Chapter 8
When I went out to milk the cow this morning, I found him lying in the field. There were buzzards overhead already and I was certain he was dead. He was breathing, but just barely.
He was wrecked. He’d never shown so much restraint in his life as he had in that moment when he’d decided to release his hold on Cassidy and let her fling herself to the ground and out of his arms.
He’d been so close to her. He’d seen the constellation of color in her eyes. The dark brown at the center flecked with green, and ringed in gold.
The need to touch her, to kiss her, had been almost unbearable. When he’d touched her ankle and started to release her from the saddle, he’d …
God.
It was an ankle. Just an ankle, yet he’d felt all his restraint, all his better judgment, flee his body.
It was their confounding, ridiculous chemistry. Made worse by the story she’d told about her past, and God knew he’d never had that experience before. Never had knowing a woman made him feel even more drawn to her.
But her past sounded …
It sounded like hell, and he wanted to find her mother and yell her down to the ground about the way she’d treated that little girl. Dragging her around Florida, leaving her in strip clubs, and then abandoning her at her father’s house without even knowing if he was there.
He’d imagined her joining the Wilders like a custody exchange.
Hell, he didn’t know their family lore. He knew Cassidy had come to Rustler Mountain.
He’d known their dad had died. He hadn’t realized the timing of the two events.
That her father had died before Cassidy’s arrival and the brothers had been responsible for her from day one without any warning or preparation.
Then he’d shared his shit with her, things he’d never even told Jessie Jane, because what was the point in talking about any of it?
He’d gotten his diagnosis, and it had made him even surer that his parents’ issues were diagnosable, but he also knew his dad would never listen, and his mom just …
Maybe she’d care. It was hard to say.
She loved him, though. He knew that much, but Cassidy’s mom …
Well, it was clear she only loved herself.
Maybe Cassidy needed a fairy tale to keep herself from feeling too bad about all of it, and he could understand that. West just felt mad.
But somehow all this history was intensifying the attraction he felt for her, and …
And she was going out of town with Dalton Wade. He’d been sure that Dalton wasn’t into her, but now he had to wonder if the guy was engineering a trip away to hook up with Cassidy.
If they weren’t hooking up already.
He considered that possibility as he sat in front of his cowboy boots in his chair, in his living room back at the trailer.
He was thinking about going out, and he should do it. He should go get laid so he could scratch the itch that was dogging him. Three months since he’d had sex—it was ridiculous. His dick was going to die of neglect.
Though it had felt healthy enough earlier today.
Dammit.
He stopped thinking and did what he did best. He acted. He put his boots on, got into his truck, and started the journey toward Rustler Mountain. He blanked out Cassidy. He blanked out what he’d told her about himself, what she’d told him.
He just played music and drove too fast, and he felt like a teenager, but maybe that was okay right now.
Because God knew that teenage West wouldn’t care who the woman was. And he needed to get in that headspace. As quickly as possible. Because he just wasn’t …
This fixation would pass. After hearing her story, he especially didn’t want to make Cassidy collateral damage of his … his impulsivity. His intensity.
No. So he drove on and took the closest parking spot to the bar.
He was already making his plan. He wouldn’t take the woman back to his place.
He never did that. If she wanted to invite him back to hers, fine.
But it made the most sense to get a room.
There were no cheap chain motels, but he could afford a nice room.
There were no events happening in town, so the inns wouldn’t be full.
None of them had very many rooms, and there was something kind of funny about doing a one-night stand in a four-poster bed with a handmade quilt on it, but it was a tourist town. He would take what he could get.
He got out of the truck and regretted not bringing a coat. It was cold. He had stomped out of the house wearing nothing but a T-shirt, but he had felt overheated at the time, and since then, he’d calmed down. Now he could feel the weather, not just the impression of Cassidy’s body against his.
He stomped into the bar, knowing that he looked like he was in a black mood, and also knowing that it would probably work in his favor. He knew that women liked a man with intensity. And that was all he had right now.
There were a lot of girls from out of town in the bar. He didn’t recognize any of the women standing back by the jukebox, wearing denim that wrapped tightly around their curves and shirts that revealed just enough for him to know exactly what he would be getting. It would be good.
Sometimes he thought sex was like pizza.
He could have a kind he didn’t especially want, from a place he didn’t especially care for, and it would still be pretty great.
He was about to move forward, to join the knot of women, when he spotted Dalton Wade out of the corner of his eye.
The first thing he thought of was Cassidy.
Cassidy telling him that she was going away with Dalton.
What was he doing here? If he was going away with Cassidy in just a couple of weeks …
Maybe Cassidy was here too.
He looked around the bar, but he already knew she wasn’t here. Because he couldn’t feel her.
When she was around, he could feel it. Like lightning in his veins. Like something on the wind.
He watched Dalton walk up to a redhead, smiling. The other man chatted her up for a bit, and West was pretty sure he offered to buy her a drink. She went to sit at one of the tables, and Dalton began to walk his way. Without giving it much thought, West reached out and thumped him on the shoulder.
“Hey,” he said.
Dalton looked at him, then over his shoulder. “Yes?”
Okay. Maybe he didn’t talk to Dalton usually. Maybe it was a little weird that he was doing it now. But there was a time and a place for everything. This was the time. And the place.
“Just thought I would say hi. It’s funny to see you, because Cassidy and I were talking about you earlier.”
Dalton paused. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“And what was the topic of conversation?” The other man’s manner was standoffish.
“I guess the two of you are going away? She asked for some time off.”
“Yeah. Cassidy is a great judge of horses, and I’m taking her up to a stable to look at a couple that I’m thinking about buying. I’d rather have her with me than just about anybody else.”
“I see.” He was staring at Dalton, but he couldn’t quite read his meaning. Maybe he just wanted her opinion on the horses. Maybe that was the whole story. Maybe there was nothing more to it.
“I haven’t talked to Flynn about it yet.”
That sent his radar up a bit. “Are you asking me not to spread it around?”
“No,” Dalton said. “Because I don’t know why you would, except it’s a little weird that it was a topic this afternoon.”
“Cassidy mentioned it to me, that’s all. Just thought it was a coincidence that I ran into you. She’s doing a great job with the trick riding, by the way. You were concerned.”
“I had no doubt that she would. I don’t remember expressing concern. I remember being confident that she could do it if she wanted to.”
“Sure,” Wes said. “Anyway. Just … she can’t go after the eighteenth.”
“She can talk to me about the timing herself.”
“Yeah. She can.”
“Excuse me. I have to go buy a drink for a lady.”
“Do you?”
“It’s why I’m here. I assume it’s why you’re here.”
“It is.”
He squared off with Dalton for a moment, and their combative stance made him think of the shoot-out portion of the Wild West Show.
Dalton was riled up. West couldn’t blame him. He’d thought Dalton and Cassidy didn’t have chemistry, but damn, what man would be immune to Cassidy’s staring at him the way she stared at Dalton?
What man wouldn’t want all the caring she was capable of?
Even if he wouldn’t know what the hell to do with her.
West didn’t, not emotionally.
Dalton wouldn’t, not physically.
But just as he was about to push the conversation a little bit further, the door to the bar opened, and in came the Wilder clan. All the brothers, their partners, and Cassidy.
“Shit,” Dalton said.
He had muttered the word, but West found it particularly interesting. Clearly, he didn’t want the Wilders to know he was going to be hooking up.
Well, West could kind of understand. He didn’t exactly like his having a front-row seat to his seduction attempts.
He looked into the group, and Cassidy saw him, her cheeks turning pink.
Then she saw Dalton. The color deepened.
Well.
He didn’t want to be in the middle of all this.
“Are you going to join us?” Cassidy asked.
“I wasn’t planning on it,” West said at the same time Dalton said, “Sure.”
They looked at each other.
West realized belatedly that of course Cassidy was asking Dalton, not him.
“You should join us,” Jessie Jane said before he could say anything else.
“Why exactly?” he asked.
“Because you’re my brother, and I love you.”
“I’m not here to have family dinner.”
“Are you actually going to chase women with me here?”
He looked over at Perry, whom he had kissed; it had been a pretty nice kiss. “How are you?”
The smile she gave him was small, and slightly amused. “Better than ever.”
“So glad to hear it.”
“And how is rehearsal going?” Carson asked, stepping between them and sticking his hand out. West had a fair idea that he was doing that to keep himself from punching his onetime rival in the face. Fair.
“Oh, it’s going well,” Cassidy said, turning toward her brother.
Carson, for his part, didn’t take his focus away from West. Not even for a moment. “Is that so?”