The Cowboy Who Strolled Into Town

by Riley Moreno

  It was late morning when she awoke, lying naked in a tangle of satin sheets on Brenton's vast bed, staring out of his panoramic windows at the broad spread of New York City, waking with the rising sun below her. A trail of their scattered clothes and underwear lead from the bed to the enormous living room, where they had first made love the night before. Somehow, Jade's bag had ended up next to the bed, so she leaned over and pulled out her phone to check the time. She realized that Jenny's message to her was still on the screen, but before she had the chance to read it, a voice spoke behind her.

  “Morning beautiful,” said a gruff voice.

  She turned and saw that Brenton had also woken up, and was looking up at her with a warm smile on his face.

  “Morning Batman,” she said with a chuckle. “Hey, I need to take a shower real quick. Where should I go?”

  “That door over there,” he said. “Use any of the towels in there, they were all freshly laundered yesterday.”

  She wrapped a sheet around herself and tiptoed off to the shower, and Brenton watched her go.

  “What's this?” he whispered to himself as he saw her phone lying on the pillow, where she had left it.

  He picked up the phone and saw a message on the screen.

  Who are you messaging at this time of the morning, Jade? That's a bit weird. I shouldn't look, I know... but... I have to.

  He looked at the words on the screen.

  “Hey girl, that white guy with the Maserati is a real chump! He's rich as hell though, so I'm gonna milk that as much as I can before I kick him to the curb. Hopefully I get some LV bags and maybe even a diamond or two before I ditch him! LOL! -J.”

  Brenton's expression morphed from one of quiet contentment to one of dark rage in an instant.

  So that's all I am to you, Jade? A “rich chump with a Maserati”? I knew it. I knew this whole 'love' thing was all bullshit. All lies, all of it. Well, you think you're gonna play me? I'm already one step ahead of you, bitch.

  Jade emerged from the bathroom half an hour later, and was surprised to see that Brenton had left already. There was, however, a note on the bed.

  “Had a meeting to get to. I left cab fare and a message for you with Francisco, the doorman, downstairs. Sorry I had to rush off. -B.”

  Alright, that's a bit odd. Why didn't he say anything about this earlier? Still, it doesn't matter. I feel great! For once, everything is working out for me! Life is really looking up!

  Jade got dressed and headed downstairs. When she got to Francisco, however, the old man was wearing a far different expression on his face than the friendly smile that he had had the night before.

  “Hi Francisco,” she said warmly.

  “This is for you,” he said, pushing an envelope toward her coldly.

  She looked inside, feeling very confused. There was enough money for a cab ride to her place, and a small note. She pulled the note out and read it, and as she did, her heart sank and her head began to swim with dizziness.

  “Did you really think you could play me like that, you materialistic, money-grubbing whore? Do you really think I'm that stupid? Well, I've got news for you: this 'rich white chump with the Maserati' is onto you, and I don't play the kind of games you do. Project SolarTwo is hereby canceled, and furthermore, if you step foot into this building ever again, your ass will get arrested quicker than you can say 'one two three'. -B.”

  CHAPTER 7

  It had been four months since Jade had last seen Brenton. Since the terrible misunderstanding that had torn their budding relationship into a million pieces, she had not been able to get hold of him. All she had wanted to do was to explain that the message he had seen on her phone was not typed by her, but was a message coming to her from a friend, who also, unfortunately, had a name beginning with the letter 'J'. Brenton, however, would not hear of it, and was not prepared to listen to a single word she had to say. He had blocked her phone, her email and her social media accounts. The Chinese investors hoping to back the SolarTwo Project had pulled out after Brenton had abruptly pulled the plug on the American side of the deal.

  Since then Jade had given up on her lofty ambitions, and had been getting by on piecemeal freelancing work. New York City had entered winter, and everything was icy and gloomy. It was enough, Jade had been thinking, to give her serious motivation to move out of the city. She had already applied for a number of jobs on the west coast; Los Angeles, with its warm and sunny winter climate was seeming a lot more appealing to her at the moment. Now all she had left in New York City was Jenny – and Jenny wasn't exactly the best company around. All she liked to do was gossip – the very same gossip that had, essentially, wrecked Jade's life here.

  Christmas would be approaching in the coming weeks, and Jade was wondering whether she shouldn't just leave New York when her apartment lease was up, which was going to happen in a few days' time, and go back to Florida temporarily so that she could at least spend the holiday season with her family. This particular question had been weighing for a while on her mind, and some days she leaned toward doing it, while on others she felt more inclined to ask her landlord to lease her place to her on a month-by-month basis when the contract expired.

  It was as she was walking through a sleet of cold rain, in the falling dusk, that she heard her phone ringing in her purse. Her jumped for a brief second; it still did, four months later, as the hope that the caller would be Brenton still burned its fire within her.

  It wasn't.

  It was a number from Los Angeles, though. That at least was a good sign. She answered the call as she continued walking along the cold, grey street under the cover of her umbrella.

  “Hi, Jade Gillie?” asked the voice on the phone, that of a middle-aged woman.

  “Yes, this is Jade speaking. Who's calling?”

  “This is Leslie Smout, personnel manager at Frands LLC. You emailed us your CV and applied for a position in our company last week, is that right?”

  “That's correct, Ms. Smout.”

  “Leslie, please.”

  The woman sounded warm and pleasant, at least – just like that Los Angeles weather Jade had heard so much about.

  “Jade, we've reviewed your CV and your qualifications and experience are exactly what we're looking for in a candidate. How soon can we set up a Skype interview with you?”

  Jade's heart started to beat faster, and a broad grin spread across her pretty cheeks. This was the first good news she had had in a long time.

  “Well, I'm actually on my way home right now. I'll be at my place in around half an hour, if that's alright with you?”

  “Sure. We've got your Skype details on file, so we'll give you a call in thirty minutes. I've gotta say, Jade, you're head and shoulders above the competition. I probably shouldn't say this, but what the heck: you've pretty much got the job. The interview is just a formality I gotta get through.”

  “That's... that's the best news I've had in ages!” exclaimed Jade, smiling broadly all the while. “It is really is! Thank you so much for the call, Leslie!”

  “No problem! I'm looking forward to chatting to you on Skype shortly. Chat soon, bye.”

  “Goodbye.”

  Jade felt like dancing a jog through the cold New York streets. She was so happy at this moment that she could cry.

  However, as she was waiting at a traffic light to cross the road, something else made her want to cry – for an entirely different reason. She heard the loud, booming engine of a sports car approaching the light at speed, and when she turned her head to see where the sound was coming from, she saw a red car approaching – a familiar red car, a Maserati. A car that she had once been inside.

  Her heart jumped into her mouth as she saw Brenton pulling up to the stop light. This was the first time they had seen each other since that fateful morning four months ago. With her heart hammering madly in her chest, and an ice of cold sweat chilling her back inside her coat, she started to cross the road.

  Right in front of his car.
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  Mere feet away from the man who had lifted her up so high, and then thrown her down with such violence.

  She couldn't help it.

  She stopped in front of the car, on the crosswalk, and stared directly into the windscreen.

  What she saw tore her heart into a million pieces.

  There, sitting next to Brenton in the passenger seat of the car, was his stunning secretary, Claire, dressed in a hot, tight, revealing white dress. Her hand was on one of his legs, and she was leaning over him, with one arm draped around his shoulders as she whispered something into his ear. Brenton looked up, and his eyes met Jade's as she stood stock-still in front of his vehicle.

  For a second, they locked eyes, and a cascade of warring emotions rushed through Jade's system. She felt at once weak, vulnerable, hopeless – and also angry, betrayed and insulted.

  And attracted, madly attracted to this powerful, handsome billionaire. She couldn't deny it; she still wanted him. And that made her feel even worse.

  What emotions were running his mind she could not tell. His eyes remained cold as she stared at him, and after a second he looked away, no longer acknowledging her presence. She turned on her heels and walked off, not looking back once as she did.

  As the traffic light changed she heard the Maserati roar off, and that was that.

  “I've seen the last of you, Brenton Huxley,” she whispered under her breath as tears of sadness, regret, anger and betrayal began to burn in her large, dark eyes. “I've seen the last of you, and you've seen the last of me. And you'll never see me again.”

  She walked briskly off to her apartment, crying softly in the falling rain, impatient to begin the interview that would take her to a new job, new city, and a new life.

  Two weeks later everything had been arranged. Her belongings had been packed and shipped across the country to LA, to her uncle's house, where she would be staying while she looked for an apartment. She had vacated her apartment a week earlier, and had spent her last few days in New York City crashing on Jenny's sofa, listening to her endless gossip and stories about the rich men she was dating and deceiving. Quite frankly, Jade was very relieved to be escaping that environment, and New York in general. To her it had come to represent everything she resented; failure, heartbreak and broken dreams. LA would be a fresh start, a clean slate. A place to lose old and painful memories, and to write new ones – happy memories, and stories of joy and success.

  Still, even as the cab pulled up to the entrance of the airport, she found her thoughts wandering back to a certain billionaire. A certain business mogul with a hard-as-rock body, piercing blue eyes, a granite jaw and the passion of a wild beast.

  Try as she may, she could not forget Brenton Huxley, and the moments they had shared.

  She exited the cab, gave the driver his fare and took her luggage out of the back. She watched as an airplane climbed from the airport high into the grey sky, disappearing eventually among the clouds. Soon, she would be up there, in one of those great metallic crafts, leaving this city and its landscape of broken dreams forever.

  As she walked into the airport to check her bags in and get her boarding pass, she wondered briefly if Brenton ever thought about her, the way she thought about him. Did thoughts of her dance through his mind in the late hours of the night? Did images of her face flash, uninvited, before his eyes. She wondered. She really wondered.

  Did he regret what he had done? Had he bothered to read any of the messages she had sent, explaining the situation, explaining that it had been a message from Jenny, not her? That everything that had transpired had just been because of a simple, but terrible misunderstanding?

  No. No, she thought bitterly, he probably doesn't. He's got his blonde secretary now, with her supermodel looks and long, slim legs. He probably hasn't thought about me for months.

  Jade checked her bags in and got her boarding pass. She went and had coffee in one of the airport cafes, and read a novel while she waited for her boarding time to arrive.

  It did, eventually, and she started making her way to the boarding gate to get on the plane that would whisk her away to a new beginning, and leave this old life behind.

  As she walked, however, she couldn't resist turning back for one more look behind her. She half-expected to see Brenton running through the airport at full speed, pushing through the throngs of people and shouting “wait Jade, wait!” at the top of his lungs.

  There was nobody there.

  She turned around and continued walking, and this time she didn't look back.

  CHAPTER 8

  Jade stared out over the Pacific Ocean as it rolled its breakers in from the deep. The sun was setting, sizzling the edges of its red fire against the water in the distance. Since she had moved to Los Angeles over two months ago, Jade had come to the ocean as often as she had been able to. Her job kept her very busy, but on the rare moments that she had free time to herself, she enjoyed coming out here, to be alone with the sea and the sand. One of her favorite films had always been The Shawshank Redemption, and in it the character Andy DuFresne had said that the Pacific Ocean had no memory. He had also said that he wanted to live out the rest of his days in a warm place, with no memory.

  Well, here she was, living out the dream of a fictional character in a movie. She was living in a warm place, by the Pacific, which took away all memories.

  “It really is as blue as I think you imagined it to be, Andy,” she whispered, imagining that she was talking to this fictional person. “And I can feel my memories slipping away, pulled further and further with every wave that rolls back into the ocean.”

  The sun had almost sunk behind the horizon now, and the first stars of the evening were lighting up in the sky. Jade stood up, brushing the beach sand off of her dark legs as she prepared to make her way back home.

  It was then that her phone buzzed. She pulled it out of her handbag, glancing at the screen to see who had just messaged her.

  That was odd; the message was from Maeve, a high-school friend in Missouri who she spoke to once every few months just to catch up. Maeve had been far better friends with Jenny than her, so Jade wondered why she was messaging her. She opened the message to read it.

  “Hey Jade! CRAZY news, girl! Jenny's gone and got her ass ARRESTED! It's all over news and social media!”

  Jade was shocked to hear this.

  “What?!” she texted back. “That's insane! What happened?!”

  “She got busted for stealing a diamond ring from some rich white dude in New York. Investigators got hold of her phone, and someone in the police leaked a list of all her incriminating texts online. It's everywhere girl, everywhere! Facebook, you'll see what I mean.”

  Jade logged on to Facebook to see if the rumors were true. Sure enough, people were sharing the story left, right and center. However, it was the headline of the news story that really caught Jade's eye:

  'RICH WHITE CHUMP IN A MASERATI' TAKES HIS WOULD-BE ROBBER TO THE CLEANERS BEFORE HE GETS CLEANED OUT HIMSELF!

  Rich white chump in a Maserati.

  That was the phrase that Brenton had read, in the text that Jenny had sent Jade. Those were the words he had thought Jade was using to describe him. Those were the words that had destroyed their relationship.

  And here those awful words are again, splashed out for millions to see all over Facebook.

  Jade shook her head and sighed. She felt sorry for Jenny, although she couldn't say that she was surprised that this had happened.

  Those words, Jenny – they destroyed my life. And now they've ruined your own life too.

  She felt bad for her old friend, but really there was nothing that she could do. And, she thought sadly, Jenny was most likely guilty of the crime she had been accused of.

  As the night began to settle in, Jade started the long walk back to her car. She heard something loud approaching in the distance – something deep and pulsing, not the usual hum of traffic. She looked up to the sky, and saw a bright light stabbing through the
low haze of Los Angeles city; a helicopter was flying this way.

  “That's weird,” said Jade to herself as she strolled slowly along the beach. “I wonder if that's a TV crew flying out here now? I wonder why, nothing newsworthy has happened out here at the beach.”

  The helicopter was flying lower, and was now speeding closer and closer, the sound of its whirring blades thrumming with bassy fury through the evening air. The chopper switched on its searchlight, roving its light across the beach.

  “What the hell is going on here?!” exclaimed Jade. It seemed now as if the chopper was coming straight for her, and she was starting to feel worried, and more than a little bit alarmed.

  The spotlight focused its glare on her – her exactly – and the chopper hovered above the beach, lowering from its height in the sky and preparing to land, kicking up a little tornado of beach sand as it came closer to the ground.

  As it got lower, the wind from its propeller blades began to buffet Jade, rippling her summer dress and blowing sand into her face. She raised an arm to shield her face from both the roaring air currents and the blowing sand as the helicopter landed on the beach. A figure jumped out of the helicopter as it touched down on the beach sand, and it started to run towards her. She couldn't make out any details of who it was; the bright light from the chopper's searchlight reduced the figure to a mere silhouette.

  But it was then, over the bassy thundering of the helicopter's whirling blades, that a familiar voice called out her name.

  And that voice made her weak at the knees, while shooting heat through her every vein and artery.

  “Jade! Jade, wait!”

  Brenton Huxley.

  He sprinted through the sand to get to her, dropping his briefcase onto the sand and throwing away his phone as he ran. Joy beamed on his face in the last rays of the dying sun as it finally sank into the Pacific Ocean.

  “Brenton! What on earth are you doing?! How did you find me?!” exclaimed Jade, shocked to the core with disbelief and surprise.