His silence is suddenly weighted and awkward, like I’m an exhibit to be studied and scrutinized. I try reeling myself back to the present, to what remains of my self-control, and I remind myself not to get too comfortable around him. We have too much of a history for anything other than friendship to ever be healthy between us, and even friendship seems like it’s asking too much sometimes.
Clearing my throat, I take a small sip from my cup.
“It’s good to see you having fun,” he says. “I was worried our argument—that after this morning . . .” He shakes his head. “It’s just . . . it’s nice to see you smiling.”
The fact that he was worried he’d ruined my day makes me regret being upset with him earlier. But then, if I was upset with anyone, I knew it was really myself.
“Do you ever wonder,” Reilly starts softly, “what it would’ve been like if that day on the beach had happened a month sooner?”
Before he signed his paperwork. I think about it all the time, wishing things had been different.
I look away, not wanting to acknowledge what his question implies.
“Sometimes,” I finally say, and I’m suddenly too warm, my armpits sweating. “What about you?” I glance at him again. He’s staring at me, still. His eyes are pained and radiant and luring me to him.
He nods.
I straighten, but whether it’s the booze or just exhaustion, I answer easily. “We were really young,” I say. “I don’t think we were really thinking—about any of it.”
Reilly lets out a deep breath. “I’m sorry I left you,” he says, surprising me.
I lean my head back, gazing up at the night. What internal struggles I have always seem smaller and less significant when I stare up at the vastness of the sky. “I’m sorry I didn’t wait for you.” My head lolls to the side so I can see him. “I was angry that you didn’t stay with me, even though I knew how bad things were with your dad.” I gaze back up at the stars. It pains me to think about how ignorant I was, how young and stupid we were to think we could’ve made any of that work anyway. “Papa sort of disappeared on me too and I panicked.”
Tapping the side of my cup, I watch Reilly from the corner of my eye. He’s staring into the fire again. Relieved, I continue. “I missed you . . . thought I needed you to feel whole, but you weren’t there and Mike was. It’s as easy and stupid as that.”
Reilly says nothing, and after a while, I turn to him. His face is cast in shadows, but I watch as his jaw clenches.
“And now what?” he says, finally looking at me. With a single blink, his expression changes from something hardened to something curious and hopeful.
I let out a humorless laugh. “I’ve asked myself that more times than you could possibly know.”
“And?”
“And I don’t know,” I say defensively and take another sip of my drink. I swallow and stare down into my cup, uncertain what answers he wants from me. “I hate what happened,” I say simply. “I hate that I hurt you, and if I could take back everything—the letter, Mike”—Papa—“I would, but I can’t, and—”
Reilly leans toward me, and by the time I register that he’s going to kiss me, his mouth is already against mine, his scruff rough and burning against my skin in the most deliciously familiar way but it’s different too, and my lips part willingly. I lose myself to a hypnotic, light-headed daze.
Reilly’s lips urge mine apart, his nose brushes against my cheek, and he touches the side of my face with his burning-hot palm, which sends a sting of excitement bursting through me. The camping chairs creak and groan beneath us, but I don’t care. Something about his kiss is so fulfilling, so wholesome, it feels like one of the missing pieces of myself I’ve been looking for. It’s so perfect and warm, I never want him to stop.
But he’s leaving again soon. This thought sobers me, and I pull away, groaning to myself.
His brow furrows.
What are we doing?
Reilly’s chest rises and falls like mine, but all I can focus on is the rushing of my blood, the fire of wanting desire against all the uncertainty and horror of him leaving, one day soon.
“I can’t,” I say. “I—we shouldn’t have done that.” I lean back, away from him and temptation, needing more distance between us. I don’t want things to be even harder when he leaves again, to regret another broken heart, one I could’ve prevented.
“Why not?” he asks, his voice rough. I can hear his frustration, snarling just below the surface of his words. “Why do you keep pushing me away?”
“I can’t do this again,” I whisper and stare into the fire. I can’t lose you again. I hear Mac, Nick, and Savannah chatting at the edge of camp and see the ember of their cigarettes glowing when I finally look up. I wish they’d hurry up.
“Alright,” Reilly says, finally, and he rises to his feet. He tosses his empty bottle into the recycling pile. “I’m ah—going for a walk.” And without even looking at me, he strides past the fire and disappears through the trees.
Confused, wondering if I’m being stupid or smart, I lean my head back and stare up into the sky again. My mind is racing—a triathlon of questions and memories, hopes and maybes, but I can’t collect them, they don’t make any sense. I blink a few times, but everything is blurry, and I can’t focus.
What I do know is that Reilly will be leaving soon, and even knowing that, the unbridled, liberated side of me wants to live again, to be with him and be happy, even if it’s just for a little while. The emptiness that lingers, just from him walking away, tells me I’ll regret never even trying.
Leaving my screwdriver by the fire, I stand up, taking a few breaths to gain my bearings. With drink-infused resolve, I shove my hands into the fleece-lined pockets of my sweatshirt and head in the direction Reilly disappeared.
My feet drag every so often, but my mind is too busy to care much. I have no idea what I’m doing or what I’m going to say, but tonight’s the night to say it, whatever it is.
As I step off the wooded path at the clearing just before the bathrooms, I find Reilly, standing with his back to me. I open my mouth, maybe to apologize, when I see Claire lean up and kiss him. It takes me a second to digest what I’m seeing.
I don’t have time to overthink it or analyze what’s happening. All I know is that my stomach churns and I want to throw up. I take a step back, turn, and hurry back toward camp on unsteady legs, toward the safety of my tent.
“Sam!” Reilly’s voice echoes, but I’m in too much of a hurry to get away, too busy keeping drunken, useless, brokenhearted tears at bay to pay attention.
“Sam, please stop.” Reilly grabs my arm and turns me around.
I feel a dab of wetness under one eye and swipe it away with my free hand, looking anywhere but at him. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I just wanted to talk.”
“Stop. You’re not interrupting anything—”
I try to pull away.
“Please look at me.” His hands cup my face, holding me—forcing me to look at him. “Whatever that was, it was one-sided. Claire’s been drinking, just like the rest of us, and—”
With more force, I pull away from his grasp. “I know, it’s fine.” I’m sober enough now to realize that anything I was planning on saying or doing would’ve been a huge mistake. “You don’t owe me an explanation.” He doesn’t owe me anything—he and I are nothing, not anymore and that’s the way it needs to stay.
I plaster on a smile I’m so good at faking. “It’s fine, really. I’m just being drunk and stupid.”
“Sam, don’t be like this—”
“Guys? Where’d everyone go?” Nick calls out just in time, his voice drawing closer. I turn back to camp, desperate to put some distance between us before I do something else I regret.
Twenty-Four
Sam
“See ya, Sam!” Sarah calls as she ducks into her car parked across the drive, by the house.
I wave goodbye as her Honda putters down the drive and back down the mountain
, leaving me alone with the sounds of Shasta’s tail whipping at the flies and her heavy, lethargic breathing. I squirt her underbelly with the hose, but my thoughts are far away.
It’s been three days since we returned from camping, and I’ve kept myself busy on the ranch with cleaning out stalls, refilling food bins, and exercising the horses, since Alison only had time to feed them while we were away. But as grueling as my workdays have been, they haven’t really helped keep my mind busy, not like they usually do.
Everything from horseback riding by the lake to walking by Target’s freshly patched paddock or the sounds of construction drifting over from the other side of the hill seems to remind me of Reilly, of everything that happened between us in those two days, and most of all our kiss.
On cue, Shasta whips me with her grey and white tail, and I’m brought back to a half-bathed horse anxiously pawing the dirt in front of me.
“Yeah, yeah. I know you’re hungry. Hold your horses,” I say, shaking my head at the horrible pun.
Like I’ve been doing since Mac dropped me off Sunday afternoon, I focus on my task, trying to keep myself from drowning in the sinkhole of what was I thinkings and never agains that seem to seep into my thoughts, uninvited. But what if . . .
Hosing Shasta down again, I contemplate my date with Adam tomorrow night, wondering where he’s taking me and why I’m not more nervous about it.
I need to call Mac, I remember. I need to pick up the dresses she’s lending me to choose from, and I need to find shoes to match. Staring down at the dirt beneath my fingernails and the horse hair covering my hands, a flit of anxiety brings to mind the list of all the other things I should probably be doing in preparation, too. I imagine the nerves I’ll have the moment he pulls up the drive, the surprise of where we’re going, if it’s fancy, if it will be awkward.
“Ugh!” It’s so hot, it’s like my mind, my body, is melting, and everything is annoying me today. I have no idea what the hell I’m thinking by agreeing to go on a date with a client. A wealthy, committed client we rely on to keep the ranch going. But then again, Alison’s reaction when I told her was indifferent, so maybe it isn’t such a big deal.
I drop the bristle brush in my hand, letting it thud onto the gravel. I’m not sure if it’s persistent nerves or if it’s just so hellishly hot outside, but I’m having a difficult time concentrating. Using the front of my damp tank top, I lean forward and wipe my brow. I’m somewhat calmed by the fact that Adam asked me out, knowing who I am and what I do. I’m sure he doesn’t expect to open the door to a princess tomorrow night.
“Sam!” Nick calls, making me jump.
“Jesus! I thought you left already.”
“Nope.” His boot steps echo through the stable before he appears in the doorway. The neck and sides of his t-shirt are drenched with sweat. “I have to run to the feed store before they close.” He takes his hat off and uses the sleeve of his t-shirt to wipe his forehead. “Damn, it’s disgustingly hot today.” He lets out a deep breath. “I could really go for a dip in the lake right about now.” He sighs, resigned. “All the other horses are sprayed down, in their stalls, and fed. Can you manage things for the rest of the day?” He gives me a cheeky grin.
“I’ll try my best,” I say, leading Shasta toward the automated walker to dry after her rubdown. “I guess we’ll just have to chance it, see what happens.”
“Smart-ass.”
I wink at him over my shoulder, and he offers me a crooked grin in return. “Well, then, unless you need me, I’m headed home after the store. But I’m taking your truck. I’ll bring everything up tomorrow.”
“Sounds good,” I say, tying Shasta to the metal arm of the hot walker.
“Hey,” Nick says. “Do me a favor and take a damn break, would ya?” He turns and heads into the stable. “You’d get heatstroke if it was left up to you,” he grumbles. “It’s like having a damn child.”
“You love me, Nicholas!” I sing, and his chuckle echoes from inside.
I dust the matted horse hair from my hands off on my cutoffs, and with a scolding glance up at the sun, I head back over to the hitching post. “Your turn, Target.” I unhook the cinch around his mahogany girth when the truck’s engine grumbles to life and with it the sound of modern country, immediately switched to rock ’n’ roll. I pat Target’s neck, humming the familiar tune as the sounds of the truck disappear down the road.
Target cranes his neck as much as the lead rope will allow and watches me.
“What, my humming voice not good enough for you?” I ask, stroking the side of his face. Target is a handful for sure, the most demanding of all eight horses on my time, but if the foam around his mouth and under his saddle is any indication, he’s been worked sufficiently today and is in want of his dinner. “I’ll hurry,” I whisper.
“Hey—”
I whirl around and gasp. “God!” My heart bumps an extra beat and I let out a breath.
“Not quite,” Reilly says with a smirk. He’s standing in the mouth of the stable, his jeans and green t-shirt spattered with blue and white paint.
“Obviously. What’s with everyone sneaking up on me today?” I blow away the wisps of blonde hair hanging in my face. As the adrenaline begins to wear off, unease settles in its place. I straighten and meet his gaze. “What are you doing here? I mean—sorry—did you need something?” I roll my eyes, knowing that question doesn’t sound any better.
One of Reilly’s eyebrows rises.
I turn back to Target.
“Was that Nick just leaving? I was hoping to get his help with something.”
I nod my head, lugging the saddle off of Target’s back and setting it on the hitching post. “You just missed him. It’s only me, I’m afraid.”
“Ah.”
I pick up the hose and spray Target’s back, trying to focus on the drying sweat and salt on his coat, on the way his skin shudders like the water tickles, instead of Reilly standing quietly behind me. “Um, do you need tools or something? You can check the shed if you want.”
Footsteps crunch the gravel behind me. “No, I needed the muscle.” He clears his throat. “Do you need any help?”
“Nope,” I say quickly, immediately shaking my head. “And since when do you know anything about horses?” I smile and move around to the other side of Target, slowly moving the spray up his neck so as not to startle him.
“Can we talk for a minute?”
My grip on the nozzle falters. “About what?”
“About the other night.”
I shrug, squinting at Target’s damp coat so not to look at Reilly. “If you’re going to tell me it was a mistake, I already know that.”
“What if I don’t think it was?” He steps closer, his eyes hidden in the shadow of his baseball cap.
Dropping the hose, I reach for the scraper and start wiping the remaining water from Target’s shoulder. The cool water feels good against the hot sweat on my skin.
“I guess it really doesn’t matter,” I say, coming back around, toward him. I finish scraping the remnants of water from Target’s side when I hear footsteps and feel the dry air shift and maybe enliven as Reilly steps up beside me. He reaches out, placing his hand on mine, stilling it.
“Please,” he breathes. “There are a few things I’d like to say.”
I drop the scraper into the tack bucket and step away from him like his touch burns, because it does. I haul Target’s saddle up into my arms and carry it toward the tack room.
“Sam?”
“What, Reilly?” I turn around to face him. “What is there to say? That kiss was magical? Yeah, sure, I’m not going to pretend it wasn’t, but it was still a mistake. You’re leaving soon, and things are too complicated between us to be anything other than that.” I continue toward the tack room to put the heavy saddle away. “You should probably go. I’ll tell Nick you came by. Okay?” When I step out of the tack room, Reilly’s leaning back against the hitching post, his arms crossed over his chest. His smugne
ss only irritates me more. I untie Target and head over to the walker.
When I look over my shoulder in Reilly’s silence, he’s smiling at me, unabashedly. “So, you’re kicking me off your property now?”
“Is that an option?” I flash him a smile. After tying Target up and giving him a quick pat on the butt, I schlep toward the strewn about tack and straighten out my rumpled t-shirt.
“God,” he says, “you sure can be a brat when you want to be. It’s hard to get used to.”
I laugh bitterly and bend down to pick up the hose. “You can leave, you know.” He’s making this too easy. I’m smiling to myself when I turn to walk the hose back over to the faucet and stumble over the rest of it snaked behind me. My fingers grip the nozzle in my attempt to right myself, and I squirt myself in the face.
Mouth gaping, I stand there, frozen—shocked—stunned. “Are you serious?” I stare down. My upper half is dripping wet. It’s actually amazingly refreshing.
And Reilly’s laughing, completely amused.
With what sounds like a snarl, I glare at him. I drop the hose, pull my clinging gray t-shirt away from my body, and shake the water off my arms. I’m about to bend over and collect the hose again, but Reilly’s too fast.
“I think you missed a spot,” he says, holding the nozzle up like a pistol aimed and ready to fire.
“Don’t. Even. Think. About. It.” My gaze narrows on him with the promise of bad things to follow if he even considers it, but I don’t like the way his mouth twitches at the corner and his eyes illuminate. Their unnerving glint has me scrambling, trying to tear the hose away from him in desperation.
Reilly’s laugh is booming and his grip too strong. “Why are you so worried? You’re already wet,” he says, a big-ass grin engulfing his face. He takes a step back as I lunge forward, his hand on my shoulder, holding me away from him.
Profanities are pouring out of my mouth as I try to grab the hose, and I threaten him within an inch of his life.
“Oh, really. I think I’d like to see you try,” he says, no longer attempting to hide any of his amusement whatsoever. “I haven’t even done anything yet.”
Saratoga Falls: The Complete Love Story Series Page 23