by Liz Isaacson
His mind wandered down previously forbidden paths, when he’d snuck over to her she-shed and kissed her despite her objections and complaints that he distracted her from her work. So he’d back up and turn to leave, only to have her grab his shirt and pull him back for another kiss.
A smile stayed on his face as they walked down the aisle, Simone looking for something only she could see. She indicated a booth on the left she wanted to go in, and Micah followed her as she said, “Bill usually has something good.”
And Bill obviously knew her, because his face lit up when he saw Simone and he abandoned the shelf where he’d been adjusting some pots. “Simone.” He took Simone into a hug, causing her to drop Micah’s hand. “It’s good to see you. What are you looking for?” Bill couldn’t be much older than Micah who had a birthday in a few weeks and then he’d be thirty-four.
Simone was older than him too, and they’d celebrated her thirty-ninth birthday at the theater in Amarillo. He’d debated with himself for the entire drive home if he’d kiss her then, but in the end, he hadn’t.
Why he was thinking so much about kissing was beyond him, and he really needed to stop. It would happen when it was meant to happen, Micah knew that. He’d learned to rely more on the Lord’s timing than his own the past couple of years, but that hadn’t eliminated any of his frustration.
He’d simply learned how to be slightly more patient than he’d used to be. And he still wasn’t perfect at it.
“Oh, you know,” Simone said, glancing around. “I’ll know it when I see it.”
“Well, look around, and if you think you might want something, let me know. I can’t bring everything I have.”
Simone nodded, and Bill turned back to the bookcase. Micah watched her look at the items in the tent, which included ratty end tables, a brass headboard, and a pair of lamps that looked like they’d once belonged to his great-grandmother.
“These are nice,” she said, almost to herself, indicating the lamps.
Micah’s eyebrows went up, and he looked at Denise. “I do not think those are nice,” he whispered.
Denise giggled and she took his face in both of her hands. “Auntie Simone makes old things into new things, Uncle Micah.”
“Oh, is that what she does?” he asked. “I didn’t know.” He grinned at the little girl, who wiggled out of his arms. He set her on the ground and said, “Don’t touch anything, Denise.”
“I know,” she said. She wandered around while Simone did too, each of them inside their own worlds. Micah had no idea what Simone was looking for, as she seemed to really examine some things while others her gaze skated right past.
She picked up a candlestick and said, “Bill, where did this trunk come from?”
The shopkeeper approached, saying, “I don’t have a trunk.”
Simone pointed to something Micah couldn’t see, because a couple of pieces of furniture separated him from where Simone stood. “What’s this, then?”
“That’s an Army locker,” he said. “And I bought it in an estate sale.”
“How much?” Simone bent down, really looking at the Army locker now. Micah stepped around the ragged armchair still blocking his view to find Simone crouching in front of what looked like a very old box. A very old box with a very rusty latch. All of it should be thrown away.
Still, a general sense of excitement filled him, because he knew exactly what Simone did in that she-shed of hers. She made gold with her bare hands. He couldn’t imagine what was going through her mind in that moment, but he had the very real feeling she knew exactly what to do with that beat-up box.
“Twenty,” Bill said.
“I’ll take it,” Simone said, and she peeled a bill out of her pocket. She wore a pair of black slacks and a dark, long-sleeved blouse covered in bright flowers. She was classy and sophisticated, and exactly everything Micah wanted in a woman.
He’d seen her in dirty jeans and cowgirl boots too, her shirtsleeves pushed up on her shoulders as she worked in a pig pen, or shoveled out a stall, or rode a lawn mower around the Shining Star Ranch.
He liked her soft side, her rustic side, her blunt side, all her sides. And he decided right then and there that he was going to kiss her today.
Today, he vowed.
Almost as quickly as he decided, his insecurities kicked in. Maybe not today, he amended. We’ll see how things go.
Simone led him and Denise through several more booths, and she bought a few more things. On the way back through, she got the shop owners or their assistants to bring all her purchases to her delivery truck, where she stood back, not getting an ounce of dirt on her hands while she directed them.
“Thank you,” she said with a smile to each one. Some got handshakes, others hugs, and she kissed Bill’s cheek as he left. Then she drew a deep breath and looked at Micah. “So I guess you’ll be unloading all of this for me later.”
“If you need me to,” he said, lifting his cowboy hat and reseating it.
“Do you want to come to lunch with us?” Simone asked, taking Denise’s hand. “I promised her a day with me and then lunch. She gets to pick the place.”
Micah looked from Simone to Denise, and he had the very real impression that he should let them have their girls’ day. He knew Simone had girls’ nights with her sisters too. No husbands. No kids. The Foster sisters were very close, and the one time he’d tried to ask what they did at girls’ night, she’d just looked at him.
“You don’t know?” he’d asked, teasing her.
“I know,” she said. “It’s just…stuff. Sister stuff. What do you do with your brothers?”
“We ride horses and talk about the rodeo and…stuff.”
“Yeah,” Simone had said. “We do stuff too.”
And he hadn’t asked again.
“I have to get back,” he said. “I said I’d send some paperwork over to Wade, and I’ve been here for a couple of hours.” He stepped into Simone and put one arm around her waist. “Good to see you, sweetheart. I will come unload this for you later, if you’d like.”
“Okay,” she said, pressing into his kiss against her cheek. “I’ll text you.”
He nodded, bent down to hug Denise, and then he tipped his hat and walked away. He heard Simone ask, “So, Deni, where do you want to go to lunch?” as he left. He wasn’t sure why he felt like he shouldn’t crash their lunch; Denise obviously didn’t care.
Does Simone?
He couldn’t answer himself, so he simply walked back to his truck and got on the road back to Three Rivers.
Micah parked in his own driveway and looked at the shell of the house. He was building it himself, though he had contracted with Stephania to do the plumbing, and Dylan to do the electrical and HVAC. He’d hire people to come install the carpet and flooring too, install the appliances, and make sure the gas fireplaces in the house and in the backyard wouldn’t explode and blow up the whole ranch.
He wanted to see how long it took to build a house by himself, with custom finishes, when he relied on other experts to do what they were best at doing. He didn’t work on his place day and night, though, because he did have ranch chores to do each day. Feeding and watering the llama herd wasn’t hard, but he’d been helping Liam with their father’s miniature horses too. And Daddy had a lot of those.
Micah also pitched in around the ranch when big events happened, like calving, breeding, branding, and haying. Jeremiah was just one man, and while they employed four cowboys, they really needed a dozen hands to keep up during the busy times on a ranch. With Skyler back now, things on the ranch were improving, and Micah was glad to have his best friend in Three Rivers with him.
He got out of the truck and cast a glance toward Skyler’s house, which he’d also designed and built. He’d purposely chosen a radically different design for his place, and the first thing that included was the size.
Skyler’s house was easily a second homestead on the ranch. It was sprawling and big and bold and open. Micah liked that concep
t, but he wanted more of a farmhouse, like his parents, and like the place where he’d been born and had grown up for a few years.
So his house utilized more outdoor space, with a massive porch that spanned the front of the house and wrapped around the side, continuing to a large patio in the backyard. The front door opened to a small foyer—much smaller than Wyatt’s or Skyler’s homes—where a hall led back into the kitchen. The homestead where Jeremiah lived currently did this too, but there were two offices off the front there.
At Micah’s house, the stairs went up, and through a doorway was another bedroom and bathroom, as well as the office or formal living room.
The kitchen and dining room weren’t enormous, though he could probably host the family with enough folding tables and chairs if he needed to. But he didn’t need to, and not everyone had six brothers and their wives, children, and dogs to host for Christmas.
The laundry room veered to the left, as did the master suite. That was it for the main level, and while it wasn’t huge, it was almost two thousand square feet. Upstairs, he had a large living room, three more bedrooms, and another bathroom, as well as a common area for his weight machine and a treadmill.
It felt cozy, and he wanted to show people that luxury didn’t always mean huge. It just meant custom, with the unique touches a family could want.
He’d put up the walls, put on the roof, and today, he needed to get some sheetrock up. The electric and plumbing had gone in last week, and he was ready to cover it all up. He affixed a mask to his face and put on a pair of work gloves.
He judged time by his stomach, working until he had to stop and get something to eat. He took off his mask and his gloves, set them on his workbench and started down the steps to the main level. He’d taken a couple of steps down to what would eventually be the yard before a bloodcurdling scream filled the ranch.
Micah took off running, going past his truck as he scanned the yards, driveways, and homes in front of him. He saw nothing.
Guide me, he thought, desperate to reach whoever needed help before it was too late.
Chapter Three
Simone looked around frantically, another scream gathering in the back of her throat. She needed a stick or a ladder. Something to get away from the three snakes in front of her, or something to get them away from her.
The rattling intensified, and all she could think about was how she’d heard that prairie rattlesnakes could be unpredictable. Hissing joined the rattling, and Simone couldn’t find anything to defend herself. Nothing at all.
She didn’t want to be bitten by a snake. She didn’t have time for it, and she had a very low tolerance for physical pain.
Another scream ripped from her throat, and Simone started crying too. Someone had to come help her. Please, Lord, she prayed. “Send someone to help me.”
“Simone?”
“Micah!” She wasn’t sure what to do. Wave her hands? Would that scare or anger the snakes further? She pressed into the dilapidated barn behind her, hoping it would hold her weight. She’d been walking in the shade toward Micah’s new house when she’d come upon the snakes. She’d actually stepped on one, and instead of it scampering away to safety, it had hissed and rattled and struck toward her.
Micah rounded the barn, his eyes wide. “What’s—?”
“Snakes,” Simone said, edging further away. But the trio of snakes seemed fixed on her, and her muscles didn’t seem to want to work.
“Okay,” he said, his voice definitely sounding not okay. “Just stay there, sweetheart. No big movements.”
So waving her arms wouldn’t have helped. Simone wished she’d known that before, and that this wasn’t such a big learning moment. Micah disappeared around the corner of the barn, and Simone’s panic reared. A whimper escaped her lips, but he returned quickly, a pitchfork in his hands.
“I’m just going to…get…them,” he said, stepping forward carefully. He scooped up one of the snakes—the one farthest from her—and tossed it away. But there were still two to go. He took another step, yelping at the same time more hissing and rattling sounded.
“There’s a whole nest of them here,” he said, dancing backward.
A whole nest.
Simone told herself not to pass out, not to scream again. She took another step sideways, her hands pressing against the scratchy wood.
“Okay, new plan,” Micah said, avoiding the patch of grass where all the snakes had been roosting. He jogged to the road several feet down and came back toward her. He came right parallel with her and reached his hand out. “You’re going to get on over here.”
“Get on over there?” Simone couldn’t fully look away from the snakes. “Micah, this is insane.”
He stepped off the gravel road and stretched toward her. “Simone, I need you to look at me.”
With some difficulty, she did, noting how loud the hissing and rattling had gotten.
“It’s two steps,” he said. “Take them, and I’ve got you.” He wore an enormous amount of earnestness in his expression, and Simone didn’t want to let him down.
She nodded and took a big breath. “Okay.”
“What’s going on?” someone asked, and Simone moved her attention to the two new cowboys who had arrived. “We heard screaming.”
“Come on,” Micah urged, not even looking at Cayden and Jarrod. Of course, it had to be Jarrod who’d come running over.
Simone leaned away from the barn and looked down at the ground. It seemed to be writhing with snakes, and she didn’t know where to put her feet. With a yelp, she launched herself away from the barn and toward Micah.
He caught her hand and pulled, and before she knew it, she stood on the gravel road with him. She buried her face in his chest while he talked to Cayden and Jarrod.
Pure humiliation filled her, and finally Micah stepped back and peered down at her. “You okay?”
She could still hear the snakes, though they were starting to quiet.
“We should get someone out here to look at that nest,” he said. “Have you seen rattlers like that here before?”
“No,” Simone croaked, her throat so dry.
“What were you doin’ down this way?”
Simone glanced toward Cayden and Jarrod. She’d known them both for a few years now, and she’d dated Jarrod fairly seriously for a while right after he’d been hired on at the Shining Star.
“Uh, just walking,” she said.
“I’ll walk with you,” he said. He did more than walk with her; he kept one hand on her lower back and the other on her forearm, as if he expected her to faint at any moment. And if Simone was being honest, she might lose consciousness.
Down the road, past the homestead where Liam and Callie lived with their family, turn, down another dirt road, Simone walked while Micah told her about his house and what he’d worked on that day. Up the steps, and Simone relaxed as the comfort and familiarity of her cabin spread before her.
“I’m okay,” she said as Micah closed the door. He released her, and she continued into the cabin, going straight to the fridge to get a bottle of water.
“I haven’t been here in a while,” Micah said, looking around. “It’s so you.” He looked at her, a smile on his face.
“Do you want something to drink?” she asked.
“Sure.” He moved further into her house, which was kind of a disaster at the moment. Simone had experimented with a brownie s’mores cake the night before, and the scent of slightly charred marshmallow still hung in the air.
“I was just headed back to the homestead. I’m starving.” He joined her in the kitchen and accepted the bottle of water she got out for him. “Do you want to go to dinner with me?”
“Yes,” Simone said, still a bit shaky. “I think a lot of carbs tonight.”
Micah chuckled and readjusted his cowboy hat. “I was thinking that too.”
“Is that right?” Flirting with Micah came like breathing to Simone; it was something she was good at and fell into naturall
y. “I’m a little afraid of snakes,” she added, as if the screaming and near-fainting hadn’t told him that already.
“I would be too,” Micah said. “What with them all hissing and rattling like that.”
“We haven’t had snakes out here for a while,” she said. She leaned against the countertop, starting to feel a bit more stable. “I guess I better tell Callie.”
“I told Cayden,” Micah said. “He said he’d get them taken care of.”
“Good.” Simone wasn’t sure what else to say. Now that her adrenaline was wearing down, embarrassment could take its place.
“Well,” Micah said. “I need a few minutes to shower. Want me to come back here and get you when I’m ready?”
She nodded, thinking she could probably use a shower too. After wandering that morning and lunching with Denise, she’d returned her niece to Callie and headed to the she-shed to make room for her new finds.
Everything still waited in the truck, and she could have Micah come help her unload it another day.
“All right,” Micah drawled, sweeping one arm around Simone and pressing a kiss to her forehead. “And don’t worry, baby. Everyone is terrified of something.”
“Yeah?” she asked. “What are you terrified of?”
“Lots of things,” he said vaguely.
“I think I remember you freaking out over some grasshoppers once,” she teased.
“Hey, there were at least five hundred of them,” he said. “And they’re crazy, hopping all over the place.” He shuddered and stepped back, wiping his arms as if he could feel the grasshoppers on his skin right then.
Simone could certainly still hear the rattling of those snakes. “Yeah, but grasshoppers don’t bite.”
“You don’t know that,” he said.
“They’re not poisonous.”
“Okay, you win that one.” Micah grinned at her. The moment lengthened, and Simone cleared her throat and tucked her hair behind her ear. She wasn’t sure what was going through Micah’s mind, but all she could think about was kissing him.
“And I might be afraid of storms,” he said. “Big ones. Lots of lightning. Not my favorite.”