A Good Old-Fashioned Cowboy

by Maisey Yates

  “I’m not afraid.”

  “Okay, you’re not afraid. Then the other option is you want an escape hatch. You play tough, but the truth is, Pru, you like an easy way out when stuff gets hard. And you know it will, because life is hard.”

  Utterly horrified, she reared back because it felt like he’d slapped her. An escape hatch? “That isn’t true.”

  “Then what is, Pru?”

  She knew there had to be something to say. Something true and firm and putting him in his place.

  No words came out.

  “This is what’s true for me. I’m in love with you. I want to work at this store with you. I want to build a life with you. I want to tell your parents, your brothers. Mine. I want to build something. But you can’t build when someone won’t build with you.”

  Love. In love with her. Love. Love. She wasn’t sure she breathed. Her vision went a little gray. Love. She wanted to throw herself at him and sob and the urge was so overwhelmingly embarrassing she was sure she turned bright red.

  And managed no words, because what could she say? While Grant stood there staring at her like she’d shoved something sharp right through him.

  The bell tinkled and her father walked in, grinning in greeting. “Well, look at this place!” he said, missing the tension in the room.

  But Grant didn’t pretend like it wasn’t there. “Jack,” Grant said curtly. “I’ve got somewhere to be.”

  Dad watched Grant stride out, then looked at Pru with some confusion. “Well, don’t go running off your help, honey.”

  She wanted to burst into tears. Nothing would horrify or terrify her father more. An emotional outburst? He’d never survive.

  “Now look at this place. Isn’t it something? Your mother and I knew you’d make it work. Nothing you can’t do that you put your mind to.” He nodded, as if that was that, because in Jack Riley’s world, such was the case. He said it, and that was that.

  And she had nothing. No defenses. No strength. Just everything stripped away because Grant was in love with her, and somehow those words had crumbled every wall she’d ever built.

  The wall between her and her father and the way he’d hurt her. “If that’s so true, why didn’t you give me a piece of the ranch?”

  Her dad seemed surprised by the question, but not taken totally off guard. He hunched a little, defensively. “It didn’t suit you. Now, this store—”

  But she wouldn’t let him change the subject or avoid it, not when for the first time in twelve years she had the courage to broach it. “I love the ranch.” She fought back the tears, because they’d only send her father running. “Is it because I’m a girl?”

  Her dad laughed. Actually laughed. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “It’s the only difference between me and Beau and JT.”

  “Now that isn’t so. You never could stand to be alone or work alone. Why do you think we had those girls over all the time? You didn’t even like to do chores on your own. You like people. You like interaction. A ranch ain’t the place for that. School was though, so that’s what we gave you. And look how well it’s all worked out.” He gestured around to the store.

  “I wanted the ranch,” she managed to whisper.

  “Well, I know.” Her father blushed, itching his head—which she knew was his nervous tic. He usually lasted about one more minute before foisting the topic off on her mother, but her mom wasn’t here. He raised his hands. “I didn’t want to embarrass us both with some kind of fight over it. Better to press you to do the right thing.”

  Embarrass us both. With emotions. A Riley could be angry, but they couldn’t be mushy. They couldn’t be sad. Not around anyone else.

  The terrible thing was, she couldn’t find her anger in the moment. Because he was right, in a way she’d never allowed herself to admit. She loved the ranch, but the process of running one would have been isolating. Lonely.

  If he’d told her his reasons back then, she would have made it her life’s work to run a ranch, no matter how miserable it would have made her.

  Grant had called himself a martyr. She wasn’t sure what she was. So determined to prove she was right? And for what? To end up like she had in California, pulling herself away from anything that brought her enjoyment because she’d been sucked soul dry by trying to prove she could be good at this life her parents had chosen for her?

  Afraid to say I love you to the man who’d raised her, because it would embarrass him. Afraid to say she’d been hurt when they didn’t offer her a piece of the ranch. Because you didn’t show that kind of emotion in the Riley house. It just wasn’t done.

  Somehow, she’d taken the Riley way to heart without ever seeing it for what it was. Cowardice.

  No. She simply couldn’t accept that she was afraid. Even knowing it was true. So, she did something utterly insane. She told her father what she was feeling. “Daddy, I’m in love with Grant.”

  If it was possible, her father blushed an even deeper shade of red. “Well, I don’t know that it’s any of my business what—”

  “And he’s in love with me. He told me so, and I didn’t handle it very well.”

  “This seems like a conversation better suited to you and your friends, Prudence.”

  She laughed, despite it not being funny. Because he was right. It was a conversation much better suited for her friends. She couldn’t change her father, the way he’d been raised or how he dealt with his own emotions. She didn’t fully want to. He was a good man who did his best.

  But she could change herself. And Grant had just given her the key to where that change started. “Daddy, I love you.”

  “Well, I love you too, Pruey,” he muttered, deeply uncomfortable but saying it anyway. He might not be comfortable with it, he might run from it, but when push came to shove, love helped him stand there and do all those uncomfortable things. Love allowed him to survive it.

  How had she missed that for so long? The love of her friends had always been her safe place to land, even when she hadn’t known how to say it. They were her sisters. The place she could go for what her family couldn’t give her—through no fault of their own.

  And that was...okay. For the best, even. To have both. A family she loved, and who’d always be a safe place to land. Her friends, who weren’t afraid to call her out on her fears.

  And now Grant loved her, and it was scary, and hard, and she didn’t know how to fix what she’d messed up. But it was love, and that was worth...this. The churning stomach. The red face. The fear and discomfort.

  Because love might be hard, but it was also good.

  “If it needs saying, you can always come home if you need to,” he muttered, deeply embarrassed to his soul.

  She couldn’t stop herself. She crossed the store and gave him a hug.

  “I know, Dad.” She’d always known she could go home, and maybe that was the escape hatch Grant had been talking about. A place to go. To hide. Because her parents would never cause her to have any emotional breakdowns.

  Her father awkwardly patted her back then stepped away. “Well, I’ll just be headed home now. You...you take care, Pruey. We’ll be by for the centennial of course.” He was backing out of the store and shoving his hat back on his head before practically sprinting outside.

  That was essentially what she’d done to Grant. She’d run away, even while standing right there. And he’d seen through her.

  And loved her anyway.

  She didn’t know what to do with that. Not his love, or her own. But she knew the first step to figuring it out.

  * * *

  GRANT EYED BEAU’S truck coming up the lane to the Mathewson ranch. Grant had thrown himself into some basic ranch chores after leaving Pru and the store. Mucking and hauling and anything physical, dirty, and sweaty to deal with his temper.

  “Didn’t expect to see
you here,” Beau said with a frown. “Haven’t been able to pry you out of Pru’s store these past few weeks.”

  “Been busy. What are you doing here?”

  “I was just coming by to get Tate for...” Beau trailed off as his phone rang. “It’s Mom. Hold on.” He turned away, said a few words into the phone, and eyed Grant with some confusion. After a few more minutes of what sounded like uncomfortable uh-huhs, Beau hung up and shoved his phone in his pocket.

  He glared at Grant. “What’s this about Pru being in love with you?” Beau demanded.

  Well. That was a surprise. Surely Pru hadn’t gone to talk to her mother? Not about him. Unless she’d actually gotten some sense knocked into her by her father and was going around telling her family. Proving something?

  But then why wasn’t she here? Telling him herself?

  He supposed those questions were moot until he dealt with Beau. “Actually, you’ve got that mixed up.”

  Relief washed over Beau’s face. “Thank God,” he said with feeling. “Let’s forget Mom ever—”

  “No, I mean, I’m in love with her, not the other way around.”

  Beau’s mouth hung open, then he shook his head.

  “I told her this morning. And she looked about as stupefied as you do, and handled it worse.”

  Beau pulled a face. “Don’t tell me this. I don’t want to know this. Let’s just forget we ever said anything.”

  “Why would we do that?” Grant asked, truly baffled.

  Beau looked at him like he’d grown three heads. “It’s just not... It’s none of my business. You’ll keep it to yourself is what you’ll do.”

  But Grant didn’t want to keep it to himself. He didn’t want to wait for the damn centennial. He wanted someone to deal with what he felt. Even if it was Beau clocking him one. “I slept with her.”

  Beau’s mouth dropped, then he slapped his hands over his ears. “Stop.”

  “Multiple times.”

  “Damn it, Grant. I’m warning you. You’re my best friend. I don’t want to have to punch you. Whatever is between you and Pru is between you and Pru and I want nothing to do with it.”

  “Multiple places.”

  Beau swore a blue streak, and then did exactly what Grant had been aiming for. He cocked his fist and plowed it into Grant’s jaw.

  It hurt like hell, but Grant took it. He moved his jaw back and forth to make sure it wasn’t broken and touched his lip gingerly when he tasted blood. “Well, now that you’ve got that out of your system, why don’t we actually talk about it?”

  “We’ll forget this,” Beau said darkly. “Put it behind us and never mention it again.” Then Beau stalked away and into his truck, slammed the door, and peeled out without ever getting Tate for whatever he’d come here for.

  And Grant saw, so clearly, and in a way he hadn’t before, what all this was. What he’d known but never fully taken on board in a way that made sense.

  Put it behind us and never mention it again.

  Grant had been wrong back in the store today. Pru wasn’t looking for an escape—that was why she’d looked so shocked when he’d suggested it. She just plain old didn’t know what to do with a complicated emotion. Or maybe just a soft emotion.

  She was afraid of love, or at least she didn’t know how to talk about it. The same as Beau couldn’t. Beau could shout and use his fists, but when it came down to it, he’d bolted rather than have a conversation about his best friend being in love with his sister.

  The Rileys never dealt with feelings. Beau and JT hadn’t stuck with a girl, because a woman always “wanted too much.” Like an “I love you” or a promise. Mary Riley never could say, “I’m worried about you, Grant.” She had to finagle him to dinners or get him into town with excuses and work-arounds.

  They were a family who straight up didn’t know how to express emotions or process them. It worked for Jack and Mary because they loved each other. Maybe somewhere in their inner lives away from their children, they knew how to deal with it.

  His family, on the other hand... The Mathewsons certainly weren’t perfect. In fact, their parents’ deaths had done a number on all of them. But they’d never been afraid to have a knock-down-drag-out. Never been afraid to express an emotion, a fear.

  But avoiding, well, that was the Riley way.

  The realization soothed the irritation that had been simmering inside of him. It softened some of the hurt and heartbreak at the thought that Pru might not have the same feelings for him.

  She did. Of course she did.

  Now he just had to figure out how to get around her fear of that. And that was going to take some doing.

  CHAPTER TEN

  PRU HAD GONE through her to-do list at the store after her father had run out. She hadn’t eaten lunch with her friends or with Grant. She’d taken some time to be alone. To think. To work out, in the inner quiet of her own head and heart, what she really felt and wanted.

  When she started to get mad about this or that, she did what she’d never really done before: asked herself what she was really mad at. Was it the people in her life? Or the way she reacted to them?

  For the first time since she’d set foot back in Jasper Creek, she allowed herself to think about what she wanted her life to look like after the centennial.

  She pretended the store would succeed, and she could have anything she wanted—if she was willing to work for it. She wouldn’t run away or escape when things got a little too complicated. She would embrace the good, and let that good help her through the bad.

  It felt a bit like a panic attack that didn’t fully form—the lack of air, the dull beating throughout her body—and yet it never went to that space of full-on inability to breathe.

  Because in a way, Grant had made her feel like her friends did. He’d said he loved her and wanted to tell everyone. Wanted to build things.

  It still scared her.

  It was terrifying, and she wasn’t ready to face it yet. First, she needed to talk to her friends.

  She locked up then went to Kit’s store and looked through the windows. The bookshelves Browning West had built were full of colorful paperbacks—books about hope and love and redemption. But no one was there. She found them in the next building, surrounded by candy in the bright Willy Wonka daydream that was Hope’s store.

  She stepped inside. Through mouthfuls of candy, they called her over to where they were taste testing Hope’s offerings. Pru didn’t take a piece. She didn’t think her stomach could handle it.

  “I need to ask a serious question.”

  Her three friends looked at her, and they didn’t shift or look uncomfortable. They didn’t bolt like her brothers would have done, or change the subject like her parents would have done. Her friends watched and waited.

  It was what Grant would have done too.

  “What if we fail?”

  “Well, the statistical chances of all four stores failing aren’t as high as you might think,” Charity said. “I did a lot of research before the move. About the businesses here, the tourism. It’s certainly feasible that for whatever reason one or two of the stores just don’t resonate with the client base, but we won’t know that until we give it a good shot. Still, if one store fails, we’ll concentrate on the three that are left. And so on and so forth. Surely, between the four of us, we can make at least one of the stores a long-term success.”

  It sounded so reasonable. So simple. And because Charity had done the research, Pru knew it was correct. Still, it wasn’t exactly what she meant.

  “Don’t worry so much, Pru. We came home for this. We’ll find a way to make it work.” Charity smiled reassuringly.

  “But not just for this,” Hope said. “You guys came home in part for me. We all agreed not just for ourselves, but for each other. I love my store. I really love it, and I’ll be bummed if it doesn’t wor
k out. But it’s you guys, it’s love and home that makes it different from where I was before.”

  Love and home. What she’d always wanted. Jasper Creek and her friends. She had it now. She had it. But she didn’t know what to do with the mix of joy and fear and love and hope.

  So Pru did what she never did. Not in front of anyone, and certainly not when she was alone with only herself to handle the mess.

  She began to cry.

  Her friends immediately circled around her. Soothing pats and back rubbing and words, but it didn’t help. It only made it worse. She just cried and cried.

  And the world didn’t end. She wasn’t going to die just because she was crying in front of her friends.

  “Are you pregnant?” Charity whispered.

  “What?” Pru croaked, as she began to pull herself together. “No. Jeez. I am very religiously on the pill. I’m just... I told my dad I loved him today.”

  “Oh my God. Is he sick?” Hope asked.

  “Are you sick?” Charity asked.

  It made Pru laugh. “Which I did after Grant told me he loved me.”

  “Woah, woah, woah. Back it up. Start from the beginning,” Kit demanded.

  So, Pru did. She told her friends everything.

  “So, to be clear. You figured out you were in love with him back, and instead of running over to tell him, you finished your tasks at the store and then came here to talk to us.”

  “It’s just...” Pru held up her hands. “I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to be in love with someone. I don’t know how to... He just said it to me. Out loud.”

  “Oh, Pru.” Kit came over and squeezed her shoulders. “You’ve always known how to complicate things.”

  “Haven’t we all?” Charity replied. “It’s part of growing up, I think. And coming into our own.”

  “Let’s break it down in a way you’ll understand,” Hope said. “Grant loves you. You love him. He told you. Now the next step is...”