“Anyway,” April went on, “I’m sure Clay and you will both be okay, and once he’s out of the hospital, he’ll head straight back to work.”
Sophie thought her heart had skipped a beat. “Why is Clay in the hospital?”
“Oh, I just assumed you’d heard. It was those chickens. He was going up the steps to his house when one of the chickens flew in his face. He fell and got a bit banged up. I tried to stay with him while he was getting stitched up and having tests, but he ordered me home since I’m supposed to be on bed rest.”
She could just see all of that playing out. See his trip to the hospital, too. He would not be in a good mood.
“Well, I’d better go and check on the boys,” April said. “Brantley put them to bed right before I called you, but they’re too quiet. Talk to you soon.”
Sophie pressed the end call button and scrolled through her contacts until she got to Clay. It would be so easy to call him. Just one little touch of her finger. Then, she could tell him how sorry she was about the latest attack. She could ask him if he was in pain.
And then what?
There’d be awkward silence because there really hadn’t been anything left unsaid between them. Yes, they’d had postbreakup sex, but while it’d been amazing, it still felt post and breakup.
“You need another drink?” Marcum asked her.
Since she hadn’t touched the first one he’d poured for her, she shook her head, turned and headed to her desk. Sophie gave her brand-spanking-new nameplate an adjustment that it in no way needed before she sat down and put her numb butt back to work.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
WHEN CLAY GOT home from work, he saw a motorcycle, a dead Christmas tree, six chickens, a chanting gypsy and Roman Granger. The chickens were expected. Ditto for the tree, since his cleaning lady had probably removed it from the house so it could be recycled. But Vita and Roman and his motorcycle were surprises.
Not exactly welcome ones, either.
It was cold, a January damp kind of cold, and Clay was tired, hungry and sleepy. It was only 5:00 p.m., but he had been thinking of eating a sandwich and crashing. Crashing, however, would have to wait.
Vita was prancing around the yard while waving around some kind of smoking clump of stuff that smelled like weed. He hoped like the devil that it wasn’t because the last thing he wanted to do was arrest an old woman hell-bent on helping him. After the last chicken attack the month before, Clay had given up dismissing anything Vita did. He wouldn’t turn down help even if it was stupid and unconventional, but he would draw the line at narcotics.
“Chief,” Roman greeted when Clay shut his truck door and walked toward the porch. Sophie’s brother was sitting on the steps, watching both Vita and the chickens as if they were circus acts. “I heard it’s permanent now. No more interim label in front of your name.”
That was true. On Christmas Eve the city council had offered him a permanent position, and Clay had accepted it. But Clay doubted that Roman had come here to offer his congratulations.
Since this talk with Roman could turn ugly fast, Clay decided to go ahead and just get it started. “If you’re here about Sophie and/or Billy Lee, there’s no need. Billy Lee’s getting probation after a plea deal, and Sophie hasn’t contacted me since she moved back to Austin over a month ago. It’s over between us, and I won’t be seeing her again.”
Vita stopped her smudging ritual and stared at him. Roman stared, too. A dark, dangerous kind of stare. Of course, that’s how Roman always looked so perhaps he didn’t have any other facial expressions.
Maybe because Clay felt the need to defend himself, he just kept on talking. “I know I shouldn’t have gotten involved with Sophie in the first place, and I’m sorry for that. Sorry that I hurt her. She deserved better after all the shit she went through with Brantley.”
Roman lifted his shoulder. “I’m actually here about your land, but if you want to keep telling me how much you screwed over my sister, I’ll listen.” He stood, meeting Clay eye to eye.
“My land?”
“Yeah. I’m here on business for Garrett.” Along with the dark bad-boy thing, there was some annoyance in his voice, too. “Legally, I own the ranch so Garrett talked me into coming here to see you. Actually, he pestered the hell out of me about it and then used Sophie to browbeat me into doing this.”
Clay had been confused enough by the land comment, but Roman wasn’t clearing up this conversation any. Worse, Vita had moved closer, no doubt so she could hear, and the weedy smoke was blowing right in his face.
Since he didn’t want to get high or go through with an arrest, Clay turned to Vita. “Could you stomp out that smoke-thing and come back to finish this? Roman and I need to talk.”
The woman nodded but didn’t budge an inch. “Are you really gonna lease your land to the Grangers? And what about Sophie and all those mopey rides she’s been taking?”
Clueless. That’s the one word that came to mind to describe how Clay felt. “Sophie’s mopey rides?” he repeated. The land question was important, too, but he didn’t like hearing Sophie and mopey in the same sentence.
Roman opened his mouth to answer, but Vita spoke before he could say anything. “Sophie’s been coming home to the ranch nearly every day and taking her mare out for long rides. The hands think she’s been crying a lot, too. Of course, that could be allergies.”
Clay thought back to Sophie’s other “allergy attack” after the Brantley mess. Hell. She’d been crying, and this time it was all his fault.
“You haven’t exactly been Mr. Sunshine, either,” Vita went on, talking to Clay. “Reena said you’ve been sulky and moody and that you kicked one of the plastic Santa decorations when it fell on the sidewalk in front of the police station. Then, you kicked the trash can twice.”
Shit. He made a mental note to have another talk with Reena about gossiping.
“It’s true?” Clay asked Roman. “Is Sophie really moping?”
“Can’t say. She does minimal moping around me because she’s afraid I’m going to bust in your face the way I did to Brantley.”
Clay hadn’t known about the Brantley face busting, but he approved. Which made him a hypocrite since he’d hurt Sophie just as Brantley had done. After he got rid of Roman and Vita, he’d drive over to the Granger ranch and check on Sophie. Of course, he could make things worse by doing that since he was probably the source of the moping, but he needed to see for himself that she was all right.
“Are you going to bust me in the face?” Clay wanted to know. He took off his jacket and tossed it on the table in the entry.
Roman kept his leather jacket on. “I’ll keep my options open on that. Especially since you’ve been sulky and moody. Are you that way because of my sister?”
“No,” Clay snarled. “Maybe,” he admitted. “You don’t know the whole story.”
“I do,” Vita piped up. “Reena said you don’t get those pink envelopes anymore, but that you’re in the same kind of bad mood that you were when you did get them. This bad mood lasts all the time, too, and everybody’s a little tired of it.”
He was surprised Reena didn’t report how many times a day he took a piss. Clay huffed, and since it was obvious Vita was staying put, he motioned for Roman to follow him inside where they could have a private talk. One that might end in a face bashing, but at least Vita wouldn’t be witnessing it. He unlocked the door, ushered Roman inside and got yet another huge surprise.
Sophie.
She was peering out from the hall and cursing under her breath. “I rode my mare over here and put her in the barn, but I didn’t know Roman was coming,” she said as if that explained everything.
“I didn’t know you were coming,” Roman answered as if he knew exactly what was going on.
Clueless went through Clay’s head again.
“Why are you here?” Roman asked Sophie at the very moment she asked him the same thing.
“The land,” Roman answered. “You?”
“Sex. And to return Clay’s key.”
Clay decided it was a good time to stay quiet, listen and try to figure out what the heck was going on. However, his body zoomed right in on the word, sex. Maybe because Sophie looked good. No allergy eyes. She looked good enough to...
He purposely didn’t finish that thought.
Especially since it was sex that had gotten him into this position.
“You go first,” Sophie prompted her brother.
Clay would have preferred to hear what Sophie had to say, but it probably wasn’t a good idea to address that sex comment in front of Roman.
Roman dragged in a long breath, turned to Clay. “Garrett wants me to ask you about leasing the back part of your land to us. He needs to expand now and could use the acreage. In exchange for what I’m sure will be a generous payment, he’ll also take down the fence between your place and the pond so your horses can water there.”
Clay was about to ask why Garrett hadn’t made this request himself, but this went back to Roman owning the ranch. Plus, it would involve paperwork, and Clay was already well aware how much Garrett disliked that particular part of his job.
“I’ll need some time to think about that,” Clay said. Best to think when Sophie wasn’t completely distracting him.
Roman nodded, turned to his sister. “Now, it’s your turn. Why are you here?”
“I told you already. Sex and keys. I forgot to return that.” She plucked said key from her front jeans pocket and handed it to Clay. It was the house key he’d given her the day April had been hospitalized. “I thought I’d just sneak in and leave it since I know you wouldn’t have wanted me to hide it in the verbena.” She paused, smiled, then quit smiling when Roman scowled. “But before I could leave, I saw Vita and Roman drive up.”
“And you didn’t want me to know you’d come here,” Roman finished for her. He made a circling motion with his fingers. “Now, explain the sex part. And FYI, sex isn’t a word brothers like to hear coming from their kid sister’s mouth.”
Clay made a sound of agreement but wished he hadn’t. It got him a scowl from both Sophie and Roman.
“I wanted to talk to Clay about sex,” Sophie explained.
Talk? Well, his man parts had gotten all excited for nothing. They didn’t get un-excited, though, because Sophie was still there, and as long as his eyes could see her, the rest of him wanted more of her.
“Clay and I didn’t have a smooth parting of the ways,” she said. “I needed some...closure. Yes, closure.” She punctuated it with a nod that wasn’t any more convincing than the remark had been. It sounded as if she’d just filled in the blank with the first word that’d popped into her head.
Roman looked at both of them. “Closure, huh? Never heard it called that before.” He huffed, put his hands on his hips and looked at Sophie. “Just assure me that whatever you’re about to do will not add to that snit you’ve been in for nearly a month.”
“A snit?” she howled.
“Snit,” Roman confirmed and brushed a kiss on her forehead. “Let me know if I need to kick Clay’s ass for you.”
Damn. They’d moved on from face-bashing to ass-kicking. Of course, if it came to that, Clay would have to face-bash and ass-kick right back, which definitely wouldn’t improve things.
“I’ll call you in a day or two about the land,” Clay told Roman when he headed for the door.
“Call Garrett instead. In the future you can keep me out of the land loop. Out of the sex talk loop, too.” Roman paused, looked at them from over his shoulder. “Was the verbena some kind of sex reference?”
“Yes,” Sophie lied with a straight face. “And if you don’t want me to describe it in complete detail, you won’t ask any more questions.”
The corner of Roman’s mouth kicked up into a smile, and he strolled out. Clay only got a glimpse of the yard before Roman closed the door, but Vita was nowhere in sight. Maybe she’d taken her smoky chantings elsewhere.
With Roman gone and no sounds from Vita, the house got very quiet. Clay waited for Sophie to say something, but when she just stood there, he decided to start.
“It’s good to see you,” he said. “And you were right—we didn’t have a smooth parting of the ways. Rug burns,” he added in a grumble.
She nodded. “And I got a bruise on my left butt cheek.”
Clay couldn’t help it, he smiled. “I’m sorry about the bruise. Sorry about a lot of things.” He was about to launch into a remixed version of why he should have never started up an affair with her, of why he was no good for her. For anyone. And why she was better off without him. But Clay decided to start with a simpler question. “How do you like being CEO?”
She lifted her shoulder, not exactly an enthusiastic response. “It’s a lot of work, but Billy Lee is helping. Plus, it’ll be easier when I move my office to the ranch. That way, I can rope Garrett into helping more. He’s one hundred percent cowboy these days and not much into the business.”
So he’d heard. But he hadn’t heard about Sophie moving her office. “Can you do that, work from the ranch?”
Another shoulder lift. “I’m actually taking over the guest cottage at the back of the house. My mother will still be around, but it’ll give me a designated work space.”
“What happened to make you want to move back to the ranch?” Clay wanted to kick himself for the question though, because it sounded as if he were fishing for an answer that involved him.
He wasn’t surprised that he wanted it to involve him. No matter how much he told himself that this wasn’t a good thing, it was. Sophie was very much a good thing. Now the real question was, what was he going to do about it?
Sophie came closer, but she slipped her hands into her back pockets as if to anchor them there. “I want a date.”
Clay was surprised. “Haven’t we had this conversation before?”
“Yes, but that was for a ruse so that my family wouldn’t kill Brantley. This time, I’m asking because I want a date. A real one. With you. No strings attached.”
No such thing.
“Look, I can’t make this perfect,” she continued before he could speak. “You have a past. I have a past. I’ll always be your brother-in-law’s ex-girlfriend, and you’ll always have pink envelopes. Maybe not physical ones, but they’ll always be there.”
Yes, they would.
She came even closer. So close that if Clay wanted, he could reach out and pull her to him. He would have done that, too, if she hadn’t continued talking.
“I know there’s no such thing as no strings attached. Dates often lead to commitments...and other things.”
She finally stopped talking and Clay was about to pull her to him, but she did some pulling of her own. Not with him but rather her phone. She took it from her pocket, opened the note that was titled LIFE PLAN and showed him the screen.
It was blank.
“The way I figure it,” she went on, “I’ve got two choices. I can fill that in with stuff that might end up being what I really want, or—”
Clay was about to kiss her, but instead he took the phone from her and typed in something. A life plan goal that he really hoped she would consider. He turned the screen and showed it to her. It got the reaction he wanted.
She smiled.
Then Sophie launched herself into his arms and kissed him. All in all, not a bad kiss but Clay figured they could do a whole lot better. Especially with the life goal he’d just suggested.
I’m in love with you. What do you say to that?
Sophie took back the phone and typed in her answer: I say I love you right back.
Clay hadn’t be
en sure how he would feel if and when Sophie ever said that to him, but it felt pretty damn good. That’s why he said it out loud.
“I love you, Sophie.”
She took hold of his shirtsleeve, pulled him back to her. “And I love you, Chief Clay McKinnon.” She smiled again. “Say, I’ve never had sex with an actual police chief before. You think he’s better at it than the interim was?”
“Much, much better.” And Clay took her to the bedroom to prove it.
* * * * *
Now, keep reading for the special bonus story
LONE STAR COWBOY, also from USA TODAY
bestselling author Delores Fossen!
LONE STAR
COWBOY
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
CHAPTER ONE
IT WASN’T EVERY day that Lily Rose Granger walked into a barn and found a naked cowboy, but apparently this was her day for ticking off that particular box. All in all, it was a nice box-ticking experience, too.
Or at least it would have been if the cowboy hadn’t been glaring.
Jake Monroe, aka naked cowboy, was clearly not a happy camper right now.
She barely glanced at his glare, though. That was because there were so many other things to grab her attention. Like Jake’s damp cocoa-brown hair, his narrowed blue eyes. That tough, gorgeous face. The very tight muscles in his neck, chest and stomach. And then there was the most eye-catching thing of all.
That towel he had wrapped around his cowboy package.
It was a little towel, barely fitting around his hips, and the way Jake was clamping on to it, it created a gap where she could possibly get a glimpse of something really interesting if he shifted just a little.
She found herself hoping he would shift or maybe there’d be a sudden breeze. The breeze might help with the flash of heat she was having, too, and Lily Rose didn’t think that flash had much to do with the steamy July temps.
Those Texas Nights Page 27