by Dahlia West
For anything.
He had trouble holding her gaze, though, for anything longer than a few seconds. His eyes kept drifting away, to the barn, to the pasture, to the house, anywhere but her. That seemed fitting. Court was always interested in anything—anyone—but her.
“We said once a week,” Rowan snapped to end the silence between them. “I’ll bring her by next week.” She glared at him. “I said I would, and I’ll do it.”
Court cleared his throat and tugged at his shirt collar. “I came to talk to you.”
“I think you said enough.”
“Rowan—”
“No!” she hissed. “No, no, no. You don’t get to do this, Court! You don’t get to come all the way out here so you can insult me some more, so you can trash me some more. You don’t get to do that. You said what you wanted to say. An alcohol-soaked manwhore who thinks I’m a slut. You know what? I don’t care. I really don’t. As long as you keep your damn mouth shut when it comes to Willow. Because I swear to God, Court, if you badmouth me to her, if you say—”
“I would never do that! I was just…I was shocked, okay? I was just shocked. My woman and my brother—”
“I’m not your woman!” Rowan cried.
Court scowled at her. “Well, you still feel like mine,” he said quietly. “Do you remember, Rowan? Do you remember us? Before things got bad? I do. I think about it all the time. I can’t stop thinking about you. I was your first, Rowan, and—”
“But I wasn’t your last!” she replied.
He winced.
“And that’s what happened. That’s the way things are. There is no going back to that, Court. I remember it, but I’m not that teenage girl anymore. I had to grow up. Fast. I didn’t have a choice. I don’t know what you want from me now. I can’t even imagine what it is you expect me do to after what you put me through. But whatever it is, Court, you’re not getting it. Not from me.”
Court slipped the hat off his head and worried the brim with his calloused hands. “I don’t know what to do. I…I just can’t seem to make the right decisions.”
“Like killing yourself?” Rowan whispered harshly.
Court gaped at her.
“What are you thinking?! Huh? What on Earth is going through your head? That we’d be better off without you?” She felt incredibly guilty about her last conversation with Seth, even though Court hadn’t heard it. She hadn’t meant it. Not really. She didn’t want Court to crawl under a rock and die. And not just for Willow’s sake. At one time she had loved him, had seen something good in him. She couldn’t wish him ill, at least not in that way.
“Don’t you do it,” Rowan demanded. “Don’t you dare. I’m sorry about what happened with your father, but that’s not the road you need to go down. No one wants that. Not me, not your family, and not our daughter. Willow’s maybe the one person in the whole world that you haven’t let down. Yet. Just get it right with her, Court. Start with her.”
“And then what?” He looked at her with a glimmer of hope in his eyes, and Rowan was damn sorry for it and knew it was a dangerous time to make him understand, but she couldn’t let him think that they had a future.
“We’ll never get back what we had, Court. We can’t. Because we never really had much that was good. It’s over between us. We’ll never be together again. But we have a daughter. And she needs us. Both of us.” Rowan cupped his face and held his gaze to hers. “Just get this right. I can’t tell you what’s going to happen for you. But it’s not about you. It’s about Willow. Get it right for her. And I’m sorry, but…maybe whatever happens to you, happens.”
Court placed his hands over hers. His gaze was dark and brooding, but he didn’t pull them away. “You mean end up alone.”
Rowan hesitated. It was a terrible fate, for anyone. And, hell, possibly one she’d end up with herself. But she couldn’t predict the future, for either of them. Nor did she want to try. “Maybe,” she replied, because she didn’t want to hurt him, but she didn’t want to lie, either. “But she’s worth it, Court. I swear to you she is. And she needs you. She needs you to love her enough to stick around.”
Rowan hadn’t intended it as a barb, but it sure sounded like one anyway. Both she and Court winced as the words tumbled out of her mouth. Court had never loved any woman enough to stay, to be loyal, to be faithful. “She’s just a little girl, Court. And she loves you.”
“What about you?” he asked suddenly.
“I…Court, you’re the father of my child. I’ll always…care…about you.”
He smiled thinly but shook his head. “That’s not what I meant. Are you going to end up alone?”
Rowan didn’t answer for a moment, because she truly didn’t know. “I have to get my dad his medications from the pharmacy today. And bring in the flock. And make dinner. And get Willow ready for bed, and honestly, Court, that’s all I can think about right now. That’s all I can put on my plate right now.”
“I can bring in your flock while you’re gone. And you can leave Willow with me. If you want.”
Rowan hesitated, eyeing him closely.
“No half-wild horses, I promise.”
“And you won’t take her anywhere?”
Court shook his head. “No. We’ll stay right here, and I won’t take my eyes off her. Not for a second.”
Rowan chewed her lip and glanced at her watch. The pharmacy would close soon, and it would be so much easier if Willow wasn’t with her.
“Don’t. Go. Anywhere,” she growled.
“We won’t.”
“And don’t…” She paused trying to think of all the ways this could go wrong. “Don’t feed her anything. I’ll make dinner when we get back.”
“Got it.”
Rowan almost walked away then, almost left it at that, even though she was nervous about the very idea on the whole. But he was Willow’s father. And he was willing to try. It was unreasonable to keep both father and daughter on a leash for the rest of their lives. “You…” She licked her lips and pulled her jacket tighter around herself. “You can stay for dinner.”
Court brightened as a goofy grin crossed his face, the one she always pictured whenever she’d thought about him over the years. Rowan smiled, too, unable to help herself. “So…can we be friends?”
Rowan snorted a little at the suggestion. “I don’t know, Court,” she said honestly. “I don’t know if it’s possible for us to be friends. But we’re parents, and we need to find a way to get along. For her sake.”
She gathered Dad’s prescriptions and waved to the old man as he sat on the porch, watching over Court and Willow. Cranking the engine of the car, she hesitated for a moment then rolled out toward town feeling a strange combination of apprehensive relief.
Chapter Thirty-One
‡
Seth stood in front of Saint Joseph’s, waiting for everyone to get out of their trucks. He helped Sofia onto the sidewalk while scanning the crowd of people arriving. He finally spotted Mac, Rowan, and Willow getting out of Rowan’s car and started to cross the parking lot to them, but the look on Rowan’s face when she spotted him made him stay where he was.
Court approached them instead, picked up Willow, and shook Mac’s hand. Neither Mac nor Rowan looked especially pleased about it, but Willow was happy, and Seth supposed that was all that really mattered.
After all, Easter was for families.
He hung back, alone, while everyone else filed into the church, heading inside himself at the very last ring of the bells. He sat next to Sawyer and the rest of his clan while Court took the end of the pew with the Archers, apparently ignoring Emma’s dirty looks.
Mass was uncomfortable, mostly because Seth couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off Rowan or stop himself from picturing her in bed. Which made him picture her in bed with Court, which was never going to happen, he realized, but Rowan was going to end up with someone.
Someone who wasn’t him.
And that made his blood boil.
He did
n’t take communion, because he didn’t feel worthy. But he wasn’t going to go to confession either, because, well, he wasn’t a damn bit sorry for his relationship with her. There was little difference, Seth decided, between the real Hell and the one he was living in now. He loved Rowan, and nothing about that was wrong, just complicated. It wasn’t until Sawyer caught him staring at the Archers that Seth finally looked away.
Eager to get out and get back home, Seth started to make his way to the exit the minute the service was officially over, but he got caught in the bottleneck of people trying to do the same, and behind him he heard his family, their familiar voices drifting through the crowd, catch up to him. He glanced over his shoulder and realized Rowan and her family were stuck as well.
She wouldn’t even meet Seth’s gaze. In fact, it seemed to him that she was very studiously trying to ignore his presence.
Walker cleared his throat, looking a bit awkward in the throng of people.
Other parishioners were staring at them as they shuffled past, slowing down, presumably so they could listen in on the stilted conversation between the two families.
Court put a hand on Rowan’s shoulder, which made Seth grit his teeth, but even he could appreciate the steely gazes the youngest Barlow was giving people as they passed, glancing at them all furtively. One thing was abundantly clear—no one was going to let an outsider belittle or point fingers at Rowan.
Court, Willow, and Rowan gave off the facade of a young, happy family, and to that end—protecting Rowan’s reputation—Seth made no bones about it.
“You should come to dinner,” Walker said to Mac and Rowan.
“We can’t,” said Emma in a clipped tone. “We have to be at Troy’s parents’.”
Rowan bit her lip, and her eyes darted back and forth between the two heads of the families, trying to think of her own excuse. “We…well, Dad’s still recovering. And we should get home so he can rest and—”
But Mac interrupted her. “No,” he said. “I’m all right. We should go.”
Rowan opened her mouth again, about to protest.
“We’re family,” Walker insisted, and Mac Archer smiled, looking relieved to hear it.
“We are,” he said, possibly a bit too loudly. But it was crowded in the vestibule.
Walker held the door so everyone could pass through, then he let it fall on Bessie Hamilton, who was practically running to stay in step with them. She blanched at the evil eye Walker gave her just before the heavy double doors clicked shut.
At Snake River, Dakota saddled up Caramel, and Court swooped Willow onto the pony’s back. Mac declared it a fine little pony indeed as Dakota led her at a steady pace. Seth couldn’t help but hover nearby, but at a respectful distance, stacking hay bales over and over just to be closer to the group. He knew he should leave, saddle up Choctaw and get the hell out of there for a while, put as much space between himself and Snake River as he could. He didn’t want to see Rowan here, surrounded by the others. He wanted her alone, at the Archer place, where even if they could no longer touch each other, he could talk to her, spend some time with her.
And Willow, too. At the Archer farm he could show her how to use a reata, how to tie a quick-release knot, the easiest way to mend a sagging fence line. Here he’d be stepping on Court’s toes, horning in on their Father/Daughter time. He loved to see her on the pony, though, loved to see her huge grin and hear her tinkling laugh.
She looked up then, almost as though his own thoughts had called out to her.
“Uncle Seth!” Willow shouted. “Uncle Seth, look! I’m riding!”
Seth waved to her and smiled. His eyes darted to Rowan, though, who quickly looked away, picking at her sweater.
“Come here! Watch!” the little girl demanded.
He wanted to—so, so much—but he instead he shook his head. “I can’t, honey. I have to work.”
She frowned. “But…it’s Easter!”
Seth returned the disappointed look. “I know, honey. I’m sorry. Have fun, though! I’m proud of you!” He stacked the last bale, turned, and quickly walked away, putting himself out of their line of sight. It felt strange going to his room in the middle of the day, so he ducked into the kitchen through the side door and found Sofia and Dakota there, working on dinner for everyone.
Without a word, Seth rolled up his sleeves and washed his hands in the sink then picked up a towel.
Dakota opened her mouth, but Seth saw Sofia shake her head sharply at her daughter. He was grateful for the invisibility of the kitchen, just listening to them chatter away about how many empanadas could fit on a rack as Seth lost himself in the familiar pinching of dough for the repulgue. It was similar to braiding a reata, and he’d done both many times.
Dinnertime came while he was still lost in thought, and Seth might have tried to slip back out the side door, but Sofia shoved a platter into his hands and shooed him into the large formal dining room. Everyone was already gathered, and it seemed impossible to sneak away.
At the table, things were a bit stiff between the adults. Gabe was (rightfully) still sore about the awful truth regarding his father’s death. Austin and Walker had little to say to each other, and though Dakota sat with her mom and brother across the table, she may as well have plunked her ass right down between the twins for all the tension in the air. Seth caught Walker looking at her more than once from across the room. Curiously, though, Austin seemed to pay her no mind at all. He seemed more interested in getting to know his little niece.
It was Willow who broke up most of the tension, asking questions about the empanadas, why some had meat and others had fruit and how yucky it was to get them confused after you’d already taken a bite of the other kind. She was a bright spot, sweeping away the clouds that had descended on all of them with the last winter storm and had never gone away afterward.
She was a Barlow, through and through, with her chestnut-dark hair, a shade deeper than Rowan’s, and her dimpled smile that looked just like Court’s. Seth was glad to have another member of the family, but he ached as he looked at her with longing of his own. She even transfixed Walker, who’d quite possibly forgotten how to smile somewhere around his sixteenth birthday and had just now remembered how it was done.
Mr. Archer said little. The old man was as reticent as Walker, who sat across from him. He thanked Sofia for the food, though, profusely, and seemed to prefer conversing with the older woman rather than anyone else at the table. Despite Sawyer and Willow’s silliness, there was still a swirling undercurrent of tension in the room.
Rowan was entirely silent and barely eating to boot. She wouldn’t so much as glance his way, which made Seth’s gut twist and had him eating less of Sofia’s Easter dinner, as well.
He sighed inwardly and tried to enjoy the moment for what it was, though.
This family, cracked and disconnected as it was, was still better than none at all.
“We should go,” Rowan said finally, the only thing she’d said all throughout dinner.
Mr. Archer, finished with his own meal, thanked Sofia again, and Walker for the invitation, and the Archers headed out the front door to Rowan’s car. Everyone followed to send Willow off, everyone except Seth, who sat alone in the dining room. He gazed at his untouched plate until he finally picked it up and carried it into the kitchen. He practically threw it into the sink. He didn’t bother to stay and help clean up. He dashed out the back door instead.
As he walked away, it became harder and harder to put one foot in front of the other. He wanted to go back, go back and pull Rowan into his arms, go back and kiss her until that look of utter defeat and disappointment was replaced with that rare smile that warmed his heart whenever he caught a glimpse of it.
His steps slowed and goddamn it all to hell he nearly turned around. These lonely nights, these meaningless days, frankly, they terrified him. A whole lifetime of them? And that’s what it would be, a lifetime, because there was no one for Seth Barlow but that fiery woman who loved
this land just as much as he did. No one else was everything he needed and everything he secretly wished for. The thought of a lifetime without Rowan made Seth’s blood run cold.
Just once, he wanted to do the wrong thing, have something, someone, for himself.
His footsteps slowed until he stopped entirely.
Dad had sacrificed everything and at the end, when it hadn’t been enough, he’d ridden out into a storm to give them the very last thing he had left—his life. It was cold now, without Rowan and Willow, and it would just keep getting colder, until Seth was frozen, too, right into this very spot.
He had almost made it to the barn before Court caught his arm and turned him. “Seth, wait. I—”
Seth’s fist connected with Court’s jaw, sending the younger man flying. “She’s not yours!” Seth bellowed. “She’ll never be yours, because she’s mine. Do you understand what I’m saying? Do you get what I’m telling you? Rowan is mine. And you do whatever it is you need to do to get over that. Because I’m not letting her go. I’m not sitting across the table from her for the rest of my life wishing for what could’ve been. It’s going to be. She and I are going to be together. So, you get your shit together! I don’t care what you have to do, or who you have to talk to, or what needs to happen, but you get it together, and you keep it together! Whatever it takes, but Rowan is mine! She’s mine, and that’s all there is to it.”
Court stared up at him, open mouthed, dumbfounded. Even Seth was surprised at the ferocity of his own words, his own feelings. He never intended for this happen. It had just boiled up, exploded somehow. But there it was, he’d said it. And he’d meant it. There was no going back now, not that Seth ever would. A fire burned inside him hotter than any he’d ever dreamed possible, and there was no putting it out.
