Laughing at him, I shake my head. “Did all these women ever find out about each other?”
His eyebrows pull together, and he tilts his head. “Look who you’re talking to? I was so charming they weren’t even mad at me when I stopped seeing them.”
I roll my eyes. “Showoff.”
“Then suddenly, my life was full of music and laughter and a woman with eyes almost as black as coal. It was the most beautiful of times with the most beautiful woman I could ever imagine.” His gaze comes back to the present. “Then one day, when I thought nothing could cast a shadow on the happiness I was feeling, she told me her orchestra would be going on tour with her as the solo cellist. It was her dream, and she was about to leave me.”
He leans back and crosses his arms. “I gave it all up for her.”
Sitting up, entranced by a part of the story I’ve never heard before, I link my hands in front of me. “Why haven’t I heard this story before?”
“To bring it up would only make her think I still thought of it, and I never wanted her to think I had any regrets. I wrapped my life around her, taking what I could get at whatever university would take me. Nothing else mattered, and I would have never let her think differently.”
Tilting my head, I cock my eyebrow up. “Dad, I know this is supposed to be relevant to my situation somehow, but I’m not sure how leaving my job would be helpful.”
With a sigh, he says, “No wonder you’re here. I’d hoped some of my innate persuasion with the fairer sex would have passed on to you.” He tips his glass back and finishes his drink off before setting the glass on the table. “I blame it on the military influence.”
“Dad, the last thing I want to think about is your innate persuasiveness with the fairer sex.” I shake my head with a chuckle and take a drink of the ice water in front of me.
“Son, what I’m about to tell you is the best advice you’re ever going to hear, most men never understand it. A woman must feel safe with a man to be truly happy. She must know that the man who tells her he loves her holds her dreams,feelings, safety, and happiness closer to his heart than he holds his own.” He points his finger at me. “If you make her feel that, you’ll have the happiest woman in the world, and you’ll be in bloody heaven.”
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I squeeze my eyes closed. “Dad, she’s a witness to a crime, if I act on my emotions and we get caught, she loses my protection, our testimony against the criminals I’ve been trying to catch will be inadmissible, and I could lose my position and credibility.”
He leans forward and sets his elbows on his knees with a chuckle. “Then don’t get caught, my boy.” He says it like it’s the easiest thing in the world and shrugs his shoulder, his eyes sparkling. Lifting his hand, he holds his finger up and shakes it at me. “Keep in mind that a strong woman who knows what she wants is not easily won back, especially if you wait too long.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
KINLEY
I DON’Texpect him to call. I’ve been telling myself since yesterday that I shouldn’t even hope for it. But Ihavebeen hoping, ever since Mason pulled away from his house with my stuff in the back of his truck.
So, I do what I always do when I want to forget - I blaze up and put a fresh canvas on my easel.
Today felt like a charcoal day, so now my fingers, and part of my leg where I habitually tap my finger when I step back to check my progress, are different shades of black and gray and I’m looking at the devastatingly handsome face of the man I want to forget, perfectly sketched on my canvas.
Damn it.
What a waste of a perfectly good canvas.
Grabbing my journal, blunt, and my lighter, I go out to the deck on the side of the cabin and listen to the water runover the rocks and through the grass on the edge of the narrow bank.
The cabin was initially built for the ranch foreman, who used to live on the ranch. For almost twenty years, Dad hid a Native American man who had several warrants out for his arrest. I never knew what his warrants were for, but Dad always said they were ‘bullshit’.
He built the deck on the cabin close to the water because he said it soothed him, and sometimes I could hear him singing the saddest chants at night. He always said the land was blessed by the spirits and being close to the water brought him closer to them.
His wife had died in childbirth on the reservation, and he and his son, Mato, lived here for most of my childhood, so we just kind of accepted him as a sort-of brother.
Plopping down in the lounger, next to the firepit on the deck, in my tank top and shorts, I pull my knees up as I light my blunt and inhale the earthy flavored smoke.
Opening the spiral journal on my legs, I write a letter to Mom. I usually write her a letter a week, but I didn’t last week because I was at Rhys’ house, so I start with an apology.
Then I tell her everything. All the feelings and insecurities I’ve felt the past week and a half are scribbled onto the blank pages. Some people say that after a person dies, they forget the sound of their voice, but I can still hear Mom’s voice in my head. Most of the time, it’s just me telling myself what I want to hear in her voice, but I can hear her just the same.
“You’ve been quiet since you got back yesterday.” Marley’s voice is behind me by the deck stairs.
Without stopping, I finish scribbling my thought on the page before I answer her. “I’m always quiet, why is today any different?”
All my siblings know I write to Mom and burn the letters every week. Even Sloane started doing it after I almost set mycabin on fire a couple of years ago, and she helped me put the flames out. Both of her parents died in a car accident when she was in college.
