“Not in this lifetime, buddy.”
Jace went inside the house, brought out a couple more beers, and pulled over one of the rocking chairs. “Take a load off,” he told Danny, using his sheriff’s voice, which pretty much translated to “Sit your ass down.”
Danny hesitated at first, pacing in front of his car. But when the realization finally sunk in that this was his best—and only—option, he reluctantly climbed the stairs. “I would really rather say what I have to say to Gina herself.”
“We got that, Danny.”
Danny hadn’t registered even an iota of surprise that Sawyer had used his name.
Fucking famous people.
If he’d come to confess and apologize, it was best that it went through Sawyer. He would only beat Danny up. Gina would kill him.
Jace handed him one of the brews and motioned to the rocker. Danny kept looking around as if he’d driven to the ends of the earth and now it was about to swallow him whole. He had trouble getting the cap off his beer. Jace took the bottle from him, placed the edge of the cap on the top of the porch railing, held the neck, and slammed the bottle down until it popped off.
“Here you go.”
The Daltons weren’t anything if they weren’t hospitable.
Sawyer didn’t push. He’d learned from being a reporter that silence was the best way to get someone to talk. Long spells of quiet made people uncomfortable so much so that they filled the gaps by spilling their guts.
So the three of them just sat there for a while, staring off into the distance. It was a beautiful evening. Warm, but not hot. Jace had lit one of those bug candles from Charlie’s shop to keep the mosquitos away. The sun was still another few hours away from setting, leaving the sky a cloudless dark blue and the fields bathed in sunlight.
“You mind if I use your bathroom? The last time I stopped was Harris Ranch.”
“Sure,” Jace said. “Inside, through the hallway to the right.”
“You want me to take a walk?” Jace asked when Danny was gone.
“You can stick around. The asshole’s going to confess to making up the whole bullshit story about him and Gina as part of a warped plot to get back at his wife for divorcing him.”
“And you know this how?”
“I don’t for sure, but that’s what I suspect is going to happen. If he does, I’d like you to be here. You’ll make a good witness when my mom takes it public.”
Jace leaned back in his chair, propping his boots on the railing. “Then Gina will be able to go home…resume her life.” He looked at Sawyer and bobbed his chin. “You going to be okay with that?”
“Yep.”
“Liar.”
“Of the worse kind.”
Jace chuckled. “You try asking her to stay?”
“In a roundabout way.” He blew out a breath.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I told her she should open a restaurant on the ranch…be our anchor.”
Jace let out a whistle and shook his head. “That sounds like a business proposition to me. Real romantic, asshole.”
Sawyer didn’t bother coming clean with Jace about telling Gina that he was falling for her. Why belabor his humiliation? “She can’t be Gina DeRose in Dry Creek Ranch, Jace. Her life is in Los Angeles. Her life is being on television.”
“So? Your life is traveling to the ends of the earth and writing stories about it. If you want her bad enough, you make it work.”
“That’s the thing, Jace. She’s a one-woman rodeo.”
