonder what he was doing with a pair of bikes. As far as I knew, he wasn’t a big bike rider. Was he going on a date with someone?

Someone who wasn’t me?

No. No, no, no. I promise I’m back for good.

A smidgeon of panic set in, scattering my thoughts and sending my brain into a frenzy. He’d met someone else in the few days I’d been gone. If he wanted to move on with someone else, someone who wasn’t so scatterbrained and unsettled, could I be as courteous as he’d been to me?

Could I let him go?

“Hey,” I said, giving him a little wave.

His head shot up. Leaving the bikes behind, Colton stalked toward me, and my heart couldn’t take it anymore. It was about to crack right through my ribs to get to him first.

I was Drew Barrymore at the end of Never Been Kissed . I was standing in the middle of the ball field, waiting for the hot teacher to jog down the bleachers and across the field to kiss me.

Colton’s hair tumbled into his eyes. And this was so much better than that scenario?—

Because he was real. Because he was looking at me the way he was.

Like he couldn’t believe his eyes.

“You’re back,” he said.

“I am.”

“That didn’t take you quite as long as I thought it would.”

“Is that…a bad thing? You say that like you wanted me gone longer.”

“Only because I was coming to surprise you.” He gestured to his pickup behind him.

I startled at this admission. “You…you were?”

“I was going to track you down once you read my letter. I had something to give you.”

“Something else?” I pulled the compass from my pocket. “I thought this was pretty good.”

He took a step toward me, flaring everything inside of me to life. “Did you look at it?”

“Yeah, it directed me back home.” Back to him.

He took another step, dusting his hands together. “And the letter?”

I winced and reached a hand toward my back pocket. “I didn’t read it.”

A scoff escaped his throat. “Fool woman.”

I could tell he wasn’t really upset. Lifting my chin, fighting a smile, I said, “What have I told you about calling me a fool?”

“What did I tell you about reading perfectly good letters that lovesick men write for you?”

“Nothing?” I said, playing with him.

Groaning, he turned away from me and back again. “I told you to read it when you got to the Grand Canyon.”

“I didn’t.”

“I can see that.” He fanned his hands toward me .

This was strange. Was he really bothered by the fact that I didn’t read it?

“Why? What did it say?”

He wagged his finger at me. “I guess you’ll never know—but it’s a good thing you came back when you left. We would have crossed paths. We might have missed each other completely.”

I stared at him. “You—you were really coming to me?”

Colton tucked his hands in to his pocket. He looked me over, allowing his gaze to rake from my feet to my face. Then he tilted his head toward his truck.

“Look in the pickup,” he said.

Chewing my lip, watching him for verification, he inclined his head toward the truck once more.

I stepped across the gravel, tiptoed forward, and peered into the cab.

“The backseat?” I asked for confirmation.

“I told you it was a prime destination. Something you and I still need to test drive.”

I was all for that. All he needed to do was say the word.

Another glance showed that, sure enough, his suitcase was in the backseat. Did that mean he’d packed?

I backed away, striding to the handlebars sticking out from the side of his truck bed. “And the bikes?”

He strode closer to the truck bed and rested his hand on the handlebars of the bike he’d been in the process of laying in when I drove up. It was pink. My favorite color.

“These are for you.”

“You…you got me a bike?”

“I got me one, too.” He gestured to the blue model waiting between the truck and the tractor. “I was coming to you, Nat. I tried letting you go, but being away from you, not seeing you, was torture. You were too far away, and that just didn’t seem right when thoughts of you were right with me the whole time.

“I figured we could roam all over the Arizona countryside, see some of the trails together at the Grand Canyon or wherever the road led us next. And you could feel that freedom you’ve been craving.”

“You gave me freedom,” I said, feeling a thrill with the words that was made all the better because I had heaven’s confirmation of that fact, too.

“The only thing freer than riding a bike is riding a horse, but those would have been too hard to handle, and I don’t have a horse trailer. I could have borrowed one from Luke and Belle, but I was on a time crunch because I knew you’d be reading that letter soon. We can get horses later, though. Once we get settled.”

He was over my head. “Settled?”

“Sure. Once you’re done seeing the world.”

I opened my mouth to reply, but he stopped my lips with his fingers.

“I got you something else,” he said softly.

I was shaken. He was a rocket blast, a wonder of nature, a math problem I couldn’t compute.

He opened the door to his truck and returned, offering a piece of folded paper to me.

Another note?

“I was going to give you these once I got there,” he said.

I took the paper, and this time, he didn’t stop me from looking at it.

“It’s plane tickets,” he explained as I perused the airline’s logo across the top of the page. “Pick any place you want in that book of yours, and we’ll go—just as soon as harvest is over this fall.”

“Oh, my.”

“I promise I won’t hurt you. I won’t hold you back or hold you down—I’m going because I want to be with you , Nat.”

“Colton.” The paper shook in my hands.

“If you don’t want me there, I get it. Just be straight up, though. Just tell me, and I’ll take it all back. ”

“I can’t believe you did this.” I was struck. Completely stunned.

He took my face in his hands. Heat circulated from his body, pooling into me.

“I want you, Nat. I want to be where you are. Wherever you are. I’ve got roots here, though, so it’s got to be within reason. But I’m just saying, I won’t hold you back. I figured I’ll just hold on for the ride while you get a little dust on your boots.”

I placed my hands on his, keeping him in place.

“I was wrong,” I told him. “I can’t believe I thought I could leave you behind.”

His mouth lifted. “You’re saying you missed me.”

“I did. You have no idea. Even for a few days, being away from you was just what you said. It was torture. I think God knew I had to learn that on my own.”

Colton blocked me in, stepping forward until my back was against his truck, and his body was flush against mine.

“Are you done learning it yet? You got your life planned out, Miss Natalie?”

My arms went around him. It was the only logical thing to do at this point.

“I’m staying in Bridgewater,” I said. “I’ll work construction or learn how to farm—whatever it takes. I want to be wherever you are.”

His gaze flicked to my mouth. My bones became shifting tectonic plates as he brought it to mine. Everything in me loosened, and I hung on this moment, this kiss, the way his body felt against mine and the feel of his lips.

I didn’t want to stop. I didn’t want to move from this spot. It was one of those moments that stretched, that made me want to unpack and live in it for a good long while. His lips were more insistent than usual, like he was trying to cross the distance that had been between us for the past three days, recover the kisses that we could have had if I’d stayed .

His hands scaled my sides, trailing along my jaw, hitching me to him. And I just tried to keep up. And then the rhythm of his mouth slowed. The kisses turned soft. Tender. Pensive. Until he pulled away and rested his forehead against mine.

“I love you,” he said.

“I love you,” I told him.

His hands gripped my sides. “Say it. Say it again.”

So I did. I said it through my stupid-wide grin. “I love you, Colton Holden.”

He growled and bent at the waist, hooking his hands under my thighs. Then he pulled me to him once more, and I held on, hugging around him with both arms and legs. Walking with his attention on me and somehow seeing where he was going at the same time, he placed me on the open jaw of his truck bed and kissed me again.

My back brushed against something, and I glanced back to find I was colliding with the pink bike’s back tire.

“Sorry,” he said breathlessly.

“Thank you,” I told him, tucking my head into the crook between his neck and shoulder and breathing him in. “I can’t tell you what it means to me. You did so much.”

His mouth wandered to my throat, and I lifted my chin like a cat waiting to be scratched, basking in the tingle of his lips shimmering up my skin.

“Read it,” he growled when he got to the space below my ear.

My eyelashes fluttered. It took several seconds to connect my brain stem to my spine.

“Now?”

“Yes.”

“Good thing I have it in my pocket,” I muttered, reaching behind to pull the letter free. It was an interesting feat since my knees were on either side of him.

He rested his hands on my legs, watching me as I opened it .

“I’ve never seen your handwriting before,” I said. I liked the sight of his manly scrawl on the small slip of paper.

“Read it,” he said again.

Nat,

I hope you’re done chasing your dreams because now, you’re making me chase mine. I love you. Don’t give up on me yet.

Colton

My nose crinkled. While the words were adorable, I wasn’t sure what he was getting at.

I fanned the paper, creating a small breeze on my face. “This was supposed to make me stay where I was?”

“Until I came to you, yeah.”

“Colton, this is so sweet. But I’m not sure I would have gotten that message.”

I probably wouldn’t have stayed there waiting for him to come to me. The note didn’t say anything about waiting for him.

“Look.” With his finger he pointed and read aloud, summarizing his own words. “You chasing your dreams is making me chase mine.”

I looked at him, swimming in his blue eyes. “I still don’t get it.”

“It’s about you,” he said.

“Me?”

He took the paper from me, refolded it, and tucked it into his pocket. Then his hands caged me on either side. Leaning in, he brushed his nose against mine, creating a light show inside of me.

“ You are my dream, Nat. And because you left, you were…never mind. I’m ruining it now.” He shook his head and rolled his eyes.

“Oh,” I said slowly as I grasped his meaning .

A soft putty took over my bones, melting them slowly and making it impossible to think.

“Oh,” I said again. I brought my face close to his. The sandpaper of his stubble made me shiver. “I was the dream you were going to be chasing? With bikes?”

“Will you just shut up?”

“No, it’s cute. Really.”

“Just stop.”

“Get over here.” I tugged one strap of his tank top, pulling him toward me. He gave in, which was just what I hoped for.

His arms wrapped around me, and his mouth found mine. And in that kiss, in that embrace, I was home. I was found.

The direction of my heart pivoted. The thrumming curiosity and need to be anywhere but here was long gone.

I felt more freedom in his embrace than I had during the entire trip to Arizona. I was free to be myself with him, free to love him without reservation, without wondering if this was where I belonged.

Because once you know? You just know.

And here in his arms, I knew.

“Wait,” I said, disrupting the press of his lips against mine as another thought occurred.

“Don’t interrupt. Things were just getting good.” He crushed me to him, kissing me again.

I giggled against his mouth and gave him what he wanted.