Mirror Lake Ranch: Once in a Memory

by Kendra Plunkett-Witt

  I pulled a high-end fountain pen from my purse. It cost more than a month’s rent on my mom’s trailer. But it had been a gift from my former father in law when I graduated from law school. I used it to sign my divorce papers and ever since considered it lucky.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow then? Call me to set up a time and try to keep this quiet as possible. This is a Christmas gift.”

  I walked out of the office. It was sunny today despite the chill in the air. I pulled my sunglasses down and wrapped my scarf around my neck. It was a six block hike, nothing to a former New Yorker, but in this town no one often walked this far.

  I was without a vehical and had hitched a ride in to town with Ed this morning. I disappeared under the pretense of Christmas shopping, which wasn’t a lie. Now I was meeting him at the diner for lunch.

  On block three I heard the whimpering of tiny puppy howls as I passed a truck parked two doors down from Fi’s. A middle aged woman leaned against the black Chevy.

  “Want to take a look?” she asked me.

  I peeked in the bed to see four fluff balls tumbling around each other. “Australian Sheppard mother and questionable father. They’re six weeks old, trying to find them homes. Three boys and one girl. They still need they’re shots but they would make great Christmas gifts.”

  I picked up a grey fluff ball with brown and black spots. The little tyke squirmed happily in my arms and nuzzled in to lick at my face.

  “I think he likes you,” the woman said as I stroked his fur.

  “I know I like him.”

  “Well take him then.”

  I hesitated. “I’m staying with friends, not sure how well they would like me bringing home a pup unannounced.”

  Just then the bell of Fi’s dinged and out strode Gentry.

  I shouted his name and waved him over eagerly. “Please, please, please,” I begged holding the pup out to him as he walked over.

  “A dog’s a big responsibility Krys,” he told me as if talking to a child.

  I handed him the puppy with a scowl. “I’m not five Hollis. Besides, if I can be trusted with all the horses, what’s a puppy? Every ranch should have a ranch dog.”

  The pup wiggled and yipped in Gentry’s arms and just seeing him with something so small pulled at my maternal instincts and I felt my ovaries want to explode.

  Men and babies of any kind. I heard did that to women but I had never experienced it before. Damn hormones.

  “It means vet appointments, potty training and making sure he doesn’t get under foot of the horses or herd. One hoof will end something this small.”

  I put my hands on my hips. “I graduated from law school. I can surely tend to a dog.”

  Gentry didn’t reply just patted the puppy. I stuck out my lower lip and pouted.

  “He’s not sleeping in our bed.”

  I smiled at him and took the puppy back. “We will see.”

  “What was that Krystina?”

  “I was agreeing with you.”

  We said good-bye and took our new puppy and walked towards the dinner.

  “What on earth is that?” Ed asked as we met him standing by the truck.

  “Our new puppy!” I held my furry friend out for him to see.

  “How did you get Gentry talked into that one?”

  “I did my pouty face. Yes I did, didn’t I? I did my pouty face now you get to come home and sleep with me.”

  “On the floor,” Gentry interjected in on my baby talk. I ignored him.

  “Well, he can’t go in here. Put him in the bed. He’s a thick furred thing. He will be fine,” Ed told me and I reluctantly let Gentry take my new baby from me.

  “Got a name for him?” Ed asked me as we went inside.

  “I’m thinking Duke maybe? Duke’s a good dog name.”

  “And Gentry always wanted a dog named Duke.”

  “That too.”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Gentry

  I had spent half my morning in town Christmas shopping for Krys and had been coming up empty handed. Two calls to my sister proved just as useless. It was hard to buy for the woman who could get whatever she wanted. This year I wanted something special.

  I was debating on getting her, her own saddle. But I was late in the game and everything worth having had to be special ordered and that would take weeks. The thought of buying her a horse of her own had also crossed my mind. However, she would need to test ride it and that would ruin the surprise. Besides, she had all but claimed Thunder as her own. After all the years of loyalty to me, he now preferred her.

  She swore up and down on the way home after a trip to the vets and then Fi’s for puppy supplies that Duke was all she needed for Christmas. But he had been free and she had swiped her card at the checkout before I could even catch up and pay.

  We pulled into the ranch yard in time for evening chores and so I unloaded the puppy supplies while Krys carried Duke around introducing him to her horses. I put his kennel in the barn and she gently pushed him in it, locking the door as he whined.

  “You’re safest in here,” she told him, petting his nose through the gaps in the wires. Most of the horses had paid no mind to him except Thunder who appeared annoyed. He wasn’t pleased about having to share his mother’s attention with the new kid.

  I stroked his neck, knowing just how he felt. I left Krys to her chores and went to attend to mine.

  “How was town?” Ethan asked as I stepped into the cattle feed room in the other barn.

  “Don’t ask.”

  “When was the last time you bought a gift for someone you weren’t related to?”

  “The last time I bought for Krys.”

  “No wonder you were a confirmed bachelor.”

  “She got herself a puppy in town. She says me letting her have him is her gift.”

  “Oh, don’t fall for that trap.”

  “I’m trying not to,” I opened up the feed grinder and started filling buckets of grain for the herd of cattle kept in the closest feed lot.

  “Did you ask Gloria or Melissa? Those two have been spending a lot time together lately.”

  “I think Melissa would like to spend a lot more time around here too,” I tossed out, it was pretty much obvious to everyone but him.

  “I’m sure she’s ready to come home. Melissa doesn’t seem like a city girl to me.”

  “Not at all where I was going with that.”

  Ethan glanced at me with this dumbass look on his face. Boy was he dense.

  “You and Alyssa have been broken up for what? Eight months now? She’s dating again you can too.”

  Ethan kicked the toe of his boot in the ground and shrugged. “She did a number on me.”

  “Yeah, but you can’t become me. Mine’s a total fluke and a miracle that it’s working out this long. Besides, you don’t want to be forty and waiting around on her, living in this bunk house.”

  “Just focus on your own problems Gentry. How it’s six days to Christmas and you’re giftless.”

  “And you’re a dick.”

  ***

  Two days later I was still giftless but I had taken the day off to spend with Krys. The last two nights had been full of puppy yelps until she snuck him into our bed when she thought I was sleeping.

  Duke always started at the end of the bed and ended up snuggled between us. And he snored. But other than that he wasn’t to annoying. Plus, he made Krys laugh so that was worth it.

  I rode out to the cabin on the lake soon as Doc had eaten his breakfast. I started a fire and swept the room and cleared the front stoop of snow. I had brought smoked sausages, cheese, crackers and red wine. I put fresh blankets on the bed and waited for Krys.

  Friday brought the bad news that the acreage had sold and I had yet to tell Krys. I hadn’t the slightest clue who had bought it but I hoped arrange, at the very least, the passage of our heard as we were accustomed to.

  I was putting another piece of wood on the fire when I heard Doc nicker. He was gre
eting his stall neighbor. I walked out the front and greeted Krys and Thunder. She rode naturally and confidently as any other cowgirl. Her long dark hair was braided down her back and I couldn’t wait to undo it in the fire light. We had made love every night for weeks now.

  This was different. The cabin was just what I had told her on the first day here, a place for making love. I wanted a much better image of the homestead in her mind. I had been cruel to her the last time we were here. I wanted the memory gone.

  I also had plans on asking her to make her move here permeant. An offer for me to fly to New York and help her make arrangements for her things was even included. Just so she would know how serious I was.

  I kissed Krystina hello.

  “You’re freezing!” I told her feeling her cheek on mine. “Get in here and let me warm you up.”

  Her laugh rang out. “That sounds a lot like a ‘let me give you a back-rub offer’ from last week.”

  “You wound me sweetheart.”

  I shut the door behind her and began undoing her clothes. “But I’m cold remember?” she said between kisses as I tugged her sweater off.

  “Body heat warms quicker.”

  I soon had us both in nothing but our skin and I lie her under the thick quilt on the bed. She wiggled, antsy and wanting to move things along. Wanting me in her. I kissed her and she grated her hips into me, hands on my ass pulling me to her.

  I growled and she groaned but I held my own. This was going to take a good long time. I was going to please her in all my favorite ways. I nibbled at her wrist and placed them at her head, out of my way.

  Our hands found each other and interlaced as I kissed her collar bone and the top of her breast, working south with every nibble and lick. She spread her legs, bucking her hips into my mouth as I slid my tongue between her folds and gripped her hips with my hands.

  As I licked and sucked and nibbled her thighs clenched and shuddered as her juices flowed into my mouth as her moans rang freely in the small cabin. Her hands tangled in my hair and I smiled knowing how much pleasure I could bring her.

  I kissed the inside of her thigh and worked my way back up her. Stiff and aching to feel her sleek skin around me. I entered her and felt her nails rake over my skin. Long gone was the perfect manicure that had dug into my back after her first week here. The bite of her nails drove me deeper into her. It was never enough. Never close enough. I thrust so deep there was nowhere else to go yet, I needed more.

  I needed to be one with Krystina. And I wasn’t sure how to make that happen.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Krystina

  I awoke to Gentry sneaking out of bed carefully so not to disturb me. I struggled to come to as he stepped to the front door to take a leak and peek at the horses. I was exhausted, sore and frankly sticky.

  He was putting another log on the fire when I pushed myself up in bed. “Lie back down, he said softly. “We have all day.”

  “True, but I don’t want to spend my whole day with you asleep. That’s the one activity we do together all night.”

  “So, we do,” he rummaged through a bag on the table as I admired every muscle on his naked form.

  He walked over to me with a pack of wet wipes. “Well boy scout, you did come prepared.”

  Gentry rolled his eyes at me and started unpacking the lunch he had brought. “Any ideas on what to do the rest of our time?” his smile was wicked.

  “Talk. We haven’t had a lot of time for that of late.”

  Gentry set a tray of food on the edge of the bed and poured us each a glass of wine. He handed me one and brushed my hair back from the mess it had become. “So often I can look at you and see you as the teenage girl I fell in love with so long ago. To have you here, now, as the woman…” he trailed off and I knew why.

  “You never were the man good with words or emotions. I guess cowboys aren’t.”

  “I wasn’t a cowboy back then.”

  This warmed my heart and I took a bite of cheese. “Yes, you were. You have always been a cowboy in your heart and soul. But when it mattered I knew you loved me.”

  “If only that was true. If it was …. There’s no sense thinking about the damned past.”

  “I can drink to that,” we toasted, clinked our glasses and sipped our wine.

  We chatted as we ate and drank. We snuggled under the heavy quilts to keep warm and made love once more. As the high and the after-glow wore off, Gentry played with my fingers as my hands rested on his chest.

  “I wanted to prove to you I could give you a good of a life here as you had back East. I’m never going to be refined or civilized socialite but the expansion could have been a large profit increase in a few years. It would keep you in fancy clothes, vacations. Whatever you needed.”

  “Gentry, I don’t need those things.”

  “It’s not been that long and I need to know, if I were to ask you to stay here, permanently – that I could provide whatever you need,” he trailed off yet again. “But I failed you yet again. I didn’t get the loan and the land sold. I got the call this morning.”

  “Gentry,” I sat up in bed staring down at my man. I understood what he meant. I saw the young, sweet but uncertain boy starring back at me. “You just love to ruin surprises, don’t you?”

  “What surprise?”

  “You’re damned Christmas gift! I bought you, or rather Mirror Lake, the land!”

  “You did WHAT!?” Gentry’s shout was not nearly as happy as I hoped.

  “I was looking for real estate …”

  Gentry climbed out of the bed and was searching for his boxers on the floor. I followed suit and began looking for my own clothes.

  “Real estate in the city, for your new home.”

  I found my underwear and pants, yanking them on. “I did do something for my new home. For what I wanted to be my new home. That’s why I bought it. To prove my loyalty! That was stay worthy!”

  Bra and shirts pulled on and I began looking for my socks. “You can’t be so stubborn and so prideful that you can’t see I did this for you! It was your dream. I wanted to do that for you. For us!”

  I found my socks and boots and was dressed at last. As was Gentry. “I didn’t want it. Not to come from you. Not something you bought with. . . HIS money. I didn’t, I don’t need James Delore’s God damn fucking money. Or yours!”

  I felt slapped. Tears stung my eyes but I would be damned if he would see me cry.

  “I don’t know what you expect me to do. The deals done. The lands bought, just awaiting Ed’s signature to make it officially part of the ranch.”

  “I won’t let him sign. If you thought for a second this would make me happy, then you did change. Probably too damn much to be here.”

  Our eyes locked. Gentry’s eyes, voice, his whole damn posture was ice cold. I had changed in ten years, I figured out how to exist once without Gentry Hollis, I was strong enough to do it again.

  I stormed out the door and jumped on Storm and rode off.

  Chapter Thirty – Eight

  Gentry

  For two hours after Krys rode away I stayed at the cabin. I cleaned up our mess, put out the fire and drank the last half bottle of our wine. I tried to calm down, tried to convince myself that she was right. It was her money, divorce settlement or not and she wanted to gift me with some of it.

  However, it didn’t change the fact that the land purchase was something I felt I needed to do for me. To prove I was man enough to provide a good lifestyle for her. To take her to New York, Boston, Tahiti, Europe. To buy her several hundred dollar shoes and purses. Whatever she was used to. She had come so far.

  I rode Doc back to the ranch yard. Thunder Storm was stalled and all the horses fed and watered despite it being a little early. I assumed Krystina had done it. My normal crew wasn’t typically that on top of things.

  No one was downstairs when I went inside. However, there was a copy of the land transfer on the table. The ranch’s copy. The originals had been si
gned and filed. As Ed was the sole legal owner, it was now legally finalized even if I didn’t wish it to be.

  I retired to my room with a bottle of whiskey and shut the door. I turned on my records. I didn’t want to fight with Krystina anymore tonight and although I regretted a few things I had said, there would be no apology tonight.

  Any attempt at conversation tonight would only end worse. This wasn’t our first fight. There was routine to them. The night grew on and my phone rang with a few missed calls and texts. I always checked them immediately with slight hope it was always Gloria.

  Although I didn’t answer and never replied it was easy to tell that she knew and that she felt I was a douche bag and an asshole among other thing.

  But maybe I was right. If Krystina didn’t know me any better than to believe I wouldn’t be upset, maybe we didn’t really belong together. I should have fought Gloria off when she offered the ranch for Krys’ retreat.

  I had become a much bigger playboy since I came out here. Much harder a man than the boy she had known. That wasn’t the kind of man Krystina would fall in love with. The woman Krys had become, that wasn’t me. Not my type. I would never fall for a girl like that. Maybe find lust and the desire to conquer but fall never fall in love.

  I heard her come up the stairs at seven and over the music I heard her moving things around. At eleven I heard her make several trips up and down the stairs. Duke cried and I watched out my window as Ethan loaded up her bags in his truck.

  I watched her turn and look at my window. I felt so helpless and pathetic. She had grown tired of my crap and was leaving me yet again. But I couldn’t move. I couldn’t go after her. I didn’t call out her name and beg her to stay.

  My chest grew tight and I found it hard to breathe as she climbed in the cab next to my best friend and drove away. I screamed her name to late. Throwing my empty whiskey bottle against the window, shattering both the bottle and the old glass pane.

  I found my feet and ran downstairs I went through the kitchen, shoving my feet in my boots at the side door and rushing to my truck. The keys weren’t in the ignition so I ran back to the house. I grabbed them from the kitchen table and my hand knocked into a letter. It fell to the floor and for some reason I stopped to pick it up.