Chapter Fifteen

“Forget all about little old me?” Piper pouted.

“What?” I asked.

She ignored me. “You flirt with that girl but you don’t really want her. You want me.”

“Get the fuck out of here, Piper!” I demanded, descending the villa stairs.

She smiled at me, but it wasn’t a beautiful smile, it was chilling. “Lost all your winnings,” she giggled, digging in the blade.

My blood ran cold in my veins and I stopped at the bottom of the stairs. “Yes, you bitch, thanks to you, it’s all gone.”

She laughed, throwing her head back. “How are you going to leave him now?”

“Joke’s on you. I already did.”

She shook her head. “My darling, you only think you did.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You have to share what you have with your sister. You don’t have enough now. You’ll go back to him because you know he’ll take you back even after what you did, and he’ll take you back because he can’t trust anyone else. You need him. You need what he has to get you what you need.”

“Shut up.”

“He’s your dealer!” she squealed.

“No, we’ll be okay,” I desperately denied. “I don’t need him anymore,” I cooed, an attempt to appease myself.

“Liar,” she sang, bobbing her head back and forth as if she was insane before tossing herself onto the sofa.

I walked past her and into the kitchen. She popped up off the couch, ran over to me and lifted herself up onto the counter beside where I stood.

I studied her. “Why are you even here?”

“I’m Piper,” she said, as if that explained everything.

“Get out of here,” I demanded, but she didn’t move.

I ignored her and opened my laptop on the coffee table, logging into my account. I could feel the pent-up pressure release from my chest as I read the balance. So close, I thought.

“Yet so far,” she needled, giggling a little at the end.

My alarm clock went off at four thirty in the morning and I woke startled, confused and more than a little creeped out by my dream. I looked around and had forgotten where I was. My surroundings were nearly pitch black.

“Stupid alarm,” Bridge whispered, her voice broken from sleep.

Dear God. Trailer. Bridge. Pregnant. Cattle. Ranch…Cricket.

It all came rushing to me in that instant, overwhelming me but the last image, the image of Cricket’s smiling face, made me chill. I smiled to myself. I want her.

Bridge turned on the light and the smile fell. I threw the covers over my face and groaned.

“Four thirty a.m. was invented by God to vex me.”

“And me,” Bridge chimed in.

“I guess it’s no more than we deserve,” I laughed.

“Speak for yourself,” she said before closing the bathroom door. I heard her vomiting on the other side.

I forced myself to get up and brushed my teeth at the kitchen sink, looking out into the drive. It was pitch black. The only light was from the window I sat at, and that only extended a few feet.

Bridge emerged and laid back down, moaning. I passed her, quickly smoothing her hair out of her face, then headed to the bathroom to shower. While I was in there the night before, I discovered I had only about three different positions I could make to wash myself. I had to angle my head to rinse my hair. It was a bitch.

I rummaged through my stuff the night before and found that I didn’t have anything to wear that wouldn’t be scrutinized by Cricket, so I picked my oldest pair of jeans, a thermal and a button-up. I donned the boots I’d worn the day before.

I opened the door, passing the afterbirth-covered clothes I’d worn and thrown on the ground. As I mourned their loss, I was interrupted by a four-wheeler’s lights meandering down the snow-covered dirt drive. My hand immediately shot up to protect my eyes from their brightness, so stark against the black morning. The vehicle came to a stop and the lights were switched off. It was Jonah.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“Uh, yeah,” he said, avoiding eye contact. “I just thought Bridget would like a ride up to the main house.”

“That was nice of you,” I said, taking in Jonah.

“Yeah, well, I figured she wouldn’t want to walk through the cold and snow in her condition.”

I opened the door and leaned in, keeping Jonah outside. “Bridge, are you decent?”

“Yeah, I’m dressed. Why? What’s up?” she asked, edging her way down the narrow center hallway, only looking a little green.

“Jonah Hunt is here to give you a ride up to the main house.”

She bit her lower lip. “Oh, that was kind.”

I let the door shut behind me. “It was, wasn’t it?”

“Hush, Spence.”

She edged past me and opened the door for Jonah. “Come in,” she invited. Jonah climbed inside. “That was nice of you,” she told him.

The idiot smiled a shit-eating grin and removed his cap from his head. I waited for the “aw, shucks,” but it never came.

“Just let me grab my coat and I’ll be right with you.”

Jonah and I stood in absolute silence.

“Ready,” she said, wrapping her scarf and putting on her beanie.

I watched her climb on the back of the four-wheeler and wrap her hands around his torso.

Yup, gonna need to nip that in the bud, I thought. Jonah slowly edged them out onto the snow-filled road and drove up toward the house at a snail’s pace. At least he’s being careful with her.

I shut off all the lights and applied layer after layer of clothing, knowing how freaking cold I’d be getting as the morning wore on. Luckily, I was in a little better shape than Bridge was, attending a college in Rhode Island. I had two pairs of wool socks on, and my boots felt tight as shit, but that was it as far as double coverage. Everything else I improvised.

I started toward the barn and was grateful that the wind was still. About halfway up the drive, my heart began to beat an irregular rhythm as I caught sight of Cricket coming toward me. My breath caught in my throat. This girl. This tiny little girl had such incredible power over me with her big, blue, round, sad eyes. Her unusual face, her unusually striking face. Her pert nose. The faint laugh lines around her eyes and mouth. And I didn’t know her, didn’t really even know if she and I were anything alike, but that didn’t stop me from wishing we shared a future...even if she did belong to someone else.

“What are you doing in my neck of the woods?” I asked her.

“Just wanted to make sure you found your way all right. Jonah told me he was getting Bridget this morning. Thought it’d be rude if we didn’t also help you out a little,” she joshed.

“Sure you just didn’t want to see me?”

She rolled her eyes. “This blatant flirting? You know you’re courting Ethan’s wrath again, right?”

This made me smile. “Am I getting you in trouble, little lady?”

“No, but—” she began, but I cut her off by grabbing her upper arm, stunned, truly stunned for the first time in my life.

“Holy shit! Are you wearing chaps?” I asked, pulling her away from me so I could get a good look.

“Excuse me?” she asked, looking at me like I was crazy again.

“You are. You are wearing chaps.” My stomach dropped to my feet. God, she’s sexy as hell. “Turn around for me,” I teased.

“Excuse me!” Is she mad? “What is wrong with you!” she yelled, yanking her arm away. Yeah, she’s mad.

“I just-I’ve never seen a girl in chaps before,” I said, staring, a hand involuntarily ran the length of my face. I clamped my lips to prevent drool.

She haughtily brought her fists to her hips. “Listen, you’re here to work not to flirt.”

“I can’t work and flirt?”

“Of course not, you’re here to—”

“I’m pretty sure I can do both. I’ve tried it before. I was very successful.”

“Stop it. You’re—”

“And you look delectable in those, if I say so myself. I wonder if I could get you to wear those at all times,” I mused.

“No! I-I...ugh!” Click.

“Are you flustered?”

“I’m getting Ethan.”

“You are flustered. I fluster you. Huh, quite a change of pace since yesterday.” She huffed ahead of me, her glorious backside facing me, rushing toward the barn. “Beautiful!” I said, stopping to appreciate it. “Now was that so hard?”

She immediately covered her ass with her hands and turned around, her eyes narrowed at me. She began to walk sideways like a crab, and I burst out laughing.

When I finally entered the horse barn, Cricket was plastered to Ethan’s side listening to Jonah. I jogged over to them.

“...her,” was the only thing I caught of whatever Jonah was saying. The group went silent. Bridge. Bridge was their topic of conversation. Damn.

“Hey, guys,” I said.

Ethan nodded but seemed civil. Cricket didn’t tattle as she’d threatened. I couldn’t have cared less, but I found that interesting. I discreetly winked at her and her eyes shot wide before narrowing in promises of lethal force.

Jonah said, “Hey, Spencer! You’re with me right now. We’ll take this half of the stalls, and Ethan and Cricket will take the other side.”

Damn. “Cool.”

“So what’s on the docket today?” I asked him, taking in my surroundings.

The barn was about fifteen-feet high, and had approximately ten horse stalls running half the back length of the barn on either sides, creating twenty stalls in all. The front half was a giant open space, though I wasn’t sure what it was for. I could see from the road the day before that the horse barn was the biggest building on the property, and it was obvious once I was inside that was the case. I took in all the rustic wood surrounding us and couldn’t imagine how many man-hours it must have taken to forge each log and plank.

The horse stalls themselves were made of wood as well. Their doors easily slid away on tracks from the opening. Each stall had swinging doors leading to the outside as well, but I could tell those were hardly used, at least not in the winter.

“We’re going to be mucking out the horse stalls,” Jonah explained. “We do this about once a day, unless the horses have been kept inside for some reason, then we’ll hit them twice.” He walked toward a wall, picked up two pitchforks and handed one to me. I followed him into the nearest stall. “Okay, so you’ll want to wedge the fork underneath the pile of manure. With the fork low to the ground, tightly shimmy it back and forth, freeing any loose pine pellet bedding. We do this so the manure doesn’t break up and we save clean bedding.”

Together we cleaned the stall in around five minutes, moving to the next with the wheelbarrow, tying up or “racking up” the horse outside the stall, then returning the horse, dropping a new bale of hay, and filling its three-pound feed bucket with grains. We went from one stall to the next and the next until all ten stalls on our side were done. We didn’t talk much but fell into an easy rhythm. In about forty-five minutes, our stalls were clean and our horses fed. I’d never worked like that with someone, and it felt like I’d actually accomplished something.