by Thomas, Jodi
She looked around the small coffee shop. He’d disappeared and his boarding pass had been left in the center of the table. She picked up the pass and walked back to the waiting area.
“You’re welcome, Noah,” she whispered, wondering if she’d been any help at all.
Her phone rang again. She didn’t recognize the number but answered it simply because she had an hour of nothing left to do now that she’d talked Noah into walking away.
“Hello, lass,” a familiar voice said. “You excited?”
“Where have you been? I thought we had a date, Kieran.”
“I’ve been working straight through so I could have time off. I may be in London but I plan to be on call for you the next few days. Anytime you need a break, call and I’ll help you out. We’re not playing against each other this time. I’m all on your side.”
She smiled and walked to the long wall of glass. Here, she felt almost alone with Kieran even though a hundred people could see her there.
Kieran started going over the rules again and kept talking until she boarded the plane. Hours later when she got to her room at the hotel, she called him back and they talked for another hour about all she had to do.
“Get some sleep, lass, you’ll need it tomorrow morning.”
She promised, then added, “Wish you were here to kiss me good night.”
He hesitated for a moment and added, “So do I.”
She fell asleep dreaming of what it would be like. She’d never waited for anything in her life. From the moment of first attraction Dusti was usually running full steam ahead. But Kieran had made her wait, and right now she wanted him more than she’d ever wanted any man. A hundred times more.
The next morning she was still thinking about Kieran when she checked in at the poker registration table and took a few pictures of the lights around her and the interesting people milling around. As she waited to be called up, she did what he said; she watched every person.
For the most part the players were easy to separate from the watchers.
The types were all there. The woman with her dress cut in a deep V. The cowboy smoking his last cigar before the game started. The guy with a hood and glasses who looked like he might rob a convenience store if poker didn’t turn out to be his game. The little man who pushed his way around as if he planned to make sure he got his fair share of attention.
When she sat down at the table, Kieran’s voice was in her head. Watch everything. Don’t talk more than you have to. Don’t get involved in a battle between two other players.
As they started playing, his voice continued. Fold if the first two cards aren’t good. Fold if the flop doesn’t help you. Watch the other players for tells.
The cowboy whose fingers were stained from smoking shook slightly when his cards were good. The guy bluffing to her right kept checking his cards like he thought they’d change on him. A tall man whose hair had slid to the back of his head kept trying to hurry everyone along as if the game were on a timer.
Two hours later, when she’d won the first round at her table, she stood, stretched, and called Kieran.
“I felt like you were with me all morning. I felt like you had my back.” She fought not to scream into the phone. “I won.”
“More rounds to go,” he said, “and I am with you. Now, during the two-hour break, go get something to eat or take a nap. Don’t play any slots around. Today just concentrate on poker.”
She bought a candy bar and walked the half mile to her room. An hour later he called to tell her to buy strong coffee and step back into the gaming room. “Don’t be friendly, lass. You’re not there to make friends. You’re there to win.”
The next round took longer, and a sweet old man next to her kept telling her, “Go ahead and fold, sweetie, I got this one.” Kieran’s warning reminded her of the trick. Even when the old man told her he was saving her money with his advice, she didn’t fold.
She won.
It was late afternoon when she called Kieran back and wondered if it might be the middle of the night where he was. He sounded sleepy when he answered.
“I won again,” she whispered.
“Way to go, lass. Now go to your room, order room service, and relax. Let the other winners go out and celebrate. You’ve got to be ready for tomorrow. Lights out by eleven.”
“Would you kiss me good night?” she asked.
“If I were there, lass, I’d kiss you senseless, but it’s a good thing I’m not. You need a clear head. I’d only mix it up. Sleep, eat, get ready to play.”
When she hung up, she did exactly what he told her to do even though several of the other players offered to buy her a drink. She was here to win, not party.
One of the other players had put his arm around her as if planning to herd her along to the bar. Dusti stepped free and didn’t bother to thank him for the invitation.
Kieran woke her early, telling her to eat a good breakfast. He said today would be intense and she had to be ready for anything. One by one he listed everything she needed in her emergency bag. Cough drops, aspirin, tissues, candy that didn’t make noise or melt.
“If you get a break in the play, disappear; don’t stand around talking to the others. The less they know about you, the better.”
Dusti laughed. He was starting to sound like her nanny. “I love you for doing this, Kieran.”
“I love you too, lass. Now get in there and play your best game.”
She smiled as she walked into the gaming room. He had to believe she had a chance or he wouldn’t be doing this. She’d worried about being all alone, but she wasn’t alone. He was with her, along with Mrs. Mills and her advice about how to play in a mostly man’s game and Martha Q with her jokes about always keeping her pants on between rounds.
“Been talking to your boyfriend?” the guy with the dark glasses asked. “Maybe whispering sweet nothings to him?”
Dusti straightened, putting her phone away. “Nope,” she answered. “Still afraid of the sun?”
She didn’t give him time to answer. If she made it through this round, she’d have a seat at the final table. She’d be in the money.
It seemed like she waited hours before it was her turn to play her round. She was exhausted from pacing. She’d even tried to watch the earlier games but couldn’t.
Kieran hadn’t called back. He must be in the air flying somewhere. He couldn’t just forget his job and coach her on the game. She knew that no matter what happened he’d be the first call she made when she walked away today.
Finally, her name was called and she walked calmly to her seat.
In all her scatterbrained life, Dusti had never concentrated on anything so completely. She played exactly as Kieran had taught her to. One by one the others moved away from the table, busted.
The clock seemed to tick by at half speed, until finally only Dusti and the sunglasses remained. Their stacks were almost equal after three hours, but she finally saw her chance. When he raised her, thinking she’d fold, she saw his tell, a slight huff he made whenever he was bluffing.
“All in,” she said. “I’m betting the rainbow.” All colors of chips rattled into the center of the table.
If he backed away, he lost big.
She licked her lips, the same thing she’d done the last three times she’d bluffed. She had no idea if he saw her. The glasses made him seem more like a bug than a person.
He smiled and shoved his pile in. “Time to shut up or get up, girl.”
The cards seem to float over the table in slow motion. He had a pair of jacks. She had two kings.
She hadn’t bluffed this time.
She won.
Chapter 41
TRUMAN FARM
REAGAN HAD SPENT THE DAY FIGHTING TEARS.
She knew Noah had left this morning for the Houston rodeo. Half the people in town knew i
t. He might as well have posted his travel plans in the paper. He’d left his old pickup parked in front of the sheriff’s office. His sister or Hank must have taken him.
That had been his way for five years. If she couldn’t take him or the weather was bad, Hank always drove him to Oklahoma City or Amarillo, depending on where he could get a flight out. Reagan loved to be the one to pick him up when he got home. They’d hug while waiting for the bags, and then they’d talk all the way home. Once they became lovers, no matter what time of day it was they’d drive straight to her place and spend a few hours in bed. Then she’d go downstairs in just her shirt and make him breakfast and they’d talk about what their lives would be like after his rodeo days were over. The house on his ranch. The kids they’d have. The fun they’d have chasing each other around the house even when they were old.
Only now, Reagan knew those dreams were only pipe dreams. They were never going to happen. The rodeo would never be over. Noah would never give up the life and come home to stay. At least not whole. At least not just to her.
Abby called to tell her Dusti was on her way to Vegas and that she thought she saw Noah stepping out of a big pickup as she was driving away.
Reagan had told a few people that she and Noah were over, but most of the town didn’t believe it. They’d probably grow old like her uncle Jeremiah and his next-door neighbor Pat Matheson, never marrying but folks still thinking they were a couple. Reagan had asked Pat once if she loved her uncle and the old woman said, “Yes, but that don’t mean I wanted to live with the man.”
Maybe women can’t help who they love sometimes, but they’re smart enough to know not to marry the fool. She was beginning to think she might be one of those women. Reagan didn’t want to worry about him being killed every time he ran off to the rodeo. She couldn’t live that way.
Picking up Utah, she whispered, “Your daddy is crazy, but I won’t hold that against you.”
Utah just stared at her, probably still trying to get her in focus. Only now and then she swore he understood something she said.
“I’d better get your diaper changed. It’s almost time we went to the western chairs. The sunset’s going to be a good one tonight. Clouds rolling in from the north. With luck the orchard will get rain tonight.”
Walking down the stairs, she held tightly to her bundle. It had been a month since Utah’s mother had dropped him off. If she was coming back, she would have made it by now. Reagan knew it was time to contact a lawyer and make it all legal, but Noah had never said anything about taking the baby home with him. Maybe he was waiting until he finished building. Maybe he just wanted to come over and hold Utah every night.
Babies and rodeoing didn’t go together.
“I’ll watch over you,” Reagan whispered as she walked out the front door. “I’ll make sure nothing bad ever happens to you.”
For a moment the setting sun blinded her as she crossed the lawn, and then she saw him sitting in one of the lawn chairs. His long legs were stretched out in front of him. His hat low over his face. His bandaged hand folded over his stomach.
Moving closer, she realized he was sound asleep.
“Noah?”
He jerked and shoved his hat back. “Reagan. I’ve been waiting for you forever.”
“Why didn’t you knock on the door?”
“After that good-bye kiss, I didn’t know if you’d answer the door.” He straightened. His best starched shirt looked wrinkled, and she didn’t miss the bag sitting beside his chair.
“So you figured it out. The kiss, I mean,” she said, deciding maybe Utah’s dad wasn’t as dumb as she thought he was. “I was saying good-bye to you.”
“It took me a while. I was at the airport rethinking every word we said last night and finally I figured something out. What I was running after was already behind me, so I turned around.
“It took me hours to get home. I thought I’d take the bus. Didn’t know it stopped in every little town in the panhandle. I think I could have walked home faster, or bought a horse and rode.”
She sat down, wondering how much of his story to believe.
“I told you once I need you and not the rodeo, and I meant what I said. I was just thinking about the money this time. That was all it was. That’s all it’s been for a long time, but I couldn’t seem to knock myself off the merry-go-round. I figured if I stayed here and didn’t go to Houston, you’d start to believe me.”
“What about the big money you might make?”
“I can make it here in four or five years. But, Rea, I’ll be here with you and Utah. I won’t be busted up in some hospital waiting for you to come get me.”
“I don’t ever want to do that again.” She remembered picking him up and bringing him home once. She’d worried herself sick thinking he might never walk again.
Noah placed his hand over hers. “If it takes telling you every day for the rest of our lives that I love you, I’m going to do it. You’re a part of me, Rea, the best part. Cutting you out of my life would be like cutting out my heart. I don’t think I can do it.”
“You lied to me, Noah.”
“Yeah, as much as I talk, it’s hard to say only the facts, but I swear I’ll never lie to you again. Well, maybe about liking potato soup, but never about the important things between us.”
“Where were you the night before you called me? It was the last call you made before you showed up at my door the night of the game. I’d gone to see you, but I couldn’t find you. I called the Hampton in Vegas and you weren’t there.” She stared at him, knowing she’d see the lie coming if he tried.
He lowered his head a minute and said, “The guy whose phone I borrowed the next morning to call you will tell you. We were out drinking till after two. You must have called before we checked in.” He dug in his bag. “I’ve got the receipt here somewhere.”
“I don’t need to see it. I believe you.” She knew this time he was telling her the truth.
He looked doubtful. “You do?”
“Noah, you’re the worst liar in Texas.”
He looked offended. “Man, this is not my week. First you tell me that I can’t sing and now I can’t lie.” He knelt down in front of her. “Rea, I never lied when I said I loved you or that I’m sorry for what happened. I’ve hated myself every day since that time I slept with that woman. I wanted to tell you, but then we’d both hate me. I thought if you didn’t know, it wouldn’t matter, but it’s been eating me up inside. You’re my best friend and I hated having something I couldn’t talk over with you. It seemed easier just to keep delaying coming home.”
He looked into her eyes as if he could see all the way to her heart. “Most of all, I hate how I hurt you. I wish I could take all the pain into me. I never want to see you hurt again. I swear.”
“I know.” She realized what she said was true. She’d known for months that something was eating away at him. She’d thought it was that he didn’t want to come home or he thought he’d get trapped if he did. But he’d come home. This time he’d picked her over the rodeo.
He smiled at her. “The guys used to tell me that I was single and I should have a little fun before settling down, but, Rea, ever since the day I said I loved you, I’ve felt like we’re already tied together. I’m about the most married single man you’re likely to meet. I don’t care if folks say we’re too young to tie the knot. You’re all I want. You’re all I’ve ever wanted.”
He stood. “Look at me, Rea. If you don’t forgive me soon, I’m going to be dead. There’s only a few inches on me now that’s not bruised or cut or beaten half to death.”
She laughed, knowing he was doing what he always did, making her smile. And he was right. Almost every night he showed up with a new injury. The whole world seemed to be picking on Noah.
He smiled down at her. “Forgive me, Rea. Let me spend the next hundred years proving how much I lov
e you. Only you. There will never be another drink in my hand or woman in my bed but you, or I promise I’ll buy Big a gun so he can stop beating on me and just shoot me.”
He didn’t look like he was kidding, but he did look like a man very much in love. He’d never had to fight for her. She’d always been his girl even before she knew it herself. But these last few weeks he’d had to fight for her and the life he wanted. And he’d fought hard.
“How do you feel about staying here?”
“I’m not leaving, Rea. This town is where I belong. I plan on being buried next to you in the Harmony Cemetery. Soon as Tyler Wright’s son gets old enough, I’ll go over and buy the plots. Little Jonathan Henry will probably be middle-aged before he plants us side by side in the McAllen plots.”
“No, I was asking how do you feel about staying here with me tonight?”
Noah froze like a preacher who was only half finished ranting and the congregation was already heading down to the front to repent.
“You mean here, with you?”
She nodded. “If you walk through that door, you’re staying, for good. Not till the next rodeo friend calls, but for good.”
He smiled back at her. “I’ll stay, only if you tell me you love me. I’m not into one-night stands.”
She stood, Utah in her arms. “I love you, Noah.”
He swung her and the baby up. “Then I’m running through that door, Rea. Eyes wide open with you in my arms.”
As he carefully carried his family up the steps, he added, “I’m thinking we should get married right away and start working on giving Utah a few more states as brothers and sisters.”
She looked at this man she’d loved for so long. He wasn’t perfect. Not even close, but he was the only one for her. There would always be a part of him that was the wild bull rider, but she knew he would come home to her every night and love her dearly.
“I think you are right, Preacher. Raising a family might turn out to be a much tougher ride than bulls.”