Ten

“Grampa, don’t let go of me. Buck is so big!” Tricia snuggled her back against Jake, who held her close with his left arm while guiding the big gelding with his right. The horse had a black mane and tail and black feet and was otherwise a solid doeskin color.

“You know I won’t let go, baby girl,” Jake told her.

Strands of Tricia’s bright red curly hair stuck out from under her stocking hat, and her cheeks were a ruddy red from the cold.

Interestingly enough, Sadie Mae had chosen to ride with Tommy Tyler. When she heard he’d never known a real Christmas or had a Christmas tree, she actually felt sorry for the very same young man who’d scared her to death in the alley back in Brighton. She was so, so much like her mother in spirit, with an angel-like ability to love the unlovable.

Which is probably why that damn old rooster in the henhouse leaves her alone, Jake thought. It was as though that demon bird recognized the special goodness about Sadie Mae, which made sense, because the wicked beast hated Jake and attacked him every chance it got. As much as the ornery, strutting cock saw the goodness in Sadie Mae, he saw the outlaw in Jake. In fact, the kids had named the rooster Outlaw. Jake dearly wanted to shoot it or twist its head off, but he didn’t dare because it would break Sadie Mae’s heart. The situation was a matter of wonderful jokes among the family. Even Tommy had laughed about it when Sadie Mae told him the story of the conflict between Jake and the rooster on their ride out here to find a Christmas tree.

Forgiveness. Sadie Mae had the ability to forgive, just like Evie. His beautiful, Christian daughter had forgiven the men who’d so sickeningly abused her back at Dune Hollow in Oklahoma. That was one of the darkest times in Jake’s life, and when he got through rescuing her, there weren’t many of those men left alive for Evie to forgive. But forgive them she did. How he’d produced a daughter of such faith and beauty he would never understand, other than it all must have come from Randy’s blood, not his.

Bells jingled as they rode, Tricia having insisted that jingly bells be tied around several of the horses’ necks. Their “hunting party” consisted of Jake and Tricia, Tommy and Sadie Mae, Stephen, young Jake, and Ben. They brought plenty of rope to drag a tree back with them, and the boys all carried rifles “just in case.” Young as they were, they all knew how to use them. A man never knew what he might come across out here in the Colorado foothills.

The girls giggled and sang Christmas carols, but the boys refused to join them, sitting tall in their saddles as though grown men didn’t sing songs. Jake quietly studied young Jake, who rode a bit ahead of him and to his left. The boy had Jake’s own spirit, which worried him a little. He was extremely defensive of his mother and father and siblings, and easily angered to the point of putting up his fists. Since he was old enough to talk, he’d made it very clear that he was proud to be a Harkner and hoped to be “just like Grandpa” when he grew up.

No, you don’t, Jake thought. Nobody wants to be just like me. Young Jake had always all but worshipped him, which had turned out to be dangerous more than once. Back in Guthrie, when he was only three and still called Little Jake, he’d run right down the street thinking to defend his grandfather when Jake was in the middle of a shootout with wanted men. Jake had taken a bullet in the thigh while shielding the boy.

Of all three boys, young Jake yearned the most to be a man, even though he was the youngest of the three. Stephen and Ben were a little more accepting of the gradual process that took, although Stephen was already tall and strong for his age, and Ben already had a man’s build. He’d exploded in growth at around eleven, and Jake was beginning to wonder if the boy would ever stop growing.

“Grampa, look at that one!” Tricia yelled then, pointing to a huge pine that was far too big for a Christmas tree. “Can we have that one?”

“Tricia, that tree would never fit in Grandpa’s house. We’d have to cut a hole in the roof.”

“But you have a big, high ceiling!”

“Not that high!”

They did have a big house—a huge log home Jake had had men build for Randy, with enough bedrooms for grandchildren to stay over any time they wanted…and a loft bedroom where he’d made love to his beautiful, faithful wife too many times to count. Randy deserved that house. It was the first home they’d owned and settled into in all their years of marriage…years of being on the run, working different jobs, time in prison. At last his wife had a “forever” place to settle.

“That one!” Sadie Mae shouted then, pointing to a scraggly tree barely four feet high. “It looks sad, Grampa.”

“Trees don’t have feelings,” young Jake scoffed.

“Yes, they do,” Sadie Mae argued.

“Sadie Mae,” Jake called to her, “that tree isn’t lonely. It’s growing right beside its mother tree. See? We’ll let that tree get bigger and stronger before we cut it down, okay?”

“Okay.”

They moved into thicker pines, dismounting and separating to look for just the right tree.

“Nobody go too far!” Jake told them as he lifted Tricia down. Tommy led Sadie Mae around a small hill of mostly boulders, and the boys began their own search in another direction, each one keeping a rifle in hand, as did Jake. Tommy had no rifle because Jake wouldn’t allow him to carry a gun yet.

“Grampa, we found one! We found one that’s just right!”

The shout came from Sadie Mae, who was with Tommy on the other side of a huge, rocky mound that hid them.

“Come, see, Grampa!”

“I’m coming.” Jake took Tricia’s hand and kept his rifle in his other hand as he led the girl toward the boulders. It was then he heard it—the growl of a cougar. And Sadie Mae’s screams.