by Maisey Yates
“I...” She inhaled sharply, then coughed, gripping the back of her office chair and trying to steady herself so she didn’t have a full-on respiratory episode in his presence. Speaking of his ego. “I am not,” she finished weakly.
“You don’t remember anything, though, so you can’t be certain. Maybe you’re responding to instinct.”
She released her hold on the back of the chair and waved a hand. “I... No. I feel like if anything were...egregious or notable I would remember.”
He crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. “So, I’m neither egregious nor notable.”
“Neither thing.”
“Which is why you don’t remember if my underwear needs to be specially tailored or not.”
“Ha!” She nearly howled. It was either that or slink under the desk in embarrassment. And she would not do that. “No, I would most certainly remember if the contents of your underwear were such that special alterations were required. Again, either way.”
“So you’re saying...”
“You were inoffensive,” she said quickly, “clearly.”
“My penis is...inoffensive.”
“Yes.” Her ears were burning. She couldn’t recall ever being so embarrassed in her life. Well, okay, not since they woke up in bed together.
“Well, that’s...something.”
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “This is terrible. You are terrible.” She released it and slapped her hand back down at her side. “Can we just...try to get through this without any more innuendo?”
“Since my body is inoffensive to you it should be pretty easy.”
“You would think.”
“Well, I’m going to take my inoffensive appendage back to work.”
She snorted, reaching for the back of her office chair and missing, stumbling slightly. “Fine. Where are you... I mean, what are you working on?”
“Building a new retirement community in Tolowa. Slightly cheaper bay-front property. Copper Ridge has gotten a little steep. Also, we’re building a house on a hill overlooking the ocean.”
She was interested, in spite of herself. “Do you actually...build?”
“I am a contractor.”
“You own the company, though,” she pointed out. “Most people would maybe sit in the office.”
“I’ve never liked sitting behind a desk. It’s not for me. Anyway, my dad owns the company. My family. It was my uncle’s until he passed away ten years ago. And then my dad folded it into his empire. Someone needed to run it.”
“And you...love building things?”
“Does anyone love building things? It’s a thing you do. A man has to do something.”
Lydia looked around her office, at her little space that felt like an extension of home. “I love what I do. I believe in it really passionately. I love this town and I want to serve it in every way I can. I don’t just do it because I have to work.”
“I think that’s a one-in-a-million thing, Lydia,” he said. “Anyway, I have to get going. I’ll see you tonight.”
He turned and walked out of the office, closing the door behind him and effectively cutting the tension off. She sagged with relief, all the way down into her chair, her heart thundering in her ears.
She would see him tonight. And every night thereafter for an awfully long time because they lived together and how had she gotten herself into this mess?
She groaned and laid her head down on her desk.
She needed to get a grip. Not on Colton. She mentally scolded herself ahead of the prurient thought that she knew was about to pop up. Maybe she was reaching her sexual peak. Women did that in their thirties. And, granted, she was only recently thirty, but it seemed like it was potentially likely.
It had been a good long while since she’d been in a relationship. Testosterone exposure was starting to go to her brain. Masculine carbon monoxide. He radiated it.
And she did not have time to worry about it.
She straightened, waking her computer up and getting back into the spreadsheet she’d been working on before she’d gone to lunch. Immediately, a sense of calm came over her. Yes, this was her domain. She was good at this. In this, she was confident.
Spreadsheets were the source of all sanity. And she was going to get as much sanity as she possibly could before she returned to Colton’s home later.
CHAPTER NINE
SHE WAS STARTING to feel like she lived with a ghost. Over the past week she had barely caught sight of Colton in their shared living space. Really, it shouldn’t bother her. Really, it didn’t. Except that they were going to have to present some kind of unified front at Eli and Sadie’s house next week for her fund-raiser dinner. So, it would help if they weren’t presenting as total strangers.
Colton seemed like a decent human being. Well, mostly. So while they rubbed each other the wrong way, and definitely carried around a little bit of tension, ultimately she didn’t see why they couldn’t come to some kind of understanding.
With that in mind, she had called ahead and told his housekeeper that they wouldn’t be needing dinner tonight, and she had picked up fish and chips from the crab shanty on her way home from work.
When she pulled in the driveway, she could see Colton’s truck was already there, but when she got into the house, she couldn’t find him. He was elusive. At least, as elusive as a man who was well over six feet tall could be.
She set the brown paper bag on the dining room table, then walked into the living room. He wasn’t there. He had a home office, but she had never ventured into it. Mostly, she stayed in the bedroom she was sleeping in, the nearest bathroom, the kitchen, living room and dining room. Common areas.
She avoided his office. She avoided even going in the neighborhood of his bedroom. These were commonsense practices. Much like avoiding a bear’s den.
She supposed she could shout and see if he responded. Or she could text him.
She pulled her phone out and opened a new message box. She hadn’t ever texted him before, but she had gotten his phone number because it seemed highly impractical not to have your husband’s number.
I come bearing dinner.
She waited, watching the bottom of her screen to see if those three telltale dots appeared showing that he was composing a response. Nothing.
She sighed heavily and wandered out to the front porch. It was a beautiful evening, a cool breeze blowing in off the ocean, rustling through the evergreen trees, making them look as though they were shivering from the cold.
She walked down the stairs, her steps on the gravel blunted by pine needles that had fallen into the driveway. She hadn’t done much exploring of the property, she realized. Not only had she localized herself indoors, she had done the same outdoors. She always parked her car in front of the house and took those few steps up to the front porch and inside. From there, she carried out her well-worn routine.
Okay, maybe she couldn’t exactly blame Colton for the distance. Maybe she was cultivating some of the avoidance. Or a lot of it.
She sighed heavily, walking down the dirt road, wishing she had brought a jacket. It cooled down sharply in the evenings, especially when the sun dipped below the tall trees and the mountains. And now she was walking in the shade, and she was definitely feeling it.
Dressed in only a short-sleeved top, a pencil skirt and sensible flats, she was really feeling the lateness of the hour. She gripped her elbows, rubbing her arms vigorously with her own hands as she continued to walk.
She knew that the barn was somewhere this way, and she felt absolutely ridiculous for having not seen it before now. It was like she was just trying to keep tunnel vision and get through this weird detour she was on.
She didn’t do detours well. She liked everything to go according to plan. She liked control. And in t
his situation, with this man, she had so little of it.
Sometimes, she got the sense that he felt the same. But most of the time, he just seemed to go about his day with a kind of smug assurance.
Irritating bastard.
She paused when she came around the corner and the tree branches gave way, revealing a large red barn bathed in golden light from the sinking sun.
There was a fence connected to the side of it, and field beyond it. She could see horses in it, grazing as though they had all the time in the world and night wasn’t about to descend.
She could hear a sharp, staccato sound echoing off the buildings, but she still didn’t see Colton. She walked across the neatly groomed gravel clearing, taking in her surroundings as best she could.
It was a much bigger operation than she had imagined. There were tractors, other heavy equipment that she couldn’t name. A large stack of hay bales was just inside the barn, giving off a sweet scent that mingled with the smell of horses. It wasn’t an overly familiar scent to her. It was something she had only experienced in special events, and on those rare occasions she had gone to visit Eli at his family ranch.
She associated it with good things. Solid and steady things. Deep roots and hard work.
It was challenging her assessment of Colton yet again.
He had told her the other day that he actually did the physical labor at his construction company. And along with that, that he didn’t particularly enjoy it, but that he liked sitting behind a desk less. And now, she was being confronted with all this. This evidence of further hard work.
She followed the strange sound that was echoing through the air, around the side of the barn until she saw a rustic, natural woodshed. And, in front of that, wearing nothing but a pair of low-slung jeans, was Colton.
Chopping wood.
It was like a cologne commercial. Like the promise of something rugged and woodsy that could be bottled and possessed. Except it was real. He was real.
For a full thirty seconds she couldn’t even move. All she could do was stand there and watch. Watch the play of his muscles as he raised the ax high into the air before bringing it down hard on the piece of wood he had stacked on top of a shorn-off tree stump.
Suddenly, she forgot why she had been cold a few moments earlier. Suddenly, she felt as though she were in the throes of a hot flash. She wanted to strip layers off, not put any on. She was actually sweating.
He raised the ax again, the muscles in his chest straining, his ab muscles shifting and bunching.
Good Lord, she was thirsty.
“Hi,” she said, because she really couldn’t stand there just staring any longer or it was going to get weird.
Okay, it was already weird. But he didn’t have to know how weird it was.
He paused, dropping the ax down to his side and resting the head on the dirt, drawing his forearm over his forehead.
“I...I came to find you,” she said, feeling like her voice sounded dull and rather obviously affected.
“Here I am.”
He was breathing hard from all the exertion, and that was making his muscles move in yet more interesting ways. Sweat was beaded across his skin, and she imagined she should find that repellent in some way. Unhygienic.
She did not.
“Yes,” she said, waving her hand in a broad gesture, “here you are.”
“You haven’t been out here to see the barn, have you?”
“No,” she said. “It’s nice.”
“Yeah,” he said, “it is.”
“Modest at all times, Colton.”
“I’m not. I’m honest. Anyway, you don’t downplay your achievements. And you shouldn’t.”
She bristled, mostly because all of this felt a little bit like telling her what to do. “No, I shouldn’t. I agree with you. Because I’m very accomplished.”
“You are.”
For some reason, that didn’t feel like a compliment.
She should just tell him that she had dinner, and then they could go back and eat it. Or he could stay here, and not eat with her. He could continue to avoid her. Really, that would be fine. But for some reason she didn’t do that.
“Is this where you’ve been spending all your time in the evenings?”
He nodded. “Pretty much.”
“What all do you... What all do you do?”
“A lot of things. I have horses, which you can see. I’ve been selling livestock to the rodeo circuit. Pretty specialized breeding.”
“So you own rodeo horses?”
“I retain ownership to a few of them. Others I sell. But it’s kind of cool to own one of the horses that’s competing. There’s decent money in that. I don’t want anyone to get hurt, of course, but I do like to root for my horses, not the cowboys.”
“Is this...is this what you love doing?”
“I would rather do this than hammer nails, let’s put it that way.”
“Rather do what? I mean, specifically. Just the rodeo horses or...?”
He leaned his ax up against the stump, putting his hands on his lean hips. Her eyes were drawn to the muscles on his broad chest, and she had to force herself to look up and meet his gaze. “I think it would be pretty cool to get some bulls, personally. Or sheep. Whatever. I think I would just rather work on my own lands than just about anything else.”
“Why don’t you?”
He laughed, shaking his head. “Because that isn’t how it works. I know a lot of people see the West family name as some kind of trophy. But the fact of the matter is there’s a lot of responsibility with it. Yeah, we have a lot. Privileged as hell. But the thing is, I have to do something with that. I didn’t build any of this. The reason I have money is that my father was able to put me in charge of a business that was already lucrative. That’s the reason I have this land. I owe it to him to keep working the business. And after that, I owe it to him to keep the family business going. I can’t just step aside to do what I want to do.”
“What about your siblings? I know your younger sister is involved in the rodeo, when she isn’t pregnant.”
“Yeah, she’s pretty much it as far as rodeo affiliation goes. Madison is into dressage. Which is mostly what my father breeds horses for. Dressage and hunter/jumpers.”
“I’ve never been to your family ranch. What’s it look like?”
He lifted a shoulder, and that small motion set his muscles into play again. She blinked hard. “It’s different than this. Lots of open space around the house, fields everywhere. My parents’ house is like an Italian villa.”
“Which sounds like nothing you would be interested in inhabiting.”
His dark brows locked together. “You think so?”
“I’m not blind, Colton. I’ve been living in your little cabin in the woods for the past few weeks.”
“Little?”
She felt a smile tugging at her lips and even though she knew it was ill-advised, she couldn’t resist. “Inoffensive?”
He laughed. “Okay.”
“The point is, this—” she gestured to the barn “—is not an Italian villa.”
“It doesn’t matter. Anyway, I can’t put too much into it, and I can’t get too much into the breeding part of it, because then I’m in competition with my dad.”
“So what?”
“Spoken like someone who doesn’t have to deal with her parents on a regular basis.”
She couldn’t argue with that, but it still hurt. And it made her want to lash out.
“So, you somehow imagine that because I don’t see my parents all the time my relationship with them is any easier?”
“I’m just saying, you don’t have to negotiate your personal life and choices around them. Or your position in the community.”
“
The reason I don’t see my parents has nothing to do with my relationship with them being easy. Trust me. I didn’t move away from them for fun or just on a whim. I needed distance.”
Her mother and father’s brand of smothering, controlling, never satisfied love was something she wouldn’t wish on anyone. And she knew it made her a terrible person to remove herself from them when she was all they had left, but she hadn’t known what else to do for her sanity.
Phone calls and occasional holiday visits were much easier. It was much simpler to listen to her mother drone on and on about how Lydia needed to start focusing on getting married, because of course Frannie hadn’t been able to live to see a wedding day. Much simpler over the phone, where her mother couldn’t read her facial expressions.
But, of course Colton wouldn’t know about that.
His brother left.
Yeah, as if that was remotely the same.
“That doesn’t change the fact that you don’t have the same considerations that I have. Plus, it’s up to me to do what my brother isn’t here to do.”
And that hit a little too close to home.
“Why? He chose to leave. Anyway, you can’t make your entire life about fixing what somebody else broke.”
“That’s what everyone does, Lydia.”
“What do you mean?”
“Everything we do is a response to something. If you do the exact opposite of what your parents want you to do, you’re still doing it for them in a way, aren’t you? Whether you work to please them, or you work to piss them off. Either way, you’re doing it for them.”
“Not me,” she said. There was almost no one on earth doing less for her parents’ benefit than her. Except for maybe a crack addict.
“All right,” he said, “I forgot. You’re a special snowflake who does everything better than everyone else.”
“Damn straight.”
“Do you go out of your way to be impossible to deal with?”
“Do you go out of your way to be the most high-handed man on the planet? Seriously, Colton. As if you have the world completely figured out?”
“I thought I did. Until I wound up married to you.”
