Cowboy Brave

by Carolyn Brown

  He narrowed his eyes and made his way down the stairs until he was standing in front of her, arms crossed. He looked her up and down as she stood there in her ever-growing puddle, and his eyes finally glinted with recognition.

  “Ava-freaking-Ellis,” he said. “And here I thought Jack Senior’s passing would go unnoticed by the rest of the world. Guess it brought someone out of the woodwork. Just wasn’t thinking it would be you.”

  She swallowed hard, then rubbed her hands on her arms, trying to fight against the shiver of cold and realization.

  Neither Walker nor Luke had any clue what she’d kept from their brother.

  Jack reappeared with a towel and what looked like clothing stacked on top of it. He offered the pile to her, though he was still drenched himself.

  “There’s a bathroom off the living room, across from the kitchen. I’ll throw your clothes in the dryer after you change. Can’t let you drive home like that.”

  While it was a sweet gesture, his voice was flat, and she knew it was just Jack being Jack—performing his obligatory duty for someone else in need. It was what made her fall for him in the first place—the way he took care of his brothers, even in the early weeks when they’d first met and he’d been in a cast. Her insides felt like they were caving in as the memories also brought her back to their first kiss—and Jack wincing when she’d pressed her palm against his torso. She’d never forget the bruises over his ribs, a terrifying kaleidoscope of purple, blue, black, and yellow. But that had been the type of pain that would heal. What lay beneath was something she’d never truly be able to understand.

  “Thanks,” she said, grateful for anything other than the cold clothes stuck to her body. She grabbed the offering and headed toward her destination. As she did, she heard Walker mumble something about a bigger bathroom upstairs—and Jack responding with an emphatic No.

  She didn’t know the full details of Jack’s last night in this house as a kid, but his father knocking him down those same stairs where she’d been reacquainted with the youngest Everett brother was all the information she needed to understand. Once inside the bathroom, with the door shut and locked behind her, she let out a long, shaky breath.

  Of course he never came back—not for her. Not for anyone. And she didn’t blame him, either.

  She steadied herself, swallowing back the memories, and peeled off her wet clothes. The towel provided welcome warmth, but when she pulled the gray T-shirt over her head, she startled at Jack’s scent, at the nearness of him, and her thoughts zoomed in on that rain-soaked kiss.

  There’d barely been enough time for her body to react when it happened. She’d been wrapped too tight in the emotion of it all, but now something long ignored, long dormant, suddenly woke. Her nipples peaked against the thin cotton of his shirt, and she knew it had little to do with body temperature.

  She’d kissed Jack Everett the boy years ago. Fallen for him. Made love to him. And though there’d been other men since, she’d never ached for their touch like she did for his now. Funny how the heart and body could reconnect, even after all this time.

  I loved you every day we were together, and I’m pretty sure I’d fall for the man you’ve become if I had the chance to.

  Chance or no chance, it didn’t matter. She knew it the day she’d shown him to his first class at Los Olivos High, the second he stepped out of that truck yesterday—and again when she found him at the vineyard this morning.

  But there was more at stake this time around. Her future, for one. She’d put her life on hold to raise Owen, and there were no regrets there. But she was getting back on track now. All that stood between her and art school was one stupid painting that she would produce. But her son—their son—was still the most important person in her life.

  Owen came first. Before she even thought about protecting her own heart, she had to protect his.

  She emerged in the too-long T-shirt and shorts she’d had to creatively fold and roll at the waist to keep them from falling down. Jack stood at the kitchen counter in a fresh T-shirt and jeans himself, his feet bare, a steaming mug of coffee in his hand. He tilted his head toward a second mug on the kitchen table.

  “I hope black is okay. We’re out of everything.” He forced a small smile, and she tried not to read too much into it. She’d dropped a bomb on him, and not in the way she’d hoped to do it. He’d need time to adjust, and she’d give him the space.

  “Black is fine,” she lied. “My clothes—I should run them to my car.” Her eyes dropped to the towel-wrapped bundle in her arms, and he quickly set his coffee down and moved toward her.

  “No,” he said, taking the clothes from her. “I said I’d take care of that.”

  “Thank you.” She ran a hand through her wet hair, trying to finger comb the tangles and keep herself from fidgeting in the presence of this strange yet familiar man who’d just kissed her until her lips were swollen.

  He walked through the kitchen to what must be the laundry room, calling over his shoulder. “Everything here dryer safe?”

  She laughed absently as she followed him, pausing in the open doorway. “I’m a single mom. I don’t have time for clothes that aren’t dryer safe.”

  A thick silence filled the air after that, punctuated moments later by the forceful slam of the dryer door. His back was still to her, and she swore under her breath.

  “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “That came out wrong. I mean, it’s a mom joke, single or not. Shit. I don’t know how to be me around you, Jack. I don’t know how to do this.” Not that she knew what this was. Was the coffee a peace offering or another obligatory gesture while she waited for her clothes to dry? Could he not even stand to be in the same room with her, or did a tiny part of him want her here?

  He started the dryer and turned to face her, arms crossed and expression, as always, unreadable. Damn him for being able to hide like that when she wore her emotions like an obnoxious holiday sweater—screaming at you whether you wanted to see them or not.

  “Yeah, well,” he said. “I don’t know how to be angry with you while a part of me still wants you, so I guess that makes two of us.”

  She exhaled. She’d spent all these years mired in guilt for not telling him, then resentment for thinking he’d found the life she’d always hoped he would—without her and Owen. Now she was wearing his clothes, and he wasn’t wearing a ring, and what the hell did all of it mean?

  She had no freaking clue. Still, she took a leap of faith with one tiny step over the threshold so they were now in the same room.

  “So—you don’t hate me?” she asked in complete earnest. Because right now that’s all she needed to hear, that there was something salvageable between them, no matter how small.

  He dropped his arms and pressed his hands against the dryer behind him, his gaze boring into hers.

  “Shit, Ava. No. I don’t hate you. I may not like how things went down, but that doesn’t mean I don’t get it—that I don’t claim some of the responsibility. I’ve spent so goddamn long reminding myself what you did to me. I’m only now realizing what I did to you, and I need some time to wrap my head around that. Around all of this.”

  “I can live with that.” She shivered.

  “You’re still cold,” he said. A pile of folded towels sat atop the dryer in a basket, and he pulled one from the bottom and draped it over her shoulders. As soon as she felt the heat she understood why.

  “You gave me the warmest one,” she said, suppressing a smile. She wasn’t going to let this silly bit of chivalry get to her.

  Except it was already getting to her.

  He tugged the cozy terry cloth around her, and she stumbled forward into his chest. She moved to step back, to pull at the tether that still seemed to bind them, but he kept each end of the towel firm in his grip—which kept her firm against him.

  She swallowed and then took a chance, pressing her palms against his chest.

  She felt his heartbeat, so strong and sure, and she wanted tha
t sureness to be about her—about them. But they were strangers now. They had to proceed with caution.

  For several seconds they just stood there, their mouths close enough so that warm breath mingled between them, but their lips didn’t dare meet. Her heart rose in her throat as her pulse thrummed in her ears.

  There was something in that moment before a kiss, in the anticipation of it. An exquisite ache. A rare hope. The promise of amazing—or of unimaginable heartbreak. Ava felt all of those things in Jack Everett’s arms, and for this one moment she threw logic out the window and welcomed every single possibility if it meant his lips on hers again.

  “I’m so goddamn angry.” His voice rumbled in his chest, and she could feel the vibration of it against her palms.

  “I know,” she said, and she also knew that anger went deeper than what had happened between him and her.

  “I spent so many years hung up on a warped version of the past. Now here you are—showing me what I’ve missed—and I don’t know what to do with all of it. I just need a few minutes where I don’t have to think about what comes next.”

  His breath was ragged. She could feel that same need—feel it building up until she thought she’d burst.

  “No thinking,” she agreed. She could do with forgetting, just for a few minutes, what it was that had gotten them to this moment.

  And just like that, the towel dropped to the floor. His hands cupped her cheeks, and hers slid around his neck. As their lips met, still hungry yet more cautious than before, everything else fell away. Gone were the past ten years—her heartache, her regret, and her longing for something she wasn’t sure she’d ever find.

  All that mattered was this moment—Jack’s hands on her skin, the electricity building between them as his tongue slipped past her parted lips and she tasted a sliver of redemption. Restoration. Release.

  His hands slid down her neck and then her sides, and a new kind of shiver ran through her as they rested on her hips, his fingertips kneading her over her shirt.

  She unclasped her own hands from his neck and grabbed his wrist, moving his palm beneath the fabric of his T-shirt that she wore and onto her bare skin.

  “Jesus, Red,” he growled.

  And there it was, the nickname he’d given her finally rolling off his own lips.

  “I thought only Luke remembered what you used to call me,” she said.

  He shook his head and leaned back. “Didn’t seem right before.”

  Does it seem right now? She wasn’t going to ask.

  “Stop thinking,” she whispered. “We agreed. No thinking. Just for right now.”

  She guided his hand higher until the tips of his fingers brushed her taut nipple, and he hissed. She hoped this meant he’d listened to her request because her ability to speak, let alone think, no longer existed. She answered his touch by kissing him harder, deeper, begging him for more.

  His thumb and forefinger pinched her tightened peak, and she drew in a sharp breath. Their bodies vibrated against the thrum of the dryer, and every one of her nerve endings was on heightened alert. She’d never been so sensitive to another man’s touch, and it was this realization—this momentary weakness of logical freaking thought, that had her gasping and pulling away this time.

  His blue eyes were a tempest of emotion, confirmation that this had gone too far.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought—”

  “I told you not to think. I wanted you not to think.” She shook her head. “But as much as I want to, I can’t turn off my own voice of reason. The thing is, there’s a little boy caught in the middle of this, and he has no clue about any of it. It’s not fair to him, Jack.” She had to force herself not to wince at his stricken expression—and not to fall apart when she saw his walls go back up, hiding any part of him he’d let slip through. “And it’s not fair to us,” she added.

  He nodded.

  “I’d like you to meet him,” she said. “If you want to. I won’t tell him who you are. Not until you’re ready for him to know.” She swallowed hard at the next thought. “And if you decide you don’t want him to know—then we’ll cross that bridge when the time comes. But I won’t get his hopes up when there’s the chance of them being shattered.”

  Jack’s brows pulled together. “How would you—”

  He didn’t finish the question, but she’d guessed what he was asking. She’d spent the whole night before working it out, how she could let her son meet his father without any pressure of what came next.

  “I told him you were a friend I hadn’t seen in a long time. Once I tell him you played baseball all through high school and college, you’ll automatically be his friend, too.”

  His lip gave a slight twitch, and although he didn’t smile, she knew a part of him wanted to.

  “He’s a pitcher?” Jack asked.

  Ava smiled. “He’s really good. A natural. My dad gives him some pointers every now and then, but that part of Owen is all you.” She glanced down at her attire and then lifted her shoulders. “I should go. I’m gonna write down my number. You can call me if you want to trade our clothes back—and if you want to see Owen again.”

  He stood there, jaw tight, his expression stoic.

  She stepped toward him, leaning close to place a soft kiss on his cheek.

  His shoulders relaxed.

  “Thank you for hearing me out,” she told him. “And for maybe, in some small way, understanding.”

  He nodded. “You’re welcome. And Red?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry you did all this alone.”

  She swallowed hard and started to back away toward the kitchen but paused as another idea struck that was either brilliant or foolish or both.

  “The vineyard’s beautiful,” she said. “If you decide to keep it, I could help you get it up and running.” She gave him a nervous smile. “Strictly business, of course. Though I wouldn’t charge you much.”

  He pressed his lips together, not quite a grin but not a frown either.

  “I’ll consider your offer,” he said, and she decided not to ask which one.

  That night she lay in bed, exhausted but unable to fall asleep. At a quarter past eleven, her cell phone vibrated on her nightstand. She assumed it was a text, but when the vibrating continued, she remembered that she’d turned her ringer off after Owen had fallen asleep. She grabbed the phone quickly and accepted the call even though she didn’t recognize the number.

  “Hello?” she said in a half whisper, tiptoeing to her door and closing it so she didn’t wake her son.

  “You were sleeping. Shit. I shouldn’t have called so late. Sorry if I—”

  “Jack?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I wasn’t asleep.”

  “Oh.”

  “And—I’m glad you called.”

  He was silent for a few beats, so she waited, giving him his space.

  “Red?”

  “Yeah?”

  “He’s my son.”

  “Yeah,” she said again, her voice breaking softly as she crawled back into bed. He’d said it with such conviction she wasn’t sure what to make of it. But that didn’t matter. He knew about Owen and acknowledged him, and that was already more than she could have hoped for after all this time.

  “Of course I want to meet him. I never for a second should have made you think I didn’t.”

  “It’s okay.” She swiped at a tear, then rolled her eyes at herself. Hadn’t she cried enough for one day? But this was a happy tear. A hopeful one. She kind of liked it for a change.

  “No,” he said. “It’s not okay. I was an asshole for letting you leave today without saying anything, but it’s been a hell of a two days.”

  She laughed at this, and God it felt good to smile. The weight hadn’t lifted from her chest, but it was suddenly a lot lighter. “I think you’ve earned a free pass or a get-out-of-jail-free card. Or something.”

  A deep, soft laugh sounded in her ear, and it only made her smile b
roaden.

  “Jack Everett, did you just laugh?”

  She heard the sound again.

  “I think maybe I did,” he said.

  She opened her mouth to say more but then bit her tongue. She liked being the reason he laughed, but knowing it was enough. She wasn’t going to break the spell by gloating.

  “What about tomorrow after school?” he asked.

  She grinned. “He gets out early. Noon, I think. Teacher in-service day or something like that. Are you free for a late lunch?”

  “How about this great little barbeque place in town, BBQ on the Bluff? I hear they buy local, and from what Luke and Walker tell me, Crossroads Ranch has some of the best beef in the area.”

  She laughed again. “Did you make a joke?”

  “I think maybe I did.”

  “We’d love to meet you for lunch,” she told him. “And as far as Owen knows, you’re my good friend Jack who I haven’t seen in years.”

  He cleared his throat. “So, one o’clock?”

  She let out a long breath and nodded, then remembered he couldn’t see her. “Yeah. One o’clock. We’ll see you then.”

  “Red?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m glad I called, too.”

  And then he was gone.

  After the adrenaline wore off, her head sank against her pillow. She barely had time to double-check that her alarm was set before she drifted off into her first restful night of sleep in years.

  She dreamed of kissing a boy under an olive tree—and what it would have been like if he’d stayed.

  Chapter Eight

  Jack’s brothers both sat at the kitchen table, a spread of sandwich fixings laid out before them. The last of what was left in the fridge, he guessed. Both had risen early to do some work in the barn while Jack tended to paperwork regarding the mortgage and the inevitable sale of the vineyard. Walker must have had a tame evening because he was awake and alert as early as Luke had been. This had set Jack somewhat at ease for the morning. Maybe he wouldn’t have to worry so much about his youngest brother once he went back to San Diego. And since he had the two of them together—sober—he figured this was as good a time as any to tell them.