Cowboy For Hire

by Victoria James

  “Cade,” she said softly before turning around.

  He took the sheen in her eyes as a good sign and walked closer, stopping a couple of feet away. “I’m sorry, Sarah. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away about your dad and the financials. I’m sorry for the reason I didn’t tell you sooner. I…” He struggled for the words to express his feelings, the stuff he’d been holding inside for so long. “There are people you meet and immediately know they’re bad, like they’re rotten from the inside. You see it in the hardness in their eyes; you hear it in the bitterness in their voice. Then there’s those people you know, deep in your core, that they’re your people, the kind who always assume the best about you. They can hurt you, but you know they’ll find a way to make it right.

  “I learned early on not to trust anyone, and then I learned to trust myself, my instincts. The moment I met you, I knew you were my people. Then I spent time with you, and I knew you had guts like I’ve never seen before. I will never be that man who holds you back, who dampens your spirit. I thought that meant you could trust me with your weaknesses and I wouldn’t use them against you, but I did. I love you. So much. I couldn’t stand to see you hurt and in pain and I justified lying to you. I’m sorry.”

  “Cade, I stood there and told you I loved you, and you rejected me,” she whispered, her eyes filling with tears.

  Self-loathing washed over him. “I know. I will never be able to take that moment back. I’m sorry. I…I just…” He took a deep breath and broke her stare, finding it within himself to be brutally honest because that’s what you had to do when you loved someone. “No one has ever said that to me before. No one has ever loved me, and for it to be you…a thousand thoughts ran through me, and I couldn’t handle what that meant. I still don’t think I’m worthy of it. But I’m here, and I love you more than I knew was possible,” he said, his voice raspy and thick.

  He didn’t move, even though he wanted nothing more than to close the gap between them. She did take a step toward him and he thought that was pretty promising.

  “I know why you did it,” she said. “I know it wasn’t because you wanted to control me, but the result was the same.”

  He took a deep breath and spoke the rest, the stuff he was embarrassed to say out loud, to be so vulnerable, but he knew he would lay it all out there if it meant a chance with her. “It wasn’t just about wanting to protect you; it was about me and my self-worth. I’ve always had to prove myself to everyone, to be useful in order to be accepted. If I couldn’t fix things for you, then what did I have left?

  “It’s not something I think about day-to-day. It’s not something I’ve ever talked about with anyone except you. But when you’re told every day that you’re nothing, you begin to believe it. It doesn’t mean I think I’m worthless or that I wallow in self-pity. I’ve never been the type. But when no one wants you, after a while you think there’s a reason, that there’s something wrong with you. No one has ever wanted me to belong to them. And that was fine. For my entire life, that was fine. Until you. I want to belong to you. I want you. I want you with my mind, my heart, my body. I want to love you.”

  He stopped speaking when she rushed into his arms. “I love you, too,” she whispered. She raised one hand to his face and gave him a look that was almost his undoing. “You never had to prove anything to me, and you never have to be more than the man I know you are. That is already enough. You are enough, just the way you are. You’re perfect.”

  That almost broke him, but he had to lay the rest out there. “What about your ranch? The fact that I bring nothing to the table?”

  “My ranch? It’s yours, too. You build it with me.” She put her hands on either side of his waist, and it took all his self-control not to move.

  “It’s not mine,” he said roughly.

  “It is. It’s your ideas that will save the ranch. Your work. You’re the one who figured out what had happened to the money. You’re the one out there every day before dawn and after sunset. You’re the one who leads that team. How did you get it into your head that it isn’t yours? It’s as much yours as it is mine.”

  “I can’t change where I came from, but I can change where I’m going,” he said. “I just want to be clear before we go any further. I don’t want to hide who I am. You need to know I have nothing to offer you.”

  “Nothing to offer me?”

  He managed a nod while also managing not to lean down and kiss her and tell her how sorry he was, because he loved her more than anything or anyone in his entire life. He stood motionless as she slowly unbuttoned the top three buttons of his shirt. He sucked in a breath as her soft hand slipped inside and stopped…covering his heart. She stared up at him, her eyes glistening with tears. “This. Your heart. You. This is all I ever wanted.”

  She pressed her hand over his heart, and he felt it throughout his body. His gut tightened, his eyes were wet, and his chest constricted painfully. She was offering him everything, telling him that all she needed was him. There had never been a day in his life where anyone had told him that he was enough, just the man he was, yet here was this woman, a stranger a few months ago, now the most important person in his world. He loved her for that. For that fierce loyalty and sheer confidence in him.

  Knowing he’d never be able to say no to her, to let her walk away from him again, but not knowing what that said about him, he leaned down to kiss her. He wanted to pull her into him, to feel the woman he never really ever thought himself worthy of. He kissed her like he’d never have another tomorrow, and he kissed her like she was the only woman he’d kissed before.

  Forcing himself to pull back before they couldn’t, because he needed to finish what he’d started, he spoke the words that she’d said to him, that he’d rejected that night, that he couldn’t really believe. “I love you, Sarah. I love you so much, and if I could take it all back—the decisions I made and how I treated you that night—I would in a second.”

  “I can handle life, Cade. I can handle the bad stuff, the good stuff. I need to know that you’ll let me handle it. I know that you’ll have my back if I need you, but that has to be my decision.”

  He nodded. “I know that now. I will be there for you when you want me to. But from now on, we make the decisions together.”

  “Deal,” she said, still holding on to him.

  This time when they kissed, there were no secrets left between them. He kissed her with a liberation and an honesty he’d never felt before. When she undid the rest of the buttons on his shirt, it wasn’t in anger, and when they fell onto the bed, he reminded himself he had one thing left to do. “Wait a second,” he said, giving her one more kiss before standing and grabbing the bag of Peach Rings.

  Her gaze went from him to the candy. “You have got to be kidding me. Please tell me this isn’t some kind of fetish you haven’t told me about?”

  He laughed, some of his nerves dissipating slightly. He ripped open the bag and pulled one ring out, dropping the bag on the dresser. “I…I wanted to do this properly, but there was no time to get out to the city to buy what I wanted to buy,” he said, slowly getting down on one knee.

  Her eyes widened, and she scrambled into a seated position. “Cade, what are you doing?”

  “I know I never got to meet your parents. I know your last years with them after Josh were rough. But I also heard the love in your voice when you spoke about those earlier years. I know how much you loved them, how much their approval meant to you. I think your parents would have wanted you to have a real marriage proposal, and I think it’s what you would want, deep down. It’s what I want to give you, too.” He grabbed a Peach Ring and gently took her hand in his.

  “I’ve never had a real family until I met you. You are family. You are everything to me, Sarah. I love you more than I knew was possible, and I want to spend the rest of my life loving you, if you’ll have me.”

  She threw her
arms around him, and he almost toppled backward, but the idea of being sprawled out on the carpet at the Highwayman made him steady them. He pulled back slightly to look into her eyes. “Yes. I love you, yes!”

  She held out her hand, and he tried to put the Peach Ring on her finger, but it wouldn’t slide past the tip. She threw her head back and laughed at the absurdity of it all. He took the opportunity to kiss the exposed part of her neck, and when she gasped and tugged at his hair, he trailed his mouth along the smooth, fragrant skin exposed in the V of her shirt. “I swear, tomorrow we go into the city and get a real ring.”

  “Our overdue road trip,” she said, kissing him.

  He lifted her onto the bed. “We need to get off this carpet,” he said, kissing her again as she tugged him onto her. He covered her body with his and knew it didn’t get better than Sarah, that he was finally home. “And I promise you, our honeymoon won’t be at the Highwayman.”

  Epilogue

  It was almost sunset. Cade put down the pliers and found himself admiring the way the sun caught the lighter shades of blond in his wife’s hair. Just like he’d admired not that long ago and yet it seemed like a lifetime ago. He’d been a different man. His gaze roamed her body, his eyes settling on the buttons of her shirt, straining against her breasts. Okay, so he was almost a different man. Thankfully, some things didn’t change. In fact, over the last few months, he’d noticed how desire could change, how it could deepen, with love.

  Sarah glanced over at him and smiled, and that familiar surge of happiness hit him. He leaned over and kissed her, his hand at the nape of her neck, her silky hair against his hands. “Have you ever wondered why I always volunteer the two of us to the farthest stretch of fencing?” he asked against her soft lips.

  She shook her head, her hands going to the top button of his shirt.

  “So that we could do this and not have anyone around,” he said, kissing her again.

  She pulled her hands from his shirt and glanced at her watch. “Actually, while that’s very sweet, I forgot that we need to get back.”

  “For what?”

  “Our friends are coming over for a late dinner,” she said, smiling.

  It hit him then, how casually she said that. Our friends. This was the woman who hadn’t had friends. She had thought herself awkward and referred to them as his friends. But Sarah had found best friends in Lainey and Hope and, for some reason, even adored Tyler and Dean. This getting together with their friends had become a weekly tradition. Sometimes at Ty and Lainey’s, sometimes at River’s…and sometimes at their house.

  If he had asked that little boy he once was to dream the wildest dream, he would never have pictured himself here. He never could have imagined loving a woman as incredible as Sarah, let alone being married to her. She had given him everything; her trust, her love, her faith, and she had made him a better, stronger man. She’d shown him that his worth wasn’t measured by how hard he could work or how valuable he was on the ranch. That it was his soul and his ability to love.

  “Come on,” she said, mounting her horse, the brilliant sun behind her, casting her in the most gorgeous flood of light. The mountains spread wide in the distance, the sky painted pink and blue, and “awe” was the only word that came close to describing what he experienced out here with Sarah.

  He swallowed, forcing himself to get back to reality as they rode back to Joshua Ranch. These were the best days of his life, and he wasn’t taking even one of them for granted. “So everyone’s coming over?”

  “Yup. Even Martin and Mrs. Busby are coming to hang out with Mrs. Casey.”

  He laughed. Somehow he’d even managed to win Mrs. Casey over these last few months and was a regular recipient of homemade pies. He returned the favor with a glass of her favorite whiskey every time. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement. “That’s nice,” he said.

  Sarah gave him a wide, gorgeous smile. “And Dean is picking up Hope.”

  He let out a choked laugh. “Are you sure that’s wise?”

  She shrugged, her eyes twinkling mischievously. “It’s for a good cause. Their feud has gone on long enough, Lainey tells me.”

  “As long as I’m not in that car, then that’s fine with me,” he said, slowing as they approached their home pasture.

  Wishing River glittered like diamonds in the distance and he glanced over at his wife, knowing she must often think about that night with her brother, those years of grief. But they had found each other. Their worst days were behind them, their future solidified by the bond they shared. He could never reclaim his old life, his old ways, because his new life surpassed all his wildest dreams.

  Once the horses were tended to, Sarah leaned up on her tiptoes and whispered in his ear. “If you hurry, you might be able to help me wash off all this dust,” she said with a wink and ran out of the barn.

  He chuckled and chased her, knowing he’d never miss an opportunity to love Sarah, happy to chase her for the rest of his days.

  Acknowledgments

  To Liz Pelletier… Thank you for believing in my writing and for your incredible insight. I always await your edits with a mix of trepidation and excitement…and always finish them with gratitude, knowing what an impact you’ve had on my book. If only I had you on my shoulder while writing—it would save us so much work!

  To Heather Howland… It was such a pleasure and privilege to work with you! Thank you for your meticulous and tireless editing. I owe you a bag of Ringolos!

  To Louise Fury…for having my back and making me feel like no dream is unachievable.

  To Jessica Turner…for making the most stressful part of my writing career manageable and fun. Thank you for the countless hours of brainstorming and marketing that you put in. It is always wonderful to work with you!

  To Stacy Abrams…Thank you for your thoughtful edits and for always keeping an eye out on the weather in Wishing River, Montana :)

  To Hang Le…for creating another heartfelt and rich cover that manages to capture the mood and emotion in my book.

  To Curtis Svehlak… Thank you SO much for always being a ray of sunshine in my inbox! Trust me, you make me laugh just as much.

  To everyone at Macmillan for believing in my books and giving me the opportunity to write books true to my heart. Thank you!

  To the countless other talented people who have had a hand in making this book possible and I haven’t mentioned by name—thank you for everything you do and all your hard work.

  Finally, to my readers and book bloggers: your support, your reviews, your emails, and your loyalty are what make it possible for me to keep writing. I treasure and value all that you do. Knowing you’re reading always makes me want to give you the best story I can deliver. I hope this book leaves you with a blissful sigh and believing that a happy ending is possible for all of us.

  Victoria

  xo

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