Page 32 of The Cowboy's Christmas Baby
She got the gift from the back seat. It was about the size of a breadbox and felt weirdly heavy, as if it had been weighted with something, which it probably had. Tanner loved giving impractical, but meaningful, gifts. She’d once gotten a sword and a scabbard to attach to her saddle. They’d been watching a fantasy series on TV, and she’d expressed an interest in the weaponry used. Hopefully, if Dana’s parents decided to give the gift to her, she’d get some pleasure from it.
When Dana herself opened the door, the speech Tate had carefully prepared for her parents departed. Wordlessly, she thrust the box into the other woman’s hands.
“What’s this?” Dana asked, holding the gift cautiously, as if it might explode any second.
“I found it. With Tanner’s things.”A year ago…Tate managed to stop babbling before blurting out that last part. It wasn’t something Dana needed to hear and wouldn’t do much for their already strained relationship. “He’d want you to have it.”
Dana’s cautious reserve thawed. She was a pretty brunette with midnight-blue eyes, thick black lashes, and skin the color of heavy cream laced with vanilla. Tanner had talked about her for days before working up the nerve to ask her out, to the point where Tate had offered to ask her out for him if he was going to be such a sissy about it.
“Come in and open it with me,” Dana said. “I’m sure we’ll both get a good laugh out of whatever this is.”
The tension trickled out of Tate’s neck and shoulders. The invitation was generous considering they hadn’t spoken to each other since the day of the funeral, or so much as made eye contact, even though Tate hadn’t quit the circuit for another few months.
The Barrett home was warm and cozy and borderline gaudy with Christmas decorations—all the things her own home used to be at this time of year. Dana’s mother was in the kitchen, baking cookies. The smell of molasses and ginger teased the tip of Tate’s tongue. She stopped long enough to say hello to Mrs. Barrett before Dana led her to the adjoining dining room and offered her a chair.
“I hope it’s not something inappropriate for his sister to see,” Dana said, caution coating her words, making it more of a warning than a joke.
Tate couldn’t imagine anything more inappropriate than what Miles’s parents had seen just that morning. “Don’t worry. If it is, I’ll survive.”
Dana opened the box. Inside was another box, with a note on top. She didn’t read the note out loud, but her smile turned wistful, and she set it aside, face down on the polished table.
Her smile slowly flattened, like a balloon with a slow leak, as she worked her way through a series of boxes and notes until she got to the final one—a small velvet jeweler’s box.
A huge knot of dread formed in Tate’s stomach. She should have taken Maybe’s advice and opened it first.
Dana didn’t open the box. Instead, she took Tate’s hand and pressed it gently into her palm. “You keep it. Or return it. Pawn it, or something. I know what it is, and I can’t accept it.”
Tate tightened her fingers around the soft velvet. “Why not?”
“Because I would have said no.”
Her words were a shock. Tate would have sworn they’d been happy together. Tanner had been crazy for Dana and Tate had been so jealous of them.Please don’t let me be the reason.
Dana began stuffing wrapping paper and packaging into the first, largest box, avoiding Tate’s eyes. “Being involved with a bull rider wasn’t for me. I was going to break up with him after that last ride.”
“I see.”
There wasn’t much more Tate could say. Guilt turned her chest into a huge block of ice and numbed her hands and lips. Tanner had known. That was why he’d wanted to quit. And Tate, because she could never leave things alone, had insisted he ride.
She dropped the jeweler’s box into her purse. She accepted one of Mrs. Barrett’s fresh cookies but declined an offer of coffee or tea. She managed a few moments of small talk before escaping to her car.
The return drive to Grand was a blur.
She wasn’t ready to go home. Maybe and Meredith would arrive in a few hours to help put up a stupid tree and she was not in the mood.
On a whim, she headed for the small Methodist church. Pastor Harm Addams—whose first name meantwarrior, or so he claimed—was an old friend of the Shannahan family. His children had gone to school with Tate and her brothers.
He’d baptized them. He’d officiated at Tanner’s funeral and laid him to rest in the cemetery out back. He’d helped walk Tate through the worst of her grief when the Shannahans had nothing left in them to spare for each other. He’d been the one to suggest she might get some comfort from doing something meaningful in Tanner’s memory for Christmas.
He’d called that one wrong. As of today, her Christmas spirit was officially dead.
I choose to be happy…
No, Tate, your dead brother is not sending you secret Christmas messages. Grow up. You heard what you wanted to, that’s all. Same as always.
How could she ever be happy when she’d ruined any chance at happiness for Tanner and Dana?
Pastor Harm’s car wasn’t in the small parking lot, but she knew the church would be open, so she slowed down and turned in. She’d sit for a few moments. She’d soak up some of the peacefulness the pretty little church offered. She’d pull herself together.
