Page 110 of Devil in Disguise
He didn’t go on, so she said, running her hands over it, “A reallynicesaddle, all leather and … and stamped or whatever. A reallyprettysaddle. I should object to leather, probably, but I can’t. It feels so good.”
“Yeah, you’d have trouble getting a saddle that wasn’t leather. Steer’s already butchered for the meat anyway. Just using more of the animal, which I figure is good. And I did oak leaves, for the tooling. I wanted to do the Wyoming rose pattern, but you don’t like things decorated with flowers, so …”
The saddle, in fact, was beautiful. No, it was gorgeous. She was fairly sure this was a work-of-art saddle. In two tones of leather, the main—saddle part, whatever you called that—pale, and the underneath-part dark. The stirrups wrapped with leather, and the … saddle horn? The thing you weren’t supposed to hold on to, except she was pretty sure you’d want to grab it as soon as the horse really took off—wrapped with leather, too. And that tooling, under the main body of the thing. She asked, “What kind is it?” Surely he wanted to tell her.
“McCall Lady Wade,” he said, and she’d been right. “Trail saddle and working saddle, both, so you can learn to do whatever. Sized right for you, because that matters, and for the horse, too. I’ve got the prettiest little chestnut Morgan. Gelding. My oldest nephew’s started to ride him some now, because that’s how gentle he is.”
“What’s his name?” she asked.
He smiled. Full-on, finally. “You never say the thing I think you’re going to say. His name’s Pete. Here.” He pulled out his phone and did some scrolling, then showed her.
“Oh,”she said. “His beautiful brown mane and tail. And his eyes. He looks kind. Doesn’t he?”
“Yep. Like I said. Pretty horse, and the Morgan’s a real nice breed. So I did the saddle to sort of …”
“To match him,” she said. “And to tell me that I was coming out to the ranch. That I should hang on, up there in Seattle without you.”
She was going to cry, maybe. She’dnevercried, before this year. She put her arms around his neck and said, “Owen. I love you so much. It almost hurts my heart to love somebody this much. And I love my saddle.”
He smiled some more. “Yeah?”
Her heart was so full, it wanted to overflow. “Yeah. If you’d thought of every possible Christmas present there was, you couldn’t have come up with anything that makes me feel more loved. So thank you.”
“I keep wanting to get you a car, but …”
“But I don’t need a car, and besides—no, you shouldn’t. But I do need a saddle. If I’m coming to Wyoming, and you’re going to teach me to ride?” She laughed. She wanted to keep on laughing forever. She wanted to stay withhimforever. “I sure do need a saddle.”
46
Anticipation
Owen wasn’t thinkingabout either Dyma or football two weeks later, when he was driving home from Seattle on Tuesday evening. Second time he’d done that drive in those two weeks, since he’d just spent his two days off with Dyma after the Devils beat the Chiefs in the AFC Championship game.
He wasn’t thinking about her, first, because he’d see her again in Miami before the Super Bowl, and second, probably because he didn’t want to think about what happenedafterthe Super Bowl, when he’d be on the ranch and she’d still be in Seattle. The offseason wasn’t so much your break as your other life, and his other life was going to feel about half-empty.
He wasn’t thinking about football, either, because you did your best to get loose before the Super Bowl. He wasn’t thinking about how he had one ring already, but he hadn’t really appreciated how special it was to get it, because he hadn’t lost enough on the road there. You had to lose the hard ones, to drop down into that dark place to get the emotional strength to go all the way again, or something like that. Something about finding out how deep you could dig, and how, when you thought you’d given everything you had in you, you could still find a little bit more, because losing would hurt too bad. You only learned that one the hard way.
He also wasn’t thinking about Dyma or football because he was on the phone with his dad and brother to go through some ranch business. And, yes, he might be doing that to avoid thinking too much about Dyma and football. About that “one week together in five months” deal, and the way his heart was hanging right out there. Or about that “digging deep” thing, and preparing to step onto the biggest stage there was.
Hey, whatever worked.
Once they got through the items on his list, though, he did say, “So, hey, how many tickets am I asking for?”
His dad said, “You kidding? You know your mom and I are coming.”
“Good,” Owen said. “Dyma’ll be there, of course. And Jennifer’s taking the baby again, plus Annabelle, and Jennifer’s grandpa, too. Long flight with a baby, but he did OK on the trip to KC. Her grandpa said he’s too old to fly that far, but he’s going anyway, because every man should go to the Super Bowl once. You could look out for Annabelle a little out there, maybe, because Jennifer’s going to have her hands full, and Annabelle’s kind of shy.”
“You bet,” his dad said. “Nice girl.”
Dane said, “Amy and the kids want to come. I’ll hang out here and manage things.”
“Nah, we should put Frank in charge for a few days,” their dad said. “You don’t want to miss this. Fly out Saturday and come home Sunday night if you have to.”
“You trust Frank with calving now?” Dane said. “Right in the middle of the season?”
“I sure don’t,” Waylon said. “Not all the time, I wouldn’t. For two or three days? I think he can handle it.”
“No,” Dane said. “I’ll stay. I’ve been to the Super Bowl before.”
