She smacked the blue box into his chest. Oh, yeah. That. What did you say to the woman you’d jilted twice? To the woman who had obviously read the engraving on the ring he’d hoped she’d wear forever?

  “Well, do you have anything to say?”

  “I…I don’t know what to say.”

  “Did you mean it? That you loved me? That you were intending to ask me to marry you?”

  “Yeah, I did.” Last week. A lifetime ago. “Before I screwed up.”

  “Screwed up by leaving Brody’s Crossing?”

  “No! Screwed up by getting you on that ATV and then taunting you into riding up that hill. You say you weren’t seriously hurt, but the point is you could have been, and I would have been responsible.”

  “Do you honestly think that I’m so feebleminded that I make decisions based solely on whether you taunt me or not? How dare you imply that I’m that stupid!” She clenched her hands into fists and started pacing. “I’m not some weak-minded fool, Wyatt. Believe it or not, I make decisions every day without your input, and if you gave me advice on my business and I didn’t agree with you, I’d tell you so and ignore it.”

  “This is different. You told me once that you couldn’t think when I was around, or something like that.”

  “I wasn’t talking about when you were around me like in public or the same county! I meant…intimate. You know what I mean,” she said, waving her arms, then immediately winced.

  “Please, don’t hurt yourself.”

  “It was my choice to do something stupid, Wyatt.”

  “It’s still my fault. We shouldn’t have gone riding. I was going to propose to you that night, when we got back from Granbury. I had it planned. Nothing spectacular, because I was trying to be ordinary. Just a nice dinner and the ring. But, no, I had to jump at the chance to go ride ATVs with James. What does that tell you about me?”

  “That you were practicing avoidance, the desire to put off what we aren’t comfortable doing. That’s all that means.”

  He felt stunned. She was turning everything around, making it seem simple when it wasn’t. He’d put her in danger because he…Why? Had he ever thought about the danger? No, he’d only thought about the fun.

  Because it was easier to have fun than to make permanent commitments.

  He looked down at the ring box. When he’d chosen ATV riding over proposing, he’d been thinking only of himself. Selfish, just as he’d accused his mother of being selfish. She drank. He had adventures. Both were unfulfilling. Both were self-centered.

  Why had he never seen that before?

  “Okay, you figure this out,” Toni said, standing maybe five feet away. “I don’t know how we would have made everything work. You live here, I live there. You like to travel, I have responsibilities. I love my family, and you barely tolerate yours. But I do know that I love you, Wyatt McCall, and if you come to your senses you know where I’ll be.”

  She started for the door.

  “No, Toni, wait!”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “This is the craziest thing you’ve ever done,” Leo complained as he climbed the metal ladder behind Toni. “I can’t believe I went along with this.”

  “Be quiet, little brother, and carry the paint.” Toni’s progress was slow because of her sprained wrist, but she was determined to make it to the top. Just as determined were her brother and best friend. Determined to help, even though they thought she was nuttier than Myra Hammer’s fruitcake.

  “He’s right,” Jennifer said from farther down the ladder. “What if he—”

  “Don’t even say it!” Toni said quickly. If you didn’t put your fears into words, they seemed a lot less scary. And right now, taking this step was stupid and silly and reckless and maybe even criminal. But when she’d walked out on him in Carmel, angry and hurt and uncertain after her mad dash to get there, she’d known she had to do something dramatic.

  “How do you know he’s coming?” Jennifer asked.

  “Cassie called me.”

  “Oh.”

  They climbed to the top of the metal walkway that circled the water tower. Toni looked up at the big fake wreath and the weathered red bow that hung from the top, giving the water tower a little taste of the Christmas season. Some city worker had been even higher up here fairly recently. The idea gave her a feeling of vertigo that made her good hand clench on the rail. She would never, ever become a rock climber, even if Wyatt asked her to go on one of his adventures.

  “You’d think the city would have put a gate and a lock on this thing,” Toni muttered. Especially earlier in the month, when they first knew that Wild Wyatt McCall was coming back to town to finish his sentence.

  “They probably didn’t think that the mayor was planning an act of vandalism,” Leo said, placing the paint on the walkway next to her.

  “It’s only paint,” Toni muttered. “It’s not like it’s permanent.” Not like a marriage, surely.

  “Wow, look at this view,” Jennifer said. “It makes my head swim.”

  “You don’t have to do this, you know,” Toni said, putting her good hand on Jennifer’s arm.

  “Are you kidding? This is fun. We haven’t done anything this crazy in…” Her face fell when she realized what she was about to say.

  “Fifteen years, right? Since Wild Wyatt McCall left town?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “It’s okay. I understand, and you’re right. But just like desperate times call for desperate measures, crazy times call for crazy measures.”

  “Well, this qualifies,” Leo said. “Where should I start?”

  WYATT DROVE INTO BRODY’S Crossing and went directly to the motel. He’d called his parents to tell them he was coming to town, so they wouldn’t hear it from someone else. They might have meddled a little to get him back together with Toni, but their intentions seemed to be good. And as an adult, he could see that his mother was really trying. Over the past week or so, his resentment had started to fade. They weren’t perfect, but they did love him, and his mother had conquered a serious addiction, a disease, which was something that he’d never objectively considered before.

  Maybe he really was growing up.

  “Have you seen it?” the manager asked, handing him a key.

  “What? No, I don’t suppose so. What is it?”

  The manager chuckled. “Just drive all the way out Elm Street. You can’t miss it,” she said with a chuckle and a shake of her head.

  It was probably a new city Christmas tree or some more lawn decorations. Maybe he’d inspired someone to decorate like Christmas on steroids.

  He unpacked as quickly as possible and went back out to the Hummer. He liked the big rented vehicle and he wasn’t trying to be ordinary any longer. If Toni wanted ordinary, she’d have to settle for someone else.

  She’d probably be safer, but maybe she wouldn’t be as happy. She wouldn’t be loved. He’d come to those conclusions and more in the two days since she’d left him in Carmel.

  He drove to her office, but she wasn’t there. As he walked back to the Hummer, he noticed that not many people were around town. It was oddly deserted for a Thursday afternoon.

  Where was everyone? Were they out seeing it?

  He remembered being told that the beauty shop was the place where everyone talked about everything. He pulled out of the parking spot and headed south to Clarissa’s House of Style, past the lamppost-mounted tinsel candy canes he hadn’t gotten around to replacing.

  “Next year,” he promised the windblown decorations. As far as he knew, they hadn’t been donated by any person or group who might miss their departure from the Christmas landscape.

  The only person working at the shop was Venetia. She held a lethal-looking can of hair spray and a wicked metal comb over the tight curls of a little old lady Wyatt didn’t know.

  “Why, look who’s here,” Venetia said. “We weren’t sure you were coming back.”

  “I didn’t know my return was of public interest.”

  “Oh, it is now,” Venetia said, and chuckled.

  “What does that mean?” He was getting slightly irritated by the smirking tone of these comments.

  “You’ll see. The only reason I’m here is that someone had to style Mirabelle’s hair for her cousin’s funeral in Decatur. Otherwise, I’d be with most everyone else in town.”

  “Is this where you tell me that I’m supposed to drive west on Elm Street?”

  “That’s right!”

  “What am I looking for?”

  “You’ll know it—”

  “—when I see it. Got it. One more question. Is there someone I could get more information from?”

  “You should just drive out Elm Street. All your questions will be answered.”

  “Okay. Thanks, I guess. And sorry about your loss.”

  “Thank you kindly, young man,” Mirabelle said. “Do I know him?” he heard her ask Venetia as he walked out the door.

  He got into the Hummer and drove west on Main Street to the stoplight, then turned right on Commerce and left on Elm. He passed the police station on the corner and the neat houses along the residential street that reminded him of Toni’s bungalow, just a block away. All the homes were decorated for the holidays, with Christmas just over a week away.

  If she accepted his proposal, they’d need a bigger house. He had nothing against her place, but it wasn’t spacious enough for his seventy-two-inch plasma TV, workout equipment and rock-climbing wall. He’d seen only a one-car garage, which didn’t look as though it could be expanded to house his four vehicles and his motorcycles.

  The sun was getting low in the sky as he passed the last house and headed up the hill. He remembered the drive well. The last time he’d been here was a little more than two weeks ago, when he and Toni had made love under the stars. The time before that had been fifteen years earlier, when he and Toni had made love under the stars. Definitely a pattern was developing.

  He shook away the memories and realized that there were cars lining the two-lane road. People waved at him and smiled. He frowned and waved back. What was going on? He felt like the only float in a one-man parade.

  He turned the corner and looked up at the water tower he’d once painted purple and gold. Well, he and James, but he hadn’t given his friend away. Now it was white again, decorated with a big wreath, and…What was that on the side? Black lettering? Was the town so desperate that they rented out advertising space?

  He stopped the Hummer and looked. The sun shone in his eyes, so he got out for a better viewing angle. People in the cars around him started clapping. He felt as if he’d entered a surreal world.

  “What’s going on?” he asked everyone in general.

  “Read it,” someone shouted.

  Shielding his eyes, he looked up. You’ll know it when you see it. This must be it.

  He tilted his head, the angle making the letters hard to read. “M-A-R-R-Y,” he spelled out. He walked a few steps and continued. “M-E.” His heart sped up as he walked a few more steps. “W-Y-A-T-T.” He stopped and stared. “Marry me, Wyatt.” Then a big heart, and the word, Toni.

  Toni? “Where is she?”

  “Up there!” someone shouted.

  He shielded his eyes again and looked. Sure enough, on the walkway around the water tower, Toni stood, her blond hair blowing in the breeze, her good arm waving. His heart skipped a couple of beats at the sight of her, high overhead.

  He ran toward the tower, people cheering him on. “You’re crazy,” he shouted, but she shook her head, either denying the fact or unable to hear him.

  “You’re crazy,” he shouted again as he reached the base and looked up.

  She looked over the railing, down at him. “I love you,” she shouted.

  “I love you, too. Now, get down here before you break your other arm!”

  She laughed and headed for the ladder.

  “No! Wait! It’s too dangerous.”

  Leo walked over, then Jennifer Wright. “She climbed up there,” Leo said. “I think she can climb down.”

  “You were here? And you didn’t stop her?”

  “Hell, no. Have you ever tried to stop Toni from doing something she really wanted to do?”

  “She was highly motivated,” Jennifer said.

  “She’s highly insane,” Wyatt said, watching her inch down the ladder. “She’s wearing a cast!”

  “No, just a brace,” Leo said.

  “Don’t be mad at her. She did this in a big way, the best that she could,” Jennifer said.

  “She could have just said yes when I propose later.”

  “Yes, but this is one of those stories you can tell your grandkids someday.”

  Wyatt swallowed. Grandkids meant kids first. They hadn’t talked about that. He’d been worried about where to put his gym equipment and he hadn’t thought about a nursery.

  Of course he wanted kids. With Toni. He didn’t even mind that in doing so he’d make his parents happy. Maybe his mother would be a better grandmother than she’d been a mother. She was clean and sober, and she was enthusiastic.

  Toni neared the bottom. He strode the few steps and caught her around the waist as she prepared to step off the ladder.

  “That was the craziest thing you’ve ever done,” he said as he swung her down. “Please don’t ever make me worried about you again.”

  “I can’t promise that,” she said, running her hand around his jaw. “But I can promise that I’ll love you forever.”

  He swept her into his arms and kissed her with all the passion and frustration and love he’d bottled up inside for days and weeks and years. He kissed her as if he’d never let her go.

  When he did, finally, he realized that the people of Brody’s Crossing had gathered around, and they were clapping.

  “Well done, Toni!” someone yelled.

  “Well done, Wyatt,” someone else said.

  He smiled down at Toni. Her hair was windblown and she was smudged with black paint, but she’d never looked more beautiful. “I really do love you, you know.”

  “I know. And I really do love you, too, even when you make me mad and get me all shook up.”

  “Okay, then.” He dropped to one knee and pulled the ring box out of his pocket. “Antonia Casale, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife and my best friend, again, and this time forever?”

  Tears sparkled in her eyes, reflecting the setting sun. “I will—if you’ll take me as I am, where I am.”

  He placed the engagement ring on her finger and watched the stone pick up the pinks and yellows of the sky. “I’ll live here for as long as you want, if you’ll promise me you’ll take time from your business every now and then. The sunsets are nice in Carmel, too, and Australia, and Alaska, and Peru, and—”

  She put a finger to his lips. “I get the picture. Yes, I will live with you and travel with you as much as I can. But our home is here, in Brody’s Crossing, among the people we love.”

  “Does that mean you’re running for mayor again?” he asked.

  “I think I owe them one more time.”

  “She said yes and she’s running for mayor again!” Claude McCaskie shouted. A cheer went up from the crowd.

  Wyatt smiled and looked around. Her parents were wiping their eyes; Leo and Jennifer were smiling and heading toward Toni. Wyatt saw so many people that he’d known all his life, so many friends and new friends. He felt as if he’d received the best Christmas present ever, the gift of his own sense of place in the world.

  His place was, and always had been, with Toni. He just hadn’t realized it until he’d almost lost her.

  He would have to share her with the town, but that was okay, because at the end of the day, he knew right where she’d be. In his arms.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-2567-5

  A TEXAN RETURNS

  Copyright © 2008 by Victoria Chancellor Huffstutler.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  *Brody’s Crossing

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  *Brody’s Crossing

 

 

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