I run a hand over my chest, trying to catch my breath, before pulling my bra over my breasts and fastening the buttons of my shirt. “Yes, you have. And what you just did for me was … incredible.”
I hear him zip before he props himself up on his elbow. Leaning over me, he kisses me softly on the cheek. “It’s empty. Meaningless. What we have. We’re getting ready to go off to college, go our separate ways for a while. I don’t want anyone else. I’ll never want anyone else … I want us to go our separate ways—but together.”
I laugh when he nips my chin with his teeth. “Greer, what does that even mean?”
“It means that I’m yours, and you’re mine. We may be a few hours away from each other, but we’ll see one another on the road and when we come home to visit. And we’re … together. Like a real couple. That’s what I want. And I know somewhere deep down that’s what you want too.”
My eyes mist over as I take in his earnest look. I don’t respond.
“Dammit,” he says softly before he sits up to put his boots on.
The sane, rational part of me screams, Yes! Yes, I want to be yours, and I want you to be mine. But the damaged place that’s in control says, No. No way. You’ll destroy him just like your mother did your father. And here’s your chance to end this. Out of sight, out of mind. He’ll meet someone amazing and move on.
He springs up, picking his shirt up along the way. Exhaling, he brings it up over his head and stretches it out with both hands. He’s grown taller but remained lithe, and his muscles were compact things that were way stronger than they appeared. My eyes run down his frame and linger on his trim hips for a second before his shirt hits me in the face.
“Quit objectifying me,” he barks out. “I already feel like a piece of meat to you most of the time.”
“You shouldn’t feel that way,” I protest.
“Don’t tell me how to feel, Denver.”
“I—”
Whatever I was going to say dies out as he shouts, “Life or death!” I sit up and start to ask him what he means, but he’s moving quickly to the opening of the loft. “Life or death situation,” he says as he teeters on the edge. “You have to choose. Be with me, or watch me bite it? What’s it gonna be? Come on, Denver,” he cajoles me with a laugh.
I laugh loudly at his over-the-top ultimatum.
His face falls, and his eyes bore into mine. “I’m serious.”
I shake my head.
“Choose.”
“No.”
“OK,” he says with a shrug before propelling himself backwards from the top of my barn.
“No!” I scream, as I scramble to the edge. I mean, it’s not a big enough drop to kill him, but it could hurt him.
When I peer over at him, he’s lying in the middle of the corral on a pretty large chunk of the bales of hay that we threw out for the horses earlier. He looks like he’s about to make a snow angel, or hay angel, as the case may be. I giggle at him. Idiot. “Denver Magnolia Dempsey, will you be mine?”
“Go home. You’re drunk!” I joke, trying to distract him.
He shakes his head at me. “I’m serious.”
I want to scream at him for pushing me. But I don’t have the right. And he wouldn’t understand my truth anyway—I can’t be his when I’m not mine to give. I’m a slave to my emptiness. It’s stolen into every aspect of me and owns me so thoroughly.
“I’m giving you as much of myself as I’m able, Greer,” I say, slightly above a whisper.
He closes his eyes and nods. “Your body will have to do for now,” he says after a minute. “Can you come help me up? I think I broke my ankle.”
I shimmy down the ladder and make my way over to him. “You’re crazy you know that,” I say as I take his hands in mine.
“Crazy for you,” he whispers. He winces when I pull him to his feet. “I really did hurt myself,” he mutters, astonished.
“Idiot,” I say aloud this time.
A PERSISTENT BUZZING wakes me up. Pulling my phone from my nightstand, I hold it in front of my one opened eye before rolling them both at Greer’s smirk on the screen. “What Greer?”
“Hey, Denver. It’s not Greer. It’s Walt.”
Wide-awake, I sit straight up. “What’s wrong?”
“Umm …”
“Is he hurt?”
Walt hesitates for a second, but it feels like a year. “Not like you think. He’s just drunk. I can’t bring him home or to my house. He told me to call you.”
“Of course he did.”
“Want me to take him home anyway? He can deal with the consequences.”
“No,” I say running my hand over my hair as I think fast. “His parents would freak. Bring him to the barn. I have a bed in the tack room. He can sleep it off in there.”
“’K. Thanks, Denver.”
“Yep,” I say quickly before disconnecting. It’s my fault he’s acting like this anyway. After his ultimatum in the barn, he left to go hang out with his buddies since I had to pack to go to my dad’s. He told me he was going to go drink me off his mind. I begged him not to. We usually reserved drinking for hanging out in my barn where nothing bad could happen. He told me there was only one thing that could keep him from going and doing just that. I didn’t respond. And at my silence, he left.
I texted him on and off throughout the night, trying to check on him. He ignored me all night until he sent me a picture of him with his tongue down some random chick’s throat with the caption. “I’m good. Real good.”
Asshole.
Bitch, I promptly remind myself.
After throwing on some boots and a hoodie over my pajamas, I grab an extra blanket out of the closet before heading out to the barn.
Walt’s pulling up as I open the door. Greer swings from the truck as soon as it comes to a stop. “Hey, baby,” he shouts. “My ankle don’t hurt no more. All healed!”
I roll my eyes. More like too drunk to feel. Walt jumps out and steadies him as he walks him over to me. “You sure you can handle him? I can call my mom and make something up so I can stay.”
I blow out a breath and look at Greer’s now-slack face. “No, it’s fine. I’m just gonna put him down in here, and we’ll both go to sleep.”
“You make me sound like one of your horses, Denver. Not your property,” Greer slurs.
“Whatever, Greer. You know what I meant.”
Walt helps me get him situated, and I walk him out so that I can close up behind him. He thanks me again and tells me briefly how out of control Greer had gotten that night.
“Y’all having problems?”
“No. Why?” Lie.
“He kept saying ‘If your best friend doesn’t love you, nobody will.’ Then he was taking polls on how many people had been broken-hearted and all kinds of shit. I’ve never seen him act like that.”
I nod because I have, to some extent. He can’t hold his liquor. Beer? He was good. Not so much with the hard stuff. “We had a little fight. He’s not happy with our going to different schools. And I’m leaving for Mississippi tomorrow.”
“Ah. Well, he, uh … he loves you. If you should ever stop … um, you know, he’d be there for you.”
Walt is a good guy. He’s the only one of Greer’s friends who’ll even speak to me. So I feel about two inches tall when he hints at my reputation. “We’ll be fine,” I say with a pasted grin. “He just needs to sleep it off.”
We say our good nights. I lock up and find my way back to the tack room. I have a daybed in there for when one of the animals is sick or due to have a baby. I’m glad it’s big enough for me to crash with him. I really don’t want to leave him alone.
I lock the tack room door behind me and move through the room, grateful for the moonlight guiding my way. I toe off my boots and climb under the covers with him. Wrapping my arm around him, I fit myself to his back. Curling up to Greer is the most natural thing in the world. I kiss his neck before laying my head down beside his. Closing my eyes, I allow myself to drift to
one of my favorite daydreams. The one where I’m not evil, Greer’s not bitter, and we’re happy together. I’m only happy there for about thirty seconds.
“Did you kiss him?”
“What?”
“Walt? Did you kiss him?”
“No, Greer,” I snap, my annoyance seeping through. “Go to sleep.”
“Why not?”
“Because I had no desire to.”
“I tried to fuck that girl in the picture I sent you,” he confesses, pain lacing his words.
I take in a swift breath. That’s not Greer. He doesn’t talk like that. He doesn’t think like that. And in that second, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I’ve thoroughly damaged him even though keeping him at bay was supposed to protect him. I’ve made him paranoid and needy and insecure. These little moments had been coming with more frequency of late, and I could no longer deny the facts.
“I take it you weren’t successful,” I mutter.
He shakes his head. “I wanted to. I wanted to so bad. I need to be rid of you. Couldn’t do it.”
Despite my numb state, that hurts. The pain flips on me, though, and twists into what looks like hope. He’s breaking things off with me. Finally, he’ll end this. He’s stronger than me. He’ll do it, and then he’ll be free. And I’ll be … I don’t know exactly. I guess I’ll be free too. Free of guilt, free to float off into the ether, free to figure out what the hell I am.
“I’m sorry, Greer,” I whisper. He just grunts. And we both slip into sleep.
I smell leather, oats, and horse. Why? Ah … I’m in the tack room with Greer after his drunken night. Him ending things with me punches me in the gut. I shift a little under the pain. Better me than him, I remind myself.
I sense him staring at me. I let out a shaky breath. This is going to hurt. I hate to lose my best friend, but I’ve done it all by myself, so I was going to have to bite the bullet and deal. And he’s going to be so much better off without me. Ah … I chant—Greer is better without you, Greer is better without you. And repeat.
“I know you’re awake,” his whisper raspy.
My eyes fly open. I smelled it on him with the booze, but thought it was on him not in him. “Were you smoking last night?”
“What the hell do you care?”
I narrow my eyes at him. “You know I care about you.”
“I do?”
“Of course.”
“Just not enough to act like it.”
I close my eyes tight so that I don’t give in to the hurt I’ll see there. “I want you to leave here today and forget about me. Go to college and find someone amazing. Someone who deserves you. Someone who would never hurt you the way I do.”
“Let me guess. You’re off to find someone else too. I’m not enough for you somehow.”
I open my eyes so he can see the truth there. “It’s not about you, Greer. You’ve never been the problem. It’s about me.” My hand subconsciously moves to where my heart should be. “I don’t have it in me.”
“You did at one time. I remember. I saw it when we looked at each other. I felt it when we kissed. I heard it in our conversations. It was so strong that I could taste it. Hell, all my senses fired with it. You couldn’t have faked them all out, so I know it was real.” His voice had gotten louder with each word. He pauses to calm himself, but I have nothing, so he continues, quieter now. “But that’s not there anymore. And I want that back. Don’t you? How can we get that back?”
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and throw my hands out in despair. He’s beating a dead horse, yet again. “I’d give anything for that to happen,” I say through gritted teeth. “But I’m not that girl anymore. I wish I were. But I’m just … not.” One hand stills while the other beats at the empty hole in my chest as if I can massage it back to life. “If I could do it for anyone, Greer, please know that you are the one person I’d do it for.”
A single tear slips down his cheek. “If you wanted it bad enough, you’d make it happen. Look at everything you’ve accomplished with little to no help from anyone. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever known.”
But I’m not strong. That’s just it. I’m too weak to allow myself to feel—that is what’s wrong with me. Fear claws at my throat, and I rush out, “Not when it comes to this! I’m not strong enough to let you hurt me!”
He drops his head, shaking it. “I’d never hurt you on purpose.”
A jaded laugh cuts across the room. “Did you catch your little qualifier? ‘Cause I sure did.”
“So where do we go from here?” he asks, jerking his hands through his hair.
“We go to school and recover from how I fucked up our once beautiful, once perfect relationship. When we see each other over the holidays, we’ll be reset, reborn.”
“And …”
“And that’s it,” I whisper, wearied. “Friends, Greer.”
“Back to just friends.”
We sit and stare at each other for a few minutes before he stands and puts his hands on his hips. Finally, he walks over to me and bends, placing his lips on the top of my head. “Tell your dad I said hello,” he murmurs against my head. I nod under his touch. “Don’t forget me while you’re away.” I shake my head fiercely. “I’m not saying goodbye. OK? So … I’ll see you soon.” And with that he strides out of my life.
Chapter Fourteen
Now
“YOU JUST SIGHED an entire cloud. Thinking about me again?” Austin whispers in my ear.
I throw my head back and groan as he slides into the seat next to me, cackling like a fat kid on a chocolate high.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I complain. I had three classes today—all of which Ransom’s cousin, Austin, is in. He spotted me every time too and sat right next to me. He spent half the class writing me dirty notes and the other half giving me naughty looks.
“Aw … come on. You love me. Admit it,” he says as he spins my desk toward his. “I’m gonna venture to say that this is fate at its finest.”
“Oh, yeah. How’s that?” I can’t help but ask. He is kind of funny and endearing in a most annoying way.
“Denver.” He points at me. “Austin.” He thumps himself and raises his brow.
“You, Austin. Me, Denver. You swing from vine lately?” I quip, in a weird cavegirl voice.
He bursts out laughing. “Ah, good one,” he cries. “No, seriously.” His smile drops just as quick. “We’re both named after two legendary U.S. cities. Obviously, we’re meant to be together and have children named Dodge, Las Vegas, and Amarillo.”
“Las Vegas?” I say with horror.
“So you’re good with Dodge and Amarillo then? I can compromise on the other,” he deadpans with a shrug and a mischievous grin.
“Denver!” Maggie squeals from the door before rushing toward us. “Hey, Austin!”
“What’s up? Hey, how’d I end up in so many classes with you two freshmen anyway?”
“They’re called Advanced Placement classes.” He gives me a blank look. “We took college level classes in high school so we could get a head start?”
Recognition dawns in his eyes before they brighten with mischief. “Aw, shit. I just aced three of my classes. Fucking sweet!”
“You’re not cheating off us,” Maggie and I cry together.
“C’mon,” he cajoles. “Doesn’t matter, since this is my last year anyway.”
“Why? Aren’t you a sophomore?” Maggie asks.
He blows out a breath. “Yeah, but I’m not college material. The only reason I’m here is ‘cause Ransom didn’t want me on the pro circuit without him. He graduates in May. I’m sticking a fork in my college experience. And we’re hitting the road.”
“Why didn’t Ransom want you going pro without him?”
He gives me that already-infamous Austin grin. “Thinks I’ll get in trouble out there. Can you believe that shit?” he asks, dumbfounded.
“Yes,” we answer in unison.
“Anyway, I don�
�t want to cheat off of you.” He takes on a faraway, dreamy look. “I’m seeing lots of study sessions where y’all only wear those cute little boy shorts that no real boy’d ever wear, and those tops that look like bras. Oh,” he moans, “and pillow fights and back rubs that turn into—”
“Speaking of sports bras,” Maggie cuts in, taking the focus of Austin’s wet daydream. “We’re working out after class.”
“Uh … I don’t work out.”
She gasps. “How do you keep that fabulous body?”
“Mmm, that’s a cornbread-fed girl right there, Maggie,” he declares as he slaps the side of my thigh. I kick him in the shin. He better be glad I wasn’t wearing boots. “Ow!” His voice drops down an octave and his eyebrows shoot up. “I just meant don’t change one … healthy … inch.”
“You’re incorrigible.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” he smirks.
I turn back to Maggie. “I don’t know. I don’t work out though.”
“You worked your ranch, didn’t you?” I nod. “You’re not doing near as much here. You don’t want to get flabby.” She peeks around me to eyeball Austin. “Even if you do have wonderful curves.”
I’VE NEVER BEEN so miserable in my life. I’d rather load a hundred bales of hay, drive cattle for two weeks straight, and deliver fifty colts single-handedly, than run on another damn treadmill for an hour. At least when I did my farm work, I had shit to show for it. I just ran in place for an hour. She made me run on it for an hour. An hour! I scream in my head as I push the door open to the locker rooms. Then she wanted me to get a bicycle that went nofreakingwhere for—an hour! Umm … no, thank you. I stumble into the locker room, wiping a towel across my sweaty face.
Dropping the towel to my neck, I glance around and see guys. Lots of hot guys in various stages of undress, standing around, and in what is clearly a boxing ring. Oh, sweet goodness. I gawk for a couple more seconds before slowly beginning to back out of the room.
“Denver?” a familiar voice says.
Shit, shit, shit. I glance over to my right and see a half-dressed, sweat-drenched Ransom standing by a big bag suspended from the ceiling.
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