Chapter 13
EMMA COULDN’T brEATHE. There was likely a handful of viable reasons—nerves, Cade, pending panic attack, Cade, anxiety, Cade, nerves again—but none of those were wholly responsible. No, the fundamental reason she couldn’t draw a deep breath were the jeans Reagan had finally deemed “perfect.”
They fit Emma like a second skin, or even a first skin if you were counting the fact the pockets actually seemed riveted to her butt.
She’d have a permanent W from the Wrangler logo branded on her backside before long—if it wasn’t already there.
She was too scared to take the jeans off to check.
Taking them off would mean she’d have to stuff herself back into them, and Reagan had left her here at the cabin less than twenty minutes ago, saying she didn’t want to be here when Cade showed up.
Cade.
Just the thought of him made the butterflies attempt to flutter against the front panel of her jeans.
She hadn’t seen Cade all day. Probably best, since she couldn’t believe she was doing this, going out with him like this after professing to love him.
It was so backward. Simple dating didn’t happen for her at home.
Who had time? But here, in the remote hills and in the shadows of the wild New Mexico mountains?
Apparently she was a different woman. And if she was, it was all because of him.
Walking across the room, she laughed as she tried to swing her hips.
Under no delusion did she appear sexy. Instead, she assumed she looked far more like someone with severe back problems trying to make her way across a room while in debilitating pain.
Poor Cade. He’d have to lay her out across the bench seat of the pickup and then pull her out at the restaurant.
She’d be the cowgirl version of the kid in the snowsuit in A Christmas Story.
They’d have to eat leaning against the bar because there would be no sitting down.
And if she got her sock twisted in her boot?
She was so screwed because she doubted she could bend over.
Of course, her ass looked amazing, but that was inevitable in jeans this “fitted,” as Reagan had called them.
Emma laughed and ended up gasping for breath. Was it worth it just to ensure her ass was the best on the dance floor? Glancing in the mirror that hung by the front door, she did a little shimmy. Vanity might be the death of her, but damn if she wasn’t hot when they buried her.
Then there was the top. Emma tugged at the hem, more than a little self-conscious.
The sleeveless white shirt was stark and crisp against the dark blue denim and black boots.
The shirt wasn’t long enough to meet the waistband of the jeans, but exposed roughly two inches of skin all the way around, tying in the front beneath all of three silver Concho buttons.
She’d explained to Reagan she was nervous that Cade would consider her inappropriately dressed.
It seemed odd to put so much effort into her appearance with plans to have fun over dinner and dancing, and then work to create enough distance between them there would be no accusations of impropriety when the other guests arrived.
She was sure he wouldn’t be keen on her plan, but a client affair was the last thing her firm could afford to have publicized, particularly when it involved the owner.
Emma wandered to the window and pulled the curtain aside, attempting to be casual as she tried to see if Cade was near.
That’s when it struck her. There was nothing going on out there but a good, stiff breeze strong enough to make the evergreens planted beside her cabin lift and fall back with each gust. Yet nothing blew over her skin beyond the cabin’s air-conditioning.
Her window, the same one she’d opened last night, was closed and locked.
Someone had been in here...with all the paperwork scattered.
He’d left at daybreak and would have walked right past the window. For the space of a heartbeat, her entire system shut down. Cade would have come in to close the window, the screenless window, left open to the elements.
“No.” The single word was more plea than declaration as every system came back online with a rush of fear-fueled adrenaline. If he’d shut the window and left, great. But if he’d looked at the paperwork...
She spun so quickly she nearly tripped in her rush to reach the little workstation. She breathed easy. Both her folders were there. If he’d been inside the cabin to fix her window, he’d have seen the binders and...
The papers. The papers are all wrong.
She’d left them scattered across the little table after making call after call. And the phone. It had been returned to the little pass-through into the kitchenette.
Her fingers were numb as she flipped the blue binder open. The papers she’d left scattered all over were now organized and in alphabetical order.
He’d read them. Read all her notes on how she could both establish the dude ranch and save her company. But without context, without explanation, she understood exactly how he’d have interpreted the documentation.
Hands trembling violently, she slowly opened the green notebook.
The pages were organized. That hardly registered.
Her focus was locked on an envelope that had been placed inside.
An envelope with the ranch’s logo and mailing address on the upper left corner, and her name—Ms. Emmaline Graystone, President—followed by her Manhattan office address formally printed in rough, handwritten script on the front.
And she knew. Eli would have printed the address off the computer. Ty, being the youngest and most likely to defer to his oldest brother, would have probably left the task for Eli. But Cade—Cade would have made this as personal for her as it was for him.
Her hands shook so hard she ended up ripping the envelope open, decimating the paper. Inside was a check in the amount due her firm for services rendered sans optional performance bonus per their contractual agreement.
She dropped the check and looked for a note. Nothing. Driven by an emotional panic she couldn’t name, she shook the binders, pages down, dug through the small pockets front and back and did a cursory flip through the pages.
She found nothing because he’d left nothing. Just the check. A cold, final closing of the door on what might have been.
She shouldn’t have expected otherwise. Not really.
The Covingtons wouldn’t engage in a major confrontation; there would be no screamed allegations or assertions of wrongdoing.
That wasn’t the Covington way. They might deal with each other in such a straightforward manner, but never, ever did they deal so directly or take such a hard line with those outside their intimate fold.
And this? This said she’d been officially evicted.
She traced the sharp edge of the linen envelope.
The smart thing to do would be to go to the house and face the music.
But she couldn’t. She didn’t have it in her to leave here with the recriminations and hateful words Cade would hurl at her, no matter that he probably had some right.
Instead, she would, for once, allow herself to be a coward.
She’d return to Manhattan, to her apartment and to a life where she had no friends close enough to commiserate with.
There’d be no one to share the truth—that she’d fallen in love with a cowboy—no one to hold her as she explained she’d ultimately failed to survive the fall.
Shivers rocked her. What she wouldn’t do to go back and make this right.
She’d been in over her head when she’d taken the ranch job from Michael.
After all, what in the name of the heavens did a city girl know about marketing a dude ranch?
Nothing—that’s why she’d handed over the bulk of the work to him in the first place.
Desperate for the business, she’d trusted him to do his job as she did hers.
She’d been assured repeatedly that he had the Covington contract under control.
She’d been so busy trying to shore up her other accounts, she’d had to trust him to forge new contacts and open new avenues they could pursue in the future.
Instead, he’d been taking money from the company and then set her up to fail with the Covington account. Only she’d ruined herself much more thoroughly than he could ever have imagined.
From the beginning, she’d let others take control of her life. First her parents, then Michael and, most recently, Cade. That ended here. She’d salvage the only thing she could now—her business.
Eyes stinging, she unbuttoned the jeans and tried not to laugh as the zipper voluntarily slid down with almost inanimate relief.
Catching the heel of her boots in the horseshoe bootjack, she pulled them free one at a time and then pulled off the jeans.
She tucked the boots under the edge of the sofa, and then folded the jeans along the sharp, starched crease.
She took her top off and folded it, too, placing it on top of the jeans.
Moving blindly to the bedroom and her suitcase, she pulled out a pair of linen pants, a tank and a matching white linen blazer.
She couldn’t bring herself to care about the wrinkles.
Standard nude platform heels to give her a little height and she was dressed.
She’d have to call a car service to pick her up and deliver her to the Amarillo airport.
It would take the service forever to arrive, but she now had nothing on her hands but time.
Depression pulled at her, an ugly darkness that encouraged her to lie down and give in.
It would be so easy, to give in and sleep until she could flee, but all the same emotions would still be here when she woke.
The knowledge didn’t stop her from flopping onto the bed and staring at the waxed, tongue-and-groove pine ceiling. The ceiling fan circled fast enough to create eddies of cool air but not fast enough to dry the tears rolling down her temples.