Ignoring the look of outrage on his sister’s face, Colt nodded. “I would love to meet your sister. But more importantly, I’d like to meet your mother.”
“Well, you can’t.” Jesse shoved his hands in the front pockets of his jeans. “She’s at work. But my sister is right over there.”
He pointed across the street to where a teenage girl with glasses stood behind a stroller with a blanket-bundled baby inside and a toddler holding onto one of the
curved handles. When the teenage girl’s eyes narrowed on them, Jesse suddenly acted like a cat with a firecracker attached to its tail.
“Then again, maybe another time.” He raced across the street before Colt could stop him.
“Where did you meet that ornery kid?” Shirlene asked as she sat back down and adjusted the blanket around her.
“He came to the garage.” Colt watched as the girl lit into Jesse, her gaze flickering across to Colt and back again before she whirled the stroller around and headed down the street. Jesse took the hand of the toddler and followed at a slower pace, glancing back only once to wave at Colt.
“He lives out on Grover Road,” Colt said.
“Figures.” Shirlene snorted. “Ornery kids come from Grover Road.”
As the kids disappeared around a corner, Colt looked back over at her and grinned. “They sure do.”
Colt had about a million questions to ask his sister about Hope’s decision to keep the baby. But about that time, Sheriff Winslow’s patrol car came around the corner of Elm with siren blaring to start the parade. And figuring he had plenty of time for answers, Colt leaned back against the SUV to watch the parade. It turned out to be better than he’d remembered. Even without helium balloons or Broadway numbers, Bramble’s beat out Macy’s for sheer entertainment.
In the first few minutes, Sheriff Winslow snagged the gaping pocket of a lodge clown with the bumper of his patrol car and dragged him halfway down the parade route before Rye Pickett grabbed one of the clown’s big red shoes and pulled him lose. Then some idiot put the
Four-H Club in front of the Jazzercising Ladies from Shady Meadows Retirement Village, and those old gals put on quite a show, trying to keep the green tennis balls on the ends of their walkers away from the huge steaming piles left behind by the horses. The marching band never broke stride, not even when Ms. Murphy’s toy terrier attacked a band girl’s flag and was whipped around for a full minute of “Love Shack” before he let go.
Luckily, Rossie Owen’s grandson, Jimmy, was one hell of an outfielder and had no trouble reaching up and snagging the tiny dog before he hit the ground.
Finally the football team arrived, crowded onto a flatbed trailer covered in ugly purple flowers and huge Styrofoam guns that pointed out in all directions.
“What the hell?” Colt breathed, unable to take his eyes off the hideous float.
“It was the homecoming float,” Shirlene stated as if that explained everything. And it did. For as long as Colt could remember, the homecoming floats had been damned hideous.
“Hey, Shirlene!” Austin Reeves, who cockily straddled the Colt Peacemaker, yelled to her from the float.
“Hey yourself, Austin!” Shirlene waved back. “I guess you think you’re a stud now?”
“Pretty much!” Austin waved his straw cowboy hat over his head and released a big cowboy yee-haw, which had his teammates laughing and the crowd cheering.
Austin reminded Colt of a dark-headed Slate, a conquering hero who had the town by the tail. And Colt couldn’t fault the kid for that. Nor could he fault Slate for enjoying all the glory that came with being a winning football coach in Texas. Standing with the rest of the
coaches in the back of the pickup following the float, Slate smiled and waved like the golden-haired boy he was.
As the truck passed, he looked down at Colt. At one time, the situation would’ve been demeaning—the exalted hero looking down at “the poor Lomax kid.” But now Colt realized that they were two different men who filled two different spots on this big rotating ball. And neither spot was any better or any worse than the other.
He nodded, and Slate nodded back.
A split second later, Colt’s gaze got caught on Harley Sutter’s convertible Cadillac, following the truck. Hope sat on the trunk of the Cadillac with her feet on the backseat, tossing out candy to the kids who raced along beside her.
Even after the news about the baby, Colt had thought Hope would be long gone by now—off to Hollywood to accomplish another one of her goals. But instead, there she was, looking much as she did twelve years earlier when riding atop the homecoming float. Her face was flushed with cold, her long hair blew out behind her, and her smile was bright as she waved to the whistling crowd.
“She’s something else, isn’t she,” Shirlene said.
“Yes.” Colt straightened and tried to restrain himself from running out into the street and jerking her from the car, a good half a block away, so he could ask her about her decision to keep the baby.
“Faith looks as pretty as a picture and that fat little pig sitting between them is a riot. But, if you notice, everyone’s eyes are on Hope.”
Since Colt hadn’t even noticed Faith, or Sherman sitting next to Hope, he had to agree with his sister.
“It’s a strange phenomenon,” Shirlene continued.
“One I still haven’t figured out. Somewhere between reciting Bible scriptures in church and winning ribbons at the county fair, Hope became something more than just a member of the town. She became a shining beacon of everything this town stands for and all its dreams for the future.”
Colt pulled his eyes off the Cadillac and turned to his sister, although he couldn’t think of a thing to say. His mind was too consumed with the truth Shirlene had spoken, a truth he hadn’t understood until now: Hope’s life hadn’t been any easier than his. In fact, it had been harder. While he had had the weight of a mother and sister on his shoulders, Hope had the weight of an entire town.
“Do you love her?” Shirlene asked.
The question didn’t shock him as much as he thought it would.
“I’m not sure I know what love is.”
“Bullshit, Colt Lomax. You know exactly what love is, you’re just too afraid to give yourself over to it. Too afraid you’ll end up like Mama. But what you refuse to see is that love didn’t put Mama on the road to self-destruction, Colt. Mama did that all by herself. And while it’s always been easier to blame our crappy childhood on a twist of fate, fate doesn’t control our lives…” She leaned up. “We do.”
How in the hell did his little sister get so smart? And so pushy? Colt wondered.
“It might be too late,” he said. “She’s got her heart set on making it big in California.”
Shirlene snorted. “Does that look like a woman who has her heart set on being anywhere but right where she is?”
Colt stared at the laughing woman who waved and
yelled out greetings to everyone she passed. The sight evoked the same wealth of emotions it always had, but this time he took his baby sister’s advice and accepted love for what it was: a perfect emotion in an imperfect world.
“And what if she thinks I’m not good enough for her?” he said, more to himself than Shirlene.
“You’ll never know until you try,” Shirlene shot back. She paused. “And by the way, if you ever tell her the things I said about her, I’ll deny every word.”
Colt might’ve laughed if the Cadillac hadn’t finally reached them. Everything inside him stilled when Hope’s gaze caught his.
After searching for it for the last few weeks, it was finally there in the deep-blue depths of her eyes—something he only thought he’d see again in an old photograph. And just that quickly, Colt’s heart jumped up to his throat as if he was free-falling from a fourteen-thousand-foot drop, and he wished he had a cowboy hat to wave over his head as he yelled yee-haw.
He wasn’t aware of moving out to the curb. Or stepping into the street. He wasn’t aware of anything but those eyes, which mirrored the same emotions churning deep inside of him.
“Colt?” Hope’s voice penetrated his love bubble. “What are you doing?”
Finally becoming aware of his surroundings, he realized he was jogging next to the car. A younger Colt might’ve cared about looking like a fool in front of the entire town of Bramble, especially when some smartass yelled out, “Hey, Colt! If you’re supposed to be a clown, you forgot your pooper-scooper!”
But this lovesick Colt couldn’t have cared less.
“I need to talk to you,” he said as he ran.
“Now?”
It was a good question, since they were in the middle of a parade.
“Yes. Right now.”
She nodded as she leaned up over the front seat. “Stop the car, Kenny.”
“Now, Hope, you know I can’t do that,” Kenny said. “Harley gave us strict orders to keep it at ten miles an hour. No more, and no less.”
“I don’t give a shit what Harley said, Kenny,” Colt said as he placed a hand on the side door. “Stop the damned car.”
“Please, Kenny,” Faith joined in. “Colt needs to talk with Hope.”
“No, sir, I ain’t stoppin’.” Kenny shook his head. “Not when it sounds like Colt wants to punch my head in.”
“Well, if he doesn’t punch your head in, Kenny Gene, I sure as heck will,” Hope yelled, loud enough to draw the attention of the clown following the car in a little battery-powered Jeep. The hugely exaggerated foam cowboy hat and thick face paint couldn’t camouflage the handlebar mustache or the mayor’s big belly, swelling over the small steering wheel.
“Now, Colt,” Harley said. “You sure have earned my respect in the last few weeks, but I still can’t let you disrupt the parade with any more of your delinquent shenanigans.”
“I need to talk with Hope,” Colt said through gritted teeth.
Harley drove around in tiny circles behind the Cadillac. “Well, we only have less than a mile until we get to the school. You can talk to Hope then.”
Except Colt didn’t want to talk to Hope when he got to the school.
“Now, Harley. I need to talk to her now.”
“What is going on here?” Rachel Dean pedaled up on her unicycle in face paint and a curly red wig, her man hands waggling in front of her. Colt had to give it to her. For a large woman, she was extremely skilled on the one-tire bike.
“Colt is bothering Hope again,” Harley explained, as he tooted the horn of the little red Jeep and fired off a couple rounds from his cap gun.
“He is not bothering me!” Hope turned around and yelled at him.
“Now, Hope,” Harley said. “I realize you’ve always had a soft spot for the underdog, and no one is more of an underdog than Colt Lomax—being how he was falsely accused and sent to prison and all. But I won’t condone any more pranks.”
For a moment, Colt thought about lifting Hope from the car. And if she hadn’t been pregnant, he might’ve tried it. But the car was going a little too fast and the soles of his cowboy boots were a little too slick for him to chance it.
Sheriff Winslow pulled up behind with lights flashing and leaned out of his window. “Is there a problem?”
“No problem, Sam.” Rachel backed up and then went forward as she tried to keep the same pace as the car. “Colt is just pullin’ another prank on Hope.”
“I’m not pulling a prank! I want to ask her something, is all.”
“Well, go ahead and ask her, son,” Harley said. “At this point, no one’s stoppin’ you.”
“Fine!” For a runner, he suddenly felt extremely out
of shape. His heart was beating like the base drum up ahead, and his head reeled from lack of oxygen. But it didn’t seem to matter anymore. All that mattered was the woman who looked at him with big questioning eyes.
“Hope,” he started.
“Yes?” She scooted along the backseat as close as she could get to him. The baby pig snuffled and followed her, his snout pushing beneath her arm until his head rested on her lap.
Colt cleared his throat, but before he could speak, he stepped in a steaming pile left by the Four-H Club and almost took a header.
“Colt!” Hope grabbed his coat and held on while he got his footing. And once he was keeping pace again, she prompted. “So you were saying?”
He took a deep breath and dove in. “Marry me, Hope.”
Up ahead, the horn of the semi truck pulling the float blasted, drowning out his words.
“What?” Hope leaned closer. “What did you say?”
“He said, ‘Larry needs soap,’ ” Rachel supplied on her way around the car.
“Larry?” Kenny Gene questioned. “Is that Larry Lines who lives south of Big Springs? Because he empties septic tanks for a livin’, and soap ain’t gonna get rid of that smell.”
“He didn’t say ‘Larry needs soap,’ ” Harley jumped in. “He said, ‘Ferry the boat.’ ”
“Well, what in the heck does that mean?” Rachel asked, on her way around the other side.
“I said, marry me Hope!” Colt blurted the words out as loudly as one of Hope’s hog calls. It was quite a feat, considering he was still running. There was a long,
painful silence before everyone around them burst out laughing.
“And you said you wasn’t pullin’ no prank!” Rachel executed a jerky figure eight. “Why that’s the biggest joke I’ve heard in a while. Hope Scroggs marrying Colt Lomax.” She shook her orange corkscrews while Kenny banged on the steering wheel.