Never the Cowboy's Lover

by Amelia Wilde

  Won’t we?

  15

  16

  Luke

  Julie May clutches her phone like it’s a priceless treasure map all the way down Laura’s street and all the way through the bustling downtown. She keeps her eyes on the street signs, even though the GPS is going to show us the way. I can feel her taking everything in. The fall decorations in the storefronts. Leaves gathering on corners. There’ll be more of those soon as the last gasp of summer goes away. People gather outside a restaurant, talking and laughing on the street corner. Everything about this town plays into the vision Julie May has of her family.

  It takes all my strength not to remind her that Paulson offered that, too. But how can I explain that nobody thought of her as an outsider? In all my years in Paulson I never once heard anybody say such a thing about Julie May. Sure, maybe she was too bookish for some people, too invested in the library, and too focused on what she wanted. And sure, maybe those things—working at the library, getting a library sciences degree in college—didn’t track with the prevailing Paulson Dream of owning a ranch. Somebody has to run the library for all those ranchers anyway. Somebody has to keep the collection fresh and the computers up and running. It’s the way of things.

  I’d normally bring this up with her. We’d talk it through and circle back around again until Julie May was tired of talking or until something else came to mind. This drive, I keep my lips shut tight. I saw Laura’s face when Jules pressed her on the information for their mother. I know this isn’t a good plan.

  Julie May rattles her foot against the floorboard of her truck. She agreed to let me drive so she could keep a lookout for the address, but her shoulders get tighter with every block that passes. We’re not turning down any of the residential streets that branch off from downtown. We trundle slowly by a library, but that’s not it, either. A quick frown at the GPS unit and Julie May is back to staring out the window.

  “It says it’s on the right, doesn’t it?”

  She knows perfectly well it’s on the right.

  “Yeah. But not for a few more miles.”

  In a small town like this one, a few miles is far enough outside of the downtown area that we might as well be in another town. Or we could be in the middle of a far-off subdivision—the kind rich people like to build and then inhabit so they can keep far away from the riffraff. Or a trailer park. Or a rundown ranch in the middle of nowhere.

  We leave the downtown and head out, the speed limit increasing for the local highway. There’s an Auto Mart and a car was, and a lonesome Burger King past all of it. A gas station. My stomach sinks. This looks industrial as all hell. It doesn’t look like the kind of place a person would put down roots unless they absolutely had to. We have places like this outside of Paulson, but not many—where the apartments are above repair shops or other businesses that nobody particularly wants smack in the middle of downtown.

  The map doesn’t look good.

  The roads aren’t in the shape of a subdivision, with lots of crisscrossing streets and open spaces for things like parks. We’re out in the big parcels, where the roads come every half mile, and then every mile.

  The GPS dings and I send up a quick prayer that the map is wrong. That somehow we’ll pull off the highway and into the driveway of a cute little house with a fence and a friendly dog.

  There’s still a chance, right up until there isn’t.

  “Your destination is on the right,” intones the GPS unit, and with an ache in my chest I pull into the driveway of what looks like a strip mall.

  It looks like a strip mall because it is a strip mall.

  A Chinese buffet, a hair salon, a women’s resource center, and a dollar store jostle for space, looking out at a parking lot that’s too big for the number of people who could possibly be in these stores at once.

  “Oh, Jules.” My throat goes tight with disappointment for her. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry about what?” she snaps. “Park over there.” With a shaking finger she directs me to the front of the women’s resource center. When I’ve got the car in park she taps frantically at her phone. “That’s the address she gave. So maybe she’s inside.”

  The women’s resource center has seen better days, judging by the faded poster in front advertising a festival that happened four years ago.

  “She could be inside,” Julie May says fiercely, and then she gets out without waiting for me to answer.

  I hop out on my side and catch her just before she opens the door. “Maybe it’s for the best.” It’s the wrong thing to say, and I know it as soon as the words are out of my mouth. “If she’s not inside. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be.”

  Julie May’s eyes go dark with anger and hurt and she stalks back toward me. “Listen to me, Luke Bliss. You have no idea what my life’s been like. It’s not for the best if I can’t find her. Okay? I’d appreciate if you wiped that worried look off your face. I’m not a kid anymore.”

  “I didn’t say—”

  She doesn’t give me any more chances after that. Jules just goes into the women’s resource center with fury coming off her in waves.

  My cell phone rings.

  I pick it up, feeling numb. Caved-in.

  “When are you gonna be home, Luke?” Austin says by way of greeting. “This cider thing is a bigger project than any of us thought. I need you here to help manage people.” His voice is stretched thin with excitement and stress. “It could go really well if we can pull it off. More income for the ranch.”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.” Anger and hurt mix together and burrow into the pit of my gut, guilt layering over top. I should be there for my family, too. And here I am, fighting with Julie May at a strip mall. “By tonight.”

  “Good. Everything okay?”

  Everything is so far from okay. “It’s fine. Tell you about it when I get there. I gotta go, Austin.”

  I hang up because Julie May has stepped outside of the women’s resource center, a quiver in her chin. She hands her head. For a moment, I think she might dissolve into tears right there on the sidewalk. But she visibly shakes it off, then looks up at me.

  I lean out the window. “Get in, Julie May. I’m taking you back home where you belong.”

  She sits stone-faced for thirty miles outside of town. “You remember when we got voted Prom Prince and Princess?” It used to be one of her favorite memories. When we were sophomores, our first year at prom, we’d made fun of the prom king and queen contest relentlessly. Imagine our surprise when we got voted the prince and princess. “You took it so seriously. I felt like a real prince.”

  “Yeah, I remember that.” Jules sounds like she’s trying to swallow down a sob. She turns her face toward the window. “It was fun, wasn’t it?”

  “I don’t know. Was it more fun or less fun than the time I fell in the river at the mini golf place trying to get that ball for you?”

  “About the same amount.” A tear drips down the side of her cheek, catching the sunlight in it. Julie May’s grip on her phone is so tight her knuckles have gone white.

  “All right.”

  I spend the next twenty miles hoping against hope that she’ll say something to me. Anything. Julie May can be mad at me if she wants.

  I spend the twenty miles after that daydreaming about a few weeks ago, when she hadn’t found her family yet but everything was still okay between us. It’s not that I want to go back. It’s that I want things to go forward. We could be like we always were, only with sex and love added in. Being with Julie May feels like opening a door on a bright new reality. Or—it felt like that, until she slammed it shut. Every mile that goes by in silence is another opportunity to open that door. But no. No, and no, and no.

  In the end I turn on the radio to something modern and mindless and turn it up loud. It’s a song about making mistakes and wishing you hadn’t, which is so appropriate for the moment that it hurts. I sing along anyway. Is that a flicker of a smile I catch out of the corner of my eye
? By the time I turn my head, it’s gone.

  It doesn’t feel great to sing while you’re trying to stifle the biggest dread of your life. I wish I could go back to you, the song lyrics say. I’ve heard them a hundred times at the grocery store. I just never thought they’d apply to me.

  17

  Julie May

  Funny, funny, funny. Laura didn’t like me when she first saw me, but now she’s calling.

  And I don’t answer.

  Because I am back where I belong, just like Luke said. I’m in Paulson, where I belong. Maybe if I keep repeating it, then I will actually belong here and nowhere else in the world.

  I toss my phone back into the drawer at my desk in the library and rest my head on the polished wood. What’s the point of talking to Laura, anyway? This whole journey is over and we circled right back to the Shire. I mean, right back to the beginning. Nothing has changed.

  Except how busy Luke is.

  Luke has not shown up at the library in days. He has not brought me lunch in almost a week. And yes, I realize how selfish and stupid it sounds to expect lunch from Luke after what happens. I just never thought that things between us would come to such a crashing halt.

  God, I wanted to call him. As soon as he dropped me off and got into his own car, I wanted to call him. I wanted to tell him that I was sorry for acting the way I did at that Women’s Resource Center. I was so desperate for my mom to be in there that I was foolish. And hurtful. And even more foolish and hurtful on the way back home.

  I click around uselessly on my computer for another hour, hardly paying attention to the new items for the catalogue, and finally I am forced by virtue of my own distraction to call it a day.

  But when I get out to my truck, I find I can’t drive it to my house.

  I need to see Luke.

  Tears well up on the way over. Damn it, this whole thing has been a disaster. Oh, Julie May, get a grip on yourself. Okay. Okay. Fine. Not the whole thing. I met Maya, and I met Laura, and that should be enough for me.

  Except I lost Luke.

  Can you put a value on people like that? Is it still a net positive if you gain two and lose one?

  No. Screw it. I’m not going to lose Luke, I’m just not. I’m going to apologize, even if it kills me. Which it might.

  I rumble down the long driveway to the Bliss Ranch, gripping the wheel hard, and as I pull up in front of the house Luke comes out the front door and lopes down the front steps. His head comes up, and—

  Wow.

  His blue eyes catch mine and suddenly the air is mountaintop clear with so much oxygen that I feel high from it. Not that I’ve ever been high. God, my mind is not on straight. Looking at Luke’s strong shoulders and the way his shirt nips in at the waist scrambles my brain no matter what state I’m in. How have I been able to stand it all these years?

  And of course, because I’m Julie May Collins, it makes me burst into tears all over again.

  I clamber down from my truck with tears rolling down my cheeks. “Hey.” My voice sounds wobbly and terrible. “I’m sorry we got in a fight. Can we just be friends now?”

  Luke drops his hands to his sides. “We’ve always been friends, Julie May.”

  “Come here.”

  He does, slowly enough that I get a chance to marvel at his walk while still being irritated with him. When Luke gets within arms’ reach I pull him in hard and kiss him.

  It’s off.

  It’s just…off.

  He’s stiff and surprised and it takes way too long for his hands to go around my waist. I wrench myself back from him. “God, Luke.”

  “Jules.” He’s so reasonable. I hate how reasonable he is. “You’re a mess. You want to come inside?”

  “I screwed everything up. Okay? It’s all wrong.” The beauty of the Bliss Ranch is a taunt. It’s too nice here. It’s always been too nice here. “We’re not friends anymore. You don’t want to kiss me. And I couldn’t find my mother and I am heartbroken about it.”

  I break into big, ugly sobs, knowing exactly how stupid I look, but Luke just lets out a breath and gathers me into his arms. “It’s all right,” he murmurs against my hair. “It’s all right.”

  “It’s not.” I take a big step back, getting myself as free of him as I possibly can. “It’s not, and you don’t get it. You just don’t. You’ve always had a family.”

  Hurt shines in his eyes. “Yeah, I have. But I’ve been by your side while you were looking for your family, too. I’ve seen how hard it is.”

  “But you don’t understand.” Ice gathers around my chest, around my heart. It squeezes itself tight. “You don’t understand the way I do. Or the way Laura does. And Laura—” Another sob sears my throat. “It’s great, having a cousin and a sister. It’s so great. But I wish I’d never done it. I wish I’d never done any of it.”

  Luke’s eyes go wide, and then pain radiates out from his gaze. I have a front-row view for the moment he understands what I’ve said. What I meant. And I do mean it. I didn’t know what my plan was until the words came out of my mouth, but now I do. Now I know it’s the only way forward.

  “Jules.” He sounds broken but clears his throat, standing up tall. “Do you regret what we did?”

  “Yes.”

  The word is a brick through a pane of glass, a fighter jet splitting the sky. A crash. A punch. It’s everything bad in the world. Stop, something screeches at the back of my mind. Stop, stop.

  But I can’t. Because Luke will never know. And I’ll never be able to explain it. And everything will always be wrong between us. There will always be fundamental mismatch between the two of us that all the sex in the world can’t fix.

  “Yes, I regret it.” Good job, Julie May. Twist the knife. “And I don’t want to see you again.”

  18

  Luke

  Mrs. Morrison at the grocery store looks me up and down, assessing me. She’s a bright-eyed old lady who doesn’t miss much of anything. Knowing what I know, she could have retired years ago, but then where would she get the town gossip? Easy enough to chitchat with people while they ring up the groceries.

  I’m on the second trip of the day for more tubing for all the cider equipment. Turns out Austin ordered way more apples than he thought, and he wants to get all the cider to the farmer’s market as quick as possible. But all the focus on cider means we’re running low on the essentials at the house. I thought the grocery store would be a good place to forget about the empty gash that Julie May has left behind in my life, but wouldn’t you know it? It didn’t work. I spent the entire time wondering if she was going to appear at the end of an aisle. What would happen then? Would she see me and walk away? Sweat beaded underneath the collar of my shirt. I had to go back to the bread aisle three times because I kept forgetting tortillas.

  It’s been hell.

  And now—Mrs. Morrison is chucking my items down the belt to the bag boy. This is one of those times I wish I lived somewhere anonymous. Somewhere I could just stick my card in the reader and be on my way.

  No such luck.

  “I haven’t seen Julie May in lately. Any idea where she is?” She punches a few numbers on the register. What was I thinking, getting an order this size? It’s just an invitation to chat. The checkout lanes on either side of me sing their songs, with the low chatter of residents all around us. I’ve got to play my part here at the supermarket.

  “Nope.” I rub the back of my neck. “Haven’t seen her in a week or so.” Ever since she dumped me in my own front yard. I’ll never forget, not for the rest of my life, the fury in her eyes when she showed up at the ranch. God, I wish I knew what had set her off. What could it have been? Just the trip? No, I can’t speculate. I’ve been speculating nonstop for hours. For days. It just brings me back to where I’ve started. Except I have nothing. Well, not nothing. I have my brother and Brooke and their love-fest. I am not jealous of it. I swear.

  Mrs. Morrison crooks one of her eyebrows. “Are you doing all right, Luke?”


  “Busy with all my brother’s big cider plans.” I flash her my best Bliss smile and hope it hides the bags under my eyes. No effect. This is Mrs. Morrison at her gossip-collecting best, but I’m not going to give it to her. She’ll see right through to the destroyed insides of me, which are not suitable for display at the local grocery store. “You know how harvest season gets.”

  Blessedly, the last item from my cart comes up next and goes down the rolling belt to the bag boy. I make my excuses to load it all into the cart and take the whole getup out to the parking lot.

  “Hey, Luke!” Chris Easton’s jovial voice rings across the parking lot. Is it too late to crawl into the trunk with the groceries? Guess it is. “How are you, buddy? I haven’t seen you in a while. Heard you were out of town for a while.”

  “I’ve been in and out.” I toss the last bag into the trunk and close it with enough force that it must seem like I have somewhere to be, and urgently. “How are things at the fire station?”

  “You know.” He grins. “Putting out fires. Hey, where’s Julie May been? I usually see her out walking in front of the station, but she hasn’t been out this week.”

  I grit my teeth. “I honestly don’t know, Chris. Give her a call and find out, would you?” I smack my head. “Aw, sorry, man, my brother’s waiting for these groceries. Gotta get back.”

  Chris is no fool. He’s known our family for years, and I see the suspicious furrow in his brow. But it’s too late. I’m not going to talk about this, not any more.

  I get into my car and rattle down the highway, picking up speed as I head out toward the mountains. Toward the ranch. For the first time, I consider driving out of Paulson. Out of the state. Hell, maybe even out of the country. I want to drive so far that nobody there has ever heard of me or Julie May or watched us grow up together. And then I want to drive father.