Page 83 of A Cowboy in the Streets

“Mom,” I said, exasperated. “It’s not like I’m asking him to go vegan. I’m asking him to be a little less sexist, that’s all. I don’t know how you put up with it.”

She shrugged. “It’s not like he thinks women are stupid or incompetent. He is well aware that I run his life for him and that he’d be lost without me. The difference is that what I want aligns with what he wants. It’s a partnership. He wants the same for you, for you to be happy like he is. He can’t wrap his mind around the idea that you might want something else for yourself.” She reached across the table to squeeze my hand. “He loves you, James. So much.”

“I know he loves me.” I paused, frowning, and considered my words. “But I’m never going to be good enough for him. I’m not the daughter he wants me to be, and it doesn’t matter how good I am at my job, I’m never going to be the trainer he wants me to be, either. And you know what? I’m done trying. Because these last few months have taught me that I am good enough. For myself, for Lodestar, for Belle. I’m enough.”

“For Adam?” Mom asked, her voice soft, her gaze sharp.

“Well.” I sawed off a bite of French toast. Mom winced as the knife scraped against the porcelain plate. “I thought I was.”

Mom tilted her head, studying me, and took a ladylike sip of her bloody Mary. “What makes you think you’re not?”

You should go.

“You know, I spent years trying to convince Dad I’m right for the job. Years trying to get him to see me as more than the deliverer of grandbabies. And he always told me I wasn’t what he wanted for Blue Skies. He never hid that. So I left. I went to college where he wanted me to go. I went to other stables for experience. But the second he crooked his finger at me, I’d run straight home again.”

“What does any of that have to do with Adam?” Mom asked.

“Everything.” I blew out an exasperated breath. “What I learned from Dad after futilely chasing his approval is that when a man tells you what he wants, you should take him at his word. And Adam...he told me to go.”

“So you’re going to come back to Blue Skies after all?” she asked, sounding more confused than actually hopeful.

I growled. I didn’t want to go to Blue Skies. I wanted to stay at Lodestar. I was happy here. Even taking Adam out of the equation, I didn’t feel done yet. There was so much more I could accomplish with Belle and the ranch.

“I’ll take that as a no.” Mom delicately dabbed her mouth with a napkin, somehow managing to avoid smearing her lipstick even a smidge. “What did Adam say, exactly? I can’t imagine he’s disappointed with your job performance. Why did he tell you to go?”

“He knows how much I love Blue Skies and you and Dad. He said he couldn’t stand in the way of my happiness.”

“Of all the nerve,” Mom said dryly. She shook her head. “I love your father, but that doesn’t sound like anything he would say. Adam must care for you a lot to put your needs before his.”

I sighed. “You don’t understand. Adam won’t let himself care for me that much. He’s been in love before. It was a disaster, and he doesn’t want to go through that again. It doesn’t matter if I stay at Lodestar or go somewhere else. Adam won’t ever love me like that, and I’m not going to tie myself in knots trying to convince him to.”

“Like you did with your dad,” Mom said. “Hmm.”

“Right,” I said.

Except it didn’t feel right.

Dad had always loved me, but I was never enough. Adam wouldn’t let himself love me, because—my knife clattered on the plate as the epiphany hit—because he didn’t believe he was enough.

Well, shit.

Chapter 34

Adam

“You’re in a foul mood,” Brax remarked.

I didn’t disagree with him. What would be the point in refuting what we both knew to be true? I was in a foul mood. The reason being that any hour now, James was going to come tell me what I already knew, that being she had decided to part ways with Lodestar Ranch and return to California with her family. And I was going to be a goddamn gentleman about it and wish her well.

Brax pushed his hat off his forehead, mopped up the sweat there with a towel, and pulled the brim down again. “You want to talk about it?”

I sure as fuck did not.

“Talking isn’t going to get these heifers rounded up any faster,” I said. “We’ve got a job to do.”

Lodestar Ranch kept a small herd of cattle—about twenty head, most years—to train ranch horses with and every August, we rounded them up for their annual vaccines. We didn’t sell them for beef, but we did breed them enough to sustain the herd, so this was also an opportunity to see how the younger calves were faring. It was a two-person job that usually fell to me and Dad, but for reasons he seemed inclined to keep to himself, Brax had shown up this morning ready to ride. I suspected it might have something to do with the fact that Essie was coming by later to take Magpie home.

I nudged Crackerjack into action. The chestnut gelding was coming up on four now and had taken to cow work like a pig to mud. Already I had interest from buyers around Colorado. Together, we worked to separate the calves from the mamas, always a harrowing experience.

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