by Natalie Dean
“I realize that’s a really terrible reason to help someone, but then you took over and ordered me to take you to Peggy. No one has really talked to me like that in ages, and I guess I just got swept up in all that was you.”
“All that’s me?”
“Yeah. You were relentless. Nothing seemed to fluster you, even when you had an unhappy, several hundred-pound pig squealing at you. In my entire life, I don’t think I’ve ever been as driven as you were that day. And so, I just… kinda went with whatever you said.”
Her eyes flicked down, and he saw the faintest flush of pink to her cheeks. “You know, most people don’t describe my stubbornness like that.”
“That’s probably because most people are jealous of it.”
“And you’re not?”
Sterling smiled. “Oh no, I’m massively jealous of it. But I figure watching you might give me a chance to try to have that kind of drive myself.”
She let out a heavy breath then leaned back in her seat, crossing her arms. “Whew, when you asked me out on a date, I didn’t expect a course in existentialism.”
“Me either. But that seems to be where we are.”
“It does.” She narrowed her eyes, regarding him in that way that let him know she was thinking about what she was going to say next. “Do you feel like you’ve learned anything?”
“I certainly hope so. Although there is one question that remains unanswered.”
“Oh really? What’s that?”
He shot her what he hoped was a charming grin. “Does the Great Elizabeth Brown ever slow down?”
Her responding smile made his temperature rise several notches. “Only if I’m dead.”
He whistled, but her look only grew more intense. It felt like she was staring right into the deepest parts of him, seeing all that was broken and figuring out how to fix him. Unfortunately, he wasn’t like the pigpens. They couldn’t buy some logs and food dispensers then declare him better.
“Have you ever been in love? Romantically?” she asked.
Whoa. That was a question out of left field if there ever was one. And yet he found himself answering anyway, caught up in the spell of the woman across from him.
“No,” he said. Was that the wrong answer? It felt like it might be, but it was the truth. He’d just never felt that connection to anyone. “You?”
“No.” Oh… that was… good, right? “But I feel I could be. Maybe. With someone very specific, but I’m afraid I’ll never meet him. Or… what if I’m wrong?”
The rest of the restaurant could have been lit on fire and he wouldn’t even know, all of his consciousness narrowed down to the beautiful, capable woman in front of him. The one who made him feel like he was fumbling along and listless, the one who made him want to be better.
“You know, my mom said I was in puppy love a few times when I was younger.”
“Did she now?”
He nodded, wondering why he was telling something out of his embarrassing childhood. But like with so much else involving Elizabeth, he was flying by the seat of his pants. “Apparently I had two and only two puppy crushes in my young life, and that was it.”
“Only two? I hear that’s impressive for a teenage boy. Or at least if I’m to believe my cousins’ tales of puberty.”
He chuckled at that. Puberty had been a real weird time, with both him and his twin shooting up several inches and developing facial hair at the ripe ol’ age of sixteen. Silas had definitely had the worst of it, as their sudden growth spurt had caused some of the barely healed scarring on his chest to split right back open. Actually… Sterling was pretty sure that was when his twin stopped going shirtless into pools.
“One was my Latin teacher in school, Ms. Harrington. And the other was a character from a… uh, a TV series.”
“A TV series?” Elizabeth parroted, sounding quite amused. “I can tell by your pause that you’re embarrassed about it, so that means you absolutely have to tell me.”
“Oh really…”
“Of course. It would be terribly rude not to.”
“Well heaven forbid I ever be rude.” He shook his head, feeling strangely abased by the story but wanting to share it with Elizabeth anyway. He found himself wanting to split himself open and spill all of himself out to her, all the bad, the good, the lazy. He wanted her to look at what was wrong with him and give him a list that would help him feel like maybe he was around for an actual purpose. “It was this warrior lady type, defending her home from evil forces. Some sort of high fantasy thing on the science fiction channel. She had a sword and a spear and was just, uh, very capable.”
“And in a skimpy leather outfit?”
“And in a skimpy leather outfit,” he confirmed, his cheeks coloring. “But yeah, other than that, never really been drawn to anyone.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
She was looking at him even more intensely and if he wasn’t having so much fun, he might have started to sweat. She had a gaze on her that was just so unnerving.
“Not even now?” she asked.
Oh.
Oooh.
His mouth opened. No words. His mouth closed. Still no words. He took a breath and tried to boot his brain back into gear, but then a loud voice spilled over him like a bucket of cold water.
“Oh hey, Silas! How are you?”
Sterling jolted and looked towards the sound to see someone approaching them. A tall man with bright red hair and a full beard. It took a few more beats before he recognized him as one of the co-owners of the small company that his brother had paid to help with renovations of the community center.
“Uh, hey,” he said, standing and offering his hand. “I’m afraid—”
“You look different, buddy. You been working out? Growing out your hair?”
The man took his hand in a warm, friendly grip. Clearly, he was trying to be jovial, but it was the absolute worst timing.
“I’m sorry, sir, but there’s no Silas here. But you can call me Sterling.”
“Ster-what—oh!” He broke out into a wide grin, and Sterling got the feeling he knew why Silas had chosen the redhead's company. “You’re the twin! I heard about you, but somehow, we never met before. Hi, it’s good to meet you.” He turned to Elizabeth and gave her a polite tip of the head. “And nice to meet the missus. You look lovely, of course.”
“She’s not—”
“Anyways, I better get back to my own wife. She’s eight months pregnant and this might be the last time we get to eat out together before it’s sleepless nights and applesauce. Good seeing you two!”
A friendly clap on his back and then the man was gone, hurrying back to the woman who was lowering herself into a seat with a hefty sigh.
“Uh, right,” he said, sitting down himself. “Where were we?”
He knew exactly where they had left off, but the moment was broken. However, the question she asked played over and over again in his mind on repeat. Not because he wasn’t sure of the answer, he knew that he was attracted to Elizabeth in a way he hadn’t been in his entire adult life. No, the reason it kept going on repeat was because he couldn’t help but wonder why she had asked it.
But with the interruption of the stranger, they couldn’t quite slide back into the moment, and although they finished up the meal with pleasant conversation, he could never quite steer it to a place where it seemed natural that he would ask such a thing.
The conversation was still enjoyable, of course, electric even. He felt like he was getting to see a whole new side of Elizabeth, one that had been locked away before. One that most people didn’t get to see.
Eventually, however, the night had long since grown dark and it was growing ever closer to the restaurant’s closing time. When they were one of the last couples around, they agreed that they should go, although he certainly had plenty of hesitation on his part. He wanted to stay in the moment forever. Just the two of them, no pigs, no ranch, no money, just them.
Was this
how Silas felt around Teddy? No wonder he was such a sap. And Solomon around Frenchie? Suddenly his frequent trips to visit her in the city made sense. He’d always thought they were just being ridiculous, but maybe he owed them a mental apology.
But that could wait until later. At the moment, he had Elizabeth on his arm as he walked her to her vehicle in the parking lot. He was starting to get used to not using the valet services, even if it still felt weird.
Unfortunately, they reached Elizabeth’s car far too soon. She was still driving that old junker around, even if she did insist that Teddy had made the insides like new. He wasn’t quite sure why she didn’t just buy a new one, but he was beginning to trust that Elizabeth had a reason for why she did what she did.
“Funny, now that we’re here, I kind of wish we weren’t,” Elizabeth said, looking up at him through her thick lashes. And if that wasn’t an expression and a half. For someone who usually walked around the ranch with a permanent grimace on her face, she certainly knew how to make his heart pound.
Was it pathetic that he was so enthralled? Caught up in every micromovement of her face? Probably. It couldn’t be healthy.
“Me either,” he said.
She let go of his arm and turned to face him. He wasn’t prepared for just how close that brought them to each other, barely a hand’s worth of space between them. He practically could feel the electricity of her body, the rise and fall of her chest with her breathing. It made his own exhalations pick up, his senses suddenly acutely aware of everything happening around them.
“Thank you,” she said, voice soft. Low. He didn’t think he had ever heard it pitched like that. “I had a lovely time.”
“Good to know this pity date didn’t turn out to be so bad.”
“It wasn’t a pity date.”
She took a step forward, and Sterling swore he could feel his pulse pounding in his throat. One of her hands came to rest on his shoulder while her face tilted up to his, eyes half-lidded and expression hazy. “Definitely not a pity date,” she murmured, voice barely above a whisper.
Part of his mind was in shock, because it seemed like Elizabeth was trying to kiss him. The other part of his mind was already reacting, wrapping one arm around her waist and pressing his lips to hers with perhaps less finesse than he would have liked.
But that didn’t matter because the moment they kissed, everything else washed away. There was just the heat of her body, the muscles of her back strong and firm under his hand. A soft, sweet little sigh escaped her, and Sterling’s head spun with the rush of it all.
Almost as soon as it started, she was stepping away. The expression she wore was a strange one, but certainly not unwelcome on her features. “Goodnight, Sterling.”
“Goodnight, Elizabeth,” he answered back, although his voice was noticeably shakier than hers.
And then she was getting into her car, checking to make sure Sterling was out of the way before she began pulling her junker out. Sterling watched her go, feeling like he was still lost in that kiss. Still lost in the feel of everything that was her.
He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, but when he did eventually return to his truck, it felt like he was floating.
18
Sterling
“Finally.” Sterling couldn’t help but sigh to himself as he finished up the last of his budget proposal to send to Silas and Solomon. Normally it was the sort of thing that he would send straight to his father, but he figured it would be prudent to have his brothers on his side considering the price tag on his plan. It went well beyond his expense account, and by went well beyond, it would be more accurate to say it was almost a total revision of how they currently handled their livestock situation.
Actually, normally Sterling wouldn’t have cared about such a situation. The ins and outs of the ranch were never of much interest to him. But that had changed, along with a whole lot of other things.
As he saved the file, he realized that he understood his northern cousins a lot better. Before, when there’d been talk about the quality of life or returns on happiness of the livestock, his eyes had mostly glazed over. After all, they were a bunch of bleeding-heart hippie liberal types according to Dad. But since Elizabeth had started up with her plans, he’d already noticed a change in the pigs. They were more sociable and definitely more vocal. In only about two months, they’d had less of them chew at each other’s ears or bite workers. And the contractors weren’t even through half of the list.
He definitely owed his aunt and uncle an apology, too. They could go on the list of people owed one, because at the moment he wanted to head out to the pens and catch Elizabeth on her lunch break. Maybe it was sappy, but the night before, he’d packed a sort of picnic basket to share with her. He’d noticed how much she’d liked the sandwich he made her that night when he brought her home from the hospital, and if she liked that, then she’d love his deviled eggs.
…or at least he hoped so. It was one of four dishes he knew how to make, if only because he insisted on “helping” his mother make them for picnics so he could sneak some ahead of time.
He was only halfway to the kitchen, about to head into the main part of the house from his wing when the door that separated them burst open.
Sterling blinked, stopping in his tracks as he saw his father standing there, breathing harder than what was normal.
That was a cue that he was not around for a happy visit. And by clue, he meant a big, flashing sign. Sterling steeled himself, wondering what dark cloud had brought his father his way.
McLintoc Miller was once a solid cut of a man, a brawler who had gotten in more fights than not, fights that his older brother had often gotten him out of. But he hadn’t aged gracefully, fighting the process tooth and nail. All of his sons were taller than him, wider than him, but he still made Sterling feel so small.
“Son,” he said, but the term held no warmth.
“Dad,” Sterling returned cautiously. Why did he feel like he was a teenager getting caught sneaking out of the house? He wasn’t doing anything wrong!
“You want to tell me what’s going on?”
For the first time in over a decade, there were too many possible answers. Sterling was so used to doing nothing, but between his soil tests, the pens, and his proposal to expand Elizabeth’s expertise to the rest of the ranch, he had a lot of projects that he was juggling. A lot of very expensive projects.
“Sir?” he said instead when it was very clear that his father wanted an answer.
“I was just talking with my good friend Colunius—”
Who named their kid Colunius, even in the sixties?
“—and he said that his son spotted you out with a woman at a restaurant in the city.”
“…I am allowed to go out, Dad, last time I checked.”
McLintoc Miller rolled his eyes. “Why are all of you so dramatic? No one is saying that. I just want to know what possible reason you could have for being out with someone like… her.”
It was like someone poured ice-cold water down his back. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I’m afraid I don’t.”
That, apparently, was the wrong thing to say, because Mr. Miller’s face went red as a beet and he raised his cane, slamming it against the wall with a resounding thwack. Sterling flinched on instinct, even though his father hadn’t raised a hand to him since that day he’d gotten his brother permanently disfigured for life with a single firecracker.
“Tell me since when do you keep company with some lower-class black woman? Huh? You know what that looks like for us?”
“Elizabeth isn’t—”
“Elizabeth!? So she has a name now?”
“Yeah, Dad. People have names, don’t you know?”
Another smack and this time Sterling squared his shoulders. It was one thing when his dad set in on him or his family, but it was another to insult Elizabeth. It went against every nerve in Sterling’s body and he found hims
elf wanting to protect the woman, even if she had no idea what his father was saying.
“Where did I go wrong? How is it that half of my sons are running around with street trash? Do you want to ruin our reputation, or are you all so stupid that none of you can recognize gold diggers when they bite you right in the face!?”
Some small, young part of Sterling wanted to curl up, to apologize and do whatever he needed to please his father. To show off for him, to prove that he was a good son, a son that he could be proud of. But the bigger part of him roared at the disrespect of the woman he was falling in love with.
Elizabeth was smart, intense, strong, capable. She had a heart as big as their entire estate, even if she usually only let animals into it. She was hard-working. She was determined. And she deserved so much better than some rich, wrinkly old man besmirching her character.
“Elizabeth isn’t a gold digger,” Sterling said as calmly as he could, which turned out to not be very calm at all. “She’s a veterinarian and an amazing woman.”
“Oh yeah, I’m sure. Have you seen her degree? And just how did you meet this supposed ‘veterinarian’? Was she a streetwalker like Solomon’s”—his nose wrinkled, and Sterling’s temper jumped up that much hotter—“plaything?”
“Frenchie was not a prostitute,” Sterling snapped, taking a step closer to his father. “And even if she were, she isn’t now. She is engaged to your son and set to be your daughter-in-law.”
“Not if I have anything to say about it.”
His temper jumped up again. Sterling couldn’t remember a time when he’d been so angry. He hadn’t had something he really cared about enough to get angry over. “You don’t, Dad.”
“What?”
He kept on. He didn’t know where his strength was coming from, but he wasn’t going to stand there and let his own father speak ill of the world that Sterling was just discovering. “You don’t get to say anything about it, Dad. We’re your sons, yes, but you don’t get to dictate our destinies because of that. We’re going to date who we want to date, fall in love with who we want to fall in love with. We’re going to open the community centers we want to; fund the charities we want to. And when you’re old and decrepit, we’re going to run this ranch the way we want to.
