Too Hot to Handle (Jackson Hole 2)

He watched her for a long moment without answering, his dark, weary eyes getting sadder as the seconds passed. “I did the right thing,” he finally said. “I’m sorry it took so long.”

“No! It’s your land and your family! I understand now why you fought it. Providence shouldn’t be built out of spite. It shouldn’t be brought back to life as a way of hurting you. That’s so wrong, Shane! Gideon Bishop did something terrible to you, and I don’t want to be a part of that.”

“You’re not, Merry. You’re the opposite of that. I’ve spent the past year so damn angry. Hell, more than the last year. When my dad left, it broke us. My whole family. My brother was angry from the age of nine on, and I was sucked into denial and delusion by my mom. She always believed he was out there somewhere. Always believed he was coming back. She made me believe it for a long time, too. When I finally woke up, I think I was angrier than my brother ever was.”

“Of course you were. You had every reason to be.”

“Apparently not.” He glanced up toward the hills.

“Did you decide to drop the lawsuit when you found him?” She was relieved at that. It’d had nothing to do with her.

But Shane shook his head. “No. I did that for you, Merry.”

“Shane, I—”

He cut off her alarmed words by taking her hand and tugging her a little closer. “You showed me what life could be like if I was willing to let go of the anger. To accept the past and live like I at least wanted to be happy.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You haven’t had a perfect life, but you don’t walk around angry and scared.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” she murmured, remembering the way she’d lashed out at Crystal. She’d also thrown a few choice words at Shane.

He smiled. “I know you get angry. You’re a woman, not a saint. But you see the possibility in things, Merry. You see it in every day. You see it in this pile of run-down buildings and spiderwebs. You even see it in me. And all I could see was a challenge to try to get back a little of what was taken from me. As if that would change anything.”

“But the money. It should be yours.”

“Why? Because I had the good grace to be born? I didn’t give my grandfather the time of day for over a decade. I didn’t even want his name. I told myself I wanted nothing from him then I happily took his land and demanded his money, too. Like a selfish damn child.”

“He was the one who was selfish!”

“And I was so much better?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. “Come on. Look what I did to you.”

She couldn’t argue with that. He’d used her and betrayed her. No matter what he was going through or how he’d tried to make it up to her, she couldn’t deny that.

His gaze fell. He turned her hand over in his and traced the lines of her palm with his thumb. “I’m so sorry, Merry. You made my life sweeter. You let me see things I needed to see. And all I did was hurt you.”

“That’s not true,” she whispered.

“Everything else I tainted with a lie.”

She curled her fingers and captured his. “That’s true. But you’ve taken that back now with an awfully grand gesture. I think we might be able to find a way to be friends again.”

“Friends,” he repeated.

Despite the way the word ached inside her, she nodded. “I don’t want you to be alone out here like this. It’s not right.”

He nodded, but then his forehead creased in a tortured frown. “I don’t want to be friends.”

“Oh.” She tried to tug her hand back. Right. Just because he’d given up the money didn’t mean he was happy about it.

But he didn’t let her go. “I’ve spent my whole life telling myself I’d never be good at this. That the men in my family were nothing but philanderers and escape artists and people who could never be counted on. Hell, all the way back to Providence, even. But I don’t have to be that. I can’t use that as an excuse just because love scares the hell out of me.”

Merry blinked. “Love?” she croaked.

“Yeah, I know. You might not even like me right now. You certainly don’t trust me. But that’s fine. That won’t stop me from loving who you are, Merry Kade. That won’t stop me from loving your smile and your laugh and the stupid jokes you crack when you’re nervous.”

“Oh.” She shook her head in shock.