Page 6 of Awaiting the Storm (Wildhaven #1)

T he bell above the front door tinkles as I step into Ryse the writing had been on the wall for a while.

Neither of them was angry, but we were all sad about the situation.

I promised them that they would be the first call I made when things turned around.

And they will turn around. They have to.

“Matty Storm,” Imma Jean calls from behind the counter, her voice as thick and warm as honey straight from the comb.

“You just missed your sister. Charli was in here not ten minutes ago, wanting one of the new scones I baked with those huckleberries your father brought me from up in Buckskin Gulch.”

“I wondered where she’d run off to,” I say, walking up and giving Imma Jean a one-armed hug over the counter. “It would have been nice if she’d told me. She could have saved me a trip into town.”

She smells like cinnamon and almond soap, holding me close, as she always does, as if I were still fifteen, heartbroken, and missing my mother something fierce. There’s comfort in this place and in her presence.

Imma Jean Ryse was one of Mom’s closest friends.

They had grown up together, and we girls considered Imma Jean our aunt.

She stepped in during our most difficult times, when we needed her the most—times when Daddy was so lost in his grief that he could barely function.

A couple of years after Mom passed away, she lost her husband to a heart attack.

Instead of falling apart, she gathered her strength, put a For Sale sign on their house in the country, and used the proceeds to purchase this place.

She moved into the apartment upstairs and opened the café, putting her God-given talents to good use. Nobody can bake like Imma Jean.

“You look frozen,” she says, leaning back to take me in.

“Yeah, I think winter is blowing in a little early this year. I’ve been in the truck most of the morning with the heat blasting, but I was working the south end before that.”

“Fence again?”

“Always.”

“Well, you sit yourself down, honey. I’ll bring you something to warm up your bones. Coffee with extra sweet cream?”

“Please and thank you,” I say.

She sashays off, apron strings swinging behind her, and I slide into my usual stool. From here, I can gaze out the big picture windows and watch the folks passing by on the street. I set my phone on the counter and glance around the café, only half paying attention—until my eyes fall on him.

Ugh. Caison Galloway.

He’s standing near the pastry case, talking with Imma Jean like he’s known her forever. She’s smiling up at him like he just told the best story she’d heard all month, and he’s smiling back, that lazy, charming grin of his working overtime.

He’s got his sleeves rolled up, showing off tan forearms, and the top two buttons of his shirt are undone, like the cold doesn’t bother him at all.

Dark jeans and actual boots today. Not those ridiculous loafers.

His hair’s still trimmed close, and he’s clean-shaven today, but somehow, he looks … less polished. More like he belongs.

Damn it .

I glance out the window, suddenly very interested in the Chevy parked across the street. Maybe he won’t see me.

“Matty!” Imma Jean’s voice floats over. “Have you met Case?”

So much for that.

I turn back, school my expression into something neutral, and raise a brow in question. “Case?”

Caison’s eyes catch mine, and I feel the contact all the way down to my boots.

“Only pretty ladies and my mom call me Case.” He winks at Imma Jean, and I swear she blushes from head to toe.

“And, yes, we’ve met. Good to see you again, Maitland,” he says, making his way over like we’re old friends.

He’s holding a cup of coffee and a croissant and slides onto the seat right beside me like he’s been invited.

“You too,” I reply, though it comes out cooler than his greeting.

He sets his drink down and rests one arm on the back of the stool as he twists to face me.

I raise an eyebrow. “You always invite yourself into other people’s spaces?”

He glances around. “It looks like open seating to me. And this particular stool happens to be the best seat in the house,” he says, easy as can be.

I snort. “Flattery doesn’t work on me, Galloway.”

He smiles, unbothered. “Noted. But I wasn’t trying to flatter you, Miss Storm. This stool is right below the heating vent,” he says, pointing toward the ceiling.

Imma Jean returns just then and sets my coffee in front of me with a flourish, along with a large cinnamon roll slathered in icing on a floral china plate. “You eat that whole thing,” she says with a wink. “You’re too skinny.”

I laugh. “You say that every time I come in here.”

“And I mean it every time. You Storm girls burn through calories faster than a spark in dry brush.” Then she glances at Caison and smiles again, soft and knowing. “Caison, you behave now. This one may seem tougher than old boot leather, but she’s soft as a lamb’s wool inside.”

“Is that right?” His amused eyes come to mine, and somehow, that smile of his turns into a sexy grin.

I feel my face heat and take a long sip of my coffee to cover it.

Imma Jean winks at me and bustles away, off to chat with another customer, and I’m left alone next to a man I still don’t trust, sipping coffee like it’s going to shield me from the way he’s looking at me.

“What do you want, Galloway?” I ask, setting the cup down. “From me, I mean.”

“Maybe I don’t want anything.”

I tilt my head. “That’s right. You just came by the other day to be neighborly, correct? I don’t buy it. Everyone wants something. Especially people who work for Holland Ludlow.”

His mouth tightens just a touch. Not enough for most folks to notice. But I’ve been reading people my whole life. It’s a defense mechanism.

“I’m not sure what your problem with Holland is, but I’m not him,” he says.

“I didn’t say you were. I just said you work for him. What’s that old saying? A man is known by the company he keeps ?”

He nods slowly, like he gets it. “So, you think you know me now?”

“I know men like you. Question is, do you know who you’re in business with?”

“Holland and Priscilla are like family to me. He and my father were best friends,” he replies.

We lapse into silence. I take a bite of my pastry. It’s spicy and sweet, and it melts on my tongue. I chew slower than necessary, giving myself time to think before I speak again.

“ Was your father’s best friend? They’re not friends now?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “My father passed away in March. Pancreatic cancer.”

I swallow the lump in my throat. “Oh, I’m sorry. It’s hard to lose a parent,” I whisper.

He gives me a funny look, but doesn’t press. Just slides his gaze to the street out the window for a beat.

I ask, “If your father and Holland were close, does that mean you grew up around here?”

He and his name aren’t familiar. And I’m guessing he can’t be much older than me, so if he had grown up in Wildhaven, surely, we would have known each other.

He shakes his head. “Born in Jackson Hole, but I spent quite a few summers here as a kid. ”

“Oh.”

“And I assume you’ve been here your entire life?”

I nod. “Yep. Four generations of Storms have lived here. My great-great-granddad homesteaded our land. My father and all four of us girls were born in the house we still live in.”

There’s pride in my voice. I don’t hide it.

He leans forward a little. “That’s rare. People usually sell out before the second generation. Hard to hang on to land these days.”

“We would never sell.”

“I believe you.”

I look at him again, sharp. “Do you? Because I know Holland wants to expand, and I know you asked Daddy to walk our western pastures. Which isn’t going to happen, by the way.”

“I do,” he says, calm as can be. “I can tell by the way you talk about it. And how you ride that horse of yours like she’s an extension of your body. People don’t give that kind of care to places they’re willing to let go of easily.”

I blink.

Because that … that’s not what I was expecting him to say.

“She was my mother’s,” I say.

He raises a brow.

“Luna, my horse—she belonged to Mom before she passed. She was actually riding her when it happened. Luna carried her all the way home.”

There’s something in his eyes now—not just charm or confidence. Not sympathy exactly. Something gentler.

It makes me uncomfortable.

I clear my throat. “You’re good at talking pretty, Galloway. Is that part of the job?”

“Maybe,” he says with a half grin. “But I’m being honest. I can tell how much you love your family and your ranch.”

“I still don’t trust you.”

He smiles, but his eyes fall to the mug in his hands.

Another long silence. But this one feels different. Not tense. Not hostile. Like two people circling something unspoken, unsure of what to say next.

“How’d you end up here? I mean, Texas had to be more exciting,” I ask before I can stop myself.

His jaw flexes. “I came back for my mother. She needs me.”

Well, that punches me straight to the heart.

He doesn’t say more, and I don’t ask. I know that tone. It’s the sound of wounds that haven’t quite closed.

“Holland offered me a fresh start,” he finally continues. “Figured I’d give it a try.”

“You planning to play by his rules?”

His gaze meets mine. Steady. Intense. “Not if they’re wrong.”

I study him. He seems sincere, and hell if he isn’t handsome as sin.

“I get that you’re skeptical. I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t trust me either. Not yet. And, yes, you are correct in assuming that I had ulterior motives for my visit the other day. I wanted to feel you guys out.”

“Why?”

“I’m interested in doing business together. And I’d like to discuss it more. Maybe over dinner one evening?” he asks.

“Dinner? Really? That’s your play? Do I look like the kind of girl who can be swayed by a fancy meal into making a deal with the devil?”

He snorts. “The devil? Geezus. I’ll admit, I’m no saint, but I’m not the devil, Maitland.

I’m not trying to sneak in and take advantage of you or your family.

It’s not how I do business. If I bring any propositions to your table, it’ll be ones that are fair and mutually beneficial to all parties. You have my word.”

Imma Jean floats back over. “Can I get you anything else?” she asks Caison.

He finishes the last bite of his croissant and brushes his hands off. “No, ma’am. I need to get back to the ranch,” he says to her before turning to me. “Thanks for letting me sit here. Even if it was under protest.”

“I didn’t protest.”

“You didn’t exactly welcome me either.”

I shrug. “Maybe I’m reserving judgment.”

“I’ll take it.”

He stands and tips his chin. “See you around, Maitland. ”

“Matty,” I say.

He smiles. “Matty. You have a good day, and I’ll be in touch soon about that dinner.” And with that, he’s gone.

I watch him leave, annoyed that I’m looking at all. Annoyed at the little flutter in my chest as I watch him cross the street and get into his truck.

Caison Galloway is trouble, wrapped in a sharp jaw and a smooth voice. I just know it.

“He sure is a looker,” Imma Jean says as she tops off my coffee.

“I guess,” I mumble.

“What was that I heard about dinner?” she asks, and I don’t miss the giddiness in her tone.

“Don’t get any ideas. He’s not wanting to date me. He just wants to wine and dine me because he thinks it will impress me into doing business with him.”

“Maybe. Maybe not,” she murmurs.

“Trust me, Imma Jean, all Caison Galloway is interested in is making money for Ironhorse.”

She smirks. “Oh, honey, I may be old, but I’m not blind. And believe me, the way that man was looking at you, he’s interested in way more than money can buy,” she muses before walking off to fill another customer’s mug.

I sit there, drinking my coffee, licking icing off my thumb, and wondering what the hell I’m supposed to do with a man like that.