Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 114263 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 571(@200wpm)___ 457(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114263 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 571(@200wpm)___ 457(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
That’s support I could really, really use right now. I may be twenty-six years old, but in this moment, I feel all of fourteen, awkward and lost and bursting with emotions I can’t process and don’t understand.
I feel myself tilting into a death spiral of regret and grief. My eyes burn. I can barely breathe around the moon in my throat.
I am in a room full of people who had a closer relationship with my father than I did. And none of them are even related to him.
It makes me feel like absolute shit.
But just as I’m about to actually burst into tears, the back door opens. Sunlight floods the kitchen as a man steps inside, sweeping his sweat-stained hat off his head.
“Ooooo-eeee, don’t that smell good! Y’all got no idea the hurt I’m ’bout to put on this food. Sally, don’t tell me you made your buttercream frosting for those brownies.”
Sally rolls her eyes, but she’s grinning. “Wyatt, you smell atrocious.”
“Eau de horse.” He waves his scent toward her.
She flaps her hand in front of her nose. “More like BO.”
“You’re welcome to hose me down out back.” He holds out his arms and smirks. “You can undress me and everything.”
“Let me get my rubber gloves,” Sally deadpans.
The man coming in the door behind Wyatt roars with laughter. “Dang, Sally, we missed having you around. Someone needs to kick this kid’s—”
“Children are present,” Sawyer warns, covering Ella’s ears with his hands.
“Sally recently graduated from a veterinary residency,” Goody explains. “She’s been shadowing her dad ever since while she decides what she’d like to do with her degrees long-term. That’s Duke.” She points to the other man. “He’s Sawyer’s younger brother.”
“Ah,” I say, staring at the door as one cowboy after the next wipes his boots on the mat outside before entering the kitchen.
Each one takes off his hat, hair soaked through with sweat. Their faces and hands are deeply tanned, making their blue eyes pop even more.
The men are alarmingly dirty and even more alarmingly handsome, despite the sweat and the dust and the, er, outdoorsy smell that rises off them.
My heart pounds. How many Rivers boys were there? Four? Twelve?
And when is Cash going to walk through that door? Is he going to walk through it? What do I say to him? So far, everyone’s been exceptionally kind to me. I don’t want to break the spell. But I also don’t want to give him any kind of advantage by playing nice.
The last cowboy to enter the kitchen is the tallest. He’s wearing a T-shirt of indeterminate color that’s dotted with sweat. It’s not soaked through, so I get the impression he must’ve changed before coming to lunch. But the shirt still clings to his chest and his stomach, revealing a thickly muscled torso.
His jeans—those cling to him too. Add in the cowboy boots and the wide leather belt and the way he holds his hat to his chest—
“Cash!” Ella shouts with delight, holding up her arms. “Ella hold you!”
I watch, head spinning, as Cash aims a wide white smile at the little girl before dropping his hat on the table, crown up, and scooping her into his arms. “Ellie belly boo, I missed you! How was school?”
What in the world? I wonder if Cash has a twin brother. One who has the same name. Because this guy? The one cooing to his niece while he smiles at her like an idiot?
This cannot possibly be the same asshole cowboy I met in Goody’s office last week.
“Ella loves school,” the little girl replies.
Sawyer grabs a cup from across the table and takes a sip of water. “Probably because she’s the teacher’s pet.”
Cash puts her on his hip, arm slung easily underneath her bottom like he’s done this hundreds, thousands of times. “How could she not be? You’re the smartest and the cutest kid in the class, aren’t you?” He tickles her tummy. “Aren’t you, Ella?”
She giggles, a high, happy sound that’s so sweet, I can’t help but smile, even as I continue to stare.
That’s when Cash looks up, and our gazes lock.
My stomach bottoms out. His smile fades, his eyes taking on a hard glint. They flick down my body. Back up. His jaw tics, as if he doesn’t like what he sees.
I blush so furiously, I can feel it all the way in the soles of my feet. Still, I look him square in the eye. Screw him for making me feel off-kilter. Embarrassed, even. He’s the one who should be embarrassed with his sweaty shirt and stupid beard-mustache thing.
Goody smiles at him. “You remember Mollie, Cash?”
“How could I forget?” He says it like a joke. Like I’m a joke. “Hello, City Girl.”
CHAPTER 7
Cash
GIDDYUP
Not gonna lie, my heart skips a beat at the fire that ignites in Mollie’s brown eyes at the insult.