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He looked up. “Yeah?”
“Do you want kids?”
“I have for a while now, yeah,” he said. “I just see my friends and their families, and it’s become this, this…I don’t know, this need inside of me.”
She nodded. “Now that I’m at Three Rivers, I can see that I can live by myself. I can date and find someone to love, and maybe just now, I started to see a future with kids.”
“Interesting,” he said as he went back to his menu.
Charlotte found it interesting too, and she smiled to herself as she hid behind the menu too. I really have changed, she thought. And the man across from her had played a vital role in all of that.
She chanced a peek at Beau, and she felt something she’d never felt before. Her heart beat in a way she’d never experienced before, and she couldn’t give it any other name but….
Love.
Just as quickly as that feeling had come and she’d classified it, an overwhelming sense of fear flooded her. She pulled in a tight breath, which drew Beau’s attention. He raised his eyebrows, but she just shook her head.
And because he was so good and so kind, he went back to the menu without challenging her further. She’d talk about this when she could, and that moment was not right now, on her cowboy boyfriend’s birthday.
No, she wasn’t going to live in fear and ask him a bunch of questions tonight. She just wanted to be with him and share a good experience with him for his birthday. So that was exactly what she was going to do.
Chapter Seventeen
Beau brushed his teeth, his only thought of how amazing this birthday had been. And to think, six months ago, he’d been dreading it. Of course, six months ago, he hadn’t met Charlotte yet, and his current Stable Manager had just announced that he’d be leaving soon.
He definitely had a lot to be grateful for, and when he finished brushing, he moved to his bedside and dropped to his knees. “Heavenly Father.”
His mind went on the fritz then, because he had so many beautiful things in his life right now. He couldn’t possibly thank God for all of them. Beau drew a breath and attempted to focus.
“Thank you for my momma,” he started. “I miss her, Lord, and I know I need to get her and Amy up here for a visit.”
The problem was he much preferred his sister Dolly to his sister Amy, and he’d have to pay for the trip, as his family didn’t have much money.
“Thank you for this ranch,” he said, something he thanked the Lord for every single night. He’d found a true brotherhood here. A family. People to love and care about who loved and cared about him too. “If there’s something I should be doing to help anyone here, please open my eyes and my mind to them. Inspire me to know how to help them.”
Beau had once heard Pete pray like this, and it had touched his heart so deeply, he’d taken it into his own prayers.
“Thank you for forty years on this planet,” he whispered. “And for a great day with Charlotte.”
Ah, Charlotte.
“Thank you for Charlotte.” Beau paused and let his feelings paint through him. “I’m falling in love with her, and I’m terrified.”
He’d felt things shift between them, even though she’d apologized for getting mad so fast. Of course he’d accepted the apology, because it felt genuine and real. But she’d stuffed something away, and Beau had let her.
He could revert to his flirty, fun self, so he wouldn’t fall further. He could put distance between them while laughing with her and kissing her; he’d done it in other relationships where he wasn’t as into the woman as she was him. Or when he’d started to fall and he could tell his girlfriend didn’t like him as much as he did her.
But with Charlotte, she didn’t know how to be inauthentic. “Mason said she keeps secrets,” he said. “Lord, if she’s keeping something from me, bless me to know. Bless me to know what to do when it comes to her.”
Pull back to spare his heart? Or finally let himself fall all the way in love, even if it shattered everything inside him?
He stayed on his knees, listening, but he didn’t get any answers right then. So he said, “Thank you for my life, Lord. Thank you for giving Your life to make it possible for me to repent and be saved. Amen.”
Beau got to his feet, his forty-year-old knees a little too old to stay down that long. He groaned as he got into bed and reached to switch off his lamp. “It was a really great day,” he whispered, and then he fell asleep, knowing he had a full day of work ahead of him tomorrow.
But he didn’t dream of horses and cows and fly spray. He didn’t see himself eating with other cowboys and coming home alone.
He saw himself alongside Charlotte, the two of them riding horses out to an overnight cabin, where they ate a picnic lunch beside a stream, the blue Texas sky overhead, and everything perfect between them.
