Lacey was 100 percent sure she’d lost her mind. She’d spent the previous day, including the last eight hours when she should’ve been asleep, trying to decide if she should stay in Red Hill Springs.
She didn’t even want to go into the kitchen for breakfast and she was starving. It would be a long six months if she spent the whole time avoiding Devin.
The reasons she’d come here for a divorce hadn’t changed. Devin was a risk-taker, the life of the party, a crowd-thrilling rodeo standout. He said he’d changed, but desperation had gotten him to this point. What would happen to her when he wasn’t desperate anymore?
He’d left her.
He’d lied to her.
Her hand spread across the barely visible rise in her abdomen where their babies were growing. She leaned her head against the door to the bedroom, praying for guidance, for wisdom...for backbone, even.
The back door slammed and she jumped away from the bedroom door, her heart pounding in her chest until she realized it was the guys going out to work. She cracked the door, slowly letting out a breath. Sadie lifted her head and gave a soft woof.
Otherwise, silence.
Feeling like she should be on tiptoe, she eased down the hall, through the living room and into the kitchen with Sadie shadowing her. Fluffy white biscuits were waiting for her on top of the stove and for a second she stared at them. Devin had remembered to make them plain. It was a small thing, but she tucked it away in her mind. She picked one up from the pan, slathered it with butter and took a big bite, her eyes nearly crossing. It was so good.
The back door banged open and she dropped her biscuit, which was quickly gobbled up by the dog.
“Well, hey.” Devin, all six feet three inches of him, stepped into the kitchen.
She swallowed hard, wishing she’d started with coffee, or juice or something that would make her mouth just a little less dry. “Mmm.”
“That good, huh?” His face split into a grin, and her pulse gave a traitorous leap.
“Delicious.” She swallowed again. “What’s up on the farm today?”
“Cutting sunflowers and loading them into buckets to sell at some of the farmers markets around here. Come on down later if you want. We can pull a chair up under a shade tree. Garrett will be around this afternoon to help, too.” He lifted a large orange drink cooler off the counter. “Forgot the water. See you later?”
She nodded. “Sure.”
Her eyes lingered on the door as it closed behind him. He looked good. He looked happy. Healthy.
She picked up another biscuit and dropped into a kitchen chair, giving the dog a warning look. “You’re not getting this one, so you can stop it with the pitiful sad eyes.”
It was a darn good biscuit, but suddenly she wasn’t that hungry. The shock of their conversation yesterday afternoon still hadn’t faded. Devin’s story of how he got addicted to painkillers was so raw and real. And he’d been so good at hiding it that she’d witnessed it happening and hadn’t even realized it.
How could that even happen? How had he gotten so low and she hadn’t noticed? That was on her.
She sighed and got up to pour herself a glass of orange juice. Whether she was hungry or not, the babies needed calories and so did she if she didn’t want a repeat of the fainting incident.
It didn’t seem real that she was carrying twins. That she was a mother and in six months’ time she’d be holding them in her arms. She couldn’t afford to take chances. In the arena, sure, she’d pushed limits—hers and her horse’s. But even then, the risks had been calculated.
Marrying Devin had been the biggest risk of her life. She’d been afraid she couldn’t trust him, and guess what? She’d been right.
But he’d said he loved her. With tears in his eyes and the ring of truth in his voice, he’d said the words she’d wanted to hear.
And the truth—the real truth—the dirty little secret she’d been hiding, even from herself, was that she’d been in love with Devin for years. She’d fallen hard from the moment she’d met him. And that was the most dangerous secret of all. She wanted to stay here. She wanted to know Devin, the real Devin who didn’t hide behind success, alcohol and that shiny gold rodeo buckle. She wanted to know if she’d fallen in love with the real Devin or if everything she’d thought about him was just an illusion.
The glass trembled in her hand. What was she thinking? She needed to hang on to her anger. She’d waited for him for over three months. She’d given him the power to hurt her... And he had.
She couldn’t forget that. Falling in love with him again was not an option. Devin was all flash and glory. Babies were bottles and dirty diapers and not the fun kind of sleepless nights.
No. A marriage needed a stronger foundation than a drug-induced fantasy. In the daylight, she could see reality and reality said she couldn’t trust him. Not yet. Maybe not ever. She had to protect herself.
Because, just like in an airplane cabin losing pressure, she had to put her oxygen mask on first so she could be there to protect her babies. And no matter what, they had to be her first priority.
So she would go to the sunflower field and she would build a friendship with Devin for her babies’ sake. She would search for the answers to her questions about who Devin really was. But she absolutely would not, under any circumstances, fall in love with him again.
* * *
In the distance, Devin heard the dog’s joyful bark and squinted toward the house. Lacey was walking down the dirt lane between pastures, throwing a ball for Sadie, who would chase it down, return it and bark her head off until Lacey threw the ball again. Lacey laughed, her head thrown back, long dark hair trailing in loose waves down her back.
And watching her, Devin could barely breathe. All morning long his mind had been on their conversation last night, wondering if she’d give him a chance. Wondering if she still had feelings for him at all and if she’d made a decision.
Sadie caught sight of him and streaked down the road, cutting across the field when she saw Tanner instead. “Ah. I see who’s really loved here.”
Lacey started across the field toward him, her crisp citrus scent reaching him before she did, the sweet aroma mingling with the green scent of the sunflowers. He drew in a deep breath as she lingered beside him.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting these ready to be sold.” He glanced up at her, but his hands kept moving, prepping the flowers for transport—sliding netting over the sunflower blossom and a wide straw over the stem. He placed the flower in a five-gallon bucket at his feet and glanced up at her. “Sunflowers seem like they would be hardy, but they break easily. Underneath they’re a lot more fragile than people think.”
“Huh.” She raised her eyebrows and looked down at her hands, where thin silver and turquoise rings shimmered on her fingers.
He narrowed his eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Oh, nothing.”
Devin leaned against the table where he was working and studied her. He was self-aware enough—now—to get what she was saying. But he didn’t want to talk about how mushy he was on the inside or how brittle he was on the outside. “Well, if you’re gonna stand here, the least you can do is help.”
Lacey shot him a look but picked up a sunflower, slid a straw over the stem and handed it to him.
In turn, Devin pulled the protective netting over the bloom and stuck it in the bucket. He turned to her, holding his hand up for a high five.
When she gave it to him with only a slight eye roll, he grinned. Progress. They made a good team.
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