his voice gentle with understanding. “You couldn’t possibly have been involved.”
His compassion and sympathy were her undoing.
“I encouraged him to go,” she admitted, her throat burning. “If he had stayed home, he wouldn’t have landed on that rock and damaged his spinal cord.”
“Come on. Name one senior at our school who didn’t tube down the river and jump from the cliffs the week after graduation. It was a rite of passage.”
“Justin didn’t normally disobey our parents.” As she had, she thought. “I told him he was eighteen and it was time he stopped acting like such a geek. I drove him to his friend’s house, then lied to our folks about where he was going.”
“Teenagers disobey their parents. It’s what they do.”
“Being popular was so important to me in high school. Justin was such a nerd back then. Shy and scrawny and brainy. He was practically invisible. I thought if he went tubing, he’d break out of his shell. Because of me, his life is ruined.”
They came to a stop at the entrance to the barn. Ethan released her elbow, only to drape an arm around her shoulders.
“Trust me, you weren’t the only one pressuring him to go tubing. His buddies were, too.”
It would have been nice to lay her head on Ethan’s chest as she’d done so often in the past, and let him comfort her.
She might have, if she wasn’t convinced she’d be sending him the wrong message.
Wiping her eyes, she tried to ease away from his embrace.
He’d have none of it.
“When someone’s seriously injured, like Justin, it’s pretty common for family members and friends to blame themselves. My dad and brother were the same way. Kept thinking if they’d been there for me when Mom was sick, and after she died, I wouldn’t have enlisted and been caught in that explosion. Eventually, they came to accept it was my decision to join the marines, and rotten luck I was standing where I was that day. Same with Justin.”
Caitlin looked up at Ethan. “You don’t think I was there for you when your mom died?”
At the time, she’d been so embroiled in her own misery over his abrupt departure, she hadn’t considered the reason he left was because of her. How incredibly selfish.
“What? Of course not. I was the one unable to cope with my grief, so was pushing people away.” He inhaled deeply. “I’m sorry, Caitlin. For abandoning you like that.”
“I appreciate the apology.”
“I know it’s not enough to make up for what I did to you.”
“No, it isn’t.”
He drew back at her brutal, but honest, admission.
“You’re not the only one who had to deal with traumatic events,” she said. “I did, too. And believe me, there were plenty of times after Justin’s accident when I wanted to run away and leave everything behind. But I didn’t. I stayed and dealt with my responsibilities regardless of how difficult it was. I just wish you had loved me enough to do the same.”
CAITLIN’SREMARKHIT ETHAN like a blow. How could she think he hadn’t loved her enough? The whole reason he’d left was because he had loved her too much. She deserved more than a man who was emotionally devastated, out of work and whose family was financially ruined, thanks to one man’s insatiable greed.
Before he could explain, Justin came wheeling toward them. Ethan was pleased to see the young man, even if his timing stank.
“Hey, there you are.” He pushed his wheelchair forward, meeting up with Ethan and Caitlin outside the cattle barn. “How are you doing?”
“I’m good.” Ethan shook his hand, which was sheathed in a worn leather glove with cutouts for his fingers.
“I was just talking to Gavin. He filled me in on all the changes round here.”
“Lots of them. Some good, some bad.”
“You miss the old days?”
No one had ever asked Ethan that. He took a moment to consider before answering. “I do sometimes. I miss the people, especially. My mom and sister.” He glanced briefly at Caitlin. If she was aware of his unspoken inclusion of her, she didn’t show it. “But all things considered, I can’t complain.”
“Me, either,” Justin said, without the slightest trace of bitterness.
Ethan’s respect for him grew by leaps and bounds. If Justin felt self-pity at losing the use of his legs, he certainly didn’t wallow in it.
“You in a hurry to leave?” Justin maneuvered his wheelchair so that he faced Caitlin. “I was hoping Ethan could show us the mustang.”
“I can’t be late for work.”
Justin checked his watch. “I thought you didn’t have to be at the clinic until two.”
“I like to arrive a little early.”
She sounded eager to go.
Ethan wanted the chance to explain his real reason for enlisting and leaving her, and was determined to find the opportunity. “It won’t take long. Prince’s stall is just behind the barn.”
Justin started wheeling in that direction. Ethan followed, as did Caitlin, her gait stiff and her steps slow.
If she so obviously didn’t want to be with him, why had she come along?
“I have to warn you,” he told Justin, “the way there’s bumpy.”
“Can’t be any worse than hiking Squaw Peak.”
“You’ve done that?”
“Five times. Four of them in my chair.” Justin beamed, his geeky smile reminding Ethan of the undersize, asthmatic kid he’d known when he and Caitlin were dating.
The smile, however, was the only thing about him that was the same. Justin had acquired some serious muscle on his upper body.
“Why do you keep him so far from the other horses?” he asked, guiding his wheelchair down the rocky slope to Prince’s pen like a pro.
“He’s too wild and unpredictable.” Ethan kept his eyes trained on the ground, watching out for potholes and rocks. What would cause another person to merely stumble could send him sprawling. “And being near the mares tends to…excite him, shall we say. Better he’s off by himself.”
Where to house Prince had been an issue when they’d captured him last month. Clay solved the problem by erecting a temporary covered pen near the back pasture.
“I’ve been wanting to see Prince ever since I watched your brother on the news.”
Ethan chuckled. “You caught that, huh?”
“Are you kidding? He was all over the TV.”
The media had gotten wind of Prince’s capture; a horse living wild in a ninety-thousand-acre urban preserve was big news. Several local stations had dispatched reporters to interview Gavin. The attention had resulted in a slew of new customers, giving the Powells’ dire finances a much-needed boost.
“Watch yourself,” Ethan cautioned as they drew near. “Prince is wary of strangers. He still doesn’t like me and Gavin that much.”
Justin showed no fear and wheeled close. Caitlin reached for his wheelchair as if she wanted to pull him back. After a second, she let her hand drop, though it remained clenched in a fist.
Was it only Justin’s fall that had made her overprotective?
As they watched Prince, the stallion raised his head and stared at them. Then, tossing his jet-black mane, he trotted