One Bride for Four Ranchers

He must have felt so alone.

I have to change the subject, otherwise thinking about that young man—the young man who was brave enough to hop on a horse his father warned him against more than once—is going to make me cry. Freaking pregnancy hormones so aren’t helping me stay tough. “So we’re going to the high pasture?”

“That’s where most of our cattle are at the moment. We’re trying something called holistic herding.”

I pull my little recorder out of my purse and then click it on and point it toward Trey. “Sounds interesting. Can you explain it to me a little bit?”

“It’s basically a more natural way of grazing for the cattle. Instead of one huge area where they can graze, we confine them through a fencing grid to one smaller area pe

r day. We move them every day, which gives the land more time to recover. It’s more labor intensive and definitely takes more fencing, but by the time you get them back to their starting point on the grid, the land has had enough time to recover.”

I nod, fascinated at his explanations of the carbon changes in the soil and how something so simple as rotating the cattle through can help so much. For just a short time, my personal worries aren’t at the forefront of my mind.

Trey pulls off the side of the road into a large field, and I click off my recorder. I scan the horizon, but I don’t see any cattle. I turn back to him to tell him I think he’s in the wrong spot, but he isn’t looking for livestock. His eyes are locked on me.

“No cattle?” I say, feeling inane. But Trey just watches me for a long moment, as if searching for something in my gaze. The tension in the truck is so thick I almost want to hop out, get away. But I have to hear what Trey has to say.

“I misled you when I asked you to come out here with me today.”

Confusion cuts through some of the tension coursing through me. “What you mean?”

“I brought you up here to show you the cattle, which is still a ways up that road.” He nods at the road we’d been driving down until he pulled off. “But I also brought you out here because I wanted to talk to you alone. And that’s tough to do around the house with everyone coming in and out all the time.”

“What did you want to talk to me about, Trey?” I say, my voice soft. I feel like I already know, but I don’t dare guess wrong. Not with something like this.

He unbuckles his seatbelt and moves a little closer to me in the truck. He reaches out his hands for mine, and, unable to resist, I unbuckle my seatbelt as well and take his hands.

“I want you more than any woman since—” He shakes his head and glances down. But a split second later, his intense gaze is locked again on mine. His deep blue eyes carry no guile, just full, honest emotion. “Since my wife died.”

All of the air leaves the truck, and I squeeze Trey’s hands. I can’t find words for a long moment. “Your wife ?”

Trey nods, expression grave. “Claire. Her name was Claire.”

Nausea hits me. Oh, God. Poor Trey. “Was,” I say.

It isn’t a question, but Trey seems to take it as one. “She died, years ago. She was my high school sweetheart.” His jaw tenses. “I wasn’t where I should have been.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t your fault,” I say, words rushing out of me. My heart aches for him, and my chest is so tight that I think I might burst into tears at any moment.

“I was out on the range and I should have been there.” He squeezes my hands and I squeeze his back in support. “The ambulance didn’t get there in time to save her.”

I ache for him. And I want to point out all the arguments he’s no doubt heard before. That if the ambulance couldn’t get there in time, he couldn’t have done any better. That working out on the range is what he does, and I’m certain that Claire wouldn’t have expected anything different. That it wasn’t his fault.

“I’m so sorry,” I say, instead. Because there isn’t anything I can say to help him. I want so badly to ease his pain, but there’s not a damn thing I can do to help.

He gives me a tight smile. “Thank you. I appreciate that. I just...needed you to know where I’m coming from. Why I don’t do casual sex the same way Clay does. Why I’ve acted like a damn monk the last eight years.”

Eight years. How heartbreaking must it have been for him to lose his wife so young—he must have been barely in his mid-twenties. And so soon after his parents... It is difficult to imagine.

My voice is soft when I ask, “Why did you bring me out here, Trey?”

“I want you. More than I’ve ever wanted anyone since...” He shakes his head. “What I need to know is, do you want me, too?”

I say the first dumb thing that pops in my head. “Clay—”

“This isn’t about Clay,” he says, emphatically. “I’ve told Clay how I feel about you. And call me crazy, but I don’t give a shit about your history together. I care about you, and me, and this feeling between us. I think it’s real, but I need to make sure it’s real for you, too.” He rubs his thumbs over my hands. “Maybe this isn’t a happily ever after kind of thing. But whatever this is, however temporary, it isn’t something that happens to me every day. And I don’t want to let this go without exploring it.”

I’m speechless. I’m stunned at his forwardness—so freaking sexy when a man is willing to put himself out there for something that he wants. I’m stunned my history with Clay doesn’t bother him. But most of all I’m stunned at how much I want this. “There are reasons... Reasons that this is a bad idea.” I look down at my hands and watch his thumbs rhythmically glide over my skin.