Chapter Thirty-Four
Hailey
The Same Afternoon
“Good boy, Buck,” I said, steering the horse around a hole in the ground. Eric had warned me more than once that a horse could get hurt terribly if I allowed it to put its hoof in a hole while we were riding. A broken leg could be fatal. The last thing I wanted after such a shitty afternoon was for a horse to die due to my carelessness.
“You’re a very good boy,” I assured him. “Not like some other asshole boys I know.” I rubbed him along his strong neck, his coat velvety soft. We weren’t going very fast at all. I’d been crying at first, but my tears had dried up, and most of my anger had burned off. I just wanted to get away from the house. We drifted to a stop, Buck unsure of what to do without my instruction. Just being out here was helping, all this open sky and the view of the craggy mountains. You didn’t get any of this in New York City. I wondered if I should just plan on heading back there as soon as I could book a ticket. If I couldn’t get out of here until tomorrow morning, I could probably stay overnight at Eric’s. If he didn’t want the trouble that could cause him with Cash, there were hotels in town too. It wasn’t like I couldn’t afford a single night someplace.
I heard the sound of pounding hooves behind me and tensed up in the saddle. The closest neighbor was miles away. This had to be Cash. I didn’t know if I was ready to speak to him right now, but I did know I wasn’t a strong enough rider to beat him in a race. I was stuck here. Buck neighed in solidarity, shaking his head as we stood waiting.
He came up beside me, riding Eric’s favorite, Lettie, instead of his own. He looked stricken, like he’d just been through some terrible ordeal and was worse off for it. That took me by surprise, though I didn’t give him anything but a scathing expression and narrowed eyes when I looked over at him.
“I’m so sorry, Hailey,” he blurted, his features tragically contrite as he shook his head. “I don’t know what came over me. You didn’t deserve none of what I said. I can’t take it back, but I can apologize for it. I feel like a real asshole, and I understand if you want me to leave you alone right now. I just wanted you to know how sorry I am for how I acted.”
He wasn’t making excuses. He was just apologizing straight up. I liked that. I’d actually never had anyone apologize without trying to share the blame with me—oh, if you hadn’t gotten me so angry, etc.—or come up with excuses for why he was acting like a complete and total bastard. I had to respect how straightforward he was being. And I realized I wasn’t as angry as I’d been a few seconds earlier. His behavior had surprised me, as had the fire in my own belly, but I’d had time to calm down and so had he.
I hopped down off of Buck and sat down on a smooth, flat rock nearby that was warm from all the sunshine. I could feel the heat through my jeans. It was nice, being out here, in nature, breathing the fresh air and enjoying the view. When Cash jumped down off his horse and moved to stand in front of me, the view got even better.
“I don’t usually get that upset over nothing,” Cash explained. He hadn’t even had time to put on his cowboy hat, so he looked a little strange standing over me, with his flushed cheeks and the urgency in his eyes, more like the very young man he’d been not too long ago. “And I knew better than to let myself fall in love with you, but here we are, and I can’t stop the way I feel about you. I’ve never felt this strongly about anyone before in my life, and things’ve just gone haywire. Everything feels out of my control, and you know how much I love control.”
He looked so damned upset right now that I had to smile. I knew I’d turned his life upside down, but I didn’t think I’d made things this hard for him. I just couldn’t see anything neat and tidy without knocking it all down, could I, including Cash’s orderly insides? I decided to give him some slack.
“I understand that this isn’t what you’re used to. I’m a mess, and I brought that mess into your house too…” my voice trailed off as a realization hit me right in the stomach, so hard it knocked the air out of me. I blinked and couldn’t speak for a moment, just trying to process what he’d actually said as I struggled to breathe.
“You love me?” I whispered, and the words felt enormous in my mouth. “Is that what you just said?”
He nodded, looking even more worried at the admission.
A smile broke over my face as a warm, tingling sensation filled up my insides, the giddiness reaching all the way from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. I stomped my feet in the dirt, squealing a little like a woman in one of the romantic comedies I’d roll my eyes at and tell to calm the hell down.
“Cash, I love you too. I was so afraid to say it because we live our lives so far apart. I didn’t know if you felt the same way, and I didn’t want to rush things or make you feel uncomfortable by putting too much pressure on you.”
He beamed, all the uncertainty falling away from his face, leaving nothing but his easy charm.
“I was going to tell you tonight over dinner, but I decided to extend my trip for a while, at least until right before the Thanksgiving holiday. I just want to see how things develop between us.”
“I like the sound of that,” he said, still grinning.
“But I don’t know about the paying rent part of all this…”
He chuckled at that. “If you’re sleeping in my bed, I can’t very well charge you rent. That just don’t seem right.”
My body fully relaxed at the change in the air between us, all that tension in the past and the future opening up to us again, large enough that we could both walk into it together, at least for the time being.
“I really want to give us a chance to grow as a couple, to really—”
He held up his hand, shaking his head and silencing me. “Shush,” he whispered, and my face collapsed into a hard frown.
I opened my mouth to protest, insulted by the sudden change in his demeanor, and that was when I heard the rattling sound.