Chapter Eleven
“Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want.”
—Blu Johnson, life lesson #86
Heather still couldn’t believe Aunt Blu had been flirting with Waylon’s dad earlier that day.
Heck, she’d been equally floored just to find out Waylon’s dad was in town.
One glance, and there’d been no doubt, though. The man didn’t have the close-cropped beard like Waylon, and the copper had begun to fade, making its way toward white, but he’d definitely been Prince Harry, Sr. A spitting image of the younger Peterson.
Therefore, Heather couldn’t exactly blame Blu for being entranced. But still. It had been twenty years since she’d lost her family. Why start dating now?
She’d have to bring Jill and Trenton in on this turn of events. The three of them would be getting together at Aunt Blu’s the following day due to a new foster girl arriving. They liked to go over and help the girls acclimate. So she’d share the news then. Additionally, maybe by then she could figure out what she thought about the idea. She wasn’t sure whether she should be happy about this new development or not.
She glanced at Cal and Jill’s ranch house as she drove past. There was no sign of either of them at home, but there was a production van sitting in the driveway. No production people, though. She craned her neck to get a better view, but the house seemed locked up tight. Rarely did filming happen on a Saturday, but with the van there, something must be going on.
She kept driving, the silence of the land leaving her feeling more alone than usual, but she didn’t let herself falter from her mission. She’d made a decision earlier today. A big one.
After accepting ice cream from Waylon, they’d hung out at the park with Rose and her new friend. And though there hadn’t been a lot of conversation between her and Waylon—as if he’d still been a little sore over her turning him down the day before—she had learned that he planned to bring Charlie and Rose out for a horse ride the following day. And at the mention of “her favorite horses,” Rose had run over, and her enthusiasm had been contagious. Heather had listened to the girl telling anyone within earshot all about the last time she’d been on a horse, and the more Heather had listened, the more her own desire had grown.
She missed riding. And she wanted to ride.
So, she’d decided to take Waylon up on his offer.
She parked at the barn, and as she stepped from the vehicle, she looked toward the backyard. They’d begun on the fire pit that week, and the boulders for the waterfall had been positioned into place, and all in all, things were coming together.
Actually, all in all, things were looking rather terrific. And that was her doing.
There’d been no additional setbacks, they were progressing on schedule and remained on target to complete on time, and at breakfast the morning before, Jill and Trenton had not only gushed about how great it was coming together, but they’d pointed out that her confidence in the project seemed to be soaring, as well.
Heather kept her pride in check, though. She wouldn’t go so far as to say “soaring.” They were still weeks from finishing. Anything could still go wrong.
But she did walk a little straighter these days.
She wasn’t half-bad at this. After getting past her initial nerves, the ability to toss out answers or to improvise at the first inkling of a hurdle had come easily. As well as simply seeing the big picture and understanding what elements to add to the design to improve upon it.
Nonetheless, along with her fledgling sense of success, she’d begun to worry over a larger issue. That being, what would come after this job wrapped up. She’d written her position into the show with this project in mind, but the reality was that she hadn’t looked too far down the road.
And now that she was looking?
Well, she didn’t see a huge call for major landscape design in Red Oak Falls.
Maybe if Building a Life eventually got larger?
She turned for the barn. The show might expand down the road. She could possibly talk the producers into seeking out the occasional project that centered more around a backyard than the house reno. That could be fun. But being a regular part of things only to handle general landscaping for weekly renovations wasn’t what she wanted.
Entering the barn, she paused a few feet in, her ears picking up on something odd, before it occurred to her that the oddness was the relative silence. Two of the horses weren’t in the barn. Moving deeper inside, she confirmed that the remaining horse was Ollie, and wondered if Jill and Cal were shooting on the others somewhere. That would explain the production van.
Or heck, possibly the van was simply parked for the weekend and Jill and Cal had gone out for a romantic ride around the property. They could be on the ranch at that very moment, christening the land, same as they’d done the barn.
She made a face at the thought.
Note to self. Steer clear of any sightings of horses.
She could definitely do that.
Going into the tack room, she grabbed a saddle and headed back to Ollie’s stall. She wouldn’t make a big deal of this, it was just a horse ride on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. One which would allow her space to think through options for what came next. But halfway to Ollie, her feet stalled. Because it was not just a horse ride on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. And she couldn’t fool herself into believing it was.
It was her. Getting on a horse. And willingly ushering old memories in.
Although she didn’t necessarily want to let the past return, she also knew she couldn’t avoid it if she mounted a horse.
Ollie poked his head over the door and neighed at her.
“I’ll be there in a minute, boy.” Heather offered a shaky smile. “Just as soon as I catch my breath again.”
A vision of her mother appeared suddenly. Her mother standing in their greenhouse, her dark hair knotted on the top of her head and a trowel poking out of her back pocket. She’d been explaining to Heather the process for creating the hybrid tree sitting on her workbench. The tree had been a surprise for her father’s birthday—Heather had been six at the time—and her dad had gushed upon receiving it.
The tree had also burned in the fire. It had been planted just to the left of the barn.
Heather forced out a breath and tucked the memory into a new box. One she might want to revisit someday. This one was a good memory. Maybe she’d soon pull others out like it and add them to the box as well.
After dragging in one more breath and letting it out slowly, she made her way to Ollie’s side. She readied the horse, her focus only on the moment at hand, and used a mounting stool to swing onto his back. And then she was riding again.
She turned for the doors. It would be a beautiful horse ride today. On a glorious Saturday afternoon.
Sunlight was the first thing to register as she and Ollie stepped from the darker interior, and Heather lifted her face to soak it in. Peace settled inside her, while at the same time, her heart continued to thunder. The quiet of the land now provided comfort. She couldn’t explain it, but she knew her mother was with her. In fact, she’d almost swear it had been her mother’s idea to come out to the ranch to begin with. Rose might have been the instigator, but Ellen Lindsay had been the voice in Heather’s ear.
It had been like that a lot lately. Though she’d long been a daddy’s girl, her mother was the one either one step ahead of her or just behind her lately. Always there, always beckoning—and sometimes pushing. Her mother was why Heather was doing Jill’s backyard, after all. Why she was finally allowing herself to remember more than the bad.
“I miss you, Mom,” she said to the clouds, then she squeezed her thighs and set Ollie into a trot.
They moved across the open land, every hundred feet kicking it up another notch, and as the wind caught in her hair, Heather began to laugh with a joy she hadn’t felt in years. She’d missed this. Missed enjoying the beauty of the land. Being with horses.
“I miss you, too, Acer.” Acer had been her horse. The one who’d escaped the fire. As a teen, she’d imagined he’d found a magical place after he’d disappeared, one where he could run and roam free.
But deep down, she’d always assumed it had been something quite the opposite.
There’d been no sightings of an injured horse in the area, but then, she also wasn’t sure Aunt Blu would have let that information pass on to her if there had been. Not at that time. She’d had too rough a first year. So, when she heard a soft whiny behind her now—one that sounded exactly as Acer’s had—she didn’t turn. Because for some reason, it made sense that her horse would be with her today as well. Even if only in her mind.
But when she heard what sounded like a brief stampede, she did look back. And she almost lost her grip when the noise spooked Ollie.
“Woah!” She tried to calm the horse as he shot forward, but there was no stopping him. Just as there were no other horses anywhere around.
She looked from side to side as Ollie pounded over the land, searching for the source of the noise, but she saw nothing except a soft breeze whispering across the dried brush.
“Mom?” she asked shakily. And then a lone gallop sounded in the distance. It was probably either Beau or Apollo, but a tear slipped from the corner of her eye just the same. As if it really had been her mother reaching out to her.
Ollie continued to run. His panic subsided, but as his enjoyment of the moment took over, Heather leaned into the movement and let him have the lead. She had no specific place to go, and no hurry to get there. So Ollie—and her mother—could take her wherever they deemed best.
And where they sent her was to the spring she’d heard was on the property.
She pulled back on the reins as the small pool of water came into sight, and she breathed in the smell of freshwater. The spring was connected to one of the many streams winding through the town. It was surrounded by tall oaks and pines and mostly shaded at that time of day, the sun having long since passed over. That’s why she didn’t notice the lone horse off to the side at first. But then she realized it was Beau.
She pointed Ollie in the other horse’s direction, while searching the area for either Jill or Cal. Or a camera crew. And as she dismounted, her concern billowed into fear. She pulled out her cell phone.
Only, the water moved before she could punch Jill’s number . . . and then Waylon burst up from beneath.
And he had no clothes on.
Heather’s eyes bugged while Waylon froze, his hands in the middle of raking his hair back.
“What are you,” she began, but couldn’t seem to get either her mouth or her eyes to function properly. She kept looking at him.
At all of him.
Or at all of him that was currently out of the water. Because thankfully, that was only from the waist up.
But still . . . waist up was staggeringly awe-inspiring.
She blinked and tried again. “Why . . .”
But her lips ended up moving silently once more, as if she were a fish out of water.
“How . . .” Her voice trickled to a whisper that time. Then finally her brain engaged, and she whirled, turning her back to Waylon.
She stared in the direction she’d come, her mouth dry and her eyes forgetting to blink, and when the sound of swishing water came from behind her, it was as if she’d been prodded with a live wire.
“Why are you naked?” she shrieked. “Why are you here?”
“I had to kill a hog.” His voice was as calm as hers was shrill. “And I decided to wash the blood off me before going home.”
Kill a hog?
And how was he going to get home? His truck wasn’t even there.
She almost looked back, confused and simply . . . flabbergasted by the whole thing, but she caught herself in time. It registered that the water had quit moving, so that meant Waylon was likely now standing on the bank. In all his glory. Then her gaze landed on his wet clothing, spread out to dry, on a rock not far from her feet. His boots and hat sat innocently beside them.
“Oh, dear Jesus,” she muttered. She grabbed the clothes and tossed them over her head. She had to say no to Waylon.
Keeping her eyes staring forward, one question rang loudly through her mind. How on earth was she going to say no to Waylon when he was standing naked right behind her?
Or maybe he wouldn’t suggest anything she would have to say no to?
A whimper slipped from her throat as the sound of rustling clothes started, and she squeezed her eyes shut.
She should have called Trenton after having had lunch with him in the barn the day before.
She should have gone over to Trenton’s after having ice cream with him earlier today.
Or called an emergency meeting! She nodded to herself. That’s what she should have done. Because she knew what she was like. And she’d known things were heading into murky territory with him. Hadn’t she wanted to say yes when he’d asked her out?
He picked up his jeans.
What she really should have done was admit to Jill and Trenton during one of their daily breakfasts that everything was not fine. That she’d been thinking thoughts.
And she absolutely should not be standing there within feet of a half-naked Waylon Peterson, who was now likely pulling his wet jeans up over his long, muscular thighs . . . while eyeing her as he did it!
“Two questions,” she muttered, and didn’t realize she’d said the words out loud until Waylon spoke behind her.
“What did you say?”
She opened her eyes and stared at the sky. “I said two questions. Let’s play two-questions.”
“Okay.” A belt buckle rattled behind her. “Whose turn is it?”
“I have no idea, but I’m going first. Why didn’t you tell me your dad was coming to town?”
“Because you didn’t ask?”
She frowned at the answer. She’d expected something a little deeper than that.
And she hadn’t yet asked because she’d been more focused on Rose.
“So what are you saying? That we’re not going to share things unless the other specifically asks?”
The sounds behind her stopped. “Do you want to share things with me, Heather?”
She shook her head. “Never mind.” That hadn’t been her point, either.
Her point had been that when she and Aunt Blu had come upon Waylon and his dad, it had hurt her feelings to realize that Waylon hadn’t mentioned his dad’s visit. Even though they’d talked just the day before.
“Forget I said anything,” she added. “That wasn’t my next question.”
“Then what is your question?”
She could tell he’d moved closer.
And his clothes were rustling again.
“What’s he doing here?” she blurted out. She didn’t really have a question. She just didn’t want to think about how close Waylon might be standing to her.
“He’s going to be helping me out at the ranch. He’s going to live with me. What are you doing riding Ollie?”
She looked at the horse. “Trying to figure out what I want to do with my life.”
Once again, all movements ceased. “And what do you want to do with your life?”
She shook her head and whispered, “I have no idea.”
Nor had she meant to bring that up.
“Do you not like what you’re doing now?”
She didn’t point out that he’d just asked a third question. Nor did she immediately answer. Instead, she focused on the clouds above her that looked like two hands clasped together, and she pictured her mom and dad as they’d been on their wedding day. A 10x14 of that photo hung on the wall in her living room.
“I have no idea.” She gave the same answer, and she also did her best not to wonder if Waylon was going to reach out and touch her. If he might kiss her. “And that’s bothered me for a while.”
Then she just let herself talk.
“My parents instinctively knew everything about their lives,” she explained. “Dad taught horticulture at the college, and Mom was a florist with a knack for making anything grow. They’d both known from an early age that they would somehow be involved with plants. They even met at a nursery.” A laugh slipped from her, but there was sadness in the sound. “They both reached for the same prickly pear.”
It had been love at first sight for her parents, and dang it, but that had made her believe that kind of love was real for everyone.
“I went to college on their insurance money,” she continued when Waylon remained silent. “I got a degree in early education, and I took a job teaching kindergarten.”
“I could see you teaching kindergarten.”
His voice came from directly behind her now, and she found herself more anxious than worried. Her panic over finding him naked had subsided.
“Me too,” she agreed. “Teaching kids felt ideal. But wow, I hated it.”
She closed her eyes again, only this time in order to see the past.
“I love kids,” she shared. “I’d love to raise a family and have summers off with them. But the funny thing is, I absolutely abhorred teaching. They weren’t my children, and there were too many rules and paperwork. I just wanted to see the smile on a child’s face when she learned her ABCs. Or when he wrote his name for the first time.
“So I came back home.” She should stop talking. She was getting too personal. But like before, her mouth didn’t want to function correctly. “And we started Bluebonnet Construction. And I liked it. But honestly, I never really liked the construction part of the job. I liked making things pretty, though, and now I get to make Jill’s wedding pretty.”
She could feel the heat of Waylon’s body.
“But I don’t know what I want to do after it’s finished.”
She finally stopped talking and opened her eyes. And then she waited.
“Heather.” Waylon’s voice had a tight, dangerous quality when he spoke.
She didn’t answer.
“Look at me.”
She shook her head. She couldn’t look at him. She couldn’t turn around. She should have gotten back on Ollie and ridden away the second she’d seen him in the water.
Only, she did turn. And she did look.
And though he was now fully dressed, she could see every last desire that she held being reflected right back at her.
He wanted her.
He needed her.
“Can I have one more question?” he asked.
She nodded. She wanted to hear his question.
“Do you know what you want right now?”
She told herself not to answer. That there was still time to walk away. Still time to hold her heart in check.
But at least part of that was a lie.
“I want you,” she answered with confidence. She reached up and opened the top three buttons of her shirt. “And I want this.”
Waylon’s eyes burned hot. “You’re sure?”
She finished with the buttons and shrugged out of her shirt. And then she stood in front of him, her white demi-bra on display and her breasts begging for his touch. “I’ve never been more certain of anything. But it’s been a long time, Waylon, since I was even kissed by a man.”
He reached for her, his calloused hands landing at her waist instead of the few inches higher that she’d hoped. “How long has it been?”
His voice was as rough as his hands, and intoxication threatened to submerge her.
“Three years.”
He nodded. “Then I promise to be gentle.”
In the next breath, he leaned in. His hands stayed at her waist, his thumbs digging slightly into the flesh of her stomach, and the only other part of him that touched her was his mouth. But with barely a brush of his lips, he pulled a moan out of her.
She leaned forward when he didn’t press for more, this time her seeking him out. And when he resettled his mouth over hers, his lips were full and warm and soft. And they made her heart beat too fast. Then they began to move against hers. Slowly. And she almost cried out at the agony of it. The man was like a drug she couldn’t get enough of.
The kiss continued as it had started, slow and mesmerizing, and it lasted for an eternity. Waylon would barely touch her, then pull back. Then retouch. Then nibble.
He tasted of water and sunshine and need, and Heather thought she might die at his feet if he didn’t hurry up and take more. She was standing there with no shirt on, dammit. Take her! But then it occurred to her that she could do the asking. She could take charge of the moment.
So she did.
“Waylon.” Her lips moved against his.
“What?” The whiskers lining his upper lip tickled, and she licked her top lip as she savored the taste of him.
“Not that gentle.”
He smiled against her mouth, and her hands reached for his belt buckle.
“It might have been a while,” she assured him, “but trust me. I’m suddenly all caught up.”
In the next breath, Waylon’s hands were everywhere. His mouth returned to hers and his fingers dragged her bra straps over her shoulders, and then her breasts poured into his hands. They groaned together as he cupped her, his fingers squeezing as if she were the best thing he could ever have in his hands, and then Heather remembered where her hands were. She got busy on the buckle, undoing it as he trailed his mouth to her ear. The button of his jeans followed. Next, he tugged at her hair while scraping his teeth down over her neck, and when he dipped his head and sucked a nipple into his mouth, she yanked at the still-wet denim.
“Faster,” she panted. She appreciated foreplay as much as the next woman, but five minutes earlier, she’d seen this man naked. And she wanted him naked again. “I need flesh,” she growled out. “I need you.”
Her bra hit the ground, her jeans reached her ankles. “And I need you,” he replied.
He palmed her rear and pulled her up, flush with his body, and she got her first solid feel of what lay beneath.
“Ah, geez,” she whispered. She dangled in the air, and she almost came right then. “Hurry,” she pleaded. Her body vibrated in his arms.
Another whimper escaped when he dragged her higher, his damp clothing catching and pulling against her now-sensitive skin, and caught a nipple between his teeth. And as her body bowed tight, her need for him reached a fever pitch.
In the next instant, she was back on the ground and his clothes were being ripped from his body. Heather caught her breath as she watched. The man in motion was a sight to behold. Muscles stretched and flexed, parts were exposed—with one standing impressively at attention—and only after his jeans caught at his boots did she remember that she had to free her legs as well. She kicked out of her boots, panties following jeans, and then she was back in Waylon’s arms.
Ten seconds after that . . . Waylon was in her.
Waylon hadn’t even recovered his breathing when it occurred to him what they’d done. He looked over at Heather, who now lay flat on her back on the shirt he’d spread on the ground for her, and traced his eyes down over her curves. She was gorgeous. She was all he’d imagined she would be.
But he could not believe what he’d forgotten.
As if sensing his review of her, Heather turned, her eyes languid with lingering desire and a soft smile curving her lips. But she apparently read the worry in him, and she shoved up.
“I swear to all that’s holy, Waylon Peterson. If you’re going to lie there and tell me this was a mistake. That you regret it”—she pointed a finger at him—“while we’re both still sweating and out of breath . . . then I’m going to turn Trenton loose on you.”
He captured her finger. “It definitely was no mistake.” And he had no idea how she could imagine he might think that it was.
“Then you just regret it?”
“Hell, no, I don’t regret it.” He pushed up to sit beside her and reached for his jeans, and when she scrambled for her own clothes, he stopped her with a hand.
He shook his head when she glared at him, and he could see her uncertainty tucked behind her bravado. The look caused a spot deep inside of him to ache. She’d said she’d been hurt before. More than once. And it destroyed him to think she worried about that with him.
“I regret nothing,” he stressed softly. He pulled his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and tugged out the condom tucked securely behind his emergency one-hundred-dollar bill. “But we did forget something.”
The air seeped out of her. “That’s all this is about?”
“All it’s about?” He literally gaped at the woman. “Sweetheart, an unexpected pregnancy isn’t a small thing to me. I would never wish Rose away, but I’ve already done the accidental thing once, and I’d prefer not to repeat it.”
“But I’m not going to get pregnant.”
He curled his fingers around the prophylactic. “And how do you know that?”
She grabbed her shirt, and slid her arms into it. Sans bra. “Because I’m as regular as clockwork.”
“You can’t know—”
She stopped him with a hand in the air. “Trust me, I do. I’ve had seventeen years of this. Like. Clockwork.” She looked at her watch. “It’s Saturday now. The twenty-third. Come Tuesday, probably at around two in the afternoon”—she looked back at him—“I’ll have your proof.”
“But—”
“No buts,” she interrupted him again. “The bigger question should be mine.” She looked at the hand holding the condom, and concern tightened her jaw. “I mean”—she chewed on the inside of her cheek—“there is the question of diseases.”
“You mean me?”
“Well, I don’t mean me,” she snapped at him. “I just told you that I haven’t been with a man in three years.”
“Well, if I can trust you about a lack of pregnancy, then believe me, you can rest assured that I don’t have a disease.” He shook his head. “I don’t sleep around, Heather. Not like people want to believe.”
“Yet you are carrying a condom.”
He wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the conversation. Carrying a condom in his wallet had been a rite of passage as a teen, and he supposed he’d never grown out of it.
He handed over the packet. “Check the expiration date.”
The corners of Heather’s mouth turned down as she snatched the condom from his hand. She held it up and squinted at the faded date. And then Waylon did laugh at the incredulity that filled her face.
“It’s over two years old,” she said.
“Yeah. And I purchased it well before that.” He took back the packet and shoved it in his jeans. “You’re not the only one it’s been a long time for.”
“But . . .” She frowned at him. “How?”
“How?” He barked out a laugh and stood to gather the rest of their clothing. “I just don’t. Being a single dad doesn’t leave a lot of time for such things.”
She followed him up, stepping into her panties as he handed them over. “But you only have Rose on the weekends.”
Waylon stopped, one arm in the sleeve of his shirt, before letting the material drop back to the ground. He reached for her hands, then he allowed her to see the sincerity inside him. “It was just me and Rose for a long time. A lot longer than the years Nikki has been dead. And yes, I do only have Rose on the weekends. For now. But nothing is a higher priority than getting my daughter back.”
A voice in the back of his head suggested that Heather could be a priority as well. If she was willing to make him one.
“So we’re good.” He nodded encouragingly. “As soon as we see what Tuesday brings. And if it’ll make you feel better, I can provide proof concerning me. After the last time I was with someone, I got tested. Because yeah, before Rose?” He twisted his mouth to the side. “I did sleep around. Too much.” He’d once done a lot of things he hadn’t been proud of. And though he wished he could say that all the moments for which he felt shame had come before Rose, that also wasn’t his reality. “I’m not that man anymore, Heather. And you can trust me when I tell you that a sexually transmitted disease is the last concern you should have with me.”
She studied him as if testing the weight of his words. Then she disentangled their hands and picked up her jeans.
“Then, I guess we’re good.” She stepped into the denim, and with one quick move, the lusciousness of her lower body was covered. She then plucked her bra from his outstretched hand and shoved it into the back pocket of her jeans. “We’ll talk on Tuesday.”