Page 59 of Drifter’s Heart

I round on him the moment his niece is safely inside the homestead. “They’re good here with you, right? You won’t spend hours fighting with your sister? Because Sally told me that she hates hearing you two yell at each other.”

The reality check stops him cold. “She said that?” Cord eyes me warily.

“Yeah, Cord. We all heard it. Fuck, everyone in the bunkhouse heard it.”

A glance across at Billy confirms my suspicions as Billy’s usually easy smile is absent. Good. That means they all heard Winnie and me going at it the night before too, which was half the purpose of the window scene apart from being a longtime fantasy with her. Hopefully they’d keep their hands and eyes to themselves while I’m not around to care for her. Not that she can’t look after herself, but still.

“Look after the girls while I’m not here.”

“You don’t have to leave,” he objects. “There’s plenty of work.”

“But no job.” I look him full in the face. “Besides, I have a rider to train for Friday night.”

That little morsel of information drops like an echo in an empty chasm. My words repeat on themselves in pure silence until they run out of fucks to give.

Rather like me.

“You’re training again?” Cord looks at me, nonplussed. The tidbit hits like a sucker punch. The shock is easy enough to read in my best friend’s face, the hard lines around his eyes widening.

Billy wisely finds something else to do and leaves the veranda.

I nod. “He’s on the list for the Invitational. I’ll make sure our insurance is paid up. All aboveboard. We’ve been working together for months.”

Something akin to physical pain etches across Cord’s face. The last man I worked with on a bull was him, and we both know it.

A breath rattles from his chest. “I remember hours eating dirt while you cussed me out like a mother-bitch,” Cord reminisces softly, his mouth set in a tight line. Sadness creases his eyes as he squeezes my shoulder. “He’s a lucky rider, West. I look forward to seeing you both on Friday.”

Cord leaves me alone and unable to breathe with a closed door in my face in a place I once called home.

Well, fuck.

I just got everything I thought I wanted. So why does it hurt so damn much as I walk away? And why does it feel like I can never return?

TWENTY

WINNIE

Pheromone Trails

Patience has never been my strongest point, so it’s beyond frustrating to wait for West where he said he’d be when he’s not actually here. The sun beats down on the back of my neck as I stare at a line of ants intent on climbing the edge of my shoe. Eventually, I move the toe and they have to start their line all over again.

The things we do to entertain ourselves.

A shadow drops over my hunched form, cooling my sunburnt skin well after my deodorant has worn past its useful period.

“You’re supposed to be at Coyote Falls with Sally.” West hasn’t lost his grumpy in the last three days. If anything, our time apart has made it worse. Or something has.

I don’t look up at him, studying my line of ants. They’ve just made it to my shoe when I move it again, and they flurry about in circles, wondering where their line has gone. “I don’t do well with demands. Or instructions. Plus, Sally misses you.”

“Does she.” He doesn’t budge.

I move my shoe again.

“That’s cruel.”

“So was leaving without saying goodbye.”

“I left a message with Sally.”