This got their attention and they stopped, waiting until Ella, Boyce and Pablo caught up to them. Then together they walked toward the tractor.
Ella wished she could be more impartial than she was. For some silly reason her foolish heart was beating harder at the thought of seeing Cord again.
Cord was busy parking the tractor in a large shed when they all came down the hill. Ella saw groups of cows crowded around feeders set out in the field past the shed. Dozens of young calves raced around the pasture, kicking up their heels, as happy to be out in the sun as Paul and Suzy seemed to be.
“Hey, Daddy,” Suzy called out, running up to him as Cord stepped out of the tractor. “Are you finished working?”
Cord bent down and pulled her close in a brief hug, then got up, lifting her up in his arms, looking disappointed. “No, punkin,” he said, sorrow tingeing his voice. “I have to run to town to get a part for the tractor. There’s something wrong with it.”
He wore a white T-shirt today, tucked into faded blue jeans. His shirt was stained with grease and his hair was sprinkled with hay. His chin was shaded with stubble.
He looked pretty good to Ella.
“Can we come?” Paul asked. “We can go to the fair. Ella can come too.”
Cord chewed his lip as he seemed to consider this. Then his and Ella’s eyes met and held a beat longer than necessary. As if he was considering the suggestion.
She thought of what she had said Tuesday when they were having their heart-to-heart in the dining room. How she had told him his children were a gift to be cherished.
And how close she had come to telling him, a virtual stranger, about her past and loss.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Boyce chimed in, looking from Cord to Ella. “We should go together.”
Ella was surprised at how appealing the idea seemed.
“It’s the last day the fair will be running,” Boyce said. “This will be the only chance for the kids to go there.”
“Tell you what,” Cord said, shifting Suzy in his arms. “Why don’t we go into town together. I can get the part for the tractor and we can get seeds for the garden at the same time.”
Suzy nodded slowly, but Ella could see she wasn’t entirely satisfied with her father’s answer.
“So we won’t go to the fair?” Suzy asked, her voice holding a note of pain.
“Daddy has a lot to do—”
“Of course we’re going,” Boyce insisted. “Miss Langton needs to experience a small-town fair.” Boyce looked from Cord to Ella, his face a picture of innocence. “I’ll help you with the tractor when we get back.”
Cord sighed and Ella could see he wasn’t too happy about the situation or the manipulation. But then he shrugged. “Okay. Let’s go.”
“Yay!” Suzy gave Cord a kiss. “I love you, Daddy. You’re the best.”
“We’re going to the fair. We’re going to the fair,” Paul chanted while jumping up and down.
Ella and Cord exchanged a look. They both knew they’d been railroaded. Then Cord set Suzy down, and rubbed his hand over his chin.
“Let me clean up, and then we can go.”
* * *
“I want to throw balls.” Suzy tugged on Cord’s hand. “I see it over here.”
Cord looked around, trying to see where she was pointing. Usually the park was a quiet spot with picnic tables tucked under the tall poplar trees that edged Cedar Creek flowing through town. But today the entire grassy area was taken up by tables, tents and makeshift booths, transforming the park from an idyllic setting to a chaos of kids, noise, balloons and food. The scent of hot dogs blended with popcorn and mini doughnuts. Children ran screaming past them.
“I don’t see it, honey,” he said, raising his voice above the noise of the fan filling the monstrously large bouncy castle beside them and the shrieks of the kids playing inside.
“I think it’s just over there.” Ella pointed at a makeshift booth with a table in front. A banner draped across the front of the table proclaimed it to be the Biggest, Bestest Ball Toss.
As she did, her arm brushed his and he was disappointed at the faint thrum it created in him. He chalked it up to basic loneliness and the fact that she was an attractive woman. But yet, as their eyes met again, he knew something else was happening. And from the way her cheeks flushed and how she quickly looked away, he guessed she felt it too.
She had pulled her hair back in a loose braid that hung over her shoulder, and had changed into a plain white sweater and black jeans. Silver hoops in her ears was all she wore for jewelry. She looked classy yet down-to-earth.
A bit of a contrast from his kids. Cord had managed to dig up a clean sundress from the depths of Suzy’s messy closet for her to put on. Paul was wearing yet another pair of baggy shorts and a striped T-shirt that had a rip in the hem. A quick search of their closets had shown him that this was all that was available. He really needed to do some laundry.
He relegated the job to the long list of things he had no time to do, trying not to let it overwhelm him.
What he really needed was a nanny. So why did his eyes shift to Ella when he thought about it?
Pushing that thought away, he took Suzy’s hand as they walked across the park. “I see it now. Let’s see how biggest and bestest this booth is.”
“Don’t judge a booth by its grammar,” Ella teased, giving him a grin.
“Or its gramper.” He grinned back at her.
She looked puzzled.
“Grammar. Gramper. Gramma. Grampa?”
“That’s horrible.”
“Hey, I’m a little out of practice.”
She laughed at that and he joined her, feeling a lightness of spirit he hadn’t experienced in a long while.
He let Suzy drag him along, Paul already running ahead of them. His father had parked himself with a group of his coffee buddies at a picnic table, cradling a styrofoam cup of coffee and was probably already holding forth on cattle prices and weather forecasts sprinkled with political commentary.
A mother and father with two children were just leaving when they arrived. The father, Chad, said hello to Cord, and did a double take when he saw Ella standing next to him.
No. Not my girlfriend, Cord wanted to say, but instead he just nodded and turned to the young guy manning the booth.
“So what’s the cost?” he asked.
“One toss for a quarter. Five for a loonie,” the booth boy muttered, not bothering to look up from the phone he was texting on. With his hair anchored by a sloppy beanie, his jeans riding around his hips, he was the poster child for a bored high school student. Cord guessed he was probably manning the booth for the same reasons Cord did when he was in high school. Either to get extra credit or to impress the girls. Or both.
“Can we do ten?” Suzy asked. “That’s only a toonie.”
“You’d make a great salesperson,” Cord said, digging some change out of his pocket. “Why don’t you each do five tosses? If Texting Tim here can pull himself away from his phone long enough to take your money.”
The young man hurriedly dropped his phone in his pocket and mumbled an apology as he took a two-dollar coin from Cord and handed Paul and Suzy five balls apiece.
“You need to knock the cans down,” Cord said, pointing to the brightly colored tin cans lined up on an old wooden sawhorse. “And if you knock them all down, you get a ticket.”
“If I get enough tickets I get an ice cream, right?” Suzy asked.
Cord nodded, amazed she remembered. The last time they had taken the kids to a fair was three years ago. When Lisa was expecting Oliver.
But to his surprise the memory created more melancholy than pain.
“I want to go first,” Paul said, pushing his sister aside.
“Paul. Watch your m
anners,” Cord reprimanded. “For that you have to wait your turn. Suzy, you can go first.”
Suzy shot Paul a smug smile, which Cord wasn’t sure what to do about.
“So what you want to do is look at the cans while you aim,” Cord said to Suzy.
“I want Ella to help me,” Suzy said, ignoring Cord.
“I’m not good at aiming.” Ella held up her hands. “I’m sure your father is better.”
“I think you are really good,” Suzy said to Ella. “I want you to help me.”
“I’ve been replaced,” Cord protested.
“I have no idea why,” Ella said.
“Probably because you’re prettier than me.” The words popped out of his mouth before he could stop them.
To his surprise she blushed, then focused her attention on Suzy.
Cord couldn’t keep his eyes off Ella as she crouched down beside his daughter, coaching her through the process. She was patient and encouraging as Suzy threw the first ball and knocked down one of the three cans.
Then Suzy missed her next shot.
“You missed, you missed,” Paul taunted. “You won’t be as good as me.”
Suzy dropped her head, her lower lip quivering.
Cord was embarrassed at his son’s poor behavior and was about to scold him when Ella spoke up. “You’re right, Paul. She did miss, but she’s trying really hard. When you go, you can show her how to do it right.”
“Can you do one for me?” Suzy asked, handing Ella one of her balls. “I don’t want to miss again.”
“But that would mean you wouldn’t do it yourself, and I know you can knock those cans down.”
“Please?”
Ella smiled, then took the ball, tossed it and, to Cord’s surprise, knocked a can down. Suzy clapped her hands, celebrating as if she had done it herself.
“You have to throw the next one on your own,” Ella said.
Suzy took the remaining balls, knocked one can down but missed the last one.
“I’m no good at this,” she said, in disgust.
“It takes time and practice.” Ella patted her on the back. “You’ve never done it before so I think you did really well.”
Suzy grinned. Then Ella turned to Paul.
“Okay, Paul, now you can show us how you throw.”
Again, her diplomacy caught him unawares. For someone who had shown discomfort around his kids initially, she seemed to know exactly how to talk to them. How to make them feel good about themselves.
Paul knocked them all down and Ella praised him, encouraging Suzy to do the same. When he got his ticket he pushed it in his shorts pocket, looking proud of himself.
“Now you have to try, Daddy,” Suzy said, tugging on his arm. “And Miss Ella.”
“I don’t think so,” Cord said.
“Why not? Afraid a girl might beat you?”
Ella’s laughing rejoinder surprised him.
“I doubt that will happen.”
“Then you have nothing to fear from me.” The grin she flashed him brought out that alluring dimple again.
“Challenge accepted. And to show what a gentleman I am, I’ll even pay for you.” He handed Texting Tim a five-dollar bill. “Keep the change.”
“Whoa, big spender,” she taunted.
“Cattle prices are up.” He returned her grin, setting the five balls down on the table in front of himself. “Ladies first. Show us your stuff.”
Ella picked up one of the balls, tilted her head to one side as if to consider how she should proceed, then tossed it with a sidearm motion. The first can bounced off the table.
“Yay. You did it,” Suzy cheered.
“Impressive. Even though you throw like a girl.”
“I would hope I do,” she retorted, but she gave him another smile. Then she threw another ball and knocked a can over. Her third ball missed but with her fourth she managed to knock two over. The fifth finished the job.
She rested her hands on her hips. “Top that.”
Cord picked up two balls with an exaggerated swagger as the boy manning the booth reset the cans.
“Tough act to follow,” Texting Tim said, now keenly interested in what was happening.
Cord tossed the ball up and down in his hand and then, as soon as the boy stepped aside, he let it fly. Then another and another. The cans popped off the table with a satisfying thunk.
“I’m in the zone,” he crowed.
“Don’t get cocky. Pride comes before a fall,” Ella said.
He took aim but his fourth one missed as did his fifth.
“Ella won. Ella won. Girls rule. Boys drool,” Suzy crowed, grabbing Ella’s hand and jumping up and down.
“I don’t know if you should say it that way,” Ella said, even as she was smiling.
Cord put his hand over his heart. “Yeah, I don’t drool,” he said.
The kids laughed, Ella joining in, and as he watched them, Ella’s hand in Suzy’s, her other on Paul’s shoulder, a surprising happiness suffused him.
“Now I want to get my face painted,” Suzy announced.
“Your command is our wish,” Cord said, still grinning.
Ella laughed. There was something decidedly appealing about a woman who laughed at your jokes, lame as they might be. And when her eyes twinkled like that when she looked at you, well, that was even more appealing.
They arrived at the face painting booth, emblazoned with the name of the local diner. Tabitha Rennie, one of the waitresses at the diner, was wielding a brush, joking with the little girl whose face she was painting a sparkling butterfly.
“Is this fair a regular thing?” Ella asked him as they waited their turn.
“Twice a year as long as I can remember. Once in the spring during spring break and then again during rodeo time.”
“Cedar Ridge has a rodeo?” Ella sounded puzzled as she sidestepped a couple of giggling teenage girls licking ice cream cones. “I thought that’s what you were busy organizing.”
“No, we’ve always held a rodeo in the summer. What I’m working on is getting our rodeo connected with a larger rodeo circuit. To make it more attractive to the career rodeo cowboys.”
Her frown told him she didn’t understand. “Some rodeos are a part of a larger association,” he explained. “Black Creek, a town down the highway, has its own rodeo as does Longview and a few others. Those rodeos are part of the Milk River Association. So the cowboys who compete in those rodeos gain points when they place. These points get added up to give them a placing in the Milk River Rodeo Association competition held in the fall. That, in turn helps them to place in the larger rodeos like the Stampede in Calgary or Canadian Finals Rodeo in Edmonton.” He paused, shooting her a glance. She was nodding.
“And your rodeo isn’t part of the association?”
“No. So any cowboy competing in our rodeo is only doing it for the cash prize offered at the end. It doesn’t give them any standing or points. Which, in turn means we don’t always get the same caliber of rough stock and cowboys the other ones do. There’s nothing in it long-term for cowboys to participate in our rodeo.”
“And this is what you’re working on? What your wife started?”
“Yes.” He gave her a sidelong glance. “Like I said, she was a barrel racer and always dreamed of making the Canadian Finals. She wanted to give local kids the same chance by making it worthwhile to compete in a local rodeo.”
They moved ahead in the lineup when the little girl who was ahead of them got up.
“Hey, Tabitha,” Cord said as the young woman looked up from her paint pots. “Sepp give you time off from your work for this?”
Tabitha Rennie held his gaze, challenge in her gray eyes. He knew Tabitha was uncomfortable around him. She showed that each ti
me she served him at the café. But he was equally uncomfortable around her. Ever since she broke up with his brother, in fact.
“Boss said our attendance was mandatory.” Tabitha shrugged, turning away as she cleaned her brush. “Your brother still doing vet work?”
“Morgan?”
“You got another brother stashed away somewhere?” She tossed her head, her red curls bouncing over her shoulders. When she was younger she got mercilessly teased about her carrot hair but now it was a beautiful shade of copper.
“No need to get sassy. Morgan is still a vet. He’s got custody of Nathan now.”
And why was Tabitha asking about Morgan? She was the one who had broken up with him all those years ago.
Besides the Rennies and the Walshes weren’t exactly on speaking terms. Especially since Tabitha’s father shorted his father of the money he had put into building the arena.
The same arena the Milk River Rodeo Association wanted them to get appraised.
“I’m ready for whoever’s next,” Tabitha called out.
Suzy was about to sit down in the empty chair when Paul scooted in front of her, shooting her a taunting grin. “Beat ya,” he said.
What had gotten into his son today? “Just for that, Paul, I think Suzy should go first,” Cord said.
Paul stared, as if challenging him.
“Or we could go home,” he added.
Paul dropped his head but got out of the chair and stood to one side.
“He’s usually not this poorly behaved,” Cord muttered to Ella, feeling he should explain his son’s behavior.
“He’s just being a boy,” Ella said. “Not that I have a lot of experience with kids.”
“You seem pretty natural with them.”
Ella gave him a look that he couldn’t decipher, and once again he couldn’t look away from her deep brown eyes.
Just then a woman joined them, leading a toddler, her hair almost the same shade of copper as Tabitha’s.
“Hey, Cord, you dare trust my sister with your kids?” Leanne Walsh joked, pointing her chin in Tabitha’s direction.
“Hey, I may not be Rembrandt but I can do a cat face.” Tabitha shrugged. “That’s what you wanted right?” she asked Suzy.
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