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with only bruises, scrapes, and sore muscles. I even placed third a couple of times and thought I was hot stuff.” He shook his head and smiled wryly. “But in San Angelo, I knew I was in big trouble even before we left the chute. That ol’ bull rolled his head around and stared at me with eyes of fire. I was on his hate list, and he did his best to squish me right there in the chute. When they threw open the gate, he flew out like a tornado. He twisted and bucked and spun one way, then the other. We parted company about four seconds into the ride. I woke up on the way to the hospital with a concussion, two broken ribs, and a broken arm. It didn’t take me long to figure out that gettin’ killed wasn’t worth the pain.
    “Trouble was, I didn’t know what to do to earn a living. Dad offered to pay my way through college, but I wasn’t interested. I didn’t want his money, and I had barely made it out of high school.”
    “Because your family life was such a mess. You’re no dummy, Wade Jamison.”
    “Why, thank you, ma’am.” He smiled, pleased with her compliment, and even more pleased that her hand still rested on his shoulder. “I liked working on the ranch better than anything else, but I knew I’d never make enough money as a cowboy to buy much of a place of my own. Uncle Ray and Aunt Della were real good to me, but I still felt like an outsider. I wanted it that way. I was afraid to love them. I didn’t want to get hurt when they got tired of having me around.”
    “Which is what happened with your parents.”
    “That’s the way I saw it then. Now, I realize how badly hurt Dad was when my mother walked out. He was having too hard a time handling his own pain to try to help me with mine, so he sent me to live here. It was a bitter, nasty divorce. He was actually trying to protect me, but I thought he didn’t love me anymore.” Her fingers tightened against his shoulder. He glanced at her, noting the tiny frown between her brows. “Don’t frown. I don’t want you getting wrinkles on account of me. Dad and I have a great relationship now.”
    “What about you and your mom?”
    “Not so great.”
    He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, but Andi sensed that the situation was still painful for him. She wanted to know more but didn’t want to spoil their time together. Giving his shoulder a tiny squeeze, she moved her hand and shifted slightly, turning to look out the window. “Spring is my favorite time of the year in West Texas—if we’ve had a rain. Everything is so pretty and green. Am I seeing things, or are those wild flowers on the hill up ahead?”
    As they sped down the highway, the flowers became more clearly defined. “You mean that great, big patch of yellow stuff?” asked Wade, leaning forward and squinting toward the small hill. “I think somebody’s been out here with a can of spray paint.”
    “Maybe Mother Nature.”
    “More like Father God,” he said quietly.
    Andi gazed across the wide, open prairie, sighing in contentment. “He does know how to do panoramic landscapes, doesn’t he?”
    “That he does.” Wade slowed the roadster and turned off the highway onto a paved road, driving beneath a wide, black wrought iron arch with the name “Smoking Pipe Ranch” worked into the pattern. A heavy wooden sign on the right side of the gate stated, “Ray and Della Jamison, Wade Jamison, Owners.” The brand of a pipe with a snake-like trail of smoke rising from it was burned into the wood.
    “Doesn’t look like you’re an outsider anymore.”
    “Nope. Half owner. Partly given, partly earned. When Uncle Ray saw I wasn’t going back to the rodeo and intended to stay on at the ranch, he offered to teach me the business and pay me regular cowboy wages. He said if I stayed five years and proved my worth, he’d give me a quarter interest in the ranch. I kept my part of the bargain, and he kept his. I also took some college classes in business and range management and learned