скачать книгу бесплатно
There was always a vague sense of something pressing at the back of his mind. A part of himself that he had left behind in Copper Ridge. It was inescapable. It had proven to be so in all his years of wandering. It was one reason he was back now. One reason he was so determined to settle everything once and for all.
But this... This was different. Now, his family was real, not just a vague impression of a thing left behind. His siblings were right in front of him, the adults they had grown into and not the children they’d been when he’d gone.
And some jackass had taken advantage of Madison.
That made his chest feel tight, the sensation spreading up to his throat. He hated that. Hated the thought of her feeling alone. Feeling broken because someone had treated her carelessly.
Yeah, he’d always had that sense that part of him was still here in Copper Ridge, but in his head, those parts of him were young and innocent, and still under the protection of his parents. For all their father was flawed, he took care of his children, even if it was only to prevent scandal from spreading.
At least, he took care of his legitimate children.
Even when they didn’t deserve it.
He gritted his teeth, curling his fingers into a fist and slamming the side of it against the support post on the porch.
It didn’t take much to remind him exactly why he had spent so long avoiding this place. It was easy to be a martyr in isolation. To self-flagellate without the consequences of your abandonment staring right at you.
Hell, there was nothing he could do about it now. What was done was done. All he could do now was fix it, and then get the hell out of Dodge.
He looked toward the barn, toward where Rebecca Bear was currently working to pay off debt that in his mind she didn’t have. She didn’t owe him anything. But she was stubborn, and she had pride. He had taken enough from her. He wasn’t going to take that too.
He had left a hell of a mess in this town. He wasn’t sure it was possible to clean it up.
But, if he died trying, at least it wouldn’t be his problem anymore.
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_3a946b1c-e443-5b85-89e0-1d12efe9c46f)
SHE HURT EVERYWHERE. There was nothing like a day of manual labor to remind her that she had once shattered her kneecap. And broken her femur. And that doing too much seemed to tighten her muscles up around the bone and make everyplace that had ever been fractured ache.
She had never hated Gage West more than she did in this moment. Actually, that was a lie, she had hated Gage West plenty of times over the years. Too many to list.
But, she could clearly picture him while she hated him now. She hobbled over to the bar, leaning against it, trying to get as much weight as she could off of her leg.
“Beer me, Ace,” she said, pressing her hand to her forehead.
The bar was crowded. It was Sunday night, and no one was looking forward to going back to work tomorrow. So, instead of getting a good night’s sleep, they were obviously out playing darts and riding on the mechanical bull that Ace had installed about a year ago.
Recently, Ace had opened a more upscale place, but he could still often be found here at everyone’s favorite dive. The fact that he wasn’t here some of the time was strange though. Copper Ridge was a constant. A small, slow-moving community that didn’t often see change. But the last few years had brought quite a bit of it. Tourism was beginning to become a major industry, and while she was definitely grateful for that, it was also changing her beloved landscape.
Just a year ago Ace had been single, and flirting with everything that moved. Now, he was married and about to be a father. Not that it bothered her. She had never been interested in Ace that way. It was just... Watching other people, people like him who had never even seemed interested in such a thing moving on with their lives and finding a companion made her feel hollow. Unsatisfied in a way she rarely was.
The fact he had married a West made her feel even weirder. Because the Wests made her feel weird in general. It was like they were infiltrating everything.
Not that she held anything that had happened to her against Sierra, Ace’s wife. Sierra was at least five years younger than Rebecca and wouldn’t remember anything about the accident, much less have any culpability in the events surrounding it.
Still. It was the whole thing.
“You feeling okay, Rebecca?” Ace asked, setting her preferred brew down in front of her. She hadn’t even had to specify what she wanted. He knew.
“Just worked too hard,” she said.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever talked to anybody who suffered from that affliction before,” he said, winking.
“What can I say?” she responded. “I’m a glutton for punishment.” As she said it, she had to wonder if it was true. She nodded once, picking up the beer and lifting it to her lips as she turned away from the bar and headed toward the table where Lane and Alison were already sitting.
“Is Cassie coming?” she asked, sitting down at the table slowly, her muscles screaming at her.
“No,” Alison said. “Something about date night.”
“As if that sexy mechanic she’s married to is better company than we are,” Lane said, grabbing hold of the toothpick in her drink and lifting it to her lips, plucking one of the impaled cherries from it and eating it.
“That’s a fancy drink,” Rebecca said, looking down at her beer. “What’s the occasion?”
“Wanting to feel fancy.”
Rebecca doubted a cosmopolitan with an entire handful of cherries could make her feel fancy after today. “Well, I guess that’s fair enough.”
“You’re limping,” Alison said, her expression concerned. “Are you okay?”
She was annoyed that they’d noticed. “I’m fine.”
“Except this is probably related to the work you were doing today?” Lane asked.
“Maybe.” She looked resolutely at her drink and not at Lane.
“What did he have you do? Were you riding the horses or bench-pressing them?”
Rebecca scowled. “There was just more lifting than I anticipated.”
“What’s happening?” Alison asked.
Rebecca shook her head, and Lane shot her a sharp look, then spoke anyway. “Rebecca is working for the guy who caused her accident.”
“You’re what?” Alison asked.
Rebecca reached across the table and grabbed hold of the remaining cherry on Lane’s toothpick, then took the unnaturally red fruit and popped it into her mouth.
“Hey!” Lane groused. “Cherry-stealing bitch.”
“Loudmouth.”
“What is going on?” Alison asked, clearly unamused by all of the antics.
“Exactly what I said,” Lane said. “Rebecca has decided to work for the guy who caused her accident, and clearly she has put herself under physical duress doing it.”
“Why?” Alison asked. “Rebecca, do you need money? If you need money, you can ask us. I would much rather give you some. Or, put you to work mixing frosting.”
“I don’t need money,” she said, feeling like a cat that had been backed up against the wall. “There’s a specific thing that I have to work out. And it requires working for him.”
“Could you possibly be more cagey?” Lane asked.
“If I tried,” Rebecca said, her tone deadpan, “I suppose I could be.”
“I just don’t get it.”
“It’s complicated. I owe him money.”
“How do you owe him money?”
“It’s complicated!” A prickling sensation assaulted the back of Rebecca’s neck, and she looked up just in time to see Gage walking through the door of the bar. “Oh, great,” she muttered.
“What?” Alison asked.
“Nothing,” Rebecca responded. She stood up, taking a long drink of the last of her beer. “I need another drink.”
She made her way back over to the bar, too late remembering that everything hurt and walking across the space was an assault. “More beer,” she said to Ace, setting the glass on the countertop.
“What happened?”
She turned around, her heart thundering hard against her chest as her gaze clashed with Gage’s stormy blue eyes. “Nothing,” she bit out.
“Then why are you limping?”
Rage poured down through her like an acid rain. “Oh, I have a little bit of a problem sometimes with my joints. My bones ache. Not because I’m old, mind you. But because I sustained a pretty serious injury to my leg and sometimes after I work, the muscles tighten up and everything goes a little bit nuts.” She gritted her teeth. “I feel like you might know something about that.”
“The work is too much for you,” he said, his voice flat.
Ace came back over to the bar and set the glass down in front of Rebecca.
“Put that on my tab, Ace,” Gage said.
She grabbed hold of the beer, her heart hammering hard. “Don’t do that, Ace.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Gage said.
“I’m going to pay for the beer if you can’t figure it out,” Ace said, turning away from them and going to help another customer.
“I’m trying to work off my debt to you,” she said, “not accrue more.”
“I can’t buy you a beer?”
“I’m confused about why you’re talking to me.”
“I don’t like you limping like this. I don’t like that the work hurt you.”
“I didn’t ask for your charity.” She scowled. “In fact, I think I’ve made it pretty clear I want to blot your charity from the record.”
“You’re not doing the work anymore. That’s it. Not going to have you limping around town because you’re trying to repay something I didn’t want you to pay for in the first place.”
He was just so large, hard and imposing, looming over her, his face a whole thunderstorm. He made her feel small and vulnerable. Like she was out of control. And she hated it.
“It isn’t your decision,” she said, her voice hard. “I have some say.”
He shook his head, and she found her eyes drawn to the grim line of his mouth. She was fascinated by it. By the deep grooves around it that proved this firm, uncompromising set was the typical expression for him. She wondered what he had to be uncompromising about.
She shouldn’t wonder. She shouldn’t wonder any damn thing about him.
“Sorry to say,” he said, not sounding sorry at all, “But you don’t.”
“I don’t understand why you’re doing this,” she said, keeping her voice low. The last thing she wanted to do was draw attention to them. They probably already were drawing attention. Pathetic, scarred-up Rebecca Bear talking to the tallest, hottest guy in the room. People were probably pitying her. Or wondering if he was asking for directions.
Heat washed over her skin, leaving a prickling sensation behind. Humiliation. Anger.
“You don’t think I feel bad about this? Do you think you’re the only person who lost sleep over it?”
“Well, I know I lost sleep. Recovery is a bitch.”
“I want to fix it. I want to make it right.”
“You can see the way that I’m walking today, can’t you? There is no making it right, Gage. There’s no fixing it. You can’t just make it like it didn’t happen. I’m not something you can just walk into town and put back together. I’m broken. That’s the beginning and end of it. And it’s my burden to bear, it isn’t yours. It isn’t fair. To wander around acting like you’ve been shouldering some of this for the past seventeen years when you just haven’t been.”
“The hell I haven’t,” he said, reaching out, wrapping his fingers around her arm and drawing her in closer to him.
His touch burned her, scorched her from the inside out. Her mind was blank, except for one thought. How long had it been since a man touched her? Anyone? She couldn’t remember.
“You can’t buy me,” she said, her voice low, shaking. And she wasn’t really sure if it was from rage, or because of the way he touched her. So firm and sure and completely unexpected. “You can’t throw money at this and expect it to go away.”
“Hey.” Rebecca turned and saw Ace standing behind the counter right next to them, his expression hard. “Is he bothering you?”
Of course Ace knew who Gage was. Ace was his brother-in-law. She wasn’t sure if anyone else in town recognized Gage West yet. And even if they did, they didn’t know the connection she had with him.
She doubted Ace knew either. But then, she couldn’t really be sure of what Gage had told his family, and what he hadn’t.
She pulled away from Gage, taking a step back. “It’s fine,” she said. She treated Ace to a hard look that expressed her to desire to have him go away.
She didn’t want him white knighting. She didn’t want anyone else enmeshed in this at all.
When he was out of earshot, Gage turned to her, leaning in slightly. “I’ve lived with it for the past seventeen years too,” he said. “Whether you want to listen to that or not, it’s true. Whether you think it’s fair or not, it’s true.”
“So, it sounds like you’re a big fan of being punished for your mistakes, then. Enjoy me withholding forgiveness.”
She didn’t even know what this fight was. Hating him for caring. Hating him for feeling some kind of responsibility for it. She shouldn’t know any of it, that was the problem. What she’d said to him earlier was the God’s honest truth.
She didn’t want to know his life. She didn’t want to know if guilt kept him awake. Didn’t want to know if he felt good, bad or indifferent.
This belonged to her. It was her pain. Her own personal tragedy. It had shaped everything she was, had disrupted her entire life in ways no one knew. In ways Gage West certainly couldn’t know.
Him feeling guilty...well, that seemed selfish. He wasn’t scarred up. His body was beautiful. Women didn’t look at him with pitying glances the way men looked at her. He didn’t have to deal with a terrible limp after a long day of physical labor. What right did he have to co-opt any of the suffering?
