Page 32 of My Cowboy Trouble (The Cowboy Romantic Comedies #1)

GAVIN

I'm replacing a broken board on the front porch when I hear Clara Mae's truck rumbling up the drive, kicking up dust like her pants are on fire.

Which, knowing Clara Mae, she probably thinks are.

The woman has a sixth sense for drama and an irresistible urge to stick her nose into other people's business.

"Afternoon, Gavin!" she hollers, climbing out of her truck with more energy than a woman her age should have. She's carrying a covered dish—probably another one of her famous casseroles that tastes like cardboard but somehow keeps showing up at every ranch function.

"Clara Mae," I acknowledge, not looking up from my work. Maybe if I keep busy, she'll deliver whatever gossip she's peddling and move along.

"Where's that sweet little city girl of yours?"

"She's not mine," I say automatically, then immediately regret it.

Because that's not true anymore, is it? After yesterday in the tack room, after the way she looked at me when I said I loved her, after everything that's been building between us—she is mine.

Ours. Whatever the hell we're calling this thing.

"Oh, honey," Clara Mae laughs, that cackling sound that usually means she's about to say something that'll piss me off. "Don't try to play innocent with me. The whole town knows about your little arrangement."

My hammer freezes mid-swing. "What arrangement?"

"The bet, sugar. About how long she'd last before running back to the city with her tail between her legs."

Ice forms in my stomach.

"Don't play dumb. Half the town has money on it. Though I have to say, I'm impressed with how long you boys kept her interested. Must have been quite the performance."

"Clara Mae?—"

"’Course, everyone knew it couldn't last forever. Pretty city girl like that? She was never going to stay with three cowboys in the middle of nowhere. The bet was just whether you'd get her to put out before she figured out you were all laughing at her behind her back. "

"That's not—" I start, but Clara Mae's already moving past me toward the house, still talking.

"Smart of you boys to make sure you got something out of it before she left. Can't blame a man for taking what's offered, especially when everyone knows it's temporary. Though I do feel a bit sorry for the poor thing. Probably thought you actually cared about her."

The front door opens, and Kenzie steps out, probably drawn by Clara Mae's voice. She's got that easy smile on her face, the one that's become more frequent over the past few weeks. The one that says she's happy here, comfortable, maybe even falling in love with this place. With us.

"Clara Mae!" she says warmly. "What brings you by?"

"Just thought I'd check on you, honey. See how you're holding up." Clara Mae's voice is dripping with false sympathy. "Must be hard, knowing the truth about why you're really here."

Fuck me.

Kenzie's smile falters slightly. "I'm sorry?"

"About the bet, sugar. About how the boys never expected you to last a month. Though I have to say, they certainly got their money's worth, didn't they?"

I watch Kenzie's face change, watch the color drain from her cheeks as Clara Mae's words hit her like physical blows. The moment Kenzie’s understanding dawns is followed immediately by hurt so raw, it makes my chest ache .

"What bet?" Kenzie asks quietly, but she's looking at me now, not Clara Mae, and there's something in her eyes that makes me want to throw up.

"Now, now," Clara Mae continues, oblivious to the damage she's doing, "don't look at him like that.

It was harmless fun. Boys will be boys, you know.

And you can't blame them for thinking a fancy city girl wouldn't last five minutes on a working ranch.

The bet was just... incentive to see how long they could keep you around for entertainment. "

"Entertainment?" Kenzie repeats, and her voice has gone flat, emotionless. Dangerous.

"Clara Mae, you need to leave," I say, finally finding my voice. "Now."

"Oh, don't get all bent out of shape, Gavin. I'm just being honest with the girl. She deserves to know the truth, don't you think? Better she finds out now than after she's made an even bigger fool of herself."

Kenzie hasn't moved, hasn't said another word, but I can see her shutting down. See the walls going up, the defenses snapping into place. The same walls that were there when she first arrived, before we'd earned her trust. Before she'd started to believe she belonged here.

"Kenzie," I start, stepping toward her.

She takes a step back, shaking her head. "No."

"It's not what she's making it sound like?—"

"Isn't it?" Her voice is still quiet, but there's steel underneath now. The kind of steel that could cut a man in half. "You made a bet about how long I'd last. About whether I'd sleep with you before I left. Is that true or not?"

The direct question hangs in the air between us, and I know that whatever I say next is going to determine everything. I could lie, could spin it, could try to make it sound better than it was. But looking at her face, seeing the hurt and betrayal there, I know she deserves the truth.

"Yes," I say quietly. "But?—"

"But nothing." She turns away from me, heading back toward the house. "Thank you for your honesty, Clara Mae. I appreciate knowing where I stand."

"Kenzie, wait?—"

But she's already gone, the front door closing behind her with a soft click that somehow sounds louder than if she'd slammed it.

Clara Mae, completely oblivious to what she's just done, sets her casserole dish on the porch railing. "Well, I suppose that's that. Poor thing. Though honestly, what did she expect? You boys aren't the settling-down type, and she's not the ranch type. Better she learns it now than later."

"Get out," I say, my voice low and dangerous.

"Now, Gavin?—"

"Get the fuck off this property before I do something we'll both regret."

Clara Mae's eyes widen at the venom in my voice, and for the first time, she seems to realize she might have crossed a line. "I was just trying to help?—"

"You just destroyed the best thing that's happened to this ranch in years. So take your casserole and your gossip and get out."

She huffs and grabs her dish, muttering something about ungrateful men and city girls who think they're too good for small towns.

But she climbs back into her truck and drives away, leaving me standing on the porch with the taste of ash in my mouth and the sick certainty that I've just lost something important.

I sink onto the porch steps, my head in my hands. The bet. Jesus Christ, how could I have been so stupid? How could any of us have been so stupid?

But it wasn't like Clara Mae made it sound.

It wasn't about humiliating Kenzie or using her for entertainment.

It was... fuck, it was exactly like that, wasn't it?

At the beginning, at least. We did make a bet about how long she'd last. We did think she was just a spoiled city girl playing cowgirl for a month.

The fact that we fell for her, that everything changed, that the bet became irrelevant the moment we realized we were in love with her. None of that changes what we did at the beginning. None of that changes the fact that we started this whole thing by wagering on her failure.

And now she knows. And she's never going to forgive us for it.

I've fucked up a lot of things in my life, but this might be the worst. Because this wasn't just about me. This was about all of us, about something we were building together. And it just crumbled to dust because of a stupid bet I made when I was too blind to see what was right in front of me.

The front door opens behind me, and I don't have to look to know it's Trent. His footsteps are heavy on the porch boards, and when he sits down beside me, I can feel the anger radiating off him like heat.

"What the hell just happened?" he asks, his voice deadly quiet.

"Clara Mae told her about the bet."

"All of it?"

"Enough." I scrub my hands over my face. "Made it sound like we planned the whole thing. Like we were just playing with her for our own amusement."

"Fuck."

"Yeah. Fuck."

We sit in silence for a moment, both of us staring out at the pasture where we've spent the morning working alongside the woman we're probably about to lose.

"We have to fix this," Trent says finally.

"How? She's not wrong, is she? We did make that bet. We did think she wouldn't last. We did start this whole thing as a joke."

"But that's not how it ended."

"Doesn't matter how it ended if the beginning was built on a lie. "

"Then we tell her the truth. All of it. How we felt, how things changed, how that bet stopped mattering the moment we realized?—"

"Realized what? That we love her?" I laugh, but there's no humor in it. "Think she's going to care about that after finding out we started by betting against her?"

Trent doesn't answer, because we both know the truth. Kenzie Rhodes doesn't forgive easily, and she sure as hell doesn't forget. And what we did, what I did by making that fucking bet in the first place, might be unforgivable.

But I have to try. Because the alternative is watching her walk away, and I'm not ready to live without her smile, her laugh, her stubborn determination to prove everyone wrong.

I'm not ready to go back to the way things were before she showed up and turned everything upside down.

I find Kenzie in the barn an hour later, aggressively mucking out stalls like the hay has personally offended her. She's changed into her oldest jeans and a tank top that's already soaked with sweat, and her hair is pulled back in a ponytail that swings with each violent stab of the pitchfork.

She doesn't acknowledge me when I walk in, just keeps working with the kind of focused intensity that usually means she's either furious or trying not to cry. Possibly both.

"Kenzie," I start, but she cuts me off without looking up.

"Stop. Shut up."

"You need to let me explain?—"

"I need you to leave me alone."