“I’m so hungry I think I’m going to die!” Bella moaned as she grabbed her belly and doubled over in mock pain.

At least Laredo thought it might be mock pain. It was hard to tell. He didn’t appreciate the fact that his daughter was whining like a spoiled brat. However, he also hadn’t actually thought about feeding her for most of the day either.

Aria put her hands on her hips and wrinkled her nose at Bella “Didn’t you eat your lunch?”

“Yes!” Bella screwed up her face into a pout. “But that was a million years ago.”

“Well, you’re in luck!” Aria said brightly.

How was Bella in luck? Laredo was having difficulty focusing on the conversation in general since his brain was still fogged over from kissing Aria. The feel of having her in his arms as he kissed her body and teased her into a frenzy of need was so incredible that he pretty much wanted to shirk every other responsibility in his life just to retreat to the bedroom with Aria.

“Does luck include food?” Bella wanted to know.

“Actually. Yes.”

Bella started jumping up and down. Her squirming antics were so ridiculous that Laredo could not help but laugh. He had never seen his daughter this giddy before. They were standing just outside Aria’s house on their way back in after a long day running all over Clouds End Farm.

Not that Laredo and Bella had done nearly the amount of work that Aria had put in, but the two of them had each ridden more than one horse and had taken care of them afterwards. Cleaning tack, helping the guys tidy up in the barn, and now feeding the horses rounded out the day. Laredo hadn’t had a day like this is ages. Not since leaving the main Hernandez ranch camp. There had been no office work. He hadn’t answered any phone calls. And he hadn’t worn a suit, jacket, or tie all day long. It had been rather—liberating.

Aria opened the front door of her home but did not step inside. Instead, she reached in and snagged something off the floor. “Mrs. Naranjo stopped by earlier today.”

“She did?”

“Who do you think made your lunch and left it on the counter for you?” Aria’s voice was so warm that there was no hint of derision or anything else. The way she interacted with Bella was nothing short of wonderful.

“She’s so nice,” Bella moaned. “I knew I’d eaten that peanut butter and jelly sandwich before.”

Laredo chuckled to himself. Kids were certainly adept at hyperbole. Turning, he noticed that Jorge had suddenly appeared with three horses in tow. Laredo’s black was accompanied by Aria’s palomino, Nugget, and Smokey.

Then Laredo realized that Aria had retrieved a bag from the house. She carried this down to the horses and helped Jorge secure the gear behind Nugget’s saddle. Turning toward Bella, Aria pointed to Smokey. “Get on and we’ll go find a place to eat the picnic that Mrs. Naranjo packed for us.”

“Picnic!” Bella was practically howling with glee.

Laredo’s daughter was already in the saddle by the time he had a chance to put his arm around Aria and press a kiss to the top of her head. “A picnic is a perfect idea. I can’t thank you enough for all that you’ve done for us. We owe you so big time that I cannot imagine ever being able to pay you back.”

Aria lifted her gaze to his face. She put her hand against his cheek. “Laredo, it isn’t about paybacks or a status quo. Stop thinking like that. I thought this would be fun for all of us. Me too. So, just get on your horse and enjoy.”

The evening was beautiful. As they left the barns and the house behind, Laredo breathed in the sweet air and flung his head back to stare up at the indigo sky. It was just starting to get dark. The days were getting longer, but night was still falling far before he was ready. He longed for those days that never seemed to end, when the night sky seemed to be filled with a million stars before the sun fully left the sky.

Bella was chattering to Aria about rodeos and barrel racing and how she wanted to be a horse trainer when she grew up. For once, this did not give Laredo hives. He was just glad to see that his daughter was happy. She’d had far too much sorrow and stress in her short life. But right now, Laredo could honestly believe that things were looking up. He had been out here all day long, and he hadn’t thought about alcohol or taking a drink the entire day.

There was no familiar ache in his gut. He wasn’t experiencing any shakes or sweats. He felt clearheaded and calm. He felt centered. There was something about being around not just Aria but the farm, the horses, and the people that did wonders for his stress levels.

“Come on, Daddy!” Bella was dismounting. “This is a good spot! Look! We can see our ranch from here!”

Aria had brought them to the crest of the hill that overlooked the valley where so much of the drama had been recently taking place. For all the tire tracks and trampled earth at the bottom of the valley, it was still a very beautiful view.

Laredo dismounted from his black horse and tied up the reins so the horse could graze with the other two. Then he made his way to the blanket that Bella was helping to spread on the grass. It was like a scene from some idyllic painting. There was something so absolutely insane about the idea that they were just casually having a picnic on a Saturday night. It seemed almost impossible that this was his life right now.

“Daddy, come and sit.” Bella was pulling food containers out of the basket. “Mrs. Naranjo made fried chicken!”

“You guys are so lucky to have her,” Aria told Bella. “She’s the best cook ever. I wish I could cook half as good as she does.”

“I’ve known her all my life,” Bella observed as she settled on the blanket. “She’s always been with us.”

Bella was also already tearing into the food as though she had suddenly grown a hollow leg. Aria and Laredo dug in too. It was either that or have nothing but crumbs left after Bella was done.

When Laredo felt as though he’d had enough to ease the ache in his belly, he leaned back on one elbow so that he was closer to Aria. He wanted to feel the heat of her skin beside him. He wanted to catch a hint of her scent mixed with the smells of spring grass and fresh, damp earth. How could he have forgotten that this was what living was all about? How could he have lost sight of what really mattered?

“Bella, would you like to move?” Laredo wondered out loud. “You’ve said you don’t like our house. What if we looked for another one?”

“A house where we could keep Smokey right in the backyard?” Bella’s blue eyes opened wide. “That would be so cool!”

“Yeah,” Laredo agreed. “It would certainly be fun. We could look for something not too far outside of Denver so I could still commute to the office when I had to.”

Aria was oddly silent. Laredo wondered why she didn’t have an opinion. Surely this mattered to her in some way. Then he saw that Bella was acting strangely too. What was going on? Was this some female thing he was totally missing?

“Daddy?” Bella was chewing fried chicken as though she were about to start gnawing on the leg bones like some tiny coyote in cowboy boots. “Why don’t we just move here?”

Laredo’s brain stutter stepped. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“You and Aria could get married.” Bella made this suggestion as if it were the most logical thing in the world. “Then we could just move out to Clouds End Farm. There’s plenty of room, and I like it here with Aria. I don’t want to move to a new house with just the two of us. It still won’t feel like home. Aria feels like home.”

There was dead silence. Laredo was still trying to process the fact that his daughter had just proposed marriage to Aria for him. They’d never even spoken about long-term plans or what either of them wanted. It was a big stretch to go from making out in the barn like a couple of teenagers to marriage. Marriage was—well, it was meant to be permanent, and Laredo had no intention of going back into another one unless he was pretty sure that this was it for him.

This is it for me.

But what about Aria? She looked like the proverbial deer in the headlights. Laredo cleared his throat to get Bella’s attention and hopefully give Aria a moment to collect herself. “That’s kind of rude, don’t you think?”

“Why?” Bella actually shrugged. Then she reached for another chicken leg. “You love Aria. Aria loves you. I love you both. I want us to be a real family. I’ve always wanted a real family. So, why can’t we be one?”

Aria finally reacted. She flopped onto her back and stared up at the sky. Then she started laughing. The sound was not maniacal or hard or angry. That was good. At least Laredo thought that it was good. Then she finally pointed at Laredo. “The girl has a point.”

“She does?” Dammit. He couldn’t make his brain come up with a more intelligent response.

“Yes!” Aria sighed and continued to remain flat on her back. “She’s just saying what you and I would take a million years to get around to.”

“That we should get married?” Laredo needed to be sure he was hearing this right.

Aria waved her hand in a little circle. “You and I will dance around the topic and be completely afraid of pushing the other person into something before they’re ready. So, simultaneously, we’ll both want to make this permanent. Because we both know it’ll make us happier. We have problems.” She snorted and threw up both hands. It was getting rather comical to watch her flounder around on the ground. “God knows we have problems! I’m commitment phobic, and you’ve got that drinking problem that’s going to take some willpower. But still! We could do this. You know?”

Aria finally rolled to her side and then to her belly. She stared at first Laredo and then at Bella. Bella was the one to react first. She flung herself at Aria and gave her a big squeeze. The two of them were rolling around on the blanket, Bella hanging on tight to Aria and Aria whispering to the little girl.

Then Laredo decided it was time to join in. He lay flat on the blanket and pulled them both into his arms. Bella was between them, but he could feel Aria’s warmth on the other side of his daughter. The three of them stayed like that until the sky went from indigo to twilight. Bella had never been quiet for so long. But then perhaps she had never felt so secure before in her life.

Laredo felt Aria’s fingers gently brush his face. “I love you both,” she said softly. “I would love to have you both sharing my home. I think it’s more of a home when you’re there.”

“Please, Daddy?” Bella whispered. “Oh, please, won’t you marry Aria and let us be a family?”

Laredo chuckled to himself at the simplicity of nine-year-old logic. But he could not fault what her end goal was. “Yes, Bella. I’m going to marry Aria. I’m going to make her my wife and your mom, and she’s going to make our family very complete.”

“Maybe not complete,” Aria whispered. “But we’re going to be on our way to the perfect combination of people, animals, and friends.”

“Mrs. Naranjo!” Bella exclaimed excitedly. “She’ll be so happy because her family is out here too!”

Laredo figured the woman would be very happy about this change, but for a myriad of reasons that Bella was not ready to understand. He looked up at the sky. The first stars were twinkling overhead. The entire scene looked like a perfect work of art. The way the sky rolled overhead, the wispy clouds just barely touching the surface of the darkening horizon, and the stars that emerged with shocking speed.

“It’s so beautiful,” Aria whispered. “Don’t you think? It looks like a fairytale.”

“It is a fairytale,” Bella added. “I finally get to be the princess with the happy ending.”

“Actually,” Aria told Bella. “I’m the princess who gets the prince and a very happy ending. And you’re the little mouse who gets a few extra crumbs when the princess moves into the palace.”

Bella’s infectious giggle was punctuated by a sound of mock outrage. She rolled toward Aria and tackled her. The two scuffled for a moment but then dissolved into laughter and some fast-talking girly nonsense that left Laredo feeling decidedly out of the loop and yet happy to be that way.

Bella finally had a real woman in her life. His daughter had an example of hard work and tenacity that would help Bella become the sort of woman that Laredo would be proud of. In fact, he felt as though he were bursting with pride right now. He sighed with contentment and wondered if at any point in his life he could have imagined it would go in this direction.

“All right, you two.” Aria sat up. “These horses need to get back to the barn. They’re practically grazing their way back on their own anyway.”

“Smokey and Nugget won’t leave us,” Bella assured Aria. Then she tilted her head to one side and looked at Laredo. “What is your horse’s name, Daddy? I never hear you call him anything but the black. Doesn’t he have a name?”

“Funny, but I’ve been wondering the same thing,” Aria teased. In the remaining half-light, her dark eyes sparkled with good humor. “We’re going to have to call him something if you want to compete him.”

Laredo grunted. “Hernandez horses are always named with the letters HLC for Hernandez Land & Cattle Company. Then they get a name that says what bloodline they come from.”

“So?” Aria prompted. “What’s his name?”

“HLC Black Bart.” Laredo sighed. “I told Cal that it was the silliest thing I’d ever heard.”

“It is,” Bella said loftily.

Laredo grabbed her and tickled her mercilessly until she was squirming away from him. “Oh, yeah? Did you know that Smokey’s registered name is HLC Okie Dokie Smokey?”

“Hey!” Aria protested. “That’s actually kind of cute!”

“Better than Black Bart,” Bella wheezed.

Aria got to her feet and started repacking what was left of the food. “I would agree. I think we’ll just keep calling him the black horse. You know, to save his pride.”

“You ladies are harsh,” Laredo joked.

They continued to tease him about his horse, but Laredo didn’t mind. The three of them packed up and then mounted their horses. There was a camaraderie and sense of family between them that Laredo had never experienced before. This was what he had been longing for all his life. He’d had it to some extent with his brothers but never like this. He could feel the love and the positive regard rolling off Aria in waves, and it made him almost certain that no matter what the Flying W, his father, or even alcoholism had in mind, he could handle it.