Page 50 of Some Cowboys Fight for Love

“Aria,” he said softly.

She didn’t appear to hear him as she shoved a drawer shut and brandished a ladle for the chili she’d brought.

“Aria,” he said louder this time. When she didn’t look up at him, he swept over to her and pried the ladle from her grasp. “Aria, are you going to tell me what’s bothering you?”

She hadn’t fought him when he took the serving spoon from her. But she also wouldn’t meet his eye. All she did was shrug. “I didn’t sleep well.”

His eyes narrowed. Of course she didn’t. “Does that have anything to do with the fact that you got up earlier than you usually do?”

Aria’s eyebrows rose as she took a quick breath. He could practically see the blood drain from her face in real time. This was it. She knew she’d been caught. She couldn’t back out now.

Oh, how wrong he was.

She shook her head. “No.” Her focus dipped to the bowls in front of her. “Are we going to eat before it gets cold?”

“I saw you, Aria.”

Her body stiffened at his side, and he could see her shutting down. It hadn’t taken much at all for her whole demeanor to shift right back to what it had been when they were barely friends.

“I saw you in town. Why were you up so early?”

“I told you, I wasn’t sleeping well. So I went to get some coffee.” She was still avoiding him. Why wasn’t she willing to talk about that man? He got the sense that the stranger was the cause of all this turmoil and yet she wanted to keep it a secret.

He reached out and grasped her hand, holding it as she finally looked at him. His gaze searched hers even as she squirmed beneath it. “And who were you with?”

She squeezed her eyes shut, then blew out a breath. When she opened them, the cool, collected, closed-off Aria stood before him. “He’s my ex,” she said flatly. “Now, can we eat?”

“No, we can’t. Something’s going on.”

She groaned with exaggeration. “He was in town. He wanted to meet to catch up. Nothing happened.”

“You can tell yourself all the lies you want, but you can’t lie to me. I can tell when something is bothering you.” Daniel still held her hand firmly in his grasp. He couldn’t say he wasn’t surprised by her confession. Aria wasn’t from here. The fact that she bumped into her ex here was strange, to say the least. At least she wasn’t trying to hide who the man was.

Then a dark thought populated his mind, and without thinking, he inched his face closer to hers.

“Is there still something between you?” Even he could hear the hurt and jealousy in his low tone. He wasn’t proud of it, but he needed to know.

Aria jerked away from him before he could read whatever it was that flashed in her eyes. “Of course not,” she snapped. “There’s nothing between us.”

Guilt coated her tongue. He could definitely hear it in the way she spat the words at him. She was hiding something, and he’d figured it out. He wanted to yell and scream. He wanted to throw a tantrum about her sneaking around on him. But he couldn’t.

All he felt was hollow.

She must have read that helplessness in his eyes because her own grew cold and calloused. “You know what? I’m not hungry after all.” Aria shoved the bowls away and pushed past him. “I don’t have to explain myself to you. And you shouldn’t be following me around. Where’s the trust? Hmm? Come find me when you realize what a fool you’re being.” She hustled out the door like she expected him to detain her.

And he let her go.

22

Aria

It was the end of the world.

At least, that was how it felt.

The second she saw Cayden’s message, she knew her life was about to change—and not for the better. She was one revelation away from Cayden figuring out she was dating Daniel. Cayden was powerful. He had connections everywhere. She didn’t know what he might be willing to do, but she had a feeling he wouldn’t mind bulldozing over anyone in order to steal her back.

She should never have agreed to meet him in town.

---