“I don’t think you’ve lost him. He’ll come around. He’s just angry, and hurt.”

“Thought we were goin’ fishin’?” He needed to change the subject, or it was going to be a very depressing day for them both.

Bree pulled away from him and walked to the passenger door of his truck. He held it open for her, wanting so badly to lift her up into the seat, but more, he wanted to kiss her breath away. Maybe he should leave today, because resisting her was going to be increasingly harder to do.

Bree pointed to the mile marker on the right. “You turn off here,” she said. “And keep going straight down this dirt road for a mile or so.”

It didn’t look like a road to him. It looked more like a trail that a horse or a human could navigate on foot, not something a truck would be able to drive on. “You sure?”

She raised her eyebrow at him. “Can’t ever trust the girl knows what she’s talkin’ about, can you, Rice?”

Jace grinned. She was a feisty one. When they’d first met, it drove him crazy. She challenged everything he said, and she also accused him of being controlling. Which, he had to admit, he probably was. At least a little. Not with her though, never with her. This was a woman who knew her own mind and was never afraid to speak it.

It made him crazy with wanting her. He’d seen her softer side, and he craved it. When she let her guard down and let him comfort her, neither one of them needed to be in control.

“Jace? Are you listening?”

“What? No, I’m sorry. What did you say?”

“I said you missed the turnoff. You have to back up now, I don’t think there’s anywhere for you to turn around.”

“Damn. Sorry ’bout that, Bree. I got lost in thought there for a minute.” Jace put the truck in reverse, rested his arm on the back of the bench seat, and turned his head to see where he was going.

“What were you thinking about?”

He took his foot off the gas, and the truck stopped moving. “Fishin’,” he answered.

“I don’t believe you.”

He put the truck in park.

“Why are you stopping?”

“Because we gotta get somethin’ straight.”

“What’s that?” She folded her arms in front of her, like she did when she was about to rip into him for something.

“You can’t always ask me what I’m thinkin’ about.”

She lifted her chin. “Why not?”

“You aren’t always gonna like the answer, that’s why.”

She didn’t respond, and for a minute, Jace actually thought he’d shut her up. Wrong.

“You’re still hung up on my sister, aren’t you? That’s why you don’t want to tell me what you’re thinking about. And it’s also why you aren’t trying very hard to make up with Tucker.”

That stung. Sure, there had been a time when he believed he was in love with Blythe. And Bree was never going to let him forget it. Tucker had pulled one of his disappearing acts, and Jace felt it was his duty to be there for the woman his brother had gotten pregnant.

In hindsight, he might’ve believed that by selflessly stepping in to help Blythe, he would somehow atone for the sins of his past. It had been a ridiculous notion. One he wasn’t sure he had been consciously aware of at the time.

But to say that he wasn’t trying to make up with his brother, was like a slap across the face. He wanted nothing more than to find a way to get Tuck to forgive him.

“I knew it,” he heard her mumble.

“You don’t know anything,” he growled at her. “You think you’re so damn smart. You got it all figured out, don’t ya? Well, I tell ya, sister, you couldn’t be more wrong.”

“Uh huh.”

Tags: Heather Slade Cowboys of Crested Butte Romance
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