by Liz Isaacson
“What the heck was that?” he asked himself, the burning, tingling sensation in his cheek from her touch still present. She’d started it. And all Beau knew was that he didn’t want to be the one to end it.
Whatever “it” was.
Beau snuck into the back of the chapel after the sermon had started, and he left early too. No reason for Graham to see him and start asking questions. He also didn’t want to face his mother, or Andrew, or anyone. He probably should’ve put on a wig and left the cowboy hat in his truck if he wanted to stay incognito, because he was halfway home when his phone chimed.
Graham had texted with, You came to church? What? My minivan isn’t good enough for you these days?
Beau snorted and laughed but didn’t respond. He knew better than most what texting could do to a good driver, and he didn’t want to end up in one of the ditches lining this canyon road.
Mom’s having dinner at her place tomorrow night, Graham sent next. She said you and Lily are both invited.
Beau didn’t think Lily would agree to that, even if it was just his family. He didn’t know a whole lot about her, but she hadn’t been keen on the idea of having other people at the lodge at all.
He pulled into the garage and sent a few texts to his mom and Graham, one to Andrew, and then he went inside. Celia herself wasn’t present, but the smell of roast beef permeated the air, evidence that she’d been at the lodge early that morning to get the afternoon meal in the slow cooker.
Beau hung his keys on the hook by the door and called, “Lily?”
The lodge seemed to tighten up, as if it were holding its breath. No one answered him back. He wasn’t sure if he should go exploring until he found her, or if he should just text her that lunch was ready and she could come eat whenever she wanted.
Maybe she’d already eaten.
He pulled out his phone and sent her the message, then got down two plates and plucked two forks from the silverware drawer. He’d just opened the slow cooker to the glorious sight of shredded beef, roasted potatoes and carrots, and au jus when the back door opened.
Dishing up some food, he asked, “You were outside?”
“It’s not terribly cold,” she said. “And the grounds are beautiful.”
“Bree takes care of those,” he said.
“Yeah, I’m learning that you don’t do much around here.”
His gaze flew to hers, and he found a teasing sparkle in her eyes and a cute, coy smile on her lips. “I…well, I’m busy with the horses. And work. You gave me something like fifteen hundred pages to read, I’ll have you know.”
He set his plate on the counter and reached for hers. “Do you like cooked carrots?”
“Absolutely not.”
Beau chuckled and fished around the carrots for only potatoes and meat. He added three extra baby carrots to his plate just for good measure. “My mom used to make them with brown sugar and butter,” he said as he nudged her plate closer to her and came around the counter to sit beside her. “Then my brothers and I would put tons of salt and pepper on them, since they were already so sweet.”
“Hm.” Lily picked up her fork. “How was church?”
“It was all right,” he said. He didn’t want to admit he’d barely heard two words the pastor had said. Instead, he’d replayed the drama in the hallway, wondering if he should’ve just leaned down and kissed her. Gotten it out of the way. Such an action certainly would’ve told her how he was feeling, and then he’d know if this current between them ran both ways.
She’d touched him.
He smiled as he forked up a bite of potato, carrot, and beef. “Did you go out to the stable?”
“Yes, I saw it.”
“Did you go in?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I wasn’t sure if I’d get trampled or not.” She glared at him for a moment, the look softening almost instantly. “But it has a great big roof on it. You should put a stained glass window in it.”
Beau almost choked on his food. “A stained glass window?” He got up and grabbed a roll of paper towels from the counter. He used one to wipe his face and beard as he tried to figure out if Lily was joking or not.
She didn’t seem to be. “Why would I put a stained glass window in a stable?”
“It would be pretty,” she said.
Beau smiled and shook his head. “Just because I have money to spare doesn’t mean I’m stupid.”
Lily laughed, and Beau was glad he hadn’t hurt her feelings with his statement. “I could do it, you know.”
“What? Put in the stained glass window?”
“Yeah, I took a class on glass art, and we made them.”
“Oh, well, let’s rip down half the barn then, and you can put one in.”
“Stop it.” She elbowed him, still laughing, and Beau caught a glimpse of what his life could be like with this woman in it permanently.
They both sobered and ate for a few minutes. Then Beau said, “We have a big window over the front door. Maybe you could do something with that while you’re here.”
“Yeah?” She looked at him with such hope, Beau realized she was worried she’d be bored in the lodge. And she might be, especially if she didn’t like riding horses or reading legal documents.
“Yeah, sure.”
She pushed herself off her stool. “I want to see it.”
“Go right ahead.” Beau almost stayed at the counter, but then he slipped off his stool too and followed her into the living room, hoping the window was as big as he remembered. “See?” he said, needlessly pointing. “It’s huge. I think stained glass there would be nice.”
“What would you put there?”
“Like, for a design?”
“Yeah, for a design.”
Beau shrugged, already ready to get back to eating. “I have no idea.” His mind worked along the lines of law and fact, not art and design.
“We could do something with your last name,” she mused.
Sounded cliché to Beau, but he knew enough to keep his mouth shut.
“Or something with the lodge. Do you guys have a logo?”
“If we do, that would be Eli’s realm of expertise.” Beau turned back to the kitchen, waiting to gauge if Lily was ready to return too. She moved, and he led the way back to their plates.
“Who’s Eli?”
“Oh, one of my older brothers,” he said. “He lived here for a while, but when he got married, he moved to California. He ran the lodge and the horseback riding stuff for a while. Big into marketing and stuff.”
“So Graham’s older than you too,” she said.
“They’re all older than me,” he said. “I’m the youngest. Then Eli, then Andrew, then Graham. He’s the oldest.” He thought of the family dinner the following evening.
But Lily nodded, and Beau didn’t want to bring up something that could shut down this peaceful feeling between them. So he let the silence be their companion as they finished eating, and then he said, “I’m going to go work on your files.”
Alarm passed through her eyes, but she nodded. “Okay.”
“You’re welcome to sit in the office with me. Or there’s a huge theater room downstairs. A hot tub. Whatever.”
“I wandered around while you were gone,” she said.
“Great.” Beau put their plates in the sink and made for the exit. He’d barely sat down in his chair and opened his laptop when Lily entered the office too.
She held a tablet and said, “I think I’m just going to read in here.”
“Okay,” Beau said, trying to ignore the way his pulse skipped around in his veins like she’d just told him he’d won a gold medal.
Lily, ever a woman of the technology age, had given him a thumb drive with all of her court documents on it. Someone at the probate court had done a phenomenal job of putting everything in order, and Beau started with the file labeled 1. Kent Gulbrandsen vs. Lily Everett – alimony settlement.
Only a few lines in, he g
lanced up at Lily. She stared at something on her screen, but she didn’t swipe or even seem to be reading.
“Is this alimony suit settled?”
“It was,” she said, glancing at him. “He named the price, and I agreed to it. He’s decided it’s not enough now, and he’s reopened the case for more.”
Beau nodded, somewhat surprised at the audacity of her ex-husband. Re-opened alimony cases almost always got turned down, usually with a reprimand from the judge.
“He’s a gambler,” Lily said, pulling Beau from the records again. “So I’m not surprised he wants more money.”
Beau looked into her blue eyes, ignoring the extra beat his heart put out. “Where does he like to gamble?”
“Online poker,” she said with a shrug. “He went to therapy for a while when we were first married, and I’d put him on an allowance.”
“How much was the allowance?”
Lily shifted in her chair. “Five hundred dollars a week.”
Beau worked not to let any emotion show on his face. He didn’t allow his eyebrows to lift. Didn’t smile. Didn’t nod.
“So two thousand dollars a month.” He leaned forward and looked at the screen. “And that was the settlement, five years ago.”
“Yes.”
Kent had reopened the alimony, citing that inflation required that he needed more money. This case would be dismissed as soon as Beau put together a dossier about the man’s gambling habit and physical ability to work. He scanned a few more lines in the brief and made a note to find out what education and skills this Kent Gulbrandsen possessed.
Because there was no way Beau would allow Lily to give him another cent.
Hours later, Beau’s head hurt and his eyes felt like they would never be able to focus on small print again.
The blue light from the computer screen made him cringe, and he leaned away from the desk and stretched his arms high above his head.
His phone chimed, and he practically lunged for it. “Graham’s bringing Daisy back,” he said. “You up for meeting my dog?”
Lily wore a hint of trepidation in her gaze, but she set her tablet on the desk and stood. “I’m ready. Might as well get it over with.”
“She’s sweet,” he said.
“How much does she weigh?”
“Daisy?”
“No, you, cowboy.” She shook her head. “Yes, the dog.”
“Probably seventy pounds or so. She’s sweet as pie, honest,” he said. “Graham has a baby at home and everything. Daisy loves Ronnie.”
That seemed to pacify her, and he waved her through the doorway first. They’d just arrived in the living room when the front door opened.
Daisy barked, her paws scrambling on the tile, trying to get a grip, as she launched herself toward Beau. He laughed and caught sight of Graham and Laney walking through the door next.
Then Daisy reached him, giving him sloppy, slobbery kisses that required all of his attention and strength to keep the animal from knocking him down completely.
Even as preoccupied as he was, he was very aware of Laney saying, “Oh my goodness, it is you. Lily Everett.”
Beau looked up to find Laney pressing one palm to her throat as the other hand fluttered around excitedly. “The Lily Everett.”
“Oh, uh….”
Beau shot forward, and positioned himself between Lily and Laney. “She’s my client,” he said, quite emphatically. Probably a bit possessively too.
Graham looked back and forth between his wife and his brother, and at last tried to get a glance at Lily, concealed behind Beau.
“Graham,” Beau said. “This is a client.”
“It’s okay,” Lily said from behind him, and he twisted toward her. “I’ll wait in the office.” She spun and retraced her steps back to the hall, disappearing before Beau could fully breathe again.
“Graham,” he said, turning back to his brother.
“I’m sorry,” Laney said. “Celia said she’d put a roast on, and your mom took the kids home.” She glanced at Graham and slipped her hand into his. “We thought we’d spend the afternoon with you. But it’s fine, we’ll—”
“It’s okay,” Beau said.
Several moments passed, and finally Graham broke the silence by asking, “You sure she’s just your client, bro?”
Ten
Lily stood just out of sight, listening to Beau talk to his family. She sucked in a breath when Graham asked Beau if she was just his client.
She held it while Beau let the silence go on and on. And she wanted to stab something into her ears when he said, “Of course that’s all she is. I’m not making that mistake again.”
Lily moved then, not wanting to hear any more of this conversation. But Beau’s words reverberated through her head. I’m not making that mistake again.
So he’d had a client-slash-girlfriend before. And obviously, that hadn’t ended well.
Lily made it to her bedroom and closed the door behind her. Her heart beat furiously fast for some reason she couldn’t name, and she pressed her hand over it, the same way Laney had been doing.
The lodge had great sound-proofing, as she didn’t hear another noise. Not a voice. A footstep. Nothing.
She sank to the floor and drew her knees to her chest. It wasn’t cold in the lodge, but she felt an iciness in her chest where her heart should’ve been.
Which was completely ridiculous. She’d met Beau less than a week ago, and just because she may have been fantasizing about holding his hand and tracing her fingers through his beard just before he kissed her didn’t mean that would ever be her reality.
She wasn’t even sure she wanted that reality. That meant trusting another man. Giving some part of herself she’d reclaimed and determined never to lose again.
About fifteen minutes later, a soft knock came at her door, and she jumped away from it.
“Lily?” Beau’s voice sounded muted through the wood. “You okay?”
She wanted to ignore him. She could claim she’d fallen into bed and taken a nap. But when the handle started to drop, she leapt toward the door and opened it.
“Hey,” she said, lifting her eyes to his. She would not let him see that she’d somehow turned into a marshmallow since meeting him, and that he possessed the flame that could melt her.
“Sorry about that.” He looked nervous, like he’d been caught eating cookies before dinner. “They’re gone.”
“They could’ve stayed,” she said. “They’re your family.” Her throat closed after the last word, and she thought about the last time she’d seen her sisters. Fourteen months ago, and they’d both told her to take the time she needed to sort things out.
Rose had said the music would still be there once Lily was ready, and Vi had insisted she could keep their producers happy with her solo album in the meantime.
That album still hadn’t come out, but Vi kept Lily up to date through regular emails.
“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “My obligation is to you, and…yeah.”
Lily crossed her arms, her hip automatically cocking too. “So that’s what I am. An obligation.” She practically spat the last word from between her lips.
Beau blinked, her animosity obviously punching him in the face. “I—”
“Who was the client you dated?” she asked, feeling reckless and out of control.
He backed up a step. “Excuse me?”
“I heard you tell your brother I was just a client, and that you didn’t want to make the mistake of dating a client again.”
She heaved in a breath, but the air in the lodge had run out of oxygen.
“Well, I—I—” Beau sputtered. He finally found his words and said, “Did you want to be my client?”
“Yes.”
He studied her, those eyes that missed nothing looking and finding what he wanted to know. “And…did you want to…?” The touch of hope in his expression spurring Lily down this path of crazy she’d started on.
She couldn’t get the words
to line up, so she just reached out and slipped her hand into his. He squeezed, and all the tension between them faded away.
“You wanna go see the horses?” he asked.
All Lily could do was nod.
The next week passed in a repetition of days. She always found Beau in the office in the morning, reading on the computer and making notes in that notebook she really wanted to take a peek at.
She’d pad down the hall to make coffee and then join him in the office. About mid-morning, they went out to the stables. He fed the horses while instructing her in small jobs she could do, like cutting twine on bales of hay and moving the hose from one trough to another.
The weather turned nasty, and guests showed up at the lodge for the weekend, and Lily met Bree.
The woman who ran the lodge was cute, with almost black hair that was very curly and hung just below her shoulders. She had a quick smile, and Lily envied her for that.
Lily didn’t feel like she could truly be friends with anyone, because she didn’t trust them. But she introduced herself to Bree, using her real name, and Bree hadn’t even blinked.
So at least Lily had found somewhere that the Everett Sisters hadn’t reached yet. She made a mental note to tell Vi, so she could tell Shawn, and he could figure out how to sell more records in Wyoming.
In the afternoon, Beau would slip his hand into hers and lead her outside. They walked down the hill toward the ranch at the bottom, where his brother and sister-in-law lived, and he mostly told stories about his childhood in Coral Canyon.
She’d opened up and told him a few things about herself and her sisters. But she felt like he was already getting an unobstructed view into her life with every paragraph he read, so she kept the conversations easy and light.
Another Sunday came, and he stayed home from church while Bree went down the canyon with Celia. The forecast had snow in it for that evening, so when he shouldered on a coat and said, “I’m going out to the barn for a bit,” Lily wasn’t surprised.
