Page 11 of Long Past Dawn
Beau didn’t say anything for so long I was afraid he had fallen asleep. When he did speak, he spoke slowly. Whether it was because he was trying to stop the stutter or because he had sobered up a little bit, I didn’t know. “Did Blaze ever tell you about the time I lived on his ranch without anyone knowing but him? I ate ah—apples and ka—rrots from the horse barn. It turns out every—everyone knew I wa—was there. I was eleven and thought we were sneaky.”
“Blaze never told me that, though I’m not sure why he would. That said, being out in Texas in March is a whole lot different than being out alone in a Wisconsin winter.”
“It was in July. I had run away from my fa—fos—ter family and right to Blaze’s ranch. We’d been best friends since the third grade, and he was all—all—all I had left.”
He was getting upset, so I rubbed his arm through the blanket to calm him. “Beau, relax, okay? I want to hear your story, but I can tell you’re struggling. Just take a deep breath.”
His inhale and exhale were apparent, though I suspected they were unconscious. “I ya——ya—use to have a stutter pra—pa—problem, did you know that?” I shook my head, and he nodded his up and down. There was more than a touch of shame in the motion. “I ga—gre—grew out of it, except if I—I am mad or sad or drunk. Sor—sorry.”
“That must be hard, Beau. No need to apologize. I’d like to hear the rest of your story. I don’t mind if you stutter. You can take as long as you need. I’m not going anywhere.”
When he spoke again, he was calmer. He had grabbed hold of my arm and wasn’t letting go. “I hid during the day, and at night, Blaze, he’d bring me food out to—ta—to the barn. Two weeks after I got there, his momma and daddy sa—sha—wed up. They let me stay in the house then as their foster son. They wanted to adopt me, but I wouldn’t let the—the—em.”
“Did you need adoptive parents? Why wouldn’t you let them? You and Blaze are closer than any two brothers I know.”
“My momma was dead and my daddy,” he shook his head in disgust. “Well, he was a real son of a motherless ga—goat. I didn’t even know the man. My momma made sure I never knew who he was. Ba—ba–ut, I heard stories. I da—do—not know if—ah—if any are true.”
“I’m sorry about your mom, Beau,” I said softly, unsure what part of this story I was supposed to be focusing on—his mother, his father, or living with Blaze. Something told me it was his mother. “What was your mom’s name?”
“Samantha,” he answered, nodding. “She la—la—oved that I had Blaze as a friend. He an—an I were like brothers. Amity and Ash raised us that way after she passed. We scrapped a lot, but we knew who loved us an—ah—and where they lived, if you know what I mean.”
“I do,” I agreed, deciding it was less about the story for him and more about just needing someone to talk to who wouldn’t judge him.
“The McAwleys are good people, Da—Da—Dawn Lee,” he said, his tongue struggling to keep up with his brain. “Sometimes, most times, I wish I had their last name. It would have made my life ba—ba—etter. Then I see my momma’s face in my mind, and I ra—rem—mber that if they adopted me, my name would change. Did you know after someone dies, that ya—ya start to forget their face? I didn’t believe my foster family when they told me that. I thought they were being jack—jackah—jerks, but they were right.” He cleared his throat and stared down at the floor. “It will be twenty years in a few weeks. I have to look at pictures to ra—rah—remember her now. I wonder if she ever would have found someone to love like Blaze found Miss Heaven. I wonder if sha—if she would have done all those things she talked about doin’. I wonder a lot of things, but I won’t ever know the answers.”
“Beau, I’m sorry,” I whispered, moving closer to him to offer comfort. Suddenly, the blurry picture from the last few months came into sharp focus. His reaction to Blaze’s engagement, his usual easygoing manner flipping tofly off the handlein the blink of an eye, and his need to seclude himself from others. “I had no idea about any of this.”
His shoulder went up and back down before he picked up my hand and inspected the fingers. “I’m sa—sa—orry ‘bout leaving you at the café the other da—day,” he whispered. “I ain’t been myself lately. I feel ra—really bad about it. Miss Heaven told me you hurt yourself, and that made me feel even worse. When I don’t know wa—wa—what to do with the way I been feelin’, the—then I know it’s better if I’m away from people. When I feel like ta—this,” he said, squeezing his fist to his chest and pounding it. “I hurt people. I don’t know why baa—but it ain’t on purpose, Dawn Lee.”
I brushed the hair out of his eyes and tipped his chin up to meet my gaze. “Beau, we’ve been friends for a long time, right?” I asked, and he nodded, his brown eyes dark and half full of whiskey. “Then, if you can’t be a jerk to your friends, who can you be a jerk to?”
Beau stared me down, but his head shook slightly. “Still ain’t right. My momma raised me better than that. I—I—am old enough ta—to know better. Accept my apology?”
“It’s already forgotten,” I promised. “Maybe you could cut yourself a little slack, though. We’re all terribly worried about you. We don’t expect you to be happy-go-lucky all the time, and we don’t want you running off. When you disappear, we worry about where you are and what you’re doing. We’d rather you stayed on the ranch and be grouchier than a bison cow ready to calve than not be here at all, okay?”
Beau nodded once, and a smile tipped his lips. “You’re startin’ to sound Texan, Dawn Lee.”
“I sure hope not, Beau Hanson,” I answered, hugging him to me and rubbing his back. He was tired—bone-tired and emotionally tired. I could feel his fatigue soak into me as I held him. Beau was every kind of tired you could be, and to add insult to injury, he thought he was alone in what he was going through.
“We all care about you, Beau,” I promised, my lips near his ear as I hugged him. He reeked of booze and bad decisions, but in the morning, he’d dust himself off and go on with life. That’s what guys like Beau always do. “Everyone at Bison Ridge has been scared to death that one day you’re going to leave and never come back.”
When I leaned away from the hug, his gaze held mine and refused to let go. “Do you care about me, Dawn?”
I brushed my hand down his cheek, his five o’clock shadow more like a soft beard after so many days away from a razor. “I have since the day I met you, Beau. When you come into someone’s life, you make it better just because you’re you. I’m pretty sure that’s how Blaze’s family felt about you from day one, too.”
Beau captured my hand against his cheek and searched my eyes for whatever it was he needed from this world at one a.m. on a Wednesday night. “I’ve cared about you since the day I met you, too,” he whispered. He lowered his forehead to mine, and even sporting the smell of whiskey, he smelled of the quintessential cowboy made of fresh air, sunshine, and horses.
He stared down into my eyes until his lips lowered to mine. His were warm, soft, and hesitant. I didn’t know this Beau. The Beau I know would have asked three times before he kissed a girl. This Beau was still out of his element, but he was taking a chance that I would accept him for who and what he was, all of him, no matter his condition.
Instinctively, I relaxed into his kiss. I had to. I couldn’t use one side of my lips to say I would always be there for him and use the other side to push him away. Not when what he needed the most was acceptance, even of the parts he thought no one liked.
I liked everything about Beau Hanson, from his silly sayings, kindness, dedication to Bison Ridge, and the vulnerabilities he showed me tonight. Everyone thought Beau was a happy-go-lucky cowboy, but tonight I got to see that this cowboy was far more complicated than any of us thought.
I’d been dreaming about the day I got to kiss Beau Hanson for six years. I was starting to think it wouldn’t happen, but the insight he gave me tonight told me why he was also so hesitant around me. He needed our friendship, which made his fear of losing me stronger than his courage to take a chance.
He didn’t disappoint.
He tipped my head to align our lips at the perfect angle, and I fell into his chest, bracing my hands against his hard muscles and silently taking great pleasure in the way they trembled under my touch.
