Coming Home to Mustang Ridge

by Jesse Hayworth

  She told herself not to stare, but even when she made herself turn away and focus on her butterfly, she remained elementally aware of his presence, his movements, and how the sticky sound of the paint roller was almost like a kiss, moist and intimate. Which made it darn near impossible to concentrate on her painting.

  Stop it. You know where you stand. Unfortunately, rather than feeling like they had settled anything, it felt more like she was tippy-toe at the edge of a cliff and sorely tempted to take the leap, even though everything inside her was screaming, Don’t do it! Don’t jump!

  She was going to listen this time, darn it. She was. Buying the store had been a leap, and she still wasn’t sure if she was going to have a soft landing or go splat. Another leap—especially one involving him—could put her in some serious free fall, headed for a bunch of pointy rocks.

  “Paint your darned butterfly, already,” she muttered under her breath, and made herself mix a brilliant shade of purple.

  “What was that?”

  “Just talking to myself.”

  Sort of.

  Quiet fell between them, not quite comfortable, but getting there. After a bit, he asked, “Have you always painted?”

  It was a safe question. A let’s-just-be-friends question. You can do this. She’d far rather be his friend than some sort of not-quite-enemy. Wiggling her paintbrush in a gesture of yes/no/sort of, she said, “I’ve always been into art. Paint, pencil, pastel, clay—whatever struck me. It used to drive my instructors batty that I’d rather be okay at a whole lot of things than really good at any one thing. My mother, too.”

  “She wanted you to be an artist?”

  “She wanted me to be a prodigy.”

  He glanced over. “Oh?”

  Shrugging, she said, “It’s not that interesting.”

  “We’ve got a lot of paint to get through, and now you’ve got me curious. So tell me about being a prodigy.”

  “I wasn’t. That was the problem. I was good, but not spectacular.”

  “Good is good.”

  “Not good enough.” She could leave it at that, but something about being there with him, with the radio playing alt rock and the world outside going dark, loosened her hold on things. “After I came along and Wylie faded out of the picture, money got real tight. Mom worked retail, while Wyatt watched me and picked up ranch chores where he could. From age eleven on, when he should’ve been being a kid instead of raising one. And the whole time, they had it in their heads that I was going to be the one to break the family tradition by actually being somebody.”

  “Everyone is somebody.”

  She only wished it had been that easy. “Tell them that.” But she exhaled. “I take that back. I owe them so much.” Which was part of the problem. “They were so convinced that I was something special, that when one of my art teachers used the p-word—prodigy, I mean—they took it and ran with it. Classes, contests, supplies . . . stuff I knew we couldn’t afford, but they kept insisting, said it was an investment in my future.”

  “Lot of pressure to put on a kid.”

  “They just wanted me to be okay.” Words emerged from the patterns on the butterfly’s wings, not Girl Power, but Stand Your Ground. “It wasn’t until I went off to art school—little fish in a big pond, you know—that it became painfully obvious that my version of good wasn’t close to being good enough.”

  “Depends on your perspective.” He nodded to the purple butterfly. “It suits you. As does the motto.”

  She stepped back and surveyed the finished product, feeling her lips curve.

  It wouldn’t have rated the back of the bathroom door at Iron Horse, the gallery that handled Wyatt’s sculptures, and was admittedly more a craft project than a piece of art. But the sweeping swirls of purple and gold were so fluid it made the butterfly’s wings look like they were moving, and the text disappeared and reappeared depending on how she focused her eyes.

  Stand Your Ground.

  Yeah. She was working on that one. Getting better at it, though.

  “It’s okay.” But she smiled as she said it.

  “Why butterflies?”

  “One of my favorite parts of being at the store is seeing the glow a woman gets when she finds something that speaks uniquely to her, something that transforms her old look into something new and vivid. That’s when she’s a butterfly. Better yet, it’s when she stops wishing she could blend in with all the other caterpillars, and spreads her wings instead.”

  “Like you’re doing now.”

  “Trying to do, anyway.” It mattered that he saw it. That he got it. “My family doesn’t understand, but that’s okay as long as I do.” Throwing her arms wide, she did a little pirouette, letting her head fall back as she exclaimed, “I love this place. The town. The shop. My new life. All of it.”

  When she stopped her spin, her ponytail came to rest over one shoulder, but her head felt like it kept on going a moment longer, in a wonderfully dizzying sensation. Then she caught the look on Ty’s face, and the spinning stopped.

  Everything stopped as the naked hunger in his expression reached inside her and sparked the blaze that had been building since the moment he’d tapped her shoulder and called her Picasso.

  Setting aside his paint roller, he rose to his feet. Came toward her. Held out a hand. “You’re beautiful, Ashley. Inside and out. Don’t ever let anybody tell you different.”

  Men had called her beautiful before, not seeming to care that it was a happy accident of genetics that her face was arranged the way it was, and nothing to do with what went on beneath. Ty, though, saw deeper. He saw what mattered.

  Almost without conscious volition, her hand rose to his. Their fingers tangled together, the drag of his work-roughened skin sending new heat into her veins. She wanted those hands on her face, her body. It didn’t matter that they had agreed not an hour ago that this wasn’t going to happen—things were shifting now, changing.

  Transforming.

  She stepped closer, her eyes locking on his lips, on the way his throat moved when he swallowed thickly. His free hand came up to her waist, slipped down to settle at the point of her hip, where her jeans rode low, baring a strip of sensitized skin. As his thumb traced a maddening pattern, he said, “I don’t want to do something you’re going to regret.”

  “I won’t.” There was no hesitation.

  One eyebrow quirked in what she was coming to recognize as not-quite-a-smile amusement. “You won’t kiss me, or you won’t regret it after?”

  “I won’t regret it. Not when I know exactly what I’m getting into.” She flattened her palm on the solid bulge of his chest, feeling the powerful drum of his heart. “I said before that I’m no good at keeping things casual, but that’s not exactly true. It’s more that I’ve never gotten a chance to try.” Not as a grown-up, with honesty on both sides. “I think I’d like to. With you.”

  His fingers tightened on her hip. “Why the change of heart?”

  She glanced over at the butterflies, one purple, one blue. “Not a change, an evolution.”

  “I’d be an idiot to argue with that,” he said in a low voice. “Especially after seeing what I’ve seen from you over the past few days.” He lifted a hand to brush his fingers across her temple and down to her cheek, and when she looked back at him, he caught her lips with his.

  And, for the second time, they shared their first kiss.

  It started soft and sweet, then deepened incrementally—a slide of lips, a touch of tongue that said he knew what he was doing. She parted her lips and let him in, reveling in the sensation when his arms banded around her, tightening her against his body with delicious pressure. He changed the angle of the kiss, taking it deeper, and she followed him down into the whirl of pleasure. Oh, this was what she wanted, here and now.

  His masculine scent cut through the odors of sawdust and paint
, surrounding her as surely as his big body enfolded her, not making her feel protected so much as powerful. Their lips fused, their hands roamed, and Ashley lost herself to the moment, the magic. The man.

  His kiss.

  It went on and on but passed in a flash, and before she was nearly ready, he had eased back to look down at her, his eyes black with passion in the muted light.

  She stared at him, breathing hard as a single word echoed in the sudden stillness of her brain: yowza. That hadn’t just been a kiss, it had been the kiss, the one all others should be measured against. Or was that coming from the freedom of knowing that she didn’t have to worry about the future with him?

  The floor was solid beneath her feet, the world steady around her. She hadn’t gone over the edge of the cliff. She wouldn’t go over, not this time. Touching a finger to his lips, she said, “No regrets, cowboy.”

  One eyebrow lifted. “Another pact?”

  “If you like.”

  “Well, then.” He leaned in and brushed his lips across hers, once more, sparking greedy need within her. “Here’s to keeping things simple and being good to each other. And to no regrets.”

  • • •

  Far from regretting her decision, Ashley found that things between her and Ty got better and better as the week went on.

  On Tuesday, he showed up at the store just past closing time, armed with more brushes and rollers, along with a memory stick loaded with music.

  “You made me a mix tape!” She clutched it to her chest, playing it up so he wouldn’t see that she had gone all mushy inside. Then she mock-frowned. “Or is this a comment on my choice in radio stations?”

  “Gift horse,” he drawled, “mouth. You want it or not?”

  Of course she wanted it. She wanted all of it—the tunes, the help, the man. . . . But she would stick with the first two, at least for now. She knew that kisses soon wouldn’t be nearly enough, but she wasn’t ready to go any further with him. Take it slow. Don’t jump until you’ve got your spot picked out at the bottom and you’re sure you’ll land on your feet.

  They painted to rockabilly and the blues, argued the merits of her beloved alternative rock, and made up unlikely names for a new slate of appetizers at the Rope Burn—everything from Peeping Tom Frog Legs to My Eyes Are Up Here Chicken Breasts. And when the staging was its full two-toned gray and a dozen butterflies were propped up to finish drying, she walked him to the back door and they kissed to the sweet melody of a single guitar played so well she could almost hear words in the notes.

  On Wednesday, he brought a giant picnic basket from the ranch, flourishing it as he came through the door. “I’ve got fried chicken, coleslaw, biscuits, and cookies. If I know Gran, there’ll be a checkered picnic cloth, too, for fun.”

  Stomach tightening as much from the sight of him as the menu, Ashley grinned. “We’ll take it up on the roof when we’re done with the grunt work—the view is incredible. It’ll be the perfect reward for us getting the rest of the floor space cleared and the racks packed away.”

  And it was, too. As was the precious half hour they spent nestled together after their picnic, staring up at the sky while he showed her the Boot, the Snake, and a few of the other constellations the old-timey cowboys used both as navigation and as company on the long, lonely nights out with the herd.

  Then, later, after they kissed good night, she came through the door into her apartment with her lips warm and chafed and her body feeling feather-light. Spinning across the living room with her arms wide, she said, “Can you believe it, Petunia? I think I might actually be able to pull this off.” The fashion show. The shop. Keeping things with Ty within bounds.

  All of it.

  On Thursday, Ty came to help her assemble the stage on the eerily empty sales floor, lugging the heavy sections in from the loading dock, one by one, while sweat beaded his brow and dampened his T-shirt, making it cling to his muscles.

  The sight heated her blood. That morning, she had awakened with her heart pounding and the phantom press of his lips on hers. During the day, she had caught herself staring at something—a mannequin, an outfit for the fashion show, a sea of butterfly-shaped giveaway bags—and seeing him instead. The powerful width of his shoulders, the glint that came into his eyes before they kissed, the lopsided grin that made her weak in the knees.

  She didn’t jump easily into bed with a man, but she wasn’t any stranger to sex. Sex with him, though . . . the thought brought a whole-body flush and a thrum of anticipation.

  Hold off, warned her inner voice. There’s no rush. Better to let it build. Which was true. Her body, though, wanted to charge headlong and see if the reality matched the fantasy. Or, better yet, exceeded it.

  Come upstairs, she wanted to say as he worked the bolts into place, securing the first two gray-painted sections together. Let’s take a break together. Instead, she said, “I’m going to order pizza.”

  They polished off a large pepperoni and a two-liter of high-test soda that she had picked on the theory that she needed the caffeine and sugar to keep her going. It made her jittery, though. So much so that she almost invited him upstairs after all, when their good night kisses suggested they both had more than their share of energy to burn.

  She lingered in the kiss, held back by the sense that it wasn’t time yet. She had to do this on her own.

  Stepping back, she brushed her fingers across his chest, let them trail down his arm, and thrilled to the way his nostrils flared. “Sleep well.” Her voice was husky, her breathing quick.

  He gave a short, rusty chuckle. “Yeah, right. You, too.”

  “Yeah, right. I’ll see you tomorrow?”

  “Count on it.” He brushed his lips across hers one last time, and said, “You’re gonna do great.” Then, settling his Stetson on his brow, he jogged down the stairs of the loading dock and made for his truck. He waved before hopping in, and again when he pulled out of the back lot, threading his truck along the alley and back out onto Main Street.

  As the sound of the truck’s engine faded, a church bell tolled in the still night air, saying it was midnight. Then past midnight. And, ready or not, it was Friday.

  11

  By midday, Ashley could barely remember her name as she buzzed around the shop, hanging butterflies and setting up her best mannequins. Later, she would dress the figures with the exquisite gowns Della had sent up from the city, along with a handmade card that looked like a ransom note and said, Good luck! Wish I could be there—I know you’ll kick ass! Hen, meanwhile, had taken to screaming at odd intervals, mostly when she found things that she thought were done that weren’t, or had somehow gotten undone, even though the shop was closed for the morning and they were the only two people there.

  All in all, they were right on schedule. Ashley had even written it on the Big List: Friday morning. Utter chaos.

  She had already checked it off. In fact, she was thinking of checking it off a second time, just because.

  “T minus eight hours and counting,” Hen announced, grabbing double handfuls of her long hair. “Aahhhh!”

  “We’ve got this,” Ashley assured her. “We’re a team. Speaking of which, can you help me with this?” She had gotten a killer deal on a bolt of polyester cloth printed with jungle-esque foliage that had the occasional pair of slitted yellow eyes peering through, and was using it to swath the bar and catering station.

  Hen made a face. “Can we talk about that fabric?”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “I’m pretty sure those eyes are following me.”

  “Last month you thought the mailman was following you. And the eyes add visual interest.”

  “I say they’re creepy, but you’re the boss.” Hen snagged the staple gun off the top of the bar setup that the caterers had brought over first thing, and got to work, deftly pleating the fabric that Ashley held up and fastenin
g it in place. “Speaking of beady yellow eyes that can see into your soul, how’s your cat?”

  “Petunia the Invisible?”

  “He’ll come around,” Hen assured her, “especially when you’ve got more time to sit and talk to him.”

  Guilt pinched. “In the next decade or so, you mean?” Between the store and Ty, she didn’t know how much sitting and talking was going to happen anytime soon. Not that Hen knew about the Ty stuff. Ashley had been keeping that to herself, for now. “How long do cats live anyway?”

  “The teens are getting up there. How old is Petunia?”

  “No clue. I’ll have to ask Nick.” She didn’t put it on the Big List, though, as the darn thing was already too daunting. Instead, she crossed off Hang fabric. Next up? Arrange chairs. “Okay,” she said, dusting her hands together like a gymnast laying on some chalk. “Let’s dial up the girl power and—” She broke off as a knock sounded at the front door. “Hold that thought.”

  She headed for the door, muttering about the meaning of a CLOSED sign and the note below it that said, Sorry, we’re closed to set up for tonight’s fashion show! Doors open at 7 p.m., the show starts at 8. For tickets, see Betty at the bakery. When she saw who was on the other side, though, she grinned. Popping the lock, she swung the door open. “Gilly, hey there. Looking good!”

  The teen was wearing a vivid green tee with jeans and boots, and had her brother’s jacket slung over her arm, name patch facing up. And instead of staring at her toes, she peered up at Ashley through her bangs. “Hey. I know you’re closed. Sorry to bother you.”

  “Is everything okay?” Ashley hadn’t seen her since the other day, when she had sent Gilly home from their big try-on session with a ticket for her mom.

  “Sure, fine. I just . . . I thought you might need some help. You know, setting up and stuff.”

  “Ohmigosh, yes. Thank you!” Ashley caught the girl’s arm and drew her through the door. “Come in, come in. Hen? We’ve got a new recruit.”