Chapter Nineteen – I Dare You To Love
Chapter Nineteen
Fallon
I DARE YOU TO LOVE
Performed by Trisha Yearwood
THREE AND A HALF YEARS AGO
HIM: Please tell me you aren’t really dating the Patrick-Swayze-in- Point-Break wannabe.
HER: Don’t be jealous. It doesn’t fit your SEAL vibe.
HIM: Not jealous, Ducky. You do remember Patrick was the bad guy in that movie, right?
HER: JJ is harmless. A golden retriever.
HIM: Even golden retrievers can bite.
HER: God, I hope so.
HER: Did I scare you away?
HER: You’re such a prude.
HIM: Only with you.
PRESENT DAY
The next morning, while the sky was still a deep gray, I scurried out of the house like a rabbit chased by a cougar.
Embarrassment trailed behind me once again.
After Parker had walked out of my room, I’d tossed and turned and berated myself until I’d fallen into a fitful sleep.
A nightmare followed me into the morning.
Sadie and I at the bar, but instead of her answering the back door that early morning, it was Parker, and it was his body that hit the ground after a shot rang out.
His eyes that had the light snuffed out of them .
I’d woken up to a racing pulse and an empty, nauseated feeling in my stomach.
As I got ready for the day, the terror from the nightmare burned away, leaving fury at myself and at Parker for how we’d ended the night. How did this one man have the power to humiliate me so many times? And why hadn’t I learned my lesson by now?
I could say I hadn’t offered myself up to him again, that I’d even told him I was absolutely not offering myself up, but the truth was, I had issued another dare he’d declined.
I wasn’t na?ve enough to think I hadn’t tempted him.
I’d seen the heat and lust in his eyes. I’d heard the groan when I’d touched him in the lake, but for some reason, he could never seem to climb the wall that he’d placed between us.
It was his damn honor. Some misplaced loyalty for my dad or me or his team.
I hated it. Or rather, I wanted to hate it when, really, his honor was part of the reason why I’d always loved Parker.
Which was the exact reason I should never have let myself slip into a relationship with JJ that had lasted on and off for years. JJ had always been jealous of Parker, and I’d tried to prove to us both that what I felt for him was just childhood affection.
And yet, it had never been that simple.
Maybe before Parker had shown up when I was fourteen, right as everything had gone down with Dad, Sadie, and the Puzos, it had just been friendship and childish adoration.
But having a Naval Academy cadet, muscled and gorgeous, tasked by our fathers to guard me like a hero from a fiction novel, had pushed all my teenage hormones into overdrive.
After that, all I could feel when I was around him was a burning fire that needed to be quenched.
I’d never felt that same intensity with JJ.
I’d been attracted to him. I’d let him be my first, and we’d had good sex.
But it hadn’t been life-altering. It hadn’t swept me into a tidal wave where I couldn’t tell which way was up.
And just a simple touch from Parker could do that to me.
A simple look could flip me around until I was doing the opposite of everything I’d promised myself.
When I walked into the barn, Kevin was frowning over a clipboard, which held the daily list of guest excursions.
He looked up at me, scratching his dark-brown scruff and looking very much the stereotypical cowboy in a plaid shirt, Wranglers, and beat-up boots.
As head of guest adventures, he made sure every activity we offered was safe, run by experienced guides, and left people with smiles on their faces, even when they’d spent the day shoveling shit.
I wasn’t sure how he did it, but he could convince anyone the worst ranch task was a delight.
“Morning,” I said, heading straight for his office in a converted stall and the coffee I knew he’d have brewing there. We’d tried to make an office for him next to Kurt’s in the ranch-hand house, but Kevin had insisted he wanted to stay close to the action.
“Going to be a scorcher today,” he said, following me.
The compostable cup was only half full when I stopped pouring. The smell, normally a sweet addiction, turned my gut. I tried to take a sip, and my body rejected it furiously. I fought back the nausea before I looked up to find him scrutinizing me.
“You okay?”
“It’s been a long couple of weeks,” I told him. “What had you all squinty-eyed when I came in?” I changed the subject, glancing down at the clipboard he’d brought with him.
“Carrie called in sick. I had her slated to take a set of new riders up the river path to the picnic area near the caves. I’d fill in, but I’m already taking over Randy’s fishing trip. He’s been out since last week.”
My stomach tightened for a completely different reason. “Is she afraid to come to work rather than truly being sick?”
He didn’t respond with an immediate no, which only made my chest ache as much as my stomach. Eventually, he shook his head. “I don’t think so. Bess told me there’s been a bunch of staff at the mercantile calling in sick too. Something is going around.”
Kevin’s wife ran the largest gift shop on Main Street, stuffed to the gills with rustic mountain knickknacks and old forty-niner merchandise the tourists ate up.
But it was her voluntary role as president of the Parent-Teacher Association that kept her finger on the pulse of what was going on in Rivers.
I set the coffee down and stepped away, hoping to put distance between me and the smell.
“I can take the beginner trip,” I told him.
I had a list of things to do today, not the least of which was to finish going through the employee files to try to figure out if it was one of them, rather than JJ or Ace, who’d slaughtered my cow and burned down my cabin.
But taking the group up to the caves and back would put distance between me and my humiliation.
Kevin scratched his chin. “You sure? You’ve already got a lot on your plate.”
“Don’t we all? That’s the way it’s always been here, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world,” I told him. And it was the truth. I loved the pace and the level of activity and how it challenged me every single day. I’d just allowed myself to forget it for a few years.
Kevin grinned. “Me either.”
“I can help out.” The soft voice had me jumping nearly out of my skin. I whirled to find Chuck at the stall door.
“Jesus, you scared the daylights out of me.”
He looked as he always did, like a gawky kid who needed to grow into his body, but there was something sad about his eyes today. “I know I haven’t been here as long as the other guides, but I know all the stories. And I’ve learned a lot about the plants and wildlife. I can do this.”
Kevin and I shared a look, and he took the lead in responding. “Thanks, Chuck, but we don’t put anyone out on their own with guests until we’re sure they can handle it.”
Chuck looked so devastated that it even made me feel sad.
“Why don’t you come with me on this ride? You can record some of my conversations and take notes. After, you can write down what you’d say if you took a group out on your own and present it to Kevin. If he likes it, we’ll see about getting you trained.”
The teen’s face lit up. “Really?”
I nodded. “Of course. We want our employees to love being here, to want to share that love with our guests. Seems like you’ve proven that to us several times this summer.”
“I’ll get Daisy saddled up for you.” He looked at Kevin and asked, “Can I take Henry the Fifth out?”
That horse had a temper if not managed right, but I didn’t know Chuck’s riding skills the way Kevin did, so when he agreed, I didn’t say anything. I just let the kid go and get the horses ready, while I went over the list of guests and their riding experience with Kevin.
An hour later, I was just putting the final guest up on one of our gentlest horses when Parker found me. He was scowling as he let go of Theo’s hand, and the boy ran straight toward the barn, shouting about the puppies Teddy had left there last night.
I could feel Parker glowering at me as I finished with the guest and sent her to join the others waiting for me at the end of the drive. Chuck was already with the group, and he said something that made them all laugh. Maybe the kid had more to him than anyone knew.
I had my hand on Daisy’s pommel, ready to mount, before I risked looking directly at Parker. “I’m about to head out. What can I do for you?”
His hand landed on top of mine, and the tension that drifted between us had Daisy shifting and stomping a back hoof. She was the calmest horse I’d ever known, but she could read my moods better than most of the humans in my life.
“What part of being your bodyguard did I leave unclear?” he growled.
Not a hair of the laughter and teasing we’d shared yesterday afternoon was left in his tone.
That was just fine with me. It was easier for me to put my guard up, to not offer myself up on a silver platter, when he was grouchy and snarling.
My jaw tightened. “I don’t need a bodyguard.”
“Don’t treat me like I’m a damn guest. I’m here to protect you.” I wasn’t sure what he was more pissed about—that I’d snuck out without telling him or that I’d ordered room service to be delivered so he and Theo would have breakfast this morning.
“Letting you and Theo sleep in was just common courtesy.”
“Bullshit.” He leaned in, and I had nowhere to go with my back up against my horse. He lowered his voice in a way that caused it to rumble through my chest and stoke those fires I was attempting to bury. “You left because of what happened last night.”
My eyes darted to his mouth and back up. “ Nothing happened last night.”
“When will you realize, me turning you down isn’t because I don’t want you?” As soon as the words were out, he looked like he’d swallowed a bug. He stepped back, face shuttering completely.