Cowboy Come Home

by Sinclair Jayne

  He inhaled her delicate scent—lightly floral—honeysuckle—and lemon. She reminded him of sunshine, but her arms were chilled. He rubbed his hand back and forth over her bare arms and wished he’d brought his jacket to the dinner.

  “Sorry,” Piper said for like the fifth time. “I’m sorry. I promised myself I wouldn’t cry. I don’t want you to feel bad.”

  Bad was an understatement. He felt like fucking hell.

  “Piper, baby, this kills me. I never meant to hurt you.”

  “I know.”

  He could feel her trembling against him, trying to choke back her sobs. He stroked his hand over her back and held her close, wanting to warm her, soothe her. And hell if he knew how he was going to let her go.

  He closed his eyes, so exhausted he wasn’t even sure if he could find the energy to stand up and get them both home. That was it, wasn’t it? Piper had become his home—not Marietta, not the ranch, not the trailer, not even his family. None of it would be home without Piper.

  “Let me just hold you,” he whispered.

  For a little while until you feel better.

  He wanted to fix this. He always fixed things—broken farm equipment, engines, tractors, motors of all sorts. Anything mechanical, he was the man, but with broken hearts, broken dreams, he was helpless. Useless.

  “It will be that much harder when you let go.” Her voice was as broken as he felt.

  She was right. Of course she was. Far off he could hear the strains of the band, and he thought the melodic rumble of the crowd, and closer the hum of the last of the season’s crickets and Piper’s hiccupping sobs.

  “We were good together, baby.”

  “I need more than good, Boone. I need more than today and maybe tomorrow.”

  He nodded.

  “I have goals for myself, and I was hoping that my goals aligned with yours, and seeing this town, knowing that you grew up here and that you have a family and a ranch here just made me see that even though you have roots, you don’t want to put any down with me.”

  Her voice ached. He ached.

  “Oh, Piper. It’s not like that at all,” he said, letting his mouth rest against his silky hair. “You’re perfect. I’ve been the luckiest idiot ever that you even looked my way. It’s just that my life has been handed to me. Everything prescribed. So much history. So much legacy. My parents are so in love. They are the best. My dad is my hero. He’s accomplished so much, and I’m just his son.”

  Piper finally looked at him. Her mouth was a whisper away from his.

  “I don’t understand. Why doesn’t that make you happy?”

  He huffed out a hollow laugh. “That’s the worst part of it, baby. I just can’t explain it, but everything that’s considered mine, my legacy, my future, was created by my parents. I need to know who I am separate from them. And if I come home and work the ranch again, I want to bring something with me. Something that’s just me.”

  “Like what?”

  He let her question settle into him. That was it, wasn’t it? The crux. The million-dollar question.

  “Land? Prize money? Buckles? How many?” Piper asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you even want to work the ranch? You said you didn’t want to go to college. Would you rather go into stock contracting? Announcing? Promotion?”

  “Piper, I don’t know.”

  “How can you achieve something if you don’t know what it is?”

  Her words hit with the power of a hoof to his sternum.

  “See that’s just it, Boone. I don’t care about any of that, and I think your parents are the same.” Piper scooted onto her knees and held his face between her two chilled hands. “I love you as you are. I don’t need you to be anything else, accomplish anything else. I love the man before me. I love you when you win and when you lose. I love you when you’re happy and fun and when you’re quiet and withdrawn. But if you are going to hold yourself to a standard of accomplishment, you need to know what it is. You can’t achieve something you can’t articulate. How can you know when you’ve climbed your peak, if you can’t see it?”

  She leaned forward and kissed his mouth, sweetly.

  “I want you to achieve your dreams, Boone. I want you to feel like you’ve made your mark, and I’d love it to be with me, but until you know what you want, you can’t be the man you want to be.”

  “I know.”

  “But if you remember nothing else about me, know that I love the man you are now.”

  He knew this was when he needed to let her go, but instead Piper sat back and didn’t resist when he curled her against his side. She laid her head on his shoulder and he just sat there enjoying feeling each breath she took.

  “Let’s get you to bed, baby. It’s been a hella day. I’ll take the truck.”

  “No, it’s your trailer. And you have to compete tomorrow. I’ll take the truck. Or sleep here.”

  His heart lurched in fear at the thought of Piper alone in a field full of cowboys and ranch hands.

  “Not going to argue about that. No way would I let you sleep in the truck without me when there will be dozens of half-drunk cowboys and stock hands around. You get the trailer.”

  “You could go to your parents’ ranch.”

  He kissed her forehead. “Not leaving you on your own, Piper.” His heart felt heavier with each attempt she made to think of his comfort instead of hers. “We’ll sort the rest out tomorrow after the short rounds.”

  *

  Piper huddled under a beautiful plaid wool Pendleton blanket she and Boone had bought on a trip to Portland, Oregon, in August. She watched Boone, freshly showered, and in a sweatshirt and sweats, walk toward her with a steaming, fragrant cup of tea.

  “Ginger spice, your favorite,” he said.

  Piper fought back the spurt of tears and took the tea. Her hand shook. She sipped it as she watched him over the rim. Boone looked uncomfortable, restless, and her heart broke even more.

  She found herself waffling. Was it so dumb to want one more night? To be held and to savor it because it would be the last? A gift to him and a gift to her. A night where she could remember every detail of the way he felt when he was in her arms. The heat of his skin. The way he always paused and looked into her eyes and whispered her name before he joined their bodies.

  “I’ll head outside, now,” Boone said quietly.

  Piper felt her heart jump, and lurch into her throat, suffocating her. She stared at the yellow stripe in the blanket, her mind suddenly awash with panic as her heart thundered in her ears and closed off her throat. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t think. Pinpricks of light burst behind her eyes.

  “Piper.” Boone took the tea from her hand as it started to slosh out.

  “Baby, what’s wrong?”

  She bent her head down as agony and embarrassment swept through her. She could hear her shallow breaths sawing in and out of her tight throat. This was so dumb. Panic because he was leaving. She’d lived through this part before so many times. She was used to it. Over it. Why were her childish panic attacks resurfacing now? She hadn’t had one since she was fourteen, and her father had slapped her to snap her out of it.

  But instead of curling up in her closet alone, Boone was there, holding a bag that had earlier contained some apples she’d bought at Monroe Groceries in town. He sat on the bed and held the bag over her mouth.

  “It’s okay, baby. I got you.”

  He pulled her onto his lap and his hold hand—the one that could keep him astride a bucking bronc or bull—was gentle on top of her head, stroking down her hair over and over.

  It took Piper an embarrassingly long time to pull herself together.

  She thrust away the bag and then grabbed it back, folding it precisely like it was origami.

  “Sorry.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m fine now.”

  So embarrassing. God, he was going to be so glad to get out of here, get away. The inconvenient ex-girlfriend who clung and panic
ked and didn’t have a clue how to end a casual fling properly.

  “Sorry,” she said again.

  “Baby,” he said so tenderly. “Feel pretty shaky myself.”

  It was so Boone—kind, self-deprecating, trying to ease the tension—that she laughed even as tears started leaking out of her eyes.

  She wanted him to stay so badly. Hold her. But that wasn’t fair. It was over. She had to be mature about it. Let him go. Let him find himself. Be who he wanted to be even though she thought he was perfect now.

  “Sorry. I’m okay now. Haven’t had one of those in a while,” she said, trying to sound brisk, while she scrubbed at her tears with the palm of her hand.

  “You’re sure?” He hadn’t stopped holding her or stroking her head.

  Boone would be a great dad, she thought in despair. He wouldn’t close his child off in their room for crying or panicking or asking too many questions. Piper pressed her lips together so tightly they hurt. She had to pull herself together. And he had to get out of here for her to do it because he was one giant reminder of everything she wanted and couldn’t have.

  “I’m okay. I’m fine,” she lied. “That was stupid.”

  “Piper, nothing you’ve ever done was stupid.”

  He sounded so admiring that it grounded her a little. “You’d be surprised.” She tried to keep the bitterness out of her voice. “There’s a long list.”

  “Doubt it. I’m pretty sure mine’s longer. Here, let me check that you didn’t burn your hand when the tea spilled.”

  He took her hand in his big, warm, calloused one, and Piper shivered.

  “Does it hurt?” His voice was so gentle Piper almost wished her hand were burned just to see how he’d take care of her, just to have him hold her a little longer.

  And that was wrong. Weak. She heard her father’s voice again, always critical, scathing. But it had been worse when he’d been indifferent. Ignored her.

  “No. It’s fine. I’m fine. You should get some sleep.”

  “I will,” he said softly. “You lie back down.” He helped to ease her back into the bed and tucked the comforter and blanket up to her chin like she was an eight-year-old who’d had a bad dream.

  His fingers gently stroked through her hair. “Close your eyes, Piper.”

  “But what about you?”

  “I’ll wait until you fall asleep, baby. Just relax, breathe. In. Out. I’ll be right here until you sleep. Promise.”

  *

  Piper woke up several hours later to an unfamiliar sound. It took her a moment to realize what the soft sound above and around her was—rain almost like a disembodied voice. She listened to the soft tapping on the roof of the trailer.

  Was it a sign of renewal or of darker days ahead?

  Piper had always loved the rain. Automatically she reached for Boone. His side of the bed was empty, cold; comforter and blanket smooth. Piper sat up, agony and longing rushed through her. But more than that: practicality. Boone was outside in the rain, or cramped in his truck—not remotely ideal conditions for him to endure the night before a competition, though Boone would be the first to shrug it off. He was cowboy tough, always.

  She needed to channel a little of that.

  She quickly climbed out of bed and flung open the door and in her tank and small exercise shorts, she hurried out into the rain.

  *

  Figured tonight it would rain. Boone hopped up and quickly began rolling up his bedroll and sleeping bag. The rain was chilly and ran down his back like icy fingers all the way to the waist of his drawstring sweats.

  This was only the beginning of how much this day would suck. His fault for sitting on the fence, for waiting for answers, for living in the moment.

  He caught a flash of Piper, feet and legs bare as she jumped out of the trailer. He hopped out of the bed of the truck, stashed his bedroll in the back seat of his cab and then strode toward her, but she was already there, bringing him up short.

  She shivered, her arms wrapped tightly around her body.

  “Baby, let’s get you back inside. You’re soaked, and it’s freezing out here.”

  The life-giving drizzle had briefly turned into a downpour.

  “Baby, your feet.” He shook his head, charmed, exasperated, and worried she’d step on broken glass or a stone that would hurt her. Cowboys were not always the most considerate of cleaners-up.

  He knew it was wrong, but it felt so right to pick her up and carry her back to the trailer. One-handed he opened the door and fed her inside, not quite trusting himself to not follow. She’d felt fantastic in his arms, and he ached for her. Hadn’t been able to sleep and the rain had been a welcome relief to get up and stop pretending to try.

  “Okay, get dried off and get back in bed.”

  “What about you?” Piper threaded her fingers through his and held on tight.

  Killing him. He had no resistance around her. None. If he had, he wouldn’t have hurt her and gutted himself in the process.

  “I’ll be fine. I’ll sleep in the truck. Done it lots of times.”

  Her eyes searched his, and Boone felt like he’d sliced himself open and she could see all of him—his doubt, his desire, his vague dreams he was unable to articulate when hers were spelled out and listed in neon, and he wanted her dreams checked off for her—fulfilled one by one. He wanted Piper happy.

  And he wanted to hold her tightly, promise her he could be that man, and to know that he wasn’t wrong, that he wouldn’t fail her.

  “You don’t have to,” Piper said.

  “Piper. I’ve fucked it up and dug a deep enough hole this weekend. No need to keep digging.” He tried to smile and failed.

  “No, Boone, don’t think like that,” Piper said, and Boone marveled at how she was so quick to forgive. “Your feelings aren’t wrong. They are just your feelings.”

  He wished like hell he knew what his ‘feelings,’ hell, his thoughts were. His emotions—such as they were—veered all over the place, making him feel a little crazy and a lot sick to his stomach.

  “Piper,” he croaked out hoarsely.

  This was a bad idea. Very bad.

  She tugged and Boone followed her inside the trailer.

  Chapter Twelve

  Boone rounded the corner of the largest barn where the horses were housed. He had his bull rope over his shoulder and work gloves on as well as his rosin. It was just past dawn. He’d fed and brushed Sundance, and talked to him while he’d worked and mucked out his stall.

  He checked his phone. He had an hour before the pancake breakfast started. He knew Piper had a few early clients so once he finished he’d swing by her tent and wait until she finished. She’d scared the hell out of him last night with her panic attack. He couldn’t stand to see her hurting. It gutted him.

  Lying next to her last night, him on the outside of the comforter, her below, had brought him some measure of peace, although he’d had to fight the urge to pull her tight in to his body. He hadn’t thought he’d be able to sleep, but when he’d woken shortly before dawn, Piper had been tangled around him, her hair a shroud, and like a dumb, weak bastard, he’d let himself soak her in for a few breaths before he slipped from the bed and left for the day.

  He’d left her a note that there was a pancake breakfast in the park and that he’d stop by to see if she wanted to go. He also told her that they could talk after the rodeo, that she could use the trailer as long as she needed, that he’d drive her or take her anywhere she wanted to go.

  All the right things.

  But everything about his life today felt wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

  He settled against the outside wall so he could feel the rising sun on his face, while he rosined his bull rope as well as his grip for Sundance. He watched the hands of the few stock contractors come and go—chatting in Spanish and English, flipping each other shit and teasing about what had or hadn’t gone down last night at the steak dinner.

  Boone briefly closed his eyes, desperate for the familiar
calm to settle over him, to once again feel pleasure in the small aspects of rodeo life. Today he felt stiff, awkward, out of rhythm when usually he loved the work. The cowboys. The simple tasks. The focus. Sundance. Only usually Piper sat with him and talked to him while he worked his ropes. Or she’d read quietly, her feet tangled with his. He tested his rope, rubbing his glove over it again and again, feeling the stickiness.

  He came to his feet. He still had a lot to do, but he had plenty of time. He knew his parents were coming to watch his events today as well as his sister Riley, her band and his brother Witt, sister-in-law Miranda and their adopted daughter Petal.

  No pressure.

  Usually he thrived on pressure. Loved the edge in his gut. The buzz in his blood. But now he wanted to be done. Far away.

  He’d let Piper down.

  He was letting his family down. They tried not to say anything, but he knew his dad wanted him home to help with the ranch and the expansion into bull breeding and later stock contracting with the Wilders. His mom wanted him to stop risking his life and health with the rodeo, but she also wanted him to ease the burden on his father.

  What did he want, Piper had asked?

  No one had ever asked him that, he’d later realized, and now when he asked himself that same question, he didn’t have the answer.

  He wanted to feel like he’d accomplished something.

  He wanted to be the kind of man he was proud of.

  He wanted to feel like Piper wouldn’t be settling if she stayed with him.

  And just those three answers alone proved that he was doing the right thing moving on and letting Piper find her own path.

  Boone watched a few cowboys showing some young kids lariat tricks. The kids were up early and waiting for their parents after spending the night at the rodeo youth campout last night. He loved that about the rodeo. The kids. The families. The fans. Giving back to the community. And then the challenge. The adrenaline when he dropped down on the back of a pissed-off animal.

  Nothing like it. Ever.

  Except spending time with Piper.

  Boone finished his work. Even joined a small knot of young boys and talked with them about their campfire stories last night. He laughed when they tried to scare him with a local ghost story and then he ambled off, trying to inject more confidence in his walk as he approached his trailer. But he wasn’t sure of his reception. Would Piper want to talk to him? Was he doing the right thing by continually checking on her? Treating the day like it was a little bit normal?