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“Doesn’t matter. I have a really good policy.”
She hugged him tightly. “If you only knew how much I’ve been worried about all the bills, as well as everything else. You’re my knight in shining armor, do you know that?”
“I’ll settle for being the man you love, darlin’.” He lifted her off his lap and patted her bottom. “Now get dressed. We’ll worry about this other stuff tomorrow.”
Chapter Seventeen
Sitting at a candlelit table at Chez Nous, staring at her handsome and wonderf
ul fiancé, who looked scrumptious in a blue-and-white striped button-down and navy Dockers, Dusty almost forgot about her blood test.
“Darlin’?”
“Hmm?”
“Could I talk you into telling me one more thing?”
“Maybe. What is it?”
“What exactly happened to your pa?”
Big jolt of reality. Dusty didn’t like talking about her father, largely because she felt responsible for his situation. Rationally, she knew none of it was her fault, but her illness had been the catalyst.
She took a deep breath. “I once promised never to lie to you.”
“You did.”
“The truth is, my father killed himself.”
Zach nodded solemnly, but said nothing.
“He swallowed a whole bottle of my pain pills, and he left a note for Sam and me.” She stopped for a few seconds and then went on. “We’ve never told anyone about it, but I think most people probably know.”
“Didn’t the coroner figure it out?”
“He’s an old family friend, so he didn’t do an autopsy and he kept it quiet.”
“I see.”
“Papa got involved in some bad investments after I got sick. We didn’t have any health insurance, and as you can guess, cancer treatment is expensive. He went a little crazy when I was diagnosed, probably because of what had happened to Mama. He was determined I was going to live, because he couldn’t go through losing someone again.”
“He loved you very much.”
“Yeah. Yeah, he did. So he researched all the options for treatment. He actually considered sending me to the Mayo Clinic, until my oncologist in Billings assured him that my type of leukemia was fairly common as far as cancers go, and the treatment was standard and would be the same no matter where we went. Anyway, a couple months after I went into remission, Papa started selling off our livestock. I was still so happy to be well that I didn’t ask a lot of questions. Soon we had nothing left. He let me keep Regina, though.” She choked up, but took a drink of water and continued.
“After Papa died, Sam and I found out there were several mortgages on the ranch. He had left us a note saying he was sorry, that he knew we were young and strong and we’d be better off without him. Truth is, we needed him.”
“I know.” Zach nodded.
“We didn’t have a lot of income coming in because the animals were gone. So we started competing in local rodeos and then we went regional. The stock show was our first national.”
“Why’d you wait so long to go national? You’re both real good.”
“Money. You and your family probably don’t think anything of the entry fees, but to us they were astronomical.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Anyway, I got paid a little for my work with local bulls as well, and that helped. Sam wanted to go out and get full-time work in Billings, but I couldn’t handle the ranch myself, and we had worked so hard to keep it during the last four years since Papa died.” She sighed. “That’s about it in a nutshell.”
