Page 32 of Trails of Temptation

“I’m sorry, George. I—I understand why you don’t want to do this with me. I get it.”

“Don’t—”

“Thank you for getting the tent for me,” I whispered and snatched it off the workbench before he could protest, but he grabbed the end of it, holding it firm. I looked up at him, into those wells of blue laced with soft gray I hadn’t even noticed before. I wanted to cry. I was sure I looked like I was about to as I waited for him to say what he wanted to say. As I waited for him to sayanythingat all.

“Thank you for that breakfast you made for me the other day. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for it.I am. I know you worked hard—”

“Thank you,” I croaked, tears beginning to blur my vision. His lips parted like he was going to say something else but his grip slacked on the tent and I clasped the heavy, awkward bag of tent parts against my chest and darted out of his shop.

I couldn’t let him see me cry. I didn’t want to cry. I didn’t want to be feeling like this anymore.

So I ran away from him and the opportunity to clear the air between us because I knew in my heart that I would never be able to let him go.

ChapterSixteen

George

Iwatched her walk away. My hands were clenched into fists at my sides as she hurried off, clutching that tent to her chest and barely able to handle its weight. I started to go after her but stopped at the end of the driveway and watched her disappear between the bunkhouse and the stables.

She was hurting, and I was livid with myself for being the reason.

This past week all I’d done was give us both space. I needed to figure things out. I needed to figure out just what to say to her to explain my awful behavior.

I needed to figure out how to tell her I loved her, that I was willing to get down on one knee right now and propose to her, to make her my wife.

But the damage had already been done, I knew that now. I’d waited too long.

“Goddammit,” I cursed, kicking gravel as I turned back toward my house. I had no plans for the day other than wait for the truckload of pigs Grant and I had just bought to show up and get them all set up in the new barn that was constructed strictly for hogs this past spring. I’d miss dinner because of it, but Grant had already told me there were no set plans tonight, not with Day and his friends out causing all kinds of havoc. Moira didn’t want them in the house, and Grant had joked about throwing burgers and hotdogs into the pasture in lieu of making everyone sit down for dinner. I’d eat at the bunkhouse, then, maybe a few beers with the guys before wallowing in self-pity at home like I had for the past week.

I hadn’t touched any whiskey or tequila in a week. I hadn’t even wanted it. That was the only good thing I had going for me right now.

I was supposed to head down to Helena on Monday to go visit my mom and my aunt. If I was going to talk to Keely, I needed to do so before heading out of town for a few days.

The rest of the day passed slowly as I waited on the pigs. They came late, of course, and the sun had long set before the ranch hands and I had everyone unloaded and settled in the barn.

It was midnight now, and I was sitting outside at the firepit with a few of the guys who lived in the bunkhouse during the busy summer season at the ranch, all of them drinking and laughing while I sat in abject silence with Randy, who was also older than the practical teenagers Grant hired in the summer.

I didn’t like Archie, who was a young, confident buck of twenty-five or so. He needed to be knocked down a few pegs.

He’d also been talking about Keely incessantly since the day she arrived at the ranch, which had me seeing red.

“I’m gonna ask her out.” He laughed from across the fire, where the young hands were keeping their distance from Randy and me, who were much older, wiser, and tougher, in my humble opinion.

“She’s going to turn you down,” Ben replied with a smirk. “Especially since I’m going to ask her out first.”

“What do you have to offer a woman like that, Ben? Nothin’. She wants someone with experience—”

“Like a man, and not a boy barely weaned from his ma’s tits,” Randy said gruffly over the rim of his beer bottle.

I smirked to myself as Archie narrowed his eyes at Randy, his cheeks stained red.

“I bet she can ride, based on those legs. Saw her in nothing but a tee shirt today, little shorts peeking out—”

“That’s about enough,” I said sternly, fixing the young men with a stare that said shut the fuck up, or else.

Archie arched his brows and rolled his eyes, slouching a little in his camping chair. He did listen to me and the conversation shifted to something else that I had no interest in following. All of these young men knew not to fuck around with me. I’d seen and done shit they couldn’t fathom and they knew it. I also wasn’t someone who took too kindly to anyone speaking of women like they were pieces of meat, especially the woman I’d lain claim to a week ago.

Maybe they knew that. I found it likely that word had begun to spread about why I’d taken some time off, and it had nothing to do with my injured hand. I never got sick, for one. I couldn’t hide my hangover behind the lie that I had the flu.

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