Chapter Twelve
“T hanks for coming,” Liam said after he and Connor started work on the foaling box. “When you didn’t get here earlier, I figured you were blowing me off.”
They finished bringing all the lumber and other supplies to the area where the new box would go. “Why would you think that?” He’d been tempted, he had to admit. “I wouldn’t blow you off over something like this.” Besides the fact that Liam worried about Val, Connor knew how important the ranch and the horses were to Liam, and he also knew that he never had as much help as he needed.
Liam gestured at Val who was introducing Sierra to the horses who were in the barn instead of the pasture. “I don’t know how I’m going to keep Val from doing too much. The doctor made her stop riding but now she thinks she can do everything else. I caught her lifting the heaviest saddle we have. She’s making me crazy.”
“It must be hard for her not to do what she’s used to doing.” Val had been a rancher all her life. She was accustomed to hard, physical work. “I mean, going from working hard to doing nothing would drive anyone crazy.”
Liam nodded. “The doctor hasn’t put any limits on her yet, other than not riding, but I don’t think the doctor realizes how physical Val is. I can’t help worrying.”
“Let me guess. She was getting ready to help build the new box.”
Liam rolled his eyes. “Thank God you showed up before she did.”
“Couldn’t she just do some of the hammering?”
“She could. But every time I turned around, I’d find her carting lumber around.”
“Is she having a problem pregnancy?”
“No, but I am.”
Connor laughed and they got down to business.
The women walked by and Connor couldn’t help watching the way Sierra moved. He wondered when they could leave and he could—
“You didn’t hear a word I said, did you?” his brother asked.
Connor managed to tear his gaze away from Sierra’s backside. “Nope. Was it important?”
“Thankfully, no. You’ve really got it bad.”
“Yeah, but you already knew that.”
“Does Sierra?”
“I don’t know.”
He thought about that. He hadn’t told her how he felt but she wasn’t stupid. She almost certainly knew he was in love with her. Problem was, he didn’t know how she felt about him. He knew she liked him. Knew she liked the sex—a lot. But did she love him?
He didn’t know and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer to that question.
*
“Want to help me up at the house?” Val asked Sierra. “I’m going to bring some lemonade down for the guys. I know it’s cold but they’ll be sweaty by the time we get back.”
“Sure. I could do with some lemonade too.”
Once at the house, Sierra discovered that Val didn’t do anything as mundane as fixing lemonade from a mix. First she mixed water and sugar together and set it on the stove to cook. “Can you stir this while I get out the other ingredients?” Val asked.
“Sure. How long do I do this?”
“Until the sugar is dissolved. This is my mom’s recipe. You can use bottled lemon juice but Mom swears it’s better with fresh squeezed.” She got out an electric juicer and several lemons and began slicing and juicing them.
“So, you must like to cook.”
Val laughed. “Hardly. This is pretty much my one claim to fame. Luckily Velma does the majority of the cooking.”
“Who’s Velma?”
“Velma is the McFarland housekeeper who’s been with them since all the brothers were young. Liam’s worried she’ll go with his mom once she marries Clint and moves out. Then we’ll have to find someone else. Or starve.”
Once the sugar was dissolved Val turned off the burner and told her to let it sit. She sat at the table and Sierra took the seat across from her. Val wore a loose top, but Sierra wouldn’t have known she was pregnant if Connor hadn’t told her.
“When is your baby due?”
“Mid-June. But to hear Liam talk it’s any day now.”
She couldn’t help smiling. “Oh, he’s being overprotective?”
Val nodded. “Yes and driving me insane. I mean, the man’s a rancher. He raises horses. You’d think he’d be used to pregnant females.”
“I guess it’s different when it’s his wife.”
She laughed. “Yes, as he’s told me several times, I’m not a horse or a dog.”
Sierra laughed. “It must be nice to have a man be so crazy about you.”
Val got up to mix the ingredients for the lemonade. “You should know. I’ve never seen Connor look at any woman the way he looks at you.”
“Oh, we’re not—We’re not serious.”
“Uh-huh. Does Connor know that?”
Did he? There had been no confessions of love. And though they’d spent a lot of time together both at work and away from work, their relationship was still casual. Wasn’t it? Sierra realized she hadn’t answered Val. “Yes, of course. We’re just having a good time.”
Yes, a good time with amazing sex. Yet she couldn’t stop thinking of the times the sex had turned tender. Still exciting, still hot as fireworks, but with an underlying feeling of what she realized now was tenderness. Or love?
What was she going to do if Connor really was in love with her? What if she fell in love with him? What if she already had but couldn’t admit it?
*
A few days after helping out at the ranch, Connor asked his brothers to meet him at Grey’s Saloon for a beer. But he hadn’t seen them come in, only realizing they were there when they showed up at his booth in the back, each holding a draft beer.
“Okay, we’re here,” Logan said, sliding into the booth. “What’s so damn important?”
Connor drank some beer and set down his glass. “Don’t be an ass. I remember listening to you two blabber about your issues with women God knows how many times.”
“That’s what this is about? Women?” Liam asked, sliding in beside his brother. “Are you and Sierra having trouble?”
“I don’t know.” He rubbed a hand over his forehead. “Maybe.”
“What’s the problem?” Logan asked. “Other than she’s the first woman you’ve ever been serious about.”
Connor looked at his brothers and sucked in a breath. He’d never wanted to tell them this story. Hell, he’d never wanted to tell anyone. Ryan knew part of it, of course, but they never talked about it. About her. Neither had Connor. Until now.
“She’s not. The first, I mean.” They both stared at him like he was crazy. “I was involved with someone when I was stationed in Afghanistan.” Involved, meaning crazy in love with.
“No shit?” Logan asked. “First I’ve heard about it.”
Liam added, “Me too.”
Connor drank some beer. “Unlike you two I don’t blab everything that’s ever happened to me. Especially not this. It happened while I was in Afghanistan.”
They waited but when he didn’t continue Liam spoke. “You never talk about your service, about Afghanistan. It’s almost like you were never over there. If it wasn’t for the time you spent in the States becoming a medic, it would seem like you were never in the army at all. Sure as hell not in Afghanistan.”
“I don’t like to talk about it.” Or think about it.
“It was that bad?” Logan asked, looking concerned.
“Not all of it. Some of it was rewarding. But some of it, a lot of it was…hell.” Connor closed his eyes. He hated remembering the attack. Still reeling from Casey’s announcement the day before, he’d had to work with her as if nothing had happened. One moment he and Casey had been working to save a soldier. Casey went back to the Humvee to get something. It had blown up just as she reached it.
Sweet, pretty Casey. Dying as he frantically worked to stop the bleeding. He got her to the field hospital, but Ryan couldn’t save her. No one could have. He could still see the expression on his friend’s face when he stepped back, met Connor’s eyes, and called time of death. She was gone. He could still see the tears in Ryan’s eyes, through his own tears.
“Connor? Are you okay?” Logan asked.
“Sorry.” He shook his head, trying to will away the past. “Bad memories.”
“About the woman?”
He nodded. “Her name was Casey.”
“Were you in love with her?”
“Yes. Crazy about her. We’d been together for about three months. I thought she was the one.”
Logan shook his head. “I still can’t imagine it. What happened?”
“She died.”
“My God, Connor,” Liam said. “You’ve never even mentioned her name. To me, anyway.” He looked at Logan.
Logan looked as stunned as Liam had. “Not to me either. Why are you telling us now?”
“The day before she died, she told me she was in love with my best friend.”
“Oh, shit,” Liam said sympathetically. Liam knew what he’d felt, having been left at the altar. Of course, now he was married to Val with a baby on the way and happier than Connor had ever seen him.
“After that I swore I’d never fall in love again. I did a good job of it too.” He shrugged. “And then I met Sierra.”
“I know the feeling,” Logan said.
Liam nodded. “Me too.”
“That’s why I haven’t gotten serious with anyone here. I never planned to fall in love. I thought I was done with it, and it would never happen again. I didn’t want it to happen again.”
“But now?”
“I didn’t plan it, but it happened anyway. I’m in love with Sierra.”
“Okay. So you changed your mind. Why is that a problem?” Liam asked him.
“Aside from me being scared shitless to fall in love?”
Liam smiled. “Yeah. Aside from that.”
“She’s not in love with me.”
“How do you know?” Logan asked. “Have you told her how you feel?”
“I haven’t come right out and said it. But she knows. Or at the least, suspects.”
“With your reputation she won’t think you love her. Maybe she’s waiting for you to actually say something,” Logan said.
He choked out a laugh. “No. She’s waiting for her ex-husband. She’s still in love with him.” At least, he thought she was.
“Isn’t he the one who cheated on her and then wanted a divorce?”
“That’s him. She told me when we first met that she’d take him back if he asked.”
“Even after the shithead cheated on her?”
“Yeah. I don’t know if she’s changed her mind about that. She never talks about him, at least not to me.”
Logan rubbed his jaw and looked thoughtful before saying, “You two have been together for several weeks now.”
Yes, and she’d never uttered the words ‘I love you’ to him. Of course, he hadn’t told her either. But he’d come close. “True. But…sometimes it feels like we’re just doing the ‘this is fun but not at all serious’ thing. And I’m not sure how to change that. Or if she even wants to change it.”
“You’re never going to know unless you tell her how you feel,” Logan said.
“I almost told her but then I chickened out.”
“I get that. It’s hard to put yourself out there.” Liam added, “But it’s worth it.”
“If she feels the same. But if she doesn’t…” If she didn’t, she’d tell him. And that would be the end of any chance he had to move on with his life. To stop fearing what might happen and live in the present.
Yes, he’d had fun. He’d enjoyed the women he’d been with. Most of them, anyway. But none of them had touched him deep inside. Like Casey’s death had.
Like falling for Sierra did.