by Lexie Ray
When had I realized that I really did love Paisley?
Had it been when I saw her on a horse, rounding up cattle with the best of them? Or maybe it was witnessing her pore over budgets and ledgers and bills and not tear her hair out like Chance did so often. She was as capable getting her hands dirty with the herd as she was managing affairs, accounts, and paperwork on the ranch.
Maybe it had been when I’d seen just how willing other men were to be seen on her arm, though that was a bit of a cop out. Watching her throw her head back and laugh, enjoying herself in spite of her business deal of a loveless marriage, watching the way people just gravitated to her, made me wonder what it was they all saw and I didn’t. It made me realize that I had been blinded to the true possibility of genuinely loving Paisley because of the expectations that had been placed on me. Consolidating our ranch with her family’s ranch had been a necessity to save our parents’ respective legacies, but the business of the arrangement had made me resent everything — Paisley, in particular.
But I knew it was when I’d seen her at her most vulnerable, there outside her father’s hospital room, waiting for me to get there, for something to happen, for someone to swoop in and save her from her distress. I’d loved her then because I knew I could be the one to save her — even if she wouldn’t be saved. I knew that I could help her in her time of need and be a good husband for once. I loved that I finally had something to offer her that wasn’t purely business, a contract a pair of wayward people signed to try and protect themselves.
I loved her. That was all there was to it. I loved her in the hospital room and I hated to see her go. I just needed to understand if I could have a life away from the ranch, if there really was a place for me that would make me feel like I belonged. Paisley had given me the go ahead, and I was here in the airport, trying hard not to stand out, trying to figure out just where my destination needed to be.
I looked at the monitor listing all of the departure times and cities, trying to find one that would take me away from all of this pain and confusion. Did I want to be a part of my family’s ranch, especially now that it had expanded so dramatically? The fact that it was Paisley’s dream to run her own ranch — along with the sad truth that it would never be possible in the most basic sense — made me want it more. With her partnership with Chance, she did run her own side of the ranch, even if he was just a figurehead to keep all the hands in line.
But running a ranch had never been my dream. I’d wanted to go away to college, to explore the world, to discover what it was that I wanted to do the most in life. All of those possibilities had been taken away from me. Now I had the chance to reclaim it.
Was Tokyo too far away? I didn’t know a lick of Japanese, and didn’t even like sushi. I knew the city had to be more than that, but going across the world like that intimidated me.
What about Cairo? I wasn’t a man who followed the news more often than glancing at the scrolling headlines on the bar television they kept on mute, but I’d heard rumblings of unrest there. Would it be safe? I’d already been shot. How could I put my life and body in even more risk?
Los Angeles seemed too close. New York seemed too typical. For every destination on that monitor, I could think of more than a handful of reasons not to go.
And that’s when I realized that of course I loved the ranch. Of course it was my home. I couldn’t see myself anywhere else because I couldn’t be anywhere else. It was so simple that I was afraid I was truly stupid.
I loved Paisley. That was the bottom line. I loved her so much that if the ranch was so important to her, I loved it, too. I loved everything she loved. The ranch was her deepest passion, and it was watching her work there that had shown me all she was capable of and more.
Maybe I’d never love the ranch as much as Paisley or my brothers loved it. But that didn’t mean it was any less my home. I just had to find my niche within it, and I thought I was beginning to have ideas on that front, ideas that I’d turned my back on for so long that I had all but forgotten them.
I strode out of the airport and toward the taxi stand, feeling stronger than I had been earlier. I had the clearest purpose for myself I’d ever experienced, and I hailed the first driver who made eye contact with me.
“I’ve got a long drive to ask of you,” I said, “but I’ve got a hell of a tip for you waiting at the end.”
The driver sized me up, and I showed him the cash. “Fair enough,” he said, and opened the backseat door for me.
I slept all the way home, trying to conserve my strength, trying to preserve the sense of purity of my plan and not overthink it. The key was to be confident, to dazzle Paisley with the deep things I had planned for myself, for the ranch.
It was nearly noon by the time we arrived at the Summers house, and I halfway expected Paisley to be working the ranch. I shoved the bundle of cash at the driver, not minding his appreciative swear at the “hell of a tip,” and went inside the house.
Paisley was asleep on the couch in the living room, exhausted from all of the drama from last night, driving to and from Dallas, trying to hold everything together even as it fell apart. She had showered and changed into clean clothes, ready to start the day, and apparently collapsed on the couch fully dressed in a rare moment of weakness.
Paisley was right — she was lots of things I didn’t understand yet, but I did understand that weak was never going to be one of them.
I had to smile as I studied her further. She had obviously been aiming to get a little work done from home to give herself a chance to rest. Sheafs of paper logs for the ranch were tucked under hear arm as securely as an infant, her lips just a few centimeters from the edges.
I gently stroked her hair, its color so similar to mine, and her hazel eyes gradually slitted open, then widened in surprise.
“This is the last place I expected to see you,” she said, frozen as if I had a gun on her.
“Why is that?” I asked her. “This is our home, isn’t it?”
“It’s precisely because it’s our home that I’m surprised. I gave you money and served you divorce papers because that was what I thought you wanted.”
I looked at her a long time, at her hazel eyes, wide in the afternoon sun, her deceptively strong fingers spread over the logs she had been poring over, her blond hair loosened and falling over her shoulders and down her back.
“I could’ve gone anywhere,” I said after a too-long pause. “But none of the places on that airport departure monitor felt like places I wanted to be.”
“But you’ve always wanted to travel.”
“I have, but not alone.”
She snorted at me. “For five thousand dollars, I bet you could’ve hired someone to travel with you — bought their ticket and everything.”
“I already have a partner I want to travel with,” I said, “and I wouldn’t trade her for anyone.”
“You’ll have to let me know what her name is,” Paisley said, sarcastic and more than a little embittered. “I’ll have to send her a note of congratulations for nailing you down.”
“Paisley, it’s you. You’re the one.”
This shocked her even more than me showing up at our marital home.
“Why? I’ve never felt a need to be anywhere except running the ranch. It’s what I was born for, what I’m good at.”
“But wouldn’t you ever want to get away just to see something different?” I asked.
“The ranch doesn’t run itself, Avery.”
“I’m not talking about getting away forever. Just for a week or two. A long weekend, even, if you really didn’t want to spend so much time with me.”
“I just don’t understand what you’re asking.”
“I did a lot of thinking. I had moments of clarity.”
“Since I left you at the hospital in Dallas this morning,” she said, dubious. She had every right to be. It seemed to be too convenient to be true, but that’s just what it was. I hadn’t been able to control when I’d come
to an understanding about loving Paisley and what my role in the ranch should be. If I had, I would’ve taken care of it a long time ago and saved everyone involved a bunch of angst.
“Paisley, I love you. I want to be with you. I recognize that I haven’t been the best husband in the world, and that I’ve said and done hurtful things to you. If you still want to maintain the separateness of our marriage, if that still makes sense to you, then I accept that. You told me to do whatever I needed to do to stay in this marriage, and that’s how all of this happened.”
“This marriage isn’t something that we have to do anymore,” Paisley said. “I gave you the papers. I had the lawyers remove the stipulations about divorce. It doesn’t matter anymore, Avery. We can both be happy now. We don’t have to force anything.”
“I have no intention of forcing anything,” I said, “but I’m not signing those papers. I don’t want a divorce from you.”
Maybe it was overdramatic, but reaching into my pocket, withdrawing the documents Paisley had drawn up to orchestrate our permanent separation, and tearing them to bits made her snap her mouth shut, made her listen in a way she hadn’t been before.
“Don’t you see?” I asked. “I understand things now that I didn’t understand before. I love the ranch because you love it. I love the ranch because you hold it in your heart, and I love your heart. I would do anything for you.”
“I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do,” she said, looking just as frightened as she did when Joe Durham loomed over her all those years ago at recess. “I’ve always loved you helplessly, loved the way you carried yourself, loved your family. You all support each other, and I’ve never really had that. Maybe I was selfish for loving you so much, for wishing myself into your family.”
“I’d say you’re just a goal-oriented person,” I said, with a smile. “The road was a little rocky, but you’re in now, aren’t you? You’re a Corbin, even if you did keep your last name.”
“I just don’t understand what the turn around was for you,” Paisley said. “I left you, and you had decided to leave the ranch for good. What was it that changed your mind?”
“I went to the airport, but no other destination seemed like home,” I said. “I want to travel, but I want you to travel with me. I’ve always felt like the ranch was my own personal prison, but I suddenly understood that it could be the exact opposite if I gave things a chance. What if I could give people a chance to experience just how magical our ranch is?”
“What do you mean? How?” I’d piqued the interest in Paisley’s business mind, but I knew she was still pretty unsure about things.
“What if we expanded the ranch in a kind of unexpected way?” I suggested, my eyes lighting up. “We could have a functioning dude ranch, which would educate people about ranching and bring in significant cash flow at the same time.”
Paisley’s lips parted, her tongue darting out to moisten them as the wheels and cogs in her brain churned. “It would be a big investment up front,” she said slowly. “A lot of capital, at first.”
“But it would pay for itself in both brand recognition and the amount of people willing to pay a lot of money to get off the beaten path and see how a ranching life would be.”
“How did you think of this?” Paisley asked, eyeing me. “What kind of brain wave were you surfing? Should Chance and I be taking painkillers to try and have ideas like this to further the ranch?”
“I wouldn’t necessarily recommend that,” I said. “It was just the idea of if I wanted to travel away from the ranch, there had to be people out there wanting to travel to the ranch. People who loved the idea of ranching, the principle behind doing hard work the right way. People who would love this ranch just as much as you, enough to invest in it and other properties like it. Enough to keep ranching alive for generations to come.”
“I think it’s an incredible idea,” Paisley said. “I’d have to run it by your brother, of course, but you have the ear of one CEO.”
“Just the ear?” I asked, smiling.
I thought she’d smile, and maybe she almost did, but she held back. “Avery, if this thing between us is going to work …”
“Our marriage, you mean.”
“Yes, that.” She seemed a little flummoxed. I understood that this was a lot to lay onto her right now. “Things have to be different between us.”
“I know they do.”
“You have to respect me,” she said. “No more going out to the bar just to escape me. I’d hope there wasn’t a reason to escape me anymore.”
“I don’t want to escape you.”
“I bring a lot to this ranch and this relationship,” Paisley said. “Maybe you’re beginning to realize that, or maybe you still need time to get to know me. But I’m smart and strong. I’m capable. I like looking good, but that doesn’t make me a princess. I can do all of those things and not be shuffled into one label or the other. I’m just myself. I’m just Paisley Summers.”
“You’re all that and much more,” I said. “You’re my wife.” The first time I’d said that, it had been an accident. I’d been angrily defending her and the memory of her father from Bud Billings. The slip had surprised both of us. But now, saying it like this, and meaning it, felt so right.
I dropped on one knee, ignoring the jolt of pain it sent bolting through my shoulder, every ounce of my attention focused on the woman in front of me.
“What are you doing?” she asked, hiding her mouth behind her hand. “We’re already married. You don’t have to do that again.”
“It wasn’t very special, that first time, was it?” I mused, taking her hand in mine and kissing it. “Paisley Corbin, you married me once for reasons neither of us was particularly excited about. Would you have me again, as your husband, but this time for all of the right reasons?”
Her eyes sparkled. “What are the right reasons, Avery Corbin?”
“I’d be your husband and you’d be my wife because we love each other,” I said. “It’s that simple. I love you for who you are and respect your passions. If you can do the same for me, if you agree to go on this adventure with me with your heart open, then I think we should stay together, stay married, for now and for the rest of time.”
“You want this?” she asked. “You’ve decided that the worst thing in the world wouldn’t be to be married with me?”
“Paisley, the worst thing in the world to me right now is to go out into it without you by my side.”
She fell on her knees in front of me, took my face in her hands, and kissed me.
“We will always be together, then,” she said. “Full partners in both love and business.”
“Why do you always have to bring business into it?” I teased, and she playfully punched my shoulder.
“Marriage is a business — at least, that’s how ours started out.”
“I’m glad it isn’t staying like that,” I said. “You don’t know how glad.”
“I think I do.” She crept closer to me on her knees until she was practically sitting in my lap. “So where should we go first on this delayed honeymoon? Is there anywhere in particular you’ve had a hankering for?”
I tucked her hair behind her ear, tangling my fingers joyfully in her hair, and kissed her again. She moved against me like she knew exactly what to do, exactly what I wanted the most.
“I have just the destination in mind,” I murmured, taking her into my arms as best I could with a bullet wound in my shoulder, thankful that it was the worst injury I’d had in all of this, aware of the fact that I was an idiot and stubborn and a fool and any other insult a person might fling at me, but so lucky that it blew my own mind.
I was so lucky Paisley Summers was my wife. It was a union I’d never look down upon again. Not when I knew that all I had to do was open my heart and let my wife in, show her my love, involve her in all aspects of my life. In a way, everything became more joyful — from saddling up the horse in the morning to a week in the Caribbean, facing t
he world together.
I wouldn’t have it any other way than to have my wife by my side.
Epilogue
There was something about the sheen on the coat of a well-groomed horse that made me happy. I spent a lot of hours making sure our horses were both healthy and well kept in addition to the rest of my responsibilities at the ranch.
Did anybody thank me? Hell, no.
Did anybody so much as notice that their horse’s mane and tail were free from tangles and brambles and all imperfections every morning when they set out for a full day’s work on the ranch? Probably not.
For us Corbins, cattle had always been king. The horses we used to take care of the herd? Second tier.
There were possibilities that my brothers didn’t take into consideration, things that we could do to make our family’s name and legacy even brighter now that we were one of the biggest cattle ranching operations in the entire state of Texas.
We needed diversification if we wanted to continue to grow. Otherwise, we would always be in danger of stagnating.
I had ideas for that — I always had ideas — but being the middle Corbin meant that with two older brothers and two younger brothers, I was always overlooked, always slipping through the cracks.
I knew more about horses than any of my brothers — probably more than anyone in the entire county. I’d never studied their care in any sort of formal nature, instead skulking around horse farms in my spare time, or rodeos, or livestock shows, watching people care for their animals, memorizing the movements and tools they used, perfecting my craft. I’d been doing it since I was a boy, and I had a love for horses that was only surpassed by my brothers’ love for all things cattle.
I didn’t not love the herd. It was important to us, our bread and butter, the principle on which this ranch was founded. But I knew enough about horses to know that our enormous ranch could easily support a herd, and that herd would bring us tons of money. Especially if we sold to horse enthusiasts, or racing enthusiast, or any person who genuinely loved the equine life.