I felt sick. After finishing my wine, I stood up and managed a small, probably watery smile. “I think I need to get some air. I’m not used to drinking this early. Thank you for breakfast, Claira.”
She lifted her glass to me in response. “Any time, honey.”
As I practically stumbled out her back door, I saw her sink down at the kitchen table, a faraway look on her face and her glass clutched in her hand. The heat hit me like a wall when I stepped outside, but it wasn’t enough to burn off the knot of anger tightening in my chest.
I walked and walked, rage building with each step until it was blooming beneath my skin, ugly, hot, and protective.How could someone do that to him? How could she take all that good, all that softness he hid, and twist it until it broke?
Unintentionally winding up at the stables, I felt like I was going to explode if I didn’t move, so when I saw the tack room unlocked, one of the gentler geldings already saddled from earlier chores, I didn’t even think.
I just went for him, grabbing the reins with trembling fingers, my chest so tight it was like the air itself resented me. I led him out of the stall, whispering apologies I didn’t even know were for him, Trent, or myself.
“Charlotte.” Trent’s voice cracked through the barn like a whip. “Horse theft is still a hanging offense in Texas.”
My whole body went rigid, but I turned slowly. Trent stood in the aisle with his hat in his hand, damp with sweat from work, but his eyes were laser focused on me. I knew what he must be looking at, that my face was probably flushed and contorted with the rage pounding through my veins.
“What are you doing?” he asked slowly. “And what’s wrong?”
Everything. Everything is wrong.My voice wouldn’t come out, though.
He stepped closer, a lot gentler this time. “Charlotte? I was kidding about the hanging. I mean, it’s a real law, but I know you’re not stealing Chili Pepper.”
For some reason, maybe because I knew what he’d survived or because I’d been walking a tightrope of feelings I didn’t understand, I snapped.
“I’m furious, that’s what’s wrong!” I exploded, the words ripping out of me before I could stop them. “Absolutely livid.”
“Livid?” Those blue eyes widened a fraction. “At who?”
“You!” I hurled the word at him like it might land and shatter on the floor. “I’m mad atyou, Trent.”
He stared at me like I’d spoken a language he didn’t understand, his chest rising and falling a little faster and his jaw tightening, but he didn’t yell back and he didn’t interrupt. Somehow, that just made me angrier.
Every moment we’d shared burned with white-hot meaning after I’d found out what had happened in his past, but maybe it was just me. Savannah had broken his heart once upon a time, and for minute there, I’d hoped the damage hadn’t been irreparable.
But now, as he stared at me with those blue eyes blazing and his hands sliding into the pockets of his dusty jeans, I had to wonder. Was all the chemistry between us nothing more than a figment of my imagination? Was he even capable of feeling anything for a woman anymore, and if he was, was that woman still Savannah? Did he still love her and did anybody else even stand a chance?
Right now, I honestly didn’t even know, but I was determined to find out.
CHAPTER 20
TRENT
For a woman who hadn’t even seen me this morning, she sure was furious at me, yelling at full volume. Full of fire, and I really didn’t hate looking at her while she did it.
Charlotte Westwood could turn heads in her oversized pajamas without even brushing her hair, but like this, in jeans and a fitted black T-shirt with her dark hair loose and wild and her eyes burning like the hottest of flames, she was fucking stunning.
It took me an embarrassingly long second to realize the flush in her cheeks wasn’t just fury. She was drunk. Or at least buzzed. At eleven in the damn morning.
All while yelling at me like I’d personally set her life on fire. “…you keep pushing me away when all you have to do is talk to me, Trent! That’s it! Just talk to me! I don’t understand why it’s so impossible for you, why you make everything so difficult.”
“Charlotte.” I finally managed to cut in, but she barreled right over me, red-faced and trembling.
“And why didn’t you tell me?” she cried. “About Savannah? About the baby? Your marriage?—”
Realization hit like a hard kick to the ribs and I narrowed my eyes. “Have you been talking to my mom?”
Christ. Of course, she has. They had breakfast together.
I dragged a hand over my face. “How much wine did you drink this morning?”
