Page 6 of Forsaken Hearts
He didn’t move either. Time stretched on, and she knew exhaustion of such a long day was about to win. When she felt him draw the covers over her, her mind decided to make a return.
She caught his wrist before he could pull away. In the moonlight, his eyes glistened dark blue, but she knew they were much closer to the cool color of the sea.
Her throat closed, but she forced the words out anyway. “You know this can never happen again.”
He stared into her eyes. “We’ve been saying that for a while.” He brushed a caress up her arm, light and fleeting. It almost undid the decision she’d made when he walked into the Stockyard tonight, in jeans and a Black Heart Ranch T-shirt, that Stetson riding low and looking so hot that every woman in the place started panting.
Her included.
She pushed into a sitting position, pulling the blanket over her bare breasts. “I’ve been thinking.”
He went still, body more rigid than when he saw Granny’s gun aimed at him.
She hated that she had to say the words.
“I realized recently that I have nothing to give. And you have nothing to give either.”
Damn. It hurt more than she expected, but she knew this road was headed to a dead end. She had to stop now because she wasn’t winding up at another dead end.
He didn’t argue or push for more.
He just got up.
That was worse.
Her chest grew hot and tight and would have made words impossible if she had anything left to say.
He pulled on his clothes and didn’t stop to look back at her as he walked out of the room.
In the front of the house, she heard the front door open and close.
She sat there in the dark, the blanket tight around her, her body still warm from her lover’s touch and her chest aching in a way she couldn’t ignore.
She’d made the right call. Did what she had to.
But it didn’t stop her from wishing.
Chapter Two
Pope hadn’t slept well in so long that he stopped setting an alarm to wake up for sunrise yoga on the Black Heart Ranch. He’d spent the first week convincing himself he needed more physical activity to tire himself out. So he threw himself into work.
He loved training the horses. It was one of the few therapy sessions he didn’t have to force himself through, and spending more time in the fields and barn wasn’t a hardship.
But two months in, he realized his insomnia had nothing to do with boredom and everything to do with the woman who told him it was over.
He cut across the ranch from the barn with his fists shoved in his coat pockets, the cold morning air biting through the lingering exhaustion that sat heavy behind his eyes. Frost still clung to the fence rails and patches of grass the sun hadn’t reached yet, the mountains beyond the ranch slicing into a pale Wyoming sky.
Construction noises carried across the property before he ever reached the therapy lodge. The ranch had been one long project for months now. Heavy equipment and contractor vehicles were parked everywhere, with crews coming and going from daylight to dusk. The yard was still more mud than grass, but they were finally hitting the final stages.
The new wing of the therapy lodge had morphed from a frame of lumber and scaffolding into a solid structure that would house more veterans who needed a place to land after spending too long pretending they didn’t.
That was the point of the Black Heart—and Pope would always be grateful he’d found his place here. He just wished to hell he could find the kind of restful, dreamless sleep he did before he became a SEAL.
On another section of the ranch, a new military training facility had turned an isolated plot into a place for operators to train in mountain warfare. He’d ridden up there a time or two with Crew, a buddy of his who graduated from the therapy program and became a trainer at the facility.
Then there was Willow Malone’s house on the rise overlooking the ranch. Construction on it had been completed last fall and as he turned his head that direction, he made out the dark roofline and the windows reflecting the morning light.
Willow and Decker—Dutch to everyone else—had already promised a huge party once spring came, complete with bonfires, drinks, music and enough food to feed half the damn county. Everyone was invited.
