42. Kaitlyn
FORTY-TWO
Kaitlyn
Opting to leave my backpack, I saddle two-tone while Went stands on the back porch, watching quietly. Even though he’s not happy that I’m leaving, he didn’t try to talk me into staying. Didn’t try to guilt or manipulate me into doing what he wanted.
Leading Two-tone out of the paddock, I fit my foot into one of the stirrups and use the saddle horn to haul myself up. Swinging my leg over Two-tone’s back, I settle into my seat before looking toward the house. Finding him leaning against the porch post at the top of the steps, long muscular arms crossed over his chest while he watches me quietly, I almost change my mind.
Almost.
“I’ll be back.” Offering him a small smile, I lean toward the porch in my saddle. “I’m probably going to head into town later—is there anything you want?”
Went runs his tongue over curve of his bottom lip. “I already told you what I want, Sunshine.”
I want you. I want to get you naked, lay you out on this dock, and eat your pussy until my face is covered in your cum and you can’t remember your own fucking name.
Fighting the flush of heat that shoots down my spine, I shake my head on an exasperated eye roll. “And you always get what you want?” It’s a question I’ve asked him before and like before, he gives me the same answer.
“Yes.” The corner of his mouth twitches into a smirk. “I do.”
“Well…” Bumping the heels of my boots into Two-tone’s belly, he takes the signal and starts walking forward. “I guess this is good practice for you then.” Looking at him over my shoulder, I give him a crooked grin of my own. “I’ll see you later.”
“You’ll see me tomorrow.” He corrects me, standing up straight to watch me ride away.
“Tomorrow.” I bump Two-tone into a trot and hurry home.
After unsaddling Two-tone and giving him a rubdown, I feed him and the rest of his cohorts their dinner. While they’re eating, I start to do a quick muck when I notice that their stalls have already been cleaned and fresh hay has already been tossed down. A quick check lets me know that the rest of my chores have been tended to as well. Telling myself that I owe Damien a thank you the next time I see him, I head to the house feeling equal parts guilty and grateful.
Letting myself in through the back, hoping to sneak in undetected, my plan backfires when I find my mom sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of tea.
Stalling at the backdoor, I sit on the mudroom bench and take off my boots, hoping against hope that it’s not me she’s waiting for. When I straighten and toss a look in her direction, my hopes are dashed.
She’s looking right at me like she’s waiting for me to explain to her where I’ve been for the last twelve hours. Instead of asking, she gives me a smile. “Come sit with me? It’s feels like forever since we’ve been able to catch up.”
Suddenly regretting my choice to take off my shoes, I shake my head. “It’s Monday,” I remind her. “I’m supposed to head into town to do the shopping for the week.”
When I say it, she frowns. While she’s never openly interfered with my father’s insistence that I earn my keep I know she doesn’t approve. “That’s perfect then.” Standing up, she walks her mug to the sink and dumps her tea down the drain. Rinsing her cup before setting it in the dishwasher, she turns to look at me again. “I’ll go with you. We can grab a bite at the diner before we shop.”
“What about Abbey?”
“What about her?” My mom shrugs her shoulders. “She’s a grown woman. I think she can survive on her own, don’t you?”
“I guess…” I nod my head. “But she’ll be mad that we went to town without her.”
Instead of answering me, my mom just laughs on her way toward me. “Put your boots back on, Kaity.” Plucking her car keys off their hook on her way out the back door. “Your mom wants a milkshake.”
Neither of us say anything important until we’re settled into a booth at the diner and ordered our dinner. Looking at me from across the table my mom gives me a smile. “If it’ll make you feel better, we’ll order a milkshake to-go for your sister. That should head off any tantrums.” Patting my hand, she leans forward in her seat and whispers, “Now tell me how school’s going. Did you pass your finals?”
“I…” Looking around to make sure no one is listening, I sigh. “I haven’t taken them yet.” Before sh e can ask me why, I tell her. “I was able to download a couple of lectures while I was up at Northpoint a few weeks ago. I was watching them in the barn when Brock showed up and…” Chewing on my bottom lip for a moment, I consider telling her what happened. That he grabbed me, hard enough to bruise my arm and shook me. That if Damien hadn’t been there, it probably would’ve been worse. Deciding to omit that part of the story, I tell her the rest. “I left my backpack in Two-tone’s stall. He stepped on it and broke my laptop.” It’s not really mine. It was Luke’s. He left it behind when he joined the army and I commandeered it for school.
When I tell her, my mom forehead crumples with concern for a moment before it smooths. “Okay.” Giving curt nod, she sits back in her seat. “We’ll just have to get you a new one—today. We’ll order one from—”
“It’s already been replaced,” I tell her, shaking my head. “Remember the package that was waiting for me on the porch yesterday, after church?”
Frowning slightly, she waits for the hovering waitress to refill our drinks before she says anything. “Brock Morris did not buy you a new laptop for school, Kaity.” That’s what I told her—that the package was an engagement gift from Brock.
“No.” I shake my head. “Damien’s… friend di d.” Unwrapping my straw, I stick it into my cherry coke. “I emailed my professors this morning and explained what happened. They were sympathetic. As long as I take my finals by the end of the week and pass, I’ll still receive full credit for the semester.”
“Damien’s friend just bought you a new laptop?” she sounds skeptical and I don’t blame her.
Nodding, I give her what I hope is a casual shrug. “He felt bad about it, considering it wouldn’t have happened if I’d been studying at Northpoint like I was supposed to.”
She makes a neutral noise in the back of her throat before leaning back, giving the waitress time to deliver our orders. When she’s gone, my mom says, “So that’s where you’ve been all day? Studying at Northpoint?”
“Yeah…” Telling myself it’s not a lie—that I did study, or at least tried to—I concentrate on stirring the straw around in my drink to mix the cherry syrup into my coke. “Damien’s friend said I can spend as much time as I need to study.” Again, not a lie. “I’ll take the week and take my finals on Friday.”
“That’s just fine.” She beams at me. “And don’t you worry about your chores—I’ll see that they’re done.”
“Mom.” I shake my head, protest bubbling in my throat. “I can—”
“Of course you can,” she says in that matter of fact tone she uses when she fully expects to get her way. “But you’re not going to. This is too important. You just worry about passing your finals and I’ll worry about the rest of it—including your father.”
“Okay.” I don’t know what else to say. “Thank you.”
She gives me a gentle smile. “I know I’m not your real mother, Kaity but—”
“You’re the only mother I’ve ever known,” I tell her quietly, my throat suddenly and unbearably tight. It’s not something we usually talk about. Something we don’t really acknowledge. “That makes you real enough for me.”
For a moment, we just sit here and look at each other. Eyes glassy with tears, my mother gives me a bright smile. “So, what’s he like?” When I don’t answer her right away, she prompts me. “The young man staying up at Northpoint. Damien told your father he was an artist.”
I give her a jerky nod. “He left some of his work out once, so I saw it while I was cleaning. He’s actually really good.” Went isn’t good . He’s phenomenal. I’ve never seen anything like his artwork before.
“Is he famous?”
The question catches me off guard. “No… I don’t think so.” The confusion must show plainly on my fa ce because she winces slightly before answering.
“When he wired your father the money for his stay, there was an NDA attached. No one’s to know that he’s here and if anyone finds out, your father will have to return the money.” My mom gives me a sheepish look while she stirs sweetener into her iced tea. “The only people I’ve ever heard of using NDAs are celebrities and since he’s from California, I thought maybe…” She lets her explanation trail off.
“Oh.” So it isn’t just that Went values his privacy. He actively doesn’t want anyone to know that he’s here.
Because he’s hiding .
Before I can ask her if there were any more stipulations attached to the money, a long shadow falls across our table.
“Hey, Kaitydid.”
Looking up to find Brock standing over our table, I’m too stunned to do or say anything when he leans down and kisses me. There’s beer on his breath and my stomach instantly starts to turn. Allowing a few seconds of contact before I pull away, I force a smile onto my face. “Brock…” Looking around, I catch sight of the pool tables through the open doorway that separates the diner from the Saddle. A group of his friends are clustered around it, pool cues in hand, longnecks scissored between their fingers. “What ar e you doing here?”
Something hard flashes in his eyes that reminds me that Brock doesn’t like being questioned. That he’s still very angry about what happened Friday night. The only reason he answers me instead of telling me to mind my own fucking business is because my mother is sitting here, listening. “Shooting pool with the guys. I stopped by the house earlier to see if you wanted to come but Abbey says she hadn’t seen you all day… where you been?”
My pulse spikes when he says my sister’s name but before I can lose it and tell him to stay the hell away from her, my mother speaks up. “She’s been with me all day, planning the wedding.” She gives him a cool smile. “If you don’t mind, we’d like to eat our dinner and keep planning—in private.”
Brock blinks at her, probably trying to decide if he heard her correctly. If she really had the audacity to dismiss him. Like she can read his mind, my mother reaches up and gives him a firm pat on his arm, practically pushing him away from the table. “Go on back to your friends, Brock and let me have this time alone with my daughter. I have a feeling I won’t get much, once this is all over.” Dropping her hand away from his arm, she dismisses him completely. “Now, I really liked that dress you tried on today. I know you said it was too busy but if you can’t be busy on your wedding day then, when can you be?”
“If you like it then it’s the one—I trust your judgment. Lord knows, I don’t know the first thing about dresses,” I tell her, playing along while Brock openly stares at the two of us for a second before he clears his throat.
Leaning down, he grunts softly, the only indication that he’s suffering repercussions over what happened with Went Friday night. Dropping a quick, hard kiss on my mouth, he straightens. “I’ll see you Friday morning. Be ready by ten.”
I stare at him for a second before I answer. “Friday morning?”
“We have a 10:30 appointment with the county clerk to apply for our marriage license.” Annoyance flashes in his eyes again. “Don’t tell me you forgot.”
I didn’t forget. He just didn’t tell me.
Instead of arguing with him like he wants, I give him an apologetic smile. “I must’ve. No worries—I’ll be ready to go when you get there.”
Completely unsatisfied with my answer, he gives me a tight-lipped smile. “I hope so—if we miss our appointment, we’ll have to wait a whole month and I know how you feel about waiting.” He gives me a smirk before looking at my mom. “I apologize for the interruption, Mrs. Barrett.”
“That’s alright.” She gives him a bland smile. “You tell your mother hello for me and that I’ll meet her at the church, bright and early, tomorrow morning. Dottie will be there to let us in so we can talk logistics.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He bobs his head in deference but I know Brock. He’s seething inside. “Kaity.” He touches a finger to the brim of his cowboy hat before he walks away.
Home and putting groceries away, I pull the paper bag filled with Abbey’s weekly batch of celebrity gossip magazines out of the bottom of the box. Stacking her milkshake on top of it, I start to leave the kitchen to take them to her when my mother stops me.
“Kaity, Peggy told me something that I’d like to ask you about,” she says while putting the milk away. “It’s about what happened with you and Brock, last Friday night.”
The second we walked into the grocery store, Peggy pounced on my mom. Cornering her near the register, Peggy gossiped non-stop while I shopped and mother attempted to pretend she cared that one of the waitresses at the Saddle is dating one of the McClintock’s hands. Remembering the threat Brock made Saturday afternoon—that he was prepared to tell everyone that he found Damien and I in the bathroom at the Saddle, Friday night, I feel my gut clench. Even though it’s as far from the truth as you can get, it doesn’t matter. A lie out of a Morris’s mouth is gospel around here.
Hugging the bag full of magazines to my chest while Abbey’s milkshake melts in my hand, I give her a nod. “Okay.”
“Well…” Closing the refrigerator door, she suddenly looks as uncomfortable as I feel. “I guess Doug Sherman went out to where Brock says he hit the deer after church to destroy it but he couldn’t find it.” Deer and Elk are strictly monitored because they carry disease that could infect the cows. The fact that my father once kept Northpoint stocked with them caused a huge uproar amongst the ranchers.
“I told you.” Shaking my head, I try my best to give her what I hope is a slightly exasperated smile. “We barely clipped it. It probably ran off.”
She gives me a stubborn head shake. “Peggy heard from Sheila at the urgent care that Brock came in around 4AM with four broken ribs and that the gash on his forehead took nearly a dozen staples to close. Sounds like whatever hit him, did more than barely clipped him.”
I bashed his fucking face in—which isn’t even a fraction of what I wanted to do to him…
“Well, you can tell Peggy that Sheila violated about fifty laws, giving her Brock’s private medical history,” I tell her, my tone clipped and laced with a panic I hope she can’t hear. “I don’t think Mr. Morris would take to kindly to that fact.”
Ignoring my attempt at ending the conversation, my mom shakes her head. “She also told Peggy that you weren’t with him when he came in.”
I give her a shrug. “He must’ve decided he was worse off than he thought after he dropped me off.”
Hand still wrapped around the refrigerator door, my mom stares at me for a few moments. Long enough to tell me that she’s not sure if she believes me or not. “If something else happened, you can tell me, Kaity.”
I really wish that were true.
As usual, the truth is useless.
Even if she did believe me, Brock has an alternative story, complete with witnesses, that would get Damien run out of town, or worse.
Much worse.
Not to mention the fact that if what really happened came out, not only would Damien pay the price, the fact that his possibly famous brother is hiding out in my dead brother’s house would become public knowledge.
As much as I want to tell her the truth, I can’t risk it on either front.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Mom.” I shake my head, shifting impatiently from one foot to the other. “Brock and I hit a deer coming home from the Saddle—just like he said.”
Looking at me for a moment longer, my mother finally gives up with a sigh. “Okay, Kaity.”
Relief that she’s going to drop it swirls around with guilt in my gut, the mix of it making my stomach turn. “I had a nice time tonight,” I tell her because I don’t want the last thing I say to her to be a lie. I want her to know how much I love her and appreciate the fact that she’s always been good to me. That sometimes, she’s the only one who has been.
“I love you too.” She gives me a faint smile while she moves across the kitchen to lift a sack of apples out of the box. “Now take your sister her milkshake and those silly magazines before she comes down here and has a fit.”