A Cowboy's Temptation

In her office, she taped up a box of paper records for the business. Everything was backed up electronically, but the originals she’d put in storage in a facility in Denver. She also had some books and photographs she wouldn’t need right away, and there were a few of her great-aunt’s possessions that she’d keep forever. Everything but her day-to-day essentials could be stored until she had a place of her own at some point in the future.

She wouldn’t keep a single memento of Seth. Not that she had anything to keep. But if she did, she wouldn’t want it. She’d been struggling for days not to think about him, because every time her mind went in his direction, she felt as if her heart was being crushed inside her chest.

Deep down, she was forced to accept that the man she’d fallen in love with didn’t really exist. But he’d seemed so real at the time. He’d seemed so incredibly real that her subconscious didn’t want to let go of the fantasy.

At night, she dreamed about him, waking up alone and upset, aggravated by her overwhelming longing to hear his voice once again and to feel his body pressed up against hers.

He was gone.

It was done.

She was stronger than this.

“Darby?”

She whirled around at the sound of his voice, half expecting him to be an illusion.

He wasn’t. He was standing in the doorway of her office, looking as sexy and handsome as ever in a tux, causing her heart to thud in her chest and her traitorous body to lurch involuntarily toward him. She stopped herself just in time.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, proud of her even, dispassionate tone. There was no way in the world she was going to let him see how badly he’d hurt her.

He took a pace into the room. “I thought we could talk.”

“About what?” And why here? Not here. The first time they’d made love was in this room.

“The same thing we’ve been talking about for the past few weeks.”

She looked him up and down, struggling hard to keep her expression from giving away how desperately she’d missed him. “There’s nothing left to talk about. You won, I lost, game over.”

He moved closer still. “Darby.”

“Stay right where you are, Seth. I didn’t invite you to come in.”

He stopped. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “What makes you think you hurt me?”

He glanced around the room. “I know how much this place means to you.”

She gave an unconcerned shrug. “Spoils of war. I’ll start over someplace else.”

“Is that a military metaphor?”

“I think it’s in the general lexicon. Why are you here?”

Every second he stayed, she felt herself winding tighter and tighter. He’d hurt her. He’d hurt her badly. But she still had her pride. She would not let him see her break down.

He took one step closer. They were only about six feet apart.

“That last night,” he said.

“You mean the night you duped me?” She gritted her teeth, willing herself not to remember even a moment of that night.

“I didn’t know,” he said.

“Didn’t know what?”

“That Danielle had succeeded. That we’d won the appeal.”

His assertion seemed like a ridiculous splitting of hairs. Her arms dropped back to her sides, and her hands clenched into fists.

“But you knew there was an appeal,” she accused.

“Yes,” he admitted.

“And you expected to win.”

He nodded.

“Yet you pretended it was still a fair fight. That we had weeks.” She stopped for a moment, fearing her voice would crack. “That one of us was going to win based on the referendum.”

He didn’t answer.

“You used sex to distract me.”

Seth opened his mouth to speak.

She didn’t let him. “I did that, too, Seth. There’s no need to apologize. I used every weapon in my arsenal to defeat you, and I wouldn’t have been sorry if I’d won.”

“I’m not sorry I won,” he allowed. “I am sorry you lost.”

She scoffed out a laugh. “You can’t have it both ways.”

“Travis told me about Sierra Hotel.”

“What about it?”

“What you do. The women you serve. Their duty and sacrifice.”

Abigail had obviously told Travis. It didn’t matter. There was no secret left to keep.

“It’s a loss to the country,” Seth said.

“It’s none of your business. Seriously, Seth. You need to go now. We’re done. Everything between us is done.”

“Everything?” he asked, with yet another step toward her.

“Everything,” she assured him, fighting an urge to fall back, then fighting an even stronger urge to rush forward.

As she’d asked herself the night in the mayor’s mansion, a tiny, rebellious part of her brain wondered how much harm it would do to kiss him once more, maybe even sleep with him once more. It would be a chance to say goodbye.

She thought she saw a flash of pain cross his expression. But he quickly neutralized it.

“So that’s all there was?” he asked. “The fight? It was the only thing ever between us?”

“What else would there have been?” she managed airily, her stomach clenching with the effort and her chest hollowing out.

“We made love, Darby.”

“That was sex, Seth.”

“Right.” His jaw tightened, and his blue eyes went hard. “You only slept with me to distract me.”

“I believe I made that perfectly clear at the time.”

Why, oh, why didn’t he leave? She didn’t know how much longer she could keep this up.

“And nothing changed?” he pressed.

“Did anything change for you?” she challenged. “Between the time I first confronted you to the time you went to the appeal court without telling me, did something change? Did you ever stop and think maybe I was right and you were wrong?”

“I wasn’t wrong,” he said.

“You weren’t,” she agreed with finality. “You did what was right for Lyndon, and you can sleep well tonight. I was collateral damage, and I accept that, but you don’t need to stand there and gloat. Now I’m asking you to leave my house. Please go.”

She reached across the desk for another cardboard box, pressing open the flaps, and blindly grabbing the nearest stack of books to place inside.

He was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, there was a hollow tone to his voice. “Goodbye, Darby.”

She didn’t look up. “Goodbye, Seth.”

* * *

Seth stopped on Darby’s front porch, gripping the post at the top of the stairs and closing his eyes as a wave of anguish and regret washed over him. He remembered her sassy jokes, their passionate kisses and how on that last night, they’d made it past each other’s defenses to their hopes and fears. He had to believe those were Darby’s true hopes and fears. He couldn’t imagine she’d been faking everything.

Marta’s voice broke through the jumble of his thoughts. “I’m not sure you’re as much of a jerk as you appear.”

He opened his eyes to see her standing at the bottom of the staircase, feet planted apart, hands on her hips, late-afternoon sun hanging in the sky behind her.

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” he asked.

“You played your hand very well.”

“I’m not sure about that one, either,” he responded. “Compliment?”

“Actually, it is. I’d have done the same thing you did. But what I don’t get is the sex.”

He couldn’t figure out where she was going. “What’s not to get? It was sex.”

“Darby flirting with you, now that was a tactical maneuver, put you off balance, maybe let your guard down and give her some valuable information. But you actually having sex with her as a tactical maneuver. Well, you’re either a coldhearted son of a bitch who used her for nothing more than physical gratification…”

Seth felt his blood pressure go up.

“Or,” Marta continued, tone laced with speculation, “you had actual feelings for her.”

“I’m not a coldhearted son of a bitch.”

Marta smiled. “That’s what I thought. You know what she’s going to do.”

“Reenlist.”

“That’s right. So if you can think of a single thing you can do to fix this, I’d suggest you do it. And you’d better do it now.”

Seth was afraid to speculate on Marta’s motives, what Darby might have confided in her. He didn’t dare let himself start to hope.

“Why are you telling me this?” he asked, pleading inside that she’d give him something positive to go on.

“Like I said, I don’t think you’re as much of a jerk as you seem.”

“Did Darby say something about me?”