Page 20 of The Cowboy's Second Chance Bride

He smirked. “Afraid to have me near and my curved?—”

“Ahh, it’s not that at all. It’s more like I’m grossed out. This is my favorite comforter of all time, and if your bad juju and presence sully it, I will be devastated, and that will be one more thing I won’t forgive you for.”

He stood and went to the armchair by the window. “So you haven’t forgiven me for Vegas.”

“Duh.” I rolled my eyes.

“What happened to ‘What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas’?”

It was a poor attempt at a joke, and he knew it. I showed him my middle finger.

CAL

I dropped into the chair and stretched out my long legs, easing the tightness in my muscles. I’d been up for hours already, trying to get ahead of this story. And her bed looked so cozy and snuggly.

Snuggly? I hadn’t thought or said that word in what… a decade?

The minute I’d seen Sabrina in my office, I knew I had to make sure her name wouldn’t get tied to mine. My dad would lose his shit, and Sabrina would pay. But when I watched her get into the elevator after not seeing her for ten years, I simply wasn’t ready for the moment to end. So, like a horny high schooler, driven by hormones and not logic, I’d gone to her hotel for one more glimpse and hung around outside like a kid with acne and no confidence, when what I really wanted was to spend time getting to know her again, maybe have dinner and catch up. But as long as I kept the truth from her, the odds of a friendly dinner out together was slim to none. I had money on none. Those were the foolish dreams of an unlucky man.

So here we were, and this was the new us. I wiped a hand down my face as I stifled a yawn. A friend of Paul’s had given him a heads-up on the story before it broke, giving us time to plan. And while we were talking strategy, all I could think of was what she’d said. How my dad had already beaten me. There was a lot of truth to those words. My dad had already gone too far, interfering in my personal life. Working on the app in real time, exposing that side of myself, just felt like I would be painting a bull’s-eye on my back. Yeah, I was aware that really didn’t make sense, because going after my business was just as personal. Except that he’d gone after my personal life before, and now there was a wound.

Her words had been the kick in the pants I needed, so I’d changed out of my suit and into my fighting clothes—a pair of worn jeans, a T-shirt, and my cowboy boots. They were the standard brown boots with no extra flourish, but they made me feel like I could kick the shit out of anyone. Then I’d walked into her house, and cruel as it was, I felt more like myself than I had in years. Once upon a time, this place had been a second home to me.

Sabrina hadn’t made a sound since opening the envelope. I dropped my hand to study her. She was flipping through the pages in a loop, her eyes darting across them.

She glanced up at me. “They’re hinting that you were aggressive with me? How coy of them to not straight-out say ‘assault.’” She tossed the papers to the other side of the bed and flopped back down, pulling the covers up to her chin. “I don’t see why any of this requires you breaking and entering. And FYI, you could have texted me the links and saved yourself a trip.”

“I don’t have your number.”

It was true. She couldn’t argue with that. She looked over the comforter at me and rolled her eyes.

“Don’t be a jackass. Jace has my number, and you were with him. Plus, I think in your line of work, it wouldn’t be hard to get my number.” She went back under the covers. Head and all.

I sighed. “Reenie…”

A raised arm came out from under the comforter and pointed a finger at me. “Do not call me that. It’s reserved for my friends.”

“And I am not one of them, clearly.” I knew I didn’t deserve to be.

She flipped the comforter off her head to look at me. “Clearly.” Sabrina rolled over and snatched up the articles. “Have you not seen these? You assaulted me. Look at this one. It’s obvious you were pushing me down.” Her expression straight-faced.

She waved an image of me gripping her arm. Her long jet-black hair hung over her shoulder, reaching all the way to the comforter, part of it falling over her face. I itched to tuck it behind her ear. Touching her the previous day had left me with a lot to unpack. The realization of how much I missed her, how her touch affected me like no other, and how all these years that I’d watched over her from afar had been low on the cruel-punishment scale compared to touching her again.

She held up another picture of her falling back and me reaching for her. “And there’s this one too.”

“The only person being assaulted in that picture was me. I still have a bruise on the top of my foot from your shoe.”

She stuck out her bottom lip to pout. “Boo-hoo, you.” Then she held up another picture, this one with her hand on my chest and mine wrapped around her wrist. “How does this even look like assault? Ugh, your dad hates you with a fiery passion. Why is that?” She lifted her elbow to frisbee the photo toward me before plopping back down.

Why indeed. I’d asked myself that since I was ten years old.

I caught the picture as it started to drift down. When this picture was taken, assault had been the furthest thing from my mind. Can she read that in my expression? I wanted to ask Jace what he saw on my face when he looked at the pictures, but that would be opening up a can of worms. I’d long sworn to Jace that my feelings for her didn’t matter, and they didn’t.

Of course I had feelings for Sabrina. I’d loved her once upon a time. And I found her fucking hot as hell, then and now. She was totally my type. But love or no love, it didn’t matter. I was her kryptonite. Eventually, being with me would have destroyed her.

When she’d touched me yesterday, though, I’d felt a gaping hole in my soul, an emptiness I’d pretended wasn’t there. Maybe she could see that in my face. I’d never wanted anyone but her. But sometimes I wondered if I felt that way because I knew I couldn’t have her.

For the last ten years, I had worked from two principles. One, I would never subject anyone to my family. That itself was a prison sentence. And two, I would never ask another woman to be a part of my life if she would always be the runner-up to a ghost from the past. That was why I’d stayed single. That was why I was a workaholic.

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