Never Say Never (11 page)

I flick my eyes to the door, wondering if I have time to get a quick selfie in to post to Instagram. A cat and me would get lots of likes, lots of comments from fans, and looking through it would make me feel good. I’ve been advised over and over to post and ignore, but I can’t stay away. I like interacting with fans over social media. I like knowing they like me, that they approve, and they want more. Yeah…I need the validation.

I get so far as getting my phone out of my pocket when I hear someone rush down the stairs inside. I quickly put the phone back and straighten up. Claire dressed me today. I’m wearing jeans and a dark gray t-shirt under a leather jacket. Everything is designer, and I know it cost a ridiculous amount. Sometimes I think about how incredibly stupid it is to charge several hundred for a fucking t-shirt. But this is how I’m supposed to dress, so I do it.

The doorknob rattles and my heart skips a beat, knowing Haley is just inches away. Seconds tick by, and my heart begins to beat faster and faster until she finally opens it. The wooden door swings in with a squeak of the hinges.

“Hi,” I say when I see her. She’s wearing dark jeans, heels, and a flowy top that’s low cut and tight across the chest, and her tits look fantastic. I stare at them for a couple seconds before moving my eyes back to her face. Her hair falls in soft waves around her face, and her makeup is light and subtle. “You look beautiful.”

She smiles and uses her foot to hold back the dog, who’s wagging her tail to greet me. “You don’t look so bad yourself,” she says, bending over to grab the dog’s collar. I get an even better view of her breasts, and it takes all I have not to stare. “Sorry, she loves everyone.”

I bend down to the Border Collie’s level. “Is she friendly?”

“Very.” She gives the dog a few inches. “Settle down, Chrissy,” she says.

“It’s okay.” I hold out my hands and the dog goes crazy. Haley lets go, and the dog bounds forward, jumping into my arms and licking my face. I laugh and pet her for a second before pushing her back and wiping the slobber from my cheeks. “She is friendly.”

“Yeah. Some guard dog.” Haley smiles again and rolls her eyes. It’s the most I’ve seen her smile since we met. Chrissy jerks away and goes after the black and white cat. The cat lashes out and hisses, and then they take off. Haley rushes onto the porch.

“Chrissy!” she yells. “Get back here right now!” The dog disappears around the house and Haley sighs. “She’s so well trained, as you can tell.”

I laugh. “Should we go get her?”

“Nah, she’ll come back.” She’s standing right next to me, close enough for me to smell her perfume. “How’s your ankle?”

“Fine,” I say. “Doesn’t even hurt.”

“That’s good. Uh, want to come in?”

I nod and follow her inside, through the foyer and into the kitchen. Baby bottles clutter the counter. I look at them then at Haley.

“You have a kid?” I look back at the bottles. There must be dozens of them. “Or a lot of kids?”

“No,” she says. “And sorry this is a mess. Today’s been a little hectic.” She picks up a bottle that rolled off the counter and tosses it into the sink. “Where are you taking me tonight?”

“I can’t remember the name,” I confess with a smile. I actually don’t know it. But I know we have reservations two hours from now. “So you’re not going to explain why you have a million bottles?”

Her smile fades and she looks at the sea of plastic and rubber on the counter. “I have a newborn. She’s only taking milk from a bottle right now. When they dropped her off, I was given all these bottles.”

“You are talking about a horse, right?”

She nods. “Yeah. I’m trying to get her to drink out of a bucket. It’s exhausting bottle-feeding a foal.”

“How often do they eat?”

She makes face that lets me know: all the damn time. “My friend Lori, who you met last night, is taking over baby duty while we go out.”

I guess she wasn’t coming back to my hotel then. Dammit. She looks so hot; just thinking about undressing her makes me start to get hard. I blink the thoughts of her naked away. I can’t let my brain wander past that, though the harder I try to
not
think about it, the more I find myself wondering what she feels like.

“What do you feed a baby horse?” I blurt, needing to stop thinking about laying Haley down and slowly stripping her clothes off.
Milk, plonker, that’s what all babies eat.

“A mixture of special formula and cow’s milk. Goat’s milk is better, but it’s super expensive,” she says, then she looks embarrassed to bring up money. What’s expensive to her isn’t to me. I haven’t always had a lot of money. I can still understand, and still feel the stress of not having enough. I remember the twisted knot that formed in my stomach when I had to scramble to pay bills.

“And you feed her a few times a day?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Try a few times an hour.”

“Ouch.”

She shrugs and wraps her arms around herself. “It’s what has to be done. Hopefully she’ll be able to drink from a bucket or I can hang bottles in her stall. And really, I worry about her getting depressed from missing her mom more than anything. Foals like to be snuggled. I’ve been holding her all day, and I’m sure I will tomorrow.” She sighs. “Hopefully she’ll adjust. I can’t miss that many days of work.”

“You take off work to take care of your horses?” I don’t mean to sound judgmental, but I’m surprised by her devotion.

“Someone has to.”

“That’s kind of amazing,” I say, and she blushes. We look at each other, unmoving, for a few seconds. The silence is growing awkward. Why did I come inside? This is weird, just standing here. Where is our scene break? Where are the writers to move this along, to make something happen, and get us out of just fucking standing here?

Something bangs and scratches on the front door, causing me to jump.

“It’s Chrissy,” she tells me, and she walks off to let the dog in. I take the time to look around the kitchen. Besides the various bottles on the counter, it’s clean but cluttered. It feels so homey, so real. I lean against the island counter and cross my arms, grinding my teeth. I start to feel like myself, my
real
self. I close my eyes and push the darkness away. What the fuck was my problem today? Some days are worse than others, some days I don’t want to get out of bed. Some days I feel so numb I want to hurt myself just to feel. Fuck. I can’t do that. I won’t do that. Not again. I have to be the version of Aiden people expect. I have to believe in him enough I feel it.

Chrissy comes running through the house, wildly greeting me again. I kneel down and pet her, long black fur catching on my fingers.

“So,” Haley says. “Should we go?”

Bloody hell, yes, get me out of here
. “Yeah.” Though really, we had a long drive ahead of us. The last time I took a chick on a long drive, she sucked my dick—twice—and I got pulled over for speeding. I got out of the ticket by giving the cop my autograph and taking a picture for his son, who was a huge
Shadowland
fan.

None of that would work on Haley.

She tosses a treat to Chrissy, grabs her purse, and leads the way out. The barn is close to the house. I can hear country music softly playing inside, and yellow light spills over the half doors. The same white horse that whinnied to me earlier sticks his head out and calls to Haley.

I watch her look at him and see the smile on her face. She slows and relaxes at the sight of him. I don’t get it. There is nothing relaxing about horses at all. They kind of scare me, to be honest. They’re big with a mind of their own. Even something as well trained as Rusty, the horse I ride on set, can spook and dump me.

I open the car door for Haley.

“Thanks,” she says as she slides in. I’m still not used to being on opposite sides, and sometimes find myself drifting into the wrong lane out of habit. Americans are weird. I dash around and get in, firing up the engine and turning down the radio I left blaring. I already have the address in the GPS, ready to give me directions. I back up and turn around in the long, L-shaped driveway.

“What happened to the baby’s mum?” I ask then immediately regret my words. Haley stiffens and closes her eyes. She doesn’t know I know about the fire, and there isn’t a good way to bring it up. I can’t turn to her and say, “Hey, I Googled you and read about the accident.”

“Nothing bad,” she says quietly. “She’s a nurse mane foal. The mom was bred for the milk, not for the baby.”

I turn my head in question. “I’m not following.”

“The milk is given to a show horse, and the baby is literally thrown away. This little girl was pulled out of the manure pile”

My mouth gapes a little. “Are you serious?”

“Unfortunately. It’s not that uncommon either.”

My heart feels cold. “I had no idea.”

“Most people don’t. But it’s usually easy to find a home for the foal once their story gets out. As long as we get to them in time, they don’t have physical issues like a lot of our rescues do.”

“Is it hard to place horses with physical issues?”

She nods. “Sometimes it means they can’t be ridden at all, or are only suitable for light riding. And the upkeep for a special needs horse is expensive. And people don’t want something damaged.”

Damaged.

No, people don’t want something damaged. I know first hand. There is sadness in her voice, but her face is set, showing no emotion. I drum my fingers on the wheel. The air between us is getting awkward—again. I feel compelled to say something.

“So, you’re a fan of
Shadowland
?”

She nods but gives me a sideways glance. “Yeah. I really like the show. I’d have friends over every Sunday while I was in college. We’d take shots every time someone died. Usually, we were drunk halfway through the episode.”

I feel like the actor everyone thinks I am. “Did you ever think you’d be going out with someone from the cast of the show? I bet your friends would shit themselves if they found out.”

She raises her eyebrows and looks out the window. “Uh, yeah. This isn’t how I thought my life would go.”

I speed around a turn and consider driving off the hillside. Anything to end this awkward conversation. A few miles pass in silence. Then she turns to me.

“Do you really want to go to some fancy restaurant and deal with all those people?”

“I don’t mind,” I tell her. “I like taking pictures with people and signing shit.”

“Really?” she asks and twists.

“Really,” I say. “It’s nice to know people like me and what I’m doing. I would be nothing without the fans.”

“Is that what you say in every interview?” she asks flatly.

I find myself smiling. I take my eyes off the road and look at her. “You really want to know? It can get annoying. Not having people tell me they’re fans or they love the show, because I really do like hearing that. And anyone who says they don’t is a damn liar. It’d be like you saying you didn’t want to hear people say they think you’re pretty or smart. Yeah, maybe you think it sounds vain, but we’re fucking humans. We like that kind of flattery.”

I glance at her again. She’s leaning back, head tipped just a bit as she looks at me. “What annoys me is having to smile and act happy when I just want to leave the gym and shower. Sometimes I just want to get my shit done and go home.”

She smiles. “What do you want to do right now?”

“Eat,” I say and smile back. “I’m hungry.”

“We could go somewhere else.”

“We can go anywhere you want, but it doesn’t really stop the problem.”

Her smile widens. “The place I have in mind can avoid that. Most of the people there don’t have TV, let alone prime channels.”

I don’t have to think about it. My eyes meet hers. “Yes, I’d like that.” I have a moment of panic. I’m pushing myself further away from my comfort zone, further away from the façade I desperately cling to. But I’m with Haley, and for some reason, she makes everything all right.

Chapter 9

I pick up the glass of lemonade and take a sip, looking at Aiden through the dim light. He’s checked his phone five times since we sat down in this little hole-in-the-wall restaurant. It’s forty-five minutes from my house in the opposite direction of Billings. I almost feel guilty when we sit down. Almost. Aiden’s cockiness turns me off enough to not really care, though. This place is a dump. I can’t be sure it’s up to code, and if the health department somehow finds it out here in the backwoods, my guess is they’d shut it down.

Mom and I came here from time to time. It was the halfway point between her barn and another rescue. We’d met here before with horses. Mom took the more serious ones, the ones that other rescue wasn’t equipped to handle. How Mom did it all on her own was beyond me. She had a gentleness to her, and the horses could sense it. Just being around her calmed them, and they knew they were in good hands.

I order my food, knowing there is something seriously wrong with me. Who turns down the chance to go to a fancy restaurant with someone famous? Other than worrying about how I’d look when the paparazzi snapped my picture, I should have eaten it up, right? Pretty much every female on the planet would give their left ovary to be wined and dined by Aiden Shepherd.