The Real Mr. Right

by Karen Templeton

  Smiling, Kelly said softly, “But now here’s this opportunity to grow, to learn even more, and you’re scared to...to take the risk. That you won’t be up to the challenge. Only that’s not your voice telling you that, baby.” She swallowed back tears. “It’s the fake voice, the one that lies. The one we have to tell to shut up, to get the heck out of our head. The voice that would keep us imprisoned in what we think is...safe.”

  Coop looked at her for a long, long time, then said, “Like you’re scared about being with Matt?”

  Kelly snorted. “And you think you’re not smart? Please.”

  He smiled a little at that, then leaned against her arm, which he hadn’t done in weeks. “Can I tell you something?”

  “Anything,” she said, despite thinking, Oh, God—now what? “You know that.”

  After scratching his nose, Coop took a biiig breath and said, very softly, “When Dad died...I wasn’t really sad about it.”

  Her breath caught. “Oh, Coop—”

  “I mean, I didn’t want him dead or anything like that, but...” His chin shook. “I know what you said, about him changing. That he wasn’t himself. But whoever he was...” He smashed his lips together, then said in a very small voice, “I didn’t like him very much anymore. Because he made me feel bad all the time. What you said? About the voice? That was Dad’s voice, telling me I wasn’t good enough, or smart enough. Or that I was fat. So after he was gone, I felt like...”

  Her eyes stinging, Kelly hugged him closer and whispered, “Like you could breathe again?”

  “Yeah,” he sighed out.

  A tear slipped out as she laid her cheek in his curls. “Sweetie...why on earth didn’t you say something?”

  Silence shuddered between them before he said, “Because...because I thought everybody would think that was messed up. That I was messed up.”

  Kelly shifted to take Coop’s face in her hands, trying to get a lock on his eyes through grimy lenses. “Nobody would ever think that. You hear me? There wasn’t, and isn’t, anything wrong with you. Ask your grandmother if you don’t believe me.”

  “Really?”

  “Swear to God. And anyone else who might be listening in.”

  A moment passed before she got a little smile. And a relieved breath. “Okay.”

  “Okay is right,” Kelly said, pulling him to her side again. “And by the way? That took courage to tell me that. So yay you.”

  She felt him nod against her, then sigh again. “Being scared sucks.”

  “Won’t argue with you there, pookie-bear,” she said, and he groaned, making her laugh.

  But honestly—how often had she reassured her babies, was still reassuring them, that there were no monsters under the bed or in their closets, that the boogeyman wasn’t real? That no matter how nasty or frightening the storm, the sun always came out again? But, yeah, she’d had the voices, too. Rick’s, mostly, reinforcing her mother’s fears, her father’s thinly veiled misogyny.

  So some example she was setting. Because the only way to conquer fear was to stand up to it. Plunk a stone in that slingshot and let ’er rip. Instead of, you know, letting the big baddie call the shots.

  Let those old voices stand between her and happiness.

  You are so going down, she said to her imaginary giant as she dug her cell phone out of her purse, scrolled through her contacts.

  “Matt!” Coop yelled, and Kelly thought, What? as Matt jerked his car into her driveway. Then he was out, the door slamming shut behind him, his gaze cemented to hers as he strode toward her, a man with a mission, hoo-boy...and a second later she was in his arms, being kissed hard enough to make her dizzy—not to mention deliriously happy, oh, yeah—and she thought, over Coop’s war whoop behind them, Well, okay, then.

  Vaguely, she was aware of Mrs. Otero bursting onto the porch, of Coop’s shriek of protest at being herded inside before Matt gathered her close, and it felt so real and right and good she gasped, and that was even before he said, “If you think I’m gonna let you go just because you’re scared, you’re crazy.”

  And on a blissful sigh, Kelly squeezed shut her eyes and thought, This.

  * * *

  At Kelly’s sigh—not to mention how she’d melted into him—Matt released a pent-up breath of his own. Because things could have played out in any number of ways, several of which would have resulted in his ego ending up in the crapper.

  But this...this was looking promising. Especially when he took Kelly’s hand and tugged her over to the porch steps, and she plopped down beside him, laughing, before snuggling up against him and saying, very softly, “I was about to call you,” and a happy little explosion went off in his chest.

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah. I have been such a goober—”

  “Me, too,” Matt said, and Kelly sat up, a little crease setting up camp between her brows as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ears.

  “How do you figure that?”

  Whether he’d ever tell her about his conversation with Lynn, he didn’t know. Maybe someday. But after the initial head slam, he’d replayed the woman’s words over and over in his head until they’d stopped reverberating enough for him to actually hear what she was saying. And to realize she was right. About a lot of things. Not the least of which was that he’d apparently gotten the wrong end of the stick about this being-a-man business. No matter how honorable his intentions.

  Because, truth? His releasing Kelly had been far more about saving his own hide than hers.

  Matt took a deep breath, then Kelly’s hand, pocketing it between both of his. “Got a minute?”

  She leaned into his shoulder. “As many as you want. I’m not going anywhere.”

  His heart thumping, Matt kissed her hair, then whispered, “What I said earlier about not letting you go just because you’re scared? What I probably should have said was—” his chest cramped “—that I’m not letting you go just because I am.”

  For a moment, she simply stroked his forearm with one fingertip, then lifted her head to look into his eyes. “Of?”

  It surprised him that even after all the soul-searching, the answer still caught in his throat. That exactly like so many of those people he’d interviewed over the course of his career, he’d have to circle around it, pounce when it—or he—wasn’t looking. Catch the fear off guard.

  He let go of Kelly’s hand to lean forward, watching some gal across the street plod barefoot across her yard to move her sprinkler—a simple, mundane act he found weirdly soothing.

  “After my parents died,” he said, “I was so...angry. At God, at the universe, whatever. Even at all those people who were only trying to be nice to me, for God’s sake. But especially at my father, for making us get into that car when he was drunk—”

  “Oh, honey... Sabrina never told me that.”

  “I don’t think she knew. In fact, I don’t think she was aware of...of a lot that had gone on. She was my father’s little angel. Me—” he shoved out a sigh “—not so much. Anyway...by that point, I suppose I’d lost trust in whatever it was I was supposed to trust. Hell, I wouldn’t even let Mom hug me. Never mind I wanted her to more than anything. Especially since I missed my own mother so damn much. But I guess, in my own little-kid way, I figured the only person I could count on was me.” He smirked. “Sound familiar?”

  “I wasn’t six,” Kelly said gently.

  “True. But, looking back, I think that’s when the protective thing kicked in. Starting with Bree, but God knows not ending there. Maybe...” He rubbed the side of his nose. “Maybe I thought if I was the one doing the protecting, I couldn’t be hurt?”

  And there it was, the splinter he’d refused to look at, let alone tried to yank out, for nearly thirty years.

  Kelly pressed herself to his side. “So you toughed it out.”
/>
  Matt laughed softly. “Actually, Mom—Jeanne—called me her little toughie. Always with a smile. And a kiss, whether I wanted it or not. Much, much later, she told me she’d refused to give up on me. To accept for a minute that I couldn’t get past the pain.” He paused. “All along, I had the perfect example right in front of me. In someone I practically worshipped. Eventually, anyway. And yet...I couldn’t hear what she was saying. Because I couldn’t—or wouldn’t—let her all the way in.” A breath pushed through his lips. “Her, or anyone else.”

  “Matt...you’re one of the most giving people I’ve ever met—”

  “So are you. Yeah, you are,” he said when she started to protest. “So no arguments. But accepting’s just as important, isn’t it? It’s about—” he made a weighing motion with his hands “—balance. Like you said. Not just honesty, but trust. And I had no right, none, to accuse you of holding back when I was doing the same damn thing. Maybe for different reasons, maybe I didn’t even fully realize I was doing it, but the result was the same.” He paused, then said, “Marcia wasn’t worth fighting for. You are. But I can’t do that while I’m busy watching my own back.” At her silence, he looked over. “No comment?”

  Mimicking his pose, Kelly sat forward, their thighs touching. “So...it wasn’t just me?”

  Matt wagged his head. “Oh, hell, no.” His eyes cut to the side of his face. “That make you feel better?”

  “Actually...yeah.” She smiled. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome—”

  “Although I was totally prepared to prostrate myself at your feet and beg you to take me back—”

  “Really.”

  “Pretty much. But the mutual groveling thing works, too. I...cleared a lot of junk out of my head, too. Feels a lot lighter in there,” she said with a soft laugh. A breeze caught the ends of her hair, blowing it across his arm. “So...where do we go from here?”

  “I suppose...wherever we want.”

  A neighbor’s orange tabby stalked into the yard, realized they were sitting there and streaked off again. Kelly laughed. “It’s really dumb, isn’t it? To cut yourself off because of what you’re afraid might happen?”

  “Yeah,” Matt sighed out. “It really is.”

  For a long moment they just sat there, listening to the chirping birds and the kids’ laughter coming through the open window, the buzz of a little twin-engine plane circling overhead. Then Kelly reached over and took his hand. “I won’t ever leave you, Matt. I promise. Even if I’m scared.”

  “Glad to hear it. Because I won’t let you. Even if I am.”

  “So—” she cocked her head, smiling at him “—we’re good?”

  Over the rush of blood in his ears, Matt slung an arm around her shoulders, pulled her close and plunged. “I’m not saying I’m done making mistakes, but I sure as hell am not about to make this one again. I’m in this for the long haul, babe. As completely as I know how. No more half-assed let’s-see-where-this-goes, no more escape clauses or ass covering. I’m here for you. For us. Whatever comes up... We’ll get through it together.”

  Grinning, he leaned closer and whispered, “The only space I’m planning on giving you is next to me. In my bed. My life. Meaning I’m putting it right out there, right now, that in my mind there’s only one possible outcome for this, and that’s us getting married. Not like next week or anything, but—”

  “Yes,” Kelly said, and Matt stopped, mouth open. Then his brows flew up.

  “Really?”

  “You got a better idea?”

  “Hell, no,” he said, and kissed her, and again for good measure...and her smile, when he lifted his mouth from hers, swept away every last trace of fear, and doubt, and loneliness.

  For good.

  Epilogue

  “So let me get a good look at this thing,” Sabrina said, planting her skinny tush next to Kelly on the Colonel’s porch swing, then grabbing Kelly’s left hand. In the fading June light, the perfect little ruby looked even redder, the tiny diamonds encircling the oval stone twinkling like mad. “Ooh, pretty. And Matt really picked it out all by himself?”

  Kelly laughed. “Sort of. I might’ve worked my thing for rubies into the conversation a time or two.”

  Matt’s twin chuckled, then let go of Kelly’s hand to lean her head against her shoulder, like they used to do when they’d been kids, shoving the heel of her red leather flat against the floorboard to set the swing in motion. Laughter filtered out from behind the house, where the Colonel’s seventieth birthday bash was drawing to a close, and Bree sighed.

  “I don’t know which of you I’m happier for,” she said. “You or Matty. Actually—” she sat up again “—I take that back. I’m happiest for me, because...” She pressed a hand to her chest, tears shining in her eyes. “Because I don’t have to choose between you.”

  Laughing, Kelly sucked in a deep, contented breath that smelled of Bree’s designer perfume, of Jeanne’s fragrant roses smothering the front of the house. Their friendship as fully in bloom again as those roses, it seemed as though the intervening years had never happened. In fact, Bree had asked Kelly to be her matron of honor for her hotsy-totsy Long Island wedding a year hence. An honor Kelly readily accepted, but only if Sabrina returned the favor by agreeing to be Kelly’s only attendant, at this very house in six weeks’ time.

  A thought that sent a little thrill scooting up Kelly’s spine...especially when Matt appeared at the front door, shaking his head at the two of them. Her angel, most definitely. But an angel there for her, not who he needed her to be to bolster his own ego. An angel who supported her, cheered for her and, yes, would protect her and her children with everything he had in him...but whose love made her more, not less.

  And Kelly would do no less for him.

  “You might want to get back there,” Matt said with a grin for his sister, “before the others eat your fiancé alive.”

  “Oh, gawd,” she said, patting Kelly’s knee before propelling herself off the swing, down the stairs and around the side of the house, bellowing, “Hey! You guys! Be nice....” and Kelly thought, God, I love these people.

  Her people now. For reals, as Coop would say.

  The swing shuddered, making the loose ends of the chain jangle when Matt lowered himself to it and draped an arm around Kelly’s shoulders, and she sighed. For now—since they’d decided not to change living arrangements again until after the wedding—it was still about these stolen moments, each one precious, perfect, shimmering with the promise of forever.

  “Mmm...you smell like a hamburger,” she said, rubbing her nose in his T-shirt, and he chuckled. “Kids okay?”

  “You kidding?” he said. “With Ethan’s brood? They’re in heaven.”

  Kelly smiled, thinking how a few months ago she could have never imagined any of this. That she’d be back in Maple River, that Coop would blossom into the self-assured kid he’d become, confident in not just his abilities, but most important, in who he was. That the brooding, dark-eyed boy she’d crushed on all those years ago would end up being her Mr. Right after all. And right on time.

  And right on cue, Matt picked up her left hand, toyed with the ring and murmured, “And yourself?” as he placed a soft kiss in her hair. “How’re you doing?”

  “You have to ask?” she said with a smile, lifting her face for a real kiss. Then, releasing another breath, she snuggled close again, letting happiness wash over her. Through her.

  Because maybe their pasts had been crazy and scrambled and, sometimes, not so hot. But right now?

  Perfect didn’t even begin to cover it.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from REUNITING WITH THE RANCHER by Rachel Lee.

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  Chapter One

  Holly Heflin walked into the lawyer’s office in Conard City with more uncertainty than she had felt in a long time, and she was used to facing some pretty ugly situations. But this was different—the reading of her great-aunt’s will. She was, as far as she knew, the only heir, so her concern didn’t lie there.

  But she had arrived in Denver after a red-eye flight, hopped into the cheapest rental car she could find and driven straight here to make this meeting. She felt tired, grungy and most of all overcome by memory. Facing this meeting seemed so final.

  Returning to Conard County wasn’t easy, but she had the fondest memories of visits to her aunt’s from childhood and early adulthood. They had begun washing over her from the instant the surrounding country began to look familiar, and with them came the numbness she had been feeling since the news of Martha’s death had begun to give way to a deep well of grief.

  The last of her family had died with Martha, and a sense of her solitariness in the world had been striking her in an utterly new way.

  But she shoved all that down as she spoke to Jackie, the young receptionist. Get through this. Get to the funeral home to watch Martha’s ashes placed in a mausoleum. Martha had always used to say she wanted to sprinkle her ashes around the ranch, but apparently that wasn’t allowed, because the attorney had been quite definite, and Martha had paid all the expenses in advance.