by Elle Thorpe
I gaped at him. “You took me by surprise! That was supposed to be a party for Dominic and —”
His laughter was so bitter. “So now you don’t like the way I proposed?”
I cringed. “No! I never said that. It was fine.”
“It was beautiful. I wrote you a poem, for fuck’s sake!” He jerked the wheel sharply.
I clutched the door handle to keep myself from slamming into the window.
“Maybe you would have preferred if it were Dominic down on one knee? Maybe you would have actually answered him within five minutes of him getting down in front of you?”
His jealousy was etched into the hard lines of his lips and the narrowing of his eyes. He reeked of it so bad, I was surprised there wasn’t a literal smell.
Everything in me wanted to scream at him that Dominic had nothing to do with what had happened tonight, or my delay in answering his proposal. He hadn’t even crossed my mind. That momentary pause, where I’d been lost for words, had nothing to do with anyone but me and Austin, and who we were as a couple.
He’d blindsided me and put me on the spot in a public way where I had no choice but to do what he wanted.
But I couldn’t say any of that for fear of upsetting him further. I had no idea what to say to get him to stop and let me drive. All I could do was try to keep him calm, so he used whatever clear-headed function he did have left to keep us on the road and get us safely home.
I didn’t want to die tonight, with his shiny, impractical car wrapped around a pole.
I tentatively put a hand on his arm. “Hey, I’m sorry. I love you. That’s all that matters, right? I was just surprised. We’ve never talked about marriage, so I wasn’t expecting it. That’s all. I can’t wait to be your wife.”
A little of the stiffness eased out of his shoulders, and he kept the car steady. So I kept talking, doing everything I could to make sure I made it home safe tonight.
“We can have the ceremony in the city if you like. There’ll be more options there. Once we move, maybe I can take a few weeks before looking for a job and start making some plans. And we can go to Hawaii on our honeymoon. You’ve always talked about wanting to go there.”
We had never gone because I was always in training. I knew how much Austin had given up for me over the years. The old familiar guilt swamped me. I owed him this. This life that he wanted.
That didn’t mean I wasn’t mad as a hornet over the shit he’d pulled tonight, though.
He took my hand and squeezed it just a little too hard. “That’s what I was thinking. There’s this great hotel, right on the beach, and with the wage increase I’ll get at the new firm, we’ll be able to splurge and buy first-class tickets. You may not even need to get a job at all, you know?”
I forced a smile. What the hell was I going to do in the city if I didn’t get a job? Be his trophy wife and play tennis at some country club? That thought sat like a stone in my belly.
Hallie had said to me once that Austin just wanted me barefoot and pregnant. I’d blown off the idea, because kids weren’t even on my radar, and I assumed they weren’t on Austin’s either. We’d never talked about them.
There was a lot we’d never talked about, I realized now.
I held Austin’s hand the rest of the way back to my home, with the knowledge playing over and over in my head that he’d willingly put my life in danger tonight, and I’d been completely powerless to stop it.
The minute we drove beneath the ancient wooden sign that declared this Hunts’ Bull Riding School and Ranch, Austin hit the brakes, dropping down to first gear to avoid flicking gravel up.
He’d slowed down so he didn’t scratch his car, but he wouldn’t when I’d asked him to out of fear?
I unclicked my seat belt and opened the door.
“What are you doing!” he yelped, stomping on the brakes.
My fingers clenched around the doorframe, and I hauled myself out onto the driveway, legs still trembling slightly. “This is far enough. I’ll walk the rest of the way. See you tomorrow.”
“I was going to stay—”
“You should stay. You should park that car on the grass and then make yourself comfy in it. Because you’re drunk, and you shouldn’t be driving anywhere. But you sure as hell aren’t sleeping next to me tonight.” I slammed the door shut and walked off into the darkness without waiting to see whether he did or not.
5
DOMINIC
A surprise ‘welcome to town’ party hadn’t been high on my list of things I wanted to do on my first night in my new home. Watching Summer get engaged in the middle made it probably the most uncomfortable first day on a new job ever.
I’d ground my teeth as she’d accepted his proposal and fought every instinct in my body that had wanted to reach over and yank her from his arms.
Just because I couldn’t stand the guy, or the fact I thought they were a completely mismatched couple, didn’t give me the right to do anything to rain on their parade. So I’d stepped back and watched the crowd swarm around them, offering their congratulations and well-wishes to the now happily engaged couple. Summer’s younger sisters grabbed her hand, and she showed off a Texas-sized rock with a giggly grin.
Austin obviously wasn’t short of cash then, even if he was only working in this small town. I probably couldn’t even imagine the sort of money he’d make once he and Summer moved to the big smoke.
I spent the rest of the party hanging out with Nate and Hallie, who’d I met the last time I’d stayed at the Hunts’ place, and they’d introduced me around. By the end of the night, I felt like I’d met half the town, and had managed to avoid Summer and Austin in the process.
There’d be no avoiding her come Monday morning, when she was due to start showing me the way she and her dad ran things out here. But the awkwardness was a short-term thing. A month or two, and then she’d be gone, so I needed to bring my A game, and show Kai that I was qualified for this job, all the way over here, on the other side of the country. Far away from my family, who were probably still confused as hell as to what I was doing. And far away from my birth mother. It was the way it had to be for now. Maybe one day I could go back and not feel the same hurt and shock and betrayal I’d felt at her rejection. But right now, Wyoming felt too small, and I couldn’t be there.
So now I had to make a new life. At least until I could cope better with the old one.
I caught a lift home with Kai and Addie, and they dropped me at the door to my cabin, not unlike the one I’d had on my parents’ property back home.
Addie had her window down and reached through it to stop me as I passed the passenger side on my way to my new home. “Sorry about tonight,” she said softly.
I shook my head on autopilot. “Why? It was a great party.”
It wasn’t a lie. Nate and Hallie’s B&B was amazing and had gotten a huge tick of approval from the town. The food had been delicious. And I’d gotten to meet people who had all welcomed me and talked about bull riding, and ranching, and all the other things I loved. In all those respects, tonight had been a raging success.
The only thing that hadn’t gone down so well was Austin’s proposal. That twit, with his rhyming bullshit. My nose crinkled just at the thought of it. Surely, she hadn’t thought that romantic?
Addie squeezed my arm. “I honestly didn’t know Austin was planning to hijack your party and pop the question. Sorry he stole your thunder.”
I grinned at her. “Never much liked the thunder anyway. So he can have it. I’m happy for them.”
“About as happy as we are, by the look of it,” Kai mumbled from behind the steering wheel.
“Hey?” I wondered if I’d heard him wrong.
But Addie slapped his arm, thwacking her knuckles across his biceps. “Stop it.”
When she turned back to me, she was all smiles. “I put some towels in your cabin for you, and a bag of groceries in case you get the munchies before you can get to the store. If you need anything else, just
let me know.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” I insisted, hating she’d put herself out for me. I made a mental note to replace all the food she’d given me when I went to the store tomorrow.
“Happy to. And you’re welcome to come to the main house for Sunday night dinner as well.”
“Oh no,” I insisted. “I know that’s your family night.” I remembered from years of visiting them.
“What do you think you are?” Kai asked. “Your dad is my brother in every way but blood. And blood don’t mean shit. You’ll be there.”
“Yes, sir,” I said automatically.
He chuckled. “Good. Night, then.”
The two of them drove away, leaving me in the silence and near complete blackness of the night. I ran my fingers over the jagged ridges of my key, but it was beautiful outside, and I didn’t want to go inside just yet. Unpacking could wait until tomorrow.
I settled myself on the tiny front porch of my cabin, sitting on the rough wood steps, since there were no chairs. I’d get one when I went to town. It would be nice to sit out here in the summer evenings and drink a beer.
The sound of footsteps on the gravel road interrupted the silence, but I didn’t think much of it. There were quite a few cabins around me. I hadn’t yet gotten to meet any of the inhabitants, but I knew from previous trips that they mostly housed wannabe cowboys who came from all over to train out here with Summer and her dad.
It wasn’t until the footsteps grew closer that I realized who they belonged to. “Summer?”
She stopped, whipping around and peering through the darkness in my direction. “Jesus, Dom. You scared the hell out of me. Lucky I wasn’t carrying my rifle.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You hunt?”
She wandered in my direction and leaned on the banister that edged the steps. “No, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know how to use one. Sometimes it’s just a necessary part of country life.”
I knew what she meant. I’d had to put down animals from time to time, that were too far gone to save. I never liked it, but leaving them suffering wasn’t an option either. “Well, just so you know, I’ll probably be around here a bit now, so if you ever do have your rifle in hand, I’ll endeavor to give you more warning before I say hi. Perhaps a whistle? Or I could try smoke signals?”
The corner of her mouth flickered up, but it died quickly.
Fair enough. My jokes were lame. “What are you doing out here? Shouldn’t you and Austin be off celebrating your engagement?”
She sank down on the steps beside me. “You’d think, wouldn’t you?”
“But you’re not, because…”
She sighed. “We had a fight.”
I hated that a tiny, assholey part of me was a little bit happy about that. I gave it a swift kick in the ass and sent it flying, because I didn’t want to be that guy. “You wanna talk about it?”
“Honestly? No. I’d rather talk about literally anything else.”
“Anything?”
“Anything.”
“How’s your arm.”
“Except that.”
I nudged her with my elbow. “Come on, tell me. You’re still wearing that sling.”
She lifted it, as if checking she could. “It’s still useless. I hate the stupid thing. I wish they’d just amputated it.”
I balked at that. “Come on, you don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I? This stupid thing is the entire reason I can’t ride anymore.”
“Are you left-handed?” Most bull riders used their dominant hand to grip the ropes.
She shook her head. “No, right-handed.”
I frowned. “So what’s the problem then?”
She took her arm out of the sling and tried to lift it. She didn’t get far, before she dropped it back down. “Can’t hold it up. If I can’t hold it up, I get disqualified.”
I shifted on the step, leaning back against the rail, so I could face her. She didn’t look my way, though, just toed the dirt with her boot, avoiding my gaze.
“Who says you have to hold it up?”
That got her to face me. “Have you forgotten the rules of bull riding? You touch the bull with your free hand, you’re out.”
“Yeah, but there’s no rule that says you have to hold it up. If you were sitting on a bull right now, instead of on a step, is your arm anywhere near the bull?”
“Well, no. But it’s in a sling.”
“So wear your sling when you ride.”
She snorted on a laugh. “I can’t do that!”
“Says who? Show me where it says in the rule book that you can’t compete with a sling on? And even if you do manage to find that, where does it say you can’t just strap that arm to your chest? You said you wished they’d amputated it. If they had, would the WBRA say you couldn’t ride because you only had one arm? I’d love to see them try. There’d be an outcry about discrimination.”
She blinked. “I wouldn’t have the balance without it.”
I shrugged. “Fine. Valid point. But maybe you’d find a way. If you tried.”
She clammed up at that.
“Does your silence right now mean you haven’t tried at all?”
“What are you, my father?” she mumbled.
I could only imagine how many times Frost had probably lectured her about getting back on and giving it another shot. He was the sort of guy who never gave up. Never let anything stand in his way. “The Summer I knew wouldn’t have let an injury stop her.”
“Yeah, well, that Summer is dead and buried. This Summer is moving to the city with her boyfriend.”
“Fiancé,” I corrected.
“Mmm. Right.”
I hated that she didn’t sound excited about it. I stood, knowing I wasn’t going to get through to her tonight. “I’ll leave you to your extreme excitement over your pending nuptials then, shall I?”
“I am excited,” she insisted.
“And that’s why you’re sitting out here with me, instead of having hot sex with the man who just asked you to marry him?”
“Dom!”
I sniggered at the fact I’d embarrassed her. “I’m going to bed. I suggest you find some enthusiasm for doing the same.”
I slipped inside and shut the door before she could say anything.
Something was seriously not right between Summer and her fiancé. I just hoped she realized that before she did something stupid, like actually marry the guy.
6
SUMMER
I wasn’t the sort of person who slept in. Even on my days off, I was up at dawn, pulling on clothes and boots and heading outside to check on my animals. But the morning after Dominic’s ‘welcome to town’ party, I stayed in bed until eight.
Nobody bothered me. They probably all thought I was in here with Austin, celebrating our newly engaged status. But I was very much alone. I had no idea where Austin had slept, and I was angry enough that I didn’t care.
But I couldn’t stay in bed forever, so eventually I hauled myself out from beneath my sheets and dragged on some clothes.
Callie and Lennon, my twin sisters, both sat at the kitchen table, absently scrolling on their phones, neither of them even glancing up as I entered. It suited me. I wasn’t in the mood for chitchat. I was in the mood for food, though, so I pulled a box of Froot Loops from the cupboard and poured myself a bowl. Austin always gave me a hard time about liking them in my twenties, saying he couldn’t take me seriously when I was eating them, so my breakfast choice was a bit of a screw you, since I was still angry with him.
I jerked the refrigerator door open, and grabbed the milk, but paused before shutting it. “Why is the fridge so empty? There was a whole shelf of beer in here yesterday.”
Callie and Lennon shot a look at each other, then put their heads back down. It was a twin thing they did regularly, communicating without actually saying anything out loud. It had bugged me when we were younger, that the two of them always seemed to be able to read each other’s minds
, leaving me on the outside. But I’d grown used to it. And frankly, I didn’t want anyone else to be quite as in my head as the two of them were. It was kind of creepy.
“What?” I demanded, sloshing milk into my bowl.
Lennon stopped playing with her phone. “You should probably go outside if you truly want the answer to that.”
A rising annoyance ticked a muscle in my eye. I abandoned my uneaten breakfast and strode out into the morning sun. It shined bright at this time of day and was low enough that I had to shield my eyes from the glare.
Something glinted in the grass at the far end of the house, and I hurried in that direction, stooping to pick the foreign object up.
I ran my hand over the glossy dark-brown bottle and picked at the label. Mom would have a coronary if she found out someone was just dropping empty beer bottles around her house.
I groaned when I realized who that someone was.
I followed the trail of empty bottles, scooping each one from the grass, practically growling with every step.
Austin’s car was still parked haphazardly off to one side of the driveway. The back door open, his feet sticking out.
He was missing a shoe. That was the first thing I noticed. He only had one shoe, and he looked freaking ridiculous.
I gripped the doorframe and surveyed the interior of his car with my molars grinding. Austin was passed out, spread across the back seat in a mess of limbs. He’d unbuttoned half his shirt, the tails sloppy and untucked from his dress pants. More empty bottles littered the floor.
I wrinkled my nose in disgust. He reeked worse than a brewery. I shoved at his leg with my foot, but he didn’t budge. If he hadn’t been snoring, I might well have assumed he was dead. Right then, I wasn’t sure I would have cared. I kicked him harder. “Austin!”
He started, jerking upright. His bloodshot gaze focused on me, and then he flopped back down, covering his eyes with his arm. “What, Summer? It’s too bright. Go away and let me sleep.”
