Page 77 of The Cowboy Who Came Home

He chuckled and said, “Well, I don’t call you Edee, so I can’t say that.”

Edith huffed. Around her, the patriotic music stopped, and that seemed to light up the buzz in the crowd again.

“I know one thing that could make tonight better, Edith,” Finn murmured, and she smiled as the first strains of The Star Spangled Banner started to play.

“Yeah?” She looked up at him again as a loud pop! filled the air. “What’s that?”

“A kiss.” He matched his mouth to hers as the first firework exploded in the sky, and Edith’s eyes got painted with bright white light as the crowd cheered around her. She didn’t join them, because she was kissing the man she thought she might be in love with—and that was better than any fireworks show.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Jeremiah Walker loved fireworks, though he wasn’t a huge fan of late nights. He loved red licorice, though he didn’t like the whining of his tweens and teens over how many treats they could have. He loved holding his wife, though it would be a long drive home from Three Rivers Ranch after the show.

All five of his children had come with him, though JJ was a legal adult now. At nineteen, he’d left the ranch and gone into a mechanic training program. He wanted to build and restore cars in his spare time as a cowboy, and Jeremiah hadn’t had the heart to tell JJ that cowboys didn’t have spare time.

As one with a lot of money, perhaps JJ could have his horses and his ranch and his cars, and Jeremiah would do anything he had to in order to make his son’s dreams come true. His three daughters—Clara Jean, Emily, and Hattie—squabbled over the light necklaces, and Whitney reached for the bag of them.

“There’s literally fifty of them,” she said. “You three don’t have to fight over everything.” She sounded exasperated as she ripped open the box and her daughters argued back with her a little bit.

“Offer them to everyone.” Whit eased back into Jeremiah’s arms, and he ducked his head to plant a kiss just above her ear.

Their other son, Jason, a lanky, strong fifteen-year-old, ignored his sisters as the song changed and three fireworks exploded in the sky—one red, one white, and one blue.

Jeremiah smiled up into the sky too, thinking of the enormous American flag painted on the side of his barn at Seven Sons Ranch. He’d had it redone once since he’d come to Three Rivers over twenty years ago.

The light bracelets got snapped and made into necklaces. They got passed to Skyler’s kids, and then Micah’s, and then Jeremiah lost track of them after that. Rhett had come with his triplet seventeen-year-olds, and Liam and Tripp had both come with their wives and the single child they had left at home.

Wyatt was up in Coral Canyon, and he didn’t make the trip back for the Fourth, as that small Wyoming town had a pretty strong Independence Day tradition of their own. Momma and Daddy sat in a pair of lawn chairs somewhere way down by Rory and Ollie, who’d come with their family as well.

The sky filled with pops and lights that seemed to go on and on, and then the music stopped. The crowd gathered on the lawn at the homestead here at Three Rivers Ranch seemed to hold its breath for a moment, and then cheers, whoops, and applause filled the sky next.

“What a great show,” Whitney yelled, her smile apparent as the lights on the ranch flooded the darkness. She got up, and Jeremiah joined her to help start gathering up all of the things they’d brought.

Candy, phones, blankets, sweatshirts. “Girls,” he said. “Go help Grandma and Grandpa with their chairs. Go on, now.” His two younger girls went to do that, but Clara Jean turned to help her aunt Evelyn with her blankets and pillows. Good enough, Jeremiah thought.

“Thank you all for coming,” Squire said over the loudspeaker. Jeremiah had spent many years here in Three Rivers, helping others on their ranches and attending ranch owner meetings with Squire himself.

“Y’all head to the truck,” he said to Whit. “I’m gonna stay and thank Squire.” He watched the path between the cowboy cabins and the ranch buildings, because that was where Squire and Pete had disappeared a half-hour ago.

Whitney started to herd the kids away, and Jeremiah moved over to stand next to Skyler. Mal was still trying to get their youngest to find all the pieces of his magnet set. “I don’t even know why you brought that,” she griped at the eleven-year-old.

“I’d keep my eye on that.”

Jeremiah glanced over to Skyler, who nodded his cowboy hat back to the right. Jeremiah turned in that direction and found Clara Jean standing with John Marshall—a man three years older than her.

Three years wasn’t that big of a difference, but it was when his daughter still had a year of high school left, and John had been gone to college for two full years. They weren’t living the same life at all, but Clara Jean giggled and ducked her head as she tucked her hair behind her ear.

Jeremiah’s blood rushed through his veins, but he held very still. John was smiling way too big to be just friendly, and as the activity continued around them, he got whisked away by someone else only a few seconds later.

Clara Jean stood there and watched him, the tide of people who’d managed to get all cleaned up and had started heading for the parking area flowing around her.

“Yeah, I don’t like that,” Jeremiah said almost under his breath.

“Daddy,” Camila said, and she put a blanket in Skyler’s arms. “We’re ready.”

“Yep.” Skyler met Jeremiah’s eyes, said nothing more, and left with his family.

“Clara Jean,” Jeremiah barked, and his daughter startled toward him. “What you doin’ here? Momma went to the truck.”

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