AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Ryan thanked him and walked out of the barn, turning and walking up the sand to the sidewalk, thinking about Goldie and his plans for his herd.
He ran into his mother after less than a block.
“Ryan. I’ve been looking for you.”
“You could call me,” he said, feeling like that was a reasonable idea.
“Well, I could, but I have something I need to ask you, and I wanted to ask you in person.”
That didn’t sound good. Anything that couldn’t be done over the phone was always something that a person probably didn’t want to do. At least in Ryan’s experience.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Do you remember the lady who used to own the souvenir shop? She and I were good friends.”
“Man. That was years ago. I haven’t seen her in...at least a decade, maybe two.”
He didn’t mention that her granddaughter used to come spend time with her during the summer. Dakota. Funny that he’d just bought a horse that used to belong to Dakota, and now here was his mom talking about Dakota’s grandmother.
A lot of times when something like that happened, he figured the Lord was trying to get his attention. But his ship with Dakota had sailed a long time ago. About the time he declined her offer of marriage.
There were a lot of times that he regretted that, but he hadn’t been in any position to get married. And he wouldn’t have been able to chase the rodeo circuit as long as he had, if he had taken on a wife. Wouldn’t have won those championships, had the endorsements, be almost all the way to owning his own ranch.
She’d had a child not long after she got married, and she got married not long after she’d asked him. So she couldn’t have been too stuck on him.
That child could have been his.
He pushed the thought aside. He and Dakota had a little bit more history than what most people knew, and maybe that was one of the reasons that he declined her offer. She scared him.
“Right?” his mother said, and he pulled himself out of his contemplation. Dakota seemed to do that to him. Even now, all these years later.
“Yeah?” he said, shoving a hand in his pocket and shifting his weight from one foot to another. He could never tell his mother about what he’d done.
He almost walked away from his family, but not because he didn’t love them. His mother had sacrificed so much to keep her family together, to keep them on the farm, to make sure that they had a good childhood, to the very best of her ability.
He had to appreciate that.
“I need you to fix the souvenir shop up.” She named a sum. “That’s what the new owner told me she could afford to pay when she asked me to see if I could hire someone here in Strawberry Sands to fix it up so she could open the shop as soon as she can. I know that there was a plumbing leak, and the water had been shut off, and I’m pretty sure there were some holes in the drywall and possibly it needs a new roof.”
“Holy smokes. That’s a lot of work.” He hoped that the amount of money that his mother quoted would be enough for those repairs. She was talking at least three weeks’ worth of work. If not more. He appreciated the work, though. He’d been doing all kinds of odd jobs in order to earn money and get his ranch. He’d been training horses on the side, planning to sell them, since a well-trained horse would bring a lot of money, and he’d do whatever he could to earn enough to buy the ranch he dreamed of.
“I told her I knew the perfect person. I know you’ll do a good job, and this person is going to try to make a living here in Strawberry Sands. You know we need people moving in and businesses opening up.”
“I know.” The more businesses that moved in, the better it was for everyone, because it attracted tourists. And their tourist dollars.
Those tourist dollars were necessary for the rest of his family and their businesses. He’d do what he could to help.
“I need to give you this.” His mother pulled her hand out of her pocket and held up the key.
“I didn’t say I would do it,” he said, even as he reached out to take the key from her proffered hand.
“I know you will.” His mother smiled, and he couldn’t disagree. She was right. If she asked him, he would do it.
“Do you have a number for the new owner?”
“They were moving. They weren’t sure whether they would continue to have the same number or not, and they gave me permission to coordinate everything. They’re also dealing with a funeral.”
He lifted his chin in acknowledgment, not asking any more questions. Sometimes a death in the family made a person have to make hard decisions and changes. He assumed that was what happened in this instance. Maybe a mother had lost her daughter and needed to move to a new area, opening a shop. He didn’t know what the connection was and didn’t want to stand around talking about it. He wanted to think about the horse he was buying.
