The Construction of Cheer Read online

  The Construction of Cheer

  Shiloh Ridge Ranch in Three Rivers, Book 3

  Liz Isaacson

  Contents

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  The Glover Family

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Sneak Peek! The Secret of Santa Chapter One:

  Sneak Peek! The Secret of Santa Chapter Two:

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  The Glover Family

  Welcome to Shiloh Ridge Ranch! The Glover family is BIG, and sometimes it can be hard to keep track of everyone.

  There is a more detailed graphic here, on my website. (But it has spoilers! I made it as the family started to get really big, which happens fairly quickly, actually. It has all the couples (some you won’t see for many more books), as well as a lot of the children they have or will have, through about Book 6. It might be easier for you to visualize, though.)

  Here’s how things are right now:

  Lois & Stone (deceased) Glover, 7 children, in age-order:

  1. Bear (Sammy, wife / Lincoln, step-son)

  2. Cactus (Allison, ex-wife / Bryce, son (deceased))

  3. Judge

  4. Preacher

  5. Arizona

  6. Mister

  7. Bishop

  Dawna & Bull (deceased) Glover, 5 children, in age-order:

  1. Ranger (Oakley, wife)

  2. Ward

  3. Ace

  4. Etta

  5. Ida

  Bull and Stone Glover were brothers, so their children are cousins. Ranger and Bear, for example, are cousins, and each the oldest sibling in their families.

  The Glovers know and interact with the Walkers of Seven Sons Ranch. There’s a lot of them too! Here’s a little cheat sheet for you for the Walkers.

  Momma & Daddy: Penny and Gideon Walker

  1. Rhett & Evelyn Walker

  Son: Conrad

  Triplets: Austin, Elaine, and Easton

  2. Jeremiah & Whitney Walker

  Son: Jonah Jeremiah (JJ)

  Daughter: Clara Jean

  Son: Jason

  3. Liam & Callie Walker

  Daughter: Denise

  Daughter: Ginger

  4. Tripp & Ivory Walker

  Son: Oliver

  Son: Isaac

  5. Wyatt & Marcy Walker

  Son: Warren

  Son: Cole

  Son: Harrison

  6. Skyler & Mallery Walker

  Daughter: Camila

  7. Micah & Simone Walker

  Son: Travis (Trap)

  Chapter One

  Bishop Glover looked in the mirror and adjusted his bow tie. He’d been praying for a solid month for two things: that the barn would be finished in time for today’s weddings, and that the weather would be perfect.

  The barn had literally been finished last night when Bishop himself had hung the mirror in the bride’s room. As the project had commenced, he’d realized they’d need more than just a huge open space for dancing or eating and a kitchen.

  They needed bathrooms. They needed a furnace room. They needed dressing rooms, especially if the barn was going to be used for weddings, which it obviously was.

  His cousin had spilled the beans to his brother about the barn project, and Bishop had been annoyed in the beginning. As the construction got started and it outgrew his own vision for it, Bishop had been grateful Bear knew about the barn renovation.

  He’d suggested Bishop contact Micah Walker, who’d designed and built the new mansion-like homestead for the family.

  Bishop had, and Micah could see way beyond what he could.

  So the barn now had bathrooms, dressing rooms, a kitchen, a mudroom, and a control room, where the music and lighting could be programmed or changed with a few taps and presses of a button.

  There were two hot water heaters in the barn, an industrial kitchen they’d probably use several times a year, beautiful barn doors that sectioned off the back of the barn for the dressing rooms and bathrooms, and a hardwood floor throughout.

  Bishop loved the barn with his whole soul. If he could put a bedroom in the loft, he’d live there.

  As it was, the loft was just for show. There was no ladder to get up to it, and it sat above the kitchen and looked pretty with the new posts and pillars Bishop had carved by hand.

  In the end, almost everyone—except the two groomsmen for today—who worked on the ranch had put in some labor on the blue barn, which Bishop had affectionately named True Blue.

  He’d gone to his mother’s and looked through the old photo albums she had, and together, they’d found several picture of his father and his uncle working on the barn. They’d built it with their daddy and a few cowboys who’d worked Shiloh Ridge Ranch at the time.

  Bishop had taken the photos and gone to the genealogical society in Three Rivers. He’d asked for the best way to enlarge them and frame them so the memories wouldn’t be lost. A very nice woman there had helped him, and Bishop had hung those pictures last night too.

  “Come on,” someone said, pounding on his door. “We’re going to be late.”

  “Coming,” he yelled as he left the bathroom. He exited his suite to noise coming down the hallway from the living room. Until last week, he’d lived in the west wing of the mansion-slash-homestead, but he and his oldest brother, Bear, had switched places.

  Bear was going to be married today, and his wife and step-son were coming to live on the ranch.

  Bishop’s suite had a large bedroom, a full bath, and a private living area. It was enough for him right now.

  His cousin, Ranger, who was also getting married today, already lived in the east wing, and once he and his wife returned from their honeymoon, they’d live upstairs together too.

  Bishop looked around at the chaos in the house and thought forward about twelve hours. All of this would be done. The brothers and sisters and cousins and aunts and uncles would all go home. The weddings would be over.

  Bishop could order dinner, drive down to Three Rivers to get it, and come sit in a quiet house by himself.

  Sort of.

  His eyes caught on his only sister as she turned toward someone entering the kitchen. Arizona was coming to stay in the house with Bishop while the two newlywed couples were on their honeymoons, because her house needed to be sprayed for termites.

  Mother was going to go stay with her sister-in-law in town, and she had plenty of sons to help get her there and back any time she wanted to come to the ranch.

  “It’s time to go,” Cactus yelled, and he could have a loud voice when he wanted to. He’d really come out of his prickly shell in the past four or five m
onths, though he still hadn’t found a woman he wanted to go out with more than twice.

  The men and women in the house started to move out, and Bishop joined the flow. They could get almost all the way to True Blue on a road, so most people loaded into vehicles and started rumbling down the gravel lane.

  Some people walked.

  Bishop caught up to Zona and asked, “Want a ride?”

  “I’m going with Duke,” she said, looking up at Bishop. “Do you want to ride with us?”

  “Sure,” Bishop said. He liked Duke Rhinehart just fine, though he knew there was something that had happened with him in the past. Bear didn’t seem to mind him, and Bishop tried very hard to only make judgments based on his own personal experiences with someone.

  He climbed in the back of Duke’s extended cab truck, finding his younger brothers there too. “Howdy, fellas,” he said. “You guys lookin’ for more work?”

  “No, sir,” one of them drawled. “Our place keeps us plenty busy.”

  The other one nodded, his eyes round like Bishop would force him to come work at Shiloh Ridge after they finished their chores on their own ranch.

  “Maybe in the summer,” Bishop said, pinning his grin in place. “If y’all have friends who need a job, send ‘em up here. We always have more work than we can do ourselves.”

  “That so?” Duke asked, looking in the rear-view mirror. He’d been waiting for his turn, and he finally eased out onto the road.

  “Yes,” Bishop said, already tired and summer was still a month or two off.

  “I might know some guys.”

  “We’ve got seven empty cowboy cabins,” Bishop said. “I’m trying to get Bear and Ranger to fill them this year. They’ll be busy with their new families, and I’m tired of working fifteen hours a day.”

  He loved Shiloh Ridge, and he didn’t want to be anywhere else. He never had. He’d always seen himself working this generational land that his ancestors had cultivated and loved. He just wanted time to sleep too. Time to date. Time to watch TV. Was that so wrong?

  A frown filled his face, and he looked out the window.

  In a truck, getting to True Blue only took about five minutes, and Bishop got out with everyone else when they arrived. He noticed Duke coming around to Zona’s side and helping her down as she was in a pretty dress the color of evening clouds. Sort of pink, but also sort of peachy, and maybe a little gold. The dress shimmered, and Bishop watched as Zona smiled up at Duke and laced her arm through his.

  They made a cute couple, and they’d been dating since just before Christmas.

  Bishop himself had been on many dates since Christmas, but nothing seemed to stick. Even with the women he really liked, he couldn’t seem to make a relationship launch. Familiar frustration built within him, and he strode inside as a bit of a breeze picked up.

  The Lord had heard his prayers about the weather, though he knew he wasn’t the only one who’d been praying for such a blessing. The whole Glover family had been, and it certainly seemed like the rain would hold off for a few more hours.

  Bishop slowed as he neared the barn. She’d gotten a fresh coat of blue paint, and she gleamed in the sunlight. The doors had been widened, and new ones fashioned and fitted on the tracks. They could lock, but right now, they’d been thrown wide open.

  A tall vase of flowers and greenery stood sentinel on either side of the open doors, with a small podium next to one. People paused there to write their names in the two guest books, but Bishop didn’t.

  The scent of roses blew toward him from inside the barn, and he stepped from dirt to a wide rug that would help clean people’s boots and shoes as they transitioned from outdoor to indoor space.

  The hardwood stretched beyond that, and the huge serving window Micah had suggested in the kitchen had been rolled up. Trays and plates sat there, and people moved in and out as they got appetizers and snacks before the wedding began.

  The altar was immediately to his left, with the rows of chairs filling what could also be a dance floor. The middle aisle ran straight back to another set of hand-planed and hand-stained barn doors. Through those sat the dressing rooms and bathrooms, and the brides and grooms would exit back there, walk down the aisle, get married at the front, and be able to walk out the doorway where he stood easily.

  It was a genius layout, really. Bishop had gotten them eighty percent of the way there.

  “This place is incredible,” Ace said, coming to a stop beside Bishop. The two cousins looked at one another and smiled. “I can’t wait to get married here.”

  “Yeah? Are you gonna ask Bea?”

  Ace’s smile turned a bit mischievous. “You never know.” He entered the barn, making a beeline for the kitchen window in the back corner, and Bishop shook his head. He knew what you never know meant.

  It meant no.

  Ace was currently dating Beatrice Gates, but he was really smitten with another woman.

  Soft music played from the speakers high above the floor, and Bishop had installed those himself too. He could lean his head back and find them easily, though neither Ranger nor Bear had been able to spot more than one or two.

  “Afternoon, Bishop.”

  He turned toward the male voice and found Pastor Summers. “Heya,” he said, smiling and extending his hand to shake the pastor’s. “Mrs. Summers. Good to see you.” He shook her hand too.

  “This is beautiful,” she said, gazing around. She had blonde hair that had started to lose its color, and eyes the same as all the Glovers: blue. She had a kind soul, and Bishop had literally never seen the woman upset. “Are y’all renting it out?”

  “I don’t think so,” Bishop said.

  Her eyes came to his. “Our daughter would love to get married here. Don’t you think, Curtis?”

  “Hmm, probably,” Pastor Summers said.

  Mrs. Summers looked at Bishop again. “We need to talk some more.”

  “Okay,” Bishop said, but he wasn’t sure why she was talking to him. He was the youngest male in the family, and he literally had no say about how things were run on the ranch. Sure, sometimes Ranger and Bear sent emails or texts about big purchases or major projects, just to get feedback from everyone. In the end, though, they got to decide what happened at Shiloh Ridge.

  “Excuse me,” a woman said into the microphone. “It’s time to take your seats, if you would, please. Our first bride will be coming down the aisle in only ten short minutes.”

  Bishop did what his cousin said to do, his seat decided up front. Both Bear and Ranger had opted for a wedding party in pictures only. Only the brides would be escorted down the aisle to meet their waiting groom. The wedding party would stand at the front for a moment, and then sit in the first couple of rows.

  He got a fancy flower for his lapel too. He supposed that counted for something.

  Bishop took his spot at the end of the row for his family, his four older brothers and Zona already there. The only one missing was Bear.

  And Daddy, Bishop thought, a momentary pang of sadness gonging against his heart. He’d only been eighteen years old when his father had died, and Bishop sometimes felt like he had no idea how to be a man because his daddy hadn’t been there when he’d become one.

  He swallowed against the emotions and looked to the other side of the aisle. Samantha Benton’s family sat over there, but it was just her mother and a few friends. Her father and her son would be walking her down the aisle to Bear.

  Sammy owned the mechanic shop in town, and all of her mechanics and their families had come. Bishop liked seeing them there, as they sure did feel like family for Sammy.

  The music paused, and the very air itself seemed to pause. Then, a new song started, and the crowd got to its feet as Bear pushed open the barn doors at the back of the hall. He beamed out at the crowd, his face softening even more as he cocked his elbow for Mother to put her hand on.

  They walked down the aisle together, and Bishop could not stop grinning. Once they’d reached the altar,
Mother straightened Bear’s tie and hugged him tight. His siblings surged forward, all of them seeming to step at the same time.

  Bear chuckled as they did a group hug for him, and then they stepped back to their places, Cactus holding onto Mother now.

  The music paused again, and Bishop spun toward the open doors. Sammy appeared, her dress simple and elegant. It hugged her close to the hip, and then flared into a traditional wedding dress shape. Her train was long, and her son helped her fan it out behind her.

  Then Lincoln disappeared again, and when he returned, he held onto his grandfather, who limped and wobbled on his feet. He managed to get to Sammy, who secured her hand in his, a wide smile on her face.

  Lincoln moved to her other side, and then the three of them marched down the aisle. Bishop reveled in the reverence and spirit in the barn, a sense of family and love so permeating he felt himself start to choke up a little.

  Pastor Summers could really get going during some of his sermons, but today, he kept the ceremony simple and to the point. He spoke of love and forgiveness, and, “Most of all,” he said. “Be willing to talk to one another. Don’t be afraid to tell your partner how you feel. Most issues can be resolved through proper communication.”

  Bishop thought about his failed relationships. Maybe that was what he’d been doing wrong. Not saying what he should say.