Her gelding stuck his nose in the water, swished back and forth a few times and then took a long drink. When the horse finished, as was his habit, he dipped his nose in the water again, swishing faster and faster until water splashed. Ruby pulled the animal back before he had her drenched.
Carson walked out the door of the stable and joined her. He looked her horse over. “Is he fresh enough for a ride?”
“Now?” She glanced at her watch.
“Why not? Do you have somewhere you have to be?”
“Yes, actually, I do. I have to go home and fix dinner for my family.”
He stood on the opposite side of her horse, leaning on the saddle to watch her, as if he knew she was looking for ways to get out of spending time with him. And he wasn’t giving her an inch of wiggle room.
“You could invite me to dinner,” he suggested.
“No. Carson, this isn’t going to happen.”
“A ride isn’t going to happen? Or dinner?”
“No, this.” She pointed from him to herself and back to him. “We are not going to happen.”
“Right, of course we aren’t.” He walked around her horse and was suddenly at her side. “I’m asking you to go for a ride. An hour or two of relaxation, not worrying about the thefts, your brother, Iva, Brandon and all of the other stuff piling up on us. I could use that break.”
She closed her eyes and prayed for strength. He was her kryptonite, it seemed, because she had no strength. “Carson.”
When she opened her eyes, he was still in front of her, his smile a little bit sweet and a little bit rakish. “Yes?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Simple. We have unfinished business, Ruby. You left and I’ve spent a lot of years wondering why.”
“Because I wasn’t good for you,” she whispered. “We were young and making decisions that would have...”
“Changed everything?” he asked. “Because I’ve thought about that a lot over the years. My life would have been different if you’d been in it.”
“Mine, too,” she admitted, trying to look away from him. His fingers touched her chin, drawing her back to him, forcing her gaze to meet his.
“You could have moved on.” His tone made it sound as if the words came easily to him, but she could hear the heavy thread of emotion in his voice. “You didn’t.”
“No, I didn’t. And neither did you.”
He shrugged that off. “I was wrong once. I didn’t want to be wrong again.”
“Wrong?”
“About us.” He walked away, ending the moment. “I’ll saddle a horse.”
“But I—” She tried to drag her horse to the door that he’d disappeared through. The crazy animal wouldn’t be pulled away from the water. “Carson!”
He looked around the corner of the door, one side of his mouth tipped in a grin. “Yes?”
Objections. She had some. She had a few. But looking at him, she couldn’t seem to get them out. Instead, she shook her head.
“Never mind.”
“Good. That’s what I was hoping.”
He returned a few minutes later with a pretty roan mare. Ruby instantly loved the horse with its sweet face and warm eyes. She thought horses were a lot like people; their eyes revealed so much about their personality. This one was a keeper.
“Like her?” Carson asked as he tightened the cinch.
“She’s really nice.” She took a step closer and this time her gelding left the water that he’d been playing in.
“You can ride her,” he offered, handing her the reins.
“No. Dusty is fine.” She ran a hand down her horse’s neck, drawing him close. She wouldn’t want him to feel bad.
“Come on, you know you want to.”
Yes, she did. She looked up at the man who fairly towered over her and she felt...not overpowered, not at all. She felt safe. He held the reins out again and she took them.
“Thank you.” She stepped close to the horse and too close to Carson.
They both stilled. The horses moved restlessly, swishing tails to brush away flies. Dusty pulled his head back to the water trough. Such a bad habit, Ruby thought. She had to break him of that.
She had to break herself of some bad habits, too. Starting with Carson Thorn. Unfortunately, he was a habit she really didn’t want to break. Being hundreds of miles away she’d really thought she’d managed to get over him. Now, being close again, she realized that maybe she’d never stopped loving him.
The word froze in her mind, and she quickly stepped away, making a big deal about checking the stirrups before mounting. She couldn’t love a man who could so easily forget her. A man who had to know that if she hadn’t taken his father’s money, it was because she’d loved him more than any amount James Thorn could have written on a check.
She loved him. And the past was between them in a way that she wasn’t sure she could forget. She would never be able to forget his dad standing on her front porch with that check or the humiliation burning her cheeks when he’d told her she needed to let Carson be somebody. His son could be a senator. He could be anything. But not with the daughter of Earl Donovan at his side.
The memories were burned into her mind. Branded.
* * *
They rode side by side. Ruby had gone quiet since they’d left. Carson knew eventually she’d talk, so he didn’t push. Instead, he relaxed. He relaxed and he enjoyed the breeze sweeping down the hillside, swirling the autumn grass and cooling the air.
“You’re right,” she finally spoke. “This is nice.”
“How do you like the mare?”
“She’s as sweet to ride as she is to look at. Where did you get her?”
“She’s out of my old mare.”
“I should have known.”
Yes, she should have. She’d always loved that mare. Years ago he’d considered giving her the horse. A pretty dappled gray that he’d hauled to her place and let her ride.
“I’ve been offered a job,” he told her out of the blue, surprising himself with the announcement.
She glanced his way, her eyes widening. “You have a job. Two of them, if I’m not mistaken.”
He pushed his hat back just a smidge to get a better look at the woman riding next to him. It did take him back, this ride, her next to him. The years seemed to melt away.
“State Department of Agriculture.”
“Politics,” she murmured. She looked away.
“Don’t say it like it’s poison.” He nearly laughed. “I didn’t say I was going to take it. I do have to admit, there are times I would like to try something different. I’ve been ranching my whole life.”
“Your dad wanted you to be a senator,” she said so softly he almost missed it.
“Yes, he did. He had a lot of plans for my life.” He rode his horse a little closer to hers. “Ruby?”
She cleared her throat. “Let’s talk about something else. Or maybe not talk at all.”
They rode a little farther in the direction of the hills and the spring. They wouldn’t make it there, not today. The temperature had dropped an easy ten degrees and clouds were rolling in from the south. Ruby shot him a worried look.
“Do you have radar on your phone?” she asked as they reined in their horses.
“Yeah, give me a sec. I’m not sure how much signal we have out here.”
“Probably not a lot.”
He had his phone out, but a look up at the increasingly dark clouds told him a lot more than the app that wouldn’t load on his phone. As he studied the clouds, Ruby moved her horse closer to his. She touched his arm and when he looked at her, she pointed to a distant service road that ran along the boundary of his property.
A truck, covered in mud, pulled a rusted-out trailer.
“Someone you know?” she asked.
“No, and I doubt the Jensens are out moving cattle in this weather. That’s their property on the other side of the road.”
“Should we try to catch up
and see who it is?” Ruby had already nudged her horse forward. Carson rode up next to her.
“We can try, but I think they’ll be gone before we get there.”
Ruby shot him a look that called him chicken. “I’m going.”
And with that she was off. He urged the gelding forward, knowing the roan she was riding would give them a run for their money.
“Hey, remember the gully.” He yelled the warning as she streaked across the field.
“I remember.” Her words floated back to him.
Carson grinned, watching as she raced across the field, her free hand pushing down the hat that threatened to lift off her head.
As they closed in on the service road the truck sped up. It must have seen them. They reached the gully with Ruby a short distance ahead of him. She leaned over the horse’s neck and the two of them flew across the narrow ditch. His horse stumbled a bit but got its footing.
Ahead of him, Ruby slowed her horse and turned to watch him catch up. Her dimple flashed and her eyes sparkled. He wanted to snatch that hat off her head and release the auburn hair, knowing it would fall around her shoulders, silky and scented of something herbal.
Her lips parted and his attention refocused, from her hair to her mouth. Because her mouth, he knew how it would taste. Dangerous thoughts, he warned himself. Dangerous distraction. He turned back to the road and the truck that was disappearing from sight. His phone was useless out here, so he couldn’t call anyone, and the truck was too far away for a clear picture. At least he could give Lucy a somewhat decent description of the old Ford and the rusted-out trailer.
Thunder rumbled overhead and the horses started to shift, ears twitching. He didn’t need to look up to know they were in serious trouble. They were a good thirty-minute ride from the house, even at a run. The wind had picked up and the sky was about to open up on them.
“The old hunting shack,” he called out over the blowing wind. “Remember?”
She nodded and turned her horse in the direction of the trees. The going was rough as the terrain became rocky and a lot less than level leading to the hill area. The rain had started to come down and wind whipped at them from all directions.
The shack was situated in the woods at the base of the hills. It took them a few minutes to reach it. When they did, they were soaked. The horses were soaked. They made their way to the lean-to on the side of the building and tied the horses in the small enclosure. A door led into the shack from the lean-to. Carson pushed it open and peeked in, not sure what they’d find inside. It had been years since anyone had used it for hunting.
Ruby slid in next to him. He drew her in, his arm around her. The place was dusty with cobwebs. From the nest of leaves, twigs and trash, it looked as if some kind of varmint called it home. Carson looked around, making sure the four-legged inhabitant wasn’t lurking under the cot or the wood stove.
“What do we do now?” Ruby shivered, standing in front of a stove that hadn’t held a fire in probably ten years.
“I guess we wait this out. I’ll call Ben and tell him where we are. Do you have your phone?”
“No signal at all.”
“I’ve got a signal. Barely. I’ll call Iva for you.”
She nodded, still shivering, hugging herself for warmth. “Thank you. And do you think we should call Lucy and tell her about that truck and trailer?”
“I’ll make that the first call.”
He made the calls. Ruby walked out the side door, leaving him alone. She came back a few minutes later with some old pieces of wood and even a piece of rail from a wood fence.
He pocketed his phone. “I made the calls. Where did you find that?”
“Against the side of the building, under the roof. There’s a little more. Enough to make a fire, but it won’t last long.”
“You realize we don’t have matches.”
She groaned as she dropped the wood next to the stove. “We’d never make it on a reality show.”
“Probably not.” He went to a cabinet and shoved through some leftover items from the last hunting trip he’d taken with his dad. Some rusted-out cans of soup, a container of coffee that had been gnawed on. He moved a few things and found what he was looking for. “Eureka, matches.”
When he turned, she was standing behind him, goose bumps on her arms and her hair dripping water. He brushed the wet hair back from her face, and she closed her eyes, lashes fanning dark against her fair skin. Forgetting matches, forgetting the fire, he wrapped her in his arms and pulled her close.
She shivered against him but she nestled her head against his shoulder, her arms going around his waist. He inhaled the scent of her hair, damp skin and rain and held her tight.
“This is better,” she whispered against him.
He couldn’t have agreed more. His lips brushed the top of her head. She looked up and when she did, he leaned, brushing his lips across hers. He knew he shouldn’t. She probably had the same thought. Better not to go there.
But a dozen years without her in his life felt like walking across the widest desert with no water in sight.
She moved her arms from around him and raised her hands to touch his cheeks, and then her fingers were in his hair. And he was lost. He whispered her name against her cheek and then his lips claimed hers again.
He’d kissed her years ago, the way a boy kissed a girl. They had been young, discovering love and attraction, all of the things that happened to teenagers. Today he kissed the woman and it rocked his world. He kissed her because it was right, and it had never been right with anyone else. He’d never felt a need to hold a woman forever the way he wanted to hold her.
A crash of thunder shook the little shack, and wind beat against the thin panes of glass in the windows. As the storm rolled through, Carson rediscovered the reason he wanted only this one woman. Because she was the other half of him.
Eventually she pulled away, shaken, her cheeks flushed with color. “Carson, I...”
“Don’t regret,” he warned.
“No, I don’t regret. I’m just not sure what we’re doing. Or what we’re going to do.”
“Do we have to answer those questions right now?” He pulled her against him. “I need you in my life.”
“And I needed you twelve years ago.”
He cupped her cheeks with his hands and kissed her again. “I can’t undo what my dad did. I can’t undo any of that. But I know what I want.”
“I don’t know.”
“Really?” He stepped back from her, brushing a hand across his face. “I’m not sure what that means.”
“I don’t think we can just sweep it all under the rug. We can’t sweep the past under a rug and we can’t pretend that everyone in town, including you, hasn’t suspected my brother of being a cattle thief. We also can’t pretend that I fit in your world.”
“Okay, so we talk about the past and we figure out how to keep Derek from suspicion.”
“That sounds so easy,” she whispered. “I want it to be that easy. Let’s just forget, pretend none of it matters and move on. But you’re not wired like that and neither am I. We both have a lot of stuff to deal with. Not just the past and Derek, but now you have Brandon to consider. I have Iva and her health.”
“Those aren’t obstacles.”
“They are,” she insisted with a sadness to her voice that shook him. “They are my obstacles. I have to keep them safe.”
“I know you do.” He didn’t reach for her. Any man with half a brain would know that it was the wrong time for that. She was holding on by a string and she didn’t want to cry.
He backed up to one of the old rocking chairs and sat down. She took the other and moved it to face him. The rain against the metal roof had slowed from pounding to a rhythmic beat that almost soothed. The shack grew quiet in the calm after the storm.
“We should go.” She looked at her watch as she said it. “I really do need to go.”
“I know you do. Give it a few minutes to blow over and we
’ll head out.”
She nodded and then drew her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. Her eyes closed.
She was right. Where did they go from here? He had no idea. But it was obvious that they’d left a lot undone and unsaid.
Chapter Eleven
Ruby walked up the steps to her grandmother’s house, weary to the bone, still damp from the rain and ready for a warm bath. But as she walked through the front door she was met with chaos.
Her grandmother looked up from her recliner, her poor body jerking as she tried to point at Derek who stood next to her.
“Tell him I will not go.” Iva shook her head and sighed. “I won’t go to the hospital.”
“What’s going on?” Ruby hurried to her grandmother’s side. “I shouldn’t have left you. I should—”
Iva held up a hand that jerked but she steadied it and she frowned big. “You have to take time off. So, yes, you should have gone. You deserve—”
It was Ruby’s turn to stop her grandmother. “Don’t say it. If you are going to say something about Carson and myself, please don’t.”
Derek bristled. She looked up at her little brother. He looked angry. She didn’t want his anger on top of her own, on top of her grandmother’s deteriorating health.
“I had a good ride. It rained. I’m home. And Gran, you have to rest. I’m going to take a guess. You’ve been up all day cooking? Cleaning? What else? Who have you been taking care of?”
“We have neighbors who are sick. I made a dinner and had Derek take it to Janie Douglas because Howard had a heart attack.”
“Of course you did. But it would really be okay if you let someone else take a meal. Let someone else visit church members in the hospital.”
Iva shook her head. “Oh, Ruby, you know they won’t. You know that people don’t think about their neighbors anymore. Everyone is busy. Too busy to visit a sick church member. Too busy to take a meal.”
Ruby sat on a nearby chair. “I know.”
“So, I have to do it.”
She didn’t argue. She knew she would lose. “Okay, we can have a compromise. You can do all of these things, but not all on the same day. And when you’re tired, rest.”
“She should go to the ER.” Derek looked a little worn out himself, but he also looked determined.
A Reunion for the Rancher (Lone Star Cowboy League 1) Page 11
