It wasn’t long after that that he met his first of many girlfriends. Women who were more interested in his money than him…or his young daughter. Daddy hired Rachel, my nanny, and from that point on she did everything with me and for me until I was able to do things on my own. I hadn’t realized until I was older how unavailable my father had been during those years. Every event I had with my horses, he promised he would show up, only to tell me he had an emergency surgery or an event that he couldn’t get out of. It wasn’t until I got to high school that I stopped asking altogether.
“Timber, did you hear me?”
I shook my head and let the memories go. “What was that?”
Candace slumped back on the couch, her light brown hair piled on top of her head in her signature messy bun. Her hazel eyes looked at me with a questioning gaze. “Why didn’t you change majors if you didn’t like nursing?”
With a humorless laugh, I shook my head. “You know why. I couldn’t.”
She stared at me with sadness in her eyes. “Timber, I know you did it because it was what your mother wanted you to do, but you could have changed it. Maybe if you had talked to your dad, he would have understood.”
I shrugged. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it was a last-ditch attempt to win my father’s love. And like all the other attempts, I had failed. I simply wasn’t good enough in his eyes.
I remembered that day like it was yesterday.
“I’ll make you and Mama proud of me.”
He stood from behind his desk, walked around it and stared into my eyes. My heart had picked up, and for the first time in years, I thought I saw a spark of happiness. And it was there because I was doing something he and my mother wanted.
“I’ll be the best nurse, Dad. I swear it.”
He smiled, placed his hands on my shoulders and kissed me on the forehead. “Oh, Timber, I know you will, sweetheart. I know you will.”
It had been the first show of affection from him in years. In that moment I saw his acceptance and love. We had gone out to dinner that night to celebrate, and it was when my father kept mentioning how great of a nurse I would make that I realized I had sealed my own fate. I signed up for a future I knew I wasn’t going to be happy with, all to make my father happy. If I had told him I wanted to work with horses, maybe even own a horse rescue, he would have looked at me like I was insane. So, I pushed my dreams to the side. How foolish I had been. It had only pulled me further away from my father.
With a sigh, I looked at my best friend. “I did it hoping to make my father happy.”
She rolled her eyes. “He certainly doesn’t act happy about it.”
A rush of sadness swept over me. “It’s complicated, Candace, and I really don’t want to talk about it.”
With a forced smile, she nodded, and I decided it was time to change the subject. “Kaylee invited me back to Montana for Christmas. She said she has some news she wants to share, and she’d love to have family there.”
Candace smiled. “I wonder what it is? She can’t already be pregnant, could she?”
My own face broke out in a wide grin. “I think she is!”
Candace grabbed my hands and we both jumped around and screamed, acting like middle school girls. Candace had met Kaylee only a handful of times, but it was hard not to fall in love with my cousin. She had a way of making everyone her best friend. I sure hoped Kaylee was pregnant. Plus, it would be another reason for me to pick moving to Montana over Utah. That and the blue-eyed man I couldn’t stop thinking about. But I refused to acknowledge that reason.
“How can her parents not want to be in the picture?” Candace asked, dropping my hands and taking a step back. “I just don’t understand it.”
I shrugged, a sadness coming over me. I had told Candace about how cruel Kaylee’s parents were. How they basically didn’t want anything to do with her unless they needed her for something, like a party where they could show her off or brag about her. Once I got into college and Kaylee told me more about it, it was strange to me how her father and my father were nothing alike, yet similar in so many ways. I sometimes saw the love in my father’s eyes when he would look at me; I simply couldn’t figure out why he couldn’t show it. That was so unlike Kaylee’s parents, who probably only had a child to give off the appearance of a well-rounded and happy family.
“If I ever have kids, I’m using your father and Kaylee’s parents as examples of how not to parent.”
I forced a laugh, but clearly missed what Candace said.
Candace regarded me closely. “Are you okay?”
I nodded. “Sorry, what did you say?”
She pulled her scrub top off, revealing a white tank top underneath,
