by Cara McKenna
“That’s where you met Ware?”
She nodded. “But not how you might be picturing. He saved me, actually. He was probably the only man who ever saved me, without wanting anything out of it for himself—sex or some hero complex or any other thing.”
“Oh.”
“He was tough. He got me sober, and we did wind up sleeping together, obviously, but it was different from before. I wanted him—out of gratitude, I think. For what he’d done for me, not for what I could get from him, going forward. He wanted me back, even if he was never truly comfortable with it. He broke it off before I knew I was pregnant, and I took it real bad. I made it ugly, and he made it ugly right back. I tossed out some real low blows, and he dealt a few of his own. I’d never seen him that angry before, and it scared me. Enough to be too afraid to tell him about the baby. The way we left it, and the way he’d met me . . . I was afraid he’d try to get her taken away, or take her himself. And once I was involved with all of you guys, I was terrified he’d tell you about me. About the kind of person I was.” She looked to the car seat and her daughter.
“So it was more than just fearing for your safety.”
She nodded, gaze falling to her hands. “It was self-preservation. Which makes me feel all the more awful. I’m . . .” She looked up, met his eyes with tears stinging her own. “I’m so sorry. I let you get so close, to me and to her. I never should have, not with so many secrets. You deserved to know who you were getting involved with, but I was too scared of losing you to say.”
“You deserved to know things about me, as well.”
After a pause, she said, “I’ve been thinking a lot about what you told me, these past couple days. About who you used to be.” She paused when the baby fussed, and rose to free her from the seat in the hopes of settling her. She sat back down, bouncing her gently.
“After everything I’ve just said, it might sound ridiculous, me saying that I’m trying to do good now. That since I found out I was pregnant, the worst thing I’ve done is lie—which for me is an improvement, sadly. But I really am trying. I just want to work, and make enough to support myself and the baby. No more secrets, no more dependence. I want a fresh start, more than anything. To believe that whatever new life I make for myself is an honest one. A genuine one . . .” Thoughts were forming. Solidifying, and she spoke them as they came. “And I think you want that, too. To put your old life behind you.”
“I do want that,” he said softly. “A fresh start. A respectable life. It took me way too long to regret what I’ve done. It took what you said for it to register . . . and it took the fire at the ranch, and losing Don, for it to really hit home. Now that it has, I . . . Christ, I feel sick. I think about what I used to do and I feel like I could throw up.”
She believed him. There was pain on his face, so real and so sharp it stabbed her in the heart.
“We want the same thing,” she said, realizing it as she heard herself speak. “But when you were honest with me, I turned my back on you.”
“Not without good cause.”
She shook her head. Something had come loose in her chest, like a clog finally washing free, letting things flow. She could breathe for the first time in days. She could feel air in her lungs, and blood moving through her body, as though her decision had shut her system down, protested by every cell in her body.
“Neither of us can fix what we’ve done in our pasts,” she said. “But neither of us gets to move on, either, not until somebody knows what we’ve done and chooses to forgive us. Chooses to believe we’re capable of doing better, going forward.”
He nodded, and now his own eyes were welling. He sipped his drink, sniffed softly, held his tongue. There was fear in those shining blue eyes, and hope as well.
“I forgive you,” she said, and leaned close to put her hand to his face—on his soft skin and scratchy beard. “Whatever you did before you met me, that was another life. And I don’t want to punish you for it. I only want to see what comes next. What you make of this life.”
He covered her hand with his. “That means a lot.” Other thoughts hid behind his lips, and he seemed poised to share them, mouth opening and closing. When he did speak, it was only to say, “For what it’s worth, I forgive you, too.”
She felt her chin crumple, and tears rolled fat and heavy down her cheeks to land on the baby’s leg. She choked out, “It’s worth way more than you know.”
“Put the baby down a second.”
She moved Mercy back to her seat, and as she sat once more, Casey set his glass on the windowsill and pulled her against him, cradling her head, rubbing her back. He let her cry for long minutes, until her bucking shoulders went still and her breathing deepened. He seemed calmer himself. Stronger, if still uncertain.
“From now on,” Casey said, sitting up straight to catch her gaze, “whatever we are—friends, or colleagues, or any other thing—we go forward accepting each other’s mistakes with our eyes wide-open, okay?”
She nodded, dabbed at her nose.
“I won’t ever hold anything you just told me against you.”
“I won’t, either.”
“All I care about is what comes next. And if you need something from me, know that you can ask for it, and I’ll give you whatever you need, because I care. Not because I think you need saving, and not because I want something from you. Just because I think you deserve a fair shot at this new life of yours, okay?”
“I’ve never doubted that.”
“I want you to know,” he said slowly, carefully, as though handpicking each word, “that nothing’s different about how I feel for you. After hearing everything you’ve been through. I’m still crazy about you, no matter what you did when you were fifteen, no matter what happened to you in Lime or any other place.”
Her chest felt funny. Light and . . . and porous. Like a sponge, thirsty to sop it all up. “Really?”
“Yeah, really.”
Was that even possible? She’d never been able to forgive herself for her mistakes, or stop feeling dirty about her past. It had been impossible to imagine someone else managing it. Certainly not a guy. “The filth of your sins is a mark that will never wash off,” her father had told her. “No decent man will ever want you now.”
She’d ached so badly for him to be wrong, though for years her choices had fulfilled that prophecy. But looking at Casey now, in the wake of what he’d just said, and knowing how it had felt, every time they’d come together . . . A good man had wanted her, and still did, in spite of all those sins. Not a perfect man, but a good one. It seemed all but impossible. A miracle.
“I don’t understand how you can know all that stuff and still see me the same.”
“I can’t see you the same, no. I can see way deeper than I did before, knowing all that. But I feel the same, I promise you. I got absolutely no attachment to a girl’s innocence, or her being perfect, or ladylike, or any other thing. All I’ve ever cared about is how somebody makes me feel, and you make me feel like I want to do better. Be better. And I can honestly say, no woman’s ever made me want those things before. You and Mercy,” he said with a smile, hooking his thumb in the baby’s direction, “you guys accomplished the impossible. Must be the blue eyes or something.”
“Must be.” She felt shy, but behind that, elated. And confused about where she stood, but also hopeful, and undeniably free of so much pain and guilt and—
“I still care about you,” he said firmly. “I still want you. Now, you don’t need to tell me tomorrow or next week or even next year that you know how you feel, where you stand, but if you ever decide that maybe you still feel that way for me . . .”
Her smile faltered, trembling under the weight of everything she felt. “I won’t tell you tomorrow,” she said.
“And that’s fine. Like I said—”
“I can tell you right now.”
He stared at her for a long moment, blinked once, twice. And then he exploded her brain.
“Marry me,�
�� he said.
“What?”
“Marry me, Abilene or Allison or whatever the fuck I should call you. Tomorrow or in five years—I don’t care when, just say you will.”
She couldn’t say that. Couldn’t say that or any other thing—she was too shocked.
“Nothing’s going to change how I feel about you. Not your secrets or me going crazy, not anything. I’ll ask you again one year from now, if you want.”
“I think maybe you should.” If only because she might need that long to be sure she wasn’t dreaming.
“I will, then. In the meantime, keep thinking about that house. Imagine every last thing about it, because someday you and me are going to find that exact place and make it just how you want.”
Her shock softened in a breath, so touched by those words, and to realize that this man knew her better than anyone else on the planet.
“I can tell you my answer now,” she blurted. “It’s yes.”
He nodded, looking bewildered but pleased. “Okay, good. That’ll take the edge off the suspense.”
“Good,” she agreed.
A pause. “What kind of a ring do you want?”
“God, I don’t know. Something simple. Something silver. I don’t need a diamond.”
“How do you want me to propose?” he asked. “A year from now?”
“Exactly like this.”
“You sure? Because this is pretty sloppy and messed up, and I’m starting to think I should have just kept my mouth shut.”
“Nothing about you and me has ever looked quite like it was supposed to.”
“That’s true enough.”
“So I don’t care how you propose. I don’t even care if you ever do. I only want to be with you again, for real. To see if this can work.”
“C’mere.”
She let him tip the both of them onto their sides, facing, legs locking. She toyed with the buttons of his shirt and his palm was warm on her waist. And his eyes were there, right there.
“Move in with me,” he said.
She nodded. That much, she could promise. “Okay.”
“My apartment’s not your dream house, but we could make it into something special, something for now. Make a home out of it.”
“You okay with curtains?”
“I fucking love curtains.”
She laughed, rubbed his chest. “Good. It’s not a home without curtains.”
“It’s not a home at all, yet. But it will be, if you’ll show me what that looks like.”
“Gladly.” And she kissed him, slow and soft, watching a smile bloom on those lips as she pulled away.
“It’s going to be a long, rough spring,” he whispered. “With everything that’s just happened, and with everything that’s going to be changing around the bar. But let’s make our place somewhere calm to escape to at the end of the day, okay?”
“I’d like that.”
“And we’ll throw ourselves a little party, just you and me and Mercy. It doesn’t feel like a time to celebrate, but it seems like we ought to do something to mark the fact that I’ve got a future, and that you’re in control of things with your ex. A lot’s fucked-up right now, but those are two good things. Too good to just let go by.”
“I’d like that, too.”
He brought his face close, rubbing their noses together, brushing his mouth softly against hers. “Maybe it doesn’t need saying, or maybe I should have said it before I fucking proposed, but I love you. You and the baby, both. You need to know that.”
She pursed her quivering lips and nodded. “You didn’t need to say. You’ve told me a hundred times, with your actions.”
“Well, now I’m telling you out loud.”
She swallowed, found her breath. “I love you, too.” Every ounce of him. Every cuss, every awful mistake. People were made of both light and dark, and you didn’t get to love the good without first forgiving the bad. She knew that now.
“How about we get the cars packed back up?” he asked. “Seeing as how you’ve decided to move, yet again.”
She smiled, wide and pure and open. “We can do that.”
“All right, then.” He stood from the bed and offered a hand, pulling her to her feet. “Let’s get you home, honey.”
Start at the beginning of the scorching-hot Desert Dogs series by Cara McKenna.
LAY IT DOWN
Available in print and e-book from Signet Eclipse.
The motel was on the so-called good side of the tracks, the western side, closer to the mountains. The bad side was where most of the locals lived, and it was also home to the grimier businesses—the quarry, some limping little retail operations, Benji’s, a couple garages, the dump, the dueling liquor stores. The nice side boasted the tech company and its employees’ homes, a half-decent grocery store, the Sheriff’s Department, and the Volunteer Firefighters’ headquarters. Alex had been a member of the latter, once upon a simpler time.
Vince was burning up inside as he and his impromptu date strolled down Station Street, headed for the tracks.
He was used to girls acting coy when he hit on them. Or scandalized. Or downright eager. He wasn’t accustomed to this woman’s reaction, though. He didn’t even have the right word for it. A weary sort of . . . unimpressed. Goddamn if it didn’t make his pulse throb.
She asked him questions about the businesses they passed, then let his arm go to snap a couple photos of the dilapidated Fortuity Depot station, and stare up into the night sky.
“Jesus, you guys get a lot of stars.”
“Benefit of living in a one-traffic-light town.” For now, anyhow. In a couple years, Fortuity would be twenty-four-hour neon pollution.
“You know there’s going to be an eclipse around here in a few months?” she asked. “A full solar eclipse.”
“I don’t exactly keep current with astronomy.”
“Someone on Sunnyside’s marketing team mentioned it. I’m hoping they’ll like my work and want to bring me back to photograph it for them. To use in promotional materials, since the casino’s named the Eclipse.” She messed with some setting on her camera, aimed it skyward, and set it beeping and whirring, capturing the stars.
Vince was distracted by other natural phenomena, such as the shape of her ass and the smell of that perfume. He wondered if she had a tripod and if that camera had a video setting. He wondered what he had to offer God to bargain his way into this woman’s bed tonight. He’d been feeling way too much this week. Maybe he could at least wake up tomorrow clearheaded, with sexual frustration checked off the list.
They crossed the tracks, turned onto Railroad Avenue, and headed for the Gold Nugget Motor Lodge’s well-lit lot. It was yet another local business that probably wouldn’t survive to see the casino’s ribbon-cutting. They were doing well now, most of the spaces filled with out-of-towners’ cars—folks here on development business. But once the resort opened, economy chains would follow, to catch the workaday tourists’ dollars. The Nugget would likely sell up, get turned into some name-brand outfit, get a major face-lift. Good for the owners, maybe, but it made Vince’s chest hurt, imagining everything anodyne, everything with a familiar logo slapped on it, the profits bound for someplace far from Fortuity.
Goddamn, since when had he turned so sentimental? He really did need to get laid.
Outside of room six, his companion’s key jingled as she got the door unlocked.
Just that noise focused his energy, the fate of the world seeming to hang on whatever was going to happen between them now. He felt his blood pumping hot and saw that sensation echoed by the pulse ticking along her throat. He could just about smell the curiosity on her. Same as he could smell that perfume, those flowers that wouldn’t last a day in this desert.
She turned in the threshold and Vince laid his forearm along the jamb, leaning close. She froze, but the interest coming off her was hot. She wasn’t scared of him, but there was a hesitance there . . . She was scared of what she felt. What she wanted. She wasn�
�t used to putting impulse ahead of consequence, he bet. He could tell from how she spoke, how she dressed. Impulsive wasn’t in her repertoire.
Welcome to Fortuity.
Vince stooped, bringing his lips to her hairline. Fuck, she smelled good.
“Thanks for the walk,” she said softly.
“Ask me in.”
He felt her exhalation on his neck, a tight, anxious huff. “I’m not sure.”
“Bet you are,” he breathed.
“It’s been a really long, shitty day.”
“All the more reason to end it on a high note.”
She laughed, the sound winding him even tighter. “You’re shameless.”
“Shame’s a useless emotion.”
“I’m going to ask you one question; then I’ll decide. Deal?”
“Shoot.”
She looked up and held his stare. “What’s my name?”
Fu-u-u-uck. “Uh . . .”
Her brows rose. “You don’t remember, do you?”
“No. No, I do not.” But he’d memorized her backside, in that skirt. Ought to count for something. “Jog my memory?”
She shook her head with an irritated sigh and stepped inside. “Good night, Vince. Thanks for the company. Sorry it had to end here.”
He grabbed her hand. “Oh, hey—come on, now. That’s not fair.”
“I was down for maybe being your random one-night stand, but not an anonymous one.” Her fingers wriggled free. Her voice had risen, cool tones lost to something far hotter. “I wasn’t feeling real choosy tonight myself, but I do have some standards.”
“When you live in a town this small, you don’t get much practice at memorizing new names.”
“All the same, maybe work on that before you try to fuck me again. Sound like a plan?” She wasn’t shouting, but every measured word hit him like a slap. He kinda liked it.
He nodded. “Sure. Sorry.”
“Good.” Her feathers were smoothing, but just this taste of her temper, just the pink staining her throat and cheeks . . . shit. The ache knotted deep in Vince’s belly felt more urgent than ever.