“All right. No rush, because I told him I was working, but that sounds good to me. Maybe we can get something figured out.”
“I really hope you can. I know that having you here is a blessing, but you’re not doing what you were born to do. And I think that’ssad. This could possibly be God opening a window or a door and hoping that you’ll head through it. Who knows what’s going to be on the other side.”
They sounded like prophetic words.
Chapter Twelve
“Ilike riding in the parade better than I like watching it,” Larissa said as they stood while the string trio went by, playing Christmas carols. He loved the trio and could sit and listen to it for hours, but he looked down at his daughter.
“I know.” He put a hand on her head and then slid it down to her shoulder and pulled her against him.
When had she gotten so tall? She came up to his chest, and before he knew it, she was going to be a young lady, and he wasn’t ready for it.
“I wish Summer was still here, because I wanted to ride in the parade too,” Robert said from his other side.
He ruffled Robert’s hair. “Who knows. Maybe the Lord will bring her back.”
He, for one, couldn’t wait to go talk to her. She hadn’t texted him at all, and he had no idea what she thought. But the more he thought about it, the more he liked it. The idea of her coming back, of her being able to run her horse therapy from his stable. Sure, it would limit what the kids could do from the barn, but if the businesscontinued to go well, maybe they could build another, smaller barn in back, where the kids could keep the riding horses. Although, if Summer was able to get the horses that they loved from their therapy sessions back, he doubted that they’d want to get different horses. But maybe he could be wrong. Maybe Summer would help him pick horses out that wouldn’t be too expensive but would be perfect for his children.
Lord, this seems like the perfect solution to me, but if it is, You’re going to have to convince her.
He paused in his prayer, as his children started to pick up candy from the driver of the fire truck who was throwing it out.
Maybe, maybe it wasn’t just him wanting to do what God wanted him to do, but maybe he had some ulterior motives.
He didn’t want to think that, but it was true. He had trouble getting Summer out of his mind. He supposed it was attraction, something he hadn’t felt for a really long time. Something he didn’t trust, either. After all, he’d been attracted to Desire, and look where that had gotten him—cheated on, and then she died of cancer.
He wasn’t looking to get married again, wasn’t looking to try to figure out how to blend his family together, and Summer was younger. She might want a family of her own, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about having more children. After all, his youngest child was nine, that was an awful big gap to have, and…listen to him thinking. He’d barely even talked to the woman, she thought he was a nutcase, and here he was thinking about having children with her.
He shook his head and waved at Judd and Terry as they drove by driving the horses and pulling the wagon behind them. It was full of church kids. They had offered to allow his children to ride in the wagon too, but they had all declined. They wanted to stand with their dad, and Larissa had said that it wouldn’t be the same if she wasn’t on Cricket.
Maybe just for Larissa’s sake, he would pray that Summer would decide to take him up on his offer.
Although, he checked out the apartment above the stable, and if she stayed, it was going to have to be in the house. The apartment was in pretty rough shape, as she had said she thought it was.
Plus, there were no furnishings at all in it, and she’d have to figure out something for a bed and a chair or table or something.
It seemed like the parade lasted an awful long time, but his kids enjoyed it and were sad when it was over. As he had arranged, his mom came to take them home after they’d walked around the festival some. He left her with some cash, thankful again that his business was doing so well, and his promise that he wouldn’t be too late. He had not wanted to tell anyone what he was thinking about, because he didn’t want his children to get their hopes up. He had just told his mom that he had to talk to someone about some business, and she had accepted that. He didn’t tell her that it was Summer and that he was thinking about her moving in.
Regardless, once he had waved goodbye to his children, he crossed the street and moseyed down to the bakeshop. He knew she wasn’t going to be able to get off for another couple of hours, but he didn’t have anything else he wanted to do. And… There was something about her that drew him.
Maybe it wasn’t wise for him to have someone like that in his house, when he seemed to have trouble not thinking about her.
He pushed that thought aside immediately. He didn’t want to not have her. The idea was too hard to contemplate.
There was a bench not far from the shop, and he sat down, nodding at people as they passed and watching the parents of children, a couple that walked by holding hands, several that were pushing strollers, and some that had children bouncing around eating candy from the parade and probably so far up into the stratosphere on a sugar high that they would never go to bed that night.
It wasn’t long after that someone carrying a cello came by, gave him an interesting glance, almost as though she were trying to place him, although he didn’t recognize her other than as the woman whohad played the cello in the parade, and maybe she was the owner of the shop, since she took a turn shortly after she passed him and went in the front door.
Maybe she was putting her cello away, and maybe Summer would be off sooner than he thought. Somehow the idea made him excited enough to stand up. He paced a bit, stood out of the way while a couple with two dogs on leashes walked by, and then he moseyed into the shop.
Sure enough, the woman who had walked by was behind the counter along with Summer. They were chatting and waiting on customers.
He stood in the back, a little bit beyond the crowd, and just watched. Summer’s ponytail swung behind her as she smiled at the guests and competently filled their orders.
Maybe she was just one of those people who were good at whatever they did.
He kinda thought that that would be true. Or maybe it was just she put everything she had into everything that she did, as it came out well. He liked that idea better. Because he could see where she had put her heart and soul into helping his children. Even to the point of doing it without pay, just because she cared. Those kinds of people were few and far between, and he knew that having someone like that as a friend was not something that happened to a person every day.
