Page 80 of One More Kiss

Ethan

Who the helldid she think she was?

Squatting down, I examined the wooden post again. I could see the slight cracks in the post. It wasn’t really major; the posts would hold unless one of the cows decided to go at it. Straightening, I thought about the exchange with Peyton from earlier. Talking to me like she was the one hard done by? Was she serious?

“Stuck up little nitwit,” I muttered as I fought the urge to turn around to look back at the house. She was probably in there eating my food and drinking my coffee as if they were hers. Well, they weren’t, they were mine. Angrily I kicked the wooden slats on the fence to see if the post would hold them. I heard the crack, but everything held firm. Quickly climbing over the fence, I checked the other side, mindful of the beasts that were curious to see me. I kicked the fence again when I thought of the one person who wasn’t happy to see me, never mind curious. “It was as if I had broken in,” I muttered as I looked for any issues. “Was I homeless?” My snort was loud as I climbed back over the fence. “Clueless, utterly clueless.”

Striding to the barn, I desperately wanted to look back to the house to see if she was watching, but even though five years had passed, I doubted Peyton had changed so much that she was able to stand still for any length of time. No, she wouldn’t be standing, staring at a view she once told me she would rather die than look at one more time. She’d be moving through the house, looking for the changes, seeing if I had wrecked her home.

Her home.

What a complete joke.

In the five years since she had left, Donna had asked Peyton twice to sell the house to her, and Peyton had refused each time. She said she would think about it when the time was right. Well, the time would never be right for her now; Donna was gone.

Her illness hit her pretty hard at the end, but she had kept her spirits up, even though she knew her health was failing. Donna had sworn me to secrecy; no one was to know how ill she was in case they spoke to Peyton. Not one person in Drayton Springs or the surrounding area had spoken to Peyton Murphy since she left in the middle of the night five years ago, but still, I had kept my promise.

Donna had been good to me. As a troubled kid in a small town, times had been hard when I was young, but Donna saw past the defiance of an angry, frightened boy. It was because of Donna that Peyton and I became…what we were.

“I still blame you,” I said out loud as I glanced upwards. “Never would have been in her orbit if it weren’t for you,” I carried on talking to her memory as I pulled on my work gloves, making my way to the ATV sitting in the centre of the barn, parts lying around it, as it waited to be fixed. “You and your need to take care of strays,” I added softly. Clearing my throat, I picked up the wrench and looked at the parts I had already removed and set aside to be repaired or replaced.

I had customers. I had a ranch to run. I had a woman’s memory to uphold. I had too much in my life to reminisce about the girl who broke my heart five years ago when she left and never looked back.

The past was the past, and okay, she was here now, but she wouldn’t be for long. The sooner she was gone again, the better. I could shove these feelings…this reminiscing, back where they belonged. Behind me. Repeating that to myself several times, I pushed thoughts of her out of my head and concentrated on the work at hand.

I was still under the four-wheeler when I saw her boots appear beside it.

“Ethan?”

“Yup.”

“It’s getting dark out. You’ve been in here for hours.”

“Yup.”

I heard her sigh and watched as her boots shifted, a sign of her uncertainty. “I had dinner.”

“Okay.”

“I left you some.”

She did? “Okay.”

Movement to the side caused my hands to still as I turned my head to watch. Her knees appeared, and then her palms were flat on the barn floor, followed by her head as she glared at me. “Yup and okay? That’s it? That’s all you’re saying?”

I pretended to think about it. “Yup.”

“You’re such a…” Peyton took a deep breath. “When you’re ready to come inside, I would like to talk to you.” Her tone was as flat as her look.

“Okay.”

I watched as her eyes closed briefly and she bit her bottom lip, and I turned my head away so she couldn’t see my smile as I pretended to tighten the bolt on the four-wheeler.

“Are you going to be juvenile?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but she cut me off as she scrambled to her feet. “I swear to the almighty, Ethan, if you say yup, I’ll knee you in the balls.”

Pushing out from under the bike, I stood and looked down at her. Her hazel eyes were glassy with temper, and her cheeks had a slight flush to them. “I was going to ask what you wanted to talk about, but you didn’t wait for an answer. Seems to be a trend you haven’t grown out of.”

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