Ashley had tried to support Kari"s decision, but secretly she thought her sister had made the wrong choice. Ryan Taylor was fun and involved in their family. He loved all the same things Kari loved, and though they"d known each other since they were young teens, their relationship always had an air of electricity about it, something Ashley saw in few couples.
She smiled at the memory of Ryan. When she was a little kid, Ryan had always found a way to make Ashley feel important.
Maybe that"s what she liked about him-he was the big brother she"d never had.
Most jocks had egos in direct proportion to their biceps, but not Ryan. Ashley had grown up hoping he would propose to
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Kari one day and be part of the Baxter family forever. When they broke up, Ashley had been nearly as upset as her sister.
That day had become something of a turning point in Ashley"s life. After that, happy endings were no longer a guarantee. It was the same day Ashley determined she wouldn"t allow herself to get involved with a man the way Kari had. The ending was simply too painful, too predictable. There were exceptions, of course. People like her parents. But by Ashley"s a.s.sessment, exceptions like that were rare.
Anyway, regardless of Kari and Ryan"s breakup, Ashley was sure of this: No one would ever love Kari the way Ryan Taylor had. The way he still did, as far as Ashley was concerned. Any doubts she"d had about that faded two months earlier, when she ran into him out by the high school football field.
Ashley had been jogging that afternoon, and as she rounded the track, she noticed one of the coaches watching her. He was tall and had the rough build of Ryan Taylor.
Then she remembered.
He was back in town. Something about his being finished with professional football and getting a job at the high school. Ashley slowed her pace, and on the next lap she watched the tall coach excuse himself from the others and jog purposefully in her direction. They met up at the end of the track nearest the football field.
"Ashley Baxter, I can"t believe my eyes." They were both out of breath as they hugged and took a step back to study each other. "You were seventeen last time I saw you, and now you"re all grown-up and gorgeous."
Ashley rarely blushed in the presence of complimentary men, and this was no exception. Still, she could feel the smile tugging on her cheekbones. "That"s me. All grown-up." She met his gaze straight on. "So you came back to finish life in obscurity, huh?"
Ryan laughed. "I guess." He shoved his hands in the pockets of his nylon sweats and c.o.c.ked his head. "What do you hear from Kari?"
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Ashley shrugged. It was strange talking to Ryan now that she : was a woman. Back when she was growing up, she had been; Kari"s kid sister. Now she was twenty-five and he was thirty.
She looked into his pale green eyes and saw not even a flicker of romantic interest. "She lives over at University Park. Her husband"s a professor at the university. No kids."
Ryan inhaled slowly through his nose and seemed to weigh the words he was about to say. "If that ever changes ..." There was a glimmer of raw pain in his eyes, but it pa.s.sed, and Ryan smiled. "You be a good girl and give me a call, okay?"
He flashed her a familiar grin, finished the conversation, and jogged back to his fellow coaches.
She and Ryan had spoken one other time at the track since then, but otherwise Ashley hadn"t seen him. For all she knew, he"d met someone and was dating by now.
She looked down at her textbook and tried three times to read a single paragraph. Frustration worked its way through her veins, and without giving herself another chance, she shut the book and looked at the phone.
It couldn"t hurt to call, right? He was probably listed. After all, he had asked her to call if anything changed.
Kari"s words from the other morning filled Ashley"s mind. He"s my husband, Ashley. . .. If there"s a way to get past this thing, that"s what I want to do.
But what about Ryan?
Shouldn"t he know that Kari"s husband had abandoned her? Shouldn"t someone at least tell him what was going on?
For the most part Ashley did not believe in prayer. But the childlike habit of conversing with G.o.d Almighty had stuck, and now and then-at times like this when she wasn"t sure what to do-she uttered a silent bit of conversation to the Lord.
Nothing wrong with calling him, right, G.o.d?
Ashley even tried to be still and listen for a response, but she heard nothing.
Not that she was really expecting one.
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"Fine." She stood up and chuckled to herself. "I"ll take that as a yes." She walked across the kitchen, flipped through the phone book, but found no Ryan Taylor listed. The listing was probably too new.
Feeling far more energized than she had moments earlier, Ashley tapped both sides of her head, and then it came to her. Clear Creek Community Church would have his number. Her mother and dad had seen him a few times at the Sunday night service.
Ashley looked up the church and dialed as quickly as she could. Kari would be home soon, and Ashley wasn"t entirely sure if- "Clear Creek Community Church. May 1 help you?"
Ashley resisted a smile. The church secretary always sounded so ... well, so much like a church secretary. She was a seventyish woman who would have given a stranger the key to her house if it meant keeping him off the streets.
"Hi, Mrs. Mosby. Ashley Baxter here. I have a quick favor to ask you."
"Oh, h.e.l.lo, dear." Mrs. Mosby was one of the few people at Clear Creak Community who hadn"t made Ashley feel like dirt for coming home from Paris pregnant and single. "What can I do for you?"
Ashley held her breath. "Remember Ryan Taylor?"
"Yes, dear, of course." She giggled politely as if the effect Ryan had on women was not limited by age. "He moved back to town and comes to the evening service every now and then."
Ashley swallowed. She hadn"t been to church since Easter, but she hoped Mrs.
Mosby wouldn"t hold that against her. "If you don"t mind, I need his phone number. I must have misplaced it somewhere."
"Oh . . ." There was a pause, and Ashley could hear Mrs. Mosby searching. "Why, yes, dear. Here it is." She rattled off the number and then clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. "I remember when your sister and Ryan were teenagers.
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She"d bring him to youth group, and all the other girls would be jealous."
"Yes." Ashley smiled at the memory.
"I feel guilty for saying this-" Mrs. Mosby lowered her voice "but I always rather hoped Ryan would marry your sister." "
A smile tugged at the corners of Ashley"s mouth, and she stared at the number she"d written down. "Yes, Mrs. Mosby. Me too."
"You know-" the older woman"s voice was wistful "I think we all did." Then she hastened to add, "But I was happy she married a nice Christian man."
Ashley didn"t answer that one. "Well, I"d better go." She suddenly was in a hurry to get off the phone. She wound up the conversation and punched in the numbers Mrs. Mosby had given her. Then she closed her eyes and waited.
Ryan Taylor lived in a well-appointed two-bedroom cabin on a ten-acre ranch. The place was minutes from the country club, less than a mile from the boat docks at Lake Monroe, and only three miles down the road from the house where Kari grew up, the house where the senior Baxters still lived. His career in professional football had paid off financially. He had a savings account he could never deplete and owed nothing on any of his material goods, including the ranch and his loaded silver Chevy truck. Someday he planned to build his dream house near the front of his land, but so far he"d had no reason to break ground.
The cabin suited him perfectly. He had never planned on having the privilege of playing professional football, but now that those days were behind him, he knew there was only one thing that could fill the decades ahead.
That thing was coaching.
When the a.s.sistant position at Clear Creek High School became available at the beginning of summer, he knew it was the
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opportunity he"d been looking for. The opportunity to come back home.
Things weren"t exactly the same, of course. Back when he"d grown up in Clear Creek, he was just one of the gang, a favorite son who was welcomed everywhere he went. Now, after his eight years with the Cowboys, people treated him like a celebrity. They stared at him in supermarkets, asked for his autograph at the movie theater, and wouldn"t let him have a public meal in peace.
Sometimes he even wondered whether he might have made a mistake in thinking he could settle down in Clear Creek. But then it was still his favorite place on earth, the place where he"d grown up, where his mother and his sister and her family still lived. All his life he"d imagined settling down here.
He just hadn"t imagined doing it without Kari Baxter.
He"d had plenty of opportunities to date when he returned from his stint with Dallas. Everyone had a daughter, a friend, a sister who wanted to meet the area"s newest eligible bachelor. A time or two Ryan had actually followed through and asked one of them out. But he always stopped after a few dates when he found himself comparing each woman to Kari.
It wasn"t that the women he saw weren"t wonderful in their own right. They were mostly beautiful and bright and would have made great wives, no doubt. But they hadn"t sat cross- legged next to him on a summer"s night the year he turned fourteen and told him the secrets of their hearts the way Kari had. They hadn"t stayed beside him all day fishing on the sh.o.r.es of Lake Monroe the summer he was seventeen or run for cover with him the afternoon the tornado siren sounded across the county.
The other women he met hadn"t shared with him a first kiss or a first dance or that first taste of love. And they hadn"t shown him for the first time what it meant to love G.o.d. To really love G.o.d and want to please him.
Ryan understood very well that Kari was married; clearly she 82 was not the woman for him. He simply wasn"t in a hurry to find one who was.
"I don"t know, Ryan, you"re getting awfully old," his mom would say to him every other Sunday when they got together for dinner. "At this rate, I"ll be toothless in a rocker before you give me some grandbabies."
Ryan would laugh and pat his mother on her shoulder. "You"re stubborn enough to live a hundred years, Mom. At fifty- three you"re young enough for anything.
You"ll probably outlive us all."
Practice had finished up early that day, and for some reason Ryan felt lonelier than usual, as if a piece of his heart weren"t fitting quite right. He slipped on his work boots. A few hours outside in the yard would help clear his head.
He tackled the bushes in front of his cabin first and was inside getting water when the phone rang. Max, his white Lab Puppy c.o.c.ked his head and stared at the receiver as Ryan picked it up. "It"s okay, Max, boy." He whispered the words and stooped to scratch Max"s ears before clicking the b.u.t.ton and answering thecall.
"h.e.l.lo." Max whined and gave two high-pitched puppy barks. "My goodness, Ryan, I didn"t know you could sing." The voice was Kari"s, but the tone was Ashley"s.
Subtly sarcastic and mixed with a teasing they"d always shared.
He smiled and cleared his throat. "I"m working on that number. Takes me a while to warm up."
She giggled. "Bet you don"t know who this is." "The voice police? Calling to tell me I"m under arrest?" Another peal of laughter erupted on the other end.
"Ah, yes, same old Ryan. You never change, do you?"
"Nope, Ashley, not really." He hesitated, curious. Ashley had never called before. "Okay, what"s up? No, wait, let me guess.
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Kari"s husband left her high and dry, and she"s pining away for me but couldn"t bring herself to call." He grinned at the audacity of his statement, certain Ashley would be doing the same.
Instead, her laughter died, and there was silence.
"Ashley?" Ryan"s heart beat twice as fast as before. "Ashley, talk to me. What is it?"
Her voice lacked any teasing. "Kari"s husband left her high and dry, and I don"t know if she"s pining away for you, but either way, I had to call."
Now it was Ryan who was silent. His mind reeled at what she was saying, trying to determine if she could possibly still be joking. "Be serious, Ashley."
"I am." She hesitated. "Tim"s having an affair. He moved in with one of his students." She paused, and he felt the wood floor give way beneath him. "Kari"s spending a lot of time at my parents" house. She"s been here the past few days.
I thought you should know."
Ryan found the nearest chair at his small dining-room table and sat down. His knees were trembling. "Is she ... is she okay?" It was the first thing he could think to ask. His emotions were bubbling within him-pain and sorrow, rage and revenge. How dare he do that to you, Kari girl? How dare he- "She"s pretty messed up, Ryan. She says she doesn"t want a divorce; she"s praying for Tim to come around."