Page 52 of Love, Hate, Love

Kade

Leah had fallenasleep against me on the couch. Now I could barely sleep knowing she was down the hall, already rethinking this idea. I’d fought too hard for her to stay to make some other arrangement now. It was done, for better or worse. When she wasn’t here I still thought about her, so what was the difference?

It was just before six and it didn’t seem there’d be any more sleep on the horizon. I got up and headed into the main living area, where the smell of coffee hit me like a siren’s song.

It wasn’t even dawn, but Leah had always been an early riser, probably made worse by staying here on the ranch.

I grabbed a coffee and my attention was drawn to motion on the front porch. She was on the swing in the soft light of predawn.

I was drawn out the door by her presence and moved to stand in front of the swing. I looked at the empty side of the seat, and she tilted her head in invitation. I settled onto it and she tucked up her toes under the blanket. I took over rocking as if this were something we’d been doing for years. I definitely needed to watch getting too at ease. It was strange how quickly a habit could form, and that could lead places I couldn’t go, or at least shouldn’t go.

“I’m glad you kept this swing,” she said.

“I’m surprised you recognized it.” It had been sanded down and repainted since she’d sat on the porch of the old ranch.

“How could I not?” She ran a finger over a knot that marred the third board.

She had always paid attention to every little detail. Every little change in someone’s mood. It had always amazed me how she took in every single thing around her. I’d never been surprised that she’d been successful in life after she left here.

Which was why it was so confusing that she’d taken that painting. She hadn’t needed it. She’d been a rock star in her field. All the biggest brands had been trying to hire her. Nothing about this situation made any sense.

She glanced over at me, and I tried to wipe the thought from my mind, afraid I’d give away some detail of where my mind had gone.

“You always such an early riser?” I asked.

“You already know the answer to that.”

“I just figured that living in a big city might’ve changed you.”

“You mean like I’d be up all night partying and sleeping all day?”

“Isn’t that what you city folk do?” I asked, smiling.

“The only time I stayed up late was to work.” She pulled a knee up to her chest, wrapping her arms around it. “About yesterday, I didn’t… I don’t know what that was exactly, but––”

“Nothing happened yesterday but your heat breaking.”

She didn’t move for a second and then gave me the slightest nod. She dropped her head, running a hand over the arm of the swing. “This is very belated, but I’m sorry I missed your father’s funeral.”

I jerked my head so fast in her direction that I could’ve given myself whiplash. It was the last thing I’d expected to hear from her. If my shock showed, she didn’t seem to notice.

“I didn’t expect you to come.” Her eyes flickered and her mouth turned down a little. By the time my father passed, we’d stopped talking. “You were in New York,” I added, trying to soften my slip.

Everyone had liked him. He was that kind of guy. Maybe a bit rough in looks and manners, but gold where it counted. I still ached when I thought of him, even now, and probably always would.

“He was a kind man. Iwantedto be there for him. To say goodbye.” She gripped her coffee mug tight in her hands.

There was something about the way she saidwantedthat made me wonder exactly what had stopped her. It sounded a little like it hadn’t just been geography. But we were once again in a place of peace, and I desperately didn’t want to fight with her right now. It was wearing me down, exhausting me and keeping me awake at night. It felt like being at odds with her was ripping apart my very being.

“You were good to him in life. He knew you cared for him. That matters more than anything else you could’ve done after he passed away,” I said.

When my father had started getting really bad at the end and had a hard time getting around, she used to bake baskets of muffins for him and bring them by at least once a week. When he got so bad he’d had a hard time even getting out of bed, she’d bring him a chessboard or cards and play with him for hours.

I’d been working the ranch from dawn to dusk a lot of those days, trying to keep the bills paid, and that help had meant the world to me.

And then one comment from the banker that had echoed what I’d said to her, and I’d turned on her without any real proof. The longer the situation sat with me, the more it felt like I was sitting on a bed of nails.

What if it had all been a plant from an ill-intentioned asshole of a stepfather? What if she had repeated my words in passing to Monroe, and her stepfather Edwin had heard them? Should I really have crucified her? I’d dwelled for so long on the bad, held on to that part of her for so long, that these buried good memories were like little shocks to the system as they fought their way to the surface.

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