Page 113 of Then You Happened
“Do you think I would sell her if that weren’t the exact case?”
He snorts and stares at me with a disappointment and disbelief that burns deep within. “You’re full of shit.”
If words could slap you, my face would be bright red.
“I am?” I shriek, feeling like every ounce of trust we’ve worked toward together fractures when he says those four words.
“You said things were tight but you had the insurance money to use. You have some foals coming to sell. You have this deal coming through if we can close this strong . . .” He scrubs a hand over his jaw. “Are you losing the ranch, Tate?”
“No.” The lone syllable is loaded with a desperation that I try to pass off as me being offended he even asked.
But the minute the word is out, I’m already ashamed of the lie. I’m already dreading how this whole conversation has gone. I’m already on the defensive.
“So, because times are tough, you’re just going to sell her? I mean, that’s the only thing that makes sense.” He snorts in disgust. “I never figured you for a quitter, Tate.”
While his words might be meant to motivate, they are actually incendiary. It’s the hurt that pushes me to retaliate. It’s the shame that chooses the words it uses. “And I never figured you for a bastard.”
“I should have fucking figured,” he mutters as we stare at each other, faces red and words we can’t take back floating into the air between us. Rather than dying in the tension like they should, they take root and dig deeper.
Jack stares at me, the muscles in his neck strained as his pulse beats frantically against his skin. He’s taking a step back figuratively, but I take one forward. I take all of the pent-up hurt and exhaustion and everything between that I told myself I’d never put up with again, and I hurl it at him.
I know later I’ll look back on it and realize that I’m in the wrong.
But in the moment, there’s nothing stopping me. In the moment, I see Jack but am consumed by the thought of selling Ruby and the shame of losing my house. I see the man I’m falling in love with but fear telling him every last detail.
Because telling him means letting him in completely. It means giving him my absolute trust and giving him the tools to ruin me if he wants to.
That fear owns me and uses my temper to protect me.
“Just because I let you slide between my legs every night doesn’t give you the right to make decisions for me or tell me how I should make mine.” It’s my turn to shock him with words. The double take of his head says as much. “How do you think we’re getting by, Jack? How do you think I’m paying your salary and every other goddamn thing that has come up in the past few months?” I fight back the tears of frustration and only grow more mad when I lose and one slips down my cheek.
“Tate.”
“No. Don’t you touch me.” I yank my arm back. My emotions are on overload, and now that the dam has broken, there is no stopping it. “Fletcher took every-goddamn-thing I had. What was in my savings from my trust. My credit. My reputation. He maxed out a home equity line I thought had a zero balance. The draw of the bet and the adrenaline rush of winning was stronger than his love was for me. He gambled away everything we had, Jack, and I’ve been digging myself out of the hole since the day he died. Is that what you need to know? Does that explain why I need to sell Ruby?”
He stares at me, lips lax but eyes hard. The man is the perfect picture of compassion for me and utter rage for Fletcher as he reaches out to wipe a tear off my cheek with the back of his hand. I step away.
“Don’t,” he warns as I cross my arms over my chest, closing myself off to him physically as well as emotionally. I’m hurt and just want to be.
“Please, leave me alone.”
“Are you losing the ranch, Tate?” he asks again, and this time, my chin quivers in response. “Jesus fucking Christ!” He moves from one side of the room and then back as he processes. “You’re losing this place and you didn’t trust me enough to tell me? Talk about ironic. You throw words at me about sliding between your thighs . . . well, turn that around, will you? You let me sleep with you—make love to you—but you don’t trust me enough to tell me this place is being foreclosed on?” He stops as he passes in front of me and grabs my shoulders and shakes them. “I can’t help you if you don’t let me! I can’t make this work if you keep shutting me the fuck out!”
“That’s not what I was . . .” I shrug out of his grip and move across the room to abate the onslaught of emotions racing through me. Maybe if I move far enough, I can outrun some of the fear of letting him completely in. When I finally turn back around, my chest constricts at the sight of him standing there so obviously hurt that I didn’t trust him.
Trust.
My hands tremble as I draw in a breath. “The bank is processing the foreclosure papers on the ranch. I . . . I used the insurance money to pay off all the accounts and to keep them current, but that’s completely gone.”
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nbsp; “So, you took care of your accounts before taking care of you,” he murmurs, his voice calm and understanding and warm and everything I need, but my own shame coats it a different color so that I can’t see through it.
“It was the right thing to do . . . and—” I blow out a breath to combat the tears that burn in my eyes. “And I’m just barely keeping my head above water. I’m months late on the mortgage, but it’s a catch-twenty-two. I use the little income I’m getting to keep this place running so I can attract and contract with a client like Steely with the hopes of securing a steady revenue stream or pay the mortgage.” I can’t meet his eyes so I stare at my fingers twisting together in front of me.
“Tate.” He says my name and the broken way he says it screams that he’s disappointed in me.
“I’m sorry”—I hiccup over the word— “I just . . . I thought if people knew, if this town knew, then they’d make things even harder on me until they succeeded in pushing me out.”
