by Maisey Yates
He winced. “Sorry.”
“That’s okay. Actually, it isn’t. But what can you do?”
“I mean, the good thing about you moving in with me is that I’ll be here to take care of you.”
“You’re acting like I’m suddenly made out of cotton candy. I’m not going to melt in the rain.”
They continued down the wooded path that led to the small house, the trees growing thicker, closing in on the pathway. He hadn’t been out this way in a while, so it was a little wild and overgrown. Eventually, he would need to widen everything so that she could drive right up to the front.
But then, if he had his way, she would be living in his house before it got to the point where she needed shorter walks.
“I know that,” he said, “but you don’t know how your morning sickness is going to be. I know some women can barely get out of bed all day. Someone is going to have to take care of you.”
“Well, I just can’t be that sick,” she said, sounding obstinate. “I have work. At the bar. I can’t just...”
“Honey, I own the bar, and I’m the father of the baby. I think I can cut you some slack.”
She stopped, stamping her booted foot and turning to face him. “No! That’s exactly what’s wrong with all of this. I was supposed to be doing this myself. Earning things on my own merit. And you know what? I’m not. Jack got me a job in the first place, then we were attracted to each other, then we slept with each other, now I’m having your baby. So, tell me what part of this is my own merit?”
Ace’s heart twisted. She made it pretty easy to feel things for her. Things other than anger and suspicion. Not that he was ready to let go of the latter entirely, for his own safety, but there was something vulnerable about Sierra. Something different. Different not just from Denise, but from every woman he’d ever met.
“You’re a damn fine waitress, Sierra West,” he said. “And not only that, you helped me with my brewery in ways that I couldn’t have ever known to ask for. You suggested things that I never would have thought of. You’ve been invaluable. And yeah, I know in the beginning I was skeptical about the kind of job you would do. Yes, it took Jack’s recommendation to get me to hire you. But I was wrong. Everyone who didn’t hire you is wrong. Obviously, your dad’s ranch was in good hands when you were managing it. Nepotism be damned.”
Her throat worked as she swallowed hard, blinking rapidly, as though trying to hold tears at bay.
He hadn’t been lying about wanting to avoid tears. It looked like he might have failed. He hadn’t gotten to know a woman well enough to be responsible for any tears in recent years. A little laughter, a little screaming—the fun kind—and that was it.
This was a little bit deeper, a little more real than he was used to dealing with.
She looked at him, her cheeks waxen, her eyes glassy. “Sometimes you aren’t that bad.”
Then she turned away quickly and started down the path again. And he followed, like she might be the one who knew where she was going. The path only went one direction, so he figured it was self-explanatory enough. He had the idea she needed to feel like she was in charge of something.
“I’m not an ogre,” he said, “I promise. In spite of the way we started out together.”
“Well, I figured you couldn’t be as bad with every woman as you were with me. After all, you have a reputation.”
“Do I?” He was vaguely aware of that, but of course, no other women had never said anything quite like that. So he was curious about what exactly his reputation might be.
“Oh, yes. You’re a notorious manwhore and seducer.”
“I don’t know that I’m much of the seducer. It never seems like it’s that much work.”
“I suppose I can’t really disprove that, I guess. I didn’t really make you work for it.”
“Not exactly.”
“Well, you didn’t exactly make me work for it, either,” she said.
“Fair enough.”
She stopped walking when the house came into view. “This is...”
“A lot smaller than you’re used to, I imagine.”
“I’ve been living in a bedroom in my brother’s house. I think you might have an inflated idea of where I’m coming from.”
He walked past her, up the steps that led to the modest porch. “Well, I have been to your family ranch for various special events. Even if you aren’t coming directly from there, I know where you’re coming from.”
He set the bags down on the ground and reached into his pocket, pulling out a set of keys. “These are for you,” he said. “You can have all the privacy you need. This is your place.”
He extended his hand, holding out the keys to her. Slowly, she took them, her fingertips brushing his as she did. It was a small bit of contact. The kind that he took for granted every night of the week as he passed drinks over the bar. But this was different. It was Sierra. And touching her was never simple. It was never anything less than a lightning storm coursing under his skin.
He was going to have to get a handle on that.
“Thanks for this. If you don’t mind, I think I need some time alone.”
“Not a problem,” he said. “If you need anything, you have my number.”
He turned and left her standing there. It was fine with him if she needed a little space. It would give him time to plan his next move.
* * *
ACE WASN’T WRONG. The house really was a lot smaller than what she was used to. But it was empty. She had filled the small closet in the bedroom with all of her clothes. And it was a good thing she hadn’t brought anything from her parents’ house, since just this sampling filled up the space.
But as for the rest of the house? He hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said there was a couch and a bed. A very small bed in the room she had chosen, covered with a threadbare quilt that was clean if a little bit musty. There was a small living area with a woodstove and an aggressively plain brown couch. There were no curtains in the windows, lace or otherwise, and there was no table to sit at. Which was fine, because there were no dishes to eat out of.
She had always had things. Her entire life had been filled with them. But more and more she was beginning to realize how much of that had nothing at all to do with her. The ornate dining set she had eaten most of her meals out of all of her life belonged to her parents. The beautiful canopy bed that she had spent her nights in starting from childhood had belonged to her parents.
The matching living room set that she had plopped down on every day after school wasn’t hers, either.
The dorm where she had spent her college years had been well stocked, mostly because her mother had arranged for it to be.
Even going to Colton’s house after leaving her parents had been less jarring than this, because it had been filled with her brother’s earthly possessions. There wasn’t much here beyond earthly dust.
The reality was, Sierra didn’t have all that much.
She put her hand on her stomach. Well, she had this new development. And she did have money. Some. Saved up from her waitressing job, and some from when she had been working at her father’s. Since she didn’t have to pay rent she could easily fill the place up with better and brighter things.
She would get things. It wouldn’t stay all bleak and empty like this. And, she wouldn’t allow herself to sit around and feel desolate about what she didn’t have. She would be fine. Yes, it was a change. Her entire life was in flux. She wasn’t about to fall apart over the fact that she didn’t have a set of dishes.
Well, she had been about to fall apart over that, but she wasn’t going to let herself.
She would get new dishes, dammit. Her first dishes. The first dishes to actually belong to her. She would figure out how to deal with all of this Ace stuff, claim her independence, and possib
ly some furniture.
She was getting thrust into adulthood in kind of a rough and unforgiving way. But she was twenty-five. It was time.
She took a deep breath and surveyed the small space. The square little kitchen and living room area, the cracked cement floor underfoot, the large picture window that looked out into the forest that surrounded the undeveloped portions of Ace’s property.
Well, since she had the day off she was going to go out and go shopping. There was no point sitting in an empty house, so she wasn’t going to do it. The thought made her smile. She had control. She had resources.
She was going to use them.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
BY THE TIME Sierra pulled back into Ace’s driveway, it was nearly dark outside. She hadn’t expected him to be there. She had expected that he would have gone out to the bar already, but much to her surprise, his beat-up blue pickup truck was sitting there, right in front of his house.
There was a horse trailer hitched up to the back, though it didn’t look like it had any horses in it.
She pulled up alongside of it and put her truck in Park before turning the engine off. She opened the door and got out, nearly falling over when she about ran into Ace. “You scared me!”
He smiled. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“Then why were you playing the part of stealth panther?”
“Stealth panther? I like that. I wasn’t trying to be stealthy. But I do want to show you something.”
She looked into the back of her truck, at all of the white shopping bags lined up in it. “Well, I have some things to take back to the house.”
“In a minute.”
“Hey,” she said, starting after him as he began to walk toward the barn. “Why exactly do you get to set a time frame?”
“Because, I’m the one that has a surprise.”
“It better not be a clown.”
“Why would it be a clown?”
She lifted her shoulder. “Because that would be another strange and unsettling surprise in a week of strange and unsettling surprises. I thought there might be a theme.”
“No clowns.”
“Is it circus-related at all?”
He laughed. “No. But I’m going to make note of this little bit of paranoia.”
“Don’t do that! I have revealed my soft white underbelly to you. You can’t take advantage of that.”
“Oh, sweetheart, I can and I will.” He paused, turning and treating her to a wicked smile.
Her stomach tumbled down into her boots. Somehow, in all of the drama of the past few days she had forgotten that she was in this situation because of her devastating attraction to this man. It had been easy to forget, all things considered. But she remembered now. Oh boy, did she remember.
She took a deep breath, trying to clear all the fuzz from her mind. Ace-induced fuzz. “I expected better of you.”
“That was your first mistake.”
“You could work to better yourself now.”
“I’ve done nothing but make efforts to worsen myself for the past decade, I don’t see why I would change course now.”
She cleared her throat. “I can think of one.”
A heavy, thick silence fell between them. It irritated her. She wanted to go back to before. To being teased. To feeling all fluttery over his smile.
Suddenly, she was angry about all of it. About the fact that she’d spent weeks resisting this beautiful man. About the fact that she’d waited to give in until she’d been desperate enough to forget birth control.
About the fact she had to resist him now because things were complicated and they had a bet with marriage or sanity as the ultimate endgame and that meant no butterflies, no lust and no kissing.
She should have spent every moment from the first time she’d seen him kissing him, because maybe then she wouldn’t feel quite so deprived now.
Either way, the opportunity was lost forever now. They had gone from strangers with growing attraction between them to expectant parents who were still basically strangers, and who now had a whole heap of baggage to deal with.
So, the attraction was a not happening thing.
“How far is it to your surprise?” she asked.
“Just to the barn.”
They walked the rest of the way in silence and Sierra did her best not to think too deeply. Instead, she closed her eyes and took a breath of the fresh air, letting the cool breeze whip across her face. It was beautiful here at Ace’s. It would feel like home easily, quickly. It was exactly the kind of environment she had grown up in. Okay, so it wasn’t as plush or as overstated, but it smelled like salt, and pine, and horses. Those were all the things she liked best.
Eventually, they would have to work out some kind of rent situation. She couldn’t continue living here and paying nothing. It didn’t feel right. But also, she didn’t know if moving away from the property—at least when their child was a baby—would be the best plan. No, living right on the same piece of land seemed like it would be a wonderful compromise for shared custody. That way, neither of them would feel as if they were missing anything.
Well, you’ll only have your child part of the time.
That made her stomach sink. But if she and Ace never became bitter exes, it wouldn’t be the same as it was for most people in her situation. It could be completely workable. There would be no reason for them to have separate birthday parties for their child. No reason to have separate Christmases. They would share it altogether.
Right. And someday, Ace’s wife and the rest of his children are just going to be thrilled that the woman he had a one-night stand with and his child are crashing all of their family get-togethers.
She gritted her teeth, setting her chin. Well, whoever the woman was, she would have to get used to that. Just as the man she eventually married would have to deal with the fact that Ace was in her life.
It would work.
Anyway, eventual spouses were not her top concern right now. It was just getting through this. Navigating the day-to-day changes and strangeness that were coming out of this circumstance. She would worry about the rest when she actually came to it.
The doors to the barn were already open, and she followed Ace inside, and down the row of stalls.
“I called your sister this afternoon.”
“My sister?” she asked, upping her pace.
“Yes. She helped make all this possible.”
“What?”
He stopped in front of the stall at the end of the road, wrapping his fingers around the bars. “Say hi to Lemon Drop.”
Her heart slammed against her breastbone, her stomach twisting up. “Lemon Drop. You went and got my horse for me?”
“Yeah. Madison was happy to help.”
“Was she?”
“Yes. In fact, she said it made the entire situation a little less upsetting.”
“What situation? Us having a baby?”
He smiled, leaning back against the stall door and crossing his arms over his broad chest. “She thinks I’m nice.”
“That’s only because she had about one conversation with you.”
“I went and got your horse for you.”
She smiled at him, if a little begrudgingly, and turned toward the stall. Her heart—it turned out—might be made of cotton candy now. Because it completely melted at the sight of Lemon Drop. Her beautiful palomino that she had figured she wouldn’t get to ride anymore. At least, not until she worked things out with her parents. And since she had no idea when that might be, she had no idea when she might be back in the saddle again.
She supposed she could have arranged to have the horse brought to Colton’s house herself. But she had been so caught up in keeping the job at the bar, and in general dealing with the
emotional trauma of her life, that she hadn’t really thought it was in her horse’s best interest.
But she could not be sorry that Ace had brought her here.
“I’m going to increase the pay for the kids who take care of my horses already. That way, you don’t have to worry about her being taken care of. Or her getting ridden enough. I imagine you won’t be riding because of the pregnancy.”
Sierra had no idea. None of her friends had had babies yet. And she had been so far off from this place in her mind that she hadn’t collected any information on the subject. “I guess I’m going to have to talk to a doctor about that. I really don’t know.”
“Well, either way, you don’t have to worry about it now. But I thought you might want your horse close. And,” he said, moving away from the stall and heading toward the back door of the stable, “I’m not done.”
“What more can there possibly be?”
“Come out to the arena.” He opened the door that led out back behind the stalls and she followed him through it, stopping dead in her tracks when she saw the covered arena. He had set up a barrel racing course inside of it.
Now she really was afraid she would cry. She didn’t really know how to handle this newer, nicer Ace.
“I might not get to use it for a million years.”
“Or nine months.”
“Same thing. Anyway, it will be way longer than nine months. Do you honestly think I am getting straight back into the saddle after I push something the size of an... Well, the size of the baby out from... There.”
He winced. “Okay. Well, this will be available for you whenever you decide you’re ready.”
“This is... I really can’t think of anything else that would have made me feel more at home. Thank you.”
She swallowed hard, her throat suddenly feeling dry and prickly. It was a little too early for her to be having hormone fluctuations. Which meant she was just having feelings. She preferred the idea of hormone fluctuations.
“I want you to feel at home here.”
She scuffed her toe through the dirt, leaving the deep groove behind. “I appreciate that. Really. I think that living here after the baby is born is probably the best decision.”