Chapter 26 – Sunshine
TWENTY-SIX
SUNSHINE
“Who, him?” Tag asked, his eyes piercing.
“Just pull up and let me out. I’ll deal with this.”
Tag growled something under his breath, but he did pull his truck into the area in front of the Lodge.
The second I stepped out of the truck, the back doors of the first SUV opened and two large men wearing fitted suits, tight buzz cuts and aviators, stepped onto the gravel area.
Once they were standing in front of me, the back passenger door to the second SUV opened and out stepped a distinguished man of underdetermined years.
His custom fit suit was gray, Armani, because that’s all he wore, and his silver hair was slicked back over his forehead with a high performing gel. His face was utterly without wrinkles and his eyelids were a little weird due to the amount of work he’d had done.
“Kaitlyn,” he said gently, his arms open as if to embrace me, but everyone in the company knew to stay at least three steps away.
The founder of Berkley and Brothers was a germaphobe and didn’t care for people in his personal space. Fun fact, he didn’t have any brothers, either. The brothers were how he characterized his first partners.
Naturally, they were all men.
“Mr. Berkley,” I nodded, respectfully.
“You’ve certainly adjusted to your environment,” he murmured, taking in my jeans, boots and cowboy hat. “That speaks to adaptability. A quality I very much admire.”
“Is this your first time visiting my home state of Wyoming?” I asked, as if we were having a breakfast meeting and not staring at each other over two hired bodyguards.
“Oh, gracious, no. I own a home in Jackson Hole.”
“You ski then?” I asked.
“Hmm?”
No. Of course, Mr. Berkley didn’t ski. Mr. Berkley simply collected properties.
“What do I owe the honor of your visit?” I asked, keeping up the pretense that this was nothing more than a casual stop.
“Kaitlyn,” he said, with a smile that showed no real emotion. “We’ve missed you. Although, I understand this loss has hit you hard.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. Mostly, because I had been low key lying about the whole situation. Yes, technically I had lost a family member, which constituted a family crisis, but my feelings for Old Man McGraw were tenuous at best.
What had hit me, was the sense of coming home to something I hadn’t even realized I was missing.
“When Jared said you were doing some trading for personal gain, I was concerned that your grief and emotions were starting to override your logical thinking. ”
“Just helping some family members out of a jam,” I said, casually. As if I hadn’t just orchestrated the single biggest pay off of my trading career.
“Yes, of course. A once in a lifetime talent like yours, it’s hard not to use your skills for those you love, but as you’re aware, as an organization, we frown on too much of that. You understand why. At Berkley and Brothers, we strive to put our clients first.”
I nodded. This was all code for the fact that my time away from Berkley was over.
Or else.
“Of course, sir. I accomplished what I needed to do here,” I admitted.
“Excellent,” he mused. “Then you’re ready to come back into the fold?”
I nodded. There was no getting around it. I’d procrastinated here long enough. It was time to go back to New York. Back to my job. Back to my life.
That was reality.
Last Hope Gulch had just been a detour. Maybe the best one of my life.
“Yes. I’d planned to fly back to New York as soon as tomorrow. You didn’t have to come all the way out here.”
“Kaitlyn, you underestimate your value to us. You must know you’re on the short list to make partner.”
“How short is that list?” a voice over my shoulder asked.
I swung around to see Tag standing right behind me. His cowboy hat rode low over his forehead and his aviators showed nothing of his expression. For the record, he wore his aviators far better than Mr. Berkley’s bodyguards.
I couldn’t imagine what Mr. Berkley saw when looking at Tag. Probably, that he was an entirely different species of man .
It wasn’t lost on me that Mr. Berkley’s bodyguards, men he never traveled without, given his considerable net worth, both stood taller once Tag approached us.
They recognized a threat.
Mr. Berkley tilted his head as if assessing this new situation. “I’m sorry, are you a friend or family to Kaitlyn?”
“A friend.”
I shook my head because I didn’t need Tag inserting himself in this situation. It would only result in Mr. Berkley being more falsely gracious.
“Tag, I’ve got this,” I said to him.
“Sure you do, darlin. This here your boss?”
I nodded.
“Seems like the boss flies all the way out to Wyoming to get you back, rents these fancy SUVs and all, that short list must be pretty damn short. So short, maybe it’s time you finally got off it and they made you a partner.”
“Tag,” I snapped. “I mean it. Back off. This is my business, not yours.”
He frowned and turned his head to the right. I could see the back of his jaw clenching. He knew what I’d said was true. But I also knew he didn’t like it.
He’d said it several times during my stay in town. While I was here, I’d been his to take care of. But, he’d ended all that last night. He knew it.
Knew it, and didn’t like it.
“You’ve obviously got good people looking out for you,” Mr. Berkley nodded and looked around.
Not just toward Tag, but in the direction of the convoy that was now pulling in behind us. Carter and the kids, Ethan, Harmony and Mac. Amity and Bliss would have been dropped off in town.
“Family,” I said, feeling a lump of emotion lodge deep in my throat.
“I see,” Mr. Berkley said. Although maybe he didn’t, because those brothers of his weren’t actually family. Just other men he did business with.
He clapped his hands together. “Excellent. Always good to have support. I’m thinking maybe you want to collect your things? We can fly back on my jet tonight.”
“Sunshine,” Tag said, his voice low behind me. I heard everything in his voice. Everything we both felt. He’d broken me, but he’d broken something in himself, too. It was better that I leave, so we could get over what we’d done to each other.
I walked up to him and put my hands on either side of his face. I pulled off his aviators because I wanted to see his eyes.
Leaning into him, I pressed my lips against his. “It’s better this way. Clean break.”
“Clean break,” he agreed.
I looked over Tag’s shoulder to Carter. “The fate of the Swinging D is in your hands, now.”
For once, his kids were standing still in front of him, as if they knew how important this place was. To everyone.
“I got it,” he said.
“Harmony, send me my things. And tell Mom I’ll call.”
“I will.” Harmony hugged me hard enough to bend my bones. “Don’t forget you’re still on the family group chat.”
“Use it sparingly, please.”
Only, I hoped they didn’t.
I turned toward Mr. Berkley.
“I don’t need to collect anything. I can come with you now.” My phone was stuffed in the back pocket of my jeans, and when I considered everything else, none of it mattered .
Because if I had to go back inside to collect my city clothes, I might change my mind. I might decide that I could stay here. Forever.
As if being a broker in Last Hope Gulch was even possible.
“Excellent. And away we go.”
He turned to walk back to his SUV and I followed him.
“Ethan,” I called out, without turning around. “Take care of my sister.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Mac, make peace with Amity.” It was the last piece of older sister advice I could think to give him.
“Never going to happen,” he returned.
Then Mr. Berkley was opening the door to the back passenger seat of his SUV while his bodyguards got in the first car.
I stopped before climbing inside, and found Tag, who hadn’t moved an inch.
In my head, I had this desperate wish that he might come after me, lift me up over his shoulder and take me back to our cabin like the caveman I knew him to be.
But beyond his caveman self, Taggart Durham was also a very practical man.
He knew it could never work between us, so it was better to end things now before anything got too deep.
Only, I didn’t know how deep I already was.
Puddle deep?
Kiddy pool deep?
River deep?
Ocean deep?
I thought of what I could say to him. Something memorable. Something that would let him know what all of this meant to me .
But, I didn’t have the words.
“You’ll tell Pop I said goodbye?” I asked him.
He nodded once.
“Kaitlyn?” Mr. Berkley asked, as if not understanding what was preventing me from jumping into the back of the SUV. “You’re not having second thoughts?”
He said it as if it wasn’t even remotely a possibility. I looked away from Tag and back at my boss.
I’d worked towards this partnership for nearly ten years. It was everything I’d ever wanted. The city, my apartment in the Upper East Side. A place I truly belonged.
A little over a week in Last Hope Gulch couldn’t change all that.
Could it?
I shook my head. “No,” I said. “No second thoughts.”
I wouldn’t look back at Tag again.
Hopping into the backseat, I slid all the way to the edge of the bench seat to give Mr. Berkley as much personal space as he required. I could hear the thunk of the door closing behind him, sealing us off from the world. The engine engage as we started driving away.
Don’t look back. Don’t look back.
“I’m sure you’ll be happy to be out of those primitive clothes as soon as we arrive in New York.”
I reached up to take my cowboy hat off and placed it in my lap. The cowboy hat I’d risked my life to get, because it felt that important to have.
“Yes, it will be good to get back to…normal.”
Mr. Berkley nodded. “Yes, that’s exactly what you need to recover from your loss. Normalcy. And what’s normal for Berkley and Brothers?”
“Making money,” I answered, like I knew he expected .
“That’s right. Making money. Once you’re doing that again you’ll forget all about your little hometown.”
There had been a time in my life when that’s all I’d wanted to do.
But I didn’t think it would be true anymore.
Tag
I watched the two SUVs drive away from the Lodge, back to the main road that would lead them to the local airstrip where I was sure there was a fancy, private jet waiting for them to whisk Sunshine away.
“Wow,” Ethan said, walking toward me, only to stand there and watch the same scene I was seeing.
Sunshine leaving.
“What?”
“I just didn’t realize how incredibly stupid you are.”
I looked at Ethan and told myself I could not kill one of the town’s few doctors.
“Kids,” Carter barked at them. “Get back in the minivan. And let this be a lesson to you, this is exactly what you don’t want to do once you’ve found the person you’re supposed to be with. Your Uncle Tag is a dumb-dumb.”
“ Uncle Tag is a dumb-dumb ,” Luke sang, even as the kid climbed back into his seat. “ Uncle Tag is a dumb-dumb!”
“I don’t think we’re allowed to call adults dumb-dumb, Dad,” Taylor, Carter’s oldest, scolded her father. “You’re not setting a very good example.”
“I never am, Pea,” Carter admitted. “But I’m right about this one.” He slid the minivan door closed and gave me a wave.
I countered with the bird.
Mac clapped his hand on my shoulder. “Don’t listen to them. You did the right thing.”
“You think so?”
“Love is fleeting. One minute, you have this thing in your chest…pretty sure it’s called a heart. The next thing you know, the person you love is ripping it out, stomping on it with her cowboy boots, and you’ll never eat her mac & cheese again. Best to avoid the whole situation altogether.”
“Thanks for the perspective, Mac,” I said dryly.
He patted my shoulder a few more times, then nodded. “Happy to help. Whelp, I’m off to the bunk house. Nice to know things will get back to normal around here. Won’t miss her at all. Can you imagine? She wanted to give me dating advice. As if I needed an older sister.”
Mac walked off and Ethan and I were left standing in front of the Lodge.
“I thought you were coming up with a plan to keep her here,” Ethan said.
“There was no plan. She doesn’t belong here. Everyone’s feeling sad right now, including her, but they’ll come to see we were both right. Her place is back in the city.”
“Or, you’re wrong. And you just let the best thing that ever entered your life walk away without a fight. Sorry, but I’m with Carter on this. What a dumb-dumb.”
Ethan went inside, and with nothing else to do, I got back in my truck and headed to my cabin. When I walked through the door, I thought all I could see was her. All I could smell was her.
The absence felt too damn big. So, I did what any sane man would do, found my pop’s good bottle of bourbon in the cabinet above the refrigerator, and then opened up all the windows to let new air come in and clear her out completely.
After finishing off the bottle, the night air filling up the cabin, I fell asleep on the couch, not even wanting to think about the bed I knew would still smell like her.
My last conscious thought…Carter was right.
I was a dumb-dumb.