She heard a sound from the barn and turned toward it, the water streaming off her soaked head obscuring her vision for a moment. She slicked her bangs back, blinked to clear her eyes, and then blinked again.
“Aunt Cassidy!” Emily screamed, and before Cassidy really knew what was happening there was a teenager in her arms, hugging her so tightly she could barely take the breath she’d lost when she’d seen them.
Them. Both of them. Emily was here, soaking her fancy designer clothes against Cassidy’s T-shirt and jeans, and over by the barn, standing in the shade, looking almost as dazed as Cassidy felt, was Will.
Will. Will and Emily, in Texas.
She forced herself to stop staring at him. Emily had wanted her visit to be a surprise, maybe, and of course Will couldn’t let her jet off across the country without supervision, or without anyone at this end of the trip knowing she was coming. Will was just a chaperone, nothing more. Cassidy needed to get a grip.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” she told Emily, who pulled away from her.
“I can’t believe you’re sopping wet,” the girl complained, but she was smiling. Then she took Cassidy’s hand and whispered, “You need to listen to him, okay,” before gently tugging Cassidy in Will’s direction.
She was too confused to resist, at least until she remembered what she looked like, soaking wet and bedraggled. She stopped moving, but it was already too late. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking somewhere over his shoulder. “I’m a mess.”
“You’re beautiful,” he replied, and there was an undercurrent of heat in his voice that Emily was too young to be hearing. Cassidy glanced in the girl’s direction, but she was still beaming.
“What are you doing here?” Cassidy asked. Her gaze caught on his shoulder, and then trailed down the rest of his body. “And what the hell are you wearing?”
“Walmart,” he responded as proudly as if he were naming a designer on the red carpet at the Oscars. “Everything I’m wearing, including underwear, cost less than sixty dollars. Can you believe it?”
“I’ve never seen you in jeans before,” she said. “And—Walmart? Seriously?”
“The boots were a gift,” he admitted, “from the guys, when they heard I was coming out here. But the rest is all from Walmart, yeah.”
“But—” She finally found the courage to look him in the face. “But why?”
He looked back at her, and she was captured by his expression. Nervous, determined, vulnerable, strong. Whatever he was going to say? He meant it, and he needed her to believe him. “You don’t want to dress like New York people and get used to living like that. So, fine. I can dress like country people and get used to living like this. I mean, I don’t think I should have to pretend I don’t have money—we can talk about that, obviously, but it didn’t feel like it was just the money you objected to. There was stuff about it you appreciated, like being able to fix the house or buy Casey, or have a housekeeper—those are fun things, Cass, and I hope you aren’t going to make me give them up. But we can negotiate, okay? The thing is—” He reached for her hands, and she was still too stunned to resist.
“The thing is, I want to be with you. You think things are too unbalanced because I have money and that gives me power over you. But you’ve got to understand—I love you, and that gives you power over me. Being with you and Em, that’s the most important thing to me. Living in New York doesn’t matter. It’s not actually the center of the universe, even if we sometimes pretend it is, but even if it were? I’d live on the far side of the galaxy, if you and Em were living there with me.”
She tugged feebly at her hands, but he didn’t release them, and she didn’t insist. “You won’t still feel—”
“No,” he said firmly. “That’s not something I’m going to be listening to. You don’t get to tell me what I feel, or what I’m going to feel in the future. You trust my judgment, Cassidy. I know you do, because you let Emily live with me. You wouldn’t have done that if you thought I couldn’t make good decisions for her. Well, I can make good decisions for myself, too. And I’ve decided—” He glanced quickly at Em, grinned, and looked back at Cassidy. “We’ve decided that you’re our priority. You’re the number-one goal. So whatever else we have to give up in order to have you? We’re okay with that.”
“But I don’t want you to have to give up anything!” She fought for her arguments, sorting through her bewilderment well enough to say, “Emily was going to go to a great school!”
“You know where the school is that had the highest SAT scores in the entire country last year?” Emily asked, her face alive with excitement. “Dallas, Texas! We’ve got an appointment to go see them tomorrow. They don’t have the NASA connection, but they have internships at Google, and a sister-school in China, and they do exchanges to Australia and France and Germany! Last year a bunch of their students biked across the country over summer vacation. Across the whole country, as a school trip. Isn’t that awesome?”
“It’s…”
“It’s a great school,” Will said firmly. “And if it doesn’t work, there are other good schools in the area. Emily doesn’t have to be in New York to get a good education and have lots of opportunities. That was stupid. I should have caught this sooner.”
“But you want her to be with you,” Cassidy said. She was fighting her excitement, trying to find the flaws in the plan before she let herself believe. “And you need to be in New York, for business. Right?”
“Not a priority,” he said. “I already told you—it’s you and Em I care about.” He saw her expression and quickly said, “I know it’s a luxury a lot of people don’t have. I get that. But I do have the luxury of being able to walk away from business if I want to. Really, I can probably work from anywhere—there’s a lot of money moving in and out of Dallas, and I can be part of that. But if I can’t, that’s okay. I have enough money. What I don’t have is enough you.”
“And if he keeps shopping at Walmart, he really won’t need that much cash,” Emily said with a happy smile.
“I don’t—” Cassidy started. “I mean—”
“Hey, Em?” Will said, and when the girl looked at him, he lifted his hand to his ear and gave it a firm, obvious tug.
“Oh, right!” she responded, and turned to Cassidy. “It’s really hot out here. I’m going to sit in the car where it’s air conditioned.” She turned and held her hand out to Will, waiting until she received the keys, then turning back to Cassidy. “Listen to him,” she said. “And then, whatever happens, can we have dinner? You and me, and maybe-Will-but-he-says-that’s-up-to-you.”
“Okay,” Cassidy agreed numbly, and then Emily skipped off to the car with an energy that suggested she hadn’t really been finding the heat all that oppressive.
The two adults were left standing quietly, Cassidy aware again of her general sogginess, and the way the heat was starting to turn what had been a refreshing dousing into a swampy mess. Will had let go of one of her hands in order to send the signal to Emily, but he’d reclaimed it as soon as he was done, and Cassidy was past resisting the contact.
“I think Emily going to school down here is the best thing for her,” Will said quietly. “She’ll get an excellent education and a lot of extra opportunities, and she’ll be with her aunt, who she loves more than anything or anybody.”
A response would probably be appropriate, but Cassidy didn’t trust her voice, and after a moment, Will said, “And I think moving here to be near my daughter is the best thing for me. I’ll be able to keep getting to know her, and living in Dallas isn’t a complete hardship for me. I’ll probably take trips back to New York for business and to see my friends, but lots of people travel a little on business. It’s not a big deal.”
She nodded dumbly. She wasn’t sure he was being honest about how big a deal the move was or wasn’t, but she supposed it was his decision to make.
“The only part that I don’t really know about is what’s best for you,” he said. “Of course you
love Em, so I know you’ll be happy to have her close to you.”
“I’m—I’m thrilled by that, Will. I really am. Thank you.”
He nodded as if there was nothing to thank him for. “For me—” he started, then stopped, then let go of her hands and stepped backward. “No pressure,” he said. “No conditions. Emily should move here, and I should move with her. That’s been decided, and nothing that happens from now on will affect that decision. Clear?”
She stared at him, and somewhere, deep inside her soggy breast, a tiny flame flickered to life. This was Will. Determined to be responsible, and respectful, and kind, but also completely ready to fuck her senseless in the back room of a small-town diner. Control and passion, perfectly balanced, and he was about to make a suggestion to her, one that maybe, just maybe, she’d be able to accept. “Clear,” she said, her throat tight around the word.
He nodded, then said, “I love you.” His eyes never left hers, his gaze burning into her with a fervent intensity. “I want to be with you. I won’t suggest marriage again, not yet, not until you’ve relaxed about everything and completely believe me. But on any terms you want, I’m yours. We never really dated, and I’m happy to do that if you want. Or it’d be great if we got a place together, the three of us, somewhere with excellent air conditioning and maybe room for the horses.” He looked around, suddenly suspicious, and said, “At some point you’re going to have to tell me what you’ve done with my goat.”
Her laugh was too high, too shrill, and she clapped a hand over her mouth to retract the ugly sound, but he gently pulled her hand away. “It’s completely up to you,” he said. “I’m in for as much as you have to give.”
Everything. She had everything to give, as long as she was brave enough to take a chance. Could she do it? Standing there staring at him, hearing his words…how could she not do it?
“I love you,” she managed, and then her voice failed her but it was okay, because they were kissing and there was no more need for words. Cassidy pulled her hands free of Will’s and lifted them to his face, locked them around the back of his neck, and held on. And he didn’t resist. He just kissed her back, and it felt like a promise, like she was giving and receiving an oath. She didn’t know exactly what they were swearing to, and she was sure there’d be lots of negotiating still to come, but she was agreeing to the big idea. The details would be taken care of; her answer to the big question was a strong, absolute “yes.”
Epilogue
“I’m just not sure they’re our sort of people,” Cassidy said as she sipped her glass of iced tea and then set it carefully on the table beside her. “The daughter seems nice enough, but the parents?”
Will had seen a picture, a quick snap Cassidy had taken on her phone, of the way he looked at times like this. When he could feel the love pouring out of him like a ray of light, when he couldn’t tear his eyes away from his woman? He looked like a complete sap, and he’d tried to steal the phone to erase the picture, but Cassidy had stolen it back and kissed him into submission. She said she looked at it before she went to sleep on the nights when he was out of town and couldn’t be there beside her.
Since she already had evidence of his besottedness, he didn’t need to worry about hiding it. So he let his face relax, let the love show, and she grinned at him and twined their naked feet together before saying, “The mother rides English. Can you imagine? In Texas? Perhaps it’s not illegal, but surely it’s immoral.”
He kissed her then, because he couldn’t resist. “You spent one afternoon with my mom and internalized her mannerisms that well? You’re a sponge. I can’t believe you thought you wouldn’t be able to fit into New York society.”
“Oh, I could have,” she said confidently, and she twisted around so she was sitting on top of him, both of them naked in their big, cool bed. “I just didn’t want to. I wanted you out here, and I schemed and planned until I got what I wanted. Pretty cunning, huh?”
“You’re an evil genius,” he agreed, and then it was his turn to spin them so she was lying on her back, and he was in tight beside her, leaning over, able to see all of her without totally losing the body contact he craved. He ran his fingernails gently down between her breasts and along her belly, watching the goose bumps rise in the trail he left. Three months he’d been living in Texas, long enough to find a place to live, a school for Emily, and a whole new lifestyle. He was enjoying being a house husband, most of the time: chauffeuring Emily around, screening her friends, even volunteering at her school as the community liaison for the Young Entrepreneurs club. He kept himself busy all day with one thing or another but always tried to be home in the afternoon when his ladies returned. His wonderful, brilliant daughter and his sexy, earthy, stubborn cowgirl.
He shifted a little farther down Cassidy’s body, letting his stubble tickle and scratch along her tender skin. He stopped for a moment to gently kiss the yellow-green bruise on her ribs. Stupid horse had spooked and bucked and sent Cassidy off its back into a rail fence. Once he got over the urge to have the horse turned into dog food, Will had tried to convince Cassidy to have padding installed on every fence on the ranch. He’d volunteered to pay for it, supply labor, whatever it took, but she’d laughed him off.
And now, as he hovered over the injury, making sure it was fading and healing properly, she twined her fingers in his hair and pulled his head away. “You’re obsessed,” she told him. “And it’s silly. Get over it.”
“I think I’m going to train Nanny to be an attack goat,” he told her. “I could let her into the pen with a bad horse, and she could teach it a lesson.”
“Yesterday Nanny was going to be a service goat, visiting nursing homes for old people who grew up on farms.”
“But you didn’t like that idea.”
“Nanny looks like Satan. Taking a creature of the devil to visit people who are on death’s door is cruel.”
He thought about arguing for his goat’s honor, but Cassidy was guiding his head upward, and he let himself be distracted. The goat was out in the yard, probably snoozing happily on top of the play structure he’d installed for her; she didn’t need to be defended.
“We have about half an hour before one of us has to go pick up Em,” Cassidy reminded him, and she kissed him with just enough heat to be a clear suggestion of how she thought that time could be spent. “Do you want to keep talking about livestock, or is there something else that might capture your attention?”
Her hand was warm and firm, her calluses adding an extra layer of sensation as she wrapped her hand around his cock. “Consider it captured,” he said, and he stopped thinking about anything but Cassidy, the woman he’d had to work so hard for.
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About the Author
Cate Cameron lives in a small town in Ontario’s cottage country. Most of her writing deals with people living and loving in similar towns or right out in the sticks—when there aren’t entertainment options on every corner, other people get a lot more interesting! She likes to write stories about real people struggling with real issues. YA, NA, or contemporary romance, her books are connected by their emphasis on subtle humor and characters who are trying to do the right thing, even when it would be a lot easier to do something wrong.
Young adult romances also by Cate Cameron…
Center Ice
Playing Defense
Winging It
Breakaway
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