Making A Texas Cowboy (Home at Last Texas #1)

Chapter Thirty-Four

H e looked out over the rolling hills, a vista he never seemed to tire of. It was obvious why this was one of Nic’s favorite spots. It brought a kind of peace he’d never known before coming here. Jeremy seemed to like it, too, because he’d eagerly joined them when they had suggested Pie needed a ride outside of the corral.

His son was coming along so quickly with his riding that Jackson didn’t feel the need to watch him every second. Besides, he trusted Nic’s uncanny equine instincts to know when trouble might be brewing. As for himself, he just kept an eye out for critters in the brush, or maybe a rattlesnake out sunbathing on a rock, taking in some warmth on this last day of February.

He heard her sigh, and a glance at her very slightly furrowed brow made him ask, “What are you thinking?”

She immediately smiled at him. “Just sour grapes. Very old sour grapes. We used to own from the road all the way out to that outcropping of rock there.” She pointed at the rough shape that jutted out of a hill in the distance. He looked from there back toward the road, which was out of sight, but he mentally tried to calculate the distance.

“That’d practically be a ranch in itself.”

“Really only a hundred acres or so. Our neighbor, Riley Garrett, bought it when we had to sell something to keep going, because it adjoined her property and, with the connection to our road, gave her access to two exits.”

“Seems like a good idea.”

“She’s a smart woman. And I shouldn’t complain. At least she’s a friend. She even told us we could buy it back if we were ever in a position to.”

The little pinto pony beside them moved, drawing Jackson’s gaze. Pie was stretching his nose out to see if any of the scrub within reach was edible. Jeremy immediately patted his mount’s neck, looking so content and happy Jackson could barely breathe for a moment. He wondered if he would always be haunted by the silent shadow his little boy had become. He didn’t know, but he did know that he would forever be filled with joy at the change that pony, this place, and the woman beside him had wrought. It was as close to a miracle as he’d ever seen in his life and closer than most people ever got. It made him wish everybody who’d gone through the hell he and Jeremy had could find this kind of happiness again.

It wasn’t until, after finishing the picnic lunch they’d brought, and they’d mounted up and headed back, that something occurred to him.

“You said that section of land you sold had access to the road, the same road your gate is on?”

“Yes. The boundary’s only about a hundred yards from the gate. Why?”

“Just . . . thinking.”

And that night he did some more of that thinking, while they had on one of Jeremy’s favorite fantasy movies, with the sarcastic, talking raccoon. Just hearing his son laugh at the on-screen antics had him pondering many things. Including his own absence from that screen.

And how he might better spend his time.

*

“I need to ask if you’d be willing to do something.”

The new tension that had come into Jackson’s voice and posture made her reach out and run a finger over the hand that was holding his coffee mug. “Have I said no to anything yet?” she asked huskily.

She’d have sworn she could feel heat shooting through him, as if that slight connection of her finger on his skin was enough. It took a moment for him to go on.

“This is... different. Nothing to do with... us, really. I mean it is, because we’d both have to work at it, but...”

And, she realized, he was having trouble getting it out. She hadn’t seen him like this in a while. He’d built not just a home for him and Jeremy here, he’d built a life. He’d put his name on the list for the phone tree, and twice already, had responded when someone had called for help. Once when a car driven by a grandfather with his three toddler grandchildren had broken down a mile away from their gate, and once when one of the wild horses neighboring rancher Jessie McBride rehabbed and found homes for had gotten loose. In fact, it had been Jackson who’d found and wrangled the recalcitrant colt and brought him safely back home. Word had gotten around after that one, and Last Stand had not just accepted but adopted him as one of their own.

She waited patiently until he drew in a deep breath and went on. “I wanted to ask if you’d do what you did for Jeremy for other kids, kids in the same boat. Teach them to ride, I mean, give them something outside their grief and fear to focus on.”

She hadn’t expected that. “What exactly do you have in mind?”

“A... haven of sorts, for bereaved kids.” It came in a rush now, telling her just how hard he’d been thinking about this. “I’d buy back the land you sold, so it would have a separate entrance. With an easement for your friend if she wants it, of course. Most of it would revert to the ranch, but we’d keep a few acres down near the road and set it up there, with an office and a small stable and corrals. With your expertise and my name—while it still means anything, at least—to promote it, I think we could do some good.”

It was all Nic could do to blink back the moisture in her eyes. How had she ever doubted this man? Because this was who Jackson Thorpe was at the core—a good, decent, caring man... who just happened to be the sexiest guy around.

“We could call it Thorpe’s Therapy,” she said with a grin, despite the urge to cry at the same time. “We’d have to buy some suitable horses, maybe even another pony or two.”

“Was that . . . a yes?”

“That was an ‘I’d love it.’ Almost as much as I love you.”

He kissed her then, and it was a long time later that he asked, while lazily stretched out in their bed, “Did you ever wonder what I talked to your folks about that first day you moved in here?”

Surprised, she drew back. “I thought you were... arranging things.”

“I was. In a way.” He propped himself up on one elbow. “I asked them if they’d ever had a wedding up here on this hill.” Her breath caught in her throat, but he gave her no chance to react, just went on, as if it were the most casual thing in the world. “Your folks said no, they hadn’t.”

A whisper was the most she could manage. “And you said?”

He looked at her then, and all the casualness had vanished from his demeanor and voice. “I said, ‘Good. We’ll be the first.’”

She stared at him, her eyes stinging with moisture. “Yes,” she said, putting everything she was feeling into her own voice. “We will be.”

He turned then, reached out and gently grasped her shoulders. “You do know I was never going to leave? I never even considered it. I was worried about how I was going to get disentangled from them, but it never entered my mind that I wasn’t going to stay. Here, with you. This is... home. The kind I never thought I’d find again.”

She enveloped him in the strongest hug she could give. “Welcome to Last Stand, Jackson. You are home now.”

*

Jeremy wielded the big scissors with obvious glee, and with the golden retriever, Maverick, at his heels, headed for the big, red ribbon strung between the new corral and classroom building. Jackson watched his son, overwhelmed by emotion and the tightness in his chest. His son had come so far, thanks to this place, this family, this town. Jeremy—hell, him too—had been hanging on by a thread, and now, three-and-a-half months after making the desperation move to come here to Last Stand, here they were, amid a crowd of townsfolk and visitors alike, cutting the ribbon on Thorpe’s Therapy Horses.

The idea he’d broached had met with great success from the beginning, when Nic’s friend Riley Garrett insisted on only being paid for the land going back to the ranch; the easement and what he was building was more than enough compensation for the new site.

For one of the few times in his life, he’d been glad of his fame, glad even for the uproar his departure from the show, now on hiatus, had caused. Not only did they have several kids lined up for the sessions with the horses—which he and Nic had had such fun finding and choosing, gentle, happy creatures with an affinity for short humans—donations were rolling in so fast, they’d had to hire staff just to handle it all. And fronting that staff was the dynamo who one day soon would be his mother-in-law, not in her chair but aboard her horse, taking particular care that the children in sad situations saw how well she rode.

So now here he was, amid a crowd that had accepted him, watching his happy child, standing next to the woman who had brought them both back to life, and all amid the incredible spring explosion of the bluebonnets that carpeted the hills. Last Stand hadn’t only accepted him and Jeremy, they had made the launch of this endeavor one of the highlights of the annual Bluebonnet Festival for which the town was famous.

And Tris kept smiling at him, with that Told ya so look in her eyes. His sister had been right about this place from the beginning.

He was aware of the looks he was getting, both openly and surreptitiously, but he didn’t care. He was beyond content with this life he was building here, he was happier than he’d ever thought he’d be again. And he didn’t care how many of the sizeable crowd was here because of who he was. He only cared about the kids clustered around Jeremy as his son proudly introduced them to the horses. Especially the one who’d started it all, Sorry, the horse Jackson had pulled out of the mudflat. And who had, to his surprise, taken perfectly to his new job, that of carefully handling his young riders.

Buck had adapted well to the change also, seeming to be glad to be rid of all the gear and equipment and noise and fuss that being a TV star of sorts brought along. And the selective animal had taken to Nic right away, which, he’d drawled out to her as she stroked the buckskin’s neck, pretty much made them family.

Jackson grinned when Maggie Rafferty got up on the platform Nic’s mom used for mounting up, which they had temporarily converted to a stage of sorts. Grinned because you could immediately tell the locals from the out-of-towners by who immediately shut up and turned to pay attention, himself included in that latter group. Not only was the woman a force of nature, but her open acceptance of him had hastened his inclusion as a Last Stander.

She spoke first of Last Stand and her love of it, and what made it special. About the mindset it took to really become part of this unique town founded by the survivors of the actual last stand. Then of people who truly fit in, not only because they had the heart and way of thinking necessary, but because they didn’t assume they could just roll in and belong.

“Some,” she said with a grin, “even have the class not to wear a cowboy hat because they don’t think they’ve earned it. Including the man behind this marvelous organization we’re opening today.”

It took him a moment to realize she’d turned it personal. Aimed at him.

“Jackson,” she called out, “quit trying to hide over there. Get up here.”

He didn’t want to, and for a moment, didn’t move. Then Nic whispered in his ear, “You know you don’t dare ignore Maggie Rafferty.”

“I know,” he muttered and surrendered.

As he walked through the crowd, applause started, and he felt as if it were something he’d never experienced before. Or maybe it was just because, as with the hat, he’d never felt he deserved it before. But he thought maybe, just maybe, now he’d earned a little of it, at least.

When he got up onto the makeshift stage, Maggie gave him a welcoming hug in front of the entire gathering.

“Well, that ought to seal the deal,” he whispered to her. “Thanks.”

She laughed, then called out for, of all people, Chief Highwater, who grinned at Jackson as he strolled out and handed Maggie a large box. She removed the lid and lifted out a pristine, dark-blue felt cowboy hat. He’d never seen one quite that color. A memory flashed through his mind, of Nic holding a shirt up to him in Yippee Ki Yay, saying the dark blue matched his eyes and really brought them out. And he knew who was behind this particular choice.

“You’ve earned this, Jackson,” Maggie said, reaching up to plant the hat on his head. “And if anybody says different, you send them to me.”

The crowd laughed, and he heard his sister’s familiar whoop of support. It gave him a chance to gather his scattered thoughts. Finally, he gave Maggie the hug this time, then looked out at the gathering and said, in his best projecting voice, “Thank you. All of you. This is the best award I’ve ever gotten.”

He meant it, and let it ring in his voice and show on his face. And when he tipped the new hat to the crowd, a roar of approval went up. He saw Nic in the crowd, with Jeremy up on her shoulders so he could see over the other heads, both of them clapping and letting out some Texas-sized yells, and he knew she’d been right.

He was home at last.

The End