Chapter 3
H is expression went blank. Dammit, why couldn’t she remember his name?
Had she screamed it at some point last night?
The more she was around him, the more flashes of memory she experienced.
Especially when she’d been cradled against his strong chest. Lots of naked images had bombarded her mind then.
She wanted more.
But she was here for a much different reason.
“I know only one guy’s full name, but their last name is Walker.
No one I’ve talked to knows who Reno Walker is, but they said the Walkers live out this way.
” Why hadn’t she asked him last night how she could find Reno Walker?
Because she’d been medicating her anger with copious amounts of alcohol.
And then he’d taken her mind off…everything.
“So, I guess I’ll ask you. Do you know who Reno is? ”
He shifted his stance and briefly looked away. He swallowed hard.
“You aren’t Reno, are you?” She kept her tone hopeful over the dread crawling its way up her throat. Why was he acting like he didn’t want to tell her?
He lost the strange expression and shot her a forced smile. “You know my name.”
Her face must’ve revealed her alarm because he looked away and shook his head. A muscle in his jaw tensed and relaxed.
“You don’t remember.”
“It’s coming back, slowly.” Probably as much as it ever would.
“You were blackout drunk?”
“No.” Kinda.
His look said he didn’t believe her. “Are you even okay to be driving yet?”
“I get a little sick when I drink and I’m paying for it.” Oh god, had she slept off enough before she’d rushed out of the hotel room? She hadn’t been dizzy, but that wasn’t the best estimate of intoxication. “Now, can we get back to Reno? Where can I find him?”
He swung his empty stare down the hallway for a few heartbeats. “You found him.”
She glanced around, like a new dude would suddenly appear. But it was just her handsome hookup.
“ You’re Reno?” Oh. Oh hell. Only she would have the misfortune to pick up her brother’s friend. Her epic episode of irresponsibility had just reached new heights.
What would Perry have thought? He hadn’t been a fan of Ellis, but to run right into his buddy’s arms…
“That’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time. It was my nickname. I’m Cash, by the way.” His bitter tone wasn’t lost on her.
Cash. Double hell. The only man she’d ever been warned away from and she’d picked him up first.
Cash Walker was Reno Walker. Elation replaced mortification.
“I found you,” she breathed. It couldn’t be this easy, could it? She wouldn’t have to scour the town. It was unfortunate she’d picked him up at the bar, but here they were.
He shoved his hands into his pockets and turned to glower out the large picture window. “You found me all right.”
Was that resentment? She didn’t care; she couldn’t care.
“Why did my brother call you Reno?”
He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes nearly glowing from the sunshine. He hadn’t taken his hat off, but the blue of his irises radiated from under the brim. If he smiled, he’d probably devastate whoever he aimed it at. No wonder she’d been warned off. He probably galloped through women’s beds.
“Because I get lucky all the time.”
Nailed it. But he didn’t sound proud.
“And because my cousin was a team leader in the same platoon, so it was how the guys kept us straight,” he finished. “And because we were stationed together for the last four years, which probably had worse odds of happening than winning the lotto. They just thought I was all around lucky I guess.”
“Did you two get out of the army after…after, uh…” Unbidden tears sprang up and she hastily wiped them away. This wasn’t how she’d pictured it all going. Throwing up in the man’s barn, then barely being able to speak when she tried to talk about what she’d come here for.
“Yeah.” His voice was thick. “Dillon and I enlisted at the same time, so we got out at the same time.”
She nodded woodenly. He stood quietly. She ran her hand along the fabric of the couch, the smooth texture doing nothing to lull her conflicted emotions.
“You’re Daniels’s little sis, huh.”
“Yep.” Now that she was here, she was at a loss for what to do. She couldn’t just blurt out the question that had been haunting her. “Are you and your cousin doing okay?”
His broad shoulders tightened in his long sleeve shirt. “Yeah, we’re fine. Work keeps us busy, and I’ll take slinging cows around over humping seventy pounds of equipment through the desert any day.”
“Perry said he hated all the sand and heat, wished he’d never gone into the infantry.”
Cash grunted. “That makes two of us.”
“What happened?” Oops. She’d blurted it anyway.
He sighed and faced her. “Didn’t they tell you?”
“They told me you guys were clearing a building and he set off an IED.”
“Then you know what happened.”
“Do I?”
“I don’t know what you’re looking for, Abbi. I’m sorry. I relive it—”
A honk from outside cut him off.
“That’s the vet. I gotta go out and meet her.” He charged out the door. Abbi jumped up to chase after him. She was finally digging into what she was here for, and he was running away.
A cute woman who looked way too short to drive the size of pickup she did hopped down and greeted Cash with a big smile. He walked toward her with his arms wide, and the woman laughed and jumped into them.
Abbi refused to be jealous, especially after she’d run from a naked Cash hours ago. But she increased her pace out of curiosity.
The woman pounded Cash heartily on the back before releasing him. She was older than Abbi had previously thought. Somewhere in her thirties, but her curves couldn’t be denied. When her gaze landed on Abbi, she cut off mid-sentence.
Cash glanced at Abbi, exasperation in his eyes. “Doc, this is Abbi, the sister of an old army buddy. Abbi, this is Dr. Bonita Wilson.”
The vet’s expression grew serious and speculative. She stuck her hand out. “Nice to meet you. Just call me Bunny. I’ll even forgive you a giggle about the irony of a vet named Bunny.”
Abbi couldn’t help her smile as she shook hands.
Bunny switched her attention to Cash. “You said it was Patsy Cline. Afraid she has colic again?”
“I tried to ride her, but she wasn’t acting right. I hadn’t noticed when I was feeding her, but I should’ve.” He gave Abbi a sidelong look. “I was distracted.”
Bunny grinned and wiggled her brows as she turned to head to the barn.
Abbi kept up with them and crossed her fingers that her vomit mess had been cleaned away. She suppressed a sigh of relief. Cash had been true to his word.
“Oh my, poor girl.” Bunny crooned and comforted the horse as she inspected her.
Abbi jumped when Cash’s hot breath wafted over her earlobe. “You don’t have to wait here. This might take a while.”
The man could move with stealth. “I don’t mind. Or am I interrupting something?” Had that come out catty?
“You aren’t interrupting a thing,” Bunny piped up from in the stall. “He can tell you about all the times I almost swatted his bottom at the pranks he pulled.”
Cash chuckled and the low sound gave Abbi shivers. Oh yeah, there was another memory of last night.
“It was Mom’s fault for putting you in charge of me and Sissy when you were only six years older.”
“I didn’t even get paid. Your mom thought since I was family I should work for free. Those rules no longer apply, by the way.” Bunny went back to work.
“Doc is my second cousin. Our grams are sisters.” Cash opened the stall to enter. “Hey, uh, I can call you later if you want to go back into town. This might take a while, and I doubt your stomach will tolerate it.”
“I can wait.”
“Abbi.” Cash draped his arms over the stall gate to watch the exam.
Hoof scrapes and horse grunts came from inside with Bunny muttering encouraging words.
“I’ve got a long day. My horse is sick and we’re in the middle of harvest. Dillon has been in a combine for hours already and we need to work until sundown.
I was supposed to be taking over for him now, but I’m here. ”
She tried to keep her expression pleasant, but it probably teetered toward droll. “And are you really going to call?”
“I said I would.”
“How many girls have you told that to?”
Bunny snorted. Cash clamped his mouth shut.
“Exactly.” Abbi pushed her hair back. “Why don’t we plan a time to meet?” Her cheeks warmed. Would he think she had plans to hit on him again?
“My day tomorrow is exactly like today. Without a dead horse, I hope.”
The concern in his features was endearing. He was worried about Patsy Cline. Abbi hoped she recovered, but she couldn’t let Cash squirm out of talking to her.
“You gotta eat, Cash. Come on. I need to talk to you.” She got the sentence out before she choked back a sob. An unknown someone picked that time to ring her. Between her phone and her insistent tears, she had to leave. No answers today.
She mustered a smile despite her disappointment and was turning away to answer the call when Cash spoke.
Distress glimmered in his eyes and he looked away. “All right. Meet me out here for lunch tomorrow before I trade with Dillon.”
Nodding, afraid he’d change his mind, she nearly ran back to her car while digging her phone out.
Her parents were going to call her every damn day, weren’t they?
She checked the screen.
Even worse. Ellis. So not what she needed. Did she have to answer? She debated until right before her voicemail kicked in.
She answered in a bored voice, “Moore Sewage Treatment. How may I direct your call?”
Silence greeted her.
Finally, Ellis spoke. “You’re cracking jokes after the way we parted?”
“What do you want, Ellis?” She couldn’t muster the energy to be angry, but his authoritative attitude rankled. How had she not noticed it before?
“I’m checking to see how you’re doing.”
Not as simple a question as he probably thought. I got drunk last night and took the best-looking piece of ass home. I don’t remember much, but I know it was goooood. “I’m fine.”
“Have you found Reno Walker?”
Had she ever. “He’s going to talk to me later.”
“Maybe I should come up there.”
Distress choked off her mental No! Yesterday, she’d drunk too much because he hadn’t come with her. Now, him being here sounded like the worst idea in history. “Why? We’re not together anymore.”
“I care about you, Abigail.”
Abigail. So grown up. So proper. So how he wanted her.
“I’m fine, Ellis, but I have to go.”
He started speaking, but she made static sounds and hung up. How immature.
God that felt good.
Cash resisted the urge to jump out of the stall and watch Abbi saunter away. Then he resisted the urge to jump out of the stall and watch Abbi drive away. Either way, she was leaving and it was a giant relief with a gaping hole of regret.
Perry Daniels’s little sister.
He could’ve gone his whole life without meeting her.
The wild little sister Daniels had worried about.
Cash hadn’t lied; he’d told her what had really happened.
They’d been clearing a building and her brother hadn’t walked out alive with the rest of them.
He almost hadn’t, either, thanks to Daniels.
His eyes drifted shut. He’d slept with Daniels’s little sister. He couldn’t save the man and then he’d bedded his sister.
“You with me, cuz?”
He started and covered it by stroking Patsy Cline. Worry overrode his tumultuous feelings—barely.
“I caught her early enough, tell me I did, Doc.” If he’d left Abbi after sex like his standard MO, he would’ve been up early like usual and might’ve noticed his mare’s condition then. In his haste, he’d missed the warning signs of colic.
“Now that your company’s gone, I’ll do the rectal exam. If that’s clear, all she’ll need is to be tubed to let the gas out.”
Cash assisted his cousin. Being around horses his whole life, and with a cousin who let him glove up and help, he was familiar with the process.
What he wasn’t prepared for was losing his girl.
Patsy Cline was one of his first major purchases, even before he’d taken over the ranching side of the Walker Five operation.
He and the colic-prone mare had bonded, and horse therapy was legit. Just not enough to fix his issues.
With the pressure eased on the creature and Bunny’s promise to check on her later so he could relieve Dillon, Cash went to his house to clean up.
Popping in through the front door, he did his damnedest to ignore Abbi’s lingering floral scent. His body stirred, and he ruthlessly tamped it down. No more drinking from that trough.
On the way to the same tiny bathroom she had used, he scanned his walls. Had she stopped and looked at his family photos? Had she noticed his mom and dad were rarely in the same one?
For reasons only obvious to him and his sister, his parents hadn’t wanted their turbulent marriage immortalized.
Nah. Why would Abbi pay attention to any of that? She’d made it clear when she’d sprinted out of the motel room that she wasn’t here for anything beyond her brother’s story.
Cash shook his head. Typical Daniels. Sticking him with the fallout.
He freshened up and hopped into his truck to go in search of Dillon. Cash chose an approach that bordered the field Dillon was harvesting and parked. Exiting his pickup, he texted Dillon and dropped the tailgate to have a seat.
The trees of the shelter belts were losing their leaves but wouldn’t be bare until the temps dropped closer to freezing day after day. More wind got through them in the fall, but they still proved to be nature’s snow fence when necessary.
The soy field looked like it’d seen better days, but to a farmer like him, it looked like dollar signs.
They were grateful for the harvest, especially after a nasty hail storm in July had taken out significant portions of their crop.
Despite the afternoon chill, the sun was warm and shining bright.
Cash tipped his face up to it and cursed.
Flashing hazel eyes and a saucy grin filled his head. Why couldn’t he quit thinking about Abbi? Perhaps he’d known deep down that they had an ominous connection.
Yeah, that was it. It had nothing to do with how her body had not only felt like paradise, but with how uninhibited she’d been.
He ground his teeth. But she’d been fucking drunk. Her reaction hadn’t been real.
Abbi Daniels. He took off his hat and cradled his head in his hands, elbows on his knees. He couldn’t forget her, and all the while she couldn’t remember him.