Claiming the Texan's Heart

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  Silence met his words. Jack wondered what Cricket was doing right now. “I think I’ll head to Fort Wylie. Maybe a bright idea will hit me on the way there.”

  “Thought you said Cricket doesn’t want to see you for a while,” Dane said.

  Jack stood. “Simple miscommunication,” he said. “If I can fix things around here with Pop, Mom and you guys, surely I can fix my relationship with a deacon.”

  “Forgiveness is easier to give than to get,” Gabe said.

  “What dummy said that? It’s terrible advice,” Jack told him, and Gabe shrugged. “If we all believed that,” Jack continued, “we’d all be in a sinking boat. Anyway, I can’t think about Pop right now. I need to meet Cricket’s family. I need to figure out my woman, whether she likes it or not. Then I’ll come up with a big idea for employment.”

  “That’s the man,” Pete said jovially. “Action instead of moping.”

  “Moping?” Jack repeated.

  “I meant sitting around thinking,” Pete explained hurriedly. He raised his beer can in Jack’s direction. “Good luck and Godspeed. Let us know how it goes.”

  Jack stood, well aware his brothers were enjoying his dilemma with empathy and a little humor. That was okay. He knew they supported him, and it was a good feeling after all the years apart. “Hey,” he said suddenly, “I never thanked you for sneaking out to see me ride. And then trying to come to the hospital. I never said it, but it scared the hell out of me when your car got hit.”

  Pete cleared his throat. Dane shrugged. Gabe grinned. “It was a wild night,” Gabe said. “We made Pop a tougher man than he ever dreamed he’d need to be.”

  They all laughed, remembering how blazing mad Pop had been. But he’d been upset that his boys were sneaking out, frightened that they’d nearly gotten killed in a car accident. Jack understood that now. Parents didn’t always show their emotions the way they felt them. He hoped he’d be able to tell his kids how much he loved them, then figured he’d better give himself a pass on being the perfect parent. “It was great knowing you were there,” Jack said. “I liked having the coolest cheering section around.”

  “You better figure out a way to get Cricket to cheer for you,” Pete said, and Jack headed toward Fort Wylie.

  Chapter 15

  This time Jack skipped Cricket’s house altogether and went straight to her family home. Most likely, Cricket wouldn’t be happy with this decision, but if he waited on her to introduce him, he’d be a father already. He had no intention of letting her be a single mom—he needed to get her safely to the altar without further delay. The wait was beginning to wear on him, and one thing he’d learned about the deacon. She could drag her feet like no other woman he’d ever known.

  He managed to get himself buzzed through the massive wrought-iron gate by giving only his name and the nature of his call, which surprised him. He was greeted at the door of a large home—about the size of the Morgan home at the ranch, but built in a Grecian style—by an elegant, older version of Cricket, tall and dark-haired and manicured. “Mrs. Jasper?”

  “Yes?” she said, giving his jeans, boots and cowboy hat a quick once-over, before her gaze peered past him to his truck for the briefest of moments.

  He removed his hat. “My name is Jack Morgan.”

  “I’ve heard the name.” She showed him in to a white room that was air-conditioned—or just cold from the marble—and smiled at him. “You’ve come about my daughter, Cricket.”

  He resisted the nervous feeling settling into the pit of his stomach. This was a first for him, and being on the receiving end of a mother’s scrutiny was unsettling. He made a mental note to remember when his daughters—surely he would have at least one daughter in Cricket’s and his batch of triplets—had sweethearts over, he would keep the air-conditioning low and his demeanor antiseptic. No sense in encouraging every Tom, Dick and Harry to date his pink-ribboned darlings—but he was no average Tom, Dick or Harry. “Yes, ma’am, I have come about Cricket.”

  She looked him over again, then seemed to make a decision. “Please seat yourself in the den. I will let my husband, Reed, know that you are calling.” She looked down at his boots, then at her white rug—he could almost feel her suppressing a mental shiver—then seemed relieved when he said, “I’ll just wait right here, ma’am.”

  “Please call me Eileen,” she said, then drifted down the hall.

  “Whoa,” he murmured to himself as he watched Mrs. Jasper depart. No wonder Cricket loved her tea shop and gingerbread house. It had life and warmth—this house was a displaced part of the Arctic Circle. He was shocked when Cricket and two men came down the hall, followed by her mother.

  “Jack! What are you doing here?” Cricket asked, not sounding as thrilled as he might have hoped. Still, he hadn’t told her that he was coming, and she was one of those independent women who thought they had to be in control of everything. This time, he was going to be in control, he thought, right before he found himself lying on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. This seems to happen a lot around Cricket, he thought, noting the blue frescoes on the ceiling surrounding the chandelier and the throbbing in his jaw.

  “Thad!” Cricket hurried to help Jack up. “Why did you do that?”

  Jack wondered the same, but he also knew. In fact, he completely understood her brother’s reaction. “It’s all right,” he said gamely, sitting up. “I’m fine.” He pushed Cricket’s hands away from him and got to his feet. “You only get one shot at me, buster, and I figure I had that one coming.” He glared at Cricket’s brother and father. “Be warned, next time I will send your ass into the next county.”

  “Oh, dear,” Eileen said. “Gentlemen, let’s not fight. I’m sure we can solve this problem without violence.”

  “Mother!” Cricket exclaimed. “There is no problem! Thad, if you do anything like that again, you’ll not be an uncle to my babies! Come on, Jack,” she said, pulling him into the white room despite his boots. “Sit down.”

  “Don’t coddle me,” he said impatiently. “I’ve been thrown from small bulls that did more damage than your brother did.” He raised his chin at the other males in the room, deciding to simply skip the niceties altogether. “I came to introduce myself. We’ve met, and clearly we won’t be sharing a table at the holidays, which is fine by me.” He stared at each of them before placing his hat back on his head. “Thank you for your hospitality. I’ll see myself out.”

  “Jack!” Cricket said, following him down the hall. “Be reasonable.”

  He didn’t answer, just kept walking. He’d been through a lot for this woman, but he wasn’t going to be told to be reasonable or any other silliness. She’d put him on hold, she’d run off on him, she’d given him the silent treatment, all of which he’d been very patient with.

  If Cricket wanted him, she knew where to find him.

  * * *

  Time had never crept so slowly for Jack. By mid-June, Jack knew Cricket wasn’t going to look him up. By July, he knew she had no plans at all to even spare him a phone call. By August, he was hanging on to hope only by his bare knuckles.

  Even Josiah didn’t ask him anymore about Cricket, nor did his brothers. Occasionally, he knew that Suzy, Laura or Priscilla went to see her in Fort Wylie, but they shared no news with him or their spouses. He wasn’t sure why, but the deacon had deemed herself totally off limits, and he had to tell himself every day that he could lead a horse to water but for darn sure he couldn’t make it drink, and right now, Cricket was in no mood to be led anywhere. He’d just dig himself into a deep hole with her, and that was no way to start off a parenting relationship. But waiting was the hardest thing he’d ever done by far. It was agonizing.

  He worked on getting the barns pulled together. He inspected the pecan trees, wondering about harvesting them into some sort of crop. Only a few of them really needed spraying; most of them were healthy. He went and watched a
rodeo in Lonely Hearts Station but didn’t participate, all the will gone out of him. A man needed fire to compete, and he knew he was on a low burn for something else.

  He kept Josiah company and got to know his brothers’ children, the most fun he could remember having in a long time. The years seemed to melt away, for all of them. He thought he hadn’t realized how much he missed them, but he knew in his heart his brothers were the only humans on earth who knew him better than he knew himself. Sometimes he wondered about all the years they’d lost, but then, he knew that everything had a purpose. So he didn’t let himself think about the lost years and focused instead on the found ones.

  He went down to the guesthouse every few nights and ate dinner with Gisella. The part of him that was sad that she’d left began to blossom with good thoughts and new memories. He grilled on her patio, and they sat on the wicker love seat chatting about things that mattered to no one but them. Gisella talked about her life in France, and how she’d known she would one day return home to Texas. He learned that her parents had passed away, but she still had many cousins, aunts and uncles. She treasured the years she’d spent with her mother and father but had sorely missed her boys. She’d known Josiah would never let her take the boys with her to France, and she’d known she could not stay with Josiah.

  Jack knew all too well how his father could force a person between a rock and a hard place, with nowhere to turn but away. The anger he’d kept burning for so long inside him slowly banked, the fire out for good.

  The only advice his mother had for him about Cricket was to let her come to him, which is what his father must have done concerning Gisella. Only, years later, when Gisella had come home, they were simply friends and nothing more, which suited everyone. Jack had no intention of being just friends with Cricket. He had fallen too hard for her, too much in love, to let her turn their relationship into friendship. He’d wait—but he also knew his waiting had a shelf life. Sooner or later, his babies would make her call him. So he waited, enjoying his nieces and nephews, planning a business with his brothers, watching his father heal under Sara’s ministrations with some amazement. Josiah married Sara one Sunday under a canopy of pecan trees, with the setting sun behind them for decoration, and everyone threw birdseed at them and ate cake baked by Sara herself. Cricket didn’t come to the wedding, but she sent a basket of teas and kitchen goodies, which Sara loved because she was always baking.

  Jack gritted his teeth and told himself his waiting wasn’t forever, even if it seemed as if it was.

  And then suddenly, on a Monday night in late September, his cell phone rang and he saw it was Cricket. He felt his heart rate skid and then escalate like no bull riding had ever jacked his blood. “Hello?”

  “Jack, it’s Cricket.”

  “Hi,” he said, putting down the sponge he’d been oiling a saddle with. “What’s up?”

  “I wondered if...you’d like to come visit.”

  Would he? This was the invitation he’d waited months to receive! “If that’s what you want,” he said, heading toward the barn sink to wash his hands.

  “I do,” she said. “And you might want to bring a change of clothes.”

  “Oh?” His brows raised, but he masked his surprise.

  “Yes,” she said, “I’m having a Cesarean section tomorrow, and I know you’ll probably want to be around for the birth of your children.”

  He jogged toward his house. “All right,” he said. “Will you be at your house or your parents’?”

  “I’ll be at my house,” she said. “Come as soon as you can, please.”

  She hung up. He stared at his silent phone for a second, then snapped it off. “Holy smokes!” he exclaimed. “I’m about to be a dad!”

  * * *

  Cricket was huge. She knew she looked quite unlike anything Jack might remember about her. It felt as if babies were popping out all over, taking up residence inside her thin frame, squeezing her out of shape from every side. This was not the way she wanted him to see her—but she had no choice. If they were to have any future together, she knew she couldn’t keep him from the birth of his children.

  She’d thought long and hard about when she felt safe enough to allow him back into her life. The time had never been right. She missed him, but she had also worried that nothing about their worlds could ever be right together. She’d procrastinated long enough that suddenly, she found herself on bed rest.

  Then she hadn’t wanted to call him, hadn’t wanted him to see her in a vulnerable state. She grew like a snowball going downhill, picking up size and girth as it rolled, and her vanity wouldn’t allow her to surrender her figure to his eyes.

  Then, today, Dr. Suzanne said she could wait no longer. The babies were as big as they could be inside her small frame; everything was straining. She’d held them inside her as long as she possibly could.

  Cricket had no choice but to call Jack and let him know he was about to be a father. He’d sounded so shocked—and delighted.

  She folded the last of her things for the hospital, smiled at the three white bassinets lined up in the nursery and jumped when the doorbell rang. Her heart zipped nervously inside her—she recognized Jack’s impatient call through the door.

  “Cricket! It’s Jack!”

  Slowly, she opened the door. It was hard to meet his gaze. Shyness swept her. Time apart had made her memory of him sharper, and yet somehow seeing him again brought home hard how handsome, how magnetic he was in person.

  “Wow,” he said, his gaze dropping to her stomach. His eyes were wide. “I—you’re beautiful, Cricket.” He handed her a bouquet of pink roses he’d been holding, blooms down, by his side, an afterthought he’d completely forgotten about in the shock of seeing her.

  “I’m huge,” she said shyly, not meaning to sound apologetic, but that’s how her words sounded.

  “Yeah,” he agreed. “How do you feel?”

  “Just huge. Come on in.” She led him inside, feeling fat, fat, fat. The thin figure he’d once admired had certainly disappeared under several pounds of babies, and yet she wouldn’t change a thing.

  “You sit down,” he said. “I’ll take care of everything. Should you even be walking around?”

  “Jack, I sent Mother home for acting just like that. And she needed some rest. I want you here, but I don’t want to be hovered over. All right?”

  He seemed to hesitate. “I don’t know if I can promise you not to hover. It just seems like you need to be resting. I almost feel bad, Cricket, for what I’ve done to you.”

  She couldn’t help a smile. “Believe it or not, this is the most amazing thing that’s ever happened to me. I couldn’t be happier.”

  “You couldn’t be more beautiful,” he said, “unless you were sitting or lying down, at which point I could relax.”

  It was a large hint and she realized how nervous he was. “If I sit, will you not pace?”

  “Was it that obvious?”

  “You’re like a tightly wound jack-in-the-box.” She grimaced. “I didn’t mean to make a play on your name. Sorry about that.”

  “It’s pretty much true. Suddenly I feel as if I have springs attached to my muscles, making me jumpy.” He sat, his gaze searching her face. “You seem calm, though.”

  “I am.” Somehow she felt better just by his presence. Her mother had been such a huge help, but as the big day neared, Eileen had begun to get nervous, antsy. They’d started to get on each other’s nerves, which Cricket hated, because she could tell her mother was trying so hard to be helpful. Finally realizing that she, too, was tight and feeling guilty about Jack, she sent her mother home. It had been the right thing to do. “I would have called you sooner,” she said, “but there was so much I needed to do on my own.”

  “As long as I’m here for the big show,” he said, “I’m content. Excited, even. Scared. Lots of emotions.”

  “T
here’s some wine in the cabinet,” Cricket said, but Jack shook his head.

  “No, thanks. I intend to share every emotion with you.”

  “Jack,” she said suddenly, “I should have called to tell you how sorry I was that Thad punched you.”

  “Forget about it. I already have.”

  She so much wanted him to give her family a second chance, and yet they had treated him rather dreadfully. Looking into Jack’s warm gaze, Cricket wondered if they could ever start over on new ground. She really wanted that.

  “Hey, I’m serious,” he said. “It wasn’t important.”

  “You never called,” she said.

  “I understood you were going through a lot.”

  “Yes, but my family should have been more courteous.”

  “Nah,” he said. “You’re their only little girl.”

  “Well, Thad wants to make it up to you.”

  He looked at her, his brows raising, a little suspicion in his gaze. “Yeah?”

  She nodded. “He wants to take you up for a jump.”

  “Ah. And does he want to pack my parachute for me?”

  She looked at him. “I don’t blame you for feeling that way.”

  He sighed. “I’m sorry. I know your brother doesn’t want to push me out of a high-flying plane with a malfunctioning parachute. He’s honest enough to at least try to kill me in person.”

  “Jack!” She knew he was teasing, but she couldn’t help feeling protective of her brother. “You don’t know Thad. He’s a sweetie, really. He was so sorry about punching you.”

  He shrugged. “I’ll pass on the jump, if it’s all the same. Unless Thad wants to do some bonding over bull riding,” he said, perking up. “That’d be a great way for us to celebrate those brother-in-law bonds.”

  “Maybe we’ll wait on the bonding,” she said.

  “That’s probably a good idea for now,” he replied. “I’m going to be very busy for the next few years. I don’t suppose you’d allow me to touch your stomach?” he asked, his voice wistful. “I’m awfully curious to meet my new children.”