Chapter 35

Chapter Thirty-Five

C aroline found herself sitting at her desk in the middle of a summer afternoon, staring at paperwork she didn't care about. And she never thought she'd think that. Paperwork usually made her happy, and she filed it away with a great deal of satisfaction.

But today marked the eighth day she hadn't seen Dawson in the flesh. They'd attended Link and Misty's wedding, and while they'd danced and laughed, chatted with their friends, and he'd kissed her when he'd dropped her off, there was something new between them.

Caroline knew it was her inability to scoot over and make room for Dawson in her life. At the same time, the cowboy had rooted himself solidly in her life. So she wasn't sure what she needed to do to become "us" with him, but she knew she hadn't done it yet.

She flipped her phone over, almost desperate to call him. He'd been busy with a couple of meetings immediately following the wedding, and then he and Duke had gone up into the hills to check on their dogs and cattle.

Then, he'd moved into a round of planting, and he'd told her this busy season would be upon them. Once it finished, though, he claimed that a large part of the work around the ranch was watching things grow. That was when they planned to take their road-boat trip—something Caroline wasn't sure they should be doing.

"What are you saying?" she muttered to herself. "That you want to break-up with him?"

She absolutely didn't want to break up with Dawson, but she couldn't help wondering if he'd like to end things with her.

She knew where the man lived, and she knew his favorites for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She could see him if she wanted to, and her fingers itched to do just that. Her left leg started to bounce with the pent-up energy pulling through her.

Heck, she could use the burrowing owls as an excuse to go up to the Rhinehart Ranch and get paid to see her boyfriend. She ran her hands through her hair, because she wasn't going to use the owls to get up to Dawson's ranch.

She needed to figure out how to be herself while being part of a couple. She hadn't been able to do it in her first marriage, and now she wondered if the person she'd been back then had been the problem. She'd been so weak that she'd just allowed Joe to take over her every thought. Dictate to her how every moment of her day would go. How long her showers could be. Everything.

And now, she was still a problem, because she'd gone too far the other way. She'd closed the door on anyone who might want to come into her life, because she was so strong and so capable and so sure of who she was.

Her chest shook with pent-up emotion, and she lay her head in her hands, dangerously close to tears. "Dear God," she whispered. "I don't want to go on like this. I don't want to lose Dawson. And I absolutely don't want to lose myself."

She'd been resisting laying down the pieces of herself she'd fought so hard to develop, because she wasn't sure who she'd be without them.

Her thoughts scattered, and then they came back together. She sat up straight, the words in her head ones she wasn't sure she could say. But if she did…and God answered her prayer…would she be obligated to do what He said?

"Help me to find a new way to be Caroline," she said, her lower lip shaking. "One who can be herself and be with Dawson Rhinehart. And if You can do that—show me the way—then I'll do it."

And of course she believed God could show her the way. He'd given her the way out of her first marriage. He'd led her to Three Rivers. He'd given her the resources to help Belle and Judy. Every step of Caroline's life had been touched by the hand of God, and the moment she uttered her desperate plea for help, she knew the Lord would answer her.

And probably not how she wanted Him to.

After all, she'd known she needed to find a way to lay down her burdens, shed who she was, and become a new creature through Christ. If only that wasn't quite so painful and didn't take quite so long.

She stayed at work; she went home and stood on the back deck with a jar of crunchy Biscoff and an overly large spoon; she put a smile on her face when Belle got home from swimming lessons with Judy.

She ate dinner with her sister and her niece; they all went shopping for new Fourth of July clothes—something festive in red, white, and blue. Caroline could admit she'd found the cutest navy blue sweater with stars and stripes on it, and bonus, it was short-sleeved, so she felt like she could wear it even in the sweltering Texas heat.

"I'll wear it with a pair of white shorts," she'd told Belle, and they'd gone home happy. But for Caroline, that happiness only existed on the outside. She retreated to her bedroom early, her phone silent.

Dawson usually texted and called starting about the time he made it to his barn-office, but he'd been silent today. She searched her memory, trying to remember his schedule and where he'd told her he'd be today .

Everything had scattered again, and she paced in her bedroom where Belle and Judy couldn't see her. "Maybe we've broken up," she said. "And I'm just the last to know."

But that didn't sit right with Caroline. Dawson had not argued with her much in the past six months, but he didn't hold back when there was something important to say. He spoke his mind, and if he didn't want to be with her, she couldn't imagine him wasting his time for even a single day.

"No," she told herself with a firm shake of her head. "He'd say something."

He did have a lot going on, and Caroline's default was to let him take care of what he needed to. His sticky notes were probably out of control, and he was probably stressed trying to make them, move them from one column to the next, keep them all organized.

Keep himself organized.

Go talk to him.

The words streamed through her mind, but Caroline bucked against them the same way she'd been pressing back against the pastor's advice to give up herself to God.

"It's late," she said to her empty master suite. Cowboys went to bed early, and Dawson followed that rule, due to his five a.m. running habit.

The words came again— Go talk to him —and Caroline noticed they were louder. More intense. She grabbed her phone from where she'd set it on the dresser and dialed Dawson instead. His line rang and rang, and he didn't pick up. When his voicemail picked up, Caroline's frustration fired through her.

His inability to do what she wanted irritated her as much now as it had when he wouldn't file the blasted owl paperwork. She had to squash down the feelings, because Dawson might be at dinner with his parents, and he silenced his phone during such an activity. He might be out on the ranch where they didn't have service. He might be in the shower, mere minutes away from going to bed.

She hung up without leaving a message, and the prompting came again, almost a shout in her head.

Go talk to him!

Caroline headed for the door, and she called, "I'm going to see Dawson," as she swiped her keys from the kitchen counter. It was forty-five minutes to the ranch, and it would be dusk-bordering-on-dark by the time she arrived.

"Dust and shadows," she fake swore as she exited the house. Dusk had already started to settle over Three Rivers, which meant she'd be showing up at Dawson's cabin at full dark.

She hesitated, and God practically bellowed at her: Go talk to him.

Caroline made the drive, barely glancing at Duke and Zona's house when she went by. She couldn't believe she'd thought it would be a good idea to show up there an hour early, simply so she could relieve her own anxieties over becoming part of the Rhinehart family.

"That's what it was," she whispered to herself, the words rising slowly and serenely, the way the dust did under her tires as she drove down the dirt road.

She'd been anxious about the steps she and Dawson were taking, because they led to her becoming a Rhinehart. Truly becoming part of his family.

She thought of Zona and how headstrong she was. Then April, who definitely had her own mind and spoke it, lived it. Caroline could maintain herself while giving up some of the control that had literally saved her in the past.

"But the past is the past," she told herself as the homestead came into view. Dawson lived a short jog around the corner, and Caroline made the drive easily, as she'd done it many times before.

Tonight felt different, because Caroline felt different. Both his and Brandon's trucks sat in front of the cabin they shared, and she found Ruffin lying in the shade of one of the big trees in the front yard.

"Odd," she murmured. Ruffin usually stuck close to Dawson, and if he was outside, then....

Caroline slammed on the brakes when she saw Dawson rise from a chair on the front porch. He held something in his hands, but she couldn't quite tell what. Her heartbeat boomed at her as if God Himself had picked up a mallet and hit a big, bass drum over and over again. The beats told her to keep moving; she'd come this far, and Dawson had now seen her. She couldn't just drive away.

She managed to get the car moving, and she parked it next to Brandon's truck. By the time she got out, Dawson had come down the front steps, his hands now empty. He looked at her and tucked his hands away in his front pockets.

"Hey," she said, and the slam from her car door closing made her flinch. "I'm a little surprised you're not in bed."

"And yet, here you are," he said, stopping a healthy distance away. So there was definitely something wrong.

Caroline twisted her hands over and around one another. "Are we still together?"

Dawson opened his mouth, then quickly closed it. He looked away, his jaw jumping in a way Caroline had seen before and didn't like.

"Because I don't want us to not be together," she said, feeling her old strength come into her body. She pushed it down, because now wasn't the time for Caroline to be her old self.

Her chin shook as tears filled her eyes. "I hate that you didn't text or call me today, and I hate that you're thinking of breaking up with me, and I really, really loathe that you believe I won't make room for you."

He ducked his head in that adorable way he had, the sweetness just pouring off him. He didn't refute anything she'd said, which meant he hadn't texted or called on purpose. He absolutely was thinking of breaking up with her. And he one-hundred percent believed she couldn't change and make room for him.

"I'll just sit with you," she said. "Is that okay? We don't have to talk, the way we didn't at the diner that one time."

He lifted his head and nodded at her, then turned and went back toward the porch. She followed him, and he retook his seat, picked up a knife and a hunk of wood, and started whittling again.

Caroline took the only other seat on the porch, the small, round table between them. "I didn't know you whittled," she said.

"From time to time," he said in his gruff voice. "When I need my hands busy."

She'd learned in the past six months that sometimes Dawson said only half of what he meant. And when he needed his hands busy, it was so he could work through the troubling thoughts in his mind.

Caroline pressed her lips together, because she'd told him they didn't have to talk. They'd never had to fill the silence with mindless chatter, and Caroline took a deep breath and clasped her hands together in her lap.

Lord , she thought. Thank You for this beautiful night.

Her prayer ended there, because she only wanted to thank God for the blessings in her life right now. She didn't want to ask Him for anything, because she'd already begged for what she wanted.

And He'd answered.

She was supposed to talk, but she didn't know what to say. She didn't want to push Dawson further away, but God had told her to come talk to him. Not sit here in silence.

Caroline decided that when the right words came, she'd say them.