Page 47 of At the Rancher's Pleasure

Her attention was diverted by Gina placing a hand on her wrist and giving it a gentle squeeze. “Mom, are you okay?”

She forced a bright smile for her darling daughter. “I’m fine! Why would you think I’m not?”

Gina shook her head and arched one eyebrow. “I swear, she still thinks I’m ten,” she told Jaynie.

“Yep, it’s what moms do. They pretend that everything is okay when they aren’t,” Jaynie said, glaring at the specially ordered green smoothie in front of her. Jaynie was on another diet and wasn’t particularly happy about it.

Seeing that smoothie reminded her of the one she’d made for Brett, back when they were together. He’d been in a hurry, didn’t have time for breakfast and she’d whipped him up one, using spinach and celery and a couple of apples. He’d hated it, and his expression was remarkably similar to the one Jaynie had on her face. It would be a while, she thought, before the smoothie craze took root in Royal, Texas.

God, she missed him.

“Mom!”

Sarabeth gave Gina a small smile, noting the worry on her lovely daughter’s face. How had she managed to make something so exquisite?

“Mom, I’m seriously worried about you. You haven’t been yourself since the TCC cocktail party.”

“I’m absolutely fine, sweetie.”

“Yeah, and a purple pig just flew past,” Jaynie muttered, scowling at her. “Your daughter is not an idiot, Sarabeth, and neither am I. You are distracted, pensive and miserable. Now, what the hell happened between you and Brett?”

Damn, she wasn’t going to be able to avoid having this conversation. “I ended it,” Sarabeth glumly admitted. “And I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Tough,” Jaynie retorted.

“Too bad,” Gina replied.

Wonderful, Sarabeth thought, placing her phone facedown on the table. Thinking that she needed more coffee for this conversation, she motioned a waitress over and asked her to refill her cup.

When they were alone again, Gina leaned forward and gripped her hands with both of hers. “What happened that night, Mom? With Brett and with Rusty?”

She was not going to tell Gina that Rusty tried to bribe her into leaving Royal; her daughter didn’t need to know that. Neither did she need to know the ins and outs of her affair with Brett.

“Brett and I were never serious and I called it off.”

Jaynie snorted and Sarabeth caught her massive, hard to miss eye roll. “What?” she demanded, irritated.

“Not serious? Oh, honey, you might be able to lie to yourself but you can’t lie to us.”

Oh, why was she beating around the bush? Gina was a grown woman! “We were having a friends with benefits thing. You know that.”

Jaynie pointed an accusatory finger at her. “Yes, he’s a hottie but stop trying to convince us that it was all about what happened in the bedroom. Sarabeth, you’re crazy about that man.”

“You really are, Mom,” Gina added. “So why did you dump him?”

“He didn’t respect me...didn’t trust me to handle your father on my own,” Sarabeth muttered, sounding stubborn. Good, stubborn was better than heartbroken.

“The way I heard it, Rusty had his hands on you,” Jaynie bluntly stated.

Gina looked horrified. “Daddy tried to hurt you?”

Sarabeth sent Jaynie a see-what-you’ve-done glare. Her friend just shrugged, unrepentant. Sarabeth turned back to Gina. “I threatened him first, drilled a finger into his chest. He grabbed my finger and Brett intervened, telling him to back off.”

Gina’s frown pulled her eyebrows together as she digested this information. “So Daddy didn’t hurt you?”

“Not really,” Sarabeth admitted. “But he was definitely trying to intimidate me.”

“But it could, from a distance, look like he was hurting you?” Gina persisted.

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