Page 113 of The Cowboy Who Worked Late
“A few months,” Jerry said. “The husband got called to a job in California, and they had to go.”
So it’s wild, Angel thought, and it kind of matched how she felt inside—and her relationship with Henry. As she climbed the sturdy steps to the porch, the strangest sense of coming home lighted on Angel’s shoulders.
She looked at Henry, and he looked at her, and she didn’t have to say anything. She hadn’t even seen the house, but it possessed a spirit that spoke to hers. As they both turned to Jerry, he said, “Let me show you through it.”
“All right,” Angel said.
“This door is solid oak,” Jerry said as he moved over to the front door. “It’s a little bit taller than normal, as you can see. Custom for the house.” He continued to talk about the flooring, the new paint, how the kitchen needed to be updated and remodeled. But everything about the place charmed Angel.
It had a beautiful front living room where she could have acquaintances and friends come to sit and visit. Or she could simply sit there and look out the big window at the trees waving their limbs to whoever passed by, or the stars as they came out to greet the night.
From there, a hall moved past the steps that went downstairs, and Angel brought up the rear as they entered a large family room. Everything was empty, so the space looked huge, and that blended into a space for a dining room table and then the kitchen.
“Their plan,” Jerry said. “Was to push this wall out a little further into the backyard.” He peered through the window over the sink. “You’d still have plenty of room for a trampoline, playsets, dogs, or chickens, but you could double the size of your kitchen.”
“Hm,” Henry said, mirroring what Angel would’ve done if she could’ve gotten her voice to work.
The master suite sat tucked in the front corner of the house with big windows and big closets and a great big bathroom.
“They’ve redone this,” Angel said, taking in the thick carpet beneath her feet and the high-end fixtures in the bathroom.
“Yep, they redid this,” Jerry agreed. “It used to be a bedroom attached to an office, and now it’s just one big bedroom, one big bath, his and hers closets.”
Angel looked at Henry again, and this time he smiled at her. They went through the upstairs, which held bedrooms and bathrooms, and the basement, which contained another large family room, a tiny kitchenette in the corner, and more bedrooms and another bathroom.
“Plenty of storage,” Jerry said. “And you have a walk-out basement here as well.” He unlocked the door and stepped through it, and sure enough, it led onto a back patio that was sheltered by the deck above.
“That deck comes off the dining room,” Jerry said, looking up. “So you’ve got some outdoor space up there and down here, and then you go right up these steps to the yard.”
Some rock steps had been built into the earth, and Angel let Henry and Jerry go ahead of her as she drank everything in. Then she also took the five steps up and stood in the backyard. Trees greeted her from the sides, with a great big copse of them right in the middle of the lawn.
“They specifically left that clump of trees to provide shade for the house,” Jerry said. “As your backyard faces west, and it can get hot.”
“I love it,” Angel said. She blinked, and suddenly the blank canvas in her mind that God had refused to paint on came to life. She could see chicken coops, a storage shed next to the weathered barn that stood there. It had been painted red in the past but needed to be redone. Her quaint,personalfarm life came to fruition right in front of her, and Angel wanted it badly. She squeezed Henry’s hand just as Jerry’s phone rang.
“I’m gonna let you guys look around for a little bit,” he said. “I’ve got to take this call. Feel free to explore out here or go back in the house. I’ll meet you out front in a few minutes.”
“Okay,” Henry said, and with that, Jerry answered the call and headed for the steps that went up to the deck. He climbed them, saying things that Angel didn’t hear, and went back into the house.
She stood on the back lawn of the house she wanted. And while it wasn’t her dream house yet, it sat in the perfect place. Only forty minutes to from Lone Star, it had great views, big trees, and plenty of potential.
“How far do you think it is to Three Rivers from here?” she asked.
“Well, we could take the road to Stinnett and then up to that new road,” he said. “I’m guessing forty-five minutes. If we need to get into town, it’s probably only fifteen minutes.”
“Fifteen minutes to Three Rivers,” she confirmed.
They walked through the barn, which needed work. It needed something and someone to exist for. But Angel still loved it. She found the bare vegetable garden beside that, and while she’d never had much of a green thumb, Angel suddenly wanted to try.
They crossed the back lawn again and took the steps to the deck, which needed to be restained. Henry noted that and said, “I did this once with my daddy. He’ll come help.”
They re-entered the kitchen, and Angel felt like neither one of them wanted to say what they really thought first. She looked at him, noting that he was scuffing his toe along a piece of the floor that probably needed to be replaced.
“Henry,” she said, her courage gathering in her soul. “I love this place. I want this house.”
“We have two more we can look at this morning,” he said.
“I don’t want to.” She shook her head. “No, I don’t want to. This is it, Henry. This isour place.” She rushed to him and planted her palms against his chest. “Can’t you feel it?”
