The Cowboy's Wife For One Night

“Now?” she asked. “Why is now different?”

“Because I see everything differently now. My dad, my past, Africa. You. Especially you.”

Her fight-or-flight instincts kicked in and she stepped backward toward the door, but he grabbed her hand, pulling her close, and she had enough pride to resist.

“I’m looking right at you,” he whispered. The world fell away. The tack room. The guys outside. Her injuries, his carelessness. Everything vanished except for Jack McKibbon looking at her like she’d always dreamed.

Years too late.

“I’m tough,” she whispered, pulling her hand free, wrestling her heart loose. “But not that tough. I can only bend so far and you hurt me again…I’ll break.”

She heard Lucy in the barn, giving Chris a hard time, and she opened the door to the tack room, letting in cool air and distance. Distance that she needed.

“You can stay for two weeks. I do need your help around here, I can’t lie. But after that…” She shook her head. “Don’t come back.”

Mia stood next to Lucy at the horse paddock watching Blue graze on the grass in the south corner.

Well, Mia was watching Blue. Lucy was watching Mia.

“Stop it,” Mia whispered.

“I can’t,” Lucy said, resting her arms on the splintery beams of the fence. “Seriously, honey, you’re like watching a car crash. I just can’t look away.”

“It’s over,” Mia said, as if she’d said, he’s died. Odd that the end of her marriage felt like that, more now than when she’d brought up the divorce almost three months ago. Then there had been a twinge of pain, some embarrassment that he hadn’t fought back. And now that he was fighting back, the end of her marriage felt like a funeral. A death.

“I don’t think it was over last night when he followed you to your room and didn’t come back,” Lucy said, tossing long, straight black hair over her shoulder. Lucy’s hair was like a tame dog compared to Mia’s. Always shiny and pretty, it did what Lucy wanted. Mia had to wrestle her hair into a ponytail and then a hat just to be presentable. “Honestly, Mia, you should have seen Mom’s face. It’s like she’s counting the minutes until you give her grandkids.”

“There won’t be any grandkids. We’re getting a divorce.”

“Really?” Lucy asked. Mia nodded. Tears, stupid tears, welled up in her eyes and she dug her chin into the wood fence post.

“Then why are you crying?“ It was fairly obvious, so Mia just sniffed and kept her mouth shut. “You still love him.”

“Of course I love him!” she cried. “Christ, Lucy, look at the man.” She turned, flinging her arm out to where Jack was riding up from the south pasture. She had no idea how she knew he was there, she just did. The same way she knew where north was. He was a part of her compass and she was so scared that when he left, she’d be lost.

“The man looks good in a cowboy hat,” Lucy said with a low whistle. “If you go for that kind of thing.”

“I’m a rancher,” Mia grumbled. “I live for that kind of thing.”

“I can see your dilemma.”

The silence was soft, comfortable, and she realized in a heartbeat how much she missed her sister. How it had felt, when Lucy took Mom to LA, like part of her had gone missing.

And now that Lucy was back, Mia needed to unload the weight she carried. The baggage she stored and hid away, that could no longer be borne alone.

“He’s going to go to that university in two weeks and tell them he’s responsible for Oliver dying,” she blurted.

Lucy hung her head and muttered something under her breath. Mia thought she heard the words God complex.

“I know it’s crazy, and I think he knows it’s crazy. But I feel bad for him. I feel—”

“Come on, now, Mia. How many more years are you going to dedicate to loving a man who doesn’t love you back?”

“Ouch, Lucy.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I just…I can’t watch you put any more time into that man.”

“He says he sees me now, really sees me.” Mia looked over and caught her sister’s dumbstruck expression. “I think…I mean I know it sounds desperate, but I think he’s changing. I really do.”

“But can he change enough?” Lucy asked after a long moment.

Mia’s heart pulled and strained like one of the dogs on a leash.

“I don’t know,” she whispered.

“Well, I know!”

“Stop, please, just stop,” Mia whispered. She looked up at the blue sky, the white clouds. So much beauty and she simply didn’t care. The world could be gray and it wouldn’t make any difference. It would, in fact, only make Jack and his temptation that much brighter.

“Tell me something good,” she said, wanting some color in her life. Something to distract her from the neon that was Jack. “Tell me how your business is booming and all the movie stars are wearing your jewelry.”