The old man looked in Fiona’s direction. “A neighbor boy comes over in the mornings to feed the goats. I should get rid of the goats but I like them, and they keep me company.” He turned stiffly to look at the pair of goats who bleated at him. “I try to keep the house going but my arthritis keeps me immobile most days.”
“Have you thought about moving to a smaller place?”asked Fiona.
“I’m too old. I’m going to die here, but it seems to be taking an awfully long time.”
Fiona crossed to where the old man stood and put a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe you could work out a deal with Jake to buy the ranch, and you could continue to live here.” She looked at Jake as she spoke the words.
The old man turned his gaze from his goat friends and looked to Fiona. “It’s taking such an awfully long time.”
Jake said, “I’d consider the idea that you stay on here, but the question is, do you want to sell?”
“I guess I’ll have to. The bank says they’re going to take it from me. Have you been here before?”
“Once, a while back when your wife was still alive. You had all the neighbors over for a barbecue. I believe it might have been a friend of one of your goats that was the main dish.”
The old man smiled for the first time. “Things were different then. We used to have picnics and invite the neighbors over for a goat roast in the summer.” His smile faded away. “Now all I have is memories. Just memories.”
Jake wasn’t sure what to do. The old man didn’t seem to have his full faculties, and he wondered if someone else had power of attorney. He wasn’t aware of any children or relatives. He’d have to look into that.
Then like the sun coming out after a storm, the old man’s eyes lost their cloudy look, and he said, “You take a walk around and look the place over. There’s a deed to the place around here somewhere, but I don’t know where. There’s the house and outbuildings. The well is deep. The water tastes good.”
“How many acres do you have?” asked Jake.
“I think there’s four hundred total. My place is long and sort of winds back toward the canyon. It is not a perfect square or anything. There’s a little grove of apple trees toward the creek. Need some pruning though. You look around. I’ll see if I can find that deed while you are looking.”
Jake and Fiona started toward the back sheds.
“Let’s see what kind of machinery he has,” Jake said. “I can tell by the look of the place he hasn’t done any farming for a long time. I doubt he’ll have any decent equipment.”
Fiona stopped to look at flowers, landscape, the back of the house, the goats. She talked to them and made a fuss. He’d forgotten how much a woman wanted a home and a man an occupation. Work was everything to him, but he could see that Fiona was more interested in the trappings of a home. That was a good sign.
They finally made it to the shed where a tractor and other farm equipment sat. The tractor was newer than Jake had imagined and didn’t have much dust on it. He found more relatively new equipment which surprised him. Where did the old man find the money? Why did he need this equipment when he wasn’t farming? He probably couldn’t afford the payments and that was why the bank was going to foreclose.
Fiona had gotten bored with the machinery and had walked down the road toward the pasture. Jake followed her.
“It’s pretty here,” she said when he caught up with her. “Look at those buttes. I thought I saw some horses up on one of those, but maybe my eyes were playing tricks on me.”
Jake looked in the direction of Fiona’s gaze. “You may have seen horses. Wild horses, probably. Kiger mustangs are known to roam in this area.” He studied the pasture and saw a lot of fresh manure but no cows. He wondered if the old man was leasing his pasture to another rancher. Maybe the equipment belonged to someone else. He’d ask the old man.
They opened a gate, closed it again, and walked through the pasture which circled the back of the ranch buildings.
“This would make a good pasture for horses,” said Jake. “It has more grass, not any greasewood that I can see.”
Again he saw fresh cow manure but no cows. That was puzzling. He looked around 360 degrees but saw no small black or brown dots that would indicate cow and calves.
“Horses make a ranch, don’t they?” said Fiona. “They are such beautiful creatures.”
“Cows and bulls make a ranch for me. It is peaceful watching horses graze, but they are expensive to maintain and dangerous. I’ve been kicked more than once and bitten as well. I like a well-trained horse for ranch work. They have to work to earn their keep in my opinion. But we could get you one like Harriet, a nice, quiet mare or gelding, and we could ride the ranch together.”
Fiona looked far away into the distance. Would she tell him what she was thinking? He watched the breeze lift strands of hair from her shoulders. He liked when she wore it down. He put his arm around her shoulders. They watched the play of the sun and wind in the trees in the distance.
“It’s beautiful here,” she said.
He turned and gathered her into his arms. It was now or never, he thought. He wanted to ask her to marry him. He had never voiced the words before. But he hesitated. If he asked her to marry him, and she refused, then what? They’d be back at square one. If she said yes, where would they live? He had no home to offer her yet. But what could it hurt to ask that simple question?
He cleared his throat. “Will you marry me, dear, beautiful Fiona?”
She returned his gaze and searched his eyes. “That’s the first proposal I’ve had today.”
Jake laughed. “Stop it. I’m serious. I want you to marry me.”
She sighed. “Living out here would be a big step for me. There’s so much to work out before we make any decision about us.”
“I may explode before that.”
She smiled. “Don’t explode.” Then her gaze turned serious. “Jake, we haven’t known each other very long. Do you realize that we were together about two weeks last year when you were in Virginia and now a little over a week here? That’s not enough time for me. People crazy in love with each other ride off together into the sunset only in one of Olympia’s romance novels. But that’s not us.”
“Fiona, I’ve been in love with you since I first saw you. I loved you when you weren’t here. I loved you when you didn’t return my calls. I loved you when you went to Australia without me. I’ve had a lot of practice loving you already. I’m prepared to do it for the rest of my life.”
She put her cheek against his, and they stood pressed together. Her body was soft and inviting. His passion for her was hard to rein in. He released her, took her hand and began to walk back toward the house. If he kept holding her, he would burst into flames. He wanted to throw her on the ground and make love to her right then and there. But he knew how fragile their relationship was. For a long time he had held onto a fantasy that she would feel the same passion for him. Reality was much different. Much, much different. He had not realized how much she was not your basic, standard, let’s-get-married female. She was her own woman, with her own strengths, goals and aspirations. He realized that he was not in that mix and might never be. But he could keep on trying.
He stopped again and faced her. “You could move in with me. I mean, Fiona, we’re adults. What’s holding you back?” He wanted her to say that she loved him. He wanted to hear the words and if she couldn’t say them, he needed to know why.
She said, “I’d like waking up to you in the morning.”
“That’s a big step. What about marrying me and being my wife and we make a home together?”
“I need more time. I can’t make fast decisions like you can. I need to think about them, get used to the idea. I have never considered being married. Do you realize that?”