Page 62 of The Rancher's Wedding

“What are you saying?”

“We don’t have a court and the sheriff does what he can to make things right. If some city people come in waving a piece of paper, Sheriff Ron’s going to need to settle things by the letter of the law and I suspect that means he’d side with your father to keep the peace.”

Estelle had come to Jacob for reassurance, but instead, all she got was support for the fears that she’d kept pushing back to the furthest regions of her mind so she could try to focus on her optimistic hope that the problems would just vanish.

“What are you saying?” she asked.

“You need to talk to Michael and let him know what’s in store. I can’t help you much. I’d always relied on him to deal with the big issues that came up. But he won’t be able to help if you don’t let him know what’s coming.”

“Why is it that it sounds so simple and easy when you say it, then when I go to actually talk to him, I tense up and nothing comes out of my mouth?”

Jacob shrugged. “You’re asking the wrong man,” he said. “I don’t understand it either. I went years barely talking to him and now we’re talking again. Why did I wait so long? I don’t know. But I do know that once you tell him, it will get easier.”

Everything he said sounded so reasonable to Estelle. She just had to remember it all to convince herself once the moment came.

“I’m going to go talk to him,” she said.

“Do it,” Jacob said. “Tell him as much as you can.”

“Okay.”

She left Jacob’s cabin and began walking back toward the house. Along the way, she saw a rock in the path and realized somebody could trip on it if they didn’t see it, so she moved it aside. It didn’t look quite right there, so she moved similar rocks around it to create a nice simple circular design.

Looking at it, she smiled at her work and began back toward the house, but stopped herself. Maybe she could place some flower petals around the rocks to add some color to the display.

Before too long, she realized she’d devoted the better part of the afternoon to her impromptu art project. With every bit she added, she felt that it needed one more thing to make it right, but it never quite satisfied her. Estelle was, after all, a perfectionist.

Jacob came out of his cabin to check on her.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Just putting a little something together.” She looked up at him, seeing the disappointment in his eyes.

“Estelle…” he began.

“I know,” she said, “you don’t need to say anything.” His look said it all. She knew what she was doing, which was delaying the inevitable and giving herself an excuse not to have to talk to Michael.

She put down the final petal she was working with and fought the desire to move it just a bit over to the right for symmetry.

“Good luck,” Jacob said.

“Thank you.”

I don’t need luck, Estelle thought,I just need the strength to blurt out the difficult part. Once that’s over, it’s all out of my hands.

The house was so close to her that every step towards it filled her with more and more dread, with ounce of her wanting to turn around and leave the conversation for later.There will be more time, the voice in her head seemed to say. The voice was wrong and, in her head, Estelle kept shouting back at it.

There isn’t much more time! We need to do this if there’s any hope of staying with Michael at all.

Estelle reached the door, then forced herself to open it, pushing herself inside so she wouldn’t back down.

But Michael was nowhere to be found. Of course he wasn’t in there while there was still light in the day.

She walked outside and looked around the ranch, then spotted him by the hogs, feeding them their slop.

You can do this, Estelle, she told herself.Let’s just do this and get it over with.

She held her chest high and walked deliberately towards Michael, telling herself everything she needed to hear right now.

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