She needed to sort herself out. She had been using him because he made her feel good. And she suspected he had been using her too. Using her to avoid thinking too much about Rose and his nephew. His life had majorly changed and they had jumped into sleeping together because…well for herself, she’d needed to comfort him and be with him.
She didn’t know why he’d done it. He said he loved her but she knew that it took longer than a few weeks to fall in love. Didn’t it? She’d never been in love with a guy or had one fall for her.
Of course, her dad had said he’d fallen for her mom in a few hours. But she wasn’t sure she could trust her feelings.
“I think you need time too,” she said at last. “You are dealing with a big change in your family—”
“I know what I’m dealing with. And I’ve got this. I always have.”
He definitely always had. Cal had been the one the boys and Rose had turned to even when they were kids. He’d always taken care of everyone. She wished she were different, so she could be the one who took care of him. She thought that she was doing that with sex, but he needed more from her than that. She knew it now. Maybe she had always known it but hadn’t wanted to admit it.
“You’re right. But you are definitely using this as a distraction to keep you from dealing with—”
“Don’t. Don’t try to tell me that I’m compartmentalizing my life. I know that I am. I’ve been doing it since my high school girlfriend slept with me and then ghosted. Hell, I think I’ve been doing it since my mom died. It’s how I survive, and it works.”
“I wasn’t asking you to change,” she said quietly.
“I know you weren’t. I’m going to get out of here. I’ll see you around,” he said, walking out of the kitchen and down the hall to the bedroom. She heard him moving around and stood there like she was rooted to the spot. This hurt worse than just about anything she’d ever experienced because she knew that he wouldn’t come back to her. And she wasn’t sure she would be able to change enough to be the woman he needed her to be.
She wanted to cry but wouldn’t let herself do it until he came out of her bedroom all dressed, his boot heels ringing in her empty house and walked out the door. She stood there by the back door, refusing to look out and watch him leave, but she heard the hemi motor in his truck as he roared out of her driveway and down her street. Only then did she stumble to the kitchen table and collapse into the chair. She put her head on her arms and cried.
She didn’t try to pretend that it wasn’t heartbreak making her cry. She loved Cal. She knew that. But what he wanted from her was more than she was ever going to be able to give. Letting him leave her was the only option that had made any sense but it hurt far worse than she had expected.
She wasn’t someone who gave up easily. She’d gone after a career as a high-end model and had been very successful at it, but in relationships, it was different. In her career, she had never felt like she had anything to lose, but in relationships she always—always found herself like this.
Alone.
Damn, she was starting to feel sorry for herself.
Her phone rang. Not her cell phone but the landline that her parents had insisted she have installed when she moved back home. She ignored it at first but then realized it could be about her mom.
She stood up so quickly the chair fell over as she ran to grab the handset of the phone from the wall.
“Hello.”
“It’s Dad. I’m taking your mom to the hospital. She’s not responsive. Call your sisters and meet me there,” he said.
“Okay, Dad. We’ll be right there. Love you.”
“Love you too, honey.”
He hung up and she called her sisters and then went to pick them up. The entire time she was trying to ignore the one fact that she couldn’t anymore. She thought she’d been protecting herself by leaving Last Stand. By letting Cal go and her parents go. But the truth was, love was there in her heart and in her soul the entire time. And no matter how strong she’d believed she was, she knew that it was that love that added the steel to her backbone and the strength to her life.
As she watched her father standing in the waiting area, anxious to hear about her mom, she recognized the look in his eyes. Realized that the pain and the fear was the same thing she’d seen in Cal’s eyes that morning. And she knew she had to figure out a way to love him and get him back into her life.
Chapter Fifteen
Cal wasn’t in any mood to talk to his brothers and as soon as he got home, he went into his office and closed the door. But that didn’t deter either of them.
Finn didn’t even bother knocking. He just came in and plopped down on the leather sofa and stretched his legs out in front of him. “Didn’t expect to see you today. I heard you left the saloon last night with Amelia.”
“Yeah, so what of it?” Cal said. He knew he sounded belligerent but the last thing he wanted was talk about her.
“Dude, you’re not doing it right if you are pissed off when you leave your woman,” Finn said.
“I’m doing it just fine,” he said.
“I wasn’t critiquing you, just saying that…do you think she’s the right woman for you?” Finn asked. “I remember when she left—just because it was right before things started taking off for me and you were messed up for a while.”
“Yeah, thanks for reminding me,” he said. “I know I seem like some sort of dumb asshole for hooking up with her, Finn. You don’t have to point it out.”
“I don’t think that at all,” he said. “I know you. You aren’t someone who just sleeps around as much as you might want to come off that way.”
He didn’t want to discuss this. He thought of the women he’d been in relationships with, now that Finn had brought them up. He’d had some really good women care for him and tell him that they loved him over the years, but he’d always been the one who didn’t want to commit. Now it seemed that was all down to Amelia. His feelings for her had been buried deep inside, just lying dormant and waiting until she came back.
“I like being a loner; you know that, right? I’m not one of those guys who has to be in a relationship to feel like I’m successful,” he said.
“I know. But she’s different and she always has been,” Finn said. “I don’t know about Braden but you and me, we’ve always been good about keeping moving so nothing can tie us down. But Amelia, she knew you before you realized that running was the only thing that could keep you safe.”
When had Finn gotten so smart about women? “That’s really wise.”
“Thanks. I can’t take credit for it. Rose said it to me the last time I was home. She was always way older than her years.”
“She was. And the smartest of all of us. Don’t let Braden know I said that.”
“Too late,” Braden said, coming into the room. “I heard you. But I agree. I miss her.”
“I do too,” Cal admitted.
“We’re not doing this,” Finn said. “I don’t want to talk about her being gone.”
“Why not?” Braden said. “Ignoring your feelings isn’t going to make them go away.”
Cal knew that his brother was talking to Finn, but the truth was that the words applied to his relationship with Amelia as well. But he didn’t have another option. He needed to get out of Last Stand.
“Bray, I think I’m going to go to Mexico for a few weeks. Javier has some new agave tanks and I haven’t been down there in a few months. Can you handle things without me?”
“Yeah, I always can but are you sure you want to leave?” Braden asked. “Looked like things were heating up between you and Amelia last night.”
He was definitely sure he wanted to leave. “Looks can be deceiving. How’d it go with you and the lady from Whiskey River?”
“Good. She was what I needed last night. But that’s not the same thing as you and Ame—”
“I don’t want to talk about this,” Cal said. “I need to get out of town and get my perspective back.”
/>
“Then go. Finn leaves all the time too,” Braden said. “I’m used to holding down the fort. I guess this time, it will be me and Lane. But that’s fine too. I’ve never seen whatever it is that pulls y’all out of here.”
Finn turned to look at Braden then glanced back at him. “I can’t speak for Cal, but it isn’t something out there. It’s always been something or someone here.”
Braden came further into the room and sat on the arm of the sofa, his brow crinkled as he looked down at Finn. “Who are you running from?”
“Dad at first. Then the mess with Rose. I didn’t want to be Dad and say all the wrong things and call it tough love…you know?”
“I do know,” Braden said. “What about you, Cal?”
“Same. But also out there, I’m just Cal. I’m not one of those Delaneys, little better than outlaws. Generations of law breaking, drinking and curses don’t follow me when I’m not in Last Stand. There’s a certain freedom to it.”
“Then go,” Braden said. “I like being a Delaney. Even one of those Delaneys—it grounds me. Gives me something to lean on when I’m feeling like the nerdy, skinny kid who used to get bullied for his lunch money.”
“We took care of that bully for you,” Finn said.
“I know. But y’all are gone now. I have to take of them for myself and every time I start feeling cowardly, I remember how badass our ancestors were and make myself do it.”
Cal got up and went over to Braden, squeezing his shoulder. “I do the same thing. I think we all feel like that.”
“Yeah?” Braden asked, looking over at him from behind his horn-rimmed glasses.
He nodded at his brother and then looked around the room. Braden was right. He couldn’t keep running away whenever things got tough. He’d check out the business in Mexico, but only for a few days. And then he’d come home. And if he saw Amelia, he’d remind himself they had a good run and he wanted more…no matter how hard that might be to believe. This was his town and it was time to change the way that everyone thought of the Delaneys, starting with himself and his brothers.
*
Amelia and her sisters took turns sitting next to their mom and watching over her. They finally had a diagnosis, which meant they could start treating it—West Nile virus. They were all incredibly worried but had spoken to the doctor who had treated several patients who had survived. The biggest thing was to get it under control. Her mom was sleeping with a breathing tube and had an IV drip with medication in it. In all her life, Amelia had never seen her mom look so vulnerable.
She’d always been so tough and projected herself as if she were taller than her five feet, three inches. She’d been indomitable, so seeing her like this scared Amelia and made her very angry with herself that she’d waited so long to come back home and forgive her mom.
She thought about all that Cal had revealed this morning and how she’d always felt like she had the moral high ground when she’d left, but was she really any different than her parents, who’d kept that big secret? Or Jax Williams, who’d had sex with her mom and never looked back?
She hadn’t set out to hurt Cal but she’d done it all the same. She’d taken from him what she needed and walked away.
She always thought of herself as a nice person but since she’d come back she’d had to face the fact that she was a user. True, she’d never intended to hurt him, but she had all the same.
She felt tears burning her eyes and wiped them away. “Are you okay?”
She glanced over to see Emma standing there with two Bluebonnet Café takeaway cups. Her sister’s long reddish-brown hair hung around her shoulders as she watched her.
“No,” she said. “I have just realized how selfish I’ve been my entire adult life.”
“I think you’re being a little melodramatic,” Emma said handing her a cup and sitting down next to her. “I don’t want to be unkind, but you have bags under your eyes, so I know you’re overtired. Also, you didn’t say what happened with Cal…and I’m guessing something did because he didn’t come with you to the hospital.”
She took a sip of the chai tea her sister had brought and then glanced at her mom. “Ems, I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Cal wanted to…like have a relationship and I couldn’t just say, sure. I like him—heck, I think I love him, but the thought of committing to him and then finding out he had some secret…well I just couldn’t do it. And I couldn’t lie to him so that he’d think I was okay with it until we were together enough for me to believe it.”
Emma reached over and took her hand in hers. Squeezing it. “That’s nothing to do with you. I feel that way too about relationships.”
Of course, her sister did. Emma had always preferred reading to interacting with people. “Thanks. But there’s more.”
“Like what?”
“I’m not a very nice person,” she admitted.
“Cal said that to you?” Emma asked, turning in her chair. “That had to be the grief talking. He has been through a lot lately.”
“Yes, he has. But he didn’t say it. In fact, he was sort of like, I’d have done the same thing, but you know he wouldn’t have.”
“What did you do?” Emma asked.
She leaned in closer to her sister. “The night before I left for New York, Cal and I slept together. I just wanted my first time to be with someone I genuinely liked and…I never told him I was leaving, mainly because we were in high school and it was weird after and he dropped me off. I never thought of how that impacted him.”
Her voice shook a little as she fought to control her emotions and then realized she was crying. Why was she crying? She’d apologized but really, could words make up for that? And it wouldn’t matter so much if she didn’t love him. And she did love him. Way more than she’d ever expected to.
“Oh, Ams, I’m so sorry that happened that way. I’m sure that he doesn’t blame you,” Emma said, rubbing her back.
“He doesn’t. That makes it even worse, like I know I was horrible to him but he’s still so decent and he loves me. But I can’t even commit to just being with him other than casually. Makes me feel like an asshole…I am an—”
“You’re not. Don’t call yourself names. If you love him then why can’t you take a chance on him?” Emma asked. “Is it that you don’t believe you deserve love?”
She shifted away from her sister back into her chair and wiped her eyes. Was that it? “I think it might be. I mean for as long as I can remember, I have tried to keep everyone at arm’s length but that was never an option with Cal. I mean he’s always been my touchstone sort of.”
“Then he’s always been there…it’s never been casual to you. Have you thought of that?”
“I hadn’t,” she admitted but saying it out loud had changed things in her mind. She could see now that it wasn’t Cal she was afraid of, but herself. He would never let her down, he never had. Plus, Cal was pretty much a tell-it-as-it-is kind of guy so he’d never hide anything from her.
It had been her own fear of not wanting to be hurt the way she had been again. “I hope it’s not too late to try to win him back.”
“Of course, there’s enough time,” Mom said from the bed, her voice weak. “Love always finds a way.”
“Mom!”
They both rushed to her side talking at the same time and hugging her. Amelia texted her dad and Delilah so they could get back from the café where they were taking a break to eat breakfast.
“You scared us,” Amelia said.
“I’m sorry,” Mom said.
Her dad rushed in and moved straight to their mom’s side, hugging her gently. They all saw the tears in his eyes as he looked down at her. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“Never,” she said. “You can tell me what’s going on. Amelia, go sort things out with Cal.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What’s going on?” Delilah asked.
“I’ll catch you up,” Emma said as Amelia grabbed her bag and headed out of the hospital.
Sure, it was all well and good to think she could fix things with Cal but how was she going to convince him that she’d changed…well actually, she hadn’t changed. She’d just finally stopped hiding from the truth. That loving him was the one thing that had always been deep inside of her.
*
Deciding she wanted to change things with Cal and actually changing them were two very different things. She had gone home on Sunday afternoon and slept for a few hours and decided Monday would be soon enough to go and talk to him. But when she went to the Outlaw Tequila offices on Monday Braden told her that Cal had gone to Mexico for a few weeks.
Then she got a call from one of her old brands asking her to come and shoot a campaign in New York, which she did, so it was the middle of June before she was back in Last Stand. Her mom was doing a lot better and was responding well to treatment. She had to use a cane for walking, but her mind was clearer, which her doctor said was the first step to recovery.
Amelia had made up her mind to go out to the Delaney ranch and wait for Cal but her memaw had called with a royal summons demanding that she come for dinner. So after she finished with her last class of the day, instead of going to see Cal, she was on her way to Memaw’s house.
Amelia freely admitted she was a bit worried about what her grandmother wanted since the last time she’d received one of these summonses, it had been after she’d updated her will and wanted to make sure she and her sisters were told which of her memaw’s stuffed dogs they were going to receive when she passed.
She pulled into the driveway and noticed that Cal’s truck was parked there. She swallowed hard and then got out of her car and walked around back, stopping when she saw Cal sitting on the bed swing in the backyard. All of the things she wanted to say to him slipped from her mind.
He looked so good just sitting there and it was all she could do not to run over and throw herself into his arms. She’d missed him so much.
Her Texas Ex Page 14
