He Asked for a Convenient Wife, I Taught Him to Say No novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: A Cowboy and Twelve Chairs
Becca challenges Tate's three impossible chair-delivery favors at a public supper; he proposes a practical marriage to stop blind dates.
My future husband ate his supper standing inside a stack of borrowed chairs.
His cream cowboy hat hung from the tallest chair's back.
He had balanced a paper plate on the seat beneath it.
Every time he reached for his food, the stack moved.
I watched him rescue a bread roll with his elbow.
"You could take a chair out," I told him.
Tate Fenwick looked at the stack before looking at me.
"They have to stay together," he said.
"They're going back to three different houses."
"Then they have to come apart eventually," I pointed out.
He considered that while a woman approached from the outdoor tables.
She carried a handbag large enough to conceal another chair.
"My four need to be home before the bridge game," she told him.
Tate put his untouched bread roll back on his plate.
"Of course," he said.
A second woman called from beside the gate.
Her four chairs belonged at a porch supper across town.
Tate promised to deliver them before her guests arrived.
The third lender came over holding an empty casserole dish.
Her four were needed at home too, and she had baked his favorite potatoes.
He accepted the dish and promised to wash it before delivery.
I looked at the twelve chairs, then at his cooling supper.
"Do you have twelve arms?" I asked him.
He lifted both hands as though I might inspect their limitations.
"A truck," he said, "which is usually enough."
"Does the truck wash dishes?"
He looked at the casserole dish in his left hand.
I took his plate before the bread roll could make another escape.
We had known each other since I arrived three weeks earlier.
He had helped pull my trailer clear of a muddy verge.
Then he had apologized because my tires were still dirty.
I had liked his green eyes and distrusted that apology immediately.
Now I set his plate on an actual table and pulled out a chair.
It was a plastic one, so none of the lenders could claim it.
"Sit," I told him.
He sat with the expression of a man accepting an expensive gift.
His mother came over before he could take a bite.
Della Fenwick wore a denim jacket and an expectant smile.
"You'll help with the folding tables afterward?" she asked.
I put a fork into his hand before he could answer.
"He has three deliveries and a potato dish," I told her.
Della looked at the stack and then at her son's plate.
"You should have said," she told him.
Tate glanced toward the lenders, careful not to sound ungrateful.
"Everybody's been very generous," he replied.
I moved the casserole dish beneath his chair.
"Now you can be generous enough to eat their food," I said.
Della's mouth twitched before she went to recruit somebody else.
Tate took a bite and shut his eyes briefly.
I let him swallow before I sat opposite him.
He looked tired beneath the sunburn across his nose.
I had spent years sharing a home with somebody who never noticed my exhaustion.
I did not want to make this man grateful for a chair.
"You are allowed supper," I said more quietly.
He put his fork down and looked directly at me.
"Thank you," he said.
The sincerity made me want to find another practical task immediately.
I reached for the bread basket instead and gave him the last roll.
A woman at the next table called his name brightly.
She had a niece visiting and wondered whether he was free on Saturday.
Tate reached toward the potato dish as though it might answer for him.
I rested my hand on its rim before he could volunteer for something.
He looked from my hand to my face, then took a breath.
"Becca," he said quietly, "would you consider marrying me?"
I waited for him to grin or mention the visiting niece.
He only glanced toward the chairs and removed his hat from the tallest one.
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