Her Cowboy Billionaire Beast

by Liz Isaacson

  “What would you do?” Cy asked, after explaining the situation to Ames.

  His twin exhaled slowly, his process for thinking through something before answering. Cy had put together a proposal over the course of the last month, and he’d laid it all out for Ames. He’d emailed him the map. Shown him where the shop was, and where his house was, and which part of the orchard he didn’t need and would never use.

  He wanted to give it all back to Patsy, and he’d put together a pretty powerful argument for why she should have it back. He just wasn’t sure if it was good enough.

  He’d left the motorcycle in her garage when she’d moved into the rental house just down the road and around the corner from the shop. She hadn’t said one word about it, though surely she knew it was there.

  Every day, his heart grew a little heavier. And a little darker, if he were being honest with himself. He tried really hard to be absolutely honest with himself, because he still hadn’t gone to a counselor, and it was the only way he could see truth and reason in his life.

  His thoughts had been twisting more and more recently, whispering things like, You didn’t even see the break-up coming from Mikaela, but you can feel something is off with Patsy.

  And he could.

  They weren’t the same, even now that she wasn’t running herself ragged at the lodge and trying to manage the orchard. But, the orchard really was in a state of disrepair, and Patsy did work from sun-up to sun-down to get the land, the trees, and the little farm back to where it could operate properly. On top of that, she had to re-establish contacts and trust with those who used to buy Foxhill apples, and assure them that their crop this year would be worth coming to see.

  “I think you should present it to her,” Ames finally said. “Get it all out in the open, Cy. This bottling-up isn’t good for you.”

  “You think it’s clear enough?”

  “It’s crystal clear,” Ames said. “And don’t think I didn’t notice how you just ignored what I’d said about bottling up your emotions.”

  Cy sighed, but he didn’t argue. He stood in his kitchen, his eyes out the window above the sink on the woods that bordered his back yard. Blue Velvet sniffed around back there, but Cy didn’t worry about her. The dog could come and go as she pleased, and she normally went to work with him, stayed by his side, and slept in the bed with him too. She did like a bit of outdoor time in the afternoon, and Cy watched as she barked and trotted over to a tree, looking up into the leaves of it.

  He turned around and leaned against the counter. “I’m fine, Ames.”

  “You keep telling yourself that,” his brother said.

  “We both will,” Cy shot back.

  Ames didn’t have an immediate comeback, and Cy was about to say goodbye and get on with obsessing over how to approach Patsy with the idea of returning fifteen acres of the twenty he’d bought from her last year.

  He didn’t need the front fifteen acres. If she’d let him keep the road leading back to his house and shop, she could have all those apple trees back. It was her family’s generational land, and Cy knew it meant a great deal to her.

  “I, uh, have to tell you something,” Ames said, clearing his throat.

  Cy’s curiosity pricked, and he smiled as he said, “Is that right? What? You found a woman who doesn’t care that you’re a cop and doesn’t know your last name yet?”

  “Sort of,” Ames said. “Actually, no. She knows both of those things. She just doesn’t seem to…care.”

  “You should propose right now,” Cy teased.

  “Okay,” Ames said with plenty of sarcasm. “This is why I didn’t tell you.”

  “How long has this been going on?” Cy asked, because he’d detected no noticeable changes in his twin. Usually, he had some sort of twin sensor that would go off, but he’d literally felt nothing.

  “A month or so,” Ames said evasively. “About the time Patsy moved out of the lodge.”

  “So you must’ve met her right after that,” Cy said. “Who is she?”

  At that moment, he heard Ames’s doorbell ring. And if he hadn’t, he would’ve definitely heard his dog start to throw a tantrum. Ames growled at Thunder Ridge to be quiet, that police dogs didn’t bark every time the blasted doorbell rang.

  Cy chuckled as the dog kept right on barking, and he said, “I’ll let you go. You need to train that dog.”

  “No kidding. Talk to you later.” Ames had to shout the words to be heard over the barking, and Cy ended the call with his brother rebuking the Malinois.

  He looked down at the folder of information, which included a color copy of the map Cy had rendered from the satellite images of the orchard, as well as the lot parcels from the county. He’d put a lot of effort and thought into this proposal, and though his pulse sped and tightened, he swept the folder into his hands and headed for the door.

  Patsy would say yes or no, and it didn’t matter if that happened today or tomorrow or next week.

  The weather had already started to cool in Wyoming, and Cy wasn’t looking forward to another winter. It felt like he’d just gotten his motorcycle out of the garage for that inaugural spring ride, though it had been four months now.

  He took the golf cart through the parking lot and down the lane to the highway. Just a hop, skip, and a turn later, and he arrived at the orchard that Patsy owned. Her car sat in the spot it always did when she worked in the office, which was a prebuilt shed she’d bought almost the day she’d moved down the canyon.

  She’d put a desk in there, and she used the Internet from her father’s farmhouse. If she wasn’t there, talking on the phone, arranging an order, or doing an interview, Patsy would be out on the land somewhere, doing whatever physical labor was required to improve the land, the harvest, or the functionality of the orchard.

  Today, when he knocked, she called, “Come on in.”

  Relief streamed through him, because he just wanted this to be over with. As he reached for the door handle, time slowed down.

  What, exactly, did he want to be over? This meeting where he tried to convince her to take back the unused part of the land he’d purchased? Or their relationship?

  As he opened the door, time moved at a steady rate again, and Cy didn’t know the answer to his questions.

  “Hey,” she said, plenty of pleasantness in her voice and the pretty smile on her face. Her hair had grown out from the extreme pixie cut of eight months ago, but she’d kept it on the short side. She now sported a cute A-line cut that left some pieces of her shockingly blonde hair to fall to her chin, while she had hardly any in the back. “What brings you here?”

  “This.” He practically threw the folder at her. It was actually pretty much a thrust, which felt aggressive to Cy. “It’s the front fifteen acres,” he said. “I don’t use them, and I want you to have them back.”

  “What?” Patsy held his gaze for a moment and then flipped open the folder.

  “I only need the back five acres,” he said, because she’d figure it out soon enough. “If you’ll let me keep the road going back there—which I’ll maintain—you can have the fifteen acres of orchard back. All the trees. Everything.”

  She scanned the front paper in the folder, which detailed everything he’d just said in bullet points and complete sentences. She flipped the page, and Cy had put the map second. There wasn’t much else to explain, but he’d put a contract as the third page. If she’d sign it today, so would he, and she’d be able to harvest all of the apples currently hanging in those fifteen acres of trees.

  She frowned as she turned the page and didn’t find another one. “There’s no price.”

  “That’s because I’m not charging you anything.”

  Her eyes shot to his, widening in shock. “Cy.”

  “It’s a gift, Patsy,” he said, his throat so raw. “Remember how you promised you’d try to find a way to accept my gifts?”

  She shook her head, and that was all the answer Cy needed. A terrible, horrible, hot rush of an
ger moved through him, touching everything and setting little fires throughout his body.

  “I can’t just take the orchard back.”

  “Why not?” he challenged. “I’m done with all the construction on my five acres. It’s just sitting there.”

  “Not without buying it.” She closed the folder and extended it back to him.

  A moment of clarity descended upon Cy. She hadn’t tried at all. She’d said she would, but she hadn’t. That was why she hadn’t said one word about the motorcycle, and why she couldn’t just take these stupid fifteen acres.

  Something’s wrong, his mind screamed. Don’t let her play you like this.

  He would not be blindsided again, the way he had been with Mikaela. He would not be caught with a diamond ring in his glove box, only to learn the woman he was in love with was actually going to break-up with him.

  He fell back a step, the whole world spinning now. Nothing made sense, and Cy’s thoughts jumbled and tangled.

  “I can’t believe you,” he said, his voice made of cruelty.

  “What do you mean?” Patsy finally lowered her hand, because Cy would not be taking that folder back. He’d been stewing over it for weeks; he had the whole thing memorized.

  “You’re so selfish,” he bit out. “You haven’t tried at all to find a way to accept a gift from me. Sure, you’ll take a plate of food, but nothing else. I don’t get it.”

  “I can’t just take fifteen acres,” she said. “You paid a lot of money for that land.”

  “I’m giving it to you,” he shouted.

  Patsy flinched and backed up, but Cy didn’t care. He wasn’t going to be the one left with his heart broken and bleeding. Not this time. If he broke up with Patsy, then he was in control. He wasn’t left wondering what he’d done wrong.

  She was the one who’d done something wrong. She was the one who would have to pick up the pieces of her life.

  Not that she would, because Cy could clearly see in that moment that Patsy would break-up with him in the future. Sooner or later, she would, and he’d be left gasping for breath and wondering how he’d let himself fall in love with another woman who didn’t love him back.

  “You’re unbelievable,” he said, plenty of disgust in his voice. “I’m done here.” With that, he spun and marched out of the door he’d just come through. The world outside wasn’t moving any slower, but Cy didn’t care. He could see the golf cart, and he focused on that, everything else in his vision a bit blurred.

  “Done?” Patsy said behind him. “What does that mean?”

  “It means we’re done,” he called over his shoulder. “Over. Don’t call me. Don’t text me.” He got behind the wheel of the golf cart, feeling a bit foolish. He wanted to speed out of her driveway, spitting gravel behind his big, manly truck tires. As it was, he’d just motor off in this wimpy golf cart.

  He glared at her as she walked toward him. “I don’t want to be with someone who won’t even try.”

  “I’m trying,” she said, plenty of anger in her expression too.

  Cy laughed, the sound high and utterly cruel. “You keep telling yourself that, Patsy.” With that, he pressed the gas pedal down in the golf cart, and sure enough, his exit wasn’t nearly as dramatic as he’d like it to be.

  She didn’t call after him, though, and as Cy drove away and back to his house, he left bits and pieces of his heart along the side of the road.

  “You did the right thing,” he told himself after he’d parked. He sat on a bench in the back yard and patted Blue Velvet, who seemed to know he was in deep turmoil. “You did the right thing.”

  He wasn’t sure how many times he said it, but maybe if he just kept repeating those words, he’d start to believe them. Maybe they’d become true.

  He spiraled, his emotions flying high and then taking a dive. A sob gathered in his chest, and Cy knew what came next.

  The debilitating panic.

  The thought to start throwing things.

  The beastly mood that would follow him everywhere for weeks and months. He’d snap at his employees and miss meetings. He didn’t want to be that person again.

  A beast.

  With a sharp intake of breath, he realized he’d already been the beast—to Patsy.

  He bent over, his breathing coming quicker and quicker. His phone rang, and Cy seized onto that one thing as if it were a lifeline.

  He couldn’t see the name on the screen through the streams of panic racing through him, but he managed to get the call connected.

  “Cy,” Ames said. “Talk to me. What’s wrong?”

  How Ames knew something was wrong, Cy didn’t know. He also couldn’t get a deep enough breath to speak.

  “I’m sending Colton over,” Ames said. “Are you at home? Or the shop? Somewhere else?”

  “Home,” Cy managed to get out, his voice nothing like his own.

  “Hang on,” Ames said. “I’m going to text him right now.”

  Cy sucked at the air, and Ames started talking again. “Deeper, Cy. Take a long, deep breath with me, okay? Can you hear my voice? Just listen to my voice.”

  Cy did, training all of his focus on his brother, who’d known through his own twin sense that Cy had just lost everything by breaking up with Patsy.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Patsy rolled over when her alarm went off, noticing that the sky beyond her window was still dark. A groan pulled through her chest and her sticky mouth, because while she needed to get up, she really needed more sleep too.

  She hadn’t slept well for a week, since Cy had said horrible things to her and driven away from the orchard, the truth of his words ringing in the air.

  She was selfish. She hadn’t tried—truly tried—to accept the motorcycle. And when he’d shown up with that folder that contained pages outlining how she could simply have the fifteen acres of apple trees back?

  She hadn’t even considered simply taking it.

  Her impulse was to say no, hand the folder back, and politely ask him if there was anything else he needed. As if he were a client. A nuisance.

  He’d been one-hundred percent right to break-up with her, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt.

  Cy’s absence in her life did hurt, all day, every day. It hurt when she came home at night, and the dull, aching pain of not being able to talk to him that day kept her awake for far too long at night.

  She hadn’t slept well in the seven days since he’d accused her of lying to herself. And he’d been right about that too.

  She sat up, misery already swirling through her. She existed with it now, but it was heavy, and she’d do almost anything to find a way to get rid of it.

  So she slid to the floor, her knees meeting the carpet of her bedroom as she started to sob. “Dear God,” she started, and then her prayer moved into silence as she cried against her sheets. She begged for help, something she’d been doing for the past several months actually. Help to be strong enough for her father. Help to know how to approach Betty. Help with the orchard.

  She’d never felt like such a failure, and the pain of that radiated through her in great waves. On and on it went, until Patsy had no energy left to even get off the floor, though her prayer had ended several minutes ago.

  Eventually, Patsy did get off the floor. She somehow found the strength to get in the shower and get dressed. She made coffee and poured herself some, adding sugar as she checked her phone to see what time she was meeting with Richard White.

  He was the buyer for a major applesauce company, and Patsy had been working to get in touch with him for two months. She’d spoken with him a couple of times this week, because one of the orchards Hammerstein had been buying from for the past couple of years had discovered worms in half of their crop.

  Patsy shuddered just thinking about what that would do to her bottom line. Foxhill was already a small operation, barely operating in the black, and something like that would push her toward bankruptcy.

  She had twenty minutes to be in
the orchard, ready to speak with Richard. She should’ve flown from the house and gotten herself down the road and in position. Instead, she sipped her coffee and waited until she absolutely had to leave or she’d be late.

  When she turned onto the piece of property where she’d been working the last couple of months, Richard’s fancy corporate SUV was already parked. He was already out and walking along the edge of the trees.

  Patsy’s pulse kicked through a few beats, and she hurried toward him. “Good morning, Richard,” she said smoothly. She couldn’t remember if she’d brushed her teeth or put on makeup, but Richard smiled at her, so she must not look or smell too bad.

  “Morning.” They shook hands, both of them all smiles. “These look great.”

  “We have everything you need here,” she said, tapping to open her phone. “I did these numbers last night, based on harvest projections.” She handed him the device, and he studied the weights and bushels she’d put together. “The Snowsweets are beautiful this year.”

  “These are Honeygold,” Richard said, taking a picture of her phone with his. “Right?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “Pick one and try it. We only use organic materials here. Hardly any pesticides, and nothing with the harmful chemicals, as always.”

  Richard reached up and plucked an apple from the tree. He handed her phone back, and Patsy was sure there wasn’t a more satisfying sound than that of someone biting into a crisp, juicy apple. “Oh, wow,” Richard said around the mouthful of fruit. “These are amazing.”

  Patsy just smiled. “We have thirty acres of trees,” she said. “Plenty of Honeygold for your applesauce.”

  “But not enough Snowsweet,” he said. “I need at least twice as many as what you have listed here for even a week of our juice production.”

  Patsy looked down the lane, toward the highway. She knew where more Snowsweet apples were—right across that road, in the north twenty that used to be part of the orchard.

  “Who owns the orchard across the street?” Richard asked. “Those were Snowsweet—at least what I could see. Isn’t that your orchard? Did you include those in the numbers?” He peered at his phone and took another bite of the Honeygold apple.