Letting Go (Triple Eight Ranch) - By Mary Beth Lee Page 0,1

up so we can eat breakfast,” he said without answering the plea, and Clarissa felt sorry for Mackenzie when she turned dejectedly and trudged to the bathroom.

“Hey there now, don’t go letting that little show of hers fool you,” he said, then held out his hand in introduction. “Jed Dillon.”

Clarissa had seen Jed Dillon and his daughter more than once since moving to Stearns. Every time they made their way to Pete’s, quiet whispers of sadness and pride moved from one patron to another. She didn’t know his whole story, didn’t really want to.

Any more than she wanted to shake his outstretched hand. But while she might wear the term loner with pride, rude was not her strong suit.

“Nice to meet you,” she said. “Clarissa Dye.”

He towered over her small frame. His palms were calloused, tanned. A working man’s hands. His cowboy hat spoke volumes. His was the real deal, like most around these parts. Straw for the late August heat. His long sleeved shirt opened to show a sun reddened neck. Crinkles along his icy blue eyes spoke of a time when laughter was his norm.

“I’m sorry about that,” he started to make amends again, but she waved his words away.

“No need for apologies,” she said.

Before she had to say more, Mackenzie was back, “I’m ready to eat now, Daddy.”

Jed looked from his daughter to her and back again, then his solemn lips tilted in a small smile and he said, “Maybe we’ll get a chance to talk again sometime,” before making his way to booth seventeen, Bev’s section.

As Clarissa watched them walk away, an ache for something she didn’t understand pulled at her heart, but like the remembered tears from earlier, she pushed it away.

Jed ordered Mackenzie’s french toast and milk, answered in the appropriate places to her knock knock jokes and tried not to think about the new waitress in town. Clarissa Dye. She wore a world of angst on that uptight face of hers.

“Daddy, Clarissa’s pretty, huh?”

Oh boy. “She’s something.”

“Yeah, but that something’s pretty. Can I put a quarter in the box an’ play Momma’s song?”

Jed congratulated himself when the question barely squeezed his heart. He reached into his pocket, grabbed some change and handed it over, then watched as Mack crossed the diner, carefully this time, to pick out four songs. One of them would be American Girl. Was every time.

On the way back to her seat, his little girl stopped and charmed the customers she knew. Most were like extended members of their family. That’s the way Stearns worked, and he thanked God for that on a daily basis. He’d made it through the toughest time in his life because of friends and family and God’s blessings.

“You really have to stop letting her out dressed like that, Jed,” Bev said, delivering Mack’s milk and his coffee.

Like he had any choice in that matter. “She picks her own clothes. That’s one battle we’re not fighting.”

“She’s picked that outfit every Saturday this month.”

“Probably will next month, too.”

“Not if Miss Susie has anything to say about it.” Bev laughed and grabbed creamer from an empty table nearby, dropped it on the corner of his booth. “Looks like you finally met Clarissa. What’d you think?”

Mackenzie climbed into the booth and gave Bev a big hug, saving Jed from answering and giving him a chance to watch the object of conversation as she moved from one table to another, behind the counter, back to the diner’s floor. She moved with the lithe grace of one of his Quarter Horses, but her face was set in the intensity of an untamed Mustang. Her hair was tucked up in a clip, keeping it away from her face, hiding its true look, but a few wisps of blonde straggled free. Her hands were tiny like the rest of her. She looked like one of their hard Oklahoma winds would blow her clear to the Gulf coast, and like she’d fight that wind every step of the way. His momma’d call that look grit.

Truth be told, he didn’t know what he thought about Clarissa, other than what Mackenzie had already stated in her five-year-old simplicity.

Clarissa Dye’s life might be full of hurt, but she sure was pretty.

“You find someone to watch Mackenzie next week after school yet?”

Jed tore his attention from the new girl in town and turned to Bev. Usually he could set his schedule up in such a way that transporting Mackenzie from town back to the Triple Eight was no