Page 28 of Craving Her Cowboy
She finished with the horse, gave it a final pat, and let it wander off. She turned to him with a soft look. “Hey you.”
“Hey, sweetheart.” He paused, then looked to the side before facing her again.
“You okay?” She asked, a slow frown coming over her face.
He gripped the top rail, knuckles whitening. “Unfortunately, it’s time for me to leave,” he said. “There’s a mess at work, and I’m the only one who can clean it.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Wow. Okay. Will you be coming back?”
He shook his head. “Not anytime soon.”
She looked past him, out over the hills where the sun was bleeding out behind the ridge. “Well, this is interesting.”
He flinched, but only a little. “I don’t want to go,” he said.
She picked at a fleck of mud on her sleeve. “But you will.”
He nodded. “Yeah. No choice. It’s my company. Some things can’t be handled by others.”
They stood there, two statues under the dying light. He wanted to say something that would change her mind, or his, but nothing came.
She tucked her hands into her pockets, like she was keeping herself from reaching out to him. “What do you want me to say, Gavin?”
He thought about it. The right answer, the clever line. He couldn’t find it. “I don’t know. Just wanted you to know.”
She nodded, slow and even. “Okay.”
He should have turned and walked away. But he didn’t. He stayed, just breathing, watching her face for any sign that she’d break. “Are you going to take the job in Colorado?”
“Is there any reason for me not to go?”
“Come on, Asha. You know I didn’t want to leave like this. We need to talk about what happens next. But you know my home isn’t here. It never was, no matter how much I enjoy taking this time away. My business, my life, will always pull me back to Virginia.”
She sighed, nodding her head. “I knew that. It’s just… Nevermind. Your life in Virginia’s important. I understand that you have to leave.”
“I don’t leave until tomorrow. We still have a bit of time.” He didn’t want them to part like this. Nothing about this moment was going the way he wanted.
Asha looked down at the ground before lifting her eyes back to him. “You don’t have to try to hold on to something that may not last beyond this moment.”
He felt something tear open in his chest, but he kept it off his face. “I want to. I need to.”
She nodded again, this time softer. “We’ll see.”
***
Just over an hour later, Gavin found her at the fence again, same as before. He stopped a few feet away, the cold air stinging his face, every word he’d rehearsed feeling too small.
Asha didn’t move to look at him. Her arms crossed, shoulders hunched like she was bracing for impact.
He cleared his throat. “I leave in the morning. Early.”
She nodded, just once. Didn’t look at him.
He set his hands on the top rail, the wood biting into his palms. “Asha, I don’t know how else to say it. They need me back in Virginia. The project’s a disaster.”
“I figured it was something important or you wouldn’t need to leave,” she said.
He looked at the side of her face, searching for any crack in the wall she’d thrown up. “I want you to come with me.” Thewords tumbled from his mouth, like if he hesitated the moment would vanish, and he’d never get this chance again.
