“Are you safe?”
“I am. The man in charge assured me that Sebastian’s dealings did not have anything to do with me. Sebastian was threatening to sell the sex tapes to pay off some of his debt, that is the only way I was ever involved.”
Nodding, I can’t deny that although that eases my mind, it only does so slightly. “You met with members of the mafia?” I practically shout.
Her body jerks, her eyes widening and she shrugs a shoulder, as if it’s not a big deal. Not. A. Big. Deal. Grinding my teeth together, I shake my head, trying to make sense of this conversation.
I’ve never had anything like this happen before. The mafia was always just something that was in the movies, never even crossed my radar as still being very real.
“Well, yeah. I wanted to find out what was really happening. What they wanted as payment.”
Lifting my hand, I run my fingers through my hair, trying to keep from throttling her right here in the middle of her fancy-assed California living room. I can’t fathom any of this. Not a single fucking part of what she’s saying to me and how nonchalant she’s being.
“Stephanie,” I growl. “What the fuck?”
“He was going to sell a sex tape of me, Ford, of us. I don’t know what’s on the one he had of he and I, but do you want the world to see you having sex?”
“If it means life or death, then who the fuck cares?”
She shakes her head, obviously just as frustrated with me as I am with her. “I care, Ford.”
Taking a step back, I turn around, unable to look at her. I’m scared. For her, for her safety, for the future. It terrifies me completely. She’s getting wrapped up in the mafia, she’s putting herself in the middle and on their radar when she didn’t have to be.
I feel her hand against the center of my back, then she tilts her head and rests it against my arm. “Don’t be upset, he promised me that I wasn’t being held responsible. He also said that he got the copies of the sex videos and destroyed them.”
Absolutely nothing that she’s just told me makes me feel any better at all whatsoever. Not even fucking slightly.
“I can’t protect you against the mafia, Stephanie,” I practically whisper.
Saying the words aloud makes me feel sick. My stomach clenches and I look down at my feet.
“I never asked you to,” she murmurs.
Snapping my head to the side, I look down at her. “Yeah? Did you want me to be your man?”
Her eyes widen and she takes a step back, probably feeling my anger swell and fill the room around us, I know that I do. It’s begging to be unleashed, but I’ll keep it under control, at least until I’m away from her. I’ve never taken my anger out on her, and I don’t plan on starting now.
“Ford,” she breathes.
“I don’t know what you want, Stephanie. You’re hot, then cold. You’re with me, then you run. Been waiting seventeen years for some kind of closure with you. Just when I think that maybe closure ain’t gonna happen, that maybe we could work out, you pump the brakes.”
“You don’t understand. I do want you, Ford. I want us, but I have a whole life here and I can’t just walk away tomorrow.”
“So what? How long do I sit back on my ranch, holding my dick and waiting for you to grace me with your presence, another seventeen years?”
“That’s not fair,” she whispers.
“It isn’t?”
There’s a long moment of silence, one where we stare at one another. My decision was made before we even started this talk.
It’s time for me to go, it’s time for her to make some hard decisions. If she doesn’t want me, she needs to say so. I’m done waiting, done knowing something in my life is missing.
I’m just done.
I’m tired.
Inhaling a deep breath, I wait for her to respond. Her eyes search mine and she shakes her head once. “No, Ford. It’s not fair. I never told you to put your life on hold. I never expected you to. Maybe we’re just meant to be. I like to think that’s why we haven’t found anyone else. It’s always been you for me.”
Pressing my lips in a straight line, I watch, and I wonder. I shouldn’t wonder out loud, but I do anyway. “Has it? Or maybe it’s been your career for you and you for me?”
The bitterness that I thought I was over, it reappears and it’s ugly as fuck. Stephanie takes a step back from me, stumbling before she rights herself.
I shouldn’t have said what I did, but fuck, I’ve been thinking it for a hell of a long time. The words just came out and now there’s no putting them back inside. They’re here and they are fucking real.
“That’s not fair, not at all,” she whispers. “You know that’s not what happened. I would have regretted not coming out here my entire life.”
Nodding, I inhale a deep breath. “I know. Regardless, you never gave me the option to choose what I wanted. You took that choice away from me. You ran. Then you did it all over again, and I swallowed my pride. I came out here and I find out you’ve been mixed up with the mafia for that piece of shit? All so strangers don’t see you fucking him, fucking me? You ever done a sex scene for your job?”
I already know the answer. She may be America’s Sweetheart, but she’s done a few sex scenes, though never showed much in any of them. Side of a tit, an ass cheek, an O face.
That’s not my point though.
It’s that the world has already seen a still shot of her in action, plus the movies she’s done, it’s not an overreach that they can imagine an actual raw footage scene.
“It’s not the same. You know it’s not.”
“Stephanie,” I whisper. “You’ve made your choice. Haven’t you?”
“I have.” She nods. “I’m quitting the business and coming back to Texas.”
I’m surprised by her words, but they don’t sit right with me, because that’s not what she’s doing. She’s saying the right things, but it’s not what she’s actually doing.
“You let me know when that happens, honey,” I rasp, taking a step toward her. Reaching out, I cup her cheek.
“Ford, don’t,” she breathes, reaching up and wrapping her fingers around my wrist.
I shake my head. “I can’t. Not anymore. I thought I would be okay. That I could do this, but I can’t.”
Taking a step back, my hand falls from her face and her fingers release my wrist. I hear the honk of the horn outside. My ride. Her eyes flick to the door and it’s as if she has it all figured out. Turning from her, I make my way over to my bag that’s beside the door.
Slipping my boots on, I grab a shirt and pull it over my head, all in silence. When I’m dressed, I turn around to look at her one last time, sure that this will indeed be my last time seeing her this close.
“You’re a coward, Ford Matthews,” she calls out.
Nodding, I smirk. “Yeah, probably. Seems you know all about being a coward though, don’t you?” I say, knowing that it’s a slap to the face. “Also, I’m just really fucking tired. You know where to find me. If you want us, you know all you gotta do is give a smile and I’m putty in your pretty little hands. You want a real life, one on a working ranch, a simple life, then you got it. But it won’t be this,” I say, waving my hand around. “And I’ll never be able to provide this. So, you gotta be good with it, all of it.”
“So now it’s about money?”
“It’s about everything, it’s all a package.”
Stephanie turns her back to me, and I pick up my suitcase after she has. Clearing my throat, I open her front door, standing and waiting for her to turn back around, but she doesn’t.
“You need me, you got me. Even if you don’t want me, I’ll always help you if you need it. Go to the police on this mafia shit. Don’t associate with them. Their protection from whatever it is you think they’re protecting you from, it ain’t free.”
STEPHANIE
I turn around just in time to see the door close behind him. He called ahead for a ride. He planned on leav
ing me, and I don’t know if that makes any of this worse or not. What I do know is, I don’t like the way any of this makes me feel.
Tears fall from my eyes, down my cheeks, and on to my shirt. My hair is a mess, but I don’t care. None of it matters. Ford is gone. The way it feels, it’s different from any time that I’ve walked away from him.
My stomach clenches and I walk over to my sofa, sinking down on the cushion as my stomach cramps and agony tears through me. My shoulders shake as my body begins to tremble. I have the insane urge to run after him.
This cannot be the end of our love story. I won’t allow it. He’s right though. I’m not ready to walk away from this life yet. I have loose ends to tie up. He’s also spot-on in his assumption that I don’t know if I’m ready to live the life of a rancher’s wife. I don’t know that I’ve ever been ready to be that.
My phone rings on the coffee table and I debate not answering it, until I see who it is. He said he was my friend, claims he’s been my friend. I guess now is the time I test that friendship, because shit is about to get really ugly.
“Can you come over?” I whimper.
“Oh shit, on my way.”
I stay sitting on the edge of the cushion, staring into nothingness as tears stream down my face in complete silence. I did this to myself. Just like I’ve always brought everything bad that’s happened to me on myself.
Ford may have walked out of those doors, but I did that to him twice. He came to me, came back to fight for me, until he ran out of fight. Can I really blame him? I’m not sure that I do.
All he’s ever wanted is a quiet life on his family ranch. All I’ve ever wanted was a glittery stage. We’re not the same, and yet he’s the only man who has ever made complete sense to me.
“Girlie,” Damion’s voice says in a hushed tone.
Turning to him, I try to give him a wobbly smile, but he only shakes his head as he closes the distance between us.
“He’s gone,” I breathe.
“Is it final?”
Shaking my head, I lift my knees and I tell him everything that happened. I know that he partially sides with Ford when he doesn’t make a scene about the way things just kind of ended, yet didn’t really end.
“What do you think?” he simply asks.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you want?”
I shrug my shoulder.
“Earlier today you wanted to run to the farm. So, either you want that farm boy ass for life, or you were playing with him and just wanted his dick for a while. Either way, I won’t judge, but you can’t have both and he’s made that very clear.”
“I want him. I want a simple life, but leaving here, maybe I jumped the gun?”
“You ran back here because you were worried about those videos getting out, not because you didn’t want to be with him, right? Or did you run because you were falling for him all over again?”
I hate the question, mostly because it’s a really damn good one. Why did I run? I know what made me leave, it was the video, but was that the only reason? I doubt it.
I was falling for the brooding cowboy all over again.
It’s easy to do when he’s smart, sexy, and gives no fucks about who I am or what I can give him. Plus, what we have in bed is something indescribable. Every part of him is indescribable and I just let him walk away from me without any kind of fight.
He wasn’t wrong. I dropped everything and ran back here, for what? To help Sebastian out of trouble? I mixed myself up with the Russian mafia because of a sex tape? What the actual fuck is wrong with me?
“Damion?” I gasp. He turns to look at me, his eyes focused on mine, his brow arching in question. “I just let Ford walk away from me,” I whisper.
His lips curve up into a smile. “What are you going to do about it?”
I shake my head. “I’m going to get my shit handled as fast as humanly possible and get the fuck out of here.”
“You gonna be a farm girl?” he asks with a small laugh.
Nodding my head, my lips curve up into a huge smile. “I am. I’m going to follow my gut, my heart, and my head and make that man mine again.”
“And again, hopefully.” He chuckles.
“You can say that again.” I grin.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
FORD
I don’t know why, but I expected her to come after me. Sitting on the airplane as it lands, then taxis at the Austin airport, I can’t help but feel a sense of sadness wash over me. I’ve been feeling far too fucking emotional since Stephanie came back into town.
Now that it’s over, I need to get back to myself, stuff that shit down, and move on with my life, the way I promised myself I would do. Clearing my throat, I stand, thankful that I don’t have to wrestle with a carry-on bag.
Once I’m out of the hustle and bustle of the airport, I walk out and inhale the thick Texas air. It’s good to be home, even if the looming cloud of all that is Stephanie hasn’t completely cleared away from above me, I just have to realize that it probably never will.
I’m not surprised to see Louis’ truck waiting for me in the passenger loading area. Chuckling, I make my way toward him.
Climbing into his passenger seat, neither of us speaks as he pulls out into heavy traffic. I’m thankful for the silence, but I also know that it’s not going to last. I know that if the tables were turned, I wouldn’t be quiet and I haven’t been.
“That was a quick trip,” he begins.
“It was,” I agree.
We’re quiet for another moment, but it doesn’t last, just like I knew that it wouldn’t. I don’t mind. I need to talk about what happened. I didn’t even go to Beaumont’s to tell him goodbye, just sent him a text in the airport terminal, like a fucking pussy.
“Ford.”
Letting out a sigh, I slouch down in the seat, my gaze focused on the window in front of me. Louis merges on to the highway with ease, and without cursing, which I don’t know how it’s possible to drive in Austin without cussing up a storm, let alone merging on to the highway.
“Her ex is mixed up with the Russian mafia. She met with them to bail him out of his troubles, because he has a sex tape of them, and of us, he was threatening to release them both.”
“That’s a lot of information in just two sentences,” Louis rumbles.
Nodding, I let out another sigh. “It is. I didn’t want to leave her there. She claims the Russian leader she talked to didn’t hold her responsible for anything, but the fact that she put herself in that situation pisses me off and for what? Some dirtbag?”
“And her reputation.”
“Claims she wants to quit acting, come and live on the ranch, so what the fuck does the reputation matter if that’s the case?”
“So, you’re mad because she doesn’t want a sex tape out for the world to see? If she’s yours, you want everyone to see her fuckin’ some other guy? I know I don’t even want to think about another man, let alone see Tulip with one. You want the world to see you fuckin’ her, too?”
Shaking my head, I clear my throat. “I don’t care about that, I just want her. That’s all. Then, I started looking around her place in Malibu and it really sunk in. Our lives are too different. She won’t be happy living on the ranch forever. For a while, yeah, but when the novelty wears off, what happens?”
“You’re getting too far ahead of yourself,” Louis points out.
“Am I? Not eighteen anymore, brother.”
He chuckles as he continues to drive. “Yeah, I know. But, Ford, you gotta give it a chance.”
“I’m tired,” I admit.
He nods. “I get that. Still, y’all are going through a lot and you have to consider her situation.”
“Instead of talking to me, she ran, again. I don’t know if I can live a life where I’m waiting for her to run at every obstacle.”
Louis clears his throat. “Maybe it’s for the best then.”
“Why does it feel so goddamn shitty?” I ask.
“Because that’s what love fucking does sometimes. It feels like shit. Then it gets better before it becomes fucking amazing. Not necessarily with the same woman. Maybe Stephanie isn’t who you end up with, maybe she’s who you learn from so that you know how to be with the next woman?”
Thankfully, he doesn’t say anything else. Instead, I’m lost in my thoughts. I can’t help but think about this mafia thing. I shouldn’t have left. Taking my phone out of my pocket, I find Beaumont’s number.
“You make it home?” he asks, picking up on the second ring.
Laughing, I nod as if he can see me. “Louis picked me up,” I murmur. “Wanted to talk to you.”
“She’s on my radar, brother, you don’t even have to ask.”
“I shouldn’t have left. I should have stayed.”
“Maybe. Doesn’t matter now. I got her, you just take care of you. I’ll update you.”
I end the call, unsure of what else to say. I want to go back to LA, but I can’t. Leaving was the right thing to do. She knows that she can come to me and honest to fuck, I hope that she does.
But I don’t even know if I could protect her from the mafia, Sebastian, or anything else that comes at her in Malibu. That’s all her shit and I think she needs to decide what she wants and if it’s me and this life that I can give her or the life she has created for herself there.
I wouldn’t even be upset if she stayed in LA. She worked hard for the life that she has built there. It’s a good one, filled with parties, expensive shit, nice houses, and luxury that I just can’t even fathom let alone give her.
Louis pulls up to my house and I thank him for the ride before I jump out of his truck and grab my bag from the back. Without another word, or look back, I make my way toward my front porch.
Jimmy and Erica are gone, and I’m glad for it. There’s a note on my kitchen counter explaining that they had to go, one of their children came down with something. Opening up my fridge, I chuckle at all the new additions.
COWBOY (Unfit Hero Book 5) Page 19