Slow Burn Cowboy

“It’s a real thing,” she said, immediately wanting to brain herself.

“I don’t doubt you. Maybe you should put them in your subscription box.”

She took a step back, up onto the next step. “They aren’t a local thing. I mean, this is a pretty volcanic region, so I imagine you could probably... But, they aren’t specific to Copper Ridge. Which is kind of the whole idea.”

“Right,” he said. “I’ll see you later, Lane. Thanks for the swim. I needed it.”

“Sure. Anytime,” she said, taking another step away from him. “Later.”

He turned away from her and walked to the truck, and she wasted no time scampering back into the house and closing the door behind her. She leaned back against it, pressing her hand to her chest, waiting for her heart rate to go back to normal.

She made her way back toward the kitchen, the silence of the house settling around her. It didn’t feel like a refuge right now. It just felt like a big echo chamber of every stupid thing that had gone on in the past hour.

She heaved out a long, vocal breath, going to the fridge to retrieve her berries. Then she stopped and swore. She caught sight of the calendar that was hanging there, and the girl’s night she had written down on it. Unlike their casual catch-up dinner the other night, this was their official monthly let’s-never-let-life-get-too-busy-for-friends night.

They were all supposed to go to The Grind tonight for their Main Street get-together. She, Alison, Cassie and Rebecca all owned businesses on Copper Ridge’s Main Street and as female business owners they had all bonded pretty quickly.

Usually, she didn’t take a day off on girl’s night, but everything was all jumbled up in her head so her decision-making had suffered.

She could skip tonight. She could legitimately stay home with a pumice stone.

But no, that was a bad idea. If she stayed home alone there would be nothing in the house with her except the memories of today’s events, which she would undoubtedly play on an endless loop, combined with that loose thread. Which she would pull out endlessly until she had finished the damage external events had already started.

She didn’t want to sit at home alone. She didn’t want to feel sad. She didn’t want to feel regret. She didn’t want to feel at all.

So, the alternative was going out. And that was exactly what she was going to do.

CHAPTER EIGHT (#udbd83345-e894-5bdf-8835-3bfa8ab29052)

SHE WAS EXCEEDINGLY grateful that she had decided to come into town. Spending time with a group of friends was precisely what she needed to lift the dark cloud that had fallen over her lately. She was being overdramatic. About everything.

Spending time listening to other people talk about their lives had given her some much-needed perspective.

Maybe the real issue was that she was working too much. Not that she needed to work harder. She needed to do something to get out of her head, most likely.

“I know he’s going to propose,” Rebecca said, talking about her boyfriend, Gage.

“That’s great!” Lane said.

“How do you know?” Alison asked, folding her arms and leaning forward on the table.

“You just do,” Cassie said pragmatically.

Cassie had been happily married to her husband, Jake, for a little over three years, and of the group, was definitely the expert on relationships.

“Well, that and he’s terrible at keeping secrets,” Rebecca said. “He left a receipt for the ring in his pants pocket, which I found...”

“When you were doing laundry?” Alison asked.

“No,” she said, “when I was going through his pants pockets.”

Lane snorted. “Well, then that wasn’t too indiscreet of him.”

Rebecca shrugged. “He had better never have an affair. He leaves too clear a paper trail.”

“You’re not actually worried about anything like that, are you?” Cassie asked.

Rebecca shook her head. “No. And I was kidding about going through his pockets. I trust Gage.”

She said it so easily, so matter-of-factly. As if there was nothing huge or concerning about a statement like that. About trusting another human being so completely.

Lane didn’t even trust herself.

But, instead of pondering that any deeper, she smiled a little wider. “Are you going to say yes?” she asked. She already knew the answer, but she was enjoying the conversation.

“I might make him suffer a little bit,” Rebecca said, a smile playing with the edges of her mouth. “But there’s no one else for me. He knows that. And I think... I think there’s no one else for him. It’s kind of an amazing feeling. To find the person that just fits with you. I didn’t think that person existed for me.”

Cassie was smiling and nodding in a knowing fashion.

Lane shared a glance with Alison. She knew their thoughts on the subject of romance were similar. Although Lane had never known Alison to date at all.

Ever since her marriage had ended in divorce, her abusive husband driven out of town, Alison had sworn off the male species.

Lane couldn’t really blame her. She had certainly suffered her own brand of pain at the hands of a man. But it wasn’t like what Alison had been through. Lane couldn’t even imagine. To love someone, to marry them and to have them betray you like that. To have them turn into this whole different monster.

It was nice that Rebecca had someone now. It was nice that Cassie had someone. But sometimes Lane wondered if she and Alison had just been wounded too deeply to ever take that kind of chance again.

Oh, Lane dated. Casually. She liked men. But she liked them in their own space, and not in hers. She liked them to fill a manageable portion of her life. To fulfill a physical need and that vague emotional craving for romance that she sometimes got, particularly around Valentine’s Day or the holidays.

Someone to go to parties with. Someone to go out to dinner with. Someone who might bring her flowers and tell her she was pretty. To kiss her and make her feel good.

She’d had boyfriends since leaving Massachusetts. Some of them had even lasted quite a while. But they had never been serious. Not in the sense of her imagining they would become anything long-term.

The very idea of a husband, of children, made her feel sick inside.

It was a future she couldn’t have.

A future she didn’t deserve.

Without permission, a vision of Cord McCaffrey and his family flitted in front of her mind’s eye. His beautiful wife, his two darling children.

Her throat tightened, bile rising in it. Why did it hurt so much? Why did it still hurt so damn much?

Or rather, why did it hurt again after so many years of lying dormant? It was his fault. For being in the public eye like this. For bringing it all up again.

“Well,” Alison said, too brightly. Lane figured she had been traveling down her own dark road just then. “Congratulations, Rebecca. I can’t wait for you to officially accept his proposal.”

“Me either,” Rebecca said. “I would never have thought... Well, I would never have thought that I would get married. Not in a million years. And I really never thought that I would marry him. For obvious reasons.”