Page 22 of A Cowboy's Twinkling Lights Lasso
“No, no, no.” She grabs my arm when I try to pass her. She clears her throat. “Tell me what happened?”
I cross my arms under my breasts, wondering where to start. “Yesterday, I called him promiscuous. Yes, those were my exact words. I didn’t want to be like, back in the day, you were a giant manwhore who likely did the hanky-panky with my sister—”
Dani shudders. “Ew. Gross. He’s like a hundred.”
“He’s my age.”
“Like I said, a hundred.” She squeezes my hand and sincerely says, “trust me, I’ve never slept with Thorn Slater.”
“I’m not worried. I don’t care what Thorn does. He’s free to do what he likes with whom he chooses. I just clarified to him that that person isn’t me.”
“Thorn never had the same reputation as his brother and dad.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” I pull from her grasp to grab a brush off the dresser and run it through my damp hair.
“I’m not wrong.” My sister debates another outfit in the full-length mirror. “He had a bad reputation. He and Theo were notorious for their reckless antics. Jail was their second home, and their first home was a hotspot for wild parties—generally thrown by their drunken dad, but don’t mistake partying and sex. Those are two very different things.”
“Are they?”
She sighs. “After you left, slowly, those parties stopped. Thorn took his dad’s rundown ranch and spent the last ten-plus years bringing it back to life. I don’t say this often because I look at Uncle Elmer and our shitty dad, but Thorn is one of the good guys. The ones we never thought existed. And maybe you should stop being such a southern belle and give him a chance.”
“A chance to what?” The brush rattles on the dresser when I drop it.
“You know.”
“I don’t know.” I fold my arms again, and my nails dig through the material and into my flesh. Much like the way I dragged them down Thorn’s rock-hard chest.
“To, you know, marry you.”
I blink. “Excuse me?”
“Those were his words.”
“No. His words were to steal my heart.”
“Which, in turn, means marry, move back here, give me lots of nieces and nephews, and live happily ever after in Rocky Ridge Creek.”
I lean on my back leg and tap my foot while I examine my sister. “You’re not telling me something.”
“You’re paranoid.”
“I don’t know why you’re suddenly ‘team Thorn’”—I air quote the last two words—“but you don’t know him as I do. You don’t know what happened at those parties.”
“I am quite versed in what happened at those parties. I attended one or two.”
“Yeah, well, so did I.”
My sister gives a half-hearted smile. “No, you didn’t.”
“I watched from afar and saw exactly who Thorn Slater is.”
My sister’s know-it-all look disappears. “What did you see?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
She races to the door and splays her body against it, blocking my exit. “Did he hurt you? Is that why you left? You tell me, Flora. You tell me now. I’ll hurt him. I’ll hunt him down and show him no one messes with a Rowe.”
I already did. And I did it well.
