Page 83 of Ride Me Cowboy

My heart races. “Were you, Cowboy?”

“If that’s alright with you.”

“Won’t people notice?”

“No one comes out here at the hours we’ll be using it.” His eyes roam my face. “I’ve got no problem with them knowing, anyway.”

“But I do,” I say, quickly, thinking of my mother in law’s text, and the double life circumstances have pushed me into living. To a whole host of people in New York, I was the perfect society wife, and am now the grieving widow of an ambitious investor and heir to the McMahon fortune.

Out here, I’m Beth Tasker, forging relationships with these people on my own terms, without them knowing what a mess I left behind me. What a mess I ran out on, ran away from.

“I know that,” he leans forward and presses a kiss to my forehead. “This is as private as any place out there,” he hitches his thumb toward the walls of the stables, indicating the fields beyond.

“Then it’s just perfect.”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

He kisses me again, but this time, he kisses me like he never wants to let me go. Which of course he will, because that’s our deal.

Later that morning, back in the main house, my phone buzzes and I pull it out, to see another text from my former mother-in-law.

Beth, I should also have said how worried we all are about you. You do not have to grieve alone. Please, come see us again soon. I have some things of Christopher’s to give you. Anna.

I feel like screaming. I feel like the air in my lungs can barely be contained. I don’t even manage to change into running gear. I just slip my shoes on at the door and push one foot in front of theother, hair flying wildly around my face as I take the drive, away from the house, down toward the gate. I run as though I can actually escape what’s waiting for me in New York. I run from the deception I’ve been carrying, and carry still.

And finally, when I can hardly breathe from how hard I’ve been pushing myself, I collapse onto the grass and drop my head between my knees, panic and anger swirling inside of me, so stars fill my eyes and I know I have to breathe deeply, to focus on a steady point on the ground, to let myself come back together again.

I can’t hide out here indefinitely. That was never my plan. I thought three months would be long enough to put some distance between me and them, to rebuild myself in a way that would be lasting. But having been here a month, a third of the time I’d planned for, the knowledge of what’s still waiting for me in New York is a cloying reality I would do anything not to have to face.

Panic subsides, slightly, so I turn my face to the side and press my cheek against my knees. The first thing my gaze lands on is the herd, in the distance. Big, beautiful, black cows—I would never have described a cow as beautiful until I came out here and saw them up close. Those eyes, though, that look like they’re seeing right inside of you.

The herd is all together, but that’s not random. As I watch, a line of five men, and one Mackenzie, ride their horses along behind the cows. I can pick Cole out easily. He’s in the middle of the line, flanked on one side by Beau and the other by Austin. Caleb rides the outside edge, Mackenzie the other, then there’s someone I don’t know far off in the distance, maybe to catch stragglers, or keep an eye on predators? I don’t know.

There’s a lot I don’t know about the running of a ranch, I realize, with a strange shifting inside of me. I’ve been here a month now, and I have a general idea of what’s involved, but it’s obviously a complicated business, rather than just playing Cowboy.

A noise startles me back to the foreground of my view, as a big red truck comes through the gates of the ranch and up the drive, speeding past me in a plume of dust before it stops and reverses back.

I don’t even want to contemplate what I look like—though I can easily imagine. Pale face, tear-stained cheeks, hair wild.

Ash Callahan—if she notices—doesn’t say a thing about my appearance. “Do you know where that jackass is?”

“Beau, you mean?”

“Yeah, that one.” She looks mad as anything. Spitting chips mad. “God rest his soul,” she adds.

“What’s happened?”

“I’m gonna kill him is what’s happened,” she snaps. I flinch a little at her obvious anger. At her threat, even though it’s obviously just that—words.

“What’s he done?” I ask, standing up, brushing my hands down the back of my jeans.

She hesitates a moment, like she’s wondering if she should tell me or not and then she says, “Oh, you’re gonna find out real soon anyways. Once Cole knows about this, the whole damn valley will hear his cussing.”

“What’s happened?” I ask, genuinely worried now.

“He’s gone and signed himself up to ride again, hasn’t he?”

I stare at Ash, my expression no doubt showing my surprise. Then again, am I actually surprised? Really? On some level, no. Having seen the passion in Beau’s eyes, when he talks about bull riding, I get it.

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