Chapter 41

The buzz of Shawnee’s phone woke her early the next morning. A text from Violet.

Where are you?

She stared blearily at the screen, trying to decide how to play this out. The old Shawnee would’ve had some smart-ass remark. Blown it off as just another fling. But she wasn’t going to fool anyone, least of all herself. Or Violet, who knew better than to even ask if she was okay. So she dodged the question.

I’m going to see Butthead. Be home in a few days.

There. That would give her some breathing room. They didn’t have to know that she’d be seeing Butthead via a live video feed, not in person. The horse was in hog heaven at A&M, with vet students standing in line to cater to his every need.

Be careful, Violet wrote back. Let me know as soon as you’re back in town.

Not likely. She couldn’t have any of them knocking on her door while she was clearing out her place, a caretaker’s apartment above a barn where she’d lived longer than any place other than her grandparent’s ranch.

The next text was from Tori. Shawnee fed her the same information, guaranteeing no one would show up on her doorstep for at least a few days. Then she got dressed and loaded her horses. By her reckoning, she was no more than three hours behind the Jacobs trucks when she rolled into Amarillo.

Violet checked in a couple more times. So did Tori, and even Melanie. But not Cole. Thank God. It was hard enough, knowing he was only an hour away. If he’d actually tried to reach her…

She gave notice to her landlords, who were only slightly mollified by the short list of names she gave them, acquaintances who would jump at the chance to take her place.

“I can’t imagine finding anyone as reliable as you,” the old lady said, sounding a little choked up. “It’s been so wonderful, to be able to leave and never once worry that everything here would be taken care of better than we could do it ourselves. And we’ll miss you.”

Shawnee swallowed hard and gave a yeah, me too nod. Yet another sign that she’d stayed in one place too long. Another string to be cut. How had she let herself get tangled in so many?

And how had she, who prided herself on traveling light, accumulated so much stuff? The apartment was no big deal. She pared her clothes down to what would fit in the closet in her trailer—her wardrobe was due for an update anyway—then the rest along with boxes of bits and pieces of household crap to the homeless shelter. Everything they couldn’t use went to the dump.

But the tack room—she stared in helpless despair at the rows of bridles and rope bags, saddles and blankets, the majority trophies from ropings. She started to sort through it all, but every piece she picked up had a memory stuck on it like a sand burr. There were the halters she and Granddad had won when she was fifteen, her official comeback after treatment. Gran had a picture of the award presentation that Shawnee hated. Granddad looked great—strong and proud—but her hair had barely started to come back in and she was still gaunt. Hollow-cheeked. A refugee from a war with her own body.

One whole corner was crammed full of stuff she’d won in the past three years with Tori. Back in college, she never would’ve imagined that the girl she’d mockingly called Cowgirl Barbie would end up being the best partner she’d ever had. The strongest, truest of all the ties that bound her to the Panhandle.

Not counting Cole. Which she didn’t, because those strings had been woven from delusions that had evaporated in the harsh light of reality.

She’d meant to sort through, pick out the must-keeps, then haul the rest to a used tack shop. Apparently, though, her fucked-up emotions had failed to get the memo. She threw in the towel when she teared up at the sight of a cheap, ugly breast collar from a roping in Hereford of all the damn places. But it was the first trophy of any kind she’d won on Roy…

A dozen bridles with various bits—snaffles, D-rings, different sizes and styles of ports and shanks to suit individual horses—went into her trailer, along with five kinds of saddle pads, a couple of insulated horse blankets for the cold New York winter, splint boots, skid boots, plus buckets and hay bags for the trip. And her ropes, of course. Brady had promised to provide anything else she might need.

She got a flash of Cole’s hands sliding over her skin, his glorious weight settling over her, and gave a short, harsh laugh. That was one need she wasn’t gonna be able to fill at the tack store.

Tuesday she scrubbed Tori’s trailer, top to bottom, front to back, until there wasn’t a trace that Shawnee had ever used it. Then she texted to say she’d be dropping it off that evening.

I’ll be there, Tori replied.

That afternoon Shawnee backed up her pickup to the tack room door, loaded everything that wasn’t going to New York, and hauled it all to a storage unit. She started to pay a year’s rent, then reconsidered and made it two. She had no idea when she would be back. Or if. Maybe, with time and distance, she’d get over herself, call the owners, and tell them to auction off the works.

It was just after five o’clock when she rolled down the garage-style door and snapped the padlock shut on what was left of a lifetime in the Panhandle. Almost done. But this last part was going to be a bitch.

When Shawnee pulled into Tori’s yard, Delon’s red Charger was gone. Tori’s generic I’m-not-anybody-important four-door was parked in the driveway, under a thriving young pecan tree. New siding gleamed on what had been an ugly concrete box, surrounded by a patch of lush green lawn and a blaze of flowers, planted and maintained under Miz Iris’s strict supervision. She was worse than Cole, taking charge of everyone who wandered into her orbit. Shawnee fought off a pang of regret that there would be no more cooking lessons.

But she would always have Miz Iris’s rolls.

She drove on past the house and backed the trailer into its usual spot, alongside the indoor arena. The heaviness in her chest condensed into a lead weight. How many thousands of practice runs had she and Tori made in that building? All the hours, curses, bickering. The laughter and moments of triumph when they pulled off a flawless run. Tori was no piece of fluff these days. The moment she had decided to own her legacy as Panhandle royalty, she had become a force to be reckoned with.

Tonight, Shawnee would’ve rather faced Cowgirl Barbie.

Tori strolled out of the house, dressed for the barn in a Rope Like a Girl T-shirt and grubby jeans. She walked directly to the front of Shawnee’s pickup, crossed her arms, and waited.

Shawnee got out and slammed the door. “Yes. I screwed up. I should have told Cole about the hysterectomy.”

“Is that normally how it works?” Tori mimed a handshake. “Hi. I’m Shawnee, and I can’t have your children.”

“Cole isn’t a normal kind of guy.”

“Now that I can’t argue with.”

Shawnee waited for the what the hell were you thinking?, but it didn’t come. Tori was supposed to be mad, dammit. Cole was family now, by way of Tori being Beni’s stepmother. But she just stood there, doing a perfect impression of her father’s bland politician face. What did she expect Shawnee to do with…nothing?

Open her trap and dig herself a deeper hole, most likely.

She clambered into the bed of the pickup to release the gooseneck hitch from the steel ball. “Home alone?”

“Delon’s at the ranch. The annual end of season barbecue.”

Ah, yes. Shawnee’s invitation had been in the pile of mail her landlady had collected while she was gone. A letter bomb hidden amongst the bank statements and grocery store flyers. She jumped down from the pickup and set a wooden block under the trailer jack. “Shouldn’t you be there?”

“In the interests of family peace, we decided it was best if I sent my regards.”

Shawnee started cranking down the jack. “Can you repeat that in regular people words?”

“I’m steering clear because Violet and I got into it yesterday when I dropped Beni off.”

Shawnee paused midcrank. “About what?”

“You. And Cole.” When Shawnee stared at her, open-mouthed, Tori shrugged. “You told him you didn’t want a husband or kids. There are witnesses. If he chose to build some fantasy world, that’s his problem.”

“And you said so.”

“Naturally.”

Shawnee’s initial reaction was gratitude. At least one person was on her side. Then the guilt sucker-punched her. Just what she needed. One more burning ember to dump on her personal hellfire. Tori and Violet got along pretty well, but that hadn’t always been the case, and no truce involving stepparents was unbreakable. The damage Shawnee had done to Cole was bad enough. She shouldn’t have to live with being a wrench in the works between Violet, Tori, Joe, and Delon.

She cranked the jack with a vengeance. “I can take care of myself, princess. Go party with your people. And try to play nice.”

“Excuse the hell out of me,” Tori drawled, sounding more amused than pissed off. “My daddy raised me to have my partner’s back.”

“Yeah, well, we both know how my daddy raised me.” Or, more precisely, didn’t. Shawnee gave the jack one last turn to be sure the hitch was clear of the ball, took a deep breath, and faced Tori. “You’re gonna need to find a new heeler. It’s been great and all, but I’m ready for a change.”

Tori’s arms dropped to her sides. “A change?”

“We’re getting kinda stale, ya know?” She made a show of brushing the dust off her hands. “Don’t take it personally. It’s not you, it’s me…blah, blah.”

Tori stared, incredulous. “You’re breaking up with me?”

The underlying hurt made Shawnee want to take it back, but she only gave an elaborate shrug. “It had to happen sooner or later.”

Tori just kept staring at her, for so long Shawnee was holding onto her cool by the tattered edges when she finally asked, “Why?”

“Huh?”

“Why did it have to happen?” Tori’s eyes narrowed, her gaze sharpening to a steely razor that could dissect flesh and bone. “Why does everything have to end with you? Is this some kind of trust issue courtesy of Ace?”

“No!” She would not give the bastard even that much credit. Or blame.

“Then why? What are you scared of?”

“Scared?” Shawnee scoffed, despite the twist in her gut.

Tori folded her arms again and gave a slow, disbelieving shake of her head. “Wow, I am slow. You’re a textbook case. Parent abandons child at a critical time in her life. Child vows never to allow anyone to wield that kind of emotional power over her again. Thus follows a string of meaningless relationships—”

“It has nothing to do with Ace!” Shawnee yelled, so loud Tori took a step back. “My life is exactly what I want it to be.”

“Yeah. I can see how happy it’s making you. Did I mention you look like shit? Almost as bad as Cole.”

Shawnee stopped dead. She had to know…“He’ll get over it, right? Eventually.”

“What do you care?” Tori curled her lip, mocking. “You’re moving on. Big, tough Shawnee Pickett doesn’t need anybody but herself.”

“No one can afford to need me!” Shawnee clamped her mouth shut, but it was too late. She couldn’t leave the words just hanging there, shrill and pathetic, so she went with a carefully blended mix of sarcasm and self-contempt. “If I was a car, there would be a mandatory recall due to a fatal design flaw. I’ve already been wrecked, I’m missing a few parts, and it’s only a matter of time before something else goes to shit. Who wants that in their life?”

“People who love you?”

Shawnee scoffed again, harsher. “And in return, they get what? A stack of medical bills. The pleasure of watching me—”

She cut off sharply and bent to unplug the trailer light cord from the socket in the pickup bumper. Crap. Sweat had broken out along her hairline, and her stomach was already a wreck from three days of inhaling the junk food she normally avoided except in small, celebratory doses. Much more of this and she’d be heaving banana Moon Pies in the grass.

Tori was quiet for too long. Thinking. Shit.

“I see,” she said, in her snotty rich bitch drawl. “You’re just watching out for everyone else. How selfless of you.”

Shawnee jerked upright too fast and whacked her head on the underside of the gooseneck. She cursed the insult to her already aching head. “Medical expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy in this country. How do you figure Violet and the rest of the family would feel about Cole tying himself to a woman who’s already brought down one ranch?”

“Been there, almost done that when Cole’s parents died,” Tori said. “As a result, Jacobs Livestock is now financially structured in a way that protects the corporation from the debt—or death—of any of the individual partners.”

Oh. Shawnee rubbed the knot on her head, feeling as if the rug had been jerked out from under one of her feet. So she couldn’t ruin the company. She could still ruin Cole.

Tori cocked her head. “So…you’ve at least considered the long-term with Cole.”

“I’ve considered that it’s impossible.” And that she wouldn’t have this nest of rattlesnakes in her gut if she hadn’t allowed herself to wander into that particular dreamland. “Even if I could give him kids, I can’t promise anything beyond my next six-month checkup.”

“So you don’t even try.” Tori’s words dripped with disgust. “All those times you rode my ass about pushing myself, never settling—it was just a massive pile of bullshit.”

Shawnee yanked the latch on the tailgate and let it fall open with a bang. “No, it was not. I always rope for first place.”

“But when it comes to real life, you won’t even enter up.”

“Don’t tell me about real.” Shawnee stomped up to Tori and jabbed a finger at her, stopping just short of making contact. “I’ve got so much fucking reality, I oughta be a television star by now. Do you have any idea what it’s like, never knowing which day will be the one when you’re taking a shower and find a lump? Which time the doctor is going to walk in with your lab results and that look on his face? Well, in case you can’t guess, it sucks. I wouldn’t inflict this on Ace, let alone Cole.”

“You’re scared. I get it.” Tori leveled that cold blue gaze on her. “Again—been there, done that after I lost Willy. And you’re right, it’s a piss-poor way to live, waiting for the next disaster. But do you really think not letting yourself have anything that matters is going to make it easier to die?”

The blunt words hit Shawnee like a fist, driving her back a step and flattening her lungs as she pictured her grandfather—his withered body and the bottomless grief in his eyes as he whispered, “I’m going to miss seeing all the things you turn out to be.”

And Gran, trying to be strong and cheerful while the other half of her wasted away until there was just…nothing. How could she stand to see Cole that way, feel him squeezing her hand, desperate to hold on as long as possible and losing. Again. And she’d know she’d done this to him because she was Ace’s selfish bitch of a daughter who took what she wanted, no matter the cost.

Shawnee shook her head violently, scrambling the images.

“Just tell me one thing.” Tori’s voice was quiet, but penetrating. “What if you don’t get sick again? You just wake up twenty or thirty years from now and realize you spent your whole life bracing yourself for a wreck that never happened?”

Shawnee made a harsh, bitter sound. “There’s not a bookie in Vegas who’d take those odds.”

Tori set a hand on the Turn ’Em and Burn ’Em logo scrawled across the hood of Shawnee’s pickup. “When you made me enter this roping, I looked at the number of entries, how many really good ropers would be competing, and told you our chances of winning were about five hundred to one. And you told me I’d never be a winner if I kept planning to lose.” She gave another disgusted shake of her head. “How did you, of all people, let hope become the enemy?”

Another sucker punch, this time right to the heart. Shawnee spun around and grappled blindly for the door handle. “Fuck. You.”

Tori didn’t even pause. “I’ve never been dumped before. How does this work? Do I pretend I don’t know you next time we both show up at the same roping?”

Shawnee finally got the damn door open. “We won’t. Brady offered me a job in New York and I accepted. Tomorrow morning, I’m gone.”

She slammed into her pickup and revved the engine. Tori stood square in her path for a long moment, staring her down through the windshield, before taking a few leisurely steps to the side. She tucked her hands in the back pockets of her jeans and continued to stare as Shawnee drove away.

Neither of them lifted a hand to wave goodbye.