Chapter 35
THIRTY-FIVE
MADDOX
Kendall reaches out for one of the plates when I walk back out to the bonfire. I pull it back, handing it to Austin instead, followed by a Cold Smoke. Her lips twist, but that’s all the thanks I get.
Mine twist because it’s all the thanks I wanted.
I take a seat in the grass at Austin’s feet, leaning back against her legs since Kenny’s taking up the other side of the log.
There’s a spot on the other side of the fire next to Bailey, but I’d rather sit in the dirt than not sit next to Austin, and isn’t that just pathetic?
“Where’s Theo?” my sister asks, eyes squinting through to smoke in the direction of Jameson’s house.
“Wallowing in self-pity,” I tell her through a full mouth, trying to balance my plate on my knee so I can pop the tab on my beer. Austin’s hand comes down over my shoulder, her nail slipping beneath the tab easily for me. Once I’ve got my food washed down, I thank her.
“And you just left him in there to deal with it?” Kenny asks incredulously, standing.
“Of course not. I told him he wasn’t a shitty dad, but did have shitty taste in best friends.”
She narrows her eyes at me and turns on her heel, stomping toward Jameson’s. I look at the empty spot she left behind on the log for a second before deciding I’m content where I am. Austin rests her plate on top of my head, so I figure she’s content with me here too.
“Not gonna say hey to me, big bro?”
Colt plops down in the spot Kendall vacated, making the log roll just enough to jostle Austin and I. “Colt!” she growls, and I knock over my beer when I grab her ankle, as though that would’ve fucking helped anything.
He laughs, kicking the can away from his boots before it can get beer all over them. “Sorry, Aus. Didn’t mean to break up the love fest.”
When Austin rights herself, she’s put a bit more distance between herself and my brother which has me sitting at an awkward angle.
I sit up and snatch his beer out of his hand, re-aligning my back with her legs and sniffing the can’s opening before taking a swig.
Finding out the can you’re taking a sip from isn’t the drink you think it is, but someone’s yuck cup instead, isn’t something you let happen twice.
Colt winks at me. “Don’t get your hopes up, bro. I didn’t quit dipping, just don’t have any on me right now. Didn’t feel like stopping to replenish.”
“I don’t sit around hoping you’ll get your shit together anymore, Colt.
Got better things to do with my day,” I lie.
Not about having better things to do, because I definitely do have a mile-long list of stuff I prefer doing over keeping tabs on my youngest brother, but I am still hoping he’ll get it together soon.
Smoking, dipping, it all seems so stupid to me now. I quit that shit the second Dad was diagnosed with cancer, and Colt had taken it all up the day he died.
To make it clear he’s ignoring me, he puts a cigarette between his lips and leans over toward Austin. “Got a light, babe?”
“There’s a really big one right in front of you. Be sure to get extra close,” she tells him, voice saccharine. I snort, but unfortunately, so does he.
Colt’s beer was nearly empty when I stole it, so I toss the can at his feet, immaturely happy when some splashes onto his Luccheses. He doesn’t even notice, turning to yell out a greeting at Tyler, who’s just walked through the gate in the fences between the ranch and his backyard.
My half-eaten burger sits in my lap. I can’t eat without something to drink, but I don’t want to get up to get another beer and leave Colt here. I know it’s stupid. I know it’s beyond stupid.
It’s not that I don’t trust Austin, or that she’s even mine to get jealous over.
It’s just that I’m working my ass off to get past Austin’s walls, trying so damn hard to get her to at least consider something long term with me, and I’ve got this irrational fear that Colt’s gonna be able to sweep her right out from under me somehow.
They’ve got a lot more in common than she and I do and they’re a hell of a lot closer in age.
They even seem to have the same sense of humor—her with her funny T-shirts and him with his quirky caps.
“Quit it,” Austin says just barely loud enough for me to hear, passing her beer over my shoulder.
It’s open but still full. I lean my head back and she spreads her legs open a bit so I can lay it against her thigh and look up at her.
Her fingers card through my hair, nails scratching at my scalp while I close my eyes, contemplating never wearing another hat again so she can do this any time the urge strikes her.
“Quit what?”
“You know what.”
She doesn’t elaborate because Tyler calls out a hello that she feels the need to respond to.
Colt turns back toward us and I can feel him thinking of just the right thing to say to piss me the fuck off, but Austin twirls my hair around her finger and snaps the fingers of her other hand at me.
She makes a grabby motion for the beer she’d shared, so I take another swig before passing it back.
With my hand free again, I take another bite of my burger.
“Jesus Christ, bro, where’re your balls?” Child’s play. Colt would think that was an insult.
“I left them in my other purse,” Austin quips, and I snort.
“Obviously,” Colt says, trying again. I struggle to swallow the food in my mouth and Austin’s passing the beer back without me even reaching for it.
“You gonna be up for another quarter of a burger when you’re done there?” she asks, looking over my shoulder at my plate. I’ve only got about a bite left. I whirl my upper body around to look at hers.
“Why aren’t you eating it?” I’m still a little up-in-arms about what Mary Edith said at dinner last month, worried Austin might start believing that bullshit if enough people spew it. It’s a pointless thing to worry about. Austin loves her body just the way it is, as she should.
“I’m full, Rancher,” she says softly, like she can read my thoughts. “We had a late lunch like two hours ago.”
True. I jostle the can in my hand, trying to determine if there’s enough beer left in it for me to finish both burgers without needing another. It’s still half full, so I nod. I don’t think she drank any of the damn thing.
“So, what? You two together now or something?” Colt asks, stretching his feet out in front of him. If I paid as much for boots as he does, I wouldn’t chance them being that close to the fire, but I’d also never buy those ridiculous things.
Neither of us answer him and I can’t figure out how I feel about Austin’s silence. On one hand, I appreciate her not telling my brother I’m head over heels for her when she’s barely indifferent, but on the other, it would’ve been nice to hear her say we were. Even if it was a lie.
Colt snorts at the silence. I think of a million places I’d rather be—first and foremost, in between Austin’s thighs with a vibrator pressed against her clit while she has her fourth or fifth orgasm in a row.
“Are you ready to go?” Austin asks, as though we didn’t just get there.
Yes, of course I am, but…
“She’s great in bed, isn’t she?” he asks low enough Mama can’t hear.
“Shut up, Colt,” Austin hisses immediately.
“What? He doesn’t know?”
“Oh, he knows,” I tell him, cracking my knuckle for something to do. Across the fire, Jameson turns his head toward the sound like he’s some sort of Border Collie. His eyes slip easily over my face and then to Colt’s.
“Colt, knock it off, man,” he calls, knowing without even needing to hear the conversation that Colt must be trying to pick a fight.
He does that sometimes when he gets bored and it’s got me wondering if he drove all the way out here just to hit me.
A good way to get the aggression out without garnering negative publicity, I guess.
“Those whimpers she makes when she gets close…”
“I’m really fucking regretting sticking up for you,” Austin tells him, but he doesn’t give her a bit of attention, and somehow, that pisses me off even more than what he said.
A lot of people whimper when they get close to coming, so he could be talking about anyone, but ignoring my girl when she’s speaking to you is bullshit.
“The way her skin dents in under your fingers when you hold her really tight to plow—”
Austin’s fingers dig into my neck and it’s only when I feel the bite of her nails that I realize I’ve been trying to stand.
Colt doesn’t have anyone keeping him seated though.
He plants his feet, his dimples popping as he grins at me, gearing for a fight.
I’ve never wanted to murder my own flesh and blood as badly as I do right now.
Even Jamie’s come over in case he’s gotta get in between us.
“Jesus Christ, can you please shut the fuck up before your mama hears what a heinous little boy you are?” Austin says, loudly enough to take Mama’s attention away from Callie.
“Colton James, you better not be causing issues,” Mama calls out. She doesn’t even get after Austin for swearing around Callie, brows furrowed as she tries to figure out what’s going on.
“Nah, Mama, I’m not starting anything. I was just warning Maddie that Austin’s gonna be coming to her senses and dumping his ass soon enough,” he lies, digging a little deeper, whether he knows it or not.
“Colton, quit it,” Jamie tells him, voice full of warning.
“Why? He can be a nagging asshole to all of us, but I can’t nag him back a little bit?”
I open my mouth to retort, but Austin beats me to it.
“Maybe he wouldn’t have to be a nagging asshole all the time if he wasn’t the only one willing to do it, Colt.
Have you ever thought of that? You spend most of the year off gallivanting around the country and risking your life on the back of a bull like you have an extra handful of them stored away.
When you do come home, it’s just to joke around and cause fights and then fuck back off before the hard work needs doing again.
Meanwhile, your brother’s up before dawn every morning and home after dark each night, keeping this place running so you’ve got a home to come back to when your dream life gets a little too boring for you. ”
Her voice turns mocking at the end, and the venom in her eyes right now is something I pray I never see directed my way.
“Tex,” I start, but she speaks over me.
“I’d probably be an asshole too in that case,” she continues. “Shit, I’d probably be an even bigger asshole than he is. You need to take this childish bullshit you’ve got going on and shove it up your ass, because the rage-baiting is getting old and so are you. Grow the fuck up.”
It’s quiet for several seconds. Austin’s chest is heaving, her face is flushed, and she’s fucking gorgeous. Her eyes don’t leave Colt’s and I’ve gotta hand it to him—his don’t leave hers either. He’s angrier than the bulls he rides though, nostrils flaring, eyes tight. His dimples are long gone.
“Well I’ll be damned,” Jameson says, loudly enough to mostly break the tension. Austin goes stiff beside me though.
Tyler chuckles from across the fire while Kenny bounces Callie on her hip. “That was a lot of bad words, huh, sunshine?” she says with a grin as the little girl giggles. Theo and Tate can’t help but smile too.
Colt storms off toward the bunk houses and I finally get up out of the dirt to sit on the log beside Austin. “I’m sorry,” she’s saying quietly, watching me. Her eyes are so wide, like she’s shocked at her own outburst, scared of the repercussions.
“I’m not,” I tell her, hoisting her up from the log and onto my thigh.
She fights me a bit. “Maddie, your mama’s—”
“My mama just heard you swear like you were scared someone would take the ability from you, Tex. I don’t think you sitting in my lap is gonna be the thing that scandalizes her tonight.”
Austin groans, hiding her face against my neck but it only makes my smile wider. I wrap her up in my arms. “Thank you, baby,” I whisper only for her to hear, pushing her hair behind her ear to kiss her cheekbone.
“Someone turn on some music, I wanna see Tate and Tyler dance.”
“They’re not monkeys you can just order to dance when you want entertainment, Mama.”
“With how much the lessons cost me, I can ask them to dance any time I want them to.”
“You only paid for my lessons, not Tyler’s.”
“Cricket,” Tyler’s voice interrupts everyone else’s bickering. I look up in time to see him sticking his hand out for her while Jameson starts a song on his phone. Tate rolls her eyes, but takes his hand like she always does.