15. Kaitlyn
FIFTEEN
Kaitlyn
After finishing my chores for the day, I hide out in Two-tone’s stall, finishing up the lecture I started this morning, trying to take notes while my mind drifts and wanders over everything that happened this morning with Damien’s brother.
James.
His name is James.
Even though I know it, I have a hard time calling him by name, even in my head, because it doesn’t fit him. Maybe because the only other James I know goes by Jimmy and is a crusty old cowboy who works for the Tanner outfit on the other side of the Morris ranch.
There’s nothing old or crusty about Damien’s brother.
He’s also nothing like anyone from California that I’ve ever met—not that I’ve met a whole lot. Mostly, when they come, it’s to the bigger towns and cities. Bozeman and Butte. Helena and Billings. We’re in a valley, slung low in between two small, nameless mountain ranges, seventy-five miles from the Canadian border and less than fifty from the Blackfeet reservation. No one would call Barrett Valley a tourist destination. I’d venture to guess that the majority of the world doesn’t even know we’re here—and that’s exactly how the people who live here like it. They don’t take to strangers. I imagine news of Damien’s brother’s residency would cause quite the stir with the town if they knew he was here.
I know he’s caused quite the stir with me.
Frowning at the laptop perched on my knees, I realize that while I’ve been thinking about beautiful, tattooed giants, ten minutes of the lecture I downloaded has passed me by and I haven’t taken a single note.
“Shit.”
Giving up, I close the laptop and set it aside while in front of me, Two-tone gives a soft nicker, the sound of it chiding me for my salty language.
“Be quiet,” I mutter at him while I fish around in my backpack for one of my notebooks. I have several—too many if Abbey is any judge.
What do you need so many notebooks for? You don’t go to school anymore so what gives?
She doesn’t know about the college classes. As much as I hate it, I’m not sure I can trust her with a secret that big. Not that she’d rat me out on purpose. No, I know she wouldn’t do that... but Abbey is careless. She’s never had to worry about a thing in her entire life. As the apple of our father’s eye, she’s always moved through life with a casual thoughtlessness that I hate and envy at the same time. If she blew my cover, it wouldn’t be because she meant to. It would be because she wouldn’t fully understand why it’s such a secret in the first place.
The only people who know about my going to college are my mom and Damien—and now, his brother.
My brother doesn’t count because even though I told him, he’s dead, so it’s not like he can tell anyone.
Finding the notebook I’m looking for, I open the dark blue cover and flip through several pages of handwritten lists before I get to the page where I’d last written something down.
Touch his tattoos.
Tracing my fingers over the words like they’re the real thing, I feel that damnable flush start to creep back into my cheeks. I’ve never been a blusher. Never been easily rattled or shaken. Ranch life isn’t for the faint of heart —that’s what my mother always says—and I pride myself on the fact that I’ve always been rock solid. Blushing and daydreaming about boys are not things I do... but put me in front of one gorgeous, tattooed man the size of a bull and I can’t seem to stop wondering what it would be like to touch him.
Maybe even kiss him.
Pulling a pen from the spiral of the notebook, I click it open and write it down.
Kiss him.
Reading what I just wrote, a flight of butterflies lifts off in my stomach, starting to swirl and bounce around in my gut until I’m dizzy and slightly sick to my stomach because I hardly know him. Scratch that—I don’t know him.
Like, at all.
Save for the fact that he’s easily the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen in my life and that he’s Damien’s brother, I don’t know anything about him.
You know he sleeps naked.
“Oh, no,” I say out loud. “I am not having this conversation with you.”
Why not?
“Because you’re my brother and that would be weird.”
We talked about Kelsey Hanover.
“And three years later, I’m still traumatized.” Laughing, I shake my head. “No thank you. I’d rather—”
Somewhere between the barn and the house, I hear the heavy slam of a truck door, the sound of it jolting me out of my one-sided conversation. Thinking it’s my parents, home from Helena ahead of schedule, I hastily bury my laptop under the fresh hay on Two-tone’s stall floor and stand, brushing the seat of my jeans clean on my way out, mentally preparing myself for the litany of questions my father is bound to have about our long-term houseguest.
Halfway through the barn, I recognize the truck parked about a dozen yards away. It’s not my father’s—it’s Brock Morris’s.
The butterflies in my stomach turn to lead and take a nosedive.
Stopping, midstride, I move back, deeper into the shadows of the barn and watch while Abbey comes out onto the porch, to greet him. I can hear them talking. He’s asking her if I’m around and she’s telling him she hasn’t seen me all day. The quick glance she flicks at the barn where I’m hiding tells me she knows exactly where I am and that she’s covering for me, rather than tell him where to find me.
Even thoughtless, careless Abbey knows that Brock Morris is someone I avoid at all costs.
Not for long—if you don’t figure something out, and fast, you’re going to spend the rest of your life staring at his smug—
“Well, how about you then?” Brock says while pulling his pristine, dark brown Stetson off his head. “ You want to go for a ride into town with me? We can stop at the diner and grab a milkshake.”
No.
Before I know what I’m doing, I’m striding through the shadowy barn and into the sun so fast, I’m temporarily blinded by the sudden change in light. “You looking for me?” I call out while I keep moving toward them. When he hears my voice, Brock turns, the corner of his mouth kicked up in a smirk. Damien’s brother gave me a look just like it earlier this morning and I couldn’t decide it I wanted to kiss him or slap him silly. I have no such dilemma when it comes to Brock Morris.
Kissing him never even enters my mind.
“There you are, Kaitydid,” Brock says, that smirk widening into a full-fledged grin when he sees me standing a few feet away. Flicking a quick look at the barn behind me, the grin hardens just a bit. “You in there hiding from me?”
“Yes.” I say it plainly. There is no love lost between Brock and me and I won’t pretend that there is, now that our fathers have finally settled on terms that will see us married.
Brock laughs at my answer but I can hear it. See it in the tight flex of his jaw—I pissed him off.
“Go on back in the house, Abbey.” I lift my gaze to give her a reassuring smile. “Mom called—she and Dad are about twenty miles out and she wants someone to pull that blue-ribbon casserole she made last week out of the freezer.” A complete and total lie but I tell it without guilt. Anything to get her out of here and away from Brock.
She hesitates for a few seconds, giving me a barely noticeable headshake while Brock and I watch each other like we’re waiting for the other to crack first. Before I can reissue my direction for her to go back in the house, I watch while she flicks her gaze over the top of my head and her shoulders instantly relax.
“Okay...” Giving Brock a smile that no one but me would know is fake, she lifts her hand in a wave. “See you later, Brock.”
“Yeah...” He turns his head to watch her walk up the porch steps with the kind of lascivious look that makes me want to poke his eyes out. “See you around, Abbey.” Turning back to look at me, the lecherous expression holds. “She sure did grow up, didn’t she?” Somehow, he makes the words grow up sound dirty enough to make my skin crawl.
Ignoring his obvious attempts to bait me, I take a couple of steps toward him, holding my ground when what I really want to do is run away. “Our date isn’t until Friday,” I remind him.
“I know...” Leaning against the front of his brand-new truck, he gives me that smirk again. “But I thought maybe you’d be interested in a dress rehearsal.”
I’d rather get kicked in the head by a two-ton steer.
“I’m not.” Flicking a quick glance at the front of the house to make sure Abbey went inside like I said, I take another step toward him and drop my tone. “Friday’s going to come soon enough, so maybe you should just climb back into your truck and—”
Something dangerous flashes in his hazel eyes, a second before his arm snaps out into the space between us and clamps its hand around my elbow, hard and fast enough to have me swallowing a startled yelp. Dragging me closer, Brock hauls me against him before I can even think about fighting back.
“You’ve always had a smart mouth, you know that?” He hisses it at me, fingers tightening their grip on my arm when I come to my senses and try to yank it loose. “Once we’re married, I’m gonna have to figure out a way to fix it.”
Mouth open to either spit in his face or scream my head off, I don’t get the chance to do either.
“Everything alright here?”
Damien.
My entire body starts to shake with relief while Brock flicks a quick dismissive look at the man standing behind me, watching our exchange.
“This doesn’t concern you, Bravebird,” Brock says, hard glare drilling into mine while he squeezes my arm so hard it goes numb. “We’re just talking about our date, Friday night. Making plans—ain’t that right, Kaitydid?”
Again, before I can either spit in his face or scream, Damien interrupts me.
“That may be, but I’m going to ask you to let her go, all the same.” I can hear it in Damien’s tone, even if Brock can’t—he’s about two seconds away from leaving civility behind. A quick glance over my shoulder all but confirms it. There’s Damien, in his heavy leather apron, glaring at Brock, his dark gaze narrowed down to dangerous slits a large, heavy shoeing hammer gripped in his fist.
“I think you might be forgetting your place, Bravebird,” Brock sneers at him, hazel glare still nailed to mine. “Kait and I are engaged. Practically married.”
“My place is right here,” Damien assures him quietly while the sound of his voice moves closer behind me. “ Let her go .”
The corner of Brock’s mouth twists into a nasty sneer while he lifts his gaze to find Damien’s. Whatever he sees behind me, loosens his grip on my arm and pushes him a step back.
“Alright then.” Lifting his hat, Brock settles it back onto his head. Touching the brim of it, he gives me one last smirk. “See you Friday, Kaitydid. ”
Moving around the front of his truck, Brock’s trajectory pushes me back, a safe distance away while I watch him climb into the driver’s seat and drive away.
“How long have you been standing there,” I ask Damien without bothering to look at him.
“Long enough.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” I say, my gaze glued to the tailgate of Brock’s retreating truck. “He’s going to tell his father. His father will tell my father and—”
“If your father fires me because I protected you, then he’s not the man I thought he was,” Damien says, his voice even closer as he moves into my peripheral. “And not the sort of man I want to work for.”
“All the same, you better be careful about going into town by yourself for the next couple of weeks—” I warn him. “especially at night.” Getting fired over what just happened is the least of his worries and we both know it.
Damien makes a soft, dismissive sound in the back of his throat while slipping his shoeing hammer back into its loop on his tool belt. “You want to tell me what that was all about?”
Watching Brock’s truck shrink in the distance, I shake my head. “No.”
Stubborn, Damien doesn’t give up. “Was he telling the truth?” Concern laces his tone. “Are the two of you getting married?”
Gaze still aimed at Brock’s tailgate in the distance, I feel the back of my eyes start to prickle with unshed tears.
I will not cry over Brock Morris.
Not ever again.
Swallowing hard, I push them away, keeping watch until Brock’s truck turns right at the end of our road. Heading toward town, it disappears completely before I answer Daimen’s question.
“Yes.”
Before he can ask me anymore questions, I turn away from the road and head back to the barn.