Dearest Cowboys Box Set

by Mia Brown

  “This is a bit like Beauty and the Beast, isn’t it?” Kenzie commented. “So romantic. You know, if it was that way inclined, which is isn’t… oh God, I’ve just made it really awkward haven’t I? Sorry, I keep forgetting that someone told you I’m in love with you and it’s a little weird, isn’t it? I don’t want it to be weird.”

  “It isn’t weird. Honestly, Kenzie, you told me that you don’t, and I believe you. Let’s just forget it, yeah?”

  She nodded gratefully and I made sure that I pushed it to the back of my mind. Not that it was in the forefront anyway. As far as I was concerned, as soon as she told me that she didn’t love me, it was done, but obviously Kenzie was worried that I still believed it. Time was going to be the only healer in that department.

  “Oh my God.” All of a sudden, Kenzie gasped desperately. “Don’t move.”

  “Why? What’s going on?” I could feel her struggling to keep me in place, which of course only made me more intrigued. “Kenzie, what the hell is happening here?”

  “Just… just stay where you are. Let’s just dance like this.”

  I couldn’t listen to that, so I span us around quickly to see what she was looking at. My heart stopped beating, I now knew exactly what Kenzie was trying to avoid. My nice night being crushed by one person. The person I wasn’t supposed to see again.

  Emily Mason.

  Thirty

  Emily

  He’s looking at me. What the hell do I do? I felt frozen to the spot as I watched him watching me, time stopping still, the world pausing around us as we decided what the hell to do with this shocking moment.

  I noticed Alex early on, the moment he first set foot in to the building, so I’d been doing everything that I could to avoid him. Instantly, I wanted to go back to the hotel, to escape this nightmare, but I couldn’t. Rebecca had told me of all the people that I absolutely needed speak to and I wouldn’t be able to get away with avoiding them.

  Denver was supposed to be my fresh start, a night to start over, but it seemed I couldn’t ever escape my past. Fate had a way of bringing that man back in to my life no matter what I wanted. Destiny didn’t care that I was done with him and all I wanted to do was move on. It placed Alex fucking Fancy right in my eye line.

  And not just Alex Fancy. Alex and his new girlfriend. Some stunning woman who had a real sweet charm to her. She was as beautiful as an English rose, I had nothing on her. It was awful. To make it even more painful for me, I actually heard her in the bathroom talking to some of the other models, and she was a lovely person to go with it. Of course, I was hidden in the bathroom stall, so I didn’t have to have any kind of face to face confrontation with her because she was bound to know who I was, me and Alex had been all over the newspapers, and I didn’t want that.

  God I was jealous. I actually had a nasty snake of anger tearing through my system as I looked at him. It wasn’t fair. He wasn’t supposed to just move on like that, so easily. Not that I wanted him to be hurt or anything, I certainly didn’t want him to be crying over me, but I didn’t like knowing that I was so easily replaceable. That he could just drop me and move on while I had been sad over him for all of this time. I was pathetic. Heart broken and stupid. This was exactly why I didn’t let anyone in. Ruby was wrong, he never loved me. I shouldn’t have listened.

  Okay, so I wasn’t in the place to complain. It was me who ended things, but that didn’t make it any less painful right now. Especially with him looking at me like that. Like he wasn’t sure what to make of me being around.

  Fucking move, my brain screamed at me, but my body didn’t react. Get the hell out of here.

  He sure as hell wasn’t leaving me. He just remained where he was, holding on to his girlfriend like she was the only thing holding him upright while he stared at me with nothing but confusion in his eyes.

  Finally, something snapped, and my legs began to move. I wasn’t sure what the hell changed, but I just went with it. My eyes down and heading towards the exit. Screw what Rebecca wanted, I needed to leave.

  “Oh, hello there, Emily Mason.” I wanted to groan as someone rested their hands on my shoulders, stopping my escape. “It’s been such a long time since I have seen you, and you’re doing such good things these days.”

  I could just about hear her over my thumping heart, just about make out her face through my fearful shaky eyes. It was Vivien, a woman who I had modeled for earlier in the year, long before I met Alex Fancy. She had given me a shot when no one else would and she was a pretty big deal herself and I needed to keep her on side. She was probably one of the people who Rebecca had told me to speak to anyway, so I needed this.

  “Hello, Vivien. Yes, it has been a long time, hasn’t it? How are you doing?”

  “I’m great, just wonderful.” I glanced behind my back to check that Alex wasn’t following me, which luckily, he didn’t seem to be. “Actually, I have wanted to get some time with you, I know that you must be busy at the moment with every company trying to get their hands on you. But I want to know if you could fit in a photo shoot in May?”

  “Erm, I will have to check with my manager.” It was so damn hard not to sound as distracted as I felt. “But I don’t know. I probably do have the time and I would love to model for you again. It was great last time.”

  “Oh, that would be just wonderful.” Vivien ran her eyes up and down me and I mediately knew that there was going to be more. “How are you doing anyway, Emily? I was sorry to read about your recent break up.”

  I knew that it had been in the press, so I was expecting something like this. I just wasn’t expecting to be in the same room as Alex when I had to speak to people about it. “Oh, it’s fine. I’m just fine, thank you.”

  “Well, he’s here, isn’t he?” As her eyes lit up, I started to realize that she had another motive for being here, and it wasn’t one that showed how much she cared about me! “With a new girl, which is a bit of a cheek, isn’t it? I think that you should say something about it. I know that I would if it were me. I wouldn’t take it lying down.”

  I sighed loudly. “Well, I don’t want to have a confrontation. This is a nice party. Not the sort of place for a row.”

  “This is exactly the sort of place for an argument. That sort of thing always happens. Why shouldn’t it be you?”

  I pursed my lips angrily, all of a sudden wondering why I liked working with Vivien so much. She as clearly a big gossip who liked a lot of drama in her life. Not my sort of person at all. “I just want to go.”

  “No, don’t leave. Please. We all want to see this story play out. We’ve all invested in this story and we want to see the next part of it. You two had so much chemistry before. It was so exciting to see. Now we want to see the explosive blow out at the posh event. We’re all waiting to see who wins. I know he’s come to the event with a bit of skirt on his arm, but you look so much better than the pair of them. I would say that you are winning.”

  Angry tears balled up behind my eyes. I felt like I was about to crumble and fall apart. I pushed passed Vivien but instead of heading outside where I assumed that everyone would expect me to go, I made my way in to the silent auction room. I came in the moment I arrived to see what was on offer, but I hadn’t put a bid down. Maybe it was time to change that. There was something about spending money that might make me feel better.

  “The Circus of Heavenly Movement,” I commented quietly the moment I saw the tickets on offer. “Huh, funny.”

  I thought about the moment when Alex promised to take me himself to this show, back when everything was good. He probably would have done had I not finished things with us. Not that it mattered now. I guess I would never go. Even if the show was in Las Vegas where I always really wanted to go… and I could probably get someone to come with me, couldn’t I? Ruby, if she wanted to, or one my new model friends if not. And if not, I could be a bad ass woman who went alone. There was no shame in that. Why the hell couldn’t I?

  I wrote my name and my bid down on
the paper determinedly. I might not even win, but if I did then I would find a way to make it happen. I wouldn’t be sad about it either, even if it was something that I was supposed to do with Alex. I wouldn’t view it as that. Instead as a way of moving passed him. It would symbolize that we were done for good and that it didn’t even bother me. If Alex saw me win it as well, he would know that I didn’t care about him and his stupid beautiful girlfriend. It would be a metaphorical punch in the face.

  “Not that I’m going to win,” I reminded myself as I continued to wander around looking at the rest of the prizes that I was sure were way out of my price range. “There are some of the richest people in the world here.”

  But of course, there was only one person in that room as far as I was concerned. The man on the dance floor who hadn’t come after me. I probably should have been relieved. After all, him not coming after me meant that I didn’t need to deal with him. I didn’t have to answer all the awkward questions, I didn’t have to have the very public argument that everyone was angling for, I could just block him from my mind and act like he didn’t exist…

  But at the same time, I couldn’t help but wonder why he hadn’t come after me. Didn’t he want to have the conversation? Was there really nothing that he had to say? We didn’t really have what I would call closure during that phone call. Yes, that was my fault, I wasn’t going to deny that, but I just thought…

  Well, I suppose it didn’t matter what I thought. It didn’t make any difference. Yet again, Alex didn’t think that I was good enough to fight for. He had picked his new girlfriend over me. Probably because she wasn’t afraid of commitment and didn’t have intimacy issues like me. Why would he pick me when I wouldn’t even have sex with him? I was holding on to my virginity for marriage which meant at this rate I would be a virgin forever. I would die never knowing if sex was quite like I imagined it or not. It would always be one of those things that I didn’t know the truth of. A bit like Alex’s true feelings for me. I never asked so I didn’t know.

  In a panic, I did the only thing that I could, and I called Ruby. I needed her advice and I needed it right now. I wish that I had fought harder for her to come with me, so I didn’t have to be by myself. If I had known that Alex was going to be here, then I could have forced her. She would have wanted to as well.

  “Hey, Emily,” she answered in a casual, happy tone, clearly with no idea what was going on. “Aren’t you at your fancy party? What the hell are you doing wasting time to call me?”

  “Alex is here.” I didn’t have any time to greet her. “With a new girlfriend.”

  “Damn male pride,” she tutted. “They always have to have a rebound girl.”

  I pondered that for a moment, before making the snap decision not to get sucked in to that fantasy. Ruby wasn’t here, she had no idea how Alex felt about the new woman in his life.

  “What do I do, Ruby? I’m freaked out. Should I leave?”

  “Hell no! Emily, trust me, you need to stay. It will be the best thing you do.”

  “Why?” I whined. “It’s horrible watching him with someone else. I want to run away.”

  “Stay. Trust me,” she replied cryptically. “You’ll see.”

  Thirty-One

  Alex (an hour later)

  The sound of Kenzie’s fingers drumming on the table was starting to get on my nerves. Couldn’t she tell that I had a lot going on and the last thing I needed was further irritation. I already felt like I couldn’t get off the edge of my seat, the same way that I’d been for an hour since I first saw her. Our eyes locked, we shared a moment of all our history and the things that were never going to come, and then she ran like wind. She raced out of the room like she couldn’t stand to be in the same place as me. I wanted to chase after her, but Kenzie wouldn’t let me go.

  She didn’t want me to get hurt again, I understood that, but she wasn’t letting me get my chance at happiness either. I just knew that me and Emily were meant to be and deep down she knew it too, but for some reason she had stubbornly pushed me to one side and I still couldn’t really understand why. Her excuse made no sense.

  Yes, this night was supposed to be the start of me moving on, but if she was here that wasn’t ever going to happen.

  “You do realize that the silent auction is going to be announced in a moment,” Kenzie snapped, clearly annoyed.

  “Er, yes I know. That’s why we all sat down, that’s why that guy is on stage. I know what’s going on.”

  “That surprises me,” Kenzie shot back with an air of passive aggressiveness which I wasn’t used to from her.

  “Kenzie, what the hell is going on?” I wasn’t about to get sucked in to whatever game she was playing. “Why are you acting like you have a stick up your ass? Are you not enjoying this fancy party because we can go…?”

  Even as I said that, I wasn’t sure it was a promise that I could follow through with. I had gone months without seeing Emily, without having a clue where she even was or what she was doing. Now, she was in the same room as me and I just needed to spend time with her. I needed to hear her voice, to see her smile close up…

  “I don’t want to do, I just want you to be here with me, Alex, because you aren’t.”

  “What?” I didn’t run after Kenzie because she didn’t want me to. What more could I do for her?

  “Well, we’re sitting here, at this table together, and it’s like I don’t even exist to you. You haven’t spoken to me much at all. You’re just staring moony eyed across the room at the woman who broke your heart.”

  A heart tore through my body. “I’m not starting at anyone. I don’t know what you’re talking about, Kenzie.”

  “Oh, please.” Her eyes nearly rolled to the back of her head. “You’re so obvious, Alex. But what worries me is the idea that you are going to go over there and speak to her, to get back with her. I don’t want that for you.”

  “Why not?” I smirked playfully, trying my hardest to lighten the mood. I didn’t need this on top of everything else. “I offered you the chance to have sex with me and you turned me down, remember.”

  Her mouth tightened. “I know that we aren’t on a real date, Alex. But it’s a buzz kill to watch you gawking over someone who has made it perfectly clear that she isn’t interested in you. I thought that you brought me here to wing woman you, to help you actually find someone to get her out of your system.”

  “But her being here changes things, doesn’t it? You can’t deny that, can you? I can’t hook up in front of her.”

  “Why not?” Kenzie shrugged. “You’re done. It wasn’t even a long term thing. Then, she broke up with you over the phone. You don’t owe her any respect. In fact, it would prove more that you don’t care about her.”

  And that was exactly the issue. If I proved to Emily that I didn’t care about her then I would cut off any future chance of us ever being together. Maybe that wasn’t ever going to happen, but I didn’t want it to be my fault.

  “I think there might be something else to say, that’s all. We need to have closure.”

  “The way that she broke you is closure enough. You really need to move on. You need to… to…” Kenzie glanced desperately around the room, trying to find anything to take my mind off Emily, as if that was even possible. “To think about what you want to win in the silent auction. What did you even bid on?”

  “I didn’t bid on anything,” I admitted. “I didn’t even go in to the room with the prizes.”

  “But that’s what all of this is about. You’re expected to, aren’t you?”

  “I don’t know. I might have been around this scene, but I don’t know everything. I can’t follow every rule.”

  “Wow, well this is just… I don’t even know what to say to you right now.”

  I knew Kenzie well enough to be certain that this mood wouldn’t last long as long as I didn’t hassle her through it. She just needed to rant, to be heard as she got all of her thoughts and fears out of her system, then she needed to c
alm down before she spoke again. So, as she did, I leaned back in my seat and sipped y drink quietly. It took every scrap of my will power and I failed on the mission a couple of times, but I tried not to look at Emily again too. That seemed to be what sparked this anger. I didn’t want to do anything to make it any worse.

  This night was supposed to be for Kenzie, I promised her that and I needed to remember it.

  Then, thankfully, just as the tension was about to make me crack and burn, the guy on the stage started to talk about the silent auction, to begin announcing who had won the prizes. Even though there was no chance of me winning anything since I hadn’t put any bids down, it was a little bit exciting. Mostly because the prizes ranged all the way from the mundane to the bizarre. From a boring sounding English tea at some pretentious place, to a sculpture that looked like it had been made by a five year old but apparently was worth a lot of money since it made over a hundred grand. Kenzie exchanged a shocked look with me at that moment, and I could sense the atmosphere between us thawing. She was finally starting to calm down, thank goodness. I didn’t like that mood.

  “…and now, on to the Circus of Heavenly Movement tickets for the show in Las Vegas…”

  My heart stopped beating, I couldn’t stop my eyes from zipping over to Emily as the memory came flooding back. She wanted to go, she told me that it was something she desperately wanted to do, and I promised I would take her… yet I never got the chance. The idea that I could have done this big romantic gesture for her now killed me. I was a fool. She was firmly looking forwards, utterly refusing to acknowledge my existence.