The Bride Wore Red Boots by Lizbeth Selvig

that the pain was unfamiliar. Lately headaches had become all too commonplace—so much so, she had a routine to deal with them.
    She flipped her low-heeled pumps straight from her feet into their corner of her bedroom and stripped every stitch of clothing, from her red-and-white pinstriped blouse to her navy pencil skirt, bra, and underpants, off her body and set them into the laundry hamper. Gratefully and gloriously, she replaced them with her loosest, ugliest gray sweatpants and a fairly hideous multicolor striped, polar fleece pullover that, strictly by virtue of its coziness against her skin, eased her impending migraine by a fraction.
    One glass of ice-cold water and the full adult dose of eight hundred powerful milligrams of ibuprofen later, she shuffled into the kitchen, popped a K-Cup of hot chocolate into her trendy new single-serve coffee maker and slipped her favorite mug into place. Surgeons Do It on the Table , it said.
    â€œIf only,” she said out loud.
    While the chocolate brewed she opened the refrigerator and searched fruitlessly for anything that sounded or looked good. This, too, was part of the headache routine, and as usual she closed the fridge door without choosing anything. There wasn’t even a lack of choice—she kept a well-stocked kitchen—but cooking sounded far too painful, and fresh anything sounded far too healthy. Finally, when her cocoa was ready, she grabbed a package of graham crackers from the cupboard and carried the nonnutritious comfort food into the living room.
    She loved her condo. It truly was her one haven away from the world of relative insanity she inhabited eighty percent of the time. She’d chosen that chaotic, high-pressure world, and she loved it, too, but here—headache or no—she could leave the hospital behind if she chose.
    She retrieved her laptop from her briefcase in the foyer and flipped on her gas fireplace on her way back to the couch. On the mantle her array of family photos smiled out from various rustic frames collected at flea markets and antique shops over the years. A group picture of her and her five sisters from twenty years before always made her smile. She’d been twelve, Harper ten and Joely seven. Each had held one of the triplets, not quite four, and each was dressed in jean shorts, a western-yoked shirt, and her favorite pair of cowboy boots. Mia’s had been red. Back then she’d never let any of her sisters copy her red boots—they were her symbol, her favorite thing even now. The triplets could wear pink; that was as close as she allowed. The others were at the mercy of brown, black, or blue.
    They still teased her even though she’d lifted the ban long ago. The sisters had recreated the picture just two months ago at their father’s funeral. Now six grown women smiled out from that image— successful women all. They still looked darn good in cut-offs and cowboy boots. Mia’s boots were still red. But they weren’t any of them nearly as carefree as they’d been in the original photo.
    She touched the picture of her father, the pang of loss always stronger after a tough day. Sam Crockett, tough, proud, handsome—a Wyoming cattleman to the depths of his heart. He’d inherited, expanded, and run one of the largest, wealthiest ranches in the state. And he’d died at age sixty-eight leaving Paradise Ranch to his wife and six daughters. None of whom had possessed the slightest interest in running it.
    Mia had been the only one groomed for the job, and her father had expected to take over until the day she’d left for college.
    She turned away, settled into the deep, heavenly cushions of her burgundy leather sofa and pulled a thick afghan, knitted by her beloved Grandmother Sadie back in Wyoming, over her legs. She’d broken her father’s heart the day she’d turned her back on the ranch. Or so he’d claimed—if not in those exact un-masculine words.