25. Cassandra
CASSANDRA
“ H e tied me to a fence and fucked me.” I stabbed my spoon into my bowl of ice cream.
Mickey blinked at me from across the office, letting out a deep bovine grunt.
The pool noodles on his horns had been replaced yesterday. He now sported a lime-green one on the left and purple on the right.
I stared at the bottle of bourbon that had been on my—Christian’s—desk since, presumably, the wee hours of the morning. The note that had been stuck to the front taunted me.
Bourbon pairs better with mint chocolate chip.
No signature. No initials. Not that I needed it to know who had left the liquor .
It had been two days since Christian demanded I make a choice that I wasn’t ready for. And two days of me avoiding him.
“After giving me an ultimatum,” I grumbled over a mouthful of ice cream.
I had just gotten off a call with Mike—my boss at the Carrington Group—who let me know that, while the Griffiths had given raving feedback about my job performance, I would still have to meet with HR due to the aftermath of my relationship with Tripp.
Just fucking great.
I had gone through an entire fling after ending things with Tripp, and yet he was still haunting me.
But after a quick call to Spenser Crenshaw, an old contact who owed me a favor, I’d be haunting Tripp soon enough.
Anger made me revenge-y. And since I couldn’t take that anger out on Christian, Tripp was the next best target.
The knife in his face on the dartboard wasn’t enough to satisfy my blood lust.
“I mean, how dare he? We hooked up a handful of times. It’s not like we were in a relationship and I put my foot down that it wasn’t going any further.
I’m not the one at fault here. He’s the one who nuked it.
” I pointed my spoon at the cow who had let himself into the office and laid on top of Sadie’s dog bed, flattening it.
Mickey huffed in annoyance.
The cow peered out of one eye, glaring at me as I turned back and forth in the desk chair.
“ He’s the one who blindsided me. You can’t ambush someone when they have their pants off, and demand a relationship. That’s highway robbery.”
Mickey groaned and closed his eyes.
Bourbon and mint burned my throat as I scooped the remnants out of the bottom of the bowl.
“So. He blows it up, makes me the bad guy because I don’t want to dive headfirst into a family unit where I’ll always be the fourth wheel, then puts ice cream and fucking bourbon in here—assuming I’d be torn up about it!”
The cow groaned in annoyance, lumbered up to his hooves, and sauntered out to get some peace elsewhere. The pool noodles smacked the doorway as he squeezed out.
“Great.” I dropped the bowl onto the desk and tossed the spoon in. “Even the cows hate me.”
Not even five seconds later, Christian waltzed in. “You kicked Mickey out?” he asked without making eye contact with me as he shuffled through the stack of paperwork piled on the corner of the desk.
“Apparently, I talk too much.”
He chuckled. “You know you’re settled in when you start talking to the cows.”
I gritted my teeth.
How dare he pretend like nothing was wrong?
Christian’s brows knitted together as he started through the stack again.
I huffed. “What are you looking for?”
“The records for?—”
I grabbed a manila folder from the top of the printer and handed it to him.
“Oh. Thanks. Do you know where the?—”
“Invoice for feed from George Thompson is already paid.” I handed him the printed sheet, confirming the payment. “I authorized the check.”
He stroked his beard. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“It’s fine. I was waiting for a phone call from a tent guy for the groundbreaking party. I didn’t know when you’d be back up here, so I took care of it.”
“Thanks. I’ve gotta do payroll, and then I’ll get out of your hair.”
“It’s done,” I clipped. “Checks are signed. I’ll tape them up on the door when the boys call it a day.”
Christian stared at me. “That’s not in your job description.”
I hit him with a frosty glare. “You authorized me to write checks, did you not?”
He frowned. “I did.”
“It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to do payroll.”
“So, why’d you do it?”
I turned my back to him and scrolled through my email inbox, looking for the rental confirmation for tables and chairs. “So you wouldn’t have a reason to be in here.”
A heavy hand landed on my shoulder with a feather-light touch. “Cass…”
“Cassandra,” I clipped.
Christian froze with his hand on my shoulder. But before he could come up with something to say—because this was all his fault—the radio chirped.
“Cass, honey, it’s Claire. A courier just delivered a big stack of papers from Lawson International to the house. Want me to bring it to the office or your house?”
I grabbed the radio. “No need. I’ll come get it.”
“Princess—” Christian said as I shoved away from the desk.
“I’m not the one throwing up mixed signals,” I snapped. “I never pretended like I wanted anything other than a fling, and you’re the one who said you could separate sex and romance.”
His eyes darkened. “You’re selling yourself short if you think that was a fling.”
“I sold myself short for years because I attached myself to someone who didn’t love me. Trust me, I know when I’m selling myself short. And I won’t be doing that again.”
I skipped the barn, and decided I’d rather have blisters on my feet from walking up to Claire and Silas’s house rather than be around Christian any longer.
I regretted it as I passed Becks and Nate’s house. An extra car—Becks’s mom—was parked in front of the fence that had been repaired after Christian tied me to it.
Becks, Nate, and their brand new baby girl, Charlotte, had just gotten home from the hospital. Everyone had been filtering over to see them as much as work and school schedules allowed, but I held back.
She was my friend, but they weren’t my family. It would just be weird. That, and I had never held a baby.
“Cassie, I told you I’d bring it to ya,” Claire said as she tipped back and forth on the old rocking chair that lived on the front porch. “If I’da known you were walking, I would’a saved you the trip.”
My heart was racing and my feet burned. “I needed the fresh air.”
“I’ll say,” Claire said with a chuckle. “You’ve been holed up in Chris’s office for days.”
“I have a lot to do before the groundbreaking.” I reached for the yellow mailer sitting in her lap. “I should be getting back to work.”
“Well, hold on now.” She patted the rocking chair beside her. “You walked all the way up here. Take a rest and sit a spell before you hike back.”
“I shouldn’t. I’m on the clock.”
“And if my son gives you shit about it, I’ll deal with him.” Claire pointed to the rocking chair. “Sit.”
She wasn’t asking this time. It was an order.
My feet screamed as I lowered into the rocking chair. Red blisters streaked the edges of my heels.
“You want somethin’ta drink? I’ve got tea, lemonade?—”
“I’m fine, thanks.”
“I’ve got vodka, too.”
“I assumed this was a whiskey family,” I said as I eased my feet halfway out of my shoes and rocked back and forth.
Claire laughed. “Maybe for the boys, but I’m a vodka girl myself. Belvedere, neat. Nothing fancy.”
I’d have to remember that and make sure the bar was stocked with Belvedere for the party. Maybe I could get a signature cocktail on the menu. One for Claire and one for Silas.
“You have good taste,” I said, working my nail into a groove in the chair’s wooden arm.
She smirked, fluffing her plume of silver hair as she surveyed the property from her throne on the porch. “How is event planning for the groundbreaking going? Chris isn’t giving you a hard time, is he?”
My throat tightened. “No, he’s deferring to me for most things. It’s made it quite easy, actually.”
Her lips pursed into a pleased smile. “He trusts you. Christian is usually hands-on with everything that happens within the fence. He doesn’t delegate well.”
I would have called it avoidance, but delegation was fine.
“I’m not sure if Christian told you, but the date for the groundbreaking celebration is locked in. It’ll be the night before the rodeo championship. I’m hoping Ray will be our guest of honor. It’ll be a great draw for the community—him being the hometown boy and all that.”
Claire sat in thoughtful silence for a moment.
“That’ll be a tough call. If he makes it through to the wild card rounds, he usually goes radio silent.
Won’t leave his hotel room. Won’t party.
None of that stuff. As much as it scares the bejeezus out of me, he’s serious about what he does and is very, very good at it. ”
“I looked up his record. He’s made quite a name for himself.”
Claire nodded proudly. “I wonder when he’ll hang it up, but bull riding is his first love. It’ll have to be something monumental for him to decide his body’s been through enough. Those championship payouts and sponsorships keep him coming back. That, and the love of the sport.”
“It took me longer than I’d like to admit to realize that the boots Christian gave me were from Ray’s line. He’s a celebrity. I never knew how big bull riding was.”
“I suppose not,” Claire said with a smile. “Has the culture shock worn off yet?”
“I don’t think it ever will. Sometimes I can’t sleep because of how quiet it is at night.”
She nodded knowingly. “I remember Becks saying the same thing when she moved in with Nathan. She’d sleep with the TV on for background noise. City girls falling for cowboys has become a common occurrence around here.”
I was about to argue that I hadn’t fallen for Christian when she cut me off.
“I was a Chicago girl.” Her smile was wistful. “Moved down here for college back in the sixties. Swore up and down that I wouldn’t fall in love with a cowboy. I had my eyes set on California after I got my degree.”
“What did you study?”
“I got a degree in accounting at Methodist. Made it all four years without dating a cowboy. I was working an internship with the Department of Agriculture when in walks this tall drink of water. I remember it like it was yesterday.”