Page 114 of Risking it for the Cowboy

Fuck. His lips trembled to say it. He chewed his cheek, petting back her hair as if to buy time to find the right words.

“Your girls want their man to know he’s worth it too,” she whispered in the face of his silence, as she twisted a clump of his hair around her finger.

His heart might thunder out of his chest and yet, the feeling, so sublime…

She reached out, fumbling for something, as he pressed his lips to hers. He kept petting back her hair, warm in this moment, his chest expanding with the thought of a woman loving him in return, when she held up a wad of cash in front of him.

Chapter Thirty-Five

“Why won’t you keep this?” she asked.

He hitched up a grin and rolled to the side, slipping an arm beneath her neck to roll her with him. Saved by a diversion. She’d found it.

He curled his arm around her to hold her.

She dropped the bills onto his pec, but when he ignored them, he noticed a dark furrow crinkle her brow as she tightened her embrace on him and tangled her legs with his. She looked away.

“Hey,” he said, tilting her face toward him, touching his lips to her cheek, to her jaw.

She said nothing. He inspected her gaze.

“You’ve done so much for us.”

“Shh—”

“I can’t even get you to take what you’re owed for fixing up my car when you didn’t owe me anything after the way I treated you that morning.”

“Baby,” he whispered, caressing her cheek to quell her. His fingers tangled in the ends of her hair, tilting her head for him. “You were scared that morning.” His own darkness began to seep through the cracks again, because he’d been determined coming here that he’d fess up to his past, that he’d lay himself honestly in front of her and, instead, he’d let himself avoid the weight bearing down on his chest like a bad omen that nice things in life were too good for him. “That’s all you were, is scared—”

His phone buzzed. A blessing buying him more time. A curse for the same reason.

He stretched an arm down to the floor, fishing for his jeans. Tyler’s face showed up on the screen.

He swiped to answer, clearing his throat. “Yup.”

“I’ve got a promising development, man,” Tyler said through the cell. “Are you sittin’ down?”

Yeah, bare-assed and in a haze of post-loving mess.

T.R. put it on speaker. “Packing some bags. We could use promising news.”

“First, is Charlie somewhere safe?”

He squeezed his arm around her, still cupping her breast, and their gazes connected as she looked inquisitively at him.

She pushed upright, creaking the springs, her hair cascading over his shoulder.

“She’s right here, man. I got you on speaker.”

“Thank hell. Charlie, glad you’re okay. Thaddeus’s been beside himself.”

Her face softened as she looked down.

“I’ve got a complaint prepared to file to the state commission, but I need to ask you a few things, first, ’cause I still can’t pinpoint that smoking gun. Your police call tonight only demonstrates further that Jason is an increasing danger to you and Daze. You need to do two things, Charlie. Swear an affidavit to the court why your daughter was endangered, upon which I’ll file for temporary emergency sole custody. At which point, we’ll get an expedited hearing within the next two weeks.”

“Two weeks?” T.R. fumed. “Ty, please tell me he’s stuck in jail until this hearing.”

“He was arrested just last weekend for criminal vandalism and drunk and disorderly. Doesn’t getting arrested again violate a term of his bond?” Charlie asked.