Chapter Nineteen
Carly unloaded Nieve into the waiting stable the day of the Dinosaur Days Rodeo. She had a couple of hours before she was expected to perform, and she was supposed to meet Jesse and Oscar beforehand, but she felt uneasy about leaving her prized stallion unattended.
“Hey, Carly.” Remi’s fiancé, Shane Corey, walked up to her. Beside him was a tall, handsome Black man who shared a lot of the same facial features. “Have you met my brother, Ellis?”
“I haven’t.” She turned to Ellis. “But I’ve met your fiancée, Tiffany, a couple of times before,” she said, shaking Ellis’s hand.
Ellis smiled. “She does make an impression.”
“She does indeed.” Carly laughed. “She also makes the most beautiful flower arrangements I’ve ever seen. Is she here?”
Shane pointed toward the exit of the indoor arena. “Remi’s helping her sell flowers.”
“Oh…” She looked in the direction he indicated before glancing back at Nieve.
“He’ll be safe here,” Ellis assured her. “Shane and I are volunteer security. No one’s going to be messing with the horses under our watch.”
“Yeah, Nieve’s in good hands,” Shane added. “Remi made me promise.”
Carly relaxed before giving Nieve a kiss goodbye on his forehead. “I’ll be back soon, my sweet boy, and then we’ll put on a show.” She turned back to the brothers. “Thank you.”
“Go have some fun,” Shane said.
She waved goodbye and headed outside. She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the sunlight.
The town had gone all out with its dinosaur theme.
There were stands selling dinosaur toys and fake bones.
A food truck sold dinosaur-shaped cookies.
In the distance, she could see people sumo wrestling in inflatable dino costumes.
The streetlights had been turned into crepe-paper trees with cardboard cutouts of large eyes peering out.
A gunshot went off, and she whipped around with her hand over her heart. She heard a loud cheer go through the air, and she craned her head in time to see pairs of people rolling hay bales down a track, clearly racing each other.
Once she realized that was where the noise had come from and that she wasn’t in any danger, Carly walked toward where she was supposed to be meeting Jesse and Oscar.
People waved to her as she went, and she recognized a few of them in return.
It hit Carly in that moment that in the few months that she’d lived in Tenacity, it had become home to her.
“Carly,” a familiar voice called out. She swung around. Joy sent her hurrying toward the group approaching: Amy and Josh, who was pushing Josephine in her stroller, and, to her surprise, her parents.
She threw her arms around her mother and father. “I didn’t know you were coming to Tenacity.”
“We missed you girls,” her mom said.
“Plus, your sister told us you were participating in the rodeo today,” her dad added. “You know we’d never miss a chance to watch you girls perform.”
She beamed at both of them, taking in her dad’s weathered face, the new strands of gray in her mom’s hair. She really needed to make more of an effort to see her family—all her family.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Carly said. “I’ve missed you too.”
“During our last phone conversation you had mentioned a boy you were dating,” her mom reminded her. “We’d love to meet him.”
Carly’s lips quirked. “He’s thirty-eight, Mom. Hardly a boy.”
Her mom waved that away. “You’re all kids to me.”
“I hope we get to meet him while we’re here,” her dad said. “I’ve been planning what I want to say to him. After all, it’s every father’s right to give a boy his daughter is dating ‘The Talk.’”
Josh winced. “Maybe you should hold off on that, Arthur. I still have nightmares about the one you gave me.”
Amy cocked her head. “Do tell.”
Josh shook his head adamantly.
Arthur folded his large, muscled arms over his chest. “I made him promise to treat you right…or else.”
“It was the ‘or else’ that gave me nightmares,” Josh muttered. “Especially when he went into detail about how he’d cut off—”
“Just doing my fatherly duty,” their dad said.
“Well, I promise you that you can meet Jesse and his son later,” Carly told her parents. “Actually… I’m supposed to meet up with them now.”
“Go on, then,” her mom said. “We’re staying at Amy’s for the week, so we’ll have plenty of time to catch up and meet your fella.”
“I’ll see you later,” she promised. She hurried through the crowd and continued on her way to town hall. She spotted Oscar first, standing on one of the steps wearing his noise-canceling headphones. As a large man in front of her moved aside, she finally saw Jesse.
He looked better than ever in a blue-and-gray flannel, jeans that looked made for him, and his trusty cowboy hat.
“Hi, you two!” she said as she ran up to them.
“Hi yourself!” Jesse said. He bent down and gave her a sweet kiss on the lips. Someone gagged, and they pulled apart to see Oscar looking at them with a fake disgusted look on his face.
“Gross,” he said. “I don’t want to see my dad making out.”
“Get used to it, kid,” Jesse replied.
He wrapped an arm around Carly’s waist, and they started to head to the center of the festival. A couple of teens around Oscar’s age came up to them.
“Hey, Oscar,” one of the guys said.
“Hi,” he replied, practically glowing. He looked at his dad and Carly. “This is Jace and Kevin. They’re on the team. Guys, this is my dad and his girlfriend—”
“Carly Hawkins,” the one introduced as Jace said. He grinned at her. “Oscar told us about you and your world records. It’s cool you’re doing Tenacity’s rodeo.”
“Thank you. I’m glad to do it.” Carly felt Jesse’s arm stiffen around her, but when she looked at him, he was staring at the teens. Perhaps he was being overly worried again about his son.
“Some of the guys are about to sumo wrestle,” Kevin told Oscar. “You want to go watch?”
“Oh, I don’t—” Jesse started to say, and Oscar immediately started to tense.
Carly squeezed Jesse’s arm. “That sounds like an amazing time. Oscar, you have your phone on you, right?”
“Yes,” he replied before looking hopefully at his dad.
Jesse let out a breath through his nose. “Fine. But make sure you’re in the arena for Carly’s show.”
“We’ll be there,” Jace told them. “None of us want to miss that.”
Jesse clasped Oscar on the shoulder. “You’d better get going, then. You don’t want to miss your friends wrestling.”
Oscar beamed. He and the other two headed over to where a couple of boys were putting on the inflatable dinosaur costumes.
“You did a good thing, you know,” Carly told Jesse as he eyed Oscar laughing with the other boys.
He gave Carly a sheepish smile. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him this happy. I owe that to you.”
Carly shook her head. “You owe it to yourself. You do an amazing job with him.”
“Thank you.” He caressed her cheek in his hand before giving her another kiss, soft and gentle but both still managing to reach her soul.
They continued to walk through town, taking in the different sights. At one point, she saw Michelle Corey standing in front of a large bouncy house. Above the play station was a banner that read Sponsored by Little Cowpokes Daycare Center. Carly waved at Michelle, and the other woman waved back.
“I want to speak with Michelle really quick,” Carly told Jesse.
“Sure,” he replied.
They walked hand in hand as they made their way over to the woman.
“Hi, Michelle,” Carly said, giving her a brief hug. “Everything looks amazing!”
“It does,” Michelle replied. “I wish I could take credit, but a lot of people put in the work to make this day happen.”
Her eyes settled on a good-looking man who stood on the other side of the lot, texting on his phone, his eyebrows scrunching together.
Michelle sighed before turning her attention back to Carly and Jesse. “Are you ready for the rodeo? I keep hearing people talk about it whenever they walk by or drop off their kids.”
“I am,” Carly affirmed. “Nieve and I have been practicing all week.”
“You’ll do great,” Michelle replied as a little girl with blond curls and a tear-stained face came up to them.
“Ms. Michelle,” the girl said, pulling on the skirt she wore. “Bobby Joe threw a sucker in my hair.”
She turned around, and sure enough, there was a glop of hair stuck to a red wet sucker.
“That kid,” Michelle muttered. “We’ll get this fixed,” she assured the little one.
“We’ll let you get to it,” Carly said. “I just wanted to stop by and thank you for getting me involved in the festivities.”
“You’re welcome. I can’t wait to see you perform!
” Michelle replied. She gripped the girl’s shoulder and guided her to the tall man she’d been eying earlier.
He looked up from his phone as they came to a stop in front of him.
Michelle said something and he nodded. Carly didn’t miss the way the man’s eyes followed Michelle as she took the girl inside the daycare center.
Jesse and Carly continued on their way, eventually stopping for a mug of hot cider. Carly noticed that Jesse kept glancing over at the sumo area where Oscar could be seen clapping and laughing with the rest of the boys.
“Do I need to apologize for overstepping?” she asked. “About Oscar.”
Jesse laughed, though it wasn’t a happy sound. “You never overstep. I told you that before. You know what Oscar needs. Sometimes better than I do.”
“Hey.” She put her hand on his arm. “You know Oscar better than anyone, and you’re an amazing dad.
I think I just relate to him. I felt like an outsider for so long when I was a kid, and it was hard for me to fit in.
That was until I met Suzie and Arthur. Speaking of, they’re in town to spend time with Amy and me. They want to meet you.”
“Oh?” Jesse smirked. “We’re at the meet the parents stage, huh?”
Carly giggled before asking somewhat nervously, “Is that okay?”
Jesse took her now empty paper cup and threw it into the trash along with his.
When he turned back to her, Carly’s eyes widened at the intent on his face.
Before she knew it, Jesse pulled her to him and was kissing her with a fierceness that took her breath away.
She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him even closer.
“You know there are children around here,” a man said, and they pulled apart only to find Grayson and JenniLynn staring at them with amusement.
“Don’t you have something else to do than bug me?” Jesse muttered.
“Hey, bro, you’re the one sucking poor Carly’s face off like a vampire,” Grayson replied.
“Stop teasing them,” JenniLynn replied, patting Grayson lightly on the chest. He grabbed her hand and kissed her knuckles. She grinned at him, then turned back to Carly and Jesse. “Carly, they’re getting ready to start the rodeo.”
Carly glanced down at her watch and swore. How had the time gone by so quickly? She rose up and kissed Jesse on the cheek.
“See you there?” she asked, only to find he had that look on his face again. Like something had upset him. They’d have to talk about it later because she was late.
“I’ll be cheering you on from the stands,” he told her.
She grinned at him before making a mad dash back to the arena, even as it hurt to leave Jesse behind.
So, this was what it was like to be truly in love with someone.