Page 39 of The Surprise

I take her hand, expecting her to pull away.

But she doesn’t.

A warmth spreads through me that I’ve never felt before. “Beth.”

She looks up at me. “What?”

“I have a mother and two sisters who are total spitfires, and I love them to the ends of the earth.”

“I can tell you do.”

“But that’s not what I want.”

Her eyes widen and she swallows, her fingers tightening on mine. “It’s not?”

“I like how calm you are. How. . .serene. That’s the word I’d use. I like that you’re more reserved and that you don’t reach out and snatch any bit of energy and attention that’s in a room.”

“It did feel a little like the middle of a cattle drive at dinner.”

My mouth dangles open. “Yes. That’s how it feels being around my family. And the energy is fun, and it’s all I know, but I want something a little more. . .”

“Calm?” She smiles. “But Ethan, I’m pretty sure exactly no one else I know would call me serene.”

I laugh. “Fair enough. I still don’t know you that well. But I want to get to know you better.”

“Even if this is all going to end with a sharp drop off a high cliff?”

“Even then,” I say. “And if it does, I’ll call you Juliet, and you can call me Romeo, and we’ll figure it out.”

“I hated how they died at the end.”

“Me too.” I can’t help smiling. “I mean, what idiots were they?”

“So stupid.”

I stare at her face, and I realize that the more time I spend with her, the more I like it. “You may say you aren’t smart, but we’re smarter than they are. We wouldn’t take poison, because neither of us are quitters. I’d do whatever it took, and I think you would, too.”

She blushes.

And I learn something else that’s new in that moment. She looks even cuter with pink cheeks.

9

Beth

Iasked for a dog for Christmas every year from the time I turned three until I started high school.

It’s not like having a dog on a ranch is difficult. Literally everyone I know has one. But my dad’s mantra is that extra things like that, pets kept for emotional reasons, are always a bad idea. I knew my mom didn’t care, but my dad’s point was that he would be the one who had to do everything for it, which was true. Mom’s always been utterly unreliable.

Christmas Day came and went, and still no wagging tail. No lolling pink tongue. No shaking puppy body. When I didn’t get one that year either, I decided to just give up.

I’d have taken an old, decrepit one, really, but instead, I got yet another stuffed animal. This time, a beagle. I threw it on the pile of them in my rocking chair and pulled on my coat to go sulk in the barn.

It’s not like I had nothing.

I had a horse I loved.

I knew that, for most city people, a horse was every little girl’s dream. I liked my horse. Her name’s Nedra, and she’s a dun, and she’s really sweet. She toted me around like a champ for trail rides, cattle drives, and any other time I needed to ride. But horses are a lot of work, and I’m not the only one who rode her. Dad’s always had a handful of cattle hands, and she was used most days for real work on the ranch.

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