“Paul?”
He sat up and tried to figure out who the voice was. When he had first put the phone to his head and heard the female voice, his mind had gone to Katie. But it wasn’t her and after a few moments, he realized that he was talking to his sister Gemma.
“Yes Gemma. Good morning.”
“You don’t sound very good.”
Paul didn’t feel very good. Though it was usually time for him to get up, he hadn’t really gotten to sleep until late. He couldn’t block out the noises like he could the hundreds of steers out on a drive. It was different there and he knew that it was the reason that he felt so bad right then. “I don’t feel very good sis. Is everything okay?”
“Yes, everything is fine, but I just talked to Scott.”
Of course she did, he thought to himself. His younger brother was always the one to tell on him and he had probably told her what an incredible idiot he was being. Paul was waiting for her to tell him that he was crazy and he should just come back to the ranch where he belonged. He almost wanted her to say that so he would have an excuse to leave. New York just wasn’t for him and he knew that though he loved Katie, he would be miserable there. Men like him couldn’t change that much.
“So what did our brother have to say?”
“That you had fallen in love with Katie and that you were there, trying to find her.”
Paul knew that she would have the complete run down. Gemma had a way of making you feel safe and getting every last detail that she was after. They had both said before that she should have been an interrogator and she wouldn’t have to do anything but ask nicely for the information. It was almost impossible to keep something from her.
“Yeah that sounds about right. Until I got here and seen this place for myself. There is no way that I could live here. Hell, I couldn’t even get to sleep last night.”
“You are not made for the city brother. You know that. Marcel may have been able to when he was thinking about moving to Houston for Davina. That was different. You are different and made for the farm. Why can’t you find you a girl from town, who wants the same thing?”
It sounded easy, like one small decision could make everything better. But the thing was though, that he didn’t want anyone else. He had been alive over thirty years and he had never felt the way Katie had made him feel. Not just the night of passion he could never get far from his mind, but the moments before when he would smile like an idiot just to be in her presence. She was the woman that made him want to be a better man, but New York was too much and he knew that he would lose what sort of man he was if he stayed there too long. “I wish I could Gemma, you just don’t understand.”
“I do Paul. I have been in love too, but you can’t change who you are for someone. Neither can she. You are like a fish and doe trying to love each other. It’s never going to work.”
“I don’t think I will feel like this again. She was the one.”
He heard her sigh on the other end of the phone. She had been in love as well. A long time ago before she knew it for what it was. When it was happening, it was too intense for retrospection, but now she seen it for what it was. She herself wondered if she had messed up the one good thing that had happened in her life. Gemma still regretted breaking up with Tony and she didn’t want Paul to feel the same way. But he would be unhappy there and she didn’t want to suggest pushing to stay either. Gemma was at a place of indecision and she was not there very often, so it felt strange.
“I don’t know what to say. You know I still miss Tony and it has been almost five years. So I am not going to tell you that you are just going to forget about her because sometimes that doesn’t happen. I know this, but I also know that you will be miserable there. You sound miserable Paul. You don’t even sound like yourself. Sometimes you just got to sit back and see how things are going to right themselves. You may even be surprised at what happens.”
She was trying to sound more optimistic than she really felt. Gemma still felt the pain of losing Tony and wondering if she should have fought harder. She still had the what-if questions in her mind that were impossible to shut off.
“Maybe you are right.”
Gemma felt saddened in a way when he gave up. What she said was true, but she still liked to think that love would conquer all. In reality it just wasn’t the case. “Are you at least going to find her first before you come back?”
Paul didn’t know if he should or not. How could he see her again and then just walk away. But at the same time, how could he make it all this way and not? “I don’t know. I don’t even know how to find her. This place is crazy and there are so many people. How do you even do it?”
He heard her sigh and after a few minutes, Gemma had him write down a couple of numbers that matched up to Katie. “She is at one of these numbers, but I am not sure which one. There is only three, so that isn’t so bad.”
“Thanks Gemma. I don’t know what I would do with you.”
She hung up, but worried about her brother in the city. He was more used to the open space of the ranch and she couldn’t even imagine him there. She wondered to herself if he was still wearing his cowboy boots and she had a feeling that he was.
***
Katie answered her phone to the unknown number. She had a feeling that she needed to, but when she said hello, there was no one there. It happened once more and she said the name of the one she had hoped it was, but then it hung up on her. She was left looking at the phone in her office and wondering who it was. When she called it back, it just rang and left her to guess at who it was. She wanted it to be Paul, as much as she wanted to forget him and his simple life in Texas.
She had never lived so free and even now as she looked at one of the best views in the city, she wanted to see horses and sunrise, instead of all of the skyscrapers that blotted out the sun. She wanted Paul, but she recognized that they were from two different places in their life. Katie had a corporate ladder to climb, even if it was her family. That it was the family business, gave her more obligations to stay and it seemed impossible that it could be any other way. It was reality, even if it was slightly depressing.
“Katie, you have a meeting at ten, remember?”
She nodded at her assistant and tried to remember who she was meeting. When she gave her the slightly blank look, she took the cue and gave her the names. It was two men that wanted to buy in with five franchises and I was supposed to be there to push the sale. Five more locations was a lot of fees and royalty money for the company. There was never enough for the business, even when it was so different than what she needed.