Chapter 17 #3
He squeezed Brigadier’s sides and raced him toward the house, his excitement at seeing Sheridan filling his veins.
She’d been coming out to the ranch in the early afternoons to bring him lunch, a situation they both found enjoyable.
And while he understood that it would be improper for her to be there overnight until they were married, he respected her decision.
She’d be his wife soon enough, though he had to admit, the nights were the hardest. He hated sleeping alone, hated that the house felt so empty.
He slowed Brigadier to a walk as soon as he hit the barnyard, noticing the strange buggy in front of the steps.
Sheridan must have rented the conveyance instead of a horse like she usually did.
He dismounted and tied the horse’s reins to the porch post, then raced up the steps, his smile widening.
He opened the door, fully expecting to smell her perfume and hear her in the kitchen.
All of his excitement died in an instant.
It wasn’t Sheridan waiting for him. It was Katie.
He’d known she was still in town but didn’t think she had the nerve to come to him.
Again. She posed on the sofa, dressed in hardly anything, trying to look as seductive as she could.
He recognized that look. She was up to something. He just didn’t know what.
“What the hell, Katie! Why are you in my house? Where’s Sherry?”
She said not a word as she rose from the sofa and strolled toward him like she hadn’t a care in the world, as if she hadn’t broken his heart, not once but over and over again.
Her smile was the one she wore when she wanted something—a new dress, a new bauble, or cold, hard cash.
She looked deeply into his eyes then smoothed her hand against his face. “Hello, Wyatt.”
He physically removed her hand from his cheek, gently so as not to hurt her, and took a step back. He didn’t want her here, didn’t want her touching him. Hell, he didn’t want to see her at all. Ever. “Why are you here? Where’s Sherry?”
She didn’t respond to his question. Instead, she moved closer…for each step back he took, she took one forward. She laid her hands on his chest, her fingers splayed over his muscles and practically purred, “I came back. For you, Wyatt. I made a mistake. I hope you can forgive me. I still love you.”
He wasn’t falling for her act. He’d done so the last time and had his heart broken again. “Get out.”
“What?”
“Get dressed and get out!” His anger flared.
To think he’d been in love with her at one time.
Now, she just reminded him that he’d chosen poorly.
And maybe he had needed to learn that lesson.
Maybe that’s what made loving Sheridan so much easier.
“I don’t want you here. I don’t want anything to do with you. ”
“I know I made a mistake, Wyatt, but can’t you forgive me?” She wrapped her arms around him. “I love you. I want to be with you.”
He shook his head and removed her arms from around his neck, then took several steps away from her.
“Actually, Katie, I do forgive you. I know it’s not your fault you are the way you are.
Never satisfied with what you have. Always wanting more.
It’s my fault, too, because I tried to give you everything you wanted.
I know now that whatever I could give you would never be enough.
” His gaze roamed over her. She was still beautiful, but not nearly as beautiful as Sheridan, not only in looks, but in heart.
Katie would never be anything other than a conniving, selfish person.
“I’ve found someone who doesn’t treat me like a bank.
She never asks for anything. Not money, not jewelry, not flowers, though she deserves them. ”
“Are you talking about your precious Sheridan?”
“I am.”
“You love her.”
“I do. She’s a good woman.” He picked up the fashionable skirt she’d left on the floor in front of the fireplace and tossed it in her direction. “Put this on.”
She let it fall to the floor then stalked, not walked, to where he stood, and stomped her foot, something she did when she didn’t get her way quickly enough.
She pouted, something she did quite well, he remembered.
She could even produce tears on demand, which still amazed him, though it had taken him a long time to realize she used her tears as a weapon.
That’s how she suckered him into giving her money the last time she was here.
“Prove it to me, Wyatt. Kiss me. If you feel nothing, then I’ll know and I’ll leave quietly. ”
He laughed, disbelieving her nerve and audacity, then sobered as the reality that he’d once loved her settled in. “I’m not going to kiss you. I want you to leave. Now.”
“Fine. Then I’ll just kiss you!” And then she pressed her full body against his, put her arms around his neck and pulled his head down toward hers. Her mouth found his.
Wyatt stiffened as the pressure of her lips deepened.
He felt…nothing. Nothing but anger. He tried to push her away, but she was stronger than he remembered and he didn’t want to hurt her.
So he stood there, letting her kiss him, his eyes wide open and staring at her, letting her know, in no uncertain terms, that whatever he’d felt for her at one time was gone.
And still, she persisted, moving her lips over his, trying, it seemed, to get some sort of reaction from him.
After a moment, she broke the kiss and stepped back, her dark eyes spitting fire, as both anger and disappointment flickered in their depths. “You really do love her.” She tilted her head to the side, giving him the same coquettish look she always did. “Why?”
“Because she’s a good woman and she loves me.”
She shrugged and walked away from him to stand in front of the fire. “Apparently, she doesn’t love you that much,” she practically purred.
He never realized before how much he hated when she did that, like talking sweetly would entice him to do whatever she wanted him to do. She hadn’t been wrong. He always did, but not now. “What do you mean? What are you saying?”
She turned and stared at him, the look of innocence she had perfected over the years on her face, but there was nothing innocent about Katie Brooks. There was purpose in everything she did. “She didn’t fight for you, Wyatt.”
Suspicion and anger—yes, anger—flared in his gut. And something else, too. Fear. “Sheridan was here?”
“She was.”
“What did you say to her?”
She ran her finger across the top of the sofa but didn’t answer him. She didn’t look at him for the longest time either, but when she did, there was a smugness and a meanness to her smile he’d never seen before, which made his gut twist.
He never in his life hurt a woman, never raised his hand to one, but he wanted, at this moment, to slap the smug smile from her face. His hands clenched and unclenched, but he didn’t move, didn’t take a step toward her, despite the anger raging through him.
“What did you say to her, Katie?” he demanded, his tone harsh, so harsh he hardly recognized it as his own.
“I told her you were still in love with me,” she confessed finally. And for once, instead of her eyes glittering with avarice and machinations, he saw fear.
Though stunned by her confession, Wyatt didn’t let his anger get the better of him, as he so easily could have. He didn’t curse. He didn’t shout. He didn’t say a word.
Instead, he approached her, lifted her in his arms, and deposited her, none-to-gently on his front porch, clad only in her underclothes. “Do not, I repeat, do not ever darken my doorstep again.” He glared at her. “In fact, if I were you, Katie, I’d leave town and never come back.”
“But…but Wyatt,” she stammered as tears filled her eyes.
“Enough,” he shouted, knowing they were fake. He took one last look at her, then untied Brigadier’s reins from the porch railing, and climbed into the saddle. “You’d better not be here when I get back.”
He kicked Brigadier’s sides and raced out of the barnyard, hoping that he wasn’t too late.