Page 103 of The Cowboy Who Worked Late

“Thank You. Could You help me with Angel? How do I feel about her? Should we really be making plans to look at places in Stinnett?” He’d texted more with Jerry, who said he’d be willing to set up the showings anytime and to just let him know. With everything with Grams up in the air and Henry not even sure when he was returning to work—and he couldn’t imagine the pile of work waiting for him at the ranch—Henry hadn’t been able to take that step.

Heck, everyone at Lone Star needed to know he and Angel were dating before they got engaged. His throat seized at that word anyway. And while he might be falling in love with Angel, he wasn’t ready to propose. But again, the Lord enlightened hismind, and Henry absolutely realized that he loved her even if it was on a small scale at the moment.

“Am I good enough for her?” he asked.

While the Lord didn’t answer, Henry felt like he got a head nod. “I’ll take real good care of her,” he promised, and he suddenly needed to see her. He didn’t want to leave in the most crucial of hours, perhaps when Grams was coming home, or Momma needed him, or Daddy was in desperate need of manpower at Courage Reins, but Henry needed to see her really soon.

“Okay.” Henry worked alongside his dad in the stables the following afternoon. “But I’m going home tonight after this,” he said. “I’ve got to get back to work.” He’d been gone from Lone Star for nine days now, and while a part of him had wondered if he would go back, if he and Angel would never be on the same page, if they’d never be able to stand side-by-side and look out at the crowd of men and tell them that they were dating, he knew now that he wanted to work through anything preventing that.

He’d take whatever flak came his way, whatever teasing, whatever consequences, whatever fallout.

He just wanted to be with her.

Henry stopped shoveling and looked over to his father. His broad shoulders rippled and worked as he spread the straw in the stable for the horses they’d already let out that morning.

“That’s okay, right?” Henry said. “I told Levi I could be back tomorrow.”

“It’s fine,” Daddy said without looking up. “I know you’ve got a job to get to. Grams is doing a lot better. She’s settled now.” She’d actually moved in with Momma and Daddy, as Kelly andUncle Squire’s homestead had stairs everywhere, and Grams couldn’t navigate those very well.

But at Momma and Daddy’s homestead, she only had to come up two stairs from the driveway to the kitchen, and Momma had a main-floor bedroom prepped and ready.

“It’s going to be fine,” Daddy said, and he finally stopped working.

“I can stay if it’ll help you,” Henry said. “I know you’re short-handed right now.”

Daddy’s blue-eyed gaze met his. “If you know I need the help, why don’t you just stay? I don’t like this conversation of, ‘Well, I can if you need me to.’ You know I need you to.”

He sighed heavily and went back to work. “I also know you’ve got a job, and they need you there too. So I’m not going to ask.”

“Well, I don’t know what to do,” Henry said, frustrated.

“You do what’s right,” Daddy said. “That’s what you always do, Henry.”

Emotion choked in his throat because Henry didn’t know what was right. He desperately wanted to return to Lone Star. They did need him there. But how much of it was that they needed him to do his job, and how much of that was him simply wanting to hold Angel at night?

Henry hadn’t felt like crying this much in a long time, and he kept swallowing and swallowing as they finished this stall and moved to the next one.

At the end of the row, Daddy took him by the shoulders and said, “I love the man you’ve become. You are such a good person. And the problems we’re having here at Courage Reins right now are not your problems. So go home. Go back to your horses. Go back to your girlfriend. It’s okay. We’re going to be okay here.”

“I feel bad,” Henry said.

“I know you do,” Daddy said. “That’s just one of the reasons why you’re so good. Paul and I have got this handled. Beau hasa couple of interns at Three Rivers, and I’m going to talk to him about lending them to us for a few weeks. I think they’re just sitting around, and he and Charlotte are inventing jobs for them to do.”

“Yeah,” Henry said.

“We’ll be fine,” Daddy said. “We just have a lot of appointments this weekend, and you’re gonna stay and help with those through tonight. And then you should go.”

Henry nodded in tight little bursts. “I haven’t told Levi yet.”

“Well, you better call him and tell him right now.” Daddy smiled at him and cuffed him under the chin. “Hey, son. Go.”

Henry nodded and grabbed onto his dad in a hug. “I love you, Daddy.”

“I know you do. Your momma and I love you a whole lot.”

Henry couldn’t believe he’d ever thought his parents didn’t need him, that they could skip from Paul to John without him, that there wouldn’t be a hole in his family if he wasn’t there. He could see now that if any of them weren’t there, they would not be complete, including Grams.

“I’m gonna move closer to Three Rivers,” he said.

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