“Yes.”
“Are you going to marry me?”
“Yes.”
The light in his eyes flared from serious to sensuous, asking another question that she let hers answer, also in the affirmative.
When the loudspeaker announced his score, he gave a disparaging smile. “Routine score for a routine ride.”
“Routine? I think I lost a couple of inches of enamel from gritting my teeth.” She hoped be couldn’t see her hands trembling.
“If that’s what it takes, I’ll love you toothless.”
She shook her head. “I’ll learn to adjust to your riding the bulls before it comes to that point. At least I will as long as I can ask of you what you asked of me.”
“What’s that?”
“Come back to me.”
He tilted his head, seeing how much this meant to her. And he made a promise they both knew he couldn’t guarantee, no more than she could have guaranteed that there would be no delay in her return from New York. Or that there would be no accident, no natural disaster that would have kept her from ever coming back to him. “I will, Kalli. I’ll always come back to you.”
“And I’ll do the same.”
He tensed. “What do you mean? You’re leaving?”
“Sometimes,” she said gently. “I can make adjustments, and I won’t work out of New York, but I’ll need to be gone sometimes to keep doing what I love. Mary once told me that really loving someone means putting their wants and needs ahead of your wants and needs—and even your fears. I’m learning to do that with the rodeo, Walker. Because you love it, and I love you. Can you love me enough to let me go, Walker?”
How long? How often? Greedily, he wanted the answers to ease his fear.
But he knew the only real way to deal with fear was to tighten your grip on the one thin rope that connected you to a force of nature, hold on for all you’re worth, and just take that ride.
“As long as you come back to me one more time than I let go.”
“That’s a deal, cowboy.”
Epilogue
* * *
SPRING CAME TO the calendar long before Wyoming could be persuaded to give up cold winds, freezing dawns and occasional ankle-deep snows. The fire in the Jeffries den drew the room’s four occupants for warmth as well as cheer.
“How can we plan for the summer’s rodeo when winter’s never going to let go?” Mary muttered.
“Don’t mind her,” Jeff advised, his smile only slightly lopsided these days. “Mary’s never been much for the benefits of a little bracing winter air.” Ignoring her disgusted “Bracing?” he went on, “Tell you what, I’ll take you to Florida next winter. Or Arizona—your choice. The whole winter, not just a month like this year.”
“You’ve promised me that for forty-three years, Jeff.”
The older man winked at his guests. “It’s kept her around. ‘Course, you two’ve been so busy, you probably haven’t noticed the chill in the air these past months.”
Turning, Kalli intercepted Walker’s smile at the gentle teasing. “We have been busy,” she agreed.
“Weddings have a way of doing that,” Mary said.
It wasn’t the wedding—which they’d kept small and simple because they both wanted to get remarried as soon as possible—it was all the celebrations after.
Her family had been protectively disapproving, until she and Walker flew to Connecticut for a long weekend and her relatives saw for themselves. Then they insisted on a belated reception at Thanksgiving for family and friends. There’d been a party thrown by the Park Rodeo employees, another by Jasper and Esther Lodge and, finally, one by Walker’s friends from the circuit at the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas in December.
“Honeymoons, too,” Jeff said with his old chortle.
Kalli pretended to frown. “I meant, we’ve been busy because of my work...”
She had agreed to freelance for Jerry on projects on this side of the country during the rodeo’s off-season and was already building a reputation for a sharp eye for investment opportunities in the West. She’d made business trips, but kept them short—Walker hadn’t said anything, but she didn’t like being away long.
“...and everything Walker’s doing...”
He’d worked hard on the KW Ranch, named by twinning their first initials the way he finally admitted he’d thought about doing all along. He worked outside when weather permitted, in the house or barn when it didn’t. In addition, he’d been knee-deep in plans for a rodeo school for novices to start in May, a month before the rodeo opened, as a way to minimize risks for those just learning. Kalli thoroughly approved.
Her enthusiasm had been less wholehearted when he’d entered a string of winter indoor rodeos to “keep his hand in.”
But she’d gone with him—twice they’d worked it so she had a business to scout in the same city where he competed. She’d watched him ride. And she’d cheered him on. Because it was what he loved, and she loved him.
“Seems like you found time for some other doings,” Jeff commented slyly.
Walker broke into a big grin as he often did at the mention of her pregnancy, and laid a protective hand on her abdomen, at three months barely showing any change. Though he checked every day, with kisses and caresses.
“Winter’s got its benefits. Long nights,” Walker murmured.
Kalli had never known the fierce peace she felt in those hours when he talked of their future, their family.
“I’ve had to keep him busy with the ranch and rodeos and school as self-protection,” Kalli said as lightly as she could around a lump in her throat, “so he doesn’t coddle me right into the insane asylum. You’d think anyone who rides bulls wouldn’t blanch at the concept that he’ll be busy changing diapers before Halloween.”
“Hey, this having a baby is a sight more complicated than hanging on to a rope and keeping your balance,” Walker objected.
While Jeff and Mary laughed at his mock indignation, Kalli gave him a warm, reassuring smile. He still had doubts about being a father and sometimes she wondered what on earth made her think she could be a mother, but they agreed that, together, they’d do fine.
“Look, cowboy, you’ve got the easier end of this bargain. You’re worrying about me coping with an eight pound baby, but I’m wondering if you’re going to escape an eighteen-hundred-pound bull.”
“Maybe you’ve got the weight advantage, but how about time? I’m on the bull eight seconds. This pregnancy is a nine-month ride.”
The dual laughter from Jeff and Mary brought their heads around.
“Nine months?” asked Mary, smiling lovingly and knowingly as she looked from one to the other of them. “Try a lifetime. A lifetime of fretting and loving and wondering and joy. That’s the deal when kids enter your life.”
Kalli felt Walker’s hand move gently against her abdomen. When she looked up, she met the blue, blue eyes of the man she loved, and knew he was thinking the same thing.
A lifetime would do just fine.
-The End-
If you enjoyed Rodeo Nights, be sure to check out Not a Family Man, the Bardville, Wyoming Trilogy and the Wyoming Wildflowers Trilogy.
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