“Did you talk?”
“No way, now I’m going to make him sweat it out.” Rachael went to the fridge and grabbed the chocolate milk.
“A word of motherly advice?”
“Sure, because what I’ve been doing hasn’t been working too well so far.”
“Quit playing games. Just apologize and get it over with.”
“Me apologize? For what?”
“The naked, gorgeous, ex-boyfriend standing in your room. You probably could’ve handled that better.”
“I guess.” Rachael chugged the chocolate milk and opened the pantry. “Chips? Have you got any chips?”
Her mother glanced at her out of the corner of her narrowed eyes.
“I’m just hungry Mom. Like I said- no decent food and not much money either. That’s college.”
“Well, eat up.” Mrs. Harte glanced outside. “Travis just pulled up out front.”
“Tell him I’m not here.”
“Your car is parked outside.”
Rachael looked outside. Travis leaned against her car, knowing she’d heard him pull in. “I guess it is.”
He can stand there until…
Mrs. Harte went over and opened the front door. “It takes an older woman to help you work through stupid.” She hollered out to Travis, “Come on in. She’s in here hiding.”
“Mother!”
“Yep, thank me tomorrow. Help yourselves to some chili. I turned off the stove. Cheese, onions, and sour cream are in the refrigerator. Bye bye,” Mrs. Harte hung up her apron, kissed Rachael’s forehead, and went out back, allowing them some privacy.
Travis stepped into the kitchen, his hat in his hands. He leaned against the doorframe. He had grown a full beard, but somehow it was trimmed and neat- and really very sexy.
“Go ahead, and kill me.” He crossed his ankles.
“So, where have you been?”
“Strip joints, bars, carousing with wild women.” He grinned.
“You wanna get shot?” Rachael tossed back.
“Nope, would you believe hunting with Wade?”
“Did you drop out of school?”
“No, I did my work and mailed it in. A little FedEx action.”
“Do you want to know what I’ve been doing?”
“Not if it involves naked dudes or strip poker, though I wouldn’t blame you.”
“I’ve been worried sick over you. I looked like a stalker. Are we broken up?”
“I hope not, we’ve had a rough patch. People do.” Travis took two steps towards her.
“Is that what we call this? So, in the future, what if I just up and leave you for weeks. Don’t return calls, don’t answer texts, pretty much dump you. Get half naked at a party with some guys. What then?”
“You did it before. It was torture. Now, I did it. I regret it.” He cleared his throat. “I’m counting that see-through blouse and black bra as half naked, in a group setting.” He grinned down at her letting her know that he was merely teasing.
Travis now stood directly in front of her, sweeping an errant blonde curl behind her ear and holding it in his hand. “I’m glad to see the curls are back. I’ve missed these curls.”
“I regret it, too. I really had no idea about their relationship. That Colten had been meeting Lucia there. Then, about the Kiss Me top… I thought it might make you jealous.”
“It worked.”
“The other top was just because guys kept trying to kiss me in the club and I didn’t have anything else to change in to.”
“Explains a whole lot.” Travis coughed into his hand. “And I had only played poker the one night. And I was planning on dropping out just as you walked in. I was just trying to prove a point. Of course, I had no idea you’d walk in at that exact moment, but I was counting on the fact that you’d hear about it.”
“Point taken,” Rachael’s heart raced in her chest.
Travis traced her lips with his thumb. “What do you say we both promise never to do this again? I will if you will.”
“I think I can do that. And, Travis, I think you need to unpause us.”
“Why’s that?”
“I can’t live without you.”
“I can’t live without you either.”
Rachael reached forward and plucked his hat from his hands. She ceremoniously placed it on her head and quoted him from two years before. The day when they’d finally overcome his pride over her flirtation with Ty and her prejudice over his past with Misty.
“Well, then, are we all good now? All cleared up?” She pouted at him.
“Yes,” he smiled, and kissed her cheek.
“Then, there’s only one thing left to do then,” Rachael blushed at him. Then, she raised up on her tippy toes and kissed him good. Long, hard, and deep… And when she ended the kiss, she added, “Now you’ve been kissed by a real cowgirl.”
His smile into her eyes was a promise of even better things to come.
“There’s only one cowgirl for me, girl. I told you before.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Do I need to barf or kick your butt?”
Michael’s voice from the kitchen doorway took them both by surprise.
“You think you could kick my ass?” Travis jested, rounding on Michael with a crooked grin.
“Maybe, I’m a lot stouter than I used to be.” Michael tossed back.
Rachael hugged Michael. She took a good, long look at him and was amazed at how much he’d grown these last few months. His chest and arms were filling out. Gone were the days of the lanky teenager. Before he’d looked just long and lean- really rangy in appearance. Now, he’d grown into a young man. It seemed that in the five months Rachael had been gone, Michael had truly transformed. Rachael couldn’t believe her eyes. He could have grown possibly three inches. She thought it sounded ridiculous, even to her. Yet, she knew it was a definite possibility. He was nearly as tall as Travis, but Travis still outweighed him. And, Travis’s arms, chest, and legs were clearly those of a man. Rachael decided to think of Michael as a boy instead of a teenager of sixteen. It made her feel better and less like an adult.
Am I an adult?
I don’t feel like one…
Rachael considered the thought a bit more and decided she wasn’t an adult yet. Her very own mother had sent her fiancé inside the house to speak to her, forcing Rachael out of hiding.
Yep, I’m totally immature.
“Want to go fill feeders?” Michael asked Travis, excitement filling his voice.
“I don’t know man, as tempting as that is I just got back from several weeks in Minnesota with three smelly guys. Your sister might not allow me back over here if I abandon her now.”
“Travis Baxter, the legacy continues. He disappears for weeks on end. No note, not a trace of the man. Then, he reappears only to seal the deal with a kiss. Levi is going to love this,” Michael skipped up the stairs, while Travis was giving him the I’m going to slit your throat gesture behind Rachael’s back.
“He’s only sixteen and even he realizes that what you did was wrong. It could be considered abandonment in some states.” Rachael decided that while Michael had opened the can of worms, she might as well go fishing.
“I had my reasons. I was seriously pissed off.”
“You got a few pics on your phone- and while I could’ve run off for weeks, hiding away on some girls’ trip, I didn’t.”
“You’re just not as passionate as I am,” he jested.
“Or just not as straight up crazy.” Crazy brought to mind thoughts of Shannah. She’d never mentioned the hunting trip or Travis’s whereabouts. Shannah was a traitor at this point. “Did Shannah know you were with Wade?”
“She did, but he never let on about our little skirmish.”
“Skirmish? Be careful, Travis. You went AWOL. There was no skirmish about it.”
“Are you still mad at me?”
“Yes,” Rachael went to stand at the screen door. His truck sat parked out front. She hadn’t
noticed his airboat was behind it. The flaps behind the prop had a new design. The entire boat looked different. She opened the screen door and peered outside. The side of the boat clearly said RD in large letters. The flaps had a painted person on them. Rachael stepped out onto the porch and saw that the person on the flaps was none other than herself.
There she stood in her jeans, tank top, and cowgirl boots. Below her it merely said RD, short for her Redneck Debutante nickname from long ago. Rachael turned to stare at Travis. Rachael knew it was customary for guys to put a pic of their girl on their boats. Some guys put pictures of girls they didn’t know, nor had met. Just like the famous bomber photos painted on planes during WWII, but these were painted on airboats. To Travis, however, his boat had always been his own. She never thought he’d go there. Rachael turned to find him standing behind her.
“Want to take it out?”
“Where to?”
“Where it all began.” He wrapped his arms around her waist. “I need to finish something I started a long time ago.”
Rachael thought back to all those times on Travis’s airboat. The first time they went swimming. The day where she pointed out to him that a guy’s only motivation to get a girl to go swimming or fishing with him is to see her in a bikini. To see her figure…
Rachael thought back to the day that they got engaged on the airboat. A day where she was unsure and he knew exactly what he wanted.
Rachael thought back to a day when she kissed Travis in the Western Store and knew he was the one for her. She remembered the first time she saw him on horseback, working cows, and she was standing in the creek in only her underwear. She remembered seeing him with Janet and knowing she had to have him- forever.
“Give me a minute to grab a swimsuit.” Rachael disappeared upstairs and returned moments later. “Let’s go.” Her mind was made up and she wouldn’t turn back now.
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely.”
Rachael knew that this last barrier between them needed to be breached. That if Travis knew she was his- and his alone, he’d know that she’d been waiting for one man and that one man was him. Three years of friendship and trust had been leading them to this one place in time. She was ready to move forward and she knew he was too.
Travis carefully led Rachael to his truck. She went around to the far side of the truck, just to play with him. She climbed in and buckled her seatbelt.
“Why are you sitting way over there?” He asked.
“I was just seeing if you’d notice.” She slid across to sit next to him.
“Well, I did.” Travis lifted her hand and kissed her ringed hand. “That seat’s for strangers.”
Rachael glanced over at his left hand, and for the first time since she’d met him she noticed his purity ring was gone. “When did you take that off?”
Travis tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “This morning,” he reached over to the ash tray of his truck and opened it. Inside, his ring glared back at her. The wide band and rugged cross called to her just like it had that first day crossing the pasture to walk Ole Lonesome George back to Aunt Margaret’s house. “Take it. It’s yours now.”
Rachael knew that this only meant one thing. She reached in and grabbed the ring. It was far too large for any of her fingers. Instead, she unfastened her necklace and slipped it on the chain.
“There’s a few things I realized when I left to go on that hunting trip. Not only do I love you, Rachael Harte, but you are all that matters to me. Nothing else. You are my everything. And once we say those vows, it’s forever. Please understand that I can’t and won’t ever let you go. I tried to give you space and freedom. Time to be a college girl- but I love you. Heart and soul. There’s no one else for me.”
They pulled into the boat ramp she recognized from that fall day four years earlier. He’d brought her here with Shannah and Maysie. His friends Gabe, Ty, Jason, Adam, and Clay had been there as well. Rachael had felt their connection immediately, and even though she’d had a boyfriend for six months, she knew that she would end up with Travis. Colten didn’t stand a chance. From the moment Travis had ridden up to that creek bed and pulled her up into his saddle, she’d been his. That was very apparent now.
Travis backed the airboat down into the water. Rachael climbed onboard and waited for him to come and join her. He drove over to park his truck and joined her on the airboat. Rachael jumped up in to the driver’s seat. Travis merely smiled over at her.
“Not so fast, cowgirl. Let me give you a lesson.” He teased.
Rachael decided to appease him. She’d only operated the airboat once and it’d been almost six months back. He idled the boat slowly away from the boat ramp and towards the large river nearby. They passed the small island where they’d fixed lunch a long time ago, they continued towards the area where she and Travis had gone swimming years before, and finally they slowed their speed to a crawl at the location where he’d proposed. Rachael felt very nervous. She couldn’t believe how one person could be both so nervous and certain at the same time.
Travis stopped the airboat and climbed out of the driver’s seat, coming over to join her at the edge of the boat. Otters played in the afternoon sun on the shoreline nearby. Rachael smiled to herself, remembering her previous fear of gators.
Rachael waited for Travis to make his move, but he didn’t and she wondered what was keeping him from doing so. She wanted to ask, but she couldn’t bring herself to utter the words. He looked out over the water and stared intently on something on the other bank.
Rachael squinted in the sunlight to see what it was. A small figure, clad in black, pulled into view. He drove a vehicle that Rachael recognized immediately as the Honcho. Its rust-red exterior and metal dog box made it clear who’d just arrived. None other than JJ strolled onto the shoreline, carrying what Rachael assumed was a Bible. This clean-cut JJ stood in sharp contrast to the bearded, snuff using, low-rise pants wearing, JJ of the past.
“Just hear me out.” Travis whispered in her ear. “I made a promise, a long time ago. And I intend to keep that promise. Marry me, Rachael Harte. We can have a quiet little service out here today. Then, we’ll send out announcements to your family and mine- or do the huge traditional wedding thing. Whatever you want. The choice is yours. I just have to know that I did this the right way.”
“Yes,” Rachael turned to face Travis. “I choose you. Now and always. There is no one else for me. And we may have our skirmishes, but in the end it’ll be us.”
“Truly, is that a yes? To here and now?” Travis looked shocked.
Maybe he’d thought that she’d say no. Maybe he thought that she’d just wanted to be intimate, but Rachael knew all she needed to know. She loved him and he would be her husband. She had plenty of time to sort out the details of announcement versus big wedding. She was a traditional girl, but all-in-all their relationship hadn’t been all that traditional.
Travis idled the boat over to where JJ stood on the shoreline. Rachael had known he was a lawman, but Justice of the Peace was news even to her. She wondered what other secrets he held. Rachael let Travis lift her off of the airboat and on to the shore. He kissed her forehead sweetly.
JJ had forgone the dip and for that small miracle Rachael was truly thankful. The ever-present spit can was also gone, as were the dogs in the coop in the back of his truck.
“Hello, Miss Rachael, I understand we’re about to have us a weddin’.”
Rachael nodded in agreement.
“Dearly, beloved, we are gathered here to witness the matrimony between Rachael Harte and Travis Baxter.”
Rachael nearly laughed. Travis reached down and held her hands.
“You can back out now if you’d like to,” he winked.
“Nope, but you better have something other than an airboat ride planned for our honeymoon.” She countered.
JJ continued with the service. For a witness, he’d brought with him some woman the two of them had never met. She seemed ni
ce enough, and even wore a dress. At the point where Travis and Rachael exchanged vows, Travis placed the matching gold diamond band on Rachael’s finger. It was an eternity band and its total weight Rachael couldn’t even guess. Rachael wondered at how long he’d been hiding away that little treasure. For him, Rachael took the ring from around her neck and lovingly returned it to his left hand. He smiled handsomely down at her and she realized then he’d had this planned for a very, very long time.
The witness was quiet throughout the entire ceremony, and at the end she even signed the marriage license with her name, Eliza Albritten. JJ drove away with little to no pomp and circumstance, taking the witness with him. Travis smiled down at Rachael and pulled her to him.
“Are you happy, Mrs. Baxter?”
“Very happy, Mr. Baxter.”
Travis bent his head and kissed her tenderly, wanting the moment to last. The sound of a helicopter overhead alerted them to another person’s arrival.
“That’s not for us- is it?”
“You said it better be a honeymoon to remember. I’m aiming to please. I only get to do this once.” Travis held her tightly. The helicopter landed and they rushed to get on. Inside, Rachael recognized Adam from their high school days. It was incredibly noisy, but Rachael managed to say a quick hello. He nodded in response and lifted off carrying them towards the coastline. Rachael spied the high-rise condominiums and hotels of the area beaches. Below them she could clearly make out Saint Armand’s Circle. Just when she thought they were going to land, the tour continued. Adam flew them towards the interior of the state and over to Central Florida. The vast cattle ranches gave way to the interstate system of Florida. Rachael spied Cinderella’s castle in the distance and wondered at their final destination. Still, they flew onward. Another hour of flight and they found themselves on a small island off the coast of North Florida and Georgia. It was tiny and boasted only one house, and a dock with two jet skis and a boat. Rachael knew that this level of event required elaborate planning. Travis must have been working on this for weeks. Perhaps no one else knew, but he’d taken a lot of time to put this together and make this happen.
Cowgirl Coed (Redneck Debutante Series Book 4) Page 15