by Amanda Renee
Abby gasped quietly. He kept going.
“Once the investigation was over, I planned to bring Ana Rosa and Paulo back to Houston with me, which is where I lived at the time. I’d convinced myself that once she heard who I really was, she’d still want to marry me. We had too many plans for her not to. And I loved Paulo as if he were my own. Only we never had the chance.”
Clay released Abby’s hand and stood, needing a little liquid courage to help him through what he was about to reveal. “Care for a beer?”
Abby nodded. “Please.”
He returned from the kitchen and handed her a longneck bottle. Unable to read the expression on Abby’s face, he sat beside her and continued.
“We had arranged for a major buy to go down between Raul and one of our agents. I wanted to warn Ana Rosa to stay away from the house that night because I knew the likelihood of the situation turning violent was extremely high. I also knew if I said anything to Ana Rosa, out of loyalty to her brother, she would tip him off. Instead, I bribed the manager at the restaurant where she worked to keep her on for a double shift that night. I would’ve been successful if Paulo’s babysitter hadn’t gotten sick, forcing Ana Rosa to leave early.”
Clay tugged on his beer and continued to scratch Duffy behind the neck. “She pulled up to Raul’s house right in the middle of the deal. I tried to get her attention from where I was hiding outside, but instead one of her brother’s guards spotted me. Hearing the commotion outside, Raul stormed out and realized he’d been set up. He grabbed Ana Rosa and Paulo and dragged them into the house, holding them hostage until we let him go. I put down my weapon in good faith. And that was when Raul gave the order to kill me. Gunfire broke out on both sides, and I watched the woman and child I loved gunned down by one of her brother’s own men.” He swiped at the moisture in his eyes. “They branded her a traitor because of her involvement with me. I had purposely not told Ana Rosa anything to protect her and Paulo. In the end, that’s what cost them their lives.”
Abby knelt beside him and clasped his face between her hands. Tears pooled in her eyes, one blink away from spilling over.
“None of this was your fault.” She braced her forehead against his. “You can’t keep blaming yourself for something out of your control.”
“If I had thought about the babysitter. Made sure there was a backup in place. Or arranged for her to take Paulo to work. I knew to cover all my bases and I didn’t.”
“Clay.” Abby sat on the coffee table across from him. “Look at me. You can play the what if game for the rest of your life, but it won’t bring Ana Rosa and Paulo back. You need to accept that what happened was not your fault. No matter how good an agent you were, no one can predict with a hundred percent certainty how someone else will react in any given situation.”
Clay choked back the sob threatening to tear from his throat. He hadn’t let himself cry for the woman he had loved and the boy he’d planned to make his son. If he started now, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to stop. Abby slipped beside him and cradled his head against her chest. The sound of her heartbeat and the feel of her hand in his hair comforted him. Duffy sat at his feet, pressing heavily against his calf, offering his own brand of comfort to Clay.
“I’m sorry.” He straightened. “I know I should have told you sooner.”
“Is that the first time you told anyone?”
Clay nodded. “My superiors didn’t even know my full involvement with Ana Rosa.”
“I’m honored you felt comfortable enough to tell me.”
“It’s more than that.” Clay rose before Abby. “I knew our relationship couldn’t go any further without my explaining why I reacted the way I have to you. When I walked away after our kiss on stage at Slater’s, it had nothing to do with you and everything to do with guilt.”
“You felt like you were betraying her, didn’t you?”
Clay nodded. “I’m now realizing it’s possible to have feelings for someone else. I haven’t been with anyone since Ana Rosa. I’d like to change that. With you.”
* * *
ABBY COULDN’T IMAGINE the anguish Clay had endured while watching the woman and child he loved be killed before his eyes. Tonight he had bared his soul to her and she wanted nothing more than to ease his pain.
Abby led Clay toward the staircase, turning to face him when she was two steps above him. Almost at eye level, she lightly gripped his shirt and tugged him toward her.
“Are you sure about this?” she asked.
“I’ve never been surer of anything.”
Clay’s gaze dropped from her eyes to her shoulders and then to her breasts. Peeling away her shirt, she let it fall from her fingertips to the floor. Clay’s eyes became half lidded as he watched her unclasp the front of her bra, releasing her breasts. Her nipples hardened at his bold perusal. The center of her ached for his touch.
Clay made no move to touch her. He silently waited for Abby to continue. Feeling as if she were on a pedestal due to her place on the staircase, she slowly slid her yoga pants past her hips, easing them to her thighs, down to her feet and then kicking them away. Clay’s eyes sparked and she reveled in his obvious approval. Standing before him in only the slightest bit of lace, Abby reached for his hands and placed them on her breasts.
He gently squeezed them, his thumbs seeking out her nipples.
“Is this what you want, Abby?” Clay growled.
“Yes.” She tilted her head back thrusting her chest closer to him. She’d never been so brazen with a man before.
Clay lowered his head, his tongue tasting and teasing the taut buds. Bracing her hands on his shoulders, Abby pressed the full length of her body against his.
“You have on entirely too many clothes,” she said in a husky voice that sounded foreign to her.
“So do you.” Clay smiled lazily, leaving enough space between their bodies to glance down at the thin slip of lace separating her from his smoldering gaze.
“If you want them off, you have to take them off,” she teased.
“Your wish is my command.”
Clay began kissing her neck, trailing his lips between her breasts before his tongue seared a path down her ribs, stopping at the thin lace. Gripping her panties with his teeth, Clay gently pulled them lower.
Abby had never been more exposed to a man. The excitement of the moment and anticipation of what was to come pooled at her center. Clay eased the lace from around her ankles and stood back to admire her.
“Stunning,” he whispered. He removed his shirt, the corded muscles in his chest flexing as he undid the top button of his jeans. He lowered them to the floor until he was wearing only a pair of extremely form-fitting hunter-green boxer briefs. His arousal strained against the thin cotton, begging to be released.
“Need some help with that?” Abby’s eyes shamelessly raked over his hardness.
“Please.”
She slid one hand down his muscled stomach, crossing over to that perfect male V that made women stupid, before dipping her hand beneath his waistband to what could only be defined as pure magnificence.
Clay’s mouth covered hers hungrily as she wrapped her fingers around him. His lips were hard, his tongue searching. Abby wound her hands around his neck, while he grabbed her backside and lifted her into the air. Instinctively, she wrapped her legs around his waist.
“I can’t wait a moment longer,” Clay croaked. Turning, he began to carry her up the stairs.
Abby put her hand against the wall to stop him. “No, here. Make love to me right here, right now.”
* * *
ABBY STRETCHED BESIDE him in bed a few hours later.
“I need a shower. Care to join me?” She playfully rubbed her leg against his.
“I’d love to, but I don’t know how clean you’re going to get,” Clay said, his g
aze falling over her bare breasts.
“Do you plan on making me dirty?”
“Oh, I think you’re dirty enough for the both of us.” Clay grabbed Abby as she attempted to leave the bed. He pulled her across his chest. “How about we skip the shower and go straight to the naked part?” Clay shifted her until she sat astride him, completely nude. Her hair fell over her shoulders, barely covering her breasts. “I’ve never seen a more gorgeous sight.”
“Clay, don’t.” Abby blushed, the color spreading down her neck and across her chest.
“Don’t what—tell you how I feel? I’ve kept too much inside for too long. I feel closer to you right now than I’ve ever felt to anyone.”
Abby leaned down and kissed him before he could say the three words he had been aching to tell her all night. “I’ve never felt this close to anyone, either,” she whispered against his mouth as her hips lightly rocked against him.
Clay groaned, thrusting himself deep within her once again, seeking the release they both craved until she collapsed into his arms.
Hours later, just before sunrise, Clay rolled onto his side to admire Abby asleep beside him. Beautiful, intelligent, compassionate. He watched her eyes flutter open. Smiling seductively, Abby reached to him for a kiss.
“The sun’s about to come up and I need to feed the animals,” Clay whispered into her hair as she ran her fingers down his chest.
“Mmm, okay. But before you go would you mind grabbing my bag from the car?”
“Bag?” Clay tilted Abby’s chin up. “Did you plan on seducing me last night?”
She smiled sweetly. “A good girl always comes prepared.”
“Oh, you were definitely a good girl. And a bad girl. It all depended on what hour it was.” Clay lazily rolled her nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ll take Duffy for a quick walk while I’m out there, too. I’m sure the little guy has his legs crossed.”
“Thank you.” Abby withdrew from his arms and shamelessly strolled naked from the bed to the bathroom. “I’m going to take that shower I started hours ago.”
Clay was almost tempted to join her, but he had a job to do. Duffy sat beside him, wagging his tail. “Make it two jobs. Come on, little guy. Time for you to go out.”
After taking Duffy for a quick walk and retrieving Abby’s bag from her car, Clay squeezed back through the narrow path of boxes in the dining room. He caught his shoulder on one of them and it tumbled onto the floor.
Bending down, he set the box upright.
“Oh, no.”
A framed photo of Ana Rosa and Paulo sat on the floor, the glass shattered.
Clay dropped to his knees, guilt ripping up his insides. Not just from the photo, but for sleeping with Abby. He hadn’t thought of Ana Rosa once since Abby and he had started to make love. It was as if she had never existed, until now. It was a harsh reminder of what he lost.
“I am so sorry, Ana.”
Clay cleaned up the broken shards of glass and returned the photo to the box, making sure he tucked it far in the back. Upstairs, he left Abby’s bag on the bathroom floor.
“I have to get going after I feed the animals,” Clay said from the doorway.
Abby poked her head out from behind the shower curtain. “Did you say something?”
“I have to leave. Something came up with a case.”
“My case?”
Great, one more thing for him to feel guilty about. Not only had everyone in Abby’s life lied to her, he’d slept with her and lied to her.
“No, but I’m going to be gone for a while.”
“Are you okay?” Abby ducked back behind the curtain and shut off the water. Grabbing a towel from the rack, she wrapped herself in it before stepping from the tub. “Clay, please don’t pull away from me. Not now.”
She reached out to touch him, but he flinched.
“That was unexpected.” She grabbed a pair of jeans from her bag and tugged them on, skipping the customary underwear. Turning her back to him, she dropped her towel and pulled a tank top over her head. Abby pushed her way past him. “Duffy, it’s time for us to go.”
He didn’t follow her down the stairs. But he wanted to. It was better this way. Let her be mad at him. It would be easier when the truth came out. Watching her tear out of his driveway, Clay marched to his dresser and grabbed his cell phone. He dialed Ruby’s number, surprised when she answered the phone.
“Clay, I know what you’re going to say—”
“Save it, Ruby,” he snapped. “You’re telling Abby and Bridgett today or I am.”
“I need a little more time,” she pleaded.
“You’ve had almost twenty-eight years of time. Abby and Bridgett deserve the truth, and every day I continue to lie to Abby for you, I’m hurting her further. Do you really want that? Ruby, I’m begging you, this needs to happen today.”
“Fine. I’ll call you back and let you know when and where.”
Clay slammed his phone down on the dresser, amazed it didn’t split in half. He needed to clear his head, and there was only one way he knew to do that.
Minutes later, he was in the barn saddling Dream Catcher. He swung his leg up and over the saddle and slid his feet into the stirrups. With two clicks of his tongue and a squeeze of his thighs, he led Dream Catcher down one of the trails behind his house. His ranch may be small compared to the Langtrys’, but it had enough acreage to provide a respectable ride.
His phone rang on the way out of the barn.
“Tonight at the salon. Six o’clock. Can you call Abby?”
“Yes, I’ll call her.” He hung up. Abby’s world was about to be shattered.
Chapter Eleven
“Why do you want to meet me at the Curl Up & Dye?” Abby argued. “It was bad enough you wanted me out of your house this morning, now you want to meet me at a salon? They are not even open that late.”
“Abby, I never asked you to leave. That was your decision,” Clay pleaded begged through the phone. “Promise me you’ll be there.”
“Fine.” Abby gripped the steering wheel. “I’ll be there.”
She tossed her phone across the seat of the car. It bounced, landing on the floorboard. Pulling off to the side of the road, Abby yanked a bra from her bag and quickly threw it on under her tank top. She’d driven around aimlessly for the past few hours not wanting to face Mazie. She ran a brush through her hair and applied mascara and lip gloss. Looking a bit more presentable, she headed for the Bridle Dance ranch.
“What a pleasant surprise,” Kay said as Abby emerged from the Dance of Hope building and into the hippotherapy corral area.
“I hope you don’t mind, but I put Duffy in your yard with Barney.”
“Not at all.” Kay tilted her head. “Is everything all right?”
“Everything is hunky-dory.”
“Just know I’m available if you ever want to talk about it,” Kay said. “And since you’re here, I am down an assistant today, so if you wouldn’t mind pitching in and helping out with a cognitive therapy session, I’d really appreciate it.”
“I’d love to.” Abby was not only honored, she was thrilled to work and take her mind off Clay. “What do you need me to do?”
“You’ll be working with Darcy, one of our therapists. Cognitive therapy on a horse is very similar to cognitive therapy off a horse. We have an entire course that the patient rides through with individual stations containing a different task for them to complete.” She pointed to a corner of the corral. “The first station involves riding up to the mailbox, opening it, removing the mail, closing it, reopening it, putting the mail back inside, closing it and putting the flag up. Then they move onto another station where they’ll grab a series of flags from a couple of poles and then reattach the flags to another set of poles a few feet away. Our course has te
n stations, and we tailor it to each individual. We also swap out the stations on a regular basis so the patients won’t get bored with the same therapy over and over again. This involves a higher level of motor-skill planning to execute each task. I’m sure all of this is very familiar to you.”
Abby followed Kay past the corrals to a path that wound through the shaded oak trees. After a round of introductions, Abby met a seven-year-old boy with Down syndrome.
“Bobby’s a pro at this course, aren’t you?” Darcy rubbed the boy’s back. “Bobby, we have somebody new working with us today. This is Abby.”
Abby walked to the boy’s side and held out her hand to him. He eagerly shook it, not wanting to let go.
Darcy laughed. “Bobby can be a bit enthusiastic at times.” Leading the horse toward the first station, Bobby still kept a firm grip on Abby’s hand. “You need to let go of Abby in order to get the mail.”
“I want the mail,” Bobby said, releasing Abby.
An hour later, they had completed the entire course. The sense of accomplishment she felt for Bobby had her fighting to keep her tears in check. Clapping enthusiastically, she rubbed Bobby’s back. “Darcy was right. You are a pro.”
The boy lifted his hands in the air and grinned. “I’m a champion.”
“That you are.” Abby looked around. Various riders were performing all sorts of hippotherapy. She knew from Kay that quite a few of them were long-term patients and would probably be here for a while. It wasn’t that much different from her long-term care patients at the hospital.
Abby’s chest physically ached at the thought of leaving her patients behind in Charleston. She knew whomever they hired to replace her would be just as good, if not better, than she was. Each interaction with the Dance of Hope patients brought her one step closer to a decision. When she thought about Clay’s reaction to her this morning, a part of her understood it had been based on guilt. They could work through it. It still hurt, but the sting of it lessened. Without consciously realizing it, Abby made the decision to stay in Ramblewood.
