Chapter 15 #2
She blows out a slow breath, and I feel her body relax. For a moment, I catch a glimpse of what a future could look like with her and me and a baby, but I quickly banish the image. No one said anything about us being a family. Her idea of a business arrangement might suit me and my life just fine.
“Thank you for going to the store for me. I really do appreciate it.”
Once we’re in the saddle, Dolly walks us slowly through the main square. I can't help pointing out a few landmarks. I love it here, and I’m proud of this town.
“That’s the grocery store. It’s been there for two generations. The people who own it also have a little grape vineyard on the edge of San Ysidro. They only produce about fifty bottles a year, but it's some of the best wine you'll ever taste.”
Pointing at a small park in the center of town, I crane my neck to see if I recognize anyone sitting on the benches.
Tom Olsen looks up from a game of backgammon and waves.
I nod back at him. “This place gets mobbed every day with moms and kids after school. Ice cream truck camps out on the corner. Not unusual to find a couple of bottle rockets being launched from over there.” I point at a strip of grass next to a jungle gym.
She looks at me over her shoulder. “Bottle rockets and ice cream? You live in a movie from the 1950s.”
I laugh. “Well, honey, there’s a lotta open space out here, no threat of running into skyscrapers. If all you know is Los Angeles, you're bound to be surprised by the pace of things.”
She tips her head against my chest, and I can smell her shampoo. I’d be lying if I said I haven’t had this exact dream since the night we met. Only it didn’t end with a ride through town. Far from it.
It also didn’t include parenthood.
“I have been outside of Los Angeles,” she says. Even without looking down, I know her bottom lip juts out, defiant. Dolly takes her time on the roads she knows well.
“Yeah? Like where?” I ask.
“You mean you want to know everywhere I've ever been?” Again, a look over her shoulder and a raised eyebrow tell me she thinks I’m absurd.
“Tell me some places that you love. Your top five.”
Well, that's different. Places I love and places I've been are not at all the same things.”
“I want the ones you love,” I say.
“Well, I did take a really great trip to Croatia once. The water there is so clear, you can see the bottom through thirty feet of it.”
“Croatia?” I ask. “Not even sure where the heck that is. Pretty sure it's in Europe, but my map skills aren't up to par.”
“Yes. Near Italy. I was lucky enough to be on a boat once there, and the water there is the most beautiful I've ever seen.
It was over ten years ago when I was in college on a backpacking trip.
I went all over, but that place stood out.
I swore to myself that I was going to get back to that water someday.
I've never been able to get the sight of it out of my mind.”
“And you haven't been back?” I ask. “Not in ten years when it made such an impression on you?”
She clicks her tongue. “Work got in the way. I've been nose to the grindstone, no breaks. Not a lot of vacation time when you’re trying to make partner, and not a lot of places I wanted to go alone.”
I file that information away. Interesting. “Now we're getting somewhere. So no boyfriend back home, no big relationships?”
“I didn't say that.” There’s a long pause, and I wait to hear about the boyfriend back home. “But no. No boyfriend.”
“How about little relationships?”
“You have a lot of questions,” she says.
“I'm just trying to get to know my baby mama. Is that so wrong?”
“Don’t call me that. And no little relationships either. I work…a lot.” She blows out a breath but doesn’t loosen her grip on my forearms. “Okay, let me ask you a few things.”
“Sure. I'm an open book, but I'm gonna want to know about your four other favorite places. I refuse to believe that Los Angeles and Croatia are the sum total.”
“Fair enough,” she says. “Okay, question one. How’d you know it was me who slid down your hill?”
“I didn’t. I was laying bets on it being a stray goat or more likely a cow.”
I guide Dolly down a bridle path that takes us the long way back to Loveland Ranch, but Tessa doesn’t need to know that.
“You thought I was a cow?”
“I said most likely.”
“You really know how to sweet-talk a woman.”
“Don't take offense, honey. There are more cows than people around here. You could’ve been a giant boar if that image suits you better.”
“Not particularly. Okay, question two. What’s your story? Why don’t you do relationships?”
“Too complicated. I don’t do complicated.”
She turns to look at me over her shoulder, and I clamp my lips shut, unwilling to comment more on the subject. Tessa stares a moment longer, and I get the feeling she isn’t satisfied with my answer, but the conversation is over for now.
Dolly keeps clip-clopping along, turning down the road to Loveland Ranch without me having to do more than nudge her.
Tessa doesn't ask how I know where the side entrance to her property is, which is a good thing because I don't feel like telling her I've done my share of creeping around, trying to gather information about the aquifer and whether the property line is drawn in the wrong place.
Unfortunately, the water is squarely on her land.
“Question three. Do you travel everywhere on a horse?”
“When I'm not going far, I do. Look at the sky and the weather out here. No reason to be cooped up inside my truck when I don't have to be.”
“Okay, I accept that answer, and I kind of agree with you even though I’m still a little scared of this horse. Question four. Do you have any siblings?”
My body stiffens. I tell my muscles to unclench, but they won’t.
“Yeah. One brother, Chad. Younger by two years.”
“Does he live around here?” Her tone is light, like she’s asking about the weather. I don’t want to talk about Chad, but I can already see that withholding information only fuels her.
“Yup. He does.”
“Maybe that was a dumb question, since your family goes back generations.”
“Come on, Duchess, even I know there’s no such thing as a dumb question. Give yourself more credit.”
“What makes you think I don't give myself credit? Then again, I got drunk and fell into bed with a cowboy, so…”
“Come on, I'd say that was one of your better decisions.”
“I'd say you're a little biased. Question five, did you bring your hazmat gear with you on the back of this horse? Because the ranch house we're about to enter is not for the faint of heart.”
“No hazmat here, but I do have a rain slicker. Will that do?”
She laughs. “I’ll let you decide.”
I lift her off the horse in front of the ranch house and let Dolly graze in the shade.
Still holding on to my arm, Tessa hobbles toward the front door, which she unlocks with a rusty key.
“Piece of advice, honey. Save yourself some time. People around here don't lock their doors.”
And once I take a step inside, I have more to say about that. “Trust me. No one wants to steal anything here. Come on, let's make this a little easier,” I say, turning her around and standing in front of her. “Hop on,” I say.
“What do you mean?” she asks.
“Hop on. I want a tour, but I don't want you on that ankle any more than you need to be.”
“You're gonna”—before she finishes the sentence, I heave her onto my back—“give me a piggyback ride? You're either a gentleman or a total goofball. I can't decide which.”
“I’ll let you decide.” I smirk, calling back her words to me earlier.
As I carry her down the hall, her arms encircle my neck, as though there's any chance I'd drop her.
“Okay, bedrooms to the left and right.” She points them out, arms waving. Each one looks as dusty as the living room, but the beds are made. And some of the floors were vacuumed a bit.
I think back on the night we met and imagine Tessa and her sisters seeing this place for the first time. “I'm starting to understand why you all drank so much on your birthday.”
“Yeah, the house was a shock. And my sisters can be a lot.”
I grunt, thinking that her sisters couldn’t possibly be a lot compared to my brother, but I’m not about to open that up for discussion.
“You’re not intimidated by the scope of the work here?”
“No, but maybe that’s because I don’t know what I don’t know. The place is growing on me. It has so much character and really good bones.”
“True. I have some familiarity with construction,” I tell her. “Maybe I can help when you get to that stage.”
“If you’re offering, I’ll take all the help I can get.”
As we pause in each doorway, she points out various details.
“Each of my sisters had a room here. Hannah insisted on the one with the bay window. Dylan asked for a bunkbed and filled the bottom bunk with stuffed animals.” She sighs, as though visiting a happy time.
“But it’s been years since anyone has used the place. ”
That explains why I didn’t know her family owned it.
Ever since I bought the property next door, there's never been a soul around here, and the only public information shows the property as owned by a trust. I vaguely remember kids playing here once, but in recent years, everyone assumed the owners were absentee investors.
She flings a hand to the side. “And that was my room.”
I’m not about to breeze by that one. I walk over to the bed, which is neatly made and looks like all the linens on it have been washed.
I want to know her better, and somehow standing in the room that was hers as a kid makes me feel something.
It’s probably the wrong thing, given our agreement to act like responsible adults, so I try to rein it in.
I try not to feel attracted to her because we’re wrong for each other. Right?
Okay, fine. I’ll work harder on convincing myself later.