Second Hope Cowboy (2 page)

“You’re not welcome here, Hope. Get back in your car and hit the road.”

She kept her eyes on him down the length of the brown glass. It made his heart skip ten beats, and he cursed his effing emotions. He didn’t want to feel anything for her, but if he had to feel something, why couldn’t it be revulsion? His southern region must have forgotten the damage she’d done to his heart.

He’d rather stay angry and bitter than admit she’d stolen his heart and he’d never gotten it back.

She set her beer on the top porch rail and sighed. “Not going to happen until you and I chat.”

“That’s real good considering you weren’t interested in talking the night you drove off and left your life behind. Now you have something to say? It’s a little late, and don’t mistake me for someone who is the least bit concerned.”

He could see her facial features soften in the light from the overhead fixture. “Do you really want to rehash old feelings, Tuck? That’s not why I came, but if getting you to listen means taking a stroll down every nook and cranny of the past, then so be it. But it won’t change a thing.”

Bringing his chin up and narrowing his gaze on her, he groaned. “Is that so?” He shook his head and stood up. “You’re right, there’s no reason to rehash old news. You have a life now with Brett. You have my blessing, now leave.” He turned and started for the door, the thumping of his boots competed with the pounding of his heart.

“His name is Blaise.”

“Yeah, whatever!” His hand was on the knob. The springs on the screen door squeaked. He could walk away. He wouldn’t give her the satisfaction and listen—

“I’m here because I want you to sign the deed of the house over to me.”

He squeezed the metal between his fingers until he thought it’d bend. Frustration sliced through him, a coyote yelped in the distance. He knew the feeling.

Darting a glance over his shoulder, his throat tightened. “You want what?”

“I want the house at Havens Ranch.” He caught the quiver in her voice.

“We agreed in the divorce that I would keep the house, remember? You walked away, wanted no part of it, including the ranch or this place.”

“I know you sold the ranch to Cash for only a third of what it was worth. But you’re not living in the house, haven’t for some time, Tuck. It’s empty and it shouldn’t be.”

“So what. It’s mine to do whatever I want with it. After all, it was me who remodeled that old place until I was broke and my hands bled.”

“Correction.
We
remodeled the house until we were broke and bleeding. We were once partners.” She wrapped her arms around her waist as if the memory was too much to endure.

He stomped across the porch, the hammering of his boots echoed through the night. She didn’t even blink. “Oh, sweetheart. I remember all too well what we were. Unfortunately, you decided to throw it all away.” He darted a hand through his hair.

“It takes two to make a marriage work and two to destroy it. Stop pretending that you don’t carry the same scars that I do.” Her bottom lip trembled and guilt sliced through him. He pushed away compassion, liking his rage much better.

As far as he was concerned, she didn’t deserve any kindness from him.

“Whatever you say, Hope. You have everything you’ve ever wanted, except you don’t have
my
house. If you even think for a second that I’m giving you that place so you and grandpa doc can move in once you’re married, you’ve got another thing coming.” His fingers dug into his fists.

“Admit it, you’re being spiteful. I’m willing to pay you whatever you want, even more than it’s worth, which isn’t much with the condition it’s in.”

“You mean Barron will pay the price!” He swallowed against the constriction in his throat, but the tightness only filtered through to his stomach and into his balls.

With a shake of her head, white blonde hair floated around her face. “For heaven’s sake, his name is Blaise.” She reached up and tugged several strands behind her ear. “My God, I should have known this would be useless.”

“Then why did you waste your time?” he snapped.

“It’s obvious you don’t care about the house, Tucker! I thought you’d live in it, but you’ve allowed it to sit and rot. At least if I move in, I can finish the remodeling. Just like this place. It needs the same repairs it did when I lived here.” As if to prove her point, she kicked a spindle on the rail.

He shoved his hands into his pockets to keep from slamming his hand into his hair again. At this rate, he’d be bald by the time she left. “Why does this mean so much to you?”

She worked her bottom lip between her teeth. “I love that house.” Her soft voice made the hairs on his arms stand.

“You walked away. With Chester, I might add. He was my dog. I raised him from a pup.” Another ounce of frustration weighed on his shoulders. “Our bed was barely cold before I received the divorce papers.” Dragging his hands from his pockets, he marched across the space of the small porch and leaned against the railing. The wood whined and splintered. He realized the house at Havens Ranch wasn’t the only thing that needed some tender loving care. Everything around him had suffered.

“Chester was a good dog. I guess I took him because—”

“What do you mean ‘was’?” His heart thumped against his ribcage.

One corner of her mouth dropped. “He died a few months ago.”

Tucker didn’t realize he was holding his breath until his lungs singed. Inhaling sharply, he kicked a broken spindle, sending it whirling through the air and landing in the grass. He crossed his arms over his chest. Chester, a Boxer, had been like a kid to him. “How?”

“He was old and in pain from arthritis. The vet said it was best to let him go.” She sniffed and suspiciously wiped her cheek.

Emotion riddled his veins but he pushed all feeling to the shadows, just as he had everything else, allowing anger to scorch its way through his body. He cleared his throat and shifted his weight from boot to boot.

The best thing he needed right now was for her to leave.

“I don’t want to see you again, Hope. You made your choice when you left. The house is mine. You gave it up. Over my dead body will I give you the place just because you have a change of mind. Now do us both a favor and move on with your life. It seems you already have. You being here only makes my head spin and my gut sicken. I bet you were fucking the doc before I even signed our marriage into dust.” He’d say anything to get her to go.

Hurt filled her eyes. “I thought you and I could talk like civilized adults, but I see that I was wrong. I should never have come.”

****

Hope slid into the driver’s side of her car but didn’t start the engine. Her hands were trembling, as well as her insides. She gripped the steering wheel, hoping her nerves would calm. She shouldn’t have drunk the beer because it settled like liquid fire in the pit of her stomach.

Seeing Tucker after so long had been harder than she’d expected. On her drive to the cabin, she’d prepared herself for an upheaval of emotion, but she had no clue she’d feel like someone caught her with a fishhook and extracted her heart.

Why had she come?

Why had she put herself through the torture?

She’d had a sliver of hope—but hope for what?

Expecting his distance, she hadn’t anticipated her raw emotions.

He was right to be upset. She’d left, given up. Even if she told him the truth, he could never understand why she’d walked away from their marriage, left everything behind that meant anything to her—except Chester. And that had been a fluke. The dog had followed her out, climbed into her car and wouldn’t budge. So, she’d driven away with a few clothes tossed into a small suitcase and a whimpering dog that stared at her in accusation for months afterward.

Who would have known the dog would become her best friend. And his death had opened old wounds. She’d wanted to connect with the past so she’d taken a ride to Havens Ranch and what she saw had made her stomach twist into a thousand knots—the abandoned house with overgrown weeds, dirty siding and a fallen shutter hanging on by a rusty nail.

She had even pushed logic aside and spoken to Cash.

He’d told her everything—how Tucker sold him the ranch, took off for a while and came back to work at the Brooke Creek Ranch. She’d driven by the land owned by the Brooke family, parked and got out. When she saw Tucker baling hay, she’d lost all nerve and left before he saw her.

Brave enough to come here today, she knew now she should have stayed away.

Each time he’d looked at her she could see his pain of loss—or maybe she was seeing her own. Guilt certainly could play on a person’s mind.

Turning the key, the engine purred alive and she backed out of the driveway, tears falling to her cheeks. She brushed them away, but they came faster than she could manage them. She should never have exposed herself to vulnerability, and yet she had because she couldn’t bear to see the Havens house sitting vacant when so many memories lived within the four walls.

She followed the bumpy dirt road, the car’s shocks squeaked and the bottom scraped. Much like the turmoil inside of her.

The tears rolled faster and she wiped them, but her sobs grew heavier. The ache throbbing through her body made her limbs weak.

She stared out of the window into the foggy darkness, struggling with the past and her chaotic life. Tucker had no clue that she’d broken up with Blaise. Would that have changed Tucker’s mind about the house?

He was a stubborn man who’d never back away from something, especially if it meant losing face.

Just when she thought things couldn’t get any worse…

Lightening lit the sky and rain came down in sheets, making visibility nearly impossible.

“Mother Nature, you picked a bad time to be pissed off,” she murmured.

Hope scrubbed her eyes and the burning turned to fuzziness. Reaching across the seat, she lowered the glove compartment door and shoved her fingers through the papers, knocking out items onto the floor. Where were all of the fast food napkins? Tissues? She finally found one shoved at the very bottom.

She dabbed her eyes at the same time a strong scent of baby powder burned her nostrils. Her deodorant had melted! “For heaven’s sake.”

Her eyes stung. Her sinuses ached.

Thunder cracked the sky followed by another bolt of lightning that struck a tree along the roadside, sending a large branch into the road. One-handed, and blinking eyes, she jerked the steering wheel, barely missing the obstacle.

Breathing a sigh of relief, she laid her palm against her chest, wishing her heart to slow.

And then a moving dark blob shot out in front of her. Deer! The first, a large buck, passed quickly but then came a second, a third and fourth. They stopped in the middle of the road, eyes wide in the headlights.

“Run! Move out of my way!” She gritted her teeth.

The deer stayed frozen. Hope slammed her foot onto the brake. Her tires skidded on the wet dirt, sliding, sending the tail of the car swerving to the right.

The next few seconds seemed to tick by in slow motion. The deer finally jumped out of her path, just missed being hit. The sky lit up with more lightning, twigs and branches pounded the roof of her car as it continued to glide sideways along the narrow road until hitting the ditch, front end first, with a loud thump.

Her head hit the steering wheel and a white light flashed before her eyes.

But she was alive.

Her head hurt. Bringing her fingers to her forehead, she felt wetness. In the lights from the dashboard, she could see red on her fingertips. Her adrenaline pumped, her heart raced and dizziness washed over her.

CHAPTER TWO

Tucker stood on the porch, watching the taillights of Hope’s car fading down the lane. His head still ached and he wanted to send his fist through one of the beams. He’d allowed his anger to get the best of him. Hope was right, they both carried scars from the past.

Seeing her had scratched all of the old wounds, poured poison into the raw abrasions.

Just when he thought he could move on, forget her, he had to face the demons again.

Hell, who was he kidding? He faced the demons of the past twenty-four-seven.

Thunder clapped and the rain started. The drops came down fast and heavy, making the red taillights appear blurry. His gut clenched. She was going down the hill slow, thankfully. He knew how treacherous the back roads could get in a downfall. The roads washed out when wet. He had his truck, built tough to handle bad weather, but he wasn’t sure about her car.

She made it to the hill and her lights disappeared.  He turned toward the door, ready to drown his emotions with a hot shower, when he heard a crash of lightning in the trees and branches breaking. He shot around, staring into the night. Had he heard a loud bang?

A knot lodged in his throat and tingles raced down his spine.

Racing into the cabin, he practically ripped his keys off the hook and tore out to his truck. His adrenaline spiked and his breaths sounded loud in his ears as he sped out of the driveway like a racer out of the pits. The big tires spit mud everywhere, splattering it up over the roof and onto the windows, until finally catching tread. He dug his boot into the gas pedal and paid no mind to the warning blaring in his head that the rain still came down hard and he could end up sending his truck over the wrong side of the hill.