The Rancher's Homecoming

by Arlene James

  Oh, yeah. He was heading back to Tulsa as soon as his dad could take over the ranch again.

  Well, in the meantime it wouldn’t kill him to attend church regularly while he was here.

  He could think of worse things, much worse things, especially with Callie smiling beside him.

  Chapter Five

  “Sleep, baby girl.”

  Callie tucked the featherweight blanket lightly around Bodie’s relaxed form, knowing that the child would likely kick it off within the next ten minutes but unable to resist the instinct to cover her. Fed, dry and exhausted from a morning of new faces and experiences at Countryside Church, Bodie slept deeply. Wes, too, slumbered after the midday meal. Callie would gladly have joined them, but Rex had gone out to the barn to tackle the baler again, saying that he dared not lose another day before getting it back into the field.

  Stuart was religious about keeping the Sabbath, but Bo, being in ministry, had found it necessary to work on Sundays, and Callie had noticed that her father never seemed to mind that she labored on Sundays to provide his meals and make him comfortable. As Bo had said, One person’s labor may honor another’s Sabbath, while holiness comes from the heart.

  She went downstairs, dropped several mint leaves into a quart jar, added ice cubes and a cup of apple juice, then filled it the rest of the way with unsweetened tea. Taking a pair of apples with her, she walked out to the barn.

  Rex had the baler jacked up so high that it practically lay on its side. His shirt off, he was using a come-along, or wire stretcher, to slip the drive chain onto the baler. Those shoulders were even broader than she’d realized. Flustered, she placed the apples on the workbench and cleared her throat, but Rex was too busy to notice.

  “Brought you something cold.”

  Rex spun around. She dropped her gaze, but not before she glimpsed smooth muscle. From the corner of her eye, she saw Rex reach for the chambray shirt he’d draped over the fender of the baler. Hearing snaps closing and steps scuffing, she held out the jar. Only after he took it from her hand did she lift her gaze. He brought the jar to his lips and drank deeply, tilting back his head.

  “Oh, man, that’s good,” he said, holding the jar to his forehead.

  “Need some help?”

  He looked at her blue T-shirt, jeans and canvas shoes, then down at his greasy hands. “You sure?”

  She nodded. “I can get all the way under there. You can’t. Smart idea, by the way, using the come-along. There’s a special tool for that, though.”

  “Well, if we’ve got one, I couldn’t find it,” he said before taking another long drink.

  “This’ll work. Just don’t let that thing slip and hit me.”

  He grinned. “Don’t worry. I’m not about to risk my best employee.”

  Chuckling, she held out her hand. “Got the pulley pin?”

  He fished it out of his pocket and handed it to her, saying, “You’ve done this before.”

  “I have.” Crouching, she crawled under the baler. It was dark, dirty and smelled of oil, gasoline and alfalfa. “Hay smells green.”

  “Yeah. Means we’ve still got a couple weeks to get it in. We’re going to need it.”

  “Got a flashlight? I’m blocking what light there is under here.”

  “Hold on.”

  She heard him rummaging around. After a minute or two, he passed her a heavy-duty flashlight.

  She went to her knees, eased her upper body into the workings of the machine and shone a light on the chain, following it.

  “I don’t know how you did,” she told him, “but it looks great. You’ve got a couple loose bolts here, though, and they need tightening before we lock this chain. Pass me an adjustable wrench.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Before they got all the adjustments made, he had to go to his back on the ground while she held the light with one hand and guided him with the other to get the wrench properly placed and the necessary bolt effectively tightened. Finally, Callie was ready to put the pin in place.

  After working several minutes, she finally had to admit that, while she could get the pin in the hole, she couldn’t push it flat. “I’m just not strong enough.”

  Rex tried to reach the small metal peg but his big hand wouldn’t fit into the space available. “If I just had a pair of pliers with really long handles,” he mused. Suddenly he started scrambling out from under the baler, saying, “I have an idea.”

  Callie heard him rummaging around in the toolbox and muttering to himself. He returned a minute or so later, pulling on his work gloves. He’d fixed a pair of vise grips to each handle of a pair of locking pliers, effectively extending the pliers by several inches. Realizing what he meant to do, Callie put her head next to his and shone the light on the exact spot where the pliers needed to grip. He closed the pliers and squeezed the vise grips with big, strong hands, straining the muscles in his arms, shoulders and neck.

  “Aaahhhh!” He fell back, letting his arms drop. “That’s all I can do.” He loosened the pliers and removed then. “Was it enough?”

  She shone the light on the pin and studied. “Perfect. I can’t even see the pin.”

  Sighing, Rex patted her hand with his gloved one. “Let’s get out from under here.” He tossed away the pliers before rolling out from under the baler and into a sitting position. Callie crawled out on her elbows and knees.

  “What would I do without you?” Rex asked, folding his legs and balancing his forearms on his thighs.

  Thrilled more than was wise, Callie got up and went to the workbench, retrieving the pliers on the way. She traded the pliers, vise grips and the flashlight for the apples, which she carried back to Rex. When she offered an apple to him, he took it with a chuckle, tossing it lightly before biting into it. Callie went down on her knees again then sank into a sitting position, her legs curled to one side.

  “I could say the same about you,” she told him. “This job gives me a way out of my situation, and your promise to take me to church closes one more avenue for Ben to plague me.”

  He shook his head and asked, “What is the deal with Dolent?”

  She sighed. “He believes whatever my father tells him.”

  “So no matter how many times you tell him no, as long as Stuart keeps encouraging him, he’ll keep showing up.”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “I don’t get it,” Rex said. “Why would Stuart want you with a clod like that?”

  Callie turned her apple over in her hands. “I defied Dad once and married against his wishes, and Dad seems to believe that Bo’s death is a direct result of that defiance. All I can figure is that he’s determined to keep me from making what he sees as another mistake by insisting that I marry someone he can control.”

  “How did your husband die?” Rex asked gently, looking at her from beneath the crag of his brow.

  “He drowned,” Callie said softly. “We operated a Christian youth encampment at Turner Falls. There was a flash flood, the first in decades.”

  His brow furrowed, Rex said, “I heard about that. I thought nearly everyone got out safe. I read that some fellow got a family out of a car and was washed away...trying to save a child.” Callie bowed her head, smiling even as tears filled her eyes. “They hailed him as a hero,” Rex finished slowly.

  “That was my Bo,” she whispered. “They found him holding that baby. She was three. They’re buried side by side.”

  “Callie, I’m so sorry.”

  She nodded, but then she smiled and said. “I’m not. He was a good man, and he did the right thing. He made me happy and proud. Now I have to do the right thing by his daughter, even if my dad doesn’t understand.”

  “I don’t understand why Stuart is so against you working.”

  “He isn’t against me working.
I work all the time in his businesses. He’s against me earning my own money. Because he knows that Bodie and I will move away from War Bonnet when I have the means to do so.”

  “You said Bo didn’t leave you anything.”

  “Not even the money to bury him with,” she confided. “There wasn’t time. We weren’t married even six months.”

  “That’s tough.”

  “God provided. People were very good. A local funeral home donated their services. The family who lost their little girl paid for the plot. Area churches chipped in to buy a headstone. People all over the state sent money to help repair the campgrounds. My ob-gyn even donated his services when he learned what happened, but full-time day care is so expensive, and the couple weeks I had to take off when she was born put me behind. Then she got sick, and I had to take off work again. My only option seemed to be to move back to my father’s house. I knew getting out again would be difficult. I just didn’t figure on Ben Dolent.”

  “So you want to leave town,” Rex said, shifting closer.

  “Not really.” She shook her head. “War Bonnet’s my home. But I have no choice. No one will give me steady, paying work here. They’re too afraid of my dad. So I’ve got to go somewhere else.”

  “I see.”

  “We won’t go far,” she told him. “Ringling, maybe, or Comanche, someplace where Stuart Crowsen doesn’t have his finger in every pie.”

  “Those are still small towns,” Rex pointed out, “not much bigger than War Bonnet, probably less than two thousand people.”

  “Small-town life is what I want for my girl,” Callie said. “It’s what her daddy wanted for her. I’ll try Duncan or Ardmore, if I can’t find work in a smaller town.”

  “Neither is exactly a metropolis,” Rex noted. “What are their populations? Twenty-five thousand, tops? There are more students at the University of Oklahoma.”

  “That seems pretty big to me,” Callie admitted. “Just think of it. You could live there your whole life and not know a tenth of the people.”

  “Never thought of it that way,” Rex admitted, frowning.

  She changed the subject, polishing her apple on her thigh. “What did you think of the church service this morning?” Taking a big bite, she waited for him to do the same.

  “It was different.”

  “How so?”

  “First time I’ve ever seen the pastor play guitar in the praise band.”

  She laughed. “He’s pretty good.”

  “He is, on the guitar and in the pulpit.”

  Callie nodded. “Folks aren’t so concerned about appearances at Countryside. They enjoy worship. I’m all for reverence, but I think God has a sense of fun, too.”

  “He must. There was lots of laughter out there this morning, and I got the feeling that’s the norm.”

  “I hope so,” Callie said, getting to her feet. “Better go check on my sleepers now.”

  “I’ll be in shortly,” Rex said, following suit. “Thanks again, Callie.”

  She nodded and started to walk away, but then she stopped and turned back. “Just so you know, this job, you, you’re an answered prayer for me.”

  Rex opened his mouth, and for a moment she thought he might speak, but then he bowed his head, and she went on, strangely pleased and, for the moment at least, at peace.

  * * *

  Answered prayer. When on God’s green earth had he ever been such a thing for anyone else? The idea shamed Rex. Callie Deviner shamed Rex. She worked daylight to dark without ever uttering a word of complaint. Just the opposite, in fact. She worked hard and was downright pleasant about it. Wes loved her. She’d made a huge difference around here and earned every cent of her pay.

  Moreover, Rex was man enough to admit that the heartbreak she’d endured would have destroyed him. He could barely imagine how alone and helpless she must have felt when her husband had died. In his own case, anger and hurt pride had overshadowed any pain or sense of loss that he’d felt at Amy’s betrayal, and that told him an uncomfortable truth about his past marriage.

  He spent a long night in contemplation, coming to the conclusion that he and Amy simply had not loved each other the way Callie and her husband had. Maybe that would have changed over time, but somehow Rex doubted it. He sensed something clean and honest about the way Callie and Bo had loved, something he’d never felt with Amy.

  He’d always known that kind of love had thrived between his parents, but somehow he’d thought it was a thing of the past, something that no longer existed in this modern world. Callie made him feel ten times the fool and out of sync with this place and time. Worse, she made him feel...lonely. For something he hadn’t even known he was missing. That left him unsettled and agitated.

  A part of him longed for what his father and Callie seemed to have—a simpler, truer way of life, an easier way of seeing the world. Another part of Rex couldn’t wait to get out of War Bonnet, leave Straight Arrow Ranch behind and return to the city and the practice of law with one of the more prestigious firms in Tulsa. This time, his goals would be different, however. This time he’d be less concerned with climbing the corporate ladder and leaving his personal mark and more concentrated on finding the right woman and building the right kind of life.

  The right woman had to be out there. Callie proved it. She’d already stood up to her father in more ways that his ex ever would. She had put her man first and even now she honored him. Plus, she was a great mom, a wonderful homemaker and partner—for someone who meant to hang around War Bonnet, which he did not. Didn’t he?

  Somehow, he wasn’t sure anymore. Just thinking of that old baler, he felt a surge of frustration—and an odd satisfaction that he studiously refused to examine. Instead, he got up and trudged through another busy day.

  One thing about ranch life was that it never lacked for work to be done, even on a holiday. It also had more than its fair share of irritants: heat, dust, insects, cockleburs, cattle that showed up where they weren’t supposed to be, hired hands who thought it was funny to hide bloody calf testicles in his cap when he wasn’t looking so that he went in to lunch with smelly hair and had to dunk his head in the water trough before he could even sit down to eat. He had to throw the cap away and get out his old straw cowboy hat. It fit more comfortably than he’d imagined it would.

  Callie showed him absolutely no compassion. “Finally blooded you, did they?”

  “Aw, they’re just excited about getting the afternoon off. I should’ve known something was up when they showed up on Memorial Day. Not like it’s even the first time they’ve got me.”

  “It’s been a while,” Wes pointed out. “You were twelve the last time, if I recall.”

  Remembering, Rex grinned. “Woody dropped a fresh pair in my shirt pocket. I kept them and later hid them in his truck, where they went undiscovered for the whole weekend.”

  Callie winced, and Wes laughed. “As I recall, you wound up cleaning that truck cab with a toothbrush.”

  “More than once,” Rex confirmed, grinning. “It still stunk.”

  A knock at the front door curbed their laughter. Callie touched Rex’s shoulder, saying, “I’ll go. Eat your lunch.”

  Assuming it was one of the men, he set about building himself a sandwich. When Callie returned, it was with Ben Dolent, her hands clasped together at her waist. Dolent carried a pale blue envelope and a vacuous smile. Doffing his hat, he spoke to Wes.

  “Mr. Billings, it good to see you up and about.”

  “Thanks.” He nodded at the blue envelope, asking, “What’s this about, Ben?”

  “Oh, it’s purely a courtesy call,” he said. “Mr. Crowsen understands how things can slip your mind in the midst of a health crisis, so he had me hand deliver this reminder to you.” Beaming, he passed the envelope to Wes.

  Splitting a loaded glan
ce between Callie and Rex, Wes opened the envelope and removed a single slip of paper. After briefly reading, he tossed the paper and envelope onto the table.

  “This note isn’t due for sixty days, and you had to come out on Memorial Day to deliver it?”

  Dolent shifted his feet. “Mr. Crowsen just wants you to know he’s thinking about you.”

  Wes linked his fingers over his belt and hung an elbow on the edge of the table. “Well, you tell Stu Crowsen not to worry about his little note. It’ll be paid in full and on time.” He speared Dolent with a pointed glare then, adding, “But not one day before it’s due. You tell him that.”

  Dolent’s smile faded, replaced by uncertainty. “Um. Okay.”

  Rex picked up the slip and looked at it. Two thousand dollars. Crowsen was hounding them over two thousand dollars, sixty days before it was due? He looked at Callie, who had closed her eyes and bowed her head. Not hardly. Tossing the paper onto the table, Rex pushed up to his full height and seized Dolent by the arm.

  “I think you’re done here.”

  “What?” Dolent shot a glance at Callie. “I was hoping—”

  “Nope,” Rex interrupted, propelling the other man back the way he’d come. “You’ve done what you were sent to do.”

  “Listen,” Dolent hissed, letting himself be escorted through the dining room and into the living area. “Wasn’t my idea to come here like this.”

  “No, but you came,” Rex growled.

  “Because I wanted to see Callie.”

  “She doesn’t want to see you.”

  “I’m trying to tell you that the boss can make life uncomfortable for you if he’s of a mind to.”

  “Now, you listen to me,” Rex muttered, holding on to his temper by a hair as he steered Dolent into the foyer. “I hate bullies.” He turned Dolent to face him, stating flatly, “If Crowsen comes after my father or his daughter, I will use every weapon at my disposal to stop him.” He poked Dolent in the chest with the tip of his forefinger. “You got that?”

  Dolent frowned and nodded. “I’m just trying to help.”