by Maisey Yates
“True enough,” Sabrina responded.
“I think I could get used to talking about it,” Clara confessed.
It was a relief to know she had friends she could talk to. Not just about Jason, but about Alex. And that they would be here when it was over. That when he was gone she wouldn’t be alone again.
She would need that. Regardless of how well she controlled her feelings, she would miss him when he wasn’t over at the ranch all the time.
She wasn’t in love. She didn’t want to be. She didn’t want forever. She just wanted to follow this thing as far as it would go. Wanted to see how it would change her. How it would remake her.
The door to the tasting room swung open and Dane, Lindy’s brother, a bull rider who was between competitions and coming back to the winery regularly to support his sister, walked in carrying a tray of cheese and a bottle of wine. “I have some things for you to test out, ladies,” he said, heading across the room and setting the tray and wine in front of them.
“What is this?” Sabrina asked.
“Cheese from the Laughing Irish. Lindy is interested in partnering more with them and seeing what we can do with pairings. I don’t know what any of that means. I’m just repeating what she said.”
“Sounds like a good experiment to me,” Olivia said, all but falling on the tray of cheese. Sabrina followed suit, though with less enthusiasm.
Clara had a feeling Sabrina was secretly afraid consuming anything from the Donnellys would result in her immediate death.
Clara wrinkled her nose. “I don’t really like cheese. I mean, I do like cheese. But not weird cheese.”
Dane’s eyebrows shot up. “Okay. Wine then?”
“Eh.”
“How did she get a job here?” Dane asked. It was a good question, honestly.
“Back off, Dane,” Sabrina said. “She’s our friend.”
And it was those words that kept Clara warm the rest of the day.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
THAT WARM AND FUZZY feeling turned into something else entirely when Clara walked back through the door of her little farmhouse. She was tired. The winery was slammed today with a couple of bachelorette parties and a large tour group of elderly women who had, frankly, been a lot more wound-up than the bachelorette crew.
But when she walked into the house, something was different. It was brighter. It took her a moment to realize that all of the lightbulbs had been replaced with a different kind. The light was no longer a soft yellow, but just a shade whiter. And had she not been so overly familiar with her surroundings she might not have realized that, but she had lived in this house her entire life, and to her, the difference was marked.
The house also smelled good, which meant that Alex had brought food from his future sister-in-law. She wandered into the kitchen and pulled the lid off the Crock-Pot, seeing macaroni and cheese inside. Well, she did approve of that.
The house was remarkably clean, and she noticed the bills that had been sitting on the counter were gone. A strange kind of panic clutched her. She had intended to handle those soon. She really had. She didn’t need Alex to take care of all this for her. She frowned, and then began to walk back toward the front door. Just then, Alex made his way up the steps and into the house. And when he walked over the threshold, the floorboard didn’t squeak.
“What happened to my floorboard?”
“What?” He looked like she’d smacked him in the face. She supposed he expected her to sound grateful. She didn’t feel grateful.
“It squeaks when somebody who weighs over two hundred pounds steps on it. Why didn’t it squeak?” she asked, her voice steadily getting higher and higher.
“I didn’t realize that was your home security system, Clara. It didn’t squeak because I fixed it.”
“I didn’t ask you to fix it,” she said, panic clawing at her now. “I didn’t ask you to do anything with my bills either.”
“I had a house cleaning service come in today while you were gone. They filed the bills. Though I took care of the ones that would let me pay. Some of them I needed your information for. But I got your phone turned back on, so you’re welcome for that too.”
“Alex! This is my life, you can’t just come in and overhaul everything.”
“Actually,” he said, moving deeper into the room, filling the space with his broad chest and shoulders. “I can. This is my house, Clara. This is my ranch. Your brother entrusted it to me. He entrusted you to me. And I have to make sure that everything is taken care of. It was all fine and good to come in and plan a few things, build a new fence and order some bison. But I’m trying to get things in order for you.”
“It’s too much,” she said.
“It’s a lot, I know. This whole thing. And I’m trying to make it less work for you.”
“No, what you’re doing is too much,” she said.
“Clara, you’re being unreasonable.” He paused, sighing and then pushed his hand through his dark hair. “My brother thought you should come over for dinner to talk to Lane about the honey thing. But I’m happy to have that conversation with her. There’s no reason for you to have more on your plate. She really liked it. And she does want to carry it in the store.”
“Alex, if I have the opportunity to meet with Lane to talk about my product, don’t you think I should do it?”
“Clara, I’m more than capable of doing it. Anyway, for now I’m technically in charge of the honey.”
“You can take it and shove it up your ass, Alex. This is my ranch. You’re not staying here. You’re not staying with me. I have to know how to handle this stuff. You can’t just do it all for me. I don’t care how good your intentions are. Though, right now I have a feeling this has more to do with you than with me.”
“This has everything to do with you,” he said as he crossed the space on his way to the Crock-Pot. “Should I dish you some dinner?”
“No! Because I am not a child. I can dish my own damn macaroni and cheese, asshole.” Clara stomped over to the Crock-Pot and jerked a bowl out of the cabinet above it. Then she slammed it down on the counter and wrenched the spoon from Alex’s hand. She began to angrily ladle a portion into the bowl.
“I am an adult woman, thank you very much.”
“Despite the fact that your diet basically consists of items from a children’s menu at a low-grade restaurant chain, I’m well aware that you’re a woman, Clara.”
“Yes,” she said, “of course you are. At least when you want to screw me. But then you get this attack of... I don’t know, misguided chivalry and suddenly you’re treating me like a child again.”
“You’re the one who said that you had nothing and no one for the past few years. I’m trying to be someone.”
“And I...” Her throat closed up, and she didn’t know how to respond to that. Because, yes, just last night she had been thinking about how wonderful it was to have somebody. Just last night she had wanted to forge that bond even deeper between them so she could have something more than that scooped out, hollow loneliness that sometimes seemed to be what she was made of.
But this felt like too much, and it felt more than a little bit frightening. Because she could get used to this. To him. To his big body filling up this small space. To him changing lightbulbs and fixing squeaky boards that her father and brother had never gotten around to repairing.
But she had to remember that he was making this house her home. Under no circumstances was it ever going to be their home. And that was fine; she didn’t even want that. She was only just starting to consider figuring out a life that transcended the aching loneliness and grief she had lived with for so long. The last thing she needed was to become dependent on somebody. Particularly a man.
Particularly him.
“Just talk to me before you do things,” she s
aid, feeling the anger drain out of her as she took her bowl and went to sit down at the small kitchen table. “And I want to go to dinner at your house.”
It hit her then, with a kind of raw shame, that it was very likely he didn’t want her to come to dinner because he didn’t want her to be too enmeshed in his life. Like it was all fine for him to come over here and inveigle himself into the very fabric of her existence, but she couldn’t come sit at the dinner table at his brother’s house without it being a drama.
“If you really want to,” he said. “But my brothers know I’m sleeping with you.”
She choked on a hot noodle, melted cheese scalding the back of her throat. “Oh.” She cleared her throat. “So what?”
“They’ll probably tell Lane and Alison. And that means they’re going to know too. And while you and I both know what this is, they’re not going to. By which I mean they’re undoubtedly going to grill you.”
It was childish to be angry that he had talked to his brothers about their relationship. That he had told them that it was nothing more than the physical. Because hadn’t she just had a conversation with Olivia and Sabrina about that very thing? Yes. She had. Really, she did not have a leg to stand on.
Except she felt like she did.
She felt indignant. The idea of him sitting there with his brothers and laughing and elbowing each other over what had happened last night, when it had been truly transformative and intimate to her, made her feel exposed. Made her feel young and stupid and small.
“It’s not like I walked in and announced it,” he added, not sounding defensive but...protective. It warmed her, even though she tried to fight it.
She looked up at him, at his concerned, serious green eyes that made her want to punch him in the face. “But I came home at about four-thirty this morning, and they aren’t idiots.”
“Well. Okay,” she responded, still feeling a little bit hard done by.
“That was just a warning. I can’t promise they’re not going to make a lot of comments and try to encourage us to open up a wedding registry.”
Clara laughed, because there was really nothing else to do. The idea of Alex marrying her was far too absurd. The idea of her wanting to get married was even more absurd.
“That funny?”
“You know it is,” she said, getting up from her chair and walking over to the fridge. She opened it and dug around until she found a can of Coke in the back. She really needed to go to the store. She popped the top on it and took a long drink.
“You still want to come to dinner?”
“I damn well do want to come to dinner,” she said fiercely.
“All right.” He took a deep breath. “How about tomorrow? The bison are coming in a few days. It would probably be best to get this taken care of before then.”
“I’m going to have to learn all about the bison too,” she said, tapping the Coke can.
“You don’t. We can hire somebody.”
“Alex, I need to know what’s happening on my own ranch. Because it’s going to be my ranch, and my ranch alone, when you leave. At least, the day-to-day of it. I need to be able to take care of it. If somebody can’t come into work, I’m going to be the one the responsibility falls to. If the bison are going to be a massive part of what makes this a moneymaking operation then that control needs to be in my hands. You’re not helping me by handing me something I don’t know how to take charge of.”
Silence settled between them, and she knew she was right, because if she wasn’t, Alex would’ve clapped back with a comment immediately. But she had forced him to think. He was probably mad, but he couldn’t disagree.
“All right. I promise you we’re going to go over everything you need to know to make sure you can take part in the bison stuff.”
“Good. I think I could be very accomplished at bisoning if I was just given a chance.”
“I don’t think that’s a verb.”
“It is,” she insisted, taking another sip of Coke. “It’s a new verb. One that I made up for just this occasion.”
“Great. Well, I will make sure you’re well versed in bisoning.”
She nodded. “That’s what I want.”
“I do live to give you what you want.”
Tension wound tight around them. And she realized then that he hadn’t made a move to touch her. Hadn’t made a move to kiss her. She wondered what was happening with that. If it was just because she had yelled at him the moment he walked in the door over squeaky board issues, or if he was deliberately holding back. She didn’t want to ask. She didn’t want to make the first move.
“I have more work to do outside,” he said.
“That’s fine,” she said, sitting back down in front of her dinner.
“I might just head home tonight.”
She swallowed hard, her throat feeling scratchy, and she wondered if it was from the earlier macaroni and cheese burn or because it just hurt so damn much in her chest that the pain was starting to climb upward.
“You work tomorrow?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Do you want to meet here and I’ll drive you over to dinner?”
“That would be good.”
“All right. I guess I’ll see you then.”
“Okay,” she said.
He turned to go, and panic welled up inside of her. She launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and pressing her face against his back, right in between his shoulder blades. “Thank you,” she said, her voice muffled.
He didn’t move, and for a moment she just held him like that, until her hands—of their own volition—slid down his chest, just ever so slightly.
He turned his head, looking at her out of the corner of his eye. “You’re welcome,” he said, his voice rough.
She leaned forward, and that was all it took to get him to arch back slightly and claim her mouth. She held on to him tightly, turning her head and meeting his lips as best she could. It didn’t allow for the deepest kiss, but there was something about the desperation inherent in the angle that she quite liked.
She could feel his heart raging beneath her palm, and really, her own heart was beating fast, as well. She wanted more. Instantly. The moment they started kissing, she wanted everything.
“I should go,” he said, the words sounding labored.
“Sure,” she responded.
Except, there was no sure about it. She didn’t understand why he had to leave. She didn’t understand why he couldn’t just spend the night.
She wasn’t going to beg him to either.
“I have to be up early,” he said.
As excuses went, it was lame. They both knew that Alex was a soldier, and that he was tougher than a little bit of sleep deprivation. Still, she wasn’t going to press.
“See you at dinner,” she replied, brushing her fingertips against his chest, over his heart, before letting him go.
And when he was gone, and she sat back down with her mac and cheese, she didn’t cry. Much.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CLARA SEEMED SUBDUED if oddly determined when Alex came to pick her up for dinner the next day. He had a feeling that leaving her alone last night hadn’t sat well with her, but just assuming he was going to spend the night every night, establishing a situation where he did, didn’t sit well with him.
What was between them couldn’t last. Plus, he had to pay attention to what was happening at the Laughing Irish. He couldn’t spend too many nights away, couldn’t go wandering up to the house past time to start work whenever he felt like it.
At least, that all made for a convenient excuse. And he could pretend it had nothing whatsoever to do with the tightening in his chest that occurred every time he looked at Clara.
It was happening now. Even
though she was being determinedly silent while giving off icy waves in the passenger seat of his truck.
“How did you sleep last night?” she asked, breaking the silence, her tone arch.
Okay. At least she wasn’t going to make him wonder what this was about. It was about exactly what he suspected it was about.
“Not good. And alone.”
She looked over at him, blinking rapidly. “Oh?”
“Did you expect me to lie? I haven’t lied to you yet. I’m not going to start now.”
“Well, you weren’t exactly honest with me last night. You acted like... You acted like you didn’t even want me.”
He was grateful for the fact that he was driving. Because if he wasn’t, he would have grabbed her and pulled her toward him. Hauled her up onto his lap and showed her just how much he did want her.
“I didn’t want to make assumptions,” he said.
She snorted. A completely inelegant sound. “There was no assuming involved in this. You knew I wanted you. I kissed you before you left. And if I hadn’t, you wouldn’t have touched me at all.”
“Clara,” he said, doing his best to stay calm. “I was being a gentleman.”
“No you weren’t,” she said. “You were being scared.”
Then he did pull the truck over. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” she said.
A car drove by on the two-lane road, but no one came after that. They were in a small turnout with deep, muddy ruts carved into it, the woods on one side, the vacant road on the other.
“I’m wondering why exactly you think a twenty-one-year-old almost virgin would scare me?”
She shrugged. “I suppose that’s exactly why I scare you.”
The problem was, she was right. Not so much because of her age or her lack of experience, but all of the things that combined to make Clara Clara. She was an unknown entity. One he didn’t know how to manage. He could tell himself he knew exactly how it was going to go. That he had a plan. But she was about as predictable as an Oregon weather forecast.