“Come on,” Colt murmured. “Back to your field...”
He spread his arms wide when the steer started toward him, and he stepped sideways, matching the animal as it tried to find a way of escape.
“Hya!” Colt shouted. “Ya! Ya!”
The steer turned and ran back past the fence that had trapped him the last hours, and into the lush field with other grazing cattle.
Colt dropped his arms and grinned at his employees. “Good work. Let’s keep an eye on him for a few minutes to make sure we don’t need a vet.”
The next twenty minutes were spent repairing the fence. Colt had most of the tools in the back of his truck, and together they ran new fence wire and stapled it into place on the wooden posts.
When the fence was complete, Colt pulled out his phone and glanced down at it. In the excitement, he’d missed a text from Jane.
It’s okay. I’m going to leave now. It’s easier this way. Thank you for everything, Colt.
She was going... The words sank into him like a knife, and he shut his eyes for a moment, trying to summon up a reply. Colt’s thumbs hovered over the keys, then he sighed and dropped the phone back into his pocket. This hurt, but it was also inevitable. Right now, all he could think about was that he was in love with her and how much he was going to miss her, and he wasn’t sure that would make anything easier on either of them.
The steer still looked a little spooked, and Colt glanced over at the other ranch hands. “I’ll keep an eye on him and see if I need to call in that vet. You two can get back to your other duties.”
Colt would be the one to make the decision on whether a vet would be called out anyway.
“Sure thing, Boss,” Keith replied, and they both tipped their hats toward Colt before they headed back to the other truck that sat opposite his.
Colt leaned back against the side of his dusty old truck, his gaze trailing along the pasture. There was another new calf that he noticed. They’d come back in a few days to tag it, but right now the mother wouldn’t let them anywhere near it.
This was the job—this was the life! He’d chosen this, even sacrificed his relationship with his cousin to get this. He should have trusted God to provide it for him, without getting between his uncle and cousin. But that was in the past now, and all he could do was try to do better in the future. He’d had no idea how bad the fallout was going to be.
Something crinkled in his shirt pocket and he reached past his phone and pulled out that old creased piece of paper from the tree house box. He’d put it in his pocket this morning, and he slowly unfolded it.
The Good Cowboy.
The Lord is my cowboy, and He makes sure I’m fed and watered. I don’t lack for anything—the hay and oats He sets out are just what I need. He puts me out to pasture when I need a rest. He stands there and watches me, making sure I’m healthy and strong.
He leads me down the paths where I’ll have sure footing—not only for me, but because of who He is. When it’s dark, when it storms, when I’m scared half to death, His strong hand comforts me.
At the end of the day, my feed trough is full and He rubs me down. My water bucket overflows. His goodness and kindness are with me all my life long, and I call this barn home because of Him.
Tears welled in Colt’s eyes, and he stood there, the page in one hand and his jaw clenched against the rising emotion.
What wouldn’t Colt do to protect one of his herd? What wouldn’t Colt pay to buy them back again?
God loved him and cared for him more carefully than Colt cared for his cattle, and yet as he looked at that steer—now calm and grazing—he realized that from the steer’s perspective everything had been scary and painful. Even Colt had seemed like a threat. And all of that had been to get the steer back into the right pasture where it would be safe and secure again.
Colt had been praying and praying for God to take away this heartbreak he was feeling, and God wasn’t answering with comfort. Instead, Colt was flooded with memories of Jane—her eyes, her pink lips, the feeling of her hand in his...the smell of her shampoo, the way she smiled that special smile when she looked down at her little girls.
It wasn’t only Jane who had been filling his mind and his heart all night and all morning. It was the toddlers, too. Micha with her fiery personality that matched those fiery curls, and Suzie who was quietly mischievous.
If he weren’t so scared of falling into the same trap as his friends and family, he’d want nothing more than to marry Jane and be a dad to those girls.
When he thought of Jane as his wife, he didn’t even think of her in a wedding dress. Instead, he saw her in blue jeans on horseback, that dark, mahogany hair of hers blowing in the wind as she rode. He could envision a life together so beautiful and full that it made his heart nearly burst.
But where was the guarantee? Wanting it this badly would only make a failed marriage hurt that much more. He wasn’t sure he could recover after something like that. Besides, she didn’t want marriage. He knew that.
The steer raised its head and looked over at Colt. The two stared at each other for a long moment, and then the bovine bent back down to grazing. Colt wouldn’t steer his cattle wrong. If they trusted him, he’d guide them true and keep them safe.
“How much more would You, Lord?” he murmured aloud.
He’d been afraid of his family
