Chapter Eight

 

As they pulled onto the ranch, surrounded by rolling high mountains and a lush covering of trees, Brook jumped out once Deacon switched off the engine, surprised at the drop-in temperature even though they didn’t seem to have climbed too high. The air had a freshness, a vitality about it, a pureness that filled her lungs with her first breath, energizing her in a way she had never expected.

“You ready to go horse riding?” Deacon said from behind her; close behind her. She smelled like honeysuckle, he thought.

“I’m just taking in the air.” She didn’t turn around, much as she wanted to. When they touched knees at Sam’s, it was electrifying. And when she ran into him this morning, it excited her down to her very core in a way she had never felt before and hadn’t been looking for when she had set off from home to find herself. Instead she had found Deacon. The very thing that she had never dreamed of finding on her trip.

She was realistic. She knew that they were impossible for each other. She, the heiress to a fortune, the city girl who had never done anything remotely useful with her life other than pose for society shots with her daddy then when he’d passed her on to her husband, pose for the same shots with him. The rest of her life was a vacuous existence filled with ways to pass the time. None of those things achieved anything but to see the clock move around another hour or two.

 

***

 

“Y’all take care now and enjoy your ride. All the trails are well marked, and you’ve ridden most of them before anyway, Deacon. He loaded the picnic into the saddlebags. See you both around six.” The homely woman who had greeted them gave them a cheery wave before heading back to the house she had emerged from when they had arrived.

It had been a couple of years since Brook had ridden and despite being a little rusty, she had immediately felt at home in the saddle. The horse had responded well to her urging when she had taken it around the paddock.

“Now, don’t go racing off at a gallop straight off. Give me a chance to get used to the horse.”

“You got it.” Deacon looked over his shoulder at her and smiled.

Deacon moved off at a slow walk and Brook fell in behind him while they negotiated the gate to the paddock. She looked out at the majestic view of the mountains.

She pushed her horse to walk side-by-side with Deacon’s once they were through the paddock gate and on a wide path, heading for an area of forest.

“It’s so beautiful up here!” She said, taking in the magnificent scene.

The horses emerged from under the cover of the trees into a wide clearing, a meadow where wild flowers bloomed in the summer sun and insects buzzed frenetically, always on the move in their ceaseless meanderings. The air was full of the sweet odour of pollen and the joyous sound of birds whistling and calling as they flit from field to forest.

They had ridden for some time. “I’m ready to eat. How about you?”

“Yes.” They didn’t talk much until then. Both just enjoying the silence.

They laid out the blanket on the lush verdant grass of the meadow and set out their picnic. It was, in truth basic fare but good enough for a lunch in the wide-open spaces of the mountain.

Brook’s mind was a long way from thinking about food. “So…”

“Shush. Just a minute. If we are real quiet, we can hear the country.” Deacon signalling her to be quiet.

She looked at him as though he told her to freeze. They started eating quietly for a good fifteen minutes. Then, Brook noticed the sounds all around her. The trees swaying, the grass dancing in the wind, the bustling in the bushes, the birds chirping, the horses whipping their tails at the bugs. She smiled over at him.

“See.” He broke the silence.

“You love it here, don’t you?”

“Yup.”

“So, if you weren’t a mechanic, what would you do?”

“This. When I was a kid, I dreamed of having a ranch.”

Brook was speechless. She didn’t know what she wanted to be. From the time she was little, she was told what to be. Deacon cut the silence by handing her a glass of wine. “Carole packed us some wine.” He laughed.

“Wow, my mother never even packed my lunch for school.”

“So, she let you starve then?”

“No. She would hand me some money. And she would say, don’t buy any junk food.” He looked at her and looked out at the mountains.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just wondering what you were like as a kid.”

“I was a bit of a nerd. I liked school. Mostly because it made my parents happy when I did well. Then there was dance, and piano and swim…polo, ballet, cello and skiing. Oh, and I also took riding lessons for four years.”

Deacon was dumbfounded. “Is it even possible for one kid to do all that?”

Brook laughed. I didn’t do them all at once. I jumped from one thing to the next. They just kept signing me up for classes. I guess they wanted me to do something other than…” She didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

“Other than play, you mean.”

She chuckled. “I guess so.” She paused. “It didn’t work though. I still don’t know what I want to do with my life.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. Maybe if you weren’t so bombarded with all that stuff, you would have had the chance to figure it out. You know, you are kind of doing it now too.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, you drove off, trying to distract yourself. But sometimes, it’s best to stay still and be quiet. Look around you.”

Deacon’s simple way of explaining things shut her up once again. Now that she no longer needed so badly to take action, the anxious feeling that she had been driving around with her all this time was gone. She felt relieved all of a sudden.

Brook remained quiet. She had another sip of wine.

He jumped up and started folding away the blankets and repacking the food. Brook stood watching him work and when he’d packed the last thing. She walked over to the edge of the clearing, put her hands on the wooden rail and stood in silence watching the mountains and listening to the forest.

He walked over to her and stood behind her, knowing she was going through some stuff, “You okay?”

She tilted her head back and looked up at his eyes. She smiled with her entire body. “I feel great.”

He smiled back. “Good.” And for some reason, he put his hands on her shoulders and gave them a little rub. He really wanted to put his arms around her but he held back, not knowing how it would make her feel.

They started riding again. Taking their time.

Deacon started “I’m sorry about what happened to you, Brook. About your husband and losing everything. You seem like a really nice person. You don’t deserve that.”

“Thanks” She looked out at the mountains, and now it was her moment to be silent. He let her have it.

“It must be tough, losing your husband, and your house at the same time.”

“It’s a condo. And no. We were married about a year. And it wasn’t the best marriage, now that I look back. We fought half the time. And the condo, well, it’s attached to him, and I want nothing to do with him, so I don’t really need to be in that condo anymore.”

“Well that’s good.” It amazed him how easily she could move on pass something so hard and with such grace. Most people, himself included, would fight, yell, cry, drink, destroy property. They would do everything they could not to let it happen. Brook just let it happen. She knew she couldn’t control it. He was impressed by the kind of woman she was.

“Deacon”

“Yeah?”

“You’re staring at me.” She said jokingly.

“Oh, sorry.” He was staring. He shifted his glance ahead at the path. “That’s because you are so beautiful.” He was no longer shy about it.

She smiled looking ahead at the path. “You’re beautiful too.” She added jokingly.

It made him chuckle. “Why thank you.”

They followed a track that climbed across the meadow, heading for the long slow climb up a gently sloping ridge to the top of the mountain. It took an hour to reach the wide top of the mountain.