Chapter 6

Opal glanced up as her cousin Jane sat beside her. An instant smile came to her face. "Hey." She leaned over and touched her cheek to Jane's as her husband Cord sat beside her.

"Hey," Jane whispered back. "No Gerty and Mike?" She looked down the pew where Gerty, Mike, and West usually sat.

"I know," Opal said. "I'm going to die without that baby as a distraction during the sermon."

Jane grinned at her and shook her head. "Pastor Danielson actually says really good things."

"I agree," Opal whispered. "I just like listening while showing West barnyard animals." She smiled at Jane. "But he's running a low fever." He'd been teething lately, and Opal had missed her goodnight kiss last night due to that fussy baby. They'd pulled up to the farmhouse only ten seconds before Mike had returned with West fast asleep in his carseat.

He'd taken him out for a drive to get him to go to sleep after Gerty had given him some baby Motrin to help with the teething.

"Mm," Jane said. "Do you want to come to our place for lunch?"

"Yes," Opal said.

"You didn't text about your date." Jane hit the T hard, even for a whisper.

"We got back late," Opal said, watching the pulpit and praying the choir director would give the nod and this conversation would be drowned out by Hallelujahs. "He had tickets to that Christmas botanical display at the Chinese Royal Gardens."

Opal couldn't even say that without smiling, and she ducked her head away from Jane, as if she wouldn't see. The woman saw everything.

Jane sucked in a breath that sounded a lot like a gasp. "Oh, boy. This Taggart Crow is aiming right for the heart."

Opal giggled with her, and then Jane linked her arm through hers. "I have something to tell you." She spoke in that conspirational whisper that made Opal's heartbeat skip.

"Oh? Family gossip? This close to Christmas?" She hoped it would be in Jane's branch of the family and not hers, because Opal wanted the Christmas party at the farmhouse to go without a hitch.

"You can't tell anyone."

"Who would I tell?"

"Gerty," Jane whispered. "Mike. Tag."

"I'll only tell West," Opal said with a grin. "Though asking me not to tell Mike and Gerty is pretty rough. Maybe I don't want to know."

Jane hesitated, and she looked over to Cord. He looked at her too, his usual stoic-ness fastened securely in place. He searched her face, and she leaned closer to him to whisper something in his ear. He bent his head so her mouth would be closer to him, and Opal shivered just thinking about having a man do that for her.

Someone who was so interested in what she had to say, he just had to get closer to hear. And he'd reply, which would put his soft breath on her neck, and she'd cuddle into his chest, and he'd put his arm around her to keep her there.

Her fantasies evaporated as Jane turned back to her. "You can tell Gerty and Mike, but no one else. We've only told my parents."

Opal met her eye, her brain whirring. Something Jane and Cord had only told her parents…. She sucked in the same type of breath Jane had a moment ago as Jane said, "I'm pregnant, Opal."

She glowed with happiness, and while Opal's eyes filled with tears, so did Jane's. She giggled again, and Opal leaned over and pressed her cheek to hers again. "Oh, this is great news; not gossip. Congratulations, my lovely."

Opal looked over to Cord, and she reached past Jane and squeezed his hand. "Congratulations, Cord."

"Thank you," he murmured, but his tough-cowboy fa?ade fell as he allowed a smile to touch his mouth. "We're real excited about it." He looked at Jane. "Obviously."

"Oh, don't be like that," she whisper-hissed at him. "I'm not going to tell anyone else."

"All right," Cord whispered, plenty of disbelief in those two, soft-spoken words.

Opal simply grinned through their brief exchange, and she looked up and to her right this time as more people arrived on their row. Tag, followed by Carrie and Kyle.

"Hey," Tag said quietly as he sat beside her. In that moment, the choir director gave the cue, because the band started as the robed singers took their spots up on the stage. Opal didn't have a chance to respond, and she got to her feet to join her clapping to the music.

When they sat for the opening hymn—a much slower, more reverent song—Opal erased a couple of inches between her and Tag. They hadn't talked about sitting together at church, as Tag didn't come all the time, and when he did, he sat by Gerty and Mike and Gerty's grandparents.

She smiled at him and pulled out the hymnal so she could be ready for the congregational hymn. When it was time, she tilted the book toward Tag, and he took the right side of it and held it. Warmth filled Opal, and not only because she loved hymns and the spirit they brought into her life.

But because she sat beside Tag, and Jane was pregnant, and everything seemed right in the world. And when all the hymnals had been put away and Pastor Danielson finally stood, Tag took her hand and threaded his fingers through hers.

And suddenly, Opal had a way better distraction than reading baby books to West: holding Taggart Crow's hand.

"What do you think of this one?" Opal turned her phone toward Jane while Cord slid their first pizza into the oven.

Jane picked up the phone with one hand and dusted flour off her other one. She studied it for several seconds. "You're looking at houses in Ivory Peaks?"

"Yes," Opal said.

Her cousin lifted just one eyebrow. "What about your job in Burbank?"

"I, uh, quit." Opal took her phone back. "I'm not married to Ivory Peaks. But I think I could guest lecture at the colleges here, or work on something like Uncle Colton did. He did the Human Genome Project and all that. I don't know." She pressed the power button on the side of her phone and turned it upside down.

"I've never done anything with my money," she said. "Everyone else has, and I want to be here."

"I didn't think you liked small towns."

"It's adjacent to a big town," Opal said as nonchalantly as she could. "Mikey's here. You're here. I want to be here. Plus." She met Cord's eye as he set a bagged Caesar salad on the counter and looked at her. "There are hospitals here. If I want to be a doctor, I can be a doctor."

"We're here," someone called, and Tucker led the way into the kitchen at the back of the house. "Hey, hey, hey! The pizza party can start now." He wore a grin from ear to ear, and he'd brought Deacon, Tarr, and Bobbie Jo with him.

The four of them worked at the Hammond Family Farm, and Tuck sat on the barstool next to Opal and put his arm around her. "Hey, you. I didn't know you were coming."

"Here I am," Opal said, glancing at Jane. She didn't need to specifically say not to bring up her moving here or how she'd quit, and Jane gave her a silent confirmation that she'd keep it to herself.

"Howdy, Opal," Tarr said as he sat on her other side. "You're lookin' pretty today."

Opal grinned at him. "Thank you, Tarr. How's Millie?"

He looked past her to Tucker. "Uh, she's not—she?—"

Opal looked at Tuck too, and he wore a sympathetic expression that iced over pretty fast.

"She ghosted him." Tuck's jaw jumped. "Imagine that? He's a National Rodeo Champion, and she stopped texting him."

Opal frowned. "Is she fifteen?"

"What? No," Tucker said, glancing over to Bobbie Jo. "She's…."

"Not impressed by rodeo champions," Bobbie Jo said. "And she doesn't like nice, hardworking, good-looking men, obviously." She threw a look to Tarr, but all conversation had completely stopped.

Everyone stared at Bobbie Jo, and Opal looked over to Tarr, who'd started to blush red, and then Tuck, who had his mouth hanging open.

"I'm just saying," Bobbie Jo said with a shrug. "He's more than just a National Rodeo Champion. Millie obviously doesn't like nice guys." She picked up a piece of pepperoni and looked at Cord. "Can I make a personal one with this?"

He took an extra moment to blink, and then he flew into action. "Yep," he said. "Yeah. Everyone gets to make their own. They don't take long." He put a tray with pizza dough in front of them and added, "Come on, Tarr. Tuck. Get yours ready, and we'll put them all in at the same time."

Tucker got up and joined Bobbie Jo on the other side of the counter. He flirted with her shamelessly, but at least he'd stopped asking her out. Opal thought they were super-cute together, but she looked over to Tarr.

"She's right, you know." She bumped him with her shoulder. "You are nice, hardworking, and good-looking. If this Millie girl isn't interested, that's on her, not you."

Tarr ducked his head, his smile practically made for TV. "Thanks, Opal."

"Tell us about your date, Opal," Jane said loudly, drawing everyone's attention to her.

"Oh, you had a date, Opal?" Tuck asked all innocent-like.

"Yes," she said, grinning despite wanting to throw a pinch of flour in Jane's smiling face. "Tag and I finally went out last night."

"Wow," Tuck said. "That's amazing, Ope."

"Yeah," she said. "It was pretty amazing." She felt very chickeny, like she could preen her feathers and be the prettiest bird in the yard.

"When are you going to see him again?" Bobbie Jo asked.

Opal switched her gaze to her, suddenly not so sure of herself. "I mean, we didn't set up a second date."

Bobbie Jo's eyes widened. "Shoot, I'm sorry, Opal. I didn't mean?—"

"It's okay," Jane said. "They live on the same farm together." She looked from Bobbie Jo to Opal. "She'll just text him and find out when he's free."

"He and Gerty are going to Coral Canyon to pick up some horses this week," she said.

"Opal's a good cook too," Jane said, implanting an idea in Opal's head. "She'll take him cookies or something tonight. Or those breakfast waffle sandwiches in the morning."

Opal gave her a grin, the idea of seeing Tag first thing in the morning so appealing. "Right," she said. "I'll take him breakfast in the morning. Something he can eat with one hand while he works."

"She'll flirt with him from the fences," Jane said, giggling.

"Oh, no." Opal shook her head. "I'm not doing that again." She laughed, the ache of her bruised ribs right there beneath the sound. "I'm still healing from the last time I tried to flirt with Tag."

"At least it hurts for someone else," Tuck said, and he grinned at Bobbie Jo.

She rolled her eyes and said, "Oh, you're fine. You don't even flirt with me anymore."

"I would if you weren't with that guy in Oklahoma."

"Not again, man," Tarr said. "I was just starting to like being around you two."

Tucker laughed. "I'm not flirting. I'm not asking her out." He grinned at her. "We're friends."

Bobbie Jo smiled back at him, and they both went back to making their pizzas. Opal wanted to reach for her phone and text Tag, but she refrained. She thought Tucker and Bobbie Jo would be great together, and she reminded herself that sometimes friends could turn into something more—and she hoped maybe that could happen for her and Tag too.

Opal had just finished brushing her teeth and had returned to her room when her phone buzzed on her nightstand. She sighed as she flopped onto the bed and reached for her device. She just wanted a half-hour before the clock struck midnight to play her mini crossword puzzle. It was going to be her cherry on top of a practically perfect day.

Church with Tag. Lunch with Jane, Cord, Deacon, Tucker, Bobbie Jo, and Tarr. An evening without wind. She'd held West for thirty minutes while he slept, and he hadn't woken since.

Now, she saw Tag's name on her phone, and she grinned up to the ceiling before she realized he should've gone to bed a couple of hours ago. At least.

She sat up, everything on high alert now. She slid on the call and said, "Tag."

"Oh, praise God," he said breathlessly. "I need you in the barn."

"The barn?"

"It's Boots," he said, and he panted, as if he'd been running. "I couldn't find him after dinner, and I thought that was weird, right? Of course it's weird. I finally went looking for him, and he—he—he was hurt. He's hurt, and I need you in the barn."

"Okay, Tag," Opal said, jumping to her feet. "I'll be there in one sec." She tossed her phone on the bed and reached for the first sweatshirt she saw. "I'm putting you on speaker. Talk to me about where you found him and what's going on."

Tag's breath came through the line frantically, desperate. Opal had encountered parents like him, loved ones who'd brought in their spouses, sisters, brothers, friends.

"Taggart," she barked. "Talk to me. What am I going to find out there?"

"His foot was in barbed wire," Tag said, and she'd never heard his voice sound like that. High-pitched. Scared. Worried. Even when she'd been kicked by his horse, he'd spoken to her in a calm, only mildly urgent voice.

In fact, she could still hear it. Come on, honey, he'd said. Wake up for me now. It's Tag, and I need you to wake up.

"It's so bloody, and I can see the bone, and oh, Opal, he's breathing so fast. He was out there for hours before I found him." Something clanged on his end of the line, and Opal hurried out of her bedroom and down the hall.

In the kitchen, she shoved her feet into her boots and yanked open the pantry. She had a first aid kit there, and she headed for the door now that she was equipped.

"I knew I should've gone looking right away," Tag said. "I ignored that prompting, and I'm so angry at myself."

"Tag, get the first aid kit off the wall in the barn," she said. She could deal with his regrets later. Right now, Boots needed help. "And turn the heater up."

"Okay," he said. "All right."

"I'm on the way," she said, the nearly-midnight air searing her lungs with icy fingers. "Get some blankets and get him comfortable. I'm two minutes away."

"Hurry, Opal," he said. "I don't know if he'll make it two more minutes."

Opal broke into a run, something she hadn't done since she'd worked in the ER, almost a year ago. "Dear God," she said aloud, not caring that Tag could hear her. "Bless Boots to just hang on for a few more minutes. Tag can't lose his dog, Lord. Please, don't let him lose his dog tonight."