Mr. Wrong (11 page)

“Daddy.”
She sat in the chair beside him and took his hand.

Her dad,
named James also, looked at her without turning his head. “My princess has come home.” He tried to smile and that even looked painful to Sara.

“I’m here.”
She took her other hand and softly stroked his head. “I’m sorry for leaving. I never should have left you like this.” Emotion thumped behind her eyes.

He took in a slow breath, then cringed and turned his h
ead. “I’m so proud of you, Princess. Proud that you are my smart cracker.” It was a nick name he’d given her a long time ago. “I need you to know that I love you. And that you’re the best daughter a man could have.”

Sara
sniffed. “But I haven’t been here for you. I’m so sorry.”

He patted her hand.
“You can take care of yourself, dear. I may not have always shown it, but I want you to have an education. I am so proud of you. Never doubt that I wanted that for you. You’re going to do incredible things with your life; don’t let anyone hold you back. And your mamma—.” He broke off coughing. “She—she wants . . .” The coughing worsened, his whole body shaking with it.

“Daddy!”
She felt more scared than she’d ever felt in her entire life. Tears stung her eyes, but she held them back. She looked beside his bed at the picture of her mother that she’d memorized as a child. His cough got worse and Sara stood, holding his hand. “Rosie!”

Rosie appeared and propped him up for a minute.
“Breathe easy, Mr. Fairbanks.” She started mimicking calm breathing.

His breathing slowed.
Then he seemed to drop off to sleep in a second.

Rosie settled him and
motioned to the door. Sara followed, but left the door propped open. She knew the monitors were loud enough to hear downstairs; she just felt extra protective of him.

“I saw the morphine, Rosie.
You said when they started him on that it would be over soon. How much time?” She put her hands on her hips, thinking of how gray her father’s skin looked around the eyes.

Rosie shrugged and
motioned her to Sara’s room. Sara noticed that someone had brought her bag up to her bedroom for her. She sat on the bed beside it.

“They started him on the morphine last night.
He hasn’t eaten anything for two days. He hasn’t drank anything since yesterday.”

“How long can he go without eating?”

“It’s hard to say. Your father’s body is shutting down. He’s been in so much pain, but the morphine has helped him quite a bit. Sometimes, when a person is in a ton of pain, their body’s adrenaline feeds the organs, keeping them alive longer. He refused it until we told him you were coming home.”

Sara
felt sick to her stomach.

“How long do you think?”

Rosie sighed. “I don’t know, two or three days maybe.”

Sara
turned and opened her bag. “You can go. I’ll just unpack my things.”

Rosie left
, and Sara quickly arranged her clothes where they belonged. She heard gravel turning and looked out of her window to the driveway. Beau was leaving the ranch.

Her brother, Mark, knocked softly and walked into the room.
“Sara.”

Sara
turned and fell into his arms. He was the third brother, the closest to her age and the closest to her. “He told me he had a message from mama.” She pulled back from him and saw the tears and anguish mirrored in his eyes.

“He’s been saying
things like that a lot lately. I’m happy for him.” Mark choked and more tears squeezed out of his eyes. “I’m happy that he has her to go home to.” He let Sara go and wiped his eyes, looking out of the window. “I just wish he wasn’t going yet, ya know.”

Sara
felt her heart breaking. She knew. She walked beside him and put her hand on his back. “I’m sorry I haven’t been here.”

Mark turned and took her hand back in his own.
“No. You needed to be there; that’s the way dad wanted it. Don’t you feel guilty about that, Sara.” He put both of his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Don’t you dare feel guilty about that.”

Sara
nodded and cried some more, leaning into his chest.

The next morning Rosie nudged her awake in the chair
beside her father’s bed. “Hospice is here to help me change the drip and get him cleaned up for the day.”

Sara
stood, running her hand over her scratchy eyes. She nodded. “He didn’t wake up at all last night.”

Rosie placed her hand on
Sara’s shoulder. “I know. Why don’t you go shower and have some breakfast. You haven’t been downstairs since you got here.”

Sara
walked to her room in a daze and got some clean clothes out. She showered and dressed quickly wanting to eat and get back to her father by the time they were done.

She
walked into the kitchen and stopped short seeing Beau at the table. James was sipping some juice. “Good morning, Sara. How is he?”

She looked at James and glared, feeling betrayed.
“Why don’t you go see for yourself?” Sara walked to the fridge and pulled the milk out.

James cleared his throat.
“I apologize for my sister’s rudeness. She’s never been easy.”

Beau stood.
“I’ll go.”

Sara
felt her face turn red. “You mean easy for me to bulldoze? I’m sorry I didn’t stay to cook your meals and do your laundry, James.”

“I never wanted that.”
His jawline was firm. “I just wanted you to be a part of this . . . of us.” He swept his hand toward the ranch.

It had been the debate older than time between them.
James had always pulled the family together, trying to make her brothers all work together. She knew it wasn’t what she wanted. It wasn’t the life she wanted to lead. “You’ve tried to force me, James.” She thought of their neighbor, Cal Livingston, and how James had even tried to set them up when she was younger because he thought it would be a good marriage for the ranch.

James stood
, squeezing his lips together. “I’ve seen the kind of business woman you are, Sara. I wanted you to help me. I wanted this to keep us all together after . . .” He looked up the stairs. “After he’s gone.”

They both stood there,
posed for battle. Tim and Mark walked through the kitchen door, the screen clanking shut.

“What’s all this?”
Tim frowned looking between Sara and James. He always tried to be the peacemaker.

“I was just going.”
Beau started to walk around the table.

“No.”
James put out his hand to stop him. “There will be no better time. Sit down everyone.” He stared back at Sara.

Sara
paused, then went to a chair and sat. The rest of them followed.

James looked at all of them.
“You all know that the ranch is not doing well. Dad has been talking to us for a lot of years about finding an alternative way to make money with the land besides cattle.” He pointed to Beau. “Mr. Hennings here has hooked us up with a surveying company that will test our land for oil. It will be minimally invasive and, hopefully, pump money back into this ranch we love.” He paused, squeezing his eyes together. Sighing he opened his eyes and turned to Tim and Mark. “I’ve realized lately, he said glancing at Sara, “that I may have been a little pushy about us all staying together and working the ranch. If you want out, say the word.”

Tim cleared his throat.
“My home’s here. We’re having our first baby in two months.” He looked at James. “I’m in.”

James turned to Mark.
James and Mark often butted heads, with James accusing Mark of being irresponsible when their differing ideas led to fighting. Mark was by no means as agreeable as Tim, but he had more of a fun-loving spirit, and he forgave quickly. “I don’t know. I might like to pursue other dreams.” He grinned at Sara. “Like hitchhiking across the United States and camping on the beaches in California.”

Sara
laughed unexpectantly. She and Mark had often lain together looking at clouds, and Sara had told him when she was sixteen that was what she wanted to do.

James cracked a smile looking between them.
His eyes got moist and the tension between all of them seemed to melt away. “I love you guys. Life is too short to be fighting all the time.” He looked at Sara. “And, more than I want us all to work together, I want us all to be happy together—even if that’s only at Christmas.”

Sara
softened and reached out to put her hand over his, realizing that keeping the ranch was not an easy job. “Or the Fourth of July. That is my favorite holiday.”

James nodded,
squeezing her hand and then releasing it.

Sara
leaned forward. “Let’s look at the details of this leasing idea. How do the mineral rights work? I assume since we’re leasing, we wouldn’t have to give anything up.” She looked at Beau.

Beau cleared his throat.
“Nope.” Beau pointed to the document on the table. “I had my attorney look this over for you all, and you are simply agreeing to exploration and leasing of the land. No first children have to be given up.” He smiled at Tim.

Tim smiled back.
“Giving up a child would be bad.”

James looked at
Sara. “What do you think?”

Sara
folded her arms. “I’ve actually been thinking about it since Beau mentioned it to me a while ago. I do think it would be a win-win for us. I guess we’d just have to hope they find something. I love this ranch too. I think all of us would need to sign an agreement that any income from the oil could go back into the ranch until you start seeing a profit, then dividends would be appropriate.”

James smiled, nodding.
“Look at you, little sister.”

Mark laughed.
“Look at this, Tim, we’re all getting along.”

Tim nodded soberly.
“Would you all mind if we go to dad and have a family prayer with him?” His eyes were filled with tears.

Sara
suddenly felt sober too. Tim had always been the most spiritual of all of them.

“Great idea.”
James stood, turning to shake Beau’s hand. “Thank you so much.” He turned to Sara. “I promised Mr. Hennings that you would make good on my promise of showing him around later.”

Sara
’s stomach clenched in anger for a minute and then she shrugged, not wanting to argue.

“It’s not a problem.”
Beau waved his hand in dismissal and his face reddened. “I have some business to take care of.”

Sara
grudgingly admitted to herself that he was saving her again. “Come back in two hours.”

Chapter 17

Beau stepped through the gap in the barn door. Sara didn’t look at him. The barn wasn’t huge, but it had a loft up top and enough space for a few horses and animals. Beau could picture Sara spending a lot of time here growing up.

“Is this the place you go?”
He picked his way across the hay, his eyes acclimating to the shadows.

Sara
looked focused on giving the horse even strokes with the brush. Her hair was pulled back, and she had on some worn jeans and a red t-shirt. Beau thought she looked younger, probably exactly how she looked every morning growing up, before taking her horse for a ride. The brush strokes seemed to calm her.

“I don’t know what you mean.”
She bent lower to move down the horse’s thighs.

“Mine is the mountains.”
Beau cautiously stepped behind her and started petting long strokes down the horse’s back too. “What’s her name?” Beau had spent many hours on his uncle’s ranch mucking out stalls and tending to the horses. It wasn’t really his passion, but he had always found peacefulness in it.

Sara still focused on the horse. “Sunfire.” She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. “I got her when I was fifteen and my dad said, “That horse has the sunniest disposition I’ve ever seen.” She shrugged and the tears spilt down her face. “And after a few days of messing around with her name, I thought Sunfire fit.” She smiled and wiped her face with the back of her hand. “Maybe because I wanted her to be fast.” She laughed harder. “My dad always told me that I would light the world on fire someday and wouldn’t need Sunfire’s help—that I had a fire all my own.”

Beau leaned back against the stall and folded his arms.
“It’s nice to see you smile, Sara.” He couldn’t help wanting to ease her grief, but he could tell she didn’t want that from him. “Are you holding up okay?”

She shrugged and focused on
Sunfire again. After a couple of minutes she smiled again. “Thank you, by the way.” She cleared her throat. “And I’m sorry.” Her eyes looked repentant.

It was Beau’s turn to shrug.
He watched her and wondered, again, why he was here. He knew she had promised herself to Jonathon two years ago. And he knew that it seemed like most of the time she hardly even liked him. But . . . there was something about her. He liked her warmth and her rude exterior that really seemed to hide her soft side. He liked her vulnerability and her desire to save the world. And . . . he couldn’t deny there was chemistry between them.