Chapter 2
I had my best friend killed so that I could live the life I wanted. Come to find out I’m not sure what the hell that is.
“Do you want some nuts?”
Cassidy turned and blinked in Dalton’s direction. She knew exactly what he was offering—the smell of roasting cinnamon and sugar meant there was very little space for a double entendre—but her imagination slid through the meager window anyway.
“Sure,” she said. And once she got past that moment of immaturity, she felt a sense of triumph, because he was paying attention to her. Offering her something special. It almost transformed standing together outside Jessie Jane’s blacksmithing stall into … a date.
He grinned at her and stuffed his hands into his pockets. It was as if he had put a boundary around himself by doing that, but she wasn’t mad. She put her hands in her own pockets and kept pace with him as he walked across the spongy, wet grass.
“So,” she said. “How was … traveling around with the rodeo?”
Though she saw Dalton often because he was Flynn’s best friend, she was rarely alone with him. But now Flynn was with Jessie, and maybe she and Dalton were both feeling a little bit left behind.
“It was good. I might spend another year traveling with them. Who knows? Good money to be made when you’re winning.”
“And you do win.”
He chuckled. “I do.”
She took a step forward, and the heel of her boot went down first, connecting with a particularly slippery patch of mud, skidding across the surface and nearly sending her into a split, which she did not possess the flexibility to pull off comfortably.
But as she was about to tear both her jeans and her body in half, Dalton reached out and grabbed her arm, lifting her and keeping her from going down entirely.
“Oh,” she said, looking up at him. “Thank you.”
Her heart was pounding hard, from the adrenaline of the near accident, but also from his closeness. His large, warm hand wrapped around her upper arm. It was as if a team of butterflies had woken up, spread their wings, and taken flight in her stomach.
His dark eyes met hers, and she could feel her face getting hot.
“Thank you,” she said again, pulling away from him, wishing she hadn’t. It was only that she couldn’t hide the way he affected her. Her feelings were far too obvious, and she didn’t want to switch up her relationship with Dalton on the public streets of Rustler Mountain.
She definitely didn’t want to do it anywhere near the vicinity of one of her brothers.
If she hoped to make a new relationship with him, her brothers were going to have to be very, very separate from it.
Because Dalton was going to have to think of her as something other than little Cassidy Wilder.
It was time he saw that she was the perfect woman for him.
At least, that was the narrative in her head.
And it was one that made sense, really.
She and Dalton were an obvious fit. They got along well. She loved talking to him. She was attracted to him.
Maybe he’s not attracted to you …
That was a grim possibility. She chose not to think about it.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” he said. “I promise you, the nuts aren’t worth it.”
She snorted. She couldn’t help it. The double entendre had gone too far.
“Call them something else,” she said. “Cashews, or something.”
“I don’t know what kind of nuts you like,” he said.
“Oh, for God’s sake, Dalton, you’re doing it on purpose.”
He smiled. Mischievous. “Maybe.”
“For the record,” she said, “I do want cashews.”
“Eminently possible.”
There were really only two reasons he could possibly be teasing her like this. Either he wanted to move things into more risqué territory … or it didn’t feel risqué to him, because he didn’t think of her sexually at all.
One was exciting, the other was galling, and that was the paradox of Dalton Wade.
“Do you want to go to The Watering Hole after we’re done here? I could use a warming drink, honestly,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself to ward off the cold.
“Sure,” he said.
Her breath left her body in a rush. She hadn’t realized she had been holding it tightly.
That was another thing about Dalton. She felt comfortable around him, she thought.
And then something happened that proved she didn’t really.
That proved she was actually wound tighter than a music box in the hands of an overzealous toddler.
He walked up to the nut booth—she was never going to be able to think of it as anything different now—and got two paper cones filled with roasted, spiced cashews. He handed one to her.
She shook it, listening to the treats rattling around inside. “Thank you.”
“No worries,” he said.
Oh, I have many worries, she thought, but she kept that truth to herself.
She walked half a pace behind him while they made their way back toward her family, and she slowly ate one nut at a time, as if making the gift last longer would keep the warm feeling in the center of her chest for as long as possible.
“Cassidy and I are headed over to The Watering Hole,” Dalton said. “Anyone want to come?”
There was a chorus of enthusiastic yeses, and Cassidy wanted to flatten herself like an irritated badger and slip right beneath the booth so no one could see her. Because she felt silly. She had been sure that Dalton understood she wanted to go with just … him. But he had invited the whole group.
Which meant he had elected to change the dynamic.
She felt mildly ill.
And suddenly the cashews did not taste so good.
Oh, come on, you’ll still get to spend time with him. It doesn’t matter if everyone else is going to be there.
She galvanized herself with that thought. She knew he wasn’t being unkind. There wasn’t an unkind bone in his body, and she would get to hang out with him tonight either way.
Perry reached out, grabbed her arm and pulled her in close. “I want fish and chips,” Perry said.
Millie, who was standing on the other side of Cassidy, wrinkled her nose. “Fish? At The Watering Hole?”
“Yes,” said Perry. “They do all fried food well.”
“Austin and I are going to have to pass. We need to get this cranky toddler home.”
Austin looked on in mock horror. “You mean I have to have a home-cooked meal instead of dinner at a dive bar?”
“A home-cooked meal? I didn’t know you’d prepared something, Austin,” Millie said, smiling at him.
There was a beat while Cassidy thought her brother might’ve actually committed a faux pas. But then he grinned. “I put some of that stew we had in the freezer in the crockpot before we left. And I got the bread maker going, so there should be a fresh loaf ready when we get home.”
If Millie’s eyes could’ve transformed into hearts, they would have. “I love you,” she said.
Perry made a gagging noise at Austin behind Millie’s back. “Saccharine.”
“Like you and Carson aren’t saccharine,” Cassidy said.
Perry lifted a brow. “I would say it’s spicier than it is sweet.”
Cassidy frowned, but didn’t say anything, because she really didn’t want that conversation to go on longer than it needed to. It was her fault, she supposed. She had baited Perry by commenting on her relationship with Carson, but still, Perry could’ve let it go.
But then, it wasn’t Perry who felt uncomfortable, Cassidy supposed.
As far as Cassidy was concerned, her brothers were … Well, they could never be called paragons of virtue, it was true. They were and had been the town outlaws, particularly in their wild teenage years. But they were always good to her.
Ever since she had been dropped on their doorstep when she was nine years old, they had rallied around her, showed her more support than her own mother ever had, and been the protectors and parental figures she’d never even imagined she could have.
Not after her scattershot existence in Florida dodging landlords—and worse—with her mother. The cockroaches didn’t just live in the walls in Florida, that much was for sure.
She knew her brothers felt sorry for her.
She knew they were worried about her. She knew they were afraid she carried some kind of deep-rooted trauma over being abandoned by her mother, but the truth was, it was the best thing that had ever happened to her.
Being here was the best thing that had ever happened to her.
So maybe she did see her brothers cast in a golden glow.
Even the outlaw parts of them. But she didn’t need to hear about how spicy Carson and Perry’s relationship was.
No thanks. They all divided up into different vehicles, and she ended up not with Dalton, which was a little annoying, but with Flynn and Jessie Jane, which was fun.
Jessie Jane was just … Well, she was the coolest. And Flynn was infinitely cooler now that he was with her.
“You okay?” Flynn asked, flicking a glance at Jessie Jane.
Cassidy looked on from the back seat of the truck. Jessie Jane nodded, but Cassidy could see tension in her face.
“What’s up?” Cassidy asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Jessie Jane said. “Everything is great. The blacksmithing demonstration went great.”
“But?”
“I’m just feeling overwhelmed,” Jessie said, trying to force a smile that didn’t seem authentic. “Because …”
“Peaceful transfer of power isn’t in Danielle’s vocabulary. And my connection to Jessie is of course making my half sister act even worse.”
“Oh, don’t blame yourself. Or rather, don’t go taking all the credit. I think I would be her complete and total nemesis whether I was engaged to you or not.”
He huffed a laugh. “I suppose that’s true.”
“Oh, it is,” Jessie said, looking mutinous. “I bring that quality out in people.”
“Well,” Cassidy said, “is there anything that you can … not do? I mean, I know it’s Christmas and all, but did you really need to do the demonstration out there today?”
“I like to do all those things. I resent that Danielle is putting me in a position where I don’t feel like I can.
Basically, she’s demanding that I shadow her, and I don’t have to.
But everything feels so dicey. Like if I put a foot wrong, and she has any ammo, she’s going to use it to fire shots whenever she can. ”