A Cowboy's Pride

by Karen Rock

  Cole’s gaze slowly glided to Katlynn. “Did you interview my grandfather?” he asked, his voice low, taut.

  “Senator Reardon!” Tom crowed, answering for her. “Quite a chatty man, but I suppose all politicians are.” Tom eyed her. “Katlynn? We need to finish filming, or the crew goes into overtime and you know how it is dealing with the union...”

  “Tom. I need a minute,” she said without taking her eyes off Cole. Grabbing his elbow, she led him out a side door.

  When they reached an empty picnic table, he ripped his arm from her grasp. “How could you?”

  “Your grandfather heard about the taping and insisted on being interviewed or he’d go to the papers. Again. I knew you didn’t want controversy before the wedding, so...”

  “You just volunteered,” he cut in, his voice low and burning as if it’d been raked over coals. “You promised me three things, Katie-Lynn. Three. Not to drag my mother into your show. To shield my father and to include me in the investigation. You said you’d let me in, keep me in the loop, but you shut me out.”

  “I refused to do it at first,” she insisted, frantically trying to catch Cole’s eye. “But Tom said they’d have Ashton Reince interview the senator instead, and he’s a shark. I had no choice.”

  “You had the choice to tell me you were interviewing my grandfather.” He averted his eyes and scrubbed a hand over his face as he prowled up and down the grassy area. “The choice between going for an Emmy or supporting me. You choose the show. Your ambitions. Again. They’ve always mattered more than me.”

  “That’s not true,” she denied.

  Was he reliving his mother’s rejection? Feeling like the unloved boy of his past? Remorse banded around her chest and squeezed. “I’d convinced them to consider another angle—Joy and Boyd’s second chance. It didn’t make sense to upset you until I knew which one they picked. I gave it my all during Boyd and Joy’s interview to make their decision easy.”

  “And who’s Ashton Reince?” Cole stopped pacing and stared at her, frustrated and confused.

  “He broke the story about who really stole Katy Perry’s backup dancers.”

  “Katy who?”

  “The whole Katy Perry-Taylor Swift scandal... It’s...it’s...” She was going to say epic but here, in the shadow of the mighty Rockies, with the love of her life staring at her like she’d betrayed him, the petty squabbles of rich Hollywood stars seemed inconsequential.

  “It doesn’t matter.” She slumped down to the picnic table. “If Ashton had interviewed your grandfather, the sleazy segment would have been too much temptation for the producers not to include.”

  “Did you ask him about my mother?” The rawness of Cole’s expression grabbed her by the throat and shook her.

  She nodded, glum.

  “About her death?”

  “Yes. He tried to give me the same pack of lies he fed to the press years ago but Cole—” she grabbed his cold hand “—I didn’t believe him back then and I don’t believe him now. I swear, I didn’t make it easy on him. In fact, I think... I think I did a good job of revealing him for what he really is.”

  “And who’s that?”

  “A grieving father unable to accept his daughter’s disastrous choices.”

  “You sympathized with him!” Cole yanked his hand away and stomped to a pole holding an overhead light. “You actually feel bad for him?”

  She hurried to join him. “A little.” She blew out a breath. “Okay, more than a little. It doesn’t mean I forgive him for what he did to you and your family. But I’m trained to see two sides to every story. I understood his misguided perception of events. His pain.”

  “His pain...his pain?” Cole stormed. “This had nothing to do with protecting my father, my family. You were just doing your job, a job you love more than me.”

  Anger rose to mingle with her regret. “It is my job. One I happen to be good at.”

  He turned sharply to face her. Overhead, moths banged against the light then fell, their wings singed by what had attracted them most.

  She could relate.

  “Have they decided to show his segment or not?”

  “Based on what Tom just said, I’m thinking yes, though I thought they’d include me in the final decision.”

  Cole clamped his hands around his ears as if he didn’t want to hear anymore. “This will kill my father.”

  “Even if the segment airs, it’ll reveal more about the senator than reflect badly on your father.”

  Cole’s scoffing sound scorched her. It was the sound of everyone who’d overlooked her, dismissed her, failed to believe in her. And in a flash, she was a meteor, burning up when it entered the atmosphere, disintegrating, falling, tumbling to earth, too small and insignificant to be noticed.

  “You don’t trust me as a professional?” Why couldn’t he be happy for her to have this opportunity and trust her to take care of his family?

  “Your show is called Scandalous History, Katie-Lynn.”

  “Have you even watched it?”

  He shook his head.

  “Then you’re judging it based on what? Your preconceived notions? Your bias? People in LA aren’t all that different than folks here. Most want the same things. A steady job. Family. Love.” She choked on the last word, feeling it slip through her fingers.

  “Money,” Cole added.

  “And you don’t care about that?” she countered. “You’re suing the Cades for five million dollars in damages they don’t even recall making.”

  “It’s different.”

  “Is it? How?” She blinked back the sting in her eyes.

  Cole shoved his hands in his tuxedo jacket’s pockets. “I’m trying to save my family’s ranch, my legacy.”

  She flinched. “In other words, your job has worth and mine doesn’t? You said we’d find a way to compromise.”

  “Compromise,” Cole mumbled under his breath before turning around, his eyes meeting Katlynn’s. There were a thousand thoughts mirrored in their depths—anger, disbelief, pain, disappointment... But regret, regret was the one that hit her the most. “A compromise isn’t possible,” he sighed out. “Not then, not now. Not when we clearly want different things out of life...out of love.”

  “Cole,” she breathed, reaching for his arm.

  He shook her off, a calm resolve settling over him, one that had her fearing the words she knew were coming. “No matter your reasons, you broke your promise and chose the show, your career over me. You’d never be happy living here in Carbondale, putting us first.”

  “I am ambitious, and I love my job, but if you believe I’d put them ahead of you, then you don’t really see who I am, after all.” Her old insecurities rose to clog her throat. Katie-Lynn the invisible—only she’d come too far to let anyone make her feel that way again. She wasn’t worthy because she was a star, but for simply being herself, flaws and all. If Cole couldn’t accept her, all of her, then he couldn’t truly love her.

  “Your actions speak louder than your words.”

  “Then you don’t hear me, either.”

  Cole shoved his hands in his pockets and stared up at the moon. “Maybe I’ve only been hearing what I wanted to hear.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “I fooled myself into thinking you cared more than you do,” he said, sounding betrayed. “You got what you wanted from me. With my grandfather’s story, you’ll score more ratings and fame than ever. You advanced your career at the expense of my family...of me. But what about your vow that I’m what you really wanted?”

  “I do want you—above everything else.”

  “Then prove it.”

  “How? By moving home and quitting Scandalous History?” she demanded once a loud group of wedding guests got into their cars and drove away.

  “Yes,” he fired back. “You can g
et another job. I can’t get another Loveland Hills. It’s my heritage. My life.”

  “Then who am I?” she cried, the threatening tears thickening her voice. “You said I’m a part of who you are.”

  Cole hung his head and blew out a breath. “You and Loveland Hills. That’s who I am.”

  “What if I asked you to choose? To put us first and come to LA?”

  “Come on, Katie-Lynn.” Cole stepped closer. “You can’t ask me to do that.”

  “Why? You asked me. Which would you choose?”

  “I won’t answer that.”

  “Because the answer is the ranch, isn’t it? Again. You still put it first and won’t compromise even the slightest bit for me. You’ve given up everything, including love, for that piece of land, which I think is selfish.”

  “Selfish?” He jerked back as if slapped. “You just named every sacrifice I’ve made for my family.”

  “No,” she countered. “You said it yourself. Loveland Hills is a part of you. The things you gave up were the things you knew you could live without—one of them being me.”

  In the sudden silence, when Cole failed to disagree, she heard the faint tinkling of her heart shattering in a million pieces.

  “I’m not part of your heritage,” she whispered, swiping furiously at the tears flowing from her eyes.

  “I want you to be.”

  “But only on your terms. Love can’t be one-sided. My career is a part of me, a part you don’t accept.”

  “Katlynn,” Tom called from the doorway, his hand over his eyes as he peered into the darkness. “We need to film.”

  Cole gripped her hand. “Stay,” he urged.

  “No,” she said without looking at him. If she did, she’d lose her resolve, lose herself in a much deeper way than she’d ever imagined the first time she fled Carbondale. “I’ve got a job to do.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  COLE SLOUCHED AGAINST the half wall separating the Cades’ kitchen from their massive living room and rolled his stiff neck. Near the flat-screen TV crowded his new, blended family. They’d all come together for the first time since last month’s wedding to watch their Scandalous History episode.

  Everyone seemed to be speaking at once and their animated chatter grated on Cole’s last nerve. Since Katie-Lynn left, he’d spent most of his time alone, recuperating from the arm he fractured when he tumbled from the silo’s ladder. According to the doctor, it’d healed enough to let him resume his ranch work.

  Too bad his heart hadn’t healed, too.

  Every thought of Katie-Lynn was like pressing on a bruise. His mind replayed their last conversation on a nonstop loop. It still confounded him how she’d turned the tables, calling him selfish and unwilling to compromise, when she’d betrayed him.

  Used him.

  “You okay?” Jewel Cade passed him a soda as she leaned into the wall beside him.

  “Why?” With a flick of his fingers, he popped the tab, releasing the slightest scent of ozone.

  “You’re scowling.” She eyed him over the lid of her can. “Standing by yourself. Then there’s that strange noise you just made.”

  “Noise?” The cool, sweet drink soothed his burning throat.

  “Sounded like someone stepped on a cat...in heat.”

  His mouth curled, despite his foul mood. “If I’m such lousy company, why don’t you join them?” He nodded to the lively group now hooting loudly as Jared and Maverick tossed peanuts into the air and caught them in their mouths, competing.

  “Misery prefers company,” she said obliquely and lifted her soda again.

  He glanced from her drooping, freckled face to his brothers. All were here minus Heath, who’d left for Nashville to try to get a contract with a record label. Was she pining for him?

  “Appreciate your pitching in at Loveland Hills while I was laid up.”

  Jewel nodded. “It wasn’t so bad.”

  Given the faraway look in her eyes, he wondered what’d really gone on while she and Heath had ridden the range together. They’d driven Loveland cattle in search of water while they awaited their court date to reinstate the easement.

  “Have you heard from Heath?” he asked, offhanded. Casual.

  Jewel jumped. “Wh-why would I hear from him?”

  “You two faced a lot of challenges together. The flashflood. Cattle getting sick. The wolf attacks. Poachers...”

  “We were busy.”

  Cole eyed her flaming cheeks. Busy doing what?

  “What about you?” Jewel asked, turning the tables. “Have you heard from Katlynn?”

  When he opened his mouth, she interrupted him. “And don’t even ask why I’m asking. I saw you two at the wedding. You looked as in love as you were in high school.”

  The directness of her stare left him nowhere to go except with the truth.

  “We were.”

  “Were? What happened?”

  Cole gulped more soda, thinking hard. What had happened? Everything fell apart so fast he still hadn’t figured it out. “Seems she cares more about her job than me.”

  “So?” Jewel challenged, her dark eyes flashing. “You’re too selfish to share her affections with something else? Got to have her all to yourself?”

  “No,” he protested, defensive. “I just—”

  “Need to come first?” she finished for him, shooting him a scornful look. “You realize this is the twenty-first century, right?”

  “Yes,” he ground out, not liking the direction of this conversation. “I’m not a male chauvinist.”

  “So why can’t her job be a priority, too?”

  He stared at her, flabbergasted. This must be what cattle felt like when they were driven from the herd, prodded and blocked until they finally went in the right direction.

  “Women need their independence,” Jewel insisted. “It makes them a real partner. Don’t you want an equal?”

  “Yes,” he conceded. If Katie-Lynn had given up her career to be with him, then she wouldn’t have anything for herself. Jewel made sense. He had been selfish. But that didn’t excuse her betrayal.

  “So why don’t you go to her? Tell her you’ve been a blockhead Neanderthal and now that you realize fire and the wheel have been invented for thousands of years already, you’re ready to evolve.”

  Cole snorted. “A blockhead Neanderthal?”

  Jewel reached behind them to grab a bag of M&Ms from the half wall. “Just calling it like I see it.”

  He extended his hand when she offered the candy. “There’s more to it than my being stuck in the Ice Age.”

  Jewel shook an overflowing handful into his cupped palms. “Like?”

  “She broke a promise to me. Three, actually.”

  A stream of colorful chocolates fell to the floor before Jewel caught herself and closed the bag. “Now that’s serious. What were they?”

  “Not to talk about my mother in the show. To protect my father from getting hurt. And to include me in every part of the investigation.”

  Jewel nodded, chewing. “But didn’t you hurt your pa by keeping the lawsuit a secret?”

  A cough erupted from him when he swallowed the wrong way. “I had a good reason,” he wheezed.

  “And Katlynn didn’t?”

  Cole sifted through the candies in his hand, stopping on a blue one matching the color of Katie-Lynn’s eyes. “She thought she did.”

  “So did you.”

  “You’re starting to get on my nerves.”

  Jewel grinned at him, chewing. “Good. The truth hurts.”

  “You’re saying I’m being hypocritical?”

  “You said it, buddy, not me.”

  He chuckled.

  Her grin stretched even wider. “Sometimes men are idiots.”

  “So I’m an idiotic, hypocritical ma
n?”

  She patted his arm. “Don’t worry. You’re not the only one. How’d Katie-Lynn hurt your pa?”

  “She went behind my back and taped a segment with my grandfather for tonight’s show.”

  Jewel whistled. “You didn’t want her bringing up old gossip.”

  Cole shook his head. “She knew how much it hurt my family...me.”

  “She was with you the whole time. Remember how she’d talk to the reporters and run interference?”

  Cole recalled how strong Katie-Lynn had been while he and his family had fallen apart.

  “Always thought that took a lot of guts,” Jewel said, her tone appreciative.

  “It did.”

  “What was her reason for giving your grandfather airtime?”

  “Her producers were going to tape the segment regardless, and if she didn’t do it, some guy named Ashton something-or-other would interview him in her place.”

  “Ashton Reince?” Jewel gaped at him. “The guy who started the Katy Perry-Taylor Swift feud?”

  “How does everyone know this but me?” he asked, mystified.

  “Because you’re living in the Dark Ages, remember?”

  “Ice Age,” he corrected with an involuntary smile. Jewel wasn’t half-bad, for a Cade.

  Jewel chewed, lost in thought, then said, “Ashton Reince is one of the snarkiest tabloid reporters in Hollywood. He’d have to be if I’ve heard of him. If Katie-Lynn stepped in, dude, she saved your family. By the time Ashton finished with your grandfather, he would have looked like Liam Neeson from Taken.”

  He eyed her quizzically.

  “Lord.” Jewel rolled her eyes. “I forget you live under a rock. It’s this film where Liam’s daughter gets kidnapped and he’s a heroic avenging father... Anyway, if Ashton interviewed your grandfather, Investigation Discovery channel would be taping a show on your mother’s death faster than you can say ratings week.”

  “You’re saying Katie-Lynn did me a favor?”

  Jewel pointed at the TV as Scandalous History’s opening credits rolled. “I’m betting she saved your life.”

  The sight of Katie-Lynn’s pretty face filling the screen ripped every ounce of air from him. When she smiled, it transported him to their Say Anything tree, to line-dancing, to baking strawberry-rhubarb pies in his family’s brick oven to an overflowing mess. Every moment, with each of her smiles, rushed through him like the first spring breeze after a harsh winter. It carried away the bleakness inside and replaced it with a warm, yearning hope.