Dusty
FOR THE FIRST TIME since I bought the ranch at auction, I’m not excited about my chores. Usually, I get a sense of pride, and I enjoy working with the animals, breaking a sweat, and knowing I’m doing the work that I’m meant to do. But today, everything is a drudge.
Pretty much everyone with half a brain has turned the other way when they see me coming. That’s new too. My crew and I are more like family than boss and employees, but I guess I look like the devil and I feel like him too.
I round the corner of an outbuilding and almost turn the other way. Maybe she didn’t see me. I don’t think she does, she hasn’t lifted her head. She’s sitting on the ground, her knees up to her chest.
Shit. She’s crying. Her tears gut me. I can’t stand it. I’d do anything to make sure she never cries again.
“Ruby?”
She looks up and her eyes are rimmed in red. When the recognition that it’s me passes over her features, her eyes go dark. “Go away. Please go away.”
“Ruby, angel. What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
She scrambles up, brushing twigs and dirt off herself. “I really can’t do this right now. Please, if you have a shred of decency you’ll just turn around and let me retreat in peace. I’ll go up to my room. You won’t even have to see me. You don’t have to skulk around your property trying to avoid me.”
“Ruby...” I don’t know what to say. What to do. She asked me to leave, but is that what she wants? I don’t want to leave her alone, but I’m probably not the best one to offer her comfort. Then it hits me that maybe I’m the reason for her tears.
Fuck. Me.
I stand there too long, not saying anything. Not taking any action. Just feeling my heart crack into a million pieces at the thought that I could hurt her when all I want to do is protect her. But I guess I stand there too long.
She turns and walks the other way.
“Ruby, please. Wait.” I catch up to her. “Please tell me what is wrong.”
“Why do you even care?”
“You think I don’t care?”
“I think you’ve been running scared from me since you realized that there might be consequences to being my first lover. But don’t worry about it. I’ll handle whatever comes my way without you.”
“Ruby.”
“I get it, okay? You think I’m clingy or whatever because it was my first time. That if you’re too nice to me, I might have expectations. That if I get pregnant, I’ll try to trap you or whatever. But I was prepared to have an affair. I might have wanted your companionship, sure. But I’m not angling for a relationship. And I certainly don’t want to be pregnant, much less force you into anything.”
“Then why are you crying?”
She narrows her eyes even as she wipes the tears from them. “You think these tears are for you? Trust me, I don’t want to have anything more to do with you than you want from me. I’m not wailing with sadness over losing what I never even had.” She’s vibrating with anger. “Deep down, I think you’re probably a nice guy. Or you want to be. But you’re not interested in anything more than any other man I’ve met since I left home. Which is a shame because I think we could have been friends.”
I feel about two inches tall. “I do want to be friends.”
I want more than that. I want to be her goddamn hero. The guy she turns to, to slay whatever dragons are making her cry. I want to be the one she seeks out when she’s happy and when she’s sad. I want...just more. But I was too scared of my own feelings to realize it and now that I see it, it’s too late. I’m more of a zero than hero. I disappointed her, and I’ll have to live with that every day.
“Look, Dusty, if you’re just feeling sorry for me, then save it, okay? I don’t need it. It’s okay that you don’t care. I’m just a random lay that overstayed her welcome.”
“You’re a guest in my home. You didn’t overstay.”
She shrugs and it’s such a lonely action. I can see it. She’s given up on just about everyone. “I’ll let you know what happens with...well...if I get pregnant. But I don’t expect anything from you.”
The idea that she might at this very minute be carrying my child gives me a hard-on. An unwelcome one. I really am a shitty person.
“You’re more than a random lay. You know that.”
She raises her brow. “Seriously? You don’t have to make me feel good about myself. I wanted to have sex with you and I did. I don’t care if I was a random lay or not.”
“I care.” I palm her shoulders. “I care about you too much.”
“You are too much. I’m going back to the house now.”
“Do you think that it hasn’t been killing me to stay away from you? That I’m not already addicted to the way you taste and the sound of your laugh or the way you moan when I’m inside you?”
She pulls back like I slapped her.
Man up, cowboy.
“You’re right. I did run. It wasn’t because I don’t care. It’s because I care too much. I know I don’t have a future with you. I can’t give you what you need here.”
“What do you know about what I need?”
“You want to be an actress. You live in Hollywood. You probably like fancy cars and fashion and parties and I’ve got nothing to offer you.”
She huffs out a rueful laugh. “You think I’m a party girl?” She plops down on the grass, so I join her. “I got in a fight with my roommate. I’m pretty sure we’re being evicted because I wasn’t there to pay more than my share of the rent on our crappy little apartment.”
“Why do you have to pay more than your half?”
She sighs. “At first, I thought I was helping a friend, but Katie’s been leeching off me for a long time. She’s just using me.” She picks random blades of grass. “Sometimes I feel like everyone in LA only wants to use me up and throw me away.”
And she thought I was one of them. Because of the way I acted. “I know how you feel. It’s hard to find good people these days. That’s why I work so hard to make this place work. For my friends, my family. Sometimes everyone else seems out for themselves.”
“I think you care. About people.”
“I think you do too. Maybe too much, sounds like.”
“Maybe too much.”
We’re quiet for a few minutes, just listening to the breeze whistle through the windbreak and a cow lowing in the pasture. “Do you think you’d give me a second chance? To be a better friend to you than I was.”
She gazes into my eyes like she’s trying to read me. “If you tell me why you ran so fast.”
I pull my hat off my head. “You don’t ask for much, do you? Just filet myself open for you?”
“If you don’t want to tell—”
“I thought I was in love once.”
That shuts her up.
“Her name was Farrah. She went to high school with Carter and me. She was a troubled girl, always. And so damned restless. Wanted to be a model. Wanted the good life, she always said. She kept moving away to the city and coming back, each time a little skinnier, as little more rough around her edges. I tried to give her a good home base. Not pen her in. That was before I bought this place. I had a small house in Buffalo.” Ruby covers my big paw with her dainty hand. Support. Reassurance. It sure feels nice. “The last time she left, she was gone a month when she called me one day out of the blue crying. Said she was pregnant. That it was mine.”
“Oh, Dusty.” I’m sure Ruby is drawing conclusions to why I freaked out about the condom.
“Farrah was distraught. She wanted to party, not be a mom. But I told her we’d figure it out. That I’d take care of her and the baby.” My gut clenches over what was never meant to be. “I went to pick her up, but she had overdosed. She didn’t make it.”
“The baby?”
I shake my head. “I didn’t love her anymore by then. I kept taking her back out of habit. But that baby. I coulda loved that baby.”
Ruby crawls onto my lap and holds my face in her hands. “I’m so sorry that happened to you. I know you probably blame yourself, but it’s not your fault. Some people can’t live in this world right. They’re too fragile inside or something.”
There’s something so earnest and pure about the way she’s touching me. I didn’t know I needed tenderness. I didn’t know I needed someone to tell me it’s okay that I couldn’t save Farrah.
I didn’t know I needed to need someone. But I do. I grasp one of her hands and kiss the inside of her wrist. “I’m supposed to be consoling you, I thought.”
She smiles and my heart flies up in my throat.
When I kiss her, it’s like our first kiss should have been. It’s sweet and gentle.
It’s just what I need.