by Lori Wilde
“Splendid.”
“Amazing.”
“Fabtastic.
“Fantabulous.”
“Amazballs.”
“Amatastic.”
“Amagasmic.”
“Oh, you’re just making up words now.”
“There are no words.” He touched the tip of her nose with his index finger.
She gave a playful snarl and nipped his finger between her teeth.
“Help! I didn’t know I married a finger-eating shark.”
“Moral of the story?” she mumbled around his finger, which she kept snugged between her teeth. “Be careful where you put your fingers.”
“I thought you liked where I put my fingers.”
“Hmm, that’s right. Good point.” She released his finger.
He beamed down at her. “You are the best.”
“Best lover ever?”
“Yes,” he said. “Unequivocally.”
“You’re just saying that because you married me. You’ve been with lots of women. How could I possibly be the best?”
“Because it’s you,” he said. “Some of the others might know more tricks, but you’ve got them beat when it comes to passion.”
“I do?”
“Absolutely. I’ve never seen a woman as responsive as you, Tara Alzate Lockhart.”
“That’s hard to believe. I’m not very adept in bed—”
“Hush that nonsense. I don’t want to hear another word about it. I’m the one who’s not good enough for you.” He lowered his head and kissed her.
She closed her eyes, and a dreamy look came over her face. “Mmm.”
Did she hear a humming noise when he kissed her? Rhett was itching to know, but he couldn’t come right out and ask her, because what if she said no?
It was just a goofy legend. Forget about it.
And yet, the question burrowed into his brain and wouldn’t leave him alone. Was he her soul mate? He didn’t believe in soul mates.
So why then was he so eager to be hers?
You can’t force someone to be your soul mate. Either she heard humming when she kissed him, or she didn’t. He couldn’t intentionally cause it. Could he?
“I’m feeling sticky,” he said to distract himself from the thoughts going around in his head. “You want a shower?”
“Are you inviting me to shower with you?”
“Um-hm.” He lowered his eyelids and sent her his best bedroom gaze. “There’s this thing I want to show you . . .”
“Well, what are we waiting for?”
After eye-opening shower sex, they were lying on the chaise together in white hotel bathrobes that Rhett had gotten Silas to bring up for them from the gift shop. Rhett was brushing Tara’s hair. She’d pinned it up in a bun while they were in the shower, and when she’d let it down afterward to run a brush through it, Rhett had taken hold of her wrist, took the brush from her, and said, “Allow me.”
Now he was counting the strokes, pulling the brush down the length of her hair to the middle of her back. “Ninety-seven.”
It was mesmerizing, the brushing, the counting. How good it felt to have someone else brush her hair for her. No one had done that since she was a kid.
“Ninety-eight.”
She sighed, her scalp tingling pleasantly. He was almost done. She wished he could go on brushing her hair all night. She glanced at the clock, saw it was well after two a.m. Correction, all the wee hours of early morning.
“Ninety-nine.” He drew out the word and the brushing. Slowly passing the brush from her crown to her back.
“That feels fantastic,” she said. “Thank you so much.”
“One hundred,” he finished. “And it was my distinct pleasure. Let’s make it a bedtime ritual. I brush your hair for you every night.”
“When you’re not on the road,” she reminded him.
“You and Julie could come on the road with me,” he said, setting the brush on the end table and easing her into the crook of his elbow.
“That’s not very practical. Your trailer is small, and Julie has a lot of needs.”
“I know.” He sighed. “I just hate the thought of leaving you two.”
“It’s only until November. After the finals we can really start our life as a family.”
“If we get custody of Julie.”
“C’mon, how can we not? You married Julie’s foster mother who is a NICU nurse. What’s Judge Brando gonna do? Take Julie away from us and give her to a stranger just because we got married?”
“I’m just worried.”
“Hey, for once you’re the worrywart.” She reached up and lightly knocked her fist against his noggin. “Don’t borrow trouble. We’ll let Lamar handle Judge Brando. For now, it’s just me and you in a fancy hotel room . . .”
“You got that right,” he said, and kissed her, and she heard that magnificent hum again. “Let’s enjoy every second of our wedding night.”
He took her back to bed and they made love again.
“I’m beginning to see why all the women are crazy for you.”
“I thought we were done discussing other women. My past is behind me. I’m an old married man now.”
“You are not the least bit old. Three times in one night? Who can do that?”
“Don’t get to thinking it’ll be a regular thing,” he said. “I’ve been sitting on a lot of sexual energy.”
“How come?”
“I haven’t been with a woman since the weekend before I came to your house in El Paso.”
“You’ve been without sex since May? Two months ago? That’s forever for a guy like you.”
“Believe me, I know.”
“Is that the longest you’ve gone without sex since you’ve been grown?”
He paused, rolled his eyes to the left. “I’m trying to remember. No, no, I went four months once.”
“You’re incorrigible.” She lightly swatted his arm.
“That’s why you like me so much. You’re very corrigible.” He licked his lips, and she saw he was getting another erection. Holy smokes.
“During the past two months you didn’t . . . um . . . take care of yourself?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“I was saving myself for you.”
“Oh, that’s a load of crap.”
“No,” he said. “It’s not. Okay, initially, I was so stunned about Julie that sex was the last thing on my mind, but then I started hanging out with you, and sex was all I could think about.”
“So why didn’t you just take care of yourself?”
“Because if I did, you’d be the one I’d be fantasizing about and it seemed . . . disrespectful.”
A warm little shiver started at the top of her head and shook all the way down her spine. Could it be true? Could she be the one woman to change him?
The hum is never wrong, she heard Granny Blue’s voice in her head. It will change you forever, and nothing will ever be the same again.
She could certainly vouch for that.
They lay on their backs, staring up at the ceiling. Rhett’s arm was stretched out underneath her pillow and she was curled into his side, smelling his manly scent. God, he smelled so good.
A long moment of silence passed. Tara closed her eyes, feeling completely content.
“Tell me,” Rhett whispered, close to her ear. “What’s your greatest sorrow?”
“Huh?” She blinked, almost asleep.
“What’s the worst thing that’s ever happened to you?” he asked. “You know my two. Losing Mom, and Brittany Fant getting rid of my baby.”
“You’re killing the mood, Lockhart. What’s this all about? You’re supposed to be the glib, happy one.”
“I just want to understand you better. Was it losing Kit? Or was it your grandfather?”
“Grandfather had lived a full life,” she said. “And he was in so much pain from the cancer. While I grieved him terribly, I was happy when his suffering came to an end
.”
“So Kit. That was unexpected. You were young. You were in love.”
“Losing Kit was horrible, tragic, but his death wasn’t the worst part.”
“No?”
Tara placed a hand on her belly. She didn’t really want to talk about it, but he’d opened up to her about Brittany. If he was letting go of his secrets, it was time for her to let go of hers. “When Kit got meningitis, I was eight weeks pregnant with our child.”
“You had a miscarriage?”
She nodded, bit her bottom lip.
“I never knew.”
“I don’t talk about it much. I . . . had just found out I was pregnant. Even Kit didn’t know. The shock of his death hastened the miscarriage, but my doctor said it would have happened eventually. That I can’t carry a child to term. That’s the biggest sorrow of my life, Rhett. The baby I lost. The children I can’t have.”
“Sweetheart, I am so sorry.” He held her close. “If I could wave a magic wand and give you what you wanted, I would do it.”
She wept then. Letting herself go in his arms. Just for a moment. Then she swiped at her eyes and smiled at him through the tears. “But that’s life, right? Full of ups and downs, joys and sorrows.”
“And there’s nothing that can be done?”
“There’s a surgery I could have, but insurance doesn’t cover the procedure and there’s little guarantee it would work . . .”
“But there’s hope.”
“Small, but yes.”
“So have the surgery. I’ll pay for it. Even if it doesn’t work, you will know that you did everything in your power to make your dream come true.”
“And if it doesn’t work,” she said, “we always have Julie.”
“And me,” he added. “You have me too.” He reached for her left hand with his right, interlaced their fingers, curled toward her, until they were facing each other in the dark, with only the night-light for illumination.
“It doesn’t bother you that you might not be able to have more children?”
“Tea, I’ve got you and Julie. I’m a lucky, lucky man. There’s no need to be greedy. If we have more children, great. If not, that’s great too.” He squeezed her hand.
She squeezed back. They were in this together.
“Now,” she said. “We’ve covered our greatest sorrows. What was your greatest joy?”
“Yesterday. When you said, ‘I do,’ and made me the happiest man in the world. Made you and me and Julie a real family.”
“You say the sweetest things.”
“What was your greatest joy?” he asked.
“That moment when you kissed me, and I heard the hum and knew you were The One I had been waiting for all along.”
“Really?” His eyes were shiny, and his voice husky. “You heard the hum?”
She nodded, smiled shyly.
“Tea,” he said. “I’ve changed my mind.”
“About what?”
“This moment is the greatest joy of my life. Because I hear it too.”
“What? You hear the hum?” She sat up and peered down at him. “You really hear it too?”
He reached out to cup her chin and smiled as if he’d just learned he’d won the Powerball lottery. “Maybe not in my head, but I hear it right here.” He touched his chest. “In my heart.”
And if she hadn’t been madly in love with him before, she most surely was now.
Chapter 22
Bad wreck: A seriously painful buck off, commonly followed by getting horned or stomped.
A week after their brief honeymoon, Rhett went back on the road.
During his time off, he gave Tara a brief education about the rules and scoring of the PBR so that she could better understand and follow his progress.
She already knew that a professional bull ride was an eight-second endurance effort between the bull rider and a strong, massive bull determined to buck him off. The rider had to last those eight seconds with one hand in the air the whole time in order to earn a score.
She learned that the clock started the second that the bull’s hip or shoulder broke the plane of the gate, and the clock stopped when the rider’s hand came out of his rope, involuntarily or intentionally. If the rider touched anything with his free hand—his body, the bull, or the ground—it stopped the clock.
And she learned that each ride was worth up to one hundred points: fifty points awarded to the bull and fifty points to the rider if he managed to last for the full eight seconds. So if the rider scored fifty points and the bull scored fifty points it was credited to the rider as a 100-point ride. The bulls themselves were in competition for points and standings. The bulls received a score anywhere from zero to fifty points after every ride or attempted ride, whether or not the rider was able to make it to the eight-second buzzer.
A panel of PBR judges scored both the bulls and the riders. The bulls received points for how difficult they were to ride. A rider was judged on how much control he exhibited in the ride. What fascinated Tara was that while Rhett wasn’t particularly controlled in his personal life, on the back of a bull, his precision, strength, and agility gave him supreme control. This year, all his years of work had culminated in top-notch skill.
At each event leading up to the finals, he scored points and made money.
“So you’ve already made a lot of money this season,” she’d said. “Even if you don’t end up winning the world finals, you’ve still had a great year so far.”
“Best year yet. If I’m careful and invest right. I’m trusting you to help me with that,” he said. “I’ve never paid much attention to money.”
“That’s because you’ve always had money,” she said, pleased to be invited to help him with his finances. “You’ll have to trim back on those twenty-dollar tips. I love how generous you are, but Julie comes first.”
“Yes, ma’am . . . oops, sorry about the ‘ma’am’ . . . yes, my queen.”
She’d laughed then and ruffled his hair.
The time between their July wedding and the court review hearing at the end of September crawled by.
Time with an infant was a roller coaster of emotions. Tara swung from joy and elation to exhaustion and a feeling of being overwhelmed. Instead of taking his travel trailer on the road, Rhett parked it and flew to each event, giving him more time with Tara and Julie. Ridge would fly his private jet to El Paso to drop him off and pick him up. It was nice to have family help. Without Ridge carting him to El Paso and back, he couldn’t have done all that flying.
During the week, when Rhett blew back into town, things were great. He thrilled to the ups and downs of parenthood, knew how to relax and enjoy the ride. Showed Tara a few tricks.
His enthusiasm and fluid personality helped her realize she did not always have to be in total control. It was okay for the house to be messy and for her to spend the day in her pajamas if that’s how things turned out. His ability to turn any mundane task into fun was one of the things she admired most about him.
When he was home, he insisted that she indulge in self-care. He would draw her a bubble bath in his big jetted soaker tub. Letting her linger while he rocked Julie in his lap, lightly bouncing her with his knees in a gentle version of giddy-up horsey.
He planned outings. A trip to the stables to introduce Julie to the horses, a stroller ride through the Cupid park, meet-ups with Kaia and Ridge and their kids at the ice cream parlor, giving Julie her first taste of vanilla ice cream.
When they stayed in, Rhett would pump music through the house, playing a variety of tunes from Nat King Cole to George Strait, Arctic Monkeys to Mozart. He had more eclectic tastes than she’d first thought. Digging up Bessie Smith, Buddy Holly, and Cole Porter records from a trunk in the attic and playing them on an old record player that had once belonged to his mother. He’d dance Julie around the room until she chuffed and grinned and flapped her little arms like a baby bird trying to take flight.
Many times, they spent the day burrowed in bed, Ju
lie sandwiched between them. Counting her fingers and toes, playing This Little Piggy Went to Market. They lightly tickled the bottoms of her feet, blew raspberries against her bare belly, and played peek-a-boo.
Yes, when Rhett was home, life was good.
But he left every Thursday morning to catch a plane to his next event, and he did not return until late Sunday evening. Giving her just three short days with him each week.
The rest of the time, the responsibilities of single parenthood pushed her limits. If it hadn’t been for her family, she didn’t know how she would have managed.
While he was gone, she did her best to stay occupied. Which wasn’t hard to do since Julie required a lot of care. She did things with the baby to stimulate her development—range-of-motion exercises, stretching, massage. And Julie thrived.
Her family was great about getting her out of the house. Kaia invited her and Julie over for lunch on Sundays after church, and her parents came over every Thursday night to watch Julie, insisting she have mommy’s night out with her sisters or friends. It helped to ease her loneliness, but she didn’t stop missing Rhett. Without him in it, the small bungalow felt empty and oversized.
On Wednesdays, she continued to volunteer at the WIC clinic, and that’s when Rhett got to spend his alone time with Julie. Father and daughter bonding. Tara was beloved at the clinic and found the work so rewarding. Being around other Apaches put her back in touch with her heritage and culture. Her grandfather would have been so proud. Merylene told her numerous times that when she was ready for a full-time job at the clinic to just say the word and the job was hers.
It was nice having that option. Maybe when Julie was a little older and Rhett was no longer in the PBR, she’d think about it.
She and Rhett Skyped every night. Texted each other in between the Skype sessions. They discussed everything and nothing. Movies, books, music, pets, medicine, bull riding, religion, politics, food, philosophies on childrearing. No topic was off-limits.
Through their Internet gab sessions, they deepened their connection and discovered they had way more in common than it seemed on the surface.
They both loved The Voice and had binge-watched Breaking Bad three times. They preferred dogs over cats, Alaska to Hawaii, and their eggs over easy. They hated split pea soup, boiled okra, and marshmallow fluff.