Almost A Bride (Montana Born Brides) (14 page)

“
Tell me.” Whatever it was, Tara could handle it.

“
There’s a rumor going around that Simon and Paige are engaged.”

Tara set a hand on the cool metal of the washing machine.
Simon was marrying her. That was...unexpected.

“
Is she pregnant?”

“
Who knows?” Scarlett moved closer, reaching out to rub her arm. “Sorry. But I thought you might hear it someplace else, or he might say something today, and I wanted you to be prepared.”

“
No, it’s okay. I’m okay. It doesn’t make any difference to me.”

It really didn
’t. She’d made her peace with the mistake she’d almost made. Simon’s betrayal wasn’t any more or less palatable because he might end up married to a girl who was ten years his junior.

“
Good,” Scarlett said.

She told her sister about her day paddle boarding then, and Scarlett told her that Mitch was due to land the day after tomorrow, having escorted his mother home and sorted out his affairs in Australia so he could join Scarlett in Montana permanently.

“Any leads on a place for the two of you yet?” Tara asked.

Scarlett had been living with their mother since she returned from Australia, not an ideal situation when you were a newly-wed woman.

“I found a place yesterday, actually. Where’s your laptop?”
They were scrolling through the photographs on the local real estate website when a knock sounded. They both looked at the door, then each other.

“
It must be douchebag o’clock,” Scarlett said.

Tara smiled, reaching out to squeeze her sister
’s hand. It was good to have her here for this. Not something she would have necessarily said about her sister not so long ago. But Scarlett had changed—and maybe Tara had, too.

Taking a deep breath, she went to answer the door. Simon was standing on the other side, hands shoved into the pockets of his chinos, shoulders tense.

“We’ll wait out on the deck while you clear your stuff,” Tara said, not bothering with greetings.

She might be relieved that she wasn
’t going to marry this man, but that didn’t excuse his bad behavior.

“
I was hoping we could talk.”

Tara crossed her arms over her chest.
“About?”

“
I wanted to explain. About Paige.”

“
I’m really not that interested, to be honest.”

“
I love her. We’re going to move to Vegas, get married. Start over away from all of this.”

Tara sent a silent thanks to her sister for forewarning her.

“I’m sure it will be a lovely ceremony. Don’t forget the stuff in the garage.”

She turned way and Simon stepped forward, reaching out to try to stop her. She shot him a look and his hand fell to his side. Nice to know he
’d learned from last time.

“
I’m sorry, Tara. I never meant for any of this to happen. For the record, I loved you. I loved you a lot. But the moment Paige walked into my class room at the start of the year I knew I was in trouble. I can’t explain it better than that, I’m sorry.”

He looked so tortured, guilty and stressed that for a second she felt a little sorry for him. But only a second.

“You’re not the man I thought you were,” she said. “You lied. You abused the trust of a student. You betrayed me. I don’t know what you want me to say to you, but I’m not going to give you a free pass, Simon.”

“
I don’t want that. I know what I did was shitty and wrong.”

“
Good. Then we’re on the same page. Like I said, we’ll be on the deck if you need anything.”

Scarlett gave Simon a scathing head to toe before turning and leading the way to the deck. Tara actually had a smile on her face by the time they were outside in the early morning sunshine.

“You have to teach me how to do that sometime. I swear, I could hear his balls shriveling,” Tara said.

Scarlett looked at little startled by her laughter. Then she smiled, too.

“That’s my Medusa look. I use it on grabby employers. It’s all in the lip. You have to get a little curl in it, and look down your nose.”

By the time Simon had cleared the house of his things and rapped on the back door to let them know he was done, Tara had mastered the Medusa look. She was tempted to try it out on Simon, but her heart wasn
’t in it.

She was better off without him, in so many ways.

“Well. I guess this is it,” Simon said on the front porch.

“
Yep. I’ll send you your share of the security deposit sometime next week,” Tara said.

“
Keep it. It’s the least I owe you.”

“
I’ll send it ,” she said firmly.

He nodded, then glanced at the ground. His throat bobbed a couple of times, and when he looked back up at her his eyes were glassy with tears.
“I’m sorry. I’m going to miss you.”

She stared at him for a long moment. He really was an idiot. A messed up, foolish idiot who had made a lot of really dumb moves.

“I hope it works out for you,” she said. Otherwise all of this, all the ugliness and hurt and embarrassment would be for nothing.

He nodded, then turned and headed down the stairs.

Tara shut the door and leaned against it, waiting for him to go. She was aware of her sister watching her. Together they waited until the sound of Simon’s car had faded.

“
Well, that’s that, I guess,” Tara said, pushing away from the door.

Scarlett came and put her arms around her.
“You’re my hero. If ever this happens to me, if I can be one tenth as classy as you, I will be so proud of myself.”

Tara blinked away sudden tears. Not because she was sad about Simon, but because she knew she was lucky. She had good people around her. People who loved and cared about her.

They held each other tightly for a long beat, then eased apart.

“
Now, how do you feel about driving me over to The Wolves Den so I can collect my pickup?” Tara asked.

Reid spent the day working with his father in the orchard. His thoughts were on Tara almost the whole time, mulling over the things she
’d said to him and the time they’d spent together last night.

At four he went up to the apartment and pulled out his suit, checking to make sure he didn
’t need to get it dry-cleaned before his interview on Tuesday. It was fine, and he hung it with a fresh shirt, ready to be ironed the night before his departure—he’d already booked flights, and he planned to leave early Tuesday and get back late the same night.

He was aware of a heaviness within himself as he contemplated the whole process. The flight, the interview, all the jumping through flaming hoops that would be required of him.
Then he reminded himself that it was a great job, and an excellent opportunity. Three times the money he could make at Bozeman PD, and he’d be living in the vibrant, cosmopolitan city of Chicago.

He walked to the window and stood staring out at the orchard. Trees stretched into the distance in orderly lines, branches swaying in the wind.
He knew from his time out there today that the fruit was coming along nicely. Soon it would be harvest time and they’d be opening the orchard to the public.

His mother hadn
’t raised the prospect of selling to the Dearborns again, and he had no idea if she’d spoken to his father about it.

It
’s not just going to go away because you want it to.

He turned away from the view and headed for the bathroom, stripping his sweaty work clothes and stepping beneath the shower. He took the time to shave carefully, splashing on aftershave before pulling on his good jeans and a linen shirt he
’d bought in Rome.

He admitted to himself that he was nervous as he drove to Tara
’s place. He wasn’t sure why. He wanted to see her very badly. Wanted to hold her again. Touch her. Look into her eyes. He was also aware of the clock ticking. All modesty aside, he knew he had a good shot at the Chicago job. Which meant his time with Tara would be limited.

The moment he acknowledged the thought, he started coming up
with out clauses for himself. There was no reason, for example, why he couldn’t fly home a couple of times a month to see her and help his folks out. She might be willing to fly out to Chicago, too. She’d talked about wanting to travel more as they floated around Fairy Lake. Maybe they could manage a long distance thing for a while.

And then what?
a voice asked in the back of his head.

Long distance was only worth enduring if there was the prospect of an end in sight. And it was pretty well established that Tara was not about to uproot herself from Marietta.

She opened the door when she heard his car in the driveway, watching as he exited the truck. Her hair was up, and she’d put on a little makeup, making her eyes smoky and sexy and her mouth pink.

She looked good enough to eat.

“Hi,” she said. “How was your—”

He stole the rest of her words with a kiss, his arms wrapping around her, hands gravitating to her perky little ass.
She gave a murmur of approval as he backed her toward the doorway.

He had her top off by the time they
’d reached the couch, and seconds later her bra was off, too. Filling his hands with creamy smooth flesh, he tongued her nipples and relished the way she trembled in response. She started fumbling at his belt buckle, pushing her hands into his jeans. He broke from her briefly to push them all the way down, helping her do the same, then he set her on the arm of the couch and slid inside her. She wrapped her legs around him, kissing him avidly as he began to move.

“
You feel so good,” he whispered in her ear. “I want to do this forever.”

“
Yes.”

He reached between them to find the place she needed him the most, stroking her inside and out until she tightened around him, her knees gripping his hips. Only then did he let himself go, pleasure swamping him.

She pressed a kiss to his chest afterward, and he wondered if she could hear his still-pounding heart.

“
I guess it’s lucky my sister went home earlier, huh?” she said.

She
tilted her head to look up at him, her face full of laughter, and his chest got tight the way it had that morning when he’d looked into her eyes.

If he got the job, he was going to be walking away from this woman.

Good luck with that one.

The next three weeks were the most bittersweet of Tara
’s life. She spent the remaining week of her leave helping out with her mother, reorganizing the townhouse and spending time with Reid. He took her paddle-boarding again, this time to Ennis Lake, and they made love on the shore beneath the warm sun. By mutual consent they didn’t talk about his job interview much, apart from general details. Reid didn’t seem eager to hash it over, and she wasn’t sure she could maintain the pretense that she would be happy for him if he got it.

The night before she was due back on the job, they had a discussion about the potential weirdness of their work situation. They both agreed that there was nothing they could do but wing it and trust each other, as they always had.

Tara turned up the following morning feeling crazy nervous and very exposed, albeit in a very different way from the day after she’d found out about Simon. Her colleagues were pleased to see her, however, and there was nothing in Reid’s greeting or demeanor to let on that she was anything more to him than his patrol partner.

She did her best to hold up her end of the deal, even though it was hard when she was so vitally aware of everything about him. The sheen of his hair, the warmth in his eyes, the texture of his skin. His smell, the way he walked, the timbre of his voice.

After twenty minutes in the patrol car, however, ingrained habit and instinct kicked in. They were on the job, and anything else between them fell back a step as they went about their duties. It helped that she’d always respected him—looked up to him, really—as a cop, and that they were kept busy with the usual rash of complaints. Break-ins, domestic disputes, MVAs. It was different, working together now they were lovers, but it wasn’t difficult or impossible. Best of all, she was confident that none of their colleagues or superiors had a clue what was going on between them, which was just the way she liked it. She’d had enough of being the source of department scuttlebutt. She was more than happy to cede the floor to someone else’s life dramas.

She helped out on the orchard whenever there was work to be done, enjoying spending time with Reid without having to monitor her behavior. His parents were so welcoming, she caught herself on the verge of explaining the finite nature of her relationship with Reid half a dozen times, but each time she reminded herself that they knew about the Chicago job.
They knew Reid would be leaving soon.

Reid surprised her by offering to help out at her
mom’s place, too, taking it upon himself to mow her lawns and do a few odd jobs around the place that neither she nor Scarlett had felt up to. Mitch was good to pitch in, too, and the Buck women found themselves in the novel position of having two healthy, strong men at their bidding. Watching Reid and Mitch joke around with each other and her mom was but one of many moments that made Tara acutely aware of the hole Reid was going to leave in her life when he finally packed up and went.

But she
’d known that, going in. She was prepared for it.

At least, she thought she was.

Then she woke on a Sunday morning almost three weeks exactly after Reid had taken her to Fairy Lake, and slipped from the bed to make use of the facilities. On her way back, she diverted to the kitchen to turn the coffee maker on. She was about to pad back to bed, her head full of all the delicious ways she could wake her lover, when her gaze fell on the thick envelope sitting on the kitchen counter. The Klieg Security Group logo filled the top left corner, and she found herself taking a step closer.

Don
’t, a voice in her head said, but she was already lifting it. It was empty, its contents sitting beneath it on the counter. She stared at the bold words across the top of the page. Confidential Employment Contract.

So.

Her gaze went to the postage mark on the envelope. It was dated earlier in the week, which meant Reid had been sitting on this news for at least a couple of days.

You knew this was coming.

She did. She’d prepared herself for it a dozen times. But nothing she’d imagined came even close to the way she felt right now—as though the bottom had fallen out of her world.

Which was stupid. So stupid.

She pressed a hand to her stomach, blinking rapidly to dispel the tears that were burning at the back of her eyes.

She was going to lose him.

The pain of the realization was visceral, like a blow to the solar plexus.

Which, again, was so dumb. This wasn
’t an ambush. She’d bought into their fling knowing it would end, and soon. Now it was time to pay the piper.

She set the envelope back on top of the contract and turned to the sink, running herself a glass of water.
Her hand shook as she lifted it to her mouth.

I didn
’t think he’d go.

She closed her eyes as she admitted the truth to herself. Even though she knew Reid, even though he
’d regaled her with tales of his travels, his eyes bright as he described a bazaar in Turkey or a weekend market in Paris, she’d sold herself a secret fantasy where Reid decided that he’d had enough of seeing the world, that being with her was more important than any of that. And she’d bought it, hook, line, and sinker, because she was wildly, crazily, passionately in love with him and didn’t want to let him go.

You fool.

She set the half-full glass on the drainer, unable to swallow past the lump of emotion in her throat.

For a moment she was so overwhelmed by the loss she was about to endure that the urge to sink to the floor and curl into a ball was almost irresistible.

Her mother had been like that after her father left, she remembered. She’d sobbed until her eyes were so red and puffy they were almost raw, she’d refused food, she’d spent hours in bed, not talking to anyone. Standing in Reid’s kitchen, for the first time in her life Tara truly understood her mother’s helplessness in the face of her grief.

It would be very easy to let the pain take over, as her mother had, to succumb to it and let it swamp her.
Right now, it felt like a tsunami crashing down on her, unavoidable, sweeping everything in its path.

But Tara was not her mother.
She’d worked diligently all her life to be different. She’d trained herself to be disciplined, to be capable. To be resilient. She was resilient.

She would be okay when Reid left.
It would hurt. It would hurt like hell. But she would be okay. There would be no sleeping for days on end for her. She wouldn’t abandon herself to pain. She couldn’t.

Her knuckles were aching, and when she looked down she reali
zed she was gripping the edge of the sink so tightly her fingers were white. She forced herself to let go. Suddenly the need to be outside, away from Reid, was so strong that she didn’t dare disobey it.

She
’d brought her running gear with her last night in anticipation of a cross-country outing with Reid today. She would put it on and slip out and run until this feeling in her chest—this tight, suffocating, painful heaviness—was gone. And when she came back, she would wait until he told her his good news and she would be happy for him.

She would.

She walked quietly into the bedroom to collect the bag with her running gear. Reid was sprawled across the mattress, the sheet tangled around his hips. She stood looking at him for a long moment, aware of the urge to climb into bed beside him and cling to him. Maybe if she asked, he would stay. Maybe if she begged him.

She retreated to the kitchen before she could allow the thought to take root. She pulled on underwear, fastening her sports bra with cold, fumbling hands. Then she pulled on her running leggings and a tank top, and finally her shoes and socks. She tied her hair back into a ponytail, then took a moment to leave a quick note on the pad of paper near the phone.

Felt the urge to run. See you soon, sleepyhead. T.

She left the note propped against the coffee can and made her way to the door.

“Where are you going?”

She glanced over her shoulder to find Reid standing there in all his naked glory, one arm raised to scratch his head.
It said a lot that even now, when she was on the verge of falling apart, she still felt the burn of attraction as she looked at his beautiful body.

She forced a smile.
“I’m just ducking out for a quick run,” she said. “Just felt the urge.”

“
Give me five and I’ll come with you.”

“
That’s okay. You go back to bed. We can still go out together later.”

She loved their runs together, and she wasn
’t about to give one up when it might very well be their last.

“
Don’t be silly. I’ll be two minutes, tops.” He closed the distance between them, wrapping her in his arms and his smell and his warmth.

She kissed him, swallowing the burn of tears. She couldn
’t object without crying. Without losing it. And she didn’t want to lose it.

Not with him, anyway.

“Okay.”

She hovered by the door as he pulled on running shorts and a tank top, sitting on the couch to tug on socks and his shoes. He ducked into the bathroom to stick his head under the tap and gulp down a glass of water, then he was back with her, his eyes alert now as he studied her.

“Is everything all right?” he asked, and she knew that he could sense her tension and upset.

He
’d always been tuned into her. Always.

“
Yep. Just feel like blowing the cobwebs away.”

She led the way down the steps, going through the motions of doing some
warmup stretches even though she really just wanted to run.

And then they were heading up the driveway, the gravel hard underfoot, and the terrible pressing-down feeling seemed to recede as she picked up the pace.

Very deliberately she cleared her mind, concentrating on her stride and her breathing, feeling the stretch in her hips with each step, visualizing her mid-foot hitting the ground and pushing off again.

Her muscles became liquid and warm as she slipped into the groove. The wind rushing past her felt good, the burn in her legs and lung
s felt good, the perfect distraction from the hollowness inside her. She increased the pace, barely looking at Reid as she pushed harder and harder.

Then, somehow, she was sprinting, arms and legs pumping, her whole body on fire as she ran as fast, as hard as she could. Her feet slapped the ground, her eyes streamed, every muscle and sinew screamed for relief.

Still she kept running, relishing the burn, embracing the pain because it was so much easier than dealing with the hurt inside herself.

I love him, I love him,
I love him. Don’t leave me, don’t leave me, don’t leave me.

And suddenly she couldn
’t breathe, and she couldn’t see, and she had to stop as tears flooded her eyes and her throat. She staggered to a halt, gasping for air, her chest heaving with sobs, tears pouring down her face.

“
Tara.” Reid was panting, too, his face twisted with concern as he reached for her.

She shook her head, unable to accept his comfort when she wanted
—needed—it so badly. His hands fell to his sides as he frowned, his gaze never leaving her face.

“
What’s going on?”

She turned her back on him, walking a few paces away, trying to get a grip. But the words she wanted to say were rising up inside her, and she couldn
’t stop them, even though pride and history and experience told her they were pointless.

“
Would it make a difference if I asked you to stay?” she said, her back still to him.

“
Tara.”

His arms came around her from behind, his big body enveloping hers. His arms were like steel bands, and she felt the rasp of his morning beard against her cheek as he pressed his face alongside hers.

“You don’t need to ask. I’m not going anywhere, doofus.”

She frowned, not understanding.
“I saw the contract, Reid.”

She struggled free from his grip, turning to face him. Needing to see him.