Page 29 of The Cowboy Who Worked Late

“I got a daddy like that too,” he said quietly.

“Going to him and telling him I want to change this rule would require me to tell him who I’m interested in,” she said. “I don’t really do that with my parents.”

“You haven’t introduced them to a boyfriend?”

“Not in a long time,” she said. “No one ever made the cut to bring home for dinner.”

“Not even that guy I saw you with in the grocery store a couple of years ago?”

Angel shook her head. “We only dated for six or seven months.”

“Why did you break up?” Henry asked.

Angel looked over to him, putting every fiery star she had in her gaze. “Because you kissed me, Henry.”

He came to a stop at the stop sign. All he had to do was turn right and get on the highway, but he sat there. Angel saw no traffic coming, but Henry made no effort to even look.

“Because I kissed you?” he asked.

She couldn’t bear the weight of his gaze. Those powerful eyes and dark beard. He seriously was the most handsome man she had ever met.

“Yes,” she said. “Because you kissed me. And I realized how much I liked it and how much I wanted to go out withyou. And it didn’t seem fair to keep going out with Caleb.”

The resulting silence smothered her. Angel couldn’t believe what she had just admitted.

“Is this why you do my interviews with the door open?” he asked.

“Yes,” she clipped out.

“Well, that’s gonna change.” He made the turn and accelerated quickly, pushing Angel back into her seat, and she realized he was upset, maybe even angry.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“You’ve liked me for a whole year, and you’ve said nothing?”

“You haven’t said anything either,” she shot back.

“There—is—a—rule,” he clipped out. “And I follow the rules because I need this apprenticeship to graduate.”

“You got the apprenticeship,” she said crossly. “You’re going to graduate.” She worked up the courage to look at him again. “I have an idea,” she said in a much softer voice. “This might sound crazy.”

“What?”

“After we watched the sunset last night, I stayed up for a while thinking about us. I’m gonna pray about the situation again tonight. And maybe you can too.”

Henry looked over to her and swallowed. He looked nervous and anxious and also, yes, angry. “All right,” he said. “Spit it out. My word, we’ve got to start saying what we mean to each other.”

Angel smiled at the exasperation in his tone. “Is that what we’ve got to start doing?”

“Yes,” he said. “Are you holding back with me on things at Lone Star too? Anything with the horses?”

“No,” she said. “I talk about the horses.”

“So it’s just your own feelings you don’t talk about.”

“Yes,” she said. “No. I talk about my feelings. I’ve literally just told you I’ve had a crush on you for a year.”

“Yeah, well, mine goes back longer than that, sweetheart,” he said.

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