Page 101 of Ride Me Cowboy

There. I’ve said it. Now, I just have to wait…

He looks at me for a long, slow moment and then nods, so my heart soars. “Okay. Well, where will you go?”

My heart cracks and my expression must reflect it because I see the way comprehension dawns across his face. It’s quickly followed by something like panic. “You’re talking about staying here, on the ranch?”

I shake my head, but my eyes sting with tears, and all I can do is drop my head forward into my hands. At least then I don’t have to look at him.

“Stop,” he says, but gently, catching my hands and peeling them off my face, which I keep bent protectively downwards, shielding myself from him. “Honey, you’re so mixed up right now, you don’t know which way is up. You don’t want to stay out here. This is a nice place to escape to, but it’s not for you, City Girl. We both know that’s the truth.”

“You think I don’t belong?”

He looks toward the kitchen window, so I wonder if it’s him shielding himself now. “I think you won’t be happy. You’d still be running away. That’s no way to live a life.”

“I’m not running anymore. I told Elsie.”

“But you’re still trying to avoid your real life.”

“Or, what if I just realized that you’re more my real life than anything I have back there? What if I realized that the place I ran away to, thinking it would just be somewhere safe to lick my wounds, actually turned out to be the missing piece of me?” I press my hand to his chest, going all in. “What if I realized that you’re the missing piece of me?”

The air crackles with the weight of my question and I hold my breath, suspended between hope and I don’t know what else, but nothing good.

“Do you remember when you told me about him, and I tried to stop this from happening?” The question is slow, drawn out of him like it’s the last thing he wants to say. “I never wanted to take advantage of you, after everything you’ve been through, and this is why. The last thing I wanted was for you to misread what we’re doing.”

Misread?

The world is slipping. I curl my hands around the edge of the bench, gripping it tight.

“You’ve been through too much to see clearly, Beth. You’re clinging to me because you think it’ll make you happy, but I’m just some guy you’ve rebounded to. And I…you know I’ll never settle down like you’re asking me to.”

My jaw drops before I can quickly snap my lips together and try not to look like he’s actually slapped me or something.

The shock though is real, and raw.

“You think that’s what this is?”

“I think the fact this is temporary is why it has been great.” He grimaces, like he knows using the past tense is a low blow.

“Wow.”

“You are so special.” His voice is deep and graveled; the truth of his statement, the depth of his sincerity, lands deep in my heart. “But we’ve always known this thing had a limit. It’s part of what makes it so easy, baby.”

I frown, trying to remember everything we’ve said, the way we’ve framed it as temporary, always coming back to the fact I’m leaving for New York. He’s right. I’ve done that every bit as muchas he has. It’s been a talisman to both of us, a promise of non-commitment, which conversely freed us up to fall in love. Or at least, that’s what it did for me.

In having the security of knowing I would only be here a few months, I let myself be totally open to Cole in a way I might otherwise have guarded against, and as a result, I fell head over heels in love with him.

“Yeah, we have,” I say with a slow nod and weeping heart. “I guess I just didn’t understand what we were doing until today.”

“Today has been emotional,” he says, gently, yet dismissively, royally pissing me off.

“In a way that’s opened my eyes.”

A muscle clenches in his jaw. “Wait and see what tomorrow brings. You might feel differently in the morning.”

“Don’t do that,” I say, quickly. “Don’t tell me I don’t know what’s in here.” I push my fingers at my chest quickly. “Don’t tell me I don’t know how much you mean to me.”

“Beth—,” he says, quickly, like he’s pleading with me not to say anything further.

But for the third time today, my mouth takes on a mind of its own. “I’m in love with you, Cole Donovan, and I’d put every penny I own on you being in love with me, too. Tell me I’m wrong.”