Destined to Change

by Harley, Lisa M.

  “Stacy came back, and she has a kid. Her name is Jaz.” The look on Uncle Jake’s face looked like something out of a bad movie.

  “What do you mean she has a kid? Is it yours? Does she look like ya, son?”

  “That doesn’t matter, Stacy’s my wife and I need to do the right thing by her and our family. I am taking her back home. I just want you to know how much I appreciate you letting me come stay with you. I really needed to get away, and you made me feel at home here. I can’t thank you enough for that.”

  I grabbed Uncle Jake and pulled him into a man hug. Trying not to let him see how much it was hurting me to leave Loralei. But this was her decision and I had to abide by it, because I loved her.

  Chapter 12

  Cade

  These past five weeks had passed like molasses. I hadn’t had sex for almost two months. I was so horny I could explode, literally. I planned to leave for Harper Farms tomorrow. I was taking my cousin Clay with me to help me with the cattle. He wasn’t too much of a worker, but I had to get his ass out of town before he got himself killed.

  That boy needed to learn to keep it in his pants, or at least pick his partners from a higher breed of women. He was twenty-one years old, and he definitely inherited our family’s good looks and charm. We were a sexy-ass bunch of cowboys. The last gal he was with told her brother about some of the things he did, like when she caught him in bed with their mother, and he threatened to shoot him. I’m pretty sure he would’ve if I hadn’t intervened. Goddamned family, can’t live with ‘em, and it’s illegal to shoot ‘em.

  Tomorrow I would get to see Loralei again. I missed her so much. I told Mr. Davidson not to tell her I was coming. I wanted to surprise her - boy would she be surprised. I really wanted her to be happy to see me. I really hoped that asshat was out of the picture. A guy could dream right?

  I didn’t sleep a wink that night. I was like a kid waiting for the carnival to come to town. I was too damn excited to sleep.

  “Wake the hell up!” I screamed at Clay from down the hall. “I got shit to do today, and you ain’t holding me up.”

  “Hold your fucking horses. I’m awake!” he screamed back at me.

  We were in the car and headed to Harper Farms before six o’clock a.m. I had my thermos of black coffee, and I grabbed a pop-tart on the way out the door. Clay was asleep before we hit the end of the lane. That was fine by me. I didn’t need to hear him whine all the way to Kipton. We had about a four hour drive ahead of us, and I was hoping he would sleep for most of it.

  I stopped in Joplin for gas and to grab some actual food. Clay woke up long enough to use the facilities and scarf down some biscuits and gravy. I was getting kinda nervous, or maybe I was excited, or maybe it was a little bit of both. I needed this woman, but what if she didn’t want to see me. I couldn’t understand what the hell it was about her. I just needed to be with her. She was the only damn thing I could think about.

  Well? I’d had weeks to think about this, and I had a couple of ideas on how to make her mine. I couldn’t wait to get there and see her beautiful face and that amazing ass. Oh my god, I had missed that ass. Just thinking about it was getting “cowboy” all excited.

  “What the hell, man?” Clay yelled as he smacked me across the back of the head. “You gonna take care of that shit in the truck? Man, I’m sitting right here. That is fucking sick!”

  That’s when I realized I was kinda playing with “cowboy” through my jeans. Oh man, this shit had to stop. I had to have Loralei. I had to make her mine again and hear her scream my name.

  All of these thoughts weren’t helping my current situation. They just caused Clay to smack me upside the head again. “Seriously, man. Pull the hell over and let me out of the truck!” I started thinking about chickens and cattle and anything else that would make my dick calm the hell down.

  We were almost there and “cowboy” had finally calmed down. Clay only had to smack me on the back of my head a couple more times on the way there.

  When we pulled onto the Harper Farms property, I immediately felt like I knew Loralei a little bit better than I had. This was her farm. I had my ranch and I knew what it meant to me. And I knew that she felt the same way about hers. I could tell she put her heart and soul into this farm. There wasn’t a thing out of place. The fence was perfect. The lanes were all tree lined. The farm definitely had felt a woman’s touch. My Loralei’s touch. I couldn’t wait to feel that touch again.

  We were slowly driving down the lane when I looked over to the stables and saw her. Her beautiful blonde hair was pulled up in a ponytail, she had on a blue flannel shirt and those amazing, “huggin’ her in all the right places” jeans. She had on her old work boots. She was brushing out one of the horses and finally she heard my truck, stopped what she was doing and made eye contact with me. That’s when I noticed she wasn’t wearing any make-up and she looked even more beautiful than I remembered.

  Loralei

  What the hell was he doing here? No way - why was this happening? Cade, goddamn Cade was here. He was at my farm. Shit!

  He got out of the truck and started to walk over toward me. He was so amazingly sexy. Why did he have to be so incredibly sexy? He didn’t walk, he sauntered. Never losing that sexy sideways smirk. He was wearing his skin-tight wranglers, cowboy boots, ten-gallon hat, and a green button-up shirt that made his green eyes shine even brighter.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I asked before he made his way all the way to me.

  “Well, hello to you too, hon,” he said with that sexy southern drawl.

  “Seriously, Cade, why are you here?”

  “Didn’t George tell ya? There was a problem with his herd. He said we would need to check the cattle out and decide who gets what. I really thought he would've called ya.”

  There was something about the way he said that. It made me think that he had known all along that George hadn’t called me about the cattle.

  “I had no idea you were coming. I got a call this morning that the cattle delivery has been postponed until next Monday. I find it a little odd that they didn’t mention you to me when they called this morning.” I leaned up against the barn. I hadn’t really noticed until just then. But I guess the entire time we were talking, Cade was getting closer and closer to me. By the time I realized it, I felt the barn behind me.

  “Where’s asshat? He around here somewhere? Will he see me if I kiss ya right now?” Cade asked, as he leaned in closer to my face. I could feel his breath on my face. It felt pretty nice.

  “Mom! Who’s the cowboy? Is he tryin’ to kiss you? MOM!” I heard Sammy yelling this from across the field. Cade jumped back away from me. The look in his eyes was almost sinful. He looked like he wanted to eat me alive. And I think he really did.

  “Mom! There’s another big cowboy over by that truck, Mom. I’ll kick their butts! Don’t you touch my mommy, you asshat cowboys!” Sammy yelled as he ran across the field.

  “Honey, mommy is fine. I know this cowboy. His name is Cade. Come and say hello. And watch your language.”

  “Hello, cowboy Cade. Who’s the other cowboy?” Sammy asked, huffing and puffing, trying to catch his breath. About that time the other cowboy came out from behind the truck. He looked like a carbon copy of Cade, except smaller. Cade was so big and muscular. This guy looked like he didn’t work quite as hard as Cade.

  “This is my cousin, Clay. Clay, say hello to these nice people,” Cade said.

  “Hello, nice people.” Clay tipped his hat, using that same sexy southern drawl his cousin had.

  “Nice to meet ya, Clay. I’m still a little confused about why ya’ll are here, though.”

  “Mommy, I’m hungry. What’s for lunch?” My little Sammy was always starving.

  “I was just going to make some sandwiches. We’ll eat in a bit, okay babe?” Sammy skulked off toward the barn.

  Cade walked over towards Sammy, and said, “A sandwich sounds great, buddy. Maybe your mom will make one for me too
?” Cade looked up at winked at me. Damn it, now I was going to have to invite them in for lunch. My mom did not raise me to be impolite.

  I shrugged my shoulders and wrinkled my eyebrows, “Sure. We would love for ya’ll to come have lunch with us. Sammy, go get your sister.” Sammy headed off to get Mags.

  When the kids got there, I had Cade and Clay follow us to our house. On the drive there I couldn’t help but think about the time I had spent with Cade. The things we had done together. The things he had done to me. I could feel the color draining from my face. I felt a little hand on my cheek.

  “Mommy, are you okay?” Mags asked with a raised eyebrow and her little eyes squinting at me.

  “Oh, sweetie, Mommy’s fine. Just thinking about stuff. Don’t worry about me.” I put a smile on my face for Mags, but when I looked in the rearview mirror and caught a glimpse of Cade that smile quickly faded.

  We pulled down our drive and Cade pulled right up beside us. The kids jumped out of the jeep and ran in the house. I nodded to Clay and had them follow us in.

  “Nice place ya got here, Loralei,” I heard Cade say as we were walking in the house.

  I kept walking, “Thanks, we like it.”

  After they removed their hats at the door and hung them on the rack on the wall, I led Clay and Cade into the kitchen. They had a seat at the table. Sammy and Mags were already getting in the fridge and pulling out the sandwich fixings. The table was covered with lunch meat, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, olives, pickles, mayo, mustard, and bread.

  “Boy, when ya’ll say sandwich, you mean sandwich.” Clay sounded in awe of our sandwich fixings.

  Mags said, “Sammy, throw me the bread.” Sammy picked up the loaf and threw it at Mags head.

  Cade jumped up and caught it in the air. He passed it to Mags. “Here ya go, sweetie.”

  She blushed and smiled, “Thanks.”

  We sat around the table and ate. Clay and Cade were pretty funny.

  “Knock knock,” Clay said to the kids.

  Sammy said, “Who’s there?”

  “Yah.”

  “Yah who?”

  Clay started cracking up, “Yah HOO, ride ‘em cowboy!”

  Cade said, “I’ve got one. “What did the horse say when it fell?”

  Sammy and Mags were really thinking about it. Finally, Sammy looked at Mags. “We give up. What did it say?”

  “I’ve fallen and I can’t giddy-up,” Cade was laughing so hard he was shaking. Even though the joke wasn’t that funny, his laughter was contagious. Before I knew it, we were all doubled over laughing.

  Then Cade smacked Clay upside the head. “Get your elbows off the table. Your momma raised you better than that.”

  Clay smacked him back. “Don’t hit me in front of the kids.”

  “Didn’t you just hit me?”

  “I was protectin’ myself.”

  Then Cade smacked Clay on the back of the head again. “What the hell, man?” Clay whined.

  “I said get your elbows off the damn table.”

  Clay jabbed his elbow into Cade’s ribs. Cade screamed out, grabbed Clay by the back of the head and body slammed him on the ground. Clay was laughing as Cade had him flat on his back. “You said get ‘em off the table. You didn’t tell me where to put ‘em.”

  The kids and I were watching, not really knowing if we should intervene or not.

  Mags said, “Mommy, what’s wrong with these cowboys?”

  I grinned at Mags “Honey, you’ll learn this soon enough. Cowboys are all a little silly.”

  Cade and Clay looked up at me and laughed. We spent the rest of the lunch laughing. It was nice to not think about Jaxon for a bit. I wasn’t the only one who missed him. The kids had been asking about him ever since he left. That was what I had been afraid of when I opened my heart up to him. I couldn’t stand to see the kids hurt. This was the first time since he had left weeks ago that we were all laughing and having a good time.

  When lunch was over the kids ran outside to play, and Clay went out to the truck to make a phone call. Cade and I were sitting in my living room.

  “Well this isn’t weird at all, is it?” He ran his hands through his hair. Messing up that already messed up blonde head of hair.

  “Why are you really here, Cade? There’s no future for us, you understand that, right?”

  Cade was trying to look innocent. He had on his best “good little country boy” face. “I do, I’m just here for the cattle. I thought it was going to be here today. George said it was. I had no idea the shipment had been put off.”

  “I am still not quite sure why you need to be here for the delivery.”

  “George called and there have been some problems with the cattle. A whole bunch of ‘em came down with something pretty bad. He said we would need to decide which ones we each wanted to keep. He said he would work out the money stuff later. Said he’d give us a hell of a deal next year.”

  “Okay, guess that makes sense. Well since the delivery isn’t going to be here until Monday, you and Clay are welcome to stay here at the ranch. We have an old log cabin down by the pond. It’s all set up. You can eat in the barn office with the farmhands.”

  Cade gave me a little sheepish grin, “Well, that’s mighty thoughtful of ya, Loralei. I would hate to impose, but since you’re offering we’ll take ya up on it.”

  I had Cade and Clay follow me to the cabin. I showed them around the cabin and helped them get settled in. I told them about the diner in town so they could grab some dinner. And I let them know that breakfast would be served in the barn office at 6:00 a.m. I headed home with the understanding that I would see them at breakfast.

  Cade

  I didn’t sleep an hour last night. I couldn’t believe I was finally here. Finally this close to her, and I couldn’t touch her. I couldn’t kiss her. I couldn’t be with her. I needed this woman. She had gotten under my skin like no other woman ever had. I didn’t just want her, which I did more than anything, I needed her.

  I was up showered, shaved, and ready for breakfast before Clay even crawled his lazy ass out of bed. “If you wanna eat breakfast, you better get your ass in gear, boy.”

  “I’m coming. Don’t get your panties in a wad, Cade.”

  Little bastard. I should’ve left him at home and let that dude kick his ass. He needed to be taught a lesson. But of course I couldn’t do that to him. I happened to love the little bastard.

  We got in the truck and headed to the barn office. When we got there I noticed about eight guys walking with Loralei toward the office. Damn that woman was spectacular. I could spend an entire lifetime just looking at her. Taking her all in. All day, every damn day. I was afraid if I wasn’t with her soon, “cowboy” would never work right again.

  All the guys were hanging on every word she said. Not like in a sexual way, like in a respectful way. That woman had the power over those men. They definitely knew who the boss was. Damn, I couldn’t wait to find out everything about this woman that was takin’ over my every thought. Just from what little I knew, I didn’t think she could be any more perfect.

  She caught a glimpse of us pulling in, and I could tell she wasn’t real happy to see me. That was killing me. I wanted her to feel somethin’ for me, but not hate. I wanted her to want me the way I wanted her.

  Clay and I parked and headed into the barn office. Loralei was already sitting at the big round table in the middle of the great room. This barn was huge. I could tell she had put some work into this place. It looked like we walked into a banquet hall instead of a barn. The great room was surrounded on the right with several offices. And on the left with restrooms, a kitchen, and a couple of sleeping quarters, I assumed they were for the farmhands who had to work overnight during birthing season.

  This barn was almost identical to mine. I wondered if we had the same guy work on our remodels. I thought I might ask her about that after we had sex again. Definitely not before. Priorities.

  I walked over to Loralei, dragging C
lay’s tired ass behind me. “Good mornin’, Loralei.” I tipped my hat.

  Without looking up at me, she said, “Good morning, Cade. I assume ya’ll slept well?”

  I wanted to be honest with her and tell her hell no, I didn’t sleep well. I didn’t sleep a fucking hour because all I could think about was burying myself as deep in her as I could get. I thought that might scare her, so I told her, “Yes, ma’am. Thanks for askin’.”

  “Well, ya’ll can grab some breakfast and then you’re more than welcome to get your hands dirty out on the farm. Jake will show ya around, and put you both to work, I assume.”

  An older gray haired man was sitting next to Loralei, just laughed, and nodded his head at me. “I assume we could find something to keep ya’ll busy.”

  I sure as hell didn’t come here to work, but I wasn’t above gettin’ my hands dirty either. “Sounds like a mighty fine idea. You just tell us what to do and we’ll do it.”

  Clay looked like he was gonna hit me. He didn’t like to work on my farm and I paid him, he sure wasn’t happy about working for free.

  Loralei

  I was having a hard time focusing today. I hadn’t been feeling real good and with Cade being here, I just felt out of sorts. He had been here less than a day, and he was already turning my life upside down. If I was being honest with myself, I would have to admit, I missed Jaxon. I knew I had sent him away, but the thought of never seeing him again was tearing me up inside. He needed to be with his family. As much as I wanted that family to include me and the twins, it just didn’t. I was going to have to get over him. But I wasn’t sure how to go about doing that.

  I walked down to the horse barn to see if the guys needed any help, when I saw him. Cade. He was standing in one of the stalls. He had his shirt off, and he was bent over mucking out the stall. Holy hell, that man was built. And so tall. His blonde hair was slick with sweat. His Wranglers were hugging him in all the right places. He had on his boots, but his hat was hanging on the door of the stall.