by Laura Drake
A minute later, he locks the door of the house and rounds the front of the truck.
Dead silence takes on new meaning on the drive home. I hold my anger close, blowing on the embers when they start to cool. It’s the only way to keep myself from crying, and to hold onto one shred of my dignity.
I use the time to reload what ammo I have left. When he pulls up to my door, I hit him with it. “I’ll have you know that I’m done putting my dreams on hold for you. I have my license, and a motorcycle down at Floyd’s in my name.”
“You what? What do you want a motorcycle for? It’s dangerous.”
I throw him a huge eye roll. “Says the guy who rides two-thousand-pound bulls for a living.”
“Yeah, but I’m a man.”
I shouldn’t be surprised. I was raised on old-fashioned country attitudes, and you can’t get much more country than Unforgiven. Still, it rankles. “You know, the sad thing is, you don’t see anything wrong with what you just said.” I know this is just an immature attempt to hurt him, but when you’re dying inside you use whatever you can.
He frowns across the gulf of seat between us. “Tigger, I don’t want you doing this. Really, I don’t.”
“You lost the right to call me that, Austin Davis.” I raise my chin. “And you have no say in it. I’m going to go find out who I am, without you. I’m done with being who everyone expects me to be. I’m a single woman, and this is the twenty-first century. I’ll do whatever I please. And you?” I flick my nails at him. “You’re in the rearview mirror.” I push open the door and take the long step down. “Hit the road, Austin. That’s what you’re really good at.”
I walk away and don’t look back. I just wish I could have done it without the internal whimpering.
I’m glad Nana and Papaw are having lunch in town so they aren’t here to witness the meltdown. I pace the twelve steps across my room, revelations going off like self-esteem claymores.
Twenty-five years gone, loving a man who loves the rodeo more.
I’ve got to be the last one in town to know this. Everyone must think Austin has me wrapped around his finger…or some other dangling appendage.
Has he?
Well, if he does, that ends today. I probably should feel some pride for finally standing up for myself and chasing my own dreams, but I don’t.
I am destroyed.
Chapter 3
Carly
Two weeks later, Papaw’s new truck backfires through the turn onto the town square, demonstrating why I named it “El Fartito.” The only thing new about it is the owners. It’s only five years younger than Nellybelle but it runs, and I don’t have to bum rides to work.
A flicking glance in the mirror takes my heart out of gear. A longer look makes it hammer like Fartito at sixty.
A dusty red F250 is two inches off my bumper. Behind the wheel, green eyes, a country-boy smile. Austin. He wasn’t due back until—crap. Today is Monday. He may not recognize the truck, but he sure knows my hair: the color, the texture, how it tastes.
His grin spreads and he raises his index finger from the wheel in the universal country greeting.
I feel the tug of the gravitational pull in that grin. My stomach rises like the first time I jumped off the cliff into the quarry lake.
Give him another chance. The voice in my head is a little girl’s. A little girl who believed in the tooth fairy, bedtime stories, and happily ever after.
Well, that chick needs to strap on some big-girl panties. A wave of pissed rolls over me. I do this every time. My resolve is firm, right up ’til Austin enters my orbit. I lock my eyes forward and flick him a one-finger salute of my own.
He blats his horn and my fingers go white on the wheel. There’s no ditching him; he knows where I’m going. Can probably even guess I’ve been on a supply run. My jaw snaps tight so fast my teeth click.
Buggers on a bun.
I pull into a spot in front of the diner and turn off the ignition. The truck bounces, chokes, and wheezes for thirty seconds before, with one last fart, it dies. Blood flash-floods my face. A glance in the rearview mirror confirms that I look like a baked tomato. I’m so not ready for this.
Austin steps to my open window, rests his arm on the sill, and smiles in at me. “Damned fine vehicle you got here, Tigger. Floyd palmed it off on you, didn’t he?”
“Don’t you diss El Fartito, Davis.” I can’t think with those radar-love eyes zeroing in on me. I duck my head, grab my purse and the grocery bags, and push open the door, forcing him to step back. I slide to the hot asphalt.
“Don’t I at least get a hug?” He opens those well-muscled arms.
I want to touch the soft curl falling on his forehead. I want to trace those lips with my tongue. I want to run. “Get. Lost.” I duck around him and hoof it for the diner.
The bell clanks when I pull open the door. The dinnertime babble settles over me. My heart settles to a more normal cadence. This is my turf.
The bell clanks again.
Lorelei’s standing at the cash register, hand on hip.
The deep, too-loud voice comes from behind. “Carly Beauchamp, are you telling me you got no sugar for a cowboy who brought you home a Champion’s buckle?”
The diner falls silent as the O.K. Corral before the shooting started.
Can skin burst into flame? I pass the bags to Lorelei. “Give it to a buckle bunny, Davis. You’ve got nothing I want.”
“Aw, come on, Carly, don’t be mean,” Moss chimes in from his seat at the counter.
The teenagers in booth four sing a soprano chorus of “Hey, Austin.”
Ignoring my personal peanut gallery, I ask Lorelei, “Everything okay?”
“Um. Fine.” She’s looking over my shoulder.
“You don’t need anything?”
“No. We’re good.”
“Your Nana raised you better than to ignore folks, Carly.” My junior high principal’s voice hasn’t grown less commanding over the years.
“I don’t recall putting my love life to a vote.” I turn to glare at the room in general and my nose almost brushes Austin’s shirt. I take a step back. If I leave now, it’s going to look like I’m running. And Carly Beauchamp doesn’t run. I put my palms against his chest and push until he backs up. I cross the floor, hit the swinging door to the kitchen, and head for my office.
I don’t hear it swing closed.
Fish’s voice comes from behind me. “Hey, Austin, when did you get back into town?”
“Just now. You still teachin’ the kids drumming?”
“Oh yeah. You’ll have to come out—”
The rest is cut off by my slamming office door.
I haven’t even caught my breath when it opens and Austin peeks in, waving a white napkin. “Can we parlay for ten minutes?”
And give him time to change my mind? “No.”
The door opens wider. “Aw, come on, Tigger, five minutes, and promise I won’t bother you no more.”
I narrow my eyes. “Swear?”
“Swear.” He licks his finger and makes a cross on his chest.
At my nod, he steps in and closes the door behind him. The room gets too small. Austin Davis isn’t a big man, but his personality fills a room. He’s cocky, irritating, too good-looking, charming, and damn it, his cologne is working on my lady parts.
He slips his fingers in the front pockets of his jeans. “Carly, you’ve been the only woman for me since the first grade. There is not a buckle bunny that could ever turn my head, and you know it.” He tips his head to the side and gives me his most winning smile, which takes a blowtorch to my frozen heart. “You’re my girl.”
“Not anymore, I’m not.” I look down, so his puppy-dog eyes can’t influence me.
“Your beautiful face is the last sight I hope to see before I die. Don’t you know that by now?”
His voice flows over me, his words making inroads in my resolve. Afraid my voice will give me away, I shake my head. Instant gratification versus long-
term happiness has started a war, and the heavy artillery barrage has begun. In my gut. In my brain.
“Do you want me to get down on one knee out there?” He points to the dining room. “Because I will. I’ll drive out and ask your Papaw for your hand right now. Just say the word.”
This would be so much easier if he was the loser I make him out to be when he’s gone. But when he’s standing in front of me, those arguments are as see-through as my Victoria’s Secret undies. “See? This is why I can’t do this.” I put my hands in my curls and pull. “It isn’t about being in love. It isn’t about being engaged. Hell, half the town already figures we are!”
He rests his hands on my folded arms. “Aw, come on, Tig.”
I jerk my arms away and take a step back. “Not going to happen.”
He hooks a finger in his belt loop. “It’s gonna happen. We’ll get married as soon as—”
“I know, I know. I’ve heard it a hundred times. I’m what you’ll do when you can’t do what you want to do anymore.”
“Now I never said th—”
“This no longer works for me, Austin. I feel like a parting gift on some game show.” My voice cracks like hot tea over ice. “I know all about your dreams. What about mine?”
“Our dreams are the same, Tig. We’ll buy some quality bloodlines—bulls and horses. In ten years we’ll be sitting pretty, supplying rodeos in three states with the best bucking stock around. C&A Rough Stock, that’s us.” He takes a step, but my hand stops him. “By then, there’ll be babies—boys I can teach to ride, and beautiful little girls with hair of fire and freckles, to steal cowboy hearts.” I see his belief in the depths of those green eyes. “I love you, Carly Beauchamp.”
I know he loves me. I’m tired. I’m hurting. I’m weak. I miss the one person I can totally be myself with. My body has missed him. All I want to do is set down all my worries for a while.
But then I’d have to live the rest of my life knowing that when it came down to it, I didn’t matter as much as what my husband really wanted. And I’ve had a long two weeks to think about that. I can’t do it. “We. Are. Done. Look me in the eyes, Austin Davis. Can you see that I mean it?”
He looks. Close. Then he nods.
I point at the door. “Get out. You come sniffing around, I swear I’ll get Pawpaw’s shotgun and load your butt with buckshot.”
With one more “forgive me” look, he walks out.
I’m blazing hot. He led me along for nine years. Nine years I can’t get back. I’ve cut myself loose, with no safety net, and now I’m falling. How dare he just assume I’m going to blindly follow, my hands in the back pockets of his Wranglers, until he decides to turn around and deal with me? The nerve. The arrogance. The…buttwipe. I fume, calling him names in my head that Nana would wash my mouth out for.
When the edges of my anger at him burn off, there’s plenty left for me. I’m not some empty-headed buckle bunny. I went along. I lived in hope, in denial, for nine years. Sure, I pitched a fit once a year, but it was just a rock in the stream of Us. We came back together on the other side, with barely a ripple.
Did I ever really believe it would be one more year?
Yes, I did. For maybe the first five years. After that, I dreaded our annual Come to Jesus meeting as much as he did, because of what might be on the other side. Oh, those agonizing weeks, when the frustration and anger would build.
Every year it got harder—the stakes got higher. On one hand, he was getting older, so odds were better that he’d end his career. But hitting that rock all those years left damage, below the surface. Every “next year” hurt more. Until this year, when I couldn’t help but see what I’m sure everyone saw a long time ago.
He doesn’t want to end his career. I’m always going to be second.
And that tells me I was in denial about a lot of things. We’re not equal partners in this relationship. That he never loved me as much as I loved him.
And that I was in love with the guy I wanted him to be, not the real Austin Davis.
Even as I think it, I realize that I’ve thought this before. I thought it, and quickly buried it, down in the deep dark. I didn’t want to know.
I’m sure he loves the Carly he thinks I am, and I can’t really blame him, since I’ve worked hard to be that Carly.
She’s the only Carly I know, too.
Is there another me under here? God, how can I have gotten this old, and not ever considered that?
My insides feel shredded, clawed to strips. I need maternal advice. In the old days, I’d’ve called Austin’s mother, but that’s out now. I pick up the phone to call a lifeline. I admire the heck out of Cora Jenkins. She’s older than my mom would be, but we got to be fast friends back when I was running barrels on the rodeo circuit. Her husband owned the food truck that supplied the rodeo, and when he died of a massive heart attack leaving her bereft and broke, Cora took over. She was alone and lonely, and I was overdosed on testosterone from hanging with cowboys 24/7. I’d bring a bottle of wine, and we’d talk about anything and everything until the wee hours of the morning.
A half hour later, I hang up calmer. Cora’s down-home savvy, support, and sympathy are like a shot of novocaine to my aching soul.
There’s a tentative knock at my door. “Carly? It’s me.”
I sit upright and pull out order forms so it looks like I’m working. “Come on in, Lorelei.”
“You know better than to let those idiots out there get to you. They’re all jealous because of what you and Austin—” She steps in and shuts the door behind her. “Whoa. You look like late August roadkill. What is it, hon?”
“I broke up with Austin. Forever.” And if she tells me I always say that, I’m going to lose it.
There is no private life in a small town. Especially when you own the place everyone comes to gossip. The town has had a front row seat to every one of Austin’s and my breakups. Some years they last a week; some years, a month.
But this time is different. I have a hard head, but the lesson has gotten through, this time. I’m done for good.
She hikes a butt-cheek on the desk and takes my hand. “Oh Carly, I’m so sorry.”
My breath rushes out, which, as it turns out, is the only thing holding me upright. My head drops onto the desk. “At least you believe me.”
“Hon, anyone with half a brain would know to look at you. Was it the rodeo?”
I’m half glad I don’t have to explain, half mortified that I don’t. I really was the last one to figure it out. I nod.
“Well, you know what? You’re worth ten little boys like that, Carly Beauchamp. He’ll never grow up, and you deserve better.”
“I know you’re right. So why does it feel like I’m going through DTs?” I hold out my hand. It’s got the shakes.
“Cold turkey is always best.” She pats my back. “What you need is distraction. You want to come out to the Rooster with me on Friday night?”
The Rowdy Rooster is Unforgiven’s only bar, and it lives up to its name. Most Saturday nights end in a brawl. “Nah. By then, the word will be out, and all I’d get are pity dances, or come-ons. Thanks anyway.”
“You’re probably right.”
An idea pops into my brain, fully formed. “I need to go where I don’t know anyone. Where I wouldn’t have to explain, or hear…maybe I’ll hit a bar in Albuquerque.”
“Not alone.”
“Why not?”
Lorelei’s brows go up and her eyes get big. “Carly, Albuquerque may be only fifty miles away, but it’s a big city. You don’t know what could happen.”
“Yeah, that’s the draw.” I’m full up with people telling me what I can and can’t do.”
“No, it’s not safe. Promise me if you want to go, you’ll call me. I’ll go with you.”
“I’m not ready yet, anyway.” I pick up a pen. The order isn’t going to place itself. “How are we doing for tea? I was thinking of trying some of that Passion Fruit instant stuff.”
; Lorelei’s mouth opens in horror.
“I’m kidding, I’m kidding.” I sigh, trying to duck a vision of the ceaseless stretch of days ahead.
Chapter 4
Carly
A month. That’s how long it’s taken for the steam to build to the point that I have a constant whistling in my ears—a pressure cooker ready to blow. I’ve tried, truly. Tried to settle into the bombed-out shell of a life I have left. Tried to shore up the brave façade that crumbles every night when I’m alone. Tried to wait out the gossip, and the comments.
Where’s Austin?
When’s he coming home?
Really? Broken up? Again?
Nana doesn’t say so, but I know from her sideways looks that even she thinks we’ll get back together.
But what they don’t know is, this time is different. I’ve always come in second place in Austin’s life. I’m going to go find a life of my own to star in.
I hadn’t realized that if you are with someone long enough, people see you as a single entity. Carly/Austin, Austin/Carly. They have a slightly unfocused look when they talk to me—like they’re looking for someone who isn’t there. Like they’re not sure they know me anymore.
I’d be pissed, but I don’t know me anymore, either. Who am I, all by myself? It’s past time I find out. I lift my duffel and head for the door.
“I’ll see you Saturday afternoon, Nana.” The screen door slaps behind me.
I climb into El Fartito, who starts after blatting an opinion about a trip to Albuquerque. I roll down the drive, heading for I-40 and some distraction.
Maybe Austin convinced himself he’s rodeoing for us. Maybe I could guilt him into coming off the road. But I think too much of dreams to dash his. Besides, what kind of marriage would that be? He’d eventually resent me for taking away the last of his glory days. And I’d always know I came in second.
What we have would crisp to cinders, and we’d end up like the Harrisons down the road—bitter and hateful, staying together out of fear and habit. Better that love dies a natural death than to burn alive. I know I’m right. Even if I don’t want to be.