Chapter 8 #2
They’ll be horrified. I can’t wait. “No, but maybe they’ll get shit on them and I can celebrate that it’s part of the experience.”
“Don’t forget to peek at the kittens.” She rubs her belly and eyes the food. My stomach clenches at the delay. “Patches is keeping them in the barn, and they’re ready for interaction.”
“Sure.” I told her I’d help get the kittens used to humans before Kacey charges in a little too loud, a little too unpredictable for the mama cat.
I give the guys a tight smile without meeting their eyes and scurry out of the house, using the door off the kitchen.
The pressure doesn’t ease off my chest as I cross the gravel loop to the barn on the other end. I find Patches curled up in an old rabbit hutch that Jamison found in a thrift store.
“Hey, Patches,” I say softly and crouch by the fenced sides to let her get used to me.
The little tortie that showed up last fall blinks and meows and pushes her face against the wires.
I chuckle and scratch her cheeks before rising to coo at her and the four little kittens snoozing on her. “Look at you, Mama. Doing a good job.”
A tiny orange kitten hisses at me before I carefully lift him. His little ears stick straight up. He closes his eyes and leans into me when I scratch him.
The three others start moving around, their little mews reaching me.
“Just wait your turn.” I giggle at the wiggling body in my grip.
“I think Iverson’s been out here spoiling them.”
I whirl around at the deep voice. Tingles race down my spine and spread outward. Guilt immediately follows. “You’ve got to quit sneaking up on me.”
Last time, I was the one who snuck into the room he was in.
He lifts his chin at the kitten I’m cradling. “I think they’ve been getting human attention for far longer than Jamison knows.” His shadow only amplifies how wide his shoulders are. They blocked out the storeroom when he was in front of me.
Envy joins the other tangled emotions. My sister has the man, the house, the kids, a dog, and even kittens. I’m planning my ex’s wedding while living with my parents.
I set the kitten down with the others and pick up another tortie with one white paw. “Are you accusing your own brother of spoiling barn cats?” I ask lightly. I want to run, to get away from his confusing presence, but not as much as I want to stay.
“Yes.” He shoves his hands into his jeans pockets. The move pulls his dark-green T-shirt tighter. “That one’s going to be my next barn cat.”
I clutch her to me. She bumps her tiny nose against my chin. “Putting her to work so early?”
“She’s got a month, and then she’s moving.”
And the mama cat is getting fixed. I knew the plans, but I didn’t know which kittens were going where. “What are you naming her?”
He clicks his tongue against his teeth. “Bold of you to think Kacey doesn’t have them named already. She’s Bootsy.”
I laugh and Bootsy mews. I trade her for another cream-colored kitten. One more and I can ditch the handsome cowboy standing in the doorway, making me wish I wore a dress today.
As if he’s reading my thoughts, he rakes his gaze down my body. Appreciation fills his eyes. I’m only in jeans and an old Hawthorne Ranch shirt.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
His question takes me off guard. I swap for the last kitten, an all-black one. From the way they’re not squirming to get away, they’ve been handled plenty already.
“Nothing, other than dealing with my cousin and her groom.” Maybe referring to them like that will make it all sting less.
“Campbell.”
A shiver whispers over my skin. He called me Belle in the dark.
“This is different,” he says softly. “You’ve hardly looked at me since the other night.”
The other night. When I practically came in his arms and he talked me through it. He helped me then, and he wants to do it again. I’m apparently a sucker for that. “Were you being honest? You don’t have a girlfriend?”
“Ah. That.” He drags in a deep breath, looks behind him, and saunters farther in. “We aren’t together.”
“I know we’re not together. I want to make sure you and Natalie aren’t either.
” I haven’t eaten anything, but the center of my chest burns.
I put the last kitten down. It was almost asleep, and I would’ve held it longer if it weren’t for the potential cheater in front of me. Do I know how to pick them or what?
I didn’t pick Durban. It just happened. I wouldn’t have chosen another guy who thinks he’s better than me.
“No, I mean, me and Natalie aren’t together.”
“You didn’t do that thing where you broke up with her right after, so technically, you’re not a bad guy, and I’m not a horrible homewrecker?” Nausea hits my stomach. “Because ugh. Technically, I still would be.”
“That’d make me an asshole. I’m not your ex, and I don’t string women along until they’re not convenient anymore.” The offense in his tone makes me feel both better and worse.
I’m insulting him, and now I have guilt wrapped up in the mix of feelings inside me. I wring my hands. “My dating history hasn’t left me with the best worst-case scenarios.”
The hardness in his jaw eases. “You should never be wrong for taking someone at their word. The night at the bar? I went there because she had just called and broken it off.”
“Oh.” The agitation in my stomach finds a different reason to continue.
He didn’t owe me an explanation, but I’m spinning out, so he gave me one.
Now the guilt grows. I gave him shit about his girlfriend, and he played it off because he was sitting there, heartbroken, and wanted to save face.
I just stomped salt into his wound. “Oh God, I’m sorry. No wonder you were so grouchy.”
“Couldn’t you read it in my expression?” he asks lightly before he turns serious again.
“Four years of waiting, and it’s over. Just like that.
” He takes his hands out and crosses his arms across his chest. Oh, that’s worse.
The flutters are back in my belly. “She said I was too distracting at such an important time for her.”
“Ouch.”
Four years is a long time to be cut out so quickly. I know how that feels. He said he didn’t string women along until they were inconvenient, but that sounds like what his ex did.
“Why?” It’s none of my business, but suddenly, I want to know everything about the Durban who’s human and makes mistakes and gets dumped just like me. I grip the horseshoe charm on my necklace and run it back and forth along the chain. “If she’s almost done with school, why now?”
“She’s busy.” The muscles on either side of his jaw pop. “I don’t know what it’s like, being in college and especially not at that level. It’s a critical time for her.”
“Harsh.”
“But true.”
“Fuck that.” I snort. “Trust me. I know how much it sucks to have people think you can’t possibly understand when it’s them who have no idea what you’re dealing with.”
His gaze narrows on me, but he doesn’t speak.
I don’t know what else to say. Relief is starting to flood in, making the cool inside of the barn almost chilly.
I could continue questioning Durban, but I believe him.
What makes him more trustworthy? His focus is on me.
Am I that needy? “It helped. Dealing with Stanford and his family after that was easier.”
Satisfaction fills his eyes. “Yeah?”
“I found his parents and my aunt and uncle much more tolerable. I think Stanford suspected something, so good.”
The same interest I saw in the storeroom flares in his eyes, and the corner of his mouth tips up. “When do you have to deal with them again?”
“He wants riding lessons. Given by me. January will be there though.”
“She won’t let him out of sight around you.”
I shake my head. I’ll take small ego strokes where I can.
“When?” he asks.
“When what?”
“Riding lessons.”
“Tomorrow after dinner. They’ll do dude ranch stuff all day, have an evening meal, then riding lessons.
” For acting like they’re so much more sophisticated than rural Montana, the Baldwins sure want all the rural Montana experiences and adventures.
Probably to laugh about them with their social circle when they return to Seattle. “The riding will be just the couple.”
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow.” He spins on a boot heel.
“Wait—what?” I admire his ass while attempting to process what he means. Because I have to be wrong.
He doesn’t turn back around; he just speaks over his shoulder, his profile strong. That mustache of his makes me wonder things. Same with the whiskers. How much would I feel them . . . down there? “You’re going to make it through these next few weeks as stress-free as I can get you.”
“But . . .” Does he mean what I think he means?
He does a half turn, brow cocked.
A full-body shiver racks me. I don’t have it in me to say no. I don’t want to. I want his growl back in my ear. I want his hulking frame over me. I want to be an unbothered hussy when I’m taking orders from Stanford and January.
It can’t be a smart idea. I’m trying to get taken seriously, and if anyone finds out, I’ll be humiliated. Satisfied, but embarrassed.
“No one can know,” I finally say, succumbing to the siren song of how he can ease my pressure. “I don’t want my reputation worse than it is.” Even if I earn it this time. “And I’m not risking the land deal my uncle made with Daddy.”
“Your sister would have my balls if she thought I was fucking around with you. Both of them. Your parents too. I don’t want to tarnish the relationship between the distillery and your family ranch.”
“What about Natalie?”
“What about her?” Confusion ripples over his face, but hurt still shines strong from his eyes too. “There’s nothing there.”
There was a short window where I hurt so much after Stanford dumped me that I would’ve opened the door to him had he shown up full of remorse.
I’m not proud of it, and I don’t want to be in that window with Durban if it happens to him.
“Not even when she gets her shiny degree and realizes she was too stressed and made a mistake?”
“Probably not.”