Rugged Cowboy - Elana Johnson Page 0,7

ready to start another relationship, he knew that. He’d spoken to Martha every day since his release. Always in private. Always for only a few minutes, because she didn’t seem able to do more than that.

Guilt gutted him as the pastor started speaking, and if Dallas were being honest, he never wanted to get married again. He simply wanted to find somewhere for him and his children to build a home and a life together.

Beside him, Jess texted, her fingers flying across her screen. Annoyance sang through Dallas, and he supposed he’d learned a few good things behind the fences and walls of the federal correctional facility where he’d lived. Number one was that he knew he didn’t have to respond immediately to every message or text. Inside River Bay, such a thing was impossible, and Dallas found he really liked being unplugged from his phone, his laptop, his tablet, and the Internet.

He’d found himself slipping back into the same obsessive need to answer a text the moment he got it—the way Jess was.

He adjusted Remmy on his lap and glanced at his son, who sat on his left side. Thomas looked utterly bored, but he hadn’t pulled out anything to entertain him. Dallas needed to tell him more about Nate, because the man was so exceptional on so many levels.

Looking back up to the altar, he listened as Ginger recited her vows to Nate, her auburn hair almost braided in the same way as the horse she rode. Dallas could only see Nate’s profile, and he wished he could see his whole face.

“I promise to love you forever,” Ginger said. “I don’t have much else to offer you, but the day you came to this ranch changed everything for me.” She smiled at him, and Dallas thought he caught a glimpse of what heaven must be like. Shining, angelic faces, with joy streaming around a person. Not necessarily from them, but almost like her happiness and love for Nate was a bubble where only she could exist, and she was trying to make sure everyone knew how she felt about him.

“I can’t wait to be your wife and build our life together.” She looked back at the pastor, and he turned slightly to Nate.

“Nathaniel has also prepared his own vows for Ginger.”

Nate’s horse shifted slightly, but Nate barely moved. He started speaking in the slow, deep, rich voice Dallas had heard him use in prison, though he did carry more of a cowboy lilt now than he had in the dormitory.

Dallas smiled, though the words sort of flowed in and around his ears. He could feel the love Nate had for Ginger, and Dallas wondered if he’d ever be able to feel like that about a woman again.

When he pictured the love of his life, she had dark blonde hair, dark blue eyes, and the name Martha.

At the same time, his eyes flitted back over to Jess—a brunette with only dark features and smattering of freckles across both cheeks. She was still texting.

“Can you stop that?” he hissed out of the corner of his mouth. “It’s really distracting.” And his best friend was saying his vows, for crying out loud.

Jess looked up at him, shock in her eyes. They glinted dangerously in the next moment, but she turned her phone over and laid it in her lap. They looked back up to the altar simultaneously, just in time for the pastor to say, “I now pronounce you man and wife.”

Nate leaned over so far, Dallas thought he’d surely slip from the saddle. He didn’t, though, and as they kissed, Ted led the charge by yelling, “Aye, yai, yai!”

Dallas joined his voice to the cheering, and Remmy clapped her hands over her ears and said, “Daddy.” Dallas let her down off his lap as he stood with many others. Nate and Ginger swung around on their horses, and the pastor had looped a braided rope around their wrists, which they raised up together.

Pure happiness radiated from their faces, and Dallas basked in the warm glow of it. He also really wanted it for himself, and again, he thought of Martha. He needed to call her as soon as he could find a spare moment to be alone.

Once Nate and Ginger had ridden away on their horses, the energy started to fade. Dallas suddenly felt the weight of the world descended on him again, and it was far too heavy for him to shoulder alone. But there was no one else