7. CT
7
ct
It had been another long day of working in the scorching sun alone, and I desperately needed an ice-cold beer.
Which was why I allow the inviting texts of Logan Cash to entice me enough to come out tonight. Rumor is he is going to be asking the owners of Bottle Grounds if we could put up a dartboard and start a league.
I park my truck in the back dirt lot of the bar and make my way inside with the other locals looking to let off some steam from the week. It was Friday night, and the bar was already hopping. People stopped me and said hello, giving me side hugs and head nods as I made my way to the back of the bar where I knew the boys would be.
I invited my brother, but according to him, he wasn’t feeling up to going out tonight after his session. I’d briefly asked over text how it went, but he never replied.
I’m guessing the answer was, “Not great.”
I see Stetson, Logan’s little brother, leaning against a bar top table with a beer in hand and headed his way.
“’Sup?” he asks as I approach the table. His eyes don’t stray from the bar area, and when I look over, I see him staring at one of the Weaver sisters.
Which one she is, I’m not sure. They haven’t been here for very long, only long enough to set up their new bar and make a name for themselves as the best watering hole in town. But considering I don’t frequent the bar scene often, it is hard for me to pick out which sister is which.
“Who’s that?” I ask as I flag down Jason, the waiter, and signal to Stetson’s beer.
“Who’s who?” he asks, keeping his eyes glued to the blonde-haired girl behind the bar who’s rushing around, taking orders and filling drinks.
“That.” A hand claps me on the shoulder, and I turn, shaking Logan’s hand as he continues to speak. “Is Annmarie.”
“Annmarie, huh?” I smirk, seeing the look on Logan’s face. “Are we smitten? ”
“Huh? Who?” Stetson asks again as Logan and I circle the table, resting against it while Jason delivers our drinks. Apparently, Logan ordered another before he went to the restroom.
“So, how is life with my cousin making her sudden reappearance into it?”
I sigh as I digest the loaded question. How do I answer that? I feel like I’m banging my head against a brick wall, just trying to have a damn conversation with the woman? “It’s been…interesting.”
Logan laughs, and his brother finally breaks out of his trance to engage in the conversation. “Wait, you’re with Dani again? This is great news!”
I frown and look at the youngest Cash brother. “No, I’m not with Dani again.”
He sighs and says, “Man, I thought that’s what you said. Why are you seeing her then?”
“She needs some help with a horse.” I sigh, looking around the bar. “Are we playing darts or what?”
“Hold on,” Logan says, holding up a hand. “You can’t just gloss over this. I was looking for a little more than nothing.”
I run a hand over my rapidly growing beard. I should probably trim it, but when you’re not looking to get with anyone, and you tend to enjoy the solitude, you don’t really give a shit about a beard or keeping it maintained.
“It’s…strained,” I reply as politely as possible. “She’s guarded, not really into talking unless it’s about Lady.”
“Understandable,” Logan says.
Unlike my family’s assumption, Logan had come to me right after we’d broken up and gotten the truth out of me, needing to know how badly he needed to kick my ass for hurting Dani.
It’d only gone as far as a punch to the jaw before he stopped and told me how sorry he was for me, for my mom…for Dani…
I sigh and shrug my shoulders. “It’s no big deal. I didn’t expect her to want to…” I trail off, unsure of exactly where I was going with that sentence.
“Rekindle things?” Stetson offers.
“I suppose.”
“Well.” Logan lets out a breath. “Give it time. You know she’s focused on getting Lady right again after she got her back from that motherfucker.”
I frown, straightening from my leaning position. “What motherfucker?”
Logan raises a brow in surprise. “She didn’t tell you who her last trainer was? ”
“No, I assumed she did the work herself.” Why I had assumed she wouldn’t go to another horse trainer…I don’t know. But I know I don’t like how it feels when I think of her working with anyone else.
Oh, hello, jealousy. It’s been a few years.
“Nah, well, she’s been trying.” He shrugs. “But while she was down in Fort Collins for the last couple of years, working with that foundation.” He assumes I know everything, and not wanting to sound like a desperate fool, I pretend that I do. “She took her to Tommy Smith.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I bark in a surprisingly hostile tone. Not one I’m used to using the last few years.
“Nope,” Logan replies, and Stetson sighs. Both work in the horse world, though they tend to go around breaking the younger horses, not shaping them into performance horses. Otherwise, Dani could have just used them.
“Doesn’t she know what a douche Tommy is?”
Logan shrugs. “He was able to offer her an affordable deal.” My blood hums beneath my skin at the thought of that fucker offering my girl any kind of deal.
Ah, my girl? Not on your life, Trevors .
“And?”
“And,” Stetson interjects. “Look at Lady now. Barely able to handle the flag.”
“So, he fucked Lady up,” I take a guess, knowing in my gut that it’s probably right.
“I don’t know for sure. Dani thought since he was a big winner, he could help her out. She never saw the side of him that we all did.”
Tommy Smith hid a side of himself from the female population at certain horse shows. Always laying on the charm extra thick and then being a fucking asshole whenever they weren’t looking.
Not to mention picking up every available—or not—chick he could find.
Between myself and Dani’s cousins, we never let her be alone long enough for him to try anything.
Just the thought of her on his property makes my blood boil. What I wouldn’t give for an excuse to knock that fucker out.
“Smith drugs his fucking horses. That’s why he wins shit. He makes them practically loopy. Of course they perform well.”
There were certain types of things you could use for horses to help them perform or ease their anxiety at horse shows, some were kosher, and some were not. I rarely ever went that route. I tried to make the choice to opt out of showing horses that had bad anxiety and instead allow them to be cattle horses back home rather than make them show.
Not everyone gave a shit like that, and it certainly wasn’t the way to win any ribbons, but who the fuck cared? I do what I do because I care for the horses, not titles.
“I know. She knows that now too, but she didn’t realize it before. It was why she left his care. She saw what he was doing and wasn’t okay with it, so she took Lady home.”
“Then she came to me.” Or rather, I tracked her down and forced a deal on her.
I shake my head. I didn’t force it. I just made it too good to pass up.
Logan nods, and Stetson says, “I think it’s great you two are working together again. Maybe it’ll open some doors for you.”
I shake my head, picturing Dani this morning as she held back. She wouldn’t let me in or tell me anything about herself.
I change the subject before I get more worked up. “Mitch and Jax coming?” I ask, referring to the two middle Cash brothers .
“Nah, Mitch is downtown, wooing all the city girls prowling for a cowboy.” I smirk at the thought. “Jax is on a new circuit he got picked up for.”
“No shit?” I raise a brow, impressed. “I didn’t realize he was getting that good.”
Stetson laughs. “Oh, he’s not, but he’s damn entertaining while he tries to not get thrown off a bull.”
Jax was a bull rider, not a career his mom wanted for him, but one he chose regardless. “I’ll bet.”
“Or get chased by one.” Stetson laughs again, looking over at me. “He’s been taking some lessons with the rodeo clowns on the circuit, learning how to be a rodeo clown. It’s fucking hilarious.” He reaches into his pocket and produces a video on his phone. I recognize Jax, dressed in rodeo clown gear running from a bull, and I chuckle.
“Rodeo clowning, huh?”
“Hell,” Logan starts. “He’s better at that than he is at riding bulls.”
“So,” Stetson starts, looking over at Logan. “Darts?”
Logan smiles and nods. “Let me go work my magic.”
We watch as Logan makes his way to the bar, leaning over and gesturing to another girl behind it. She has long light-brown hair and the deepest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. She purses her lips in distaste at Logan’s presence, and I smile, intrigued.
It’s not every day that Logan Cash gets this reaction out of a woman.
It takes a few moments before she bends beneath the bar and comes up with a stack of papers. She hands them over to him, gives him a smirk that tells me she got whatever it is she wanted and turns away from him.
Logan wanders back over, looking down at the papers in his hand and sighs. “Looks like darts may have to wait.”
“What is that?”
He slaps the papers down. “A contract.”
I sip my beer, eyeing the papers. “What?”
“Yup.” He sits down and stares at the papers like they might just bite him.
“A contract for what?” I ask, glancing at Stetson, who shrugs before we turn back to Logan.
“A marriage contract,” he says, steepling his hands on the table. “We can do whatever we want with a dart league, but she needs my help first.”
A chuckle rises in my throat at my friend’s expression. “Man, I didn’t know you two were dating. ”
He glares at me. “We’re not.”
I raise a brow and hum, pointing at the papers. “That says otherwise.”
Logan chuckles and shakes his head. “What you do for your friends, right?”
Stetson frowns. “That seems like a steep fee for darts…”