Sheri WhiteFeather – Coming Home to a Cowboy (страница 8)
“It probably got destroyed by groundwater. But it was a great memory, and I thought you might enjoy doing something like that, too, except with a time capsule that will last. This one won’t get corroded. It’s a professional model.”
“I totally want to do it.” Cody was bouncing on his heels. “Do you want to do it with me? We could both put stuff in here. It’s plenty big enough.”
“Sure,” Kade told him. “I’d love to participate. I already bought you a preservation kit to go with it. That’s still out in my truck. It comes with packets and pouches and envelopes so you can separate items. There’s a fade-proof pencil for labeling everything, too.”
Cody looked at Bridget. “How about you, Mom? Will you do it with us? It could be like a family project.”
“Of course I will,” she said. “It’ll be fun. I’d have to think about what to put in it, though.”
Kade sought her gaze, and she felt a wave of attraction, which was particularly unwelcome because she was sitting on Cody’s bed. But at least it wasn’t her bed. She didn’t want Kade anywhere near her bedroom.
“I’m going to make a comic book to put in it,” Cody said. “A brand-new one. And it’s going to be about a mom, a dad and a kid who put stuff in a time capsule, like we’re going to do. But instead of historians finding it, I’m going to make it so aliens dig it up centuries later.”
“That sounds like a great comic,” Kade said.
Cody went silent, as if he was plotting the rest of the story. A few quick-thinking beats later, he said, “The aliens are here on earth because their planet was seized by intergalactic rebels. But what the aliens don’t know at first is that the mom and dad and kid are actually superheroes who are still alive, and they’re going to help the aliens save their planet.”
Kade replied, “That’s a perfect representation of your work, especially to go into a time capsule. I can’t imagine anything better.”
“I know, right? I’m going to start on it tonight.”
Bridget hated to be the bearer of bad news, but she said, “Cody, don’t you have homework to do tonight?”
“Yeah, but that can wait. This new comic book is way more important.”
She blew out her breath. “I’m sorry, sport, but homework comes first.”
“But this is a big occasion for me. Meeting my dad and preparing for our time capsule. We still have to decide where to bury to it.”
Kade interjected, “Your mom’s right about your homework. That should come first. We still have time to figure out the rest of it.”
“How much time?” Cody asked. “How long are you going to be in town?”
“I don’t know.” Kade repeated what he’d told Bridget earlier. “I was just going to play it by ear.” He then added, “Maybe it’s something we can decide together.”
Cody jumped right on it. “I get out of school in two weeks, so you should stay longer than that. Otherwise we’ll hardly see each other.”
“How much longer do you think I should stay?”
Cody went full bore. “How about if you hang out for the whole summer? Then we could do lots of stuff together.”
The entire summer? Bridget wasn’t prepared for that. She glanced at Kade, hoping he wasn’t available.
Thankfully, he wasn’t. He said, “I’ve already got plans to go to California in mid-July, so how about if I stay here until then? Of course, if I’m going to be around for that long, then I’ll need to find another place to stay. Maybe I’ll look into renting a fishing cabin or hunting lodge or something. I don’t want to live out of a motel.”
Cody took what he could get, and Bridget breathed a sigh of relief. Of course, it was still a long time for Kade to be around, but not as bad as the entire summer.
Cody asked her, “If I do my homework first, can I work on the comic afterward? ’Cause I’m going to need to get it done if Dad is only going to be here till July.”
“That’s fine,” she told him, letting him enjoy the moment.
While she sat quietly on the sidelines, father and son continued to talk about the time capsule. They also ate the snack, both of them going after the cookies before getting to the apples and cheese.
Finally, the visit ended, with Kade saying that he needed to go back to the motel and get settled in. He hugged Cody goodbye, and the transfixed ten-year-old smiled up at him.
Cody asked Bridget if Kade could come back for dinner tomorrow, and she agreed that he could. He accepted the invitation and thanked her. Before she could save her sanity and stop him from embracing her the way he’d done when he’d first arrived, he reached out and wrapped her in the dizzying warmth of his arms all over again.
The following morning Bridget’s mom stopped by, but she didn’t come inside. Since she was on her way to work, she preferred to stand in the graveled driveway and have a quick talk.
Still, Bridget took a moment to study her. If she wanted to see herself twenty-five years from now, all she had to do was look at the woman who’d given her life. Mom was a little heavier than she used to be, with tiny lines around her eyes and threads of gray sneaking into her natural blond hair, but the overall resemblance between them wasn’t hard to miss.
“What do you think of Kade now that you’ve seen him again?” Mom asked, getting right to the point.
Bridget answered cautiously, not wanting to include anything too personal. “Cody certainly liked him. They clicked right away.”
Her mother’s face had a pinched expression. “That’s what Cody told your grandmother. He called her last night before he went to bed, singing his daddy’s praises. But he already idolized the man before he met him, so he’s been enamored from the start. If something goes wrong, he’s going to be crushed. It gives me a knot in the pit of my stomach just thinking about it.”
“I know. Me, too.” Bridget couldn’t just wash away her fears. “But Kade keeps saying that his interest in Cody won’t fade. That he’ll keep coming back to visit. So I’m trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. I promised him that much.”
“I suppose it’s the right thing to do. But it still worries me.”
“I know,” Bridget said again. If anyone understood, it was her mom. “But at least they seem to have a lot in common. I didn’t know that Kade took art classes in college. It never occurred to me that was where Cody might’ve gotten his talent. I just thought it was a random gene.”
“How could you know everything about Kade? You only spent a week with him. And as much as I hate to say this, I can tell that you’re still attracted to him.”
So much for keeping her feelings hidden. “How can you tell? I’m just standing here.”
“It’s written all over your face, honey. But I suspected that it might happen. You had a strong crush on him the first time around, and now he’s back, stirring your senses again.”
“I’m trying to compartmentalize my feelings.” And manage the temptation of being near him. “But I think it’s going to take some time for me to get a handle on it.”
“I wish Cody would’ve never taken an interest in him.” Mom swigged from the plastic water bottle she’d brought with her. “Now that your grandmother knows how pleased Cody is with Kade, she’s ready to go full steam ahead. She wants to host a barbecue this Saturday, so she and I can meet Kade. But she wants to invite other people, too.”
“What other people?” Everything was moving at such a breakneck pace, Bridget could hardly keep up.
“Our friends. Yours, hers, mine, Cody’s. The more the merrier, according to her.”
“Did she say anything to Cody about it?”
“Not yet. She wanted me to run it by you first. But she’s certain that he’ll be thrilled.”
“She’s right. He’s going to love the idea of showing his dad off to everyone. I think Kade will be fine about it, too. He already knows that Grandma is on his side, so he’ll probably appreciate that this was her brainstorm.”
“How do you feel about introducing Kade to your friends?”
Bridget was a bit nervous about it, but she tried to keep it in perspective. “They’ve just start asking about him anyway, wondering what he’s like and how it’s going. I’ll have to deal with it sooner or later. So it might as well be sooner. He’s coming for dinner tonight, so I can tell him and Cody about the barbecue then.”
Mom capped her water. “I hope this isn’t going to seem like a twisted question, considering that I never had the courage to ask you before. But have you ever secretly wanted to search for your dad? Has it ever been a thought in your head?”
“Honestly?” Bridget made a pattern in the gravel, moving the tiny stones with the tip of her boot. “I used to fantasize about it. I’d picture myself striding up to him somewhere, and when I was close enough for him to figure out that I was the daughter he’d ditched, I would tell him in no uncertain terms how much I hated him. But even in my tough-girl fantasies, I was afraid that I might break down and cry and look like a fool. I even feared that I might discover that he was dead. Then I wouldn’t be able to do anything, except feel even emptier inside.”