Protection

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

“Bliss, you get right back here and eat something before you go off riding that horse this morning.”

Bliss Cooper stopped in the middle of tightening the drawstring on her hat and sighed. She had nearly made it past the doorway of the kitchen this time before Grace noticed she didn‘t stop at the table.

“I don’t see why I can’t eat with the cowboys like a normal person.” Bliss pushed her hat off her head until it hung by the drawstring down her back.

“Because the second they get their hands on this food there won’t be crumbs enough for a mouse. Now sit and eat before I take a switch to you,” the sweet cook said.

She was on up in her years, about the age of Bliss’ father, and yet her cheeks blushed like a woman half her age. Graying wisps of hair fell from the bun on top of her head and framed her face, which had handled aging very well.

Bliss walked back to the table and took two flapjacks from the stack she swore was a mile high.

“Nope,” Grace shook her head.

Bliss took one more.

Grace gave a satisfied nod and went on about flipping more flapjacks. Bliss was on her way out of the door when she ran into her father, who was coming in from feeding the livestock.

“Hey, sunshine,” he said, taking her in his arms and squeezing her like a child.

Bliss smiled and hugged him back. Though she had turned twenty last year, she still cherished her father’s morning hug. She hadn’t always been around to enjoy it.

“Off riding again, I see.” Daddy looked down at her split skirt and riding boots.

Bliss nodded and took a bite of her breakfast.

“Well, be safe, darlin’.”

Bliss smiled and exited the house, walking toward the barn with a pep in her step. It was a lovely, typical Arizona morning. The wide expanse of the land rose and fell periodically for miles in either direction. The mesas out in the distance were one of Bliss’ favorite things about living out West. They made the sunrise and sunsets even more enchanting than they would be anywhere else. The best part was that Bliss could wake up every morning and go to sleep every night looking at one of them and it rose up to touch the fingers of the sun as it began to change the way the world was viewed with it’s light or lack thereof.

Walking through the doorway of the barn, Bliss stood in front of the long line of stalls.

“Where’s my Butterfly Kisses?” she chimed.

A loud neigh came from the stall near the end of the long line and Bliss sighed. She found her russet colored quarter-horse where she usually would be and opened the stall. Butterfly Kisses had gotten her name from the three tiny dots that appeared on her blaze square between her eyes, which Bliss had fondly called “freckles”. Since Bliss had always had an annoying spray of freckles on the apple of each of her cheeks, as a child her late mother had called them “butterfly kisses” to maker Bliss feel better. Naming her horse after the endearing memory had gave Bliss a special connection to the animal.

Walking to the tack-room and bringing back her favorite saddle blanket and saddle, Bliss went on about combing and saddling Butterfly Kisses for their morning ride.

“That you, Bliss?” a voice said from the doorway.

“Nope, it’s a horse thief who happens to be combing out the horse before she steals it,” Bliss teased the foreman, Colt Kidd.