Between Hope & the Highway Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedicated to...

  PART ONE Shattered Hope

  Chapter 1 Liz

  Chapter 2 Bentley

  Chapter 3 Rawson

  Chapter 4 Liz

  Chapter 5 Bentley

  Chapter 6 Rawson

  Chapter 7 Liz

  Chapter 8 Bentley

  Chapter 9 Rawson

  Chapter 10 Liz

  Chapter 11 Bentley

  Chapter 12 Rawson

  Chapter 13 Liz

  Chapter 14 Bentley

  Chapter 15 Rawson

  Chapter 16 Bentley

  Chapter 17 Liz

  Chapter 18 Rawson

  Chapter 19 Bentley

  Chapter 20 Liz

  Chapter 21 Rawson

  Chapter 22 Bentley

  Chapter 23 Rawson

  Chapter 24 Liz

  Chapter 25 Bentley

  Chapter 26 Rawson

  PART TWO Shaping Hope

  Chapter 27 Bentley

  Chapter 28 Liz

  Chapter 29 Bentley

  Chapter 30 Rawson

  Chapter 31 Liz

  Chapter 32 Rawson

  Chapter 33 Liz

  Chapter 34 Rawson

  Chapter 35 Liz

  Chapter 36 Rawson

  Chapter 37 Bentley

  Chapter 38 Liz

  Chapter 39 Rawson

  Chapter 40 Liz

  Chapter 41 Rawson

  Chapter 42 Bentley

  Chapter 43 Rawson

  PART THREE Nourishing Hope

  Chapter 44 Bentley

  Chapter 45 Rawson

  Chapter 46 Liz

  Chapter 47 Rawson

  Chapter 48 Liz

  Chapter 49 Rawson

  Chapter 50 Liz

  Chapter 51 Bentley

  Chapter 52 Rawson

  Chapter 53 Liz

  Chapter 54 Bentley

  Chapter 55 Liz

  Chapter 56 Rawson

  Chapter 57 Liz

  Chapter 58 Bentley

  Chapter 59 Rawson

  Chapter 60 Rawson

  Chapter 61 Liz

  Chapter 62 Bentley

  Chapter 63 Liz

  Chapter 64 Rawson

  Chapter 65 Liz

  Chapter 66 Rawson

  Chapter 67 Liz

  Chapter 68 Rawson

  Chapter 69 Liz

  Chapter 70 Rawson

  Chapter 71 Liz

  Chapter 72 Rawson

  Chapter 73 Liz

  Chapter 74 Rawson

  Chapter 75 Liz

  Chapter 76 Rawson

  Chapter 77 Liz

  Chapter 78 Rawson

  PART FOUR Empowering Hope

  Chapter 79 Liz

  Chapter 80 Rawson

  Chapter 81 Liz

  Chapter 82 Bentley

  Chapter 83 Liz

  Chapter 84 Rawson

  Chapter 85 Bentley

  Chapter 86 Liz

  Chapter 87 Rawson

  Chapter 88 Liz

  Chapter 89 Rawson

  Chapter 90 Liz

  Chapter 91 Bentley

  Chapter 92 Rawson

  Chapter 93 Bentley

  Chapter 94 Liz

  Acknowledgments

  To my Readers

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2016 Charissa Stastny

  All rights reserved

  ASIN: B01KIQ0AGY

  Dedicated to...

  PART ONE

  Shattered Hope

  Happiness in the present is only shattered by comparison with the past.

  Douglas Horton

  Chapter 1

  Liz

  Sometimes life gets so messed up there’s no other option but to grab your boots and get the heck out of Dodge. I’d reached that point. Taking one last look at the framed photo in my hands, I clenched my teeth and slammed it on my desk. No more tears! Not when I could almost taste freedom.

  Turning, I inadvertently knocked my white chair onto the hot pink rug Mom adored. She’d designed my room to look like Cupid barfed Pepto Bismol all over the floor, bed, and adjacent walls. Rubbing my knee, I set the chair aright and scanned my room for any overlooked items. A velvet box on the nightstand caused my eyelashes to spasm.

  Dang it! No tears.

  “Liz, honey,” Dad called from the hallway. “You need help, baby doll?”

  Leaping over my bed, I hid the box behind my back as he peered around the edge of my door.

  “Are you finished packing? I can take those down for you if you are.”

  “That’d be great.” I slipped around the foot of the bed to unzip my pink luggage—another dreaded gift from Mom—enough to wedge the plush container inside without him noticing.

  “Honey, are you sure about this?” He played with the handle of my prissy pink abominations. “It’s not too late to change your mind. Montana is so far away.”

  “Nothing’s far anymore, Daddy.” I was way too old to still call him that, but he considered Dad too stiff and formal for his baby girl to use. “I can call and talk to you every night. We can even Skype.”

  “You think they have reliable internet there? It sounded awfully remote from how you described it.”

  “So maybe we won’t Skype.” I hoped not. Talking on the phone would be difficult enough. I expected my heavy work load to keep calls to a minimum.

  As he trapped my face between his work-calloused hands, I squirmed and wondered where Viktorya was. She was late.

  “Are you sure you’re not running from memories, baby doll?”

  I knew without a doubt I was running, but since I hadn’t made any headway here, why not escape? The farther, the better. Memories could be weapons, and mine had become incoming missiles. In war, when the opposing side had superior fire power, you fled. It was called survival. For five months, I’d tried to participate in this thing called life. My heart still pumped blood, my lungs brought in oxygen, and my stomach digested food I forced down my throat. During the week, I answered phones at Ruthersford Construction for Dad and tried to act normal. But though I went through the motions, my heart was dead…and without a heart, I might as well have been one of those gross zombies shuffling around in movies with listless eyes and creepy outstretched arms, moaning for someone with a brain to put them out of their misery.

  “Honey?”

  I snapped back to the present and pulled his fingers off my face. “I’m sure, Daddy.” I glanced around, knowing I wouldn’t return until Thanksgiving. Eight months from now. It’d be the longest I’d ever been away from home. When the doorbell rang downstairs, I rubbed my hands together. “That’s her.”

  Dad grabbed a suitcase in each hand. “If you want to come home, just call. Even if you’ve only been there a day, I’ll drive up and get you if you hate it.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  He playfully tugged one of my wild curls. “You’re my baby girl. I can’t help worrying about you.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  As he carried my luggage out, I grabbed my leather satchel and followed. He really was the best, even if he was a wee bit overprotective.

  Mom waited at the bottom of the stairs. Clenching my teeth, I prepared for battle. She’d presented dozens of arguments against leaving. I wouldn’t know anyone and would be miles from civilization; I wouldn’t be in a wholesome, religious environment. School would be put on hold. The most important reason though was that I’d be getting older without any dating opportunities. She couldn’t bear to think of me as an old maid, but since I approached the ancient age of twenty, she believed I was at risk of that stigma.


  At first, she gave me space to heal. Daddy forced her to. After a few months though, she declared a state of emergency and decided the answer to my grief was to date every man capable of walking. I can’t tell you how many people there are, besides Mom, who ache to make me happy, and feel their second cousin or friend’s son will do that for me. As if a heart could be mended so easily.

  “I can’t believe you’re going through with this ridiculous scheme.” Mom’s bright pink lips quivered.

  To hear her talk, one would think I was a rebellious, calloused soul, although in truth, I simply didn’t care for the same things she and my sister did. Her world had revolved around cheer camp and boys as a teenager, and she thought mine should too. When I turned into sort of a tomboy despite the pink, frilly room and dresses she forced upon me, it quite literally broke her heart.

  I crossed my arms beneath my smallish chest—a deficit she’d bemoaned for years and hoped maturity would fix. It hadn’t. “I love you, Mom.” My words came out monotone.

  “You’re not acting like it, leaving me like this…and for what? To hide away with a bunch of stinky animals in a place that doesn’t even garner a blip on a map?”

  My muscles tensed. “Why can’t you be happy for me?”

  “Because you’re throwing your life away.” She yanked me around and flicked at one of my curls. “When did you last condition this rat’s nest? You should have taken time to straighten your hair, Elizabeth.”

  I dug my nails into my palms. Straightening my hair took over an hour and was tedious at best. But Mom loathed my untamed locks. She said I resembled Merida from Disney’s Brave. My hair wasn’t bright red like hers, nor was it as thick and unruly, but close enough. Mom hurled the name like a curse, but I took pride in being compared to the girl who broke the classic princess mold. Merida was wild, unsophisticated, brave, determined, and completely unconventional. Like me.

  “And you’re not wearing a speck of makeup. How many times have I stressed how important first impressions are? Don’t you ever listen?”

  After years of hearing her detail my deficiencies, I should have been immune to her negativity. Sadly, I wasn’t. I hated her nagging even more than my Pepto-splattered room.

  Dad cleared his throat and wrapped an arm around her waist. “Ilene, she looks fine.”

  Mom dabbed at her eyes. “But she’s behaving so irrationally.”

  I bit my tongue, knowing nothing I said would change her mind. Mom had never believed in my dreams, except where Justin was involved. And he was gone.

  Moistness made me blink and swallow hard. No tears! Not now. Why couldn’t I get him out of my head? Justin was Stage IV cancer to my soul, embedding himself in my heart and popping out everywhere…like in the faces of complete strangers; I’d even heard his laughter rustling in the branches of an olive tree and smelled his cologne after a rainstorm. I needed geographic chemotherapy to ensure memories of him didn’t destroy me.

  “Are you ready, Liz?” Viktorya’s thick Russian accent from the entry broke the awkward stand-off. What would I have done without her all these years? Probably been steamrolled by my mother and pinned to a cheer board.

  “Yep. Let’s hit the road.” I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

  I followed Dad out to Vikky’s truck, recalling how I’d met the expat Russian years earlier. Growing up, Mom pushed me onto the path of popularity by enrolling me in gymnastics and cheer camps. Dad, bless his heart, sensed my misery and covertly helped me. He picked me up from school and let me hang out at his construction sites a couple afternoons a week where he taught me how to wield a hammer, run a belt sander, and be confident with a power drill. We never told Mom. But she found out about my secret tomboy identity when Dad took a job building a fancy stable during my seventh grade year for Viktorya Lohman. When Vikky saw how the horses took to me, she offered to let me clean stables in exchange for riding lessons.

  Mom totally freaked when I traded my pink tutus in for boots and riding apparel. Since then, she’d nitpicked and used my most hated word—too—excessively. I was too skinny, my chin too pointy, my forehead too wide, my conduct too unladylike, my speech too casual, my laughter too obnoxious, my hands too calloused, my lips too thin, my nails too ragged, my expression too stern, my clothes too boring, my complexion too freckly, and my hair too curly. Whenever she saw me, she found something she disliked too much or too little. She’d mastered in Lizzieology, the science of picking me apart.

  Mom thought I should be attending dances on the weekends, not scraping manure off the bottom of my boots. That’s why I clung to Viktorya in a symbiotic relationship, relying on her to be with the horses I adored as she used my equine instincts to keep her business profitable. She became my surrogate mom who instilled confidence and encouraged my dreams while my real mother tried to undermine all her hard work through passive-aggressive nagging and abuse of the word too.

  As Dad threw my luggage into the bed of the truck, I turned to hug Mom. Deep down, I believed she loved me. I also knew we could stand some distance between us.

  “Bye.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t go.” She swiped at a tear. “That Robinson boy watched you pretty intently at church last week. I bet he’d ask you out this Sunday if you were here.”

  I had no doubt about that. Mom would likely corner him after the sermon and throw me on the poor, unsuspecting man. She’d done it before in her quest to see me married.

  Ignoring her comment, I let Dad sweep me into his arms.

  “I’m going to miss you, baby doll.”

  “I’ll miss you too, Daddy.”

  He squeezed me tight. Despite living with a mom who doused me in disappointment, God had blessed me with an extra high dose of optimism and a dad who always rescued me when I started to sink. Maybe that’s why he struggled with parting. I’d always been his baby girl…except for those four months when Justin ousted him from favorite man position.

  “Be excited for me.”

  “I’m trying.” He swiped at his own eyes as he released me.

  Climbing into the passenger seat, I mouthed go to Viktorya. She didn’t need to be told twice. As we pulled away from the curb, I waved and blew kisses out the window. Facing forward, I wondered what the future had in store. It certainly couldn’t be worse than what I was leaving.

  When I first approached Dad about heading to Montana to work, he’d pursed his lips and asked if I had prayed about my decision. I’d wanted to punch a hole through the wall. Of course I had. So what if I hadn’t received a heavenly sign letting me know it was the right thing to do. I was getting out of Vegas anyway.

  Mom immediately campaigned to stop me. She claimed I wouldn’t have any friends there, but I didn’t have any here. Not really. I couldn’t stomach the mindless chatter of girls my age, and boys irritated me even more. Mom said I needed to stroke their egos, but most guys I knew didn’t have a problem stroking their own, so I failed to see the point in doing it for them. Mom said that’s why I was the queen of dating but never had a steady boyfriend to call honey.

  Until Justin.

  I don’t know what it was about him, but he pushed horses from my mind when we met in the library elevator my second week at college. I was caught hook, line, and sinker. Love at first sight. I didn’t believe in clichés before him, but I did now. I experienced three months of happily ever after once we met, but had endured a war zone since he left. No, happiness could be felt in a war. Maybe a soldier opened his MRE and felt thrilled he could eat with no one shooting at him. There were no moments like that for me. A war zone would be a relief. Hell described it better. Imagine its fiery depths, and that summed up my life since I buried my heart in that shaded Colorado grave next to Justin.

  Viktorya reached over to squeeze my hand, landing me back in reality. “You are excited, no?”

  “Yeah. I can’t wait to see the place in person. The pictures on their website looked amazing.”

  “The Bar-M-Law Ranch is more than amazing. It’
s spectacular.”

  I grinned, wondering if I was more excited by the prospect of heading to a new place or leaving home. Probably both.

  As we left my salmon-colored neighborhood behind, I dug into my satchel for my employment contract. The packet of papers had resurrected hope after I skimmed the stipulations sent by the ranch owner, Mr. Law.

  “Are you worried about the work load?”

  “Not really.” I wasn’t. Thanks to her and Dad, I knew how to get my hands dirty.

  “Don’t worry,” she chewed the words in her thick accent. “The work may be grueling at first, but once Bart sees you in action, he’ll give you a raise and a promotion. Life will get easier, no?”

  I hoped not. The blunt paragraph specifying the required twelve to sixteen hour workdays and stating how I’d receive no special privileges due to my gender actually lured me into accepting the offer. That chauvinistic, no molly-coddling attitude sounded like the ideal medicine for my broken heart. If I was beat-up and exhausted each day, I wouldn’t have time or energy to think of Justin. I’d forget this pain…forget my loss…forget him.

  Chapter 2

  Bentley

  The late-spring sun warmed me as I hobbled to the aspen grove. Right step…left leg-lift, swing-out, step-down and wince…right step…left leg-lift, swing-out, step-down and wince…right step. I focused on moving my left leg smoothly, but it wouldn’t cooperate. My boot hit the ground with an awkward thud and nerve pain shot up my hip. I winced at the searing sensation, but concentrated on fluidity as Dr. Bowler emphasized at my last appointment. No pain, no gain. That was his motto.

  When I reached my sanctuary of sand and water nestled between the white-barked trees behind Dad’s office, I ducked under a low hanging branch. Office might be a deceiving term to an outsider. The white building with green metal roof matched the main stable and indoor arena. Dad’s office, as well as those of the foreman and trainers, took up the upper story where five dormer windows looked out onto fenced pasture land. The lower level stabled our champion breeding stallions.

  Glancing through the leaves, I recalled how his office and stables had seemed like a castle to me as a kid; the cupola served as the ramparts. I’d climbed, jumped, and ran as well as any other kid back then as I pretended to fight dragons. Now, five years later at the ripe old age of twelve, I had to content myself with forming sand castles out of mud slurry. No exploring the kingdom for me. One had to be able to get up and down from his horse to do that, and unfortunately, that simple feat was beyond me.