“If you need money?—”
She nearly dropped the muffin as her whole body tensed. “I don’t want your money, Beck. You’ve done enough for me already.”
A thousand memories flitted between us. Her sleeping in my bed on the nights her parents wouldn’t quit arguing. Me giving her my lunches at school when she had nothing more than a peanut butter sandwich. Us going to the pond to forget the world existed.
Life was simpler back then.
My lips rolled together. “Speaking of jobs.”Real smooth subject change—totally not obvious that discussing the past is difficult for me.“How long are you planning to stay in Bell Buckle?”
“Already sick of me?” she questioned, but the teasing lilt in her tone fell flat.
“I could never be sick of you, Park.”
As if she hadn’t used my nickname seconds prior, as if we hadn’t already been using them since the moment I walked into her hotel room, her expression saddened. Or maybe it was my brain screaming that she never should’ve left. ThatInever should’ve left.
“I’m not sure how long.” She bit the inside of her lip, tugging it past her teeth before adding, “Is that okay?”
“You can stay as long as you need to.” I grabbed my truck keys from the counter, palming them. “Do you have any appointments coming up?”
She shook her head. “I need to schedule them since I have to change doctors again.”
“Again?”
Her fingers continued aimlessly busying themselves on the muffin as she clarified, “Yeah. I’ve kind of still been moving around a ton. It’s not the most ideal situation for being pregnant, though. Plus, the bed in my trailer was hard as a rock.”
“I hope the one here isn’t too bad.”
Her lips twitched before she avoided my gaze again. “No. It’s perfect.”
Then it hit me, what she’d said. “What’d you do with the trailer? And Tex?” Tex was the horse she’d bought as a teen, and given he was young himself when she got him, I had to figure he was still alive.
A look of guilt shone bright as she gnawed on her lip again. “I had to sell both.”
“What?” The shock in my question was evident as my voice grew slightly louder.
Her eyes snapped to mine. “I needed the money, and I knew I couldn’t stay in that trailer with a baby. Let alone give Tex a fair life.”
“Where the hell is he?” That horse had been everything to her, and in turn, he was everything to me.
“A ranch in Montana. I know the people. He’s okay.”
I didn’t so much as blink when I said, “Call them.”
She narrowed her eyes on me, confused now. “I can’t just call them, Beckham. They own him now.”
“How much?”
“How much what?”
“How much did you sell him for?”
“Three grand.”
The sigh that left me was heavy. I mentally started totalling how many shifts I’d have to work to cover the cost of getting Tex back. Then I remembered my winnings I’d set aside from rodeo.
Parker must’ve sensed what I was about to offer, because her eyes turned to slits. “No.”
“Parker.”
