Page 30 of Love Me Again

“No.” Molly slung a companionable and drunk arm onto Josie’s shoulders. “Everything I do for my brother is of my own volition. I like you. And I like Boone—even when I’d like to throttle him. So, I can’t help if I want to make it all right.”

“It can’t be.”

Molly squeezed. “Then it can’t be. I love my brother. That won’t change, but I also like you. And I know what it’s like to need to move on from a relationship that isn’t right. So, I’m in your corner too.”

Josie sighed, chest constricting painfully. “You might be the only one.”

“Nah. You’re a Tyler now. We’re all in your corner. Even Boone.”

“He can’t be in my corner if he’s in his own corner.”

“Sure he can. Life’s fucking complicated, Josie.”

Well, hell, wasn’t that the truth?

Boone woke before his alarm—a feat since his alarm went off at five so he could go handle whatever puny chores his bum leg would allow him.

He’d resented ranch work since he could remember. The responsibility of something that had been in his family for almost a century. Worse, the awareness that even in that century he didn’t mean much. Even before he’d gotten hurt, the third son and fourth kid was just there for grunt work. Shane was in charge along with Mom, and Gavin had been something like second-in-command. Molly had always had more interest in horses than the cattle operation, but she’d probably be third-in-command before him.

And they all answered to Mom and Grandma. The ranch had been in the Tyler family since this area of Colorado had been settled by pioneers, and Grandma and Mom had both married into that, so they had always been very heavily involved in the day-to-day running of the operation.

Boone didn’t really want to be a rancher. Rodeoing had been fun, exciting, and he figured it was the only thing he’d ever really been good at that might make a living, so he should probably try to get back to that.

Something about considering ranch work his punishment for all the shit decisions he’d made allowed him to do the grunt work needed around the ranch these days. Or it would have been easier, if he wasn’t in so much pain half the time.

Boone got dressed for the day, then stepped out of his room into the long hallway. He stopped short.

Someone had just come out of the bathroom who was not any of the normal people he might run into here in the Tyle Ranch hallway.

Josie standing in the hallway of his youth was disorienting, and it filled him with a bright wave of a feeling he rarely had and never trusted.

But when Josie was glaring at him, he wanted to trust it, reach for it, believe in it. “Morning,” he offered, a little hoarse. She looked rumpled and beautiful and like every morning he’d woken up with her in their own bed.

She stared at him blearily. “I hate you.”

“Is there a new reason, or are you just stating the obvious?”

“You tricked me.”

He supposed she wasn’t wrong. The trick had worked better than he’d even imagined. He’d really assumed that dinner was the most he could hope for, but Josie had stayed, and sure he would have rather been in the room with her when she had, but the fact someone in his family had convinced her to spend the evening talking and laughing and had gotten her to spend the night? It felt like a miracle.

So he got to wake up, leg aching and grumpy from the early morning, and see her.

God, he’d missed her. As much as if not more than he missed being able to wake up without pain. It was the same kind of nagging, persistent, terrible ache.

Only he couldn’t take a pill to ease the loss of her.

“You never even told me what the lawyer said like you promised.”

He took a few halting steps toward her, reminding himself what Mom had said. Keep her as underfoot as possible. Show her she was welcome and belonged.

Be honest with her. He’d done a little of that yesterday, but he still didn’t have the words to be fully honest with her. So he focused on keeping her underfoot.

“Why don’t I tell you over breakfast?” he said, easily enough, moving forward like she might just follow him down the hall and to the stairs.

But she widened her stance. “No, you’ll tell me now.”

Boone glanced at the door he stood in front of now that he’d moved closer—Micah’s. That kid could probably sleep through an earthquake, but still.