she brushed them away with her fingertips. “You’re something special around here, aren’t you?”
“Like I said before. It’s a high school rodeo. Kids are pretty easy to impress.”
“It’s not just the kids. Everybody here knows who you are.”
Luke just shrugged, but she could tell the attention wasn’t lost on him. In Rainbow Valley, he was the son of the most disreputable man the town had ever seen. But in this world, he was a man other people looked up to. No wonder he was so desperate to get back to his old life.
“I told Myrna I’d have Todd home by ten,” Luke said to Shannon, then turned to Todd. “It’s getting late, buddy. We need to go.”
They hadn’t been in the car five minutes before Todd fell asleep, his head on Shannon’s shoulder, his breathing measured and even. The evening had worn him out in a good way, and she had a feeling he was going to be talking about it for some time to come.
“Have a good time?” Luke said, breaking the silence.
“Yeah,” Shannon said. “It was fun. I didn’t know there was so much involved in rodeo. And bull riding. No offense, Luke. But you’re nuts.”
He smiled. “Most days I wouldn’t disagree with you about that.”
After tonight, that didn’t really surprise her. But what did surprise her was how incredibly good he was with kids. He seemed to thrive on that almost as much as he did bull riding.
She looked at Todd. “You were so good with him. And with those boys at the rodeo.”
“I like kids,” Luke said. “There’s no pretense with them.”
“What do you mean?”
“They don’t have any ulterior motive. No hidden agenda. If they like you, they like you. If they don’t, they’ll tell you why, and it’s usually your fault. It doesn’t take much to make them happy. With the little ones, just let them wear your hat, or pet a horse, and they act like they’re at Disney World.” He glanced at Todd. “I’m going to have my own kids someday. Boys, girls—it doesn’t matter which.”
“You want to be a father?”
“Does that surprise you?” he asked.
“Yeah. I guess it does.”
“Because I didn’t exactly have the best example of a father to guide me?”
“Some men would say they don’t want kids because they figure they’d be terrible fathers just like their fathers were,” Shannon said.
“Does that make any sense at all? If a man has a terrible father, why on earth would he let himself become just like him?”
“It happens.”
“Not to me. No matter what the people in town think, I’m nothing like my father was. I want to have kids someday. And you can bet your life I’ll do it right.”
Shannon believed him. Every word.
Soon they pulled up in front of Myrna’s house. Shannon waited in the truck as Luke picked Todd up, still sleeping, and took him to the door. They disappeared inside the house, and a few minutes later Luke came back to the truck.
“Did he ever wake up?” she asked.
“Nope. He was dead tired. I put him right in bed and he never made a sound.”
“You and Myrna seem to be getting along just fine these days.”
Luke gave her an offhand shrug. “She’s been real good to Todd since his mother left.”
Luke drove to Shannon’s apartment, where he pulled his truck into a parking space and killed the engine.
“So what are your plans for after you win the World Championship?” she asked.
“The money won’t last forever. I’m a bull rider. Come January, I’ll start all over again.”
“So how long can a man ride bulls before the bulls get the best of him?”
“I don’t know. Guess I’ll find out sooner or later, won’t I?”
“You say you want to settle down. Have kids. How are you ever going to do that when you’re in a different city every week?”
“A man’s got to make a living first. I don’t know how to do anything else.”
She nodded. “When the day comes you can no longer compete, what will you do?”
“I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about that.”
A silence stretched between them, and she was sure Luke knew what she was thinking.
“Rainbow Valley,” she said finally. “Do you still hate it?”
He looked at her, then looked away again. “This isn’t the place for me. Never will be.”
“There are some good people here.”
“I know that. And I appreciate every one of them. But as long as I stay here, I’ll always be Glenn Dawson’s son. When I’m anywhere else, I’m my own man. If