“What do you mean?” she says. “I don’t really have a choice. Frank only let me take a leave from my job with the Slammers temporarily so I could come out here and help you. I have to go back. My whole life, my career, it’s in Salt Lake City.”
Her whole life.
Even though I don’t fully understand why, those words make me grimace.
“Don’t get me wrong,” she continues. “I love it out here. I’ve loved the time I’ve spent here. Especially the time I’ve spent with you. Even when you were being a total asshat,” she teases, but I’m having a hard time finding anything funny right now. “I guess the reason I’m bringing this up is…because I don’t know where…we go from here. Me and you, I mean…”
She looks at me from across the table for a brief moment, but eventually, she looks down at her fingers as they fidget with her napkin.
“Well…” I pause and try to take a cleansing breath to ease the growing tightness in my chest. “It’s going to be pretty hard with you all the way in Salt Lake and me here on the ranch.”
“I know,” she agrees and meets my eyes again. “But, I mean, people do long-distance relationships all the time, right?”
“Yeah, I know a lot of people make long-distance work, but Leah, I don’t live a normal life out here. You know that as well as I do by now. You can’t just call me on the phone anytime, and the same goes for me callin’ you. And baby, I’d want to be callin’ you.”
“So, you don’t think we could make it work?”
I run a hand through my hair. “Do you think we could make it work?”
“During the season would be hard because of all the traveling I have to do, but in the off-season, I’d definitely have more time to come out and visit. And maybe you and Joey could come to Salt Lake and visit me sometimes?”
None of those options feel good, nor do they feel possible. I work twelve-, fourteen-hour days most of the time, and with ranch life, there isn’t an off-season.
Fuck.
“Leah, you’ve seen how my life is out here. And half of that time, my dad was still doing a lot on this ranch,” I answer honestly. “With him out of commission and me eventually taking it all over, the opportunities for me to leave for any extended period of time are slim. If any.”
Her shoulders sag, and she stares down at her lap again. “So…you don’t think we can make it work?”
I wish I could tell her that I did.
I wish I could tell her a lot of fucking things, all of which would make her and me feel better about this. But I got nothing.
She’s leaving.
And all of my responsibilities—the ranch, my daughter—they’re here.
Son of a bitch.
“I take it that’s a no, then,” she mutters, and her lip trembles with emotion. “You don’t think we can make it work.”
All I can do is shake my head. I’ve never been one to sugarcoat shit. And I sure as hell can’t risk sugarcoating shit when I have a little girl whose stability relies on me.
It’s going to be hard enough on Joey when Leah isn’t here anymore.
Hell, I don’t think I’ve fully realized the consequences of that, but I can’t imagine prolonging Joey’s pain with false hope that she’ll still get to see Leah sometimes.
This is a lose-lose situation all a-fucking-round.
The selfish part of me wants to tell Leah to stay, but how can I ask that of her when she just told me that her whole life is in Salt Lake?
Her career is important to her. She’s already made that very clear to me, and I refuse to be the man who asks a woman to give up on her dreams. Hell, we still haven’t given this, whatever it is that’s happening between us, an actual title.
None of it makes sense, but that doesn’t explain this sense of impending doom that sits inside my chest like a fucking rock.
“Well, I guess that settles it, then, huh?” she retorts, and I don’t miss the way her voice vibrates with anger. “You say we can’t make it work, so that’s that.”
“Leah, that’s not—”
“It’s fine, Rhett,” she cuts me off and stands up from her chair abruptly. Plate in hand, she takes it over to the trash can and scrapes a full helping of pasta into the bin.
“You’re mad at me,” I state, and she whips around to glare at me.
“I’m not mad,” she refutes, even though everything about her current defiant stance says the opposite. “Why would I be mad? If you don’t think we can make it work or it’s not worth trying to make it work, then that’s fine. I mean, it’s not like we’ve professed our love to each other, right? If anything, this is like a summer fling, you know? No big deal.”