Chapter 15 #2
He looked down at the celery. “Well, I don’t want this if I can’t have peanut butter.”
“Give it here,” April said, and she practically snatched the vegetable stick from him. “I don’t get why cowboys can’t eat green things.”
“I was going to eat it,” he said, glancing at Louis in time to see him grinning. “Yeah, this is really funny, right?”
Louis burst out laughing then, and April gave him such a fond smile that Dawson really wanted his question answered.
“Are you two getting pretty serious then?” he asked. April’s smile dried right up, but Louis simply grinned for both of them.
“Yes, sir,” he said, giving April back the fondness she’d bestowed upon him. “I really like Miss Rhinehart here, and if she’d just stop putting me off, I’d probably have a diamond on her finger already.”
“Louis,” she said, her voice dark. “Don’t tell him that.”
“Why not? It’s the truth.”
“Because then he’ll tell my daddy, and the whole world will be flipped inside out.” April threw Dawson a look that pleaded with him not to say anything.
“You’ve asked her to marry you?” Dawson asked.
“And you said no?” Caroline chimed in perfectly, as if they’d rehearsed it though they hadn’t.
“Yes,” both April and Louis said together.
April arranged the last of the berries around the fruit dip, which was one of Dawson’s favorite things.
Cream cheese with pineapple chunks and juice, a touch of sugar, and mandarin orange juice.
Oh, and Caroline threw in a packet of Truly Lime too, and Dawson could drink the stuff, no fruit needed.
“We’ve only been dating for six months, and I told him I wasn’t going to get engaged for at least a year.”
Dawson gaped at his niece. “Sometimes you just fall in love faster,” he said.
“And sometimes, you want to make sure that the other person knows what they’re getting into.” She shot him a look with slightly narrowed eyes.
“April, you’re my favorite person on the planet,” he said, his voice low but powerful.
“Yeah, I know, Uncle Daws. But that’s because you’re a black cat who’s been rained on all day too.”
Caroline burst out laughing while Dawson stood there blinking. Louis snickered with her, and Dawson marveled at everything in life in that moment.
“Well, I think you’re a delight,” Louis said. He swept a kiss along April’s hairline. “Now, where does this veggie tray go?”
“Out on the deck, please,” Caroline said, still laughing a little bit.
Once Louis had left, Dawson leaned over the peninsula a little bit. “But you really like him too, right, bug?”
She nodded, and oh, a sniffle followed.
“Let’s do breakfast this week,” Dawson said. April nodded again, kept her head down, and picked up the fruit tray.
“I’ll take this outside too, Aunt Caroline.”
“Okay, sweets.” She watched April go, as did Dawson, and then he looked at his wife. “You made her cry.”
“I made her cry?” Dawson shook his head. “That girl makes herself cry.” He scoffed and watched as April stepped out onto the deck. “She’s in love with him and terrified about it.”
“Who’s in love with whom?”
Dawson whipped his attention to the other side of the kitchen, where none other than April’s mother now stood. “No one,” he said to Zona. “Wilder and Savannah.”
Zona scoffed and continued into the house with the laundry basket of rolls she’d brought, Momma right behind her with one overflowing with bags of chips. “Here’s the bread, Caroline.”
“Thank you so much, Zona.”
“All right, all right, all right!”
Dawson grinned as his younger brother’s voice filled the house.
“Your favorite brother-slash-uncle-slash-cowboy is here!” He appeared in the mouth of the hallway that led from the front of the house, his wife’s hand in his.
“Brandon,” Momma said. “You’re yelling indoors.”
He grinned at her and wrapped her in a one-armed hug. “It’s a party, Momma, and we made it off the homestead, and Lenore isn’t sick today.” He beamed around at everyone in the house. “So I’m celebrating a lot more than my one-year-old nephew.”
Dawson went around the counter and hugged his brother and sister-in-law. “Congratulations,” he said. “Caroline said you’re due in July?”
“The very last day,” Lenore said, and she did wear some extra lines around her eyes. Dawson stopped everything right then and there and said a quick prayer that she’d get the rest she needed, so she could continue to be healthy and could carry her baby to term.
“Dawson, we need a couple of towels out here,” Louis called, and Dawson found himself getting whiplashed back toward the sliding glass door.
“Towels?”
“Here.” Caroline threw him some, but Dawson fumbled them and sent them to the floor. He bent to pick them up as someone else came in the front door, and the very distinct sound of claws on his hardwood met his ears. That meant Mitch and his hearing dogs had arrived.
Dawson left Caroline and the others to greet him and Lacy, and he went out onto the back deck.
More cowboys and their families had arrived while he’d been inside, as he found Finn and his youngest son standing with Colt and his little boy.
They chatted while Edith walked across the backyard to where Misty had a whole crowd of children around her.
Gal, Sequoia, her own sons Diesel and Dallas, all of Ollie’s kids except his youngest, Sari, and even Wrangler. Angel and Savannah were out there too, and Dawson supposed he should be glad for a nest of snakes if it would keep people entertained.
“We just had a ranch dressing mishap,” Louis said, and he took the towels from Dawson. “I got it.”
“Thanks,” he said, catching sight of another arrival over the railing of the deck. Ty and Winnie had just arrived, and he paused at the end of the cobblestones, a frown between his eyes.
“You can come in the house too,” Dawson said, heading over to the railing to talk to them. “There are tables and chairs out here, but the house is open, and Caroline’s almost ready with the sandwich bar.”
Ty looked up and tipped his cowboy hat to Dawson. “Thanks,” he said. Then he nodded for Winnie to go back the way they’d come, and Dawson simply watched as Ty limped over the uneven surface.
The moment Ty and Winnie went back into the garage, Conrad and Glory Rose came out. She carried their baby, who was only five weeks old now, in a big, puffy blanket.
Dawson left the deck so he could mingle with those who’d come while he’d been begging for peanut butter in his own house. “Hey, you guys.” He hugged Conrad and swept a kiss along Glory’s cheek. “How’s Chance doing?”
“So much better with his new formula,” Glory Rose said, beaming down at her baby. “Caroline said she’d have a playpen for me?”
“Sure, inside,” Dawson said. “But good luck putting him in there.”
“What do you mean?” Glory Rose looked at him blankly.
“I mean, my momma is in there, and so is Arizona. They’re not going to let a newborn baby languish in a playpen.” He chuckled. “My momma would love to hold him.”
Glory Rose’s concern dissolved into a smile. “Sounds good to me.” She looked at Conrad and added, “I’m going to run him inside. It’s still a little windy.”
“Yep.” Conrad kept scanning the backyard as his wife left. “Have you seen Sari? She came with JJ and Ruby.”
“Yeah, she’s out with the snakes,” Dawson said, indicating the large pod of women and children against his back fence.
“The snakes?” Conrad looked at Dawson with concern.
“I guess I’ve got some out there,” he said. “Misty’s boys love snakes.”
“Yeah, I remember loving them too.” He grinned and then yawned. “Tell me I’m going to get more than four hours of sleep at some point.” He started across the grass and then up the steps, and Dawson went with him.
“Yeah, you will,” Dawson said. “They make up for it by being adorable.”
Conrad nodded, his eyes crinkling with happiness. “He is pretty adorable.”
Ty came out onto the deck, a look of relief in his eyes. “Yeah, we can sit out here,” he said. “Look; Dawson’s got a heater.”
“Yeah,” he said. “And it’s on the lowest setting, so if it gets colder, you can turn it up.” He grinned at Ty, and then Winnie. “Thanks for coming, you guys. I know it’s kind of ridiculous, but Bronco is our last and he’ll only turn one once.”
At least that was what Caroline had told him when she’d proposed this idea of having a huge shindig for Bronco’s first birthday. If everyone did this for their children, they’d be going to parties every other day.
“I love a good party,” Winnie said.
“Yeah, she does,” Ty deadpanned, and Dawson saw two more opposites standing in front of him. Hey, he and Caroline had made it work so far, and so did plenty of other people.
Winnie wore bright purple pants with a black plaid woven through them, and a white sweater. She carried a wrapped present that had construction trucks all over it. “Caroline said the present table was out here.” She glanced around. “But I don’t see it.”
“It’s at the bottom of the steps,” Dawson said, reaching for it. “I can take it. You didn’t have to bring anything.”
“Coming through,” Duke called, and the three of them made way for him. He carried an overflowing laundry basket of gifts, all of which had been bagged or wrapped in blue paper of some kind.
“What is happening?” Dawson asked.
“My wife and our mother,” Duke grumped at him. “I have another basket like this in my truck.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I can assure you, I’m not.”
Ty chuckled, and Dawson swung his attention to him. “Aren’t families great?”
Dawson’s disbelief and slight irritation melted away. “Yeah,” he said, listening to a round of laughter from inside, and turning toward the excited calls of the children out by the fence.
Everywhere he looked, he found someone he loved—and someone who loved him.
“Yeah,” he said. “Families are the best.”
And things only got better when Caroline announced, “We’re having cake first, everyone! Cake! First!” She moved by him and waved her arm to everyone out in the yard. “Come on up here and let’s sing for Bronco, and then we’ll eat.”