Do Not Forsake Me(146)

“I wouldn’t take no for an answer. I wanted to find my son.”

Dixie nodded. “And whatever Randy Harkner wants, she gets, I’ll bet.”

Randy smiled more. “I know how to handle Jake Harkner.”

Dixie grinned. “I’ll bet you do—but I won’t ever tell him you said that.”

“Please don’t.” Their gazes held, and Randy realized this woman loved Jake in that distant, untouchable way that Peter Brown loved her. “Life can be so strange can’t it, Dixie?”

“It surely can, Mrs. Harkner.” She rose to leave then. “I just thought you should know all these things before Jake gets back…and he will come back any day now, I’m sure.”

“I’m hoping he’ll make it here in just another day or two,” Randy told her. “It will depend on Evie’s condition and if they have to stop somewhere with her first. She could…lose her baby.”

“She won’t. I just know this will work out, Mrs. Harkner. God is looking down on your family, and this whole thing will somehow help Jake. He’ll realize prayer can be answered.”

The remark surprised Randy, coming from a woman who likely had never set foot in a church in her life. But then neither had Jake…yet he was a good man who loved with every fiber of his being. “Do you want to know something that might cheer you up, Dixie?”

Dixie smiled. “Sure.”

“Jake made me a promise that if I came home cancer-free, he’d go to church.”

Dixie raised her eyebrows in surprise. “Jake?”

“Yes.”

“In church?”

“Yes.”

Dixie burst out laughing. She waved Randy off. “Oh, I’m so sorry, but that does give me something to laugh about. Jake Harkner in church!” She laughed again. “Oh my, I am going to stick around—not just to make sure Jake gets back okay, but to watch him walk into church.” She looked at Randy kindly. “Ma’am, it is absolutely amazing how tightly you have that man roped to your side. He’s wild and wicked and mean as a hungry bobcat sometimes, but when it comes to you…he just melts right down. I’ve met that Jeff kid—the one who wants to write a book about Jake—and he said he couldn’t do it without you being a big part of the story, and he’s right about that.” Her smile faded. “You’re an angel of a woman, Mrs. Harkner. Jake is the luckiest man who ever walked, and he damn well knows it.”

Randy walked back to the window. “Thank you. What he doesn’t know is that I feel like I’m the lucky one, Dixie. Not many women are loved the way I am loved, in spite of the wild shoot-outs and the brothels and the rough life he lives. When we’re together it’s nothing like that.”

“Oh, I can see that.” Dixie rose and walked toward the door. “I’d better get out of here before Lloyd’s wife gets back. She might not be so understanding about her husband visiting my place.”

“Katie will need to learn patience, because Lloyd is a lot like Jake, and believe me, Jake isn’t always easy to live with.” Randy blinked back more tears. “But the way he loves someone…that makes it easier. He treasures the people he loves.” She took a deep breath, struggling to keep from breaking down completely. “And you don’t live with a man like Jake for twenty-six years and not trust him, because Jake is the kind of man who just blurts out everything he’s been up to…right out in the open…no bones about it.” She faced Dixie.

“That’s Jake, all right,” Dixie answered with a sly smile. “You know, Mrs. Harkner, Lloyd told me once that Jake said a man can have all the women in the world, but they don’t mean a damn thing compared to having that one special woman that’s just his alone and who loves him inside and out.”

Who do you belong to?

Jake Harkner.

Who owns every inch of this body?

Jake Harkner.

Yo te amo, mi querida.

“I hope to hell he’s alive, Mrs. Harkner,” Dixie told her, interrupting Randy’s thoughts, “and your son and daughter are all right.”

“They have to be, Dixie. They have to be. What will I do if they aren’t?”

Dixie shook her head. “Ma’am, I’m going to stay right here in town till I know, too, that he’s all right. And I can keep the boy with me if you want, till Jake gets here. Then you can talk about it with him. You don’t need the extra burden right now. I just wanted you to know about him. I brought him here because the boy was getting anxious to know if Jake got back yet. That kid already thinks the world of Jake.” She turned to go.