Page 63 of Tempting Wyatt (Triple Creek Ranch #1)

CHAPTER FIFTY

wyatt

“SHE LEFT, WYATT,” Isaac calls out as he rides Champ toward me.

I ignore him. Just like I’m ignoring the intense throbbing in my skull from the hell of a hangover I’ve got.

Keep moving cattle.

Just keep working. Keep your head down and focus on what needs to be done. Forget her face, forget her body, forget those fucking noises she made while you were inside her. It wasn’t real. Not for her.

“Wyatt! Hello? Did you hear me?”

I cut my eyes to where Isaac is losing his shit like a middle school girl having a meltdown.

“Heard you. Either help or go the fuck away.”

I gesture to the two hundred head of cattle I’ve got to rotate out of the summer pasture Summer is over.

“Seriously? Fuck the cows, dude.”

“I think some kids tried that on the Patterson ranch once. Not a good idea.”

Isaac stares hard at me. “Now you decide to develop a sense of humor? Really?”

“Better late than never.”

He makes a face. We both know where it came from. It’s her. She taught me to lighten up. Reminded me how to joke around, how to give myself permission to smile, to laugh occasionally.

I swallow the lump that missing her causes in my throat. Losing her. Letting her go. It’s a complicated knot of pain that doesn’t seem to be shrinking.

Maybe I’ll learn to live with it.

Isaac moves Champ over to block my path.

“She’s gone, like bags packed, taillights down the driveway, man. And we both know it’s unlikely she’ll come back here. Ever. Unless you give her a reason to. That what you want? Her gone? For good?”

I swallow again—hard—until I know my voice won’t break.

But Isaac isn’t finished.

“You know what Lucifer is doing right now?” Isaac asks, his voice a jagged blade slicing through me. “Pacing. Looking for her. Just like he looked for Dad when he died. We just gonna let him wear another fucking path in the paddock?”

He glares hard at me when I say nothing.

“Did I tell you she sent Asher a care package? Bunch of books and an electronic reading device or some shit. Like a hundred pounds of his favorite fucking beef jerky. Looked like a lifetime supply of protein bars. Fuzzy socks, she sent fucking fuzzy socks—said she wanted him to have something to make him feel cozy.”

I can’t listen to the list of the many ways Ivy is amazing. I know more about that than he ever could. “This was always temporary. This was just a vacation for her.” A chance to observe some hillbillies in the mountains as research for her next screenplay. “Nothing more, nothing less.”

Isaac regards me silently. “I think you’re wrong about her,” he finally says. “Vacation, my ass. We all saw it. That woman would take a fucking bullet for you, man. What else does she have to do to prove herself?”

“Not exploit everything she found out about us, things about our family I told her in confidence, to make a fucking buck.”

He frowns. “She’s not Nina. You get that, right? She didn’t do this out of spite. Or for the money. She was trying to help.”

“Help who, Isaac? In what universe does her writing about us and pitching it as some bullshit show help anyone except her?”

My brother’s eyes go the widest I’ve ever seen them. “You don’t know?”

“I know I don’t have time for this. Are you helping or leaving? Because those are your only two options.”

He shakes his head. “You’re a jackass, dude. Like one of those guys in those dirty books Willow reads. You bailed on her at the first sign she’d made a mistake. But that’s the thing, brother. She didn’t actually make one. You’re just too fucking wounded to see it.”

“See what?” I definitely don’t see the similarities between myself and the guys Willow reads about. Except that, according to the covers, we both have abs. Bet they didn’t get theirs baling hay all summer.

“You were so quick to cut and run that you didn’t even give her a chance to explain, to tell you the truth—which she would have.

I’m the one who told her not to tell you she worked in the movie business.

Apparently, it was Mom who asked her to hold off on saying anything to you about the show proposal. ”

I’m growing tired of the roller coaster ride this entire situation has taken my blood pressure on. “Get to the point, Isaac. I’m running low on patience,” I tell him.

He smirks. “Nah, brother. You’re just running. And now, so is she. Good luck catching her. Considering she was practically still engaged when she got here, I hope you figure out how to get your head out of your ass before it’s too late and you wake up to find her married to someone else.”

His words sear my soul like a cattle brand.

Mom asked her not to say anything to me?

My heart pounds in my chest. Maybe she was going to tell me the truth if I hadn’t ghosted her on her last night in town. One thing is certain: I’m not like those smutty novel guys. I’m not going to fly off like a crazy person to chase down a woman who betrayed my trust.

I’m not.

Because that’s ridiculous.

Real people don’t do that.

My breaths come faster and harder as the memory of her in my bed hits me like a sledgehammer.

Maybe it was all a lie.

But what if it wasn’t?

Staring out at the river that runs through the mountain valley, my vision blurs, and I see her. Not really her, unfortunately. A montage of my memories with her.

That first day in the driveway.

That sweet smile.

That perfect ass.

Helping her mount up on Sunny, curls bouncing in the sunshine as she rode with reckless abandon. Her body wrapped around me on the ATV.

Her tiny hand in my huge one. Holding her in my arms on the dance floor at The Stillery.

Cheering for Caleb at the rodeo.

The shot she took at her ex to save me from myself. To protect the ranch.

I asked her why she’d hit him, and she said, “So you wouldn’t have to.”

Then she said he would’ve sued us, and she knew we didn’t need another lawsuit.

I can still see everything clearly—those legs peeking out from my shirt when that was all she was wearing.

I didn’t tell my brother, but I stood by and watched Isaac see her off. Kept my distance so I wouldn’t be tempted to beg her to stay.

The red flare of taillights seared into my chest when she left.

She’s gone, and the home I’ve always known is even emptier than when my dad passed.

I’m distracted and I can’t think straight. I climb off of Jameson before I get one of us injured.

My hand slams into the workshop wall without consciously deciding to do it and feels as if it shattered my knuckles.

“Fuck.”

The pain comes quickly. It’s sharp and sudden, snapping me back to the present.

“What’d the wall do to you?” Isaac’s voice rings out in the silence.

I thought he’d left. He’s off his horse and standing behind me.

I whirl around to face him, trying to hold the broken pieces of myself together long enough to convince him I’m good.

“What are you still doing here?”

I step inside the shop and wipe the blood on a nearby oil-covered rag. He follows.

“Me? You’re the one hitting innocent walls.”

My jaw clenches. “Slipped.”

Isaac snorts his disbelief. “Yeah. Okay.”

My chest constricts. I move to walk past him before I have a panic attack. “I have work to do.”

Isaac nods. Then places a hand on my chest. “Yeah, you do. Like get your ass going and tell that girl you’re sorry and grovel till she comes back. Get to it. I can handle things here.”

I snort at his ridiculous suggestion. “I’m going to finish rotating the herd. Grab a few ranch hands for me, will you?”

Isaac sidesteps to block my exit. “Gotta say, I’m disappointed, big brother. My whole life, I’ve never seen you wuss out like this before.”

Glaring at him, I cross my arms over my chest. “Fuck are you talking about?”

His eyes meet mine. “Haven’t seen two people more meant for each other since Mom and Dad. You’re in love with that girl. And you just let her go. Now you’re in here, sulking and hitting shit like a pissed-off teenager. You’re a grown-ass man, Wyatt. Go fucking get her.”

I look up at the sky like it will have the answers. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Explain it to me like I’m five.”

“We’ve been over this,” I practically growl in frustration. “I’m not having this conversation with you again.”

It’s Nina’s bullshit all over again. I can’t believe I was stupid enough to fall for the same manipulation twice. Only this time, it’s worse. Because this time, I fell in love with the little liar.

“Respectfully,” Isaac begins, “you’re a fucking idiot. She wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, man. She was trying to help.”

I laugh harshly. “How exactly does her turning our life into a television show help us? Please tell me how it’s any different from those vultures who want to turn this place into a ski resort?”

Without warning, a female voice answers before Isaac can, “Because Ivy isn’t getting anything from selling the show. She committed to giving all the contractual income, including the advance and all royalties, to the ranch.”

My mom enters the workshop with what looks like several sheets of rolled-up paper in her hand.

“Not only that, but she’s having the production company pay us to train the actors and familiarize them with horses and ranch life. They’re paying even more to film some of it here. It’s done, Wyatt. I signed this morning, and Ivy already wired her advance over to the ranch account.”

My head and heart go to war. My Hollywood angel, trying to save everyone. But why not talk to me first?

I stare hard at my mom and brother. “How hard would it have been to discuss this with me?”

Isaac makes a pointed gesture toward my bloody knuckles. “Because you’re handling it so well now.”

Ironically enough, we talked about this—Ivy and me—when she was discussing her screenplay. The importance of not having some meaningless, contrived miscommunication that resulted in a third-act breakup that could’ve easily been avoided with an adult conversation.

And yet here we are.

Because I was too afraid to ask her to stay, because I used the first flaw I found as a reason to let her go.

Fuck me.