Play Me (Barnes Brothers Book 2)

by Alison Kent

  “I don’t want to change that about her. I don’t want to change anything about her,” he added more for his own benefit than Gardner’s.

  “Then make sure you can deal with it before you make a huge mistake and the both of you end up miserable.”

  “It’s not a mistake.” He leaned his backside against the bumper of his truck, braced his hands on his thighs, and hung his head. “It’s not a mistake.”

  “You don’t trust her?”

  “Yes, I trust her.”

  “Then give her the time she needs. And if she doesn’t come back…”

  “She’ll come back. I have her dog, remember?” That thought of Cowboy was all that kept him from going after her.

  “Then make sure that’s not all she comes back for. That she comes back for the right reason.”

  “That’s not what I’m worried about. I’m afraid that when she gets here, she’ll leave again. For the wrong reasons.” He waited a minute and when Gardner didn’t say anything more, content to let him stew, Tyler added, “She thinks she’s going to ruin my life.”

  “From what I’ve seen, your life could use a good ruining.”

  Tyler glared up at his brother. “Very funny.”

  “Hell, Tyler. Ever since you’ve come home, something’s been wrong. I’ve noticed it. Harley’s noticed it. And it looks like it took Sophie to set it right. Either she shook up what needed shaking. Or she fixed whatever wasn’t sitting the way it should. It’s more than obvious that she’s good for you. But you’ve got to consider that you might not be the best thing for her.”

  Tyler didn’t want to consider that at all. But he had to. There was a very good chance that what he’d shared with Sophie had brought her to a reckoning with herself and nothing more. That even though she’d shown him with her body and told him with the words that she loved him, that what she felt was gratitude, and that she’d said the words as a thank-you.

  He didn’t want a thank-you. He wanted Sophie, body and soul.

  The ring of the dinner bell interrupted.

  “You comin’ in?” Gardner asked.

  “I’ll be in later.” He pushed off the truck, headed toward the barn. Gardner stepped in front of him and Tyler looked up.

  “If you want to talk about it, I’ll do what I can to help.”

  “Thanks, but I think I’m gonna hafta handle this one on my own.”

  “You’re probably right. I doubt I’d be much help anyway. The only thing I know about women is what I know about Harley. And I have a feeling she and Sophie are one of a kind.” He started toward the house then stopped. “That reminds me. She told me to tell you that she’d changed her mind and the game’s not over, whatever that means.”

  That brought a smile to Tyler’s mouth. A small lift to his spirits. Whew. That helped. “Thanks.”

  He made his way to the barn, not even bothering to convince himself he was headed there for any reason other than the one that had brought him there time and again through the years. The cool darkness soothed him and he walked deeper into the shadows.

  He’d always been able to think better in here. To find answers he hadn’t managed to find anywhere else. As if in immersing himself in nature, the smells of earth and animals, the aura of what it took to survive, he was grounding himself in reality, what mattered, what was important.

  What was important was Sophie.

  And facing the possibility that he might not be what was best for her.

  Gripping the top slat of a stall, he swung the door toward him and back, listening to the squeak of hinges and the creak of wood. Outside, ol’ Pete and the other hands cut a path across the yard on their way to the house to be spoiled by another of Harley’s incredible meals.

  Tyler caught snatches of their conversation, bits about fences and feedings, a hearty thanks for the mild winter, and talk of the spring calving to come.

  It was the conversation of a family. A group of individuals with a common goal, a shared love for their work, a respectful appreciation of one another as members of a team.

  Sophie belonged here more than she belonged on the road, living her life from a duffel bag, denying herself the dream of a degree, searching for her idea of a family instead of stopping to make one of her own.

  No one could be better for her than he was. That was a fact and he refused to believe otherwise. He knew her, had shared her dreams and desires as intimately as he’d shared her body. And that last time, when she cried out that she’d need him forever, he was sure he’d convinced her to stay.

  And who’s to say that he hadn’t? The game wasn’t over. That’s what she’d said. And that meant she’d only left long enough to settle business that needed settling. He had to believe that.

  Until he knew differently, he would believe that.

  He was still believing it five endlessly long nights later when he said good night to Cowboy, shut off the lights in Doc Harmon’s clinic, and headed for his truck. It had been a hell of a day between the vaccination clinic and Stick Nichols’s new colt tangling himself up in a coil of barbed wire.

  Tyler was ready to inhale his dinner on his way to bed. Who cared if he smelled like a cross between sour laundry and a chemical spill? Harley cared, he grumbled to himself. She wouldn’t feed him if he came into her kitchen without stopping for a shower to wash off the stink.

  His fate was sealed. It was a shower or starvation. But if he walked into a house that smelled of anything close to meat and potatoes, he figured he could find the energy to climb the stairs to the bathroom.

  The minute he opened his truck door, however, he forgot about his stomach because lying on his seat was a brand new Scrabble game tied up with a big red bow. He closed his eyes, opened them. The game was still there.

  He moved it onto the dashboard where he could keep an eye on it and climbed into the driver’s seat. As he backed out of the lot, the truck’s side mirror shot back a reflection of the grinningest damned fool he’d ever seen.

  Wide awake now, he gunned the engine, spun through the gravel parking lot, and burned rubber out onto the county highway. By the time he reached Camelot, he was running on adrenaline.

  He fishtailed the truck into the yard, threw the gearshift into Neutral, and set the brake. Halfway up the back stairs, he realized the truck was still running. He ran back to cut the engine only to find he’d locked the door.

  If he kept this up, he’d never make it to Sophie. He jogged back toward the house, took the back stairs in two steps, and snagged his set of spare keys from the hook in the washroom. He started back outside then heard Gardner’s voice in the kitchen.

  “Gardner. Do me a favor, will ya?” he asked, entering the room.

  Gardner looked up from the screen of his laptop. He pulled off his reading glasses and laid them on the invoices stacked on the kitchen table. He caught the keys when Tyler tossed them. “You want me to take your truck and leave?”

  “No, but would you mind turning it off? I locked the keys inside,” he said, popping open the snaps on the front placket of his shirt.

  Harley stepped off the bottom stair into the kitchen, a basket of dirty laundry in her hands. “I left you a plate of food in the fridge. I’ll heat it up while you shower.”

  “I don’t have time to eat,” he said, jerking at his cuffs and pulling off the shirt. He wadded it into a ball, hooped it into Harley’s basket, and headed up the stairs.

  “Sophie’s back.”

  By the time Tyler stopped off at the clinic to pick up Cowboy and got back on the road to Big O’s, a cold mist had wrapped Brodie, Texas, in wintery fingers. The rain was soft, gentle. Nothing like the torrent the night he’d met Sophie.

  He supposed it was fitting really. The way they’d come full circle.

  Back to the cabin in the rain.

  One hand on Cowboy’s head, the other on the wheel, he drove across the new bridge, diamond patterns of water suspended in the white beams thrown by his headlights. He frowned as he came closer; the cabin
appeared to be dark. But then he picked up Gardner’s Jeep parked off to one side and the flicker of what had to be a fire through the west window.

  And then he saw Sophie on the porch, sitting with her back to the closed front door, her knees drawn to her chest, her jean jacket wrapped tightly against the cold. Cutting off his headlights, Tyler used the yellow glow from his parking lights to guide the way.

  He pulled his truck to a stop in front of the cabin steps, cut the lights and the engine, returning the night to darkness and a still silence broken only by the even breathing of the dog asleep on his seat.

  He opened the door, climbed down, and quickly eased it closed against the buzz of keys and the cab light. He’d let Cowboy sleep for the moment and take care of business first. Climbing the porch steps slowly, he ignored the splatter of cold water against his skin. He had eyes and senses only for Sophie.

  “How was your trip?” he asked, leaning back against a porch post, blinking to adjust to the uncompromising blackness surrounding the cabin and the far-lying fields.

  The rain eased a bit and a small break in the clouds followed. Moonlight spilled through, highlighting the curved red lines of his truck and catching the shine in Sophie’s eyes.

  “It was good,” she said. “Too long, too lonely, but good.”

  He heard the exhaustion in her voice. “You accomplished what you needed to?” he asked, not wanting to pry but doing so anyway.

  “I got quite a lot done as a matter of fact.”

  He straightened from the porch post and eased down into a crouch, putting himself at her eye level, trying to close the distance he suddenly felt.

  But then he couldn’t think of anything to say besides demanding to know where she’d gone, what she’d been doing, but most of all, what had brought her back.

  He didn’t want to make demands. This wasn’t the time for demands. So he stared at the toe of one boot, wiped the beaded moisture from the black leather, and let the tension mount

  “Tyler.”

  He looked up.

  “You’re getting wet.”

  He lifted a shoulder and shrugged. “I’ve been wet before.”

  “I know. I remember.” She propped her chin in the vee of her updrawn knees. “I think you should move.”

  “Why?” he asked, feeling the smile pull at his mouth. “You afraid all this sugar’s gonna melt right off of me?”

  “No. Because I want you over here.” She patted the porch next to her hip.

  “Why?” he asked again, this time more somber because somber kept the hope at a level he could manage.

  “Because I’m selfish and you’re too far away.”

  He laughed but stayed where he was. “You’re about the least selfish person I know.”

  “I used to be.” She stretched her legs out in front of her, crossed her ankles, tilted her toes this way and that. “But I’ve turned over a new leaf.”

  “Oh?” He kept his voice even while shifting his weight to the other foot.

  “I quit my job.”

  His heart jumped at that. “What do you plan to do now?”

  “If I’m very careful with my savings, I won’t have to worry about money for a while.”

  “Are you going to go back to school?”

  “I’ve thought about it. But I’m not sure it’s what I want anymore. I don’t think it was ever what I wanted. It was more what I felt would give me an advantage in finding my father. That’s no reason to choose a career.”

  Tyler agreed, but there was more at stake here than her career. This was her life. “You’re not going to stop looking for him, are you?”

  She shook her head, the sprinkle of mist in her hair catching the light from the moon. “No, but I’m going to face the possibility that I may never find him. I’m not going to let it consume me like I have in the past. I’m not going to put my life on hold. A very wise man taught me to live every moment. I’ve decided I can’t afford to waste a single one.”

  She got to her feet slowly, and his eyes followed every move, the way her legs unfolded into forever, the way she held her chin at an angle that could have been arrogance but he knew to be conviction. She was beautiful and he couldn’t look away. Neither could he move, even when she extended her hands.

  “Why don’t you come over here, very wise man?”

  He stood, keeping his fingers in his front pockets and the distance between them. “Sophie, I don’t want to be the cause of you giving up your dream.” That was a guilt he wouldn’t be able to live with.

  “Oh, Tyler, don’t you see? You’ve given me my dream. You’ve taught me that I don’t have to find the man who fathered me to have a family.” She stepped forward, forced his hands from his pockets, and held them tight. “For the first time in my life, I feel like I’ve truly come home.”

  Home. How long had he waited to hear her speak the word? He drew strength from the grip of her tiny fingers. “So you’re going to stay?”

  “I think I will.” She let him go and turned toward the door, stopping with one hand on the latch. “And since I’m going to be here for more than likely the rest of my life, I may just learn to do a little home cooking.”

  “Oh, yeah?” The beginnings of that damned fool grin eased into place. “What else?”

  “I may look into taking some vet tech classes. You see, I know this veterinarian who could use some help from time to time.” She pushed open the cabin door. The scent of coals and wood smoke drifted through the crack. “I’m cold. Let’s go inside.”

  He shook his head, looked out into the inky blackness and then back. He still wasn’t ready. He still needed to know.

  “What is it, Tyler?” she asked softly.

  He let her voice settle around him, soothe him. Then he spoke. “Before I walk inside that cabin with you I need the answer to a question. You told me why you left. But why did you come back?”

  “You have to ask?”

  He nodded.

  “Then I’ll tell you. I came back for my dog. For Harley and Gardner, who I consider two of my first real friends. For the wide-open spaces that give me room to breathe and more room to think than I’ll ever need. Those are the reasons I came back, Tyler. But they’re not the reasons I’m staying.

  “I’m staying because I’ve found a man who makes me happy. Who thinks there’s hope for me in spite of my hardheadedness and who wants me despite the fact that I don’t have a clue about home and family.” A tender smile turned up the corners of her mouth. Her lashes dampened as her eyes grew dreamy with tears. “I’m staying because I’m in love with you.”

  He closed his eyes, feeling the storm of fear and denial subside, and drew the first full breath he’d drawn in five days. He walked closer to the door, measuring each step, watching Sophie’s smile widen, her eyes grow impish and round.

  “I hope you’re sure about this, Sophie North.”

  “Of course I’m sure. Besides, it fits in so beautifully with the last of my plans.”

  “Which is?”

  “To be engaged by the end of next year.”

  He arched a brow. “Oh, yeah?”

  “Yeah. What do you have to say about that?” she asked, growing too cocky for her own good.

  He was gonna love loving her. “Make that married by the end of this year and you’re on.”

  “But it’s almost Christmas.”

  “And I can’t think of any gift I’d rather have than a wife.”

  “Not even that Scrabble game I left in your truck?”

  “Aw, hell. Hold on a minute. I have a gift for you, too.” He returned to his truck, scooped Cowboy into his arms, and carried him onto the porch.

  “Oh, Tyler,” Sophie exclaimed, dropping to her knees and wrapping her arms gently around the dog. Cowboy licked at her cheek, glancing up at Tyler with a huge thank-you on his canine face while Sophie fawned and cooed.

  Finally, Sophie looked up, her eyes teary but her smile the stuff of pure joy. “It’s okay for him to come home?”
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  “Since he has a really good in with a vet, it should be fine,” Tyler said, pushing open the door. “Let’s get him inside.”

  Sophie followed the dog as he gingerly made his way to the hearth. Once there, he curled up as best he could onto the quilt that lay at the foot of the bed.

  Sophie knelt beside him, stroking her hand over his head, scratching his ears, speaking low words that only the dog could hear. Finally, she realized Tyler still stood outside.

  She got to her feet and went to him. “Aren’t you coming in?”

  He looked down at the green-eyed blond pixie who’d changed his life. “You know once I cross this threshold it’s forever.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Sophie said and pulled him through the door, into her heart, and into their home.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  THIS BOOK WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED in 1997 as The Heartbreak Kid for Harlequin Temptation. It has been updated, revised, and retitled.

  READER LETTER

  Dear Reader,

  Call Me, my first book for Harlequin Temptation, featured that gorgeous Texas rancher Gardner Barnes and the love of his life, Harley Golden. But somewhere between page 15, where Gardner’s younger brother Tyler first appeared as a cocky eighteen-year-old, and page 206, where that cocky eighteen-year-old dispensed the wisdom of a man, Tyler became more than a supporting character. He became a heartbreaker.

  Well, Tyler’s all grown up now. Yessirree, all grown up. The soul of that cocky eighteen-year-old remains but ten years of maturity have made him a force to be reckoned with. He broke my heart in the best of ways but Sophie North managed to hold hers together… for an hour or so.

  Let Tyler break your heart, too. Then write and let me know if you fell in love.

  One of the best things readers can do for authors is to leave reviews. If that’s something you’re inclined to do, thank you! I’d love for you to visit my website and learn more about my books (written under this name and others), and sign up for my newsletter (Psst! There’s a free book for you at this link!) for updates.