by Amy Vastine
“I’m your woman,” she said, taking the bundle of hay from him.
“What can I do?” Blake asked.
“You can help me and Conner cut him loose.”
The five of them worked together to save the horse. Lily put the head collar on, and Amanda talked to him sweetly as she fed him hay.
“Blake, I need you to come over here and help me with the wire,” Conner said. The horse neighed and shook its head. The wire had tightened around the horse’s leg as he struggled to free himself.
Ethan tried to help calm him so he didn’t do more damage to his leg. “We have to keep him as still as possible. Every time he moves, he cuts that leg. If we lose the leg, we lose the horse.”
Amanda placed a gentle hand on the side of the horse’s head. Blake knew her heart was breaking for this poor animal. The horse had no idea what was happening and had to be terrified. “It’s okay, big boy. They’re going to get you loose. Be patient, eat your hay, buddy.”
“His name is Pirate,” Ethan said. “He’s not very old. I feel terrible he lost his way and got caught here.”
“We’ve almost got it,” Blake said. Conner had given him gloves and he was holding the wire so Conner could snip through it.
“They’re almost done, Pirate. You’re being such a good boy,” Amanda said, holding out more hay.
“Lily, grab his lead and get ready to try to guide him forward,” Conner directed. “Katie is going to be so upset about this. She’s going to blame herself for the fence being damaged, which is why he thought he could get through here.”
Ethan squirted disinfectant on the cut-up leg. “If Pirate heals, Katie won’t beat herself up too much.”
“Okay, Lily. Carefully, guide him forward,” Conner said.
Lily clicked her tongue and pulled gently on the lead. Pirate was cautious. He knew the last time he had tried to go forward, his leg had hurt.
“It’s okay, Pirate. You can trust us,” Amanda said to reassure him. “This is one of those times I wish animals could understand me.”
“You and me both, Harrison,” Blake said, giving her a lopsided grin. That car ride seemed like ages ago. He felt like so much had happened since then.
Once Pirate was away from the barbed wire, Ethan was able to safely treat the wound. By a stroke of luck, it wasn’t as serious as it could have been.
After wrapping it up in gauze, Ethan guided the injured pony into the trailer. Blake gravitated to the one person who understood what that rescue meant to him. Amanda fell into his arms, both of them laughing with relief.
“That was awesome,” she said against his shoulder.
“Yeah, it was.”
She pulled away. “I’m going to go back with Ethan and see if I can watch how he takes care of the horse now.”
“I want to do that, too.”
“You might have to take your fiancée back to the cabin first,” Lily said, getting his attention.
Nadia was on her phone, typing something and talking at the same time. She seemed completely unaware of what was happening outside of her bubble. There was no way she would want to go back to Ethan’s vet clinic and watch him work on the horse.
He jogged over to the car and tapped on the window. She put a finger up as she continued to talk to someone on the phone. He went to the other side of the car and climbed in the driver’s seat next to her.
“I understand that, Ryan. I need you to get it done today. I’ll finish my part, but I need you to do yours. Just because I’m not in the office doesn’t mean nothing happens. I’ve taken vacations before and we all know that I work whether I’m in the office or not.” She ended the call and rubbed her eyes. “Can we go back to the cabin? It’s easier for me to work on my laptop than it is to work from my phone.”
“Yeah, no problem. You can do some work back at the cabin and I’m going to check out the vet clinic. I’ll have Hadley drive you back to the cabin.”
That worked out perfectly. He opened the car door and her hand came down on his arm, stopping him from exiting. “What do you mean? I’m going to the cabin by myself?”
“You’ll only be alone for a little bit. I want to see what they do with the horse and you have work to do.”
“You’re not going to be gone long, are you?”
“I’ll be back before you know it,” he assured her. Blake hopped out of the car and felt a little guilty for being so excited to be going in the opposite direction of Nadia. That feeling quickly faded when he was sitting in the back of Conner’s truck with Amanda and Lily. There was no other place he wanted to be.
Ethan had an office downtown and a large animal clinic on the ranch. His equine examination and hospital area included two large hospital stalls and one isolation stall. He had a digital radiography, ultrasound and a surgical suite.
The black-and-white pony they had rescued was named Pirate because of the black spot on his head that surrounded one eye. He was brought into the radiography suite for an X-ray of his leg.
“I hope he’s going to be okay. That was intense,” Amanda said while they waited for the X-ray results.
“Living on a ranch is never boring,” Lily said. “That’s what really won me over. Every day is a new adventure.”
“Are you saying I’m not the only reason you decided to stay?” Conner asked.
She popped up and wrapped her arms around his waist. He tucked her under his arm. “You were a very big reason but not the only one,” she said, staring up at him with that dreamy look in her eye.
The way those two got lost in each other made Blake envious. He wondered if that was how he and Nadia looked to others when they were together.
“Do you want to help me take a group out in an hour?” Conner asked Lily.
“Yeah, sure. I need to help Amanda move her stuff into my cabin, but that shouldn’t take long. She doesn’t have that much stuff.”
“Wait—what?” Blake’s head swung in Amanda’s direction. “What is she talking about? Why would you move into her cabin?”
“So you and Nadia can have some privacy. Plus, I don’t think she likes Clancy very much.”
“That’s not true.” As soon as those words left his mouth, in walked Hadley with Clancy on his leash.
“Hey, there’s your mama.” Hadley gave Clancy an ear scratch and handed him over to Amanda. “Nadia asked me to take him. She said she didn’t feel comfortable in the cabin by herself with him. He’s a sweetheart, though.”
“Not everyone thinks so,” Lily said.
Hadley was unnecessarily apologetic. “Sorry. I didn’t know what else to do with him besides bring him here. I know you wanted to check on Pirate.”
“No, it’s fine. Thank you for bringing him to me. He’s my dog. I’ll take care of him. Lily, can I have the keys to your cabin?”
Blake stood up. “I’ll take him back to the cabin. Nadia won’t mind him being there if I’m there.”
“Blake, it’s okay. Stay and keep tabs on Pirate. I’ll come back after I get him settled at Lily’s.”
Blake followed her and Clancy out. He didn’t want her to move cabins. He didn’t want Nadia to make her feel like she had to do that. Nadia was not going to change things between them. How many times had he promised Amanda that?
“You don’t have to—”
“I do, Blake. I do.” The way she said it made it impossible for him to argue. She wouldn’t be changing her mind. Deflated, Blake went back into the clinic. After the X-ray, Ethan let Lily and Blake help him clean and re-dress Pirate’s wounds. They placed him in the isolation stall so he could stay safe while he healed.
“I can’t thank you guys enough for your help,” Ethan said. “During the rescue and afterward. It’s always scary when an animal gets itself in that kind of danger.”
“We were happy to help,” Lily said. “Can I bring my sister ba
ck later to check on him?”
“Absolutely! Pirate will be happy to have visitors.”
“I’m going to help my sister get situated and then go on a ride with Conner and one of his groups. Maybe we can stop by before dinner.”
“Perfect.”
Blake thought Amanda was going to come back after putting Clancy in the cabin, but she didn’t. He followed Lily back.
“You know, this isn’t about Clancy,” Lily said in a soft tone. “It’s about my sister. It’s always about my sister. I don’t know why you thought this was going to be any different than any other relationship you’ve been in.”
“Nadia will come around. She’s smart and kind. She isn’t going to want to come between me and Amanda. She knows we’re just friends.” He was probably trying to convince himself more than Lily.
She shook her head. “You keep saying that like just friends is what you two are. Like you can trivialize what you really have.”
“I’m not trying to make it seem less than it is. I’ve always made it clear that she’s my person. She’s not just my friend.”
Lily winced. “Exactly. Amanda is someone most men would want as a girlfriend or a wife. She’s a catch.”
Blake wouldn’t disagree with that. He would have caught her if she had let him. No one seemed to understand. “Amanda doesn’t want to marry me. She doesn’t want to be my girlfriend. She lets me be her friend, so that’s what we are. And now you’re saying I can’t be friends with her because I’m going to get married to someone else?”
Lily stopped and waited for him to do the same. “I don’t know what my sister and you have talked about when it comes to your relationship. I have a hard time believing that she has never once thought about being more than friends. But regardless, I have a little advice for you.”
There was little chance he’d be able to stop her. “I’m all ears.”
“I made the mistake of thinking I could marry my childhood friend even though I knew I wasn’t in love with him. What Danny and I had was always just friendship. The whole time we were engaged, I never felt like it was right. I pretended, but I wasn’t the one making the decisions. I was only going along with what everyone else wanted.”
Those seemed like good reasons not to try to win Amanda’s heart. It obviously wasn’t meant to be. It would end up like Danny and Lily. “I’m not marrying my best friend. I don’t see where you’re going with this.”
“I’m getting there. When I met Conner, it was clearly different. I thought what Danny and I had was a friendship like you and Amanda, but it wasn’t even close. When I met Conner, I realized that the way we connected was deeper. More. He is my person. My best friend. I wouldn’t want to marry anyone else.”
That was all well and good. Clearly, Conner felt the same way she did. They were fortunate enough for it to work out. Not everyone married their best friend. “I’m not sure where the advice is in there.”
“I almost settled, Blake. And had I done that, I would have missed out on the love of my life. Be sure you aren’t doing that. Make sure that your person knows exactly where you stand and that you know where she stands.”
That was where her advice didn’t follow. She assumed that he hadn’t made sure he knew where Amanda stood. But that night at Cameron and Talia’s wedding, after The Incident, Amanda had made herself very clear.
Blake could still picture her in that robin’s-egg-blue dress. How her hair was up off her shoulders. The smell of her perfume and the softness of her skin when he touched her cheek. Those things had burned into his memory. He also remembered the way his heart had nearly beat out of his chest when she looked at him with those eyes. The ocean could not compete with their beauty. He had been lost in her eyes, but he had read the whole thing wrong. He thought he had seen something—desire, want, love.
No kiss would ever compare to that one. The way it had made him feel to let all his guards down and let her in was like nothing else. She had tasted like the champagne they had drunk too much of at the reception. He had loved her for so long and she had finally let him truly love her back. He had got carried away and had said too much.
I love you, Amanda. I’ve wanted this for so long. I’ve wanted you like this for so long. He had trailed kisses down her neck. When he’d touched her face, he’d felt the tears running down her cheeks.
She didn’t feel the same way. She didn’t love him or want him. She only wanted to be friends. There wasn’t anything else between them. It had been a crushing blow. It was still hard to believe that he’d managed to let things go back to how they were after that. Somehow, he buried all that embarrassment and heartache and pretended that it was because he had had too much to drink and let the romance of their friends’ wedding get him mixed up.
Blake was madly in love with his best friend, but she was not in love with him. Amanda didn’t want him like that, and it wasn’t fair for her to be sad that he had to go find it with someone else. If she didn’t want him, she needed to be happy that someone else did.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
AMANDA LOVED HER sister but wished she was bothered a bit more by having all of her stuff strewn all over the place. Her cabin was a mess, and there was no way Amanda could leave Clancy there without cleaning up first.
“Wow. Did you do this?” Lily plopped down on the couch that was no longer covered in clothes, wedding magazines and a pizza box.
“Well, it wasn’t housekeeping.”
“It looks so clean. I should have had you stay with me from the start.” Clancy jumped up on the couch next to Lily and snuggled up to her like he was a lapdog.
“You know that you’re going to have to learn to pick up after yourself when you move in with Conner. The mess here was grounds for divorce.”
Lily had been teased about her messy ways her entire life, so she didn’t take offense. “He is perfectly aware of the fact that I may not always pick up after myself. I have a good excuse—I am super busy and this cabin isn’t like a real house. I feel like I’m on vacation, and no one picks up after themselves when they’re on vacation.”
Amanda sat on the other side of her sister. “I do.”
Lily, like Clancy had done to her, snuggled up against her sister. Amanda put her arm around her. Lily nudged her with her elbow. “You are not normal. But I love you anyway.”
“Thanks?” Was that a good thing? It didn’t exactly feel like it.
“I am going to go on a ride with Conner. You want to come with us?”
“I need to go grab my stuff next door. I didn’t do that yet. I didn’t want to bother Nadia.”
“Blake’s there now. It’s probably safe.”
Safe. Nothing was safe around Blake anymore. Her heart, most importantly. She wasn’t sure why today was different from every other day Blake had been dating Nadia. They’d been together for two months. Maybe it was because when he spent time with Nadia, Amanda wasn’t around. She didn’t have to see them together. It was like it was happening in an alternate universe. Her world was still filled with lunches with Blake, business meetings with Blake, Monday night football at The Lion’s Den Pub with Blake. They went surfing Saturday mornings. They texted each other funny memes all day long.
Nadia impeded on Blake and Amanda time very rarely. He had only begun to try to make them be friends the last month or so. Today had felt like a baptism by fire. Nadia all day. Amanda wasn’t sure how many more days she could do this. She was ready to send them back to San Diego.
“Although, I feel like I should warn you,” Lily said, resting her head on Amanda’s shoulder.
A sense of dread fell over her. “Warn me about what?”
“I sort of encouraged Blake to think about how he feels about you and make sure he knows how you feel about him.”
Amanda felt all her muscles tense. “I’m pretty sure he knows.”
“I think he thought
he knew why he wanted to marry her. I also think he thinks he knows how you feel, but I don’t think he does.”
That was a lot of thinking. Too much. “How I feel about what?”
“Him, obviously,” she whispered.
Lily didn’t realize what she was doing by starting this conversation. Amanda was never going to admit to how she really felt. “What did you say? Exactly.”
“All I told him was that he better be sure before he goes through with this wedding. Have you seen the two of them together all day? What do they see in each other? They have very little in common.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Help me understand. Why do you think you aren’t in love with him?”
A knock on the door gave Amanda a chance to avoid answering that question. Blake was on the porch with all of Amanda’s things.
“I figured you were going to need all this stuff if you’re serious about staying here.” She tried to read him. This was the first time in forever that she didn’t feel they were on the same page about anything. When Nadia had walked in, everything he was feeling became a mystery to Amanda.
“Thanks,” she said, taking the backpack on his shoulder from him. He carried in her bag.
Lily got off the couch and headed for the door. “I’m going riding. See you guys for dinner.”
Alone. Amanda had been waiting to get him alone all day so she could talk to him, but now that Lily had put things into his head, she wasn’t sure she could have any conversation that wouldn’t lead to both of them feeling terrible.
“Everything went okay with the horse?”
Blake stood in the middle of the room. He didn’t seem to want to sit but wasn’t trying to leave, either. “Pirate was good when we left. Ethan is an excellent vet. He’s so good with the animals, knows exactly what they need to put them at ease.”
“I’ll have to go check on him before dinner. Did you and Nadia have any plans before dinner?”
“I guess she talked to Hadley about sitting down to look at dates.”
