Page 10 of Cheyenne

“Right.” She’d missed him, too. She was allowed to miss an old boyfriend.

“Would you want to have dinner again tomorrow night? We are all going to help build a house for Habitat for Humanity tomorrow, but I’d love to see you. I’ll introduce you to my friends.”

Why did it make her feel so good that he didn’t have someone else? Why did it feel so good that he wanted to introduce heraround? Why did she feel conflicted about him because of Micah Jamison?

Anger bolted through her. Her brother did not get to control her through Micah.

“I’d love to go,” she blurted.

“You would?” Relief seemed to wash over his face. “Great. Six?”

“Yes.”

They both stood there for an awkward amount of time. She suddenly wondered if she’d made a bad decision.

A male voice from next door shouted, “Eli?”

Eli jerked a thumb in that direction. “Okay, I’d better get back there.”

“Okay.” She told him goodbye and shut the door.

Cheyenne leaned back against it and sighed. She probably should have turned him down. There was already a lot for her to do. She would go parasailing tomorrow, and then she planned on taking an Uber to Wilmington. She wanted to check out the church Chance had told them all about, the one that had the symbols from the gold and their father’s journal. She had a working theory on where some of the gold might be stashed.

CHAPTER 4

Micah

Micah went back to the Stone Family Inn and made himself a frozen pizza. Luckily, his mother and Trey had decided not to have guests until they got back, which made him happy; he liked having the home all to himself.

He thought about the rodeo queen from Wyoming. Ha! He would have to call her that in person just to tick her off. Because quite frankly, she’d ticked him off. She seemed to have distaste at having him around. Well, forget her. He didn’t need to be around. In fact, he was sure if he wanted a date this week, he could get one.

Not that he wanted one. He was about to start training to become a SEAL. He didn’t want or need a date.

He puttered around the kitchen, taking out a protein shake mix and making himself a double protein shake. He added a banana and even some spinach. He liked taking good care of himself. Of course, he could eat pretty much anything he wanted, but he always tried to pair a good protein shake with junk food like pizza.

Micah sipped on the shake and thought of the way Cheyenne seemed determined to be on her own. Wait, not on her own—with Eli. The kind of dork that would prey on Cheyenne. Not that she would be easy to prey on, but he could see it in his mind. That kind of guy was much like his birth father, the one who still lived in Colorado and who Micah talked to very seldomly. The kind who would marry someone like Cheyenne and then cheat on her.

Sure, maybe he was jaded. Maybe the Duke Law School type was the exact type he tried to avoid being like. Maybe it was his childhood trauma that led him to try to be like his stepfather. He would take Trey over his birth father any day of the week.

Micah moved out onto the back patio, stripping off his shirt and climbing into the hot tub. He always wore board shorts when he was home in South Port—you never knew when an opportunity would arise to be in the water.

He let the bubbles surround him and heard the faint sound of laughter coming from the beach. For a fleeting moment, he thought of going out there and talking to what he knew was a group of spring break girls. It had been roughly three months since his breakup with Lila. He had thought they could be good together. Too bad Lila didn’t like the idea of him being in the military. He sputtered out a laugh. Maybe Cheyenne and Lila would get along. They would both probably like the jerk Eli who was in law school.

He didn’t know why the thought ticked him off so much. The truth was, it hadn’t been that hard to get over Lila. His mother had been pretty insightful about the whole breakup, and when he’d mentioned that he wasn’t struggling with it, she’d told him it was because Lila was just someone to fill time. She wasn’t the one for him. He had batted away her comment as if it hadn’t been a big deal. Of course his mother would say that. But the words had stuck around the edges of his mind and heart.

His mind flashed to the beautiful Cheyenne. Maybe she deserved to have a guy like Eli.

Micah stood and got out of the hot tub, disgusted with himself. Why was he even thinking about that situation?

His phone buzzed, and he stared at it. Trey. He really didn’t want to answer and go into this unavoidable back-and-forth about Cheyenne. But he knew Trey, and he was probably being watched right this moment from one of his cameras.

He pressed accept. “Hey. Everything okay in DC?”

He could sense Trey rolling his eyes. It had not been Trey’s idea to do this whole surprise party for Brooks. As Trey would say, it had been the women’s idea.

“We’re fine,” Trey told him. “I guess we’re going to go pop out and say happy birthday to Brooks tomorrow. Serenity is in on it, and it’s fine. You know it’s not me, but I’m not going to complain about this whole fiasco when everyone else is so excited.”

Micah grinned. He turned toward the path to the ocean and kept the phone against his ear. “I guess you’re checking in on me.”

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