Montana Actually (24 page)

“The next level? What are we? A computer game?” She started pacing, unable to believe what she was hearing. “You’ve been engaged before, Josh, so you obviously know how to visualize a future and make a pledge to someone.”

A stony expression crossed his face. “And you know how well that worked out.”

His words hailed down on her like ice—jagged and sharp. “So what you’re really saying is that you’re not prepared to make a commitment to me?” Her heart staggered as pain gripped it.
No one commits to me.

“I’m not saying that at all. I’m offering us a chance.”

“A chance? So now we’re relationship gambling? We spin the roulette wheel and see where it lands?”

His nostrils flared as tension squared his shoulders. “If the word
chance
offends you so much,” he said, with an edge of arrogance to his voice, “what about
opportunity
?”

Fury at him raged through her. “It’s only an opportunity for
you
, Josh. You’ll have someone to come home to after a long day, decent food on the table, someone to collect your shirts and your stinking cheese—”

“That’s not fair, Katrina. I—”

But she refused to listen. “I’ll tell you what’s not fair, Josh. It’s me living with you and never knowing if we’re going to reach”—she made air quotes—“‘the next level’. And speaking of levels, what are they, exactly? Do we ever get to skip a level if we’ve collected enough gems or zombies? Do we start by sharing my house, then if I keep it tidy we might start sharing a bank account and oh, and then what, a child?”

“Are you done?” His mouth was tight, and the detached air he’d worn so often when he’d first arrived in town—an air that had faded to nothing over the weeks—was now firmly back in place. “I have a three-year contract in Bear Paw, Katrina. Making plans beyond that is pointless.”

The noise in her head muted and her anger dissolved as understanding dawned. She walked over to him, lacing her fingers in between his. “I’m not Ashley, Josh, and I’ve moved away from Bear Paw before. I could do it again.”

His eyes glinted at her, a hard and blinding silver. “So you’ll follow me anywhere a job takes me?”

She thought about her hopes and dreams of having a child and she automatically ruled out Africa. “When your contract’s up, we can discuss all the options.”

“No.” He pulled his hands away. “I’ve heard that before and it’s code for I’m not moving.”

Her anger flooded back. “So we’ve drilled right down to the truth now, haven’t we? There is no next level after ‘let’s move in together.’ It comes with a predetermined end date in three years’ time.”

“I’m not saying that.”

“No?” Her sarcasm dripped from the word. “You’re not offering me a future, either. You’re hedging your bets and asking me to put my life on hold for you. You’re calling all the shots and I’m making all the concessions.”

Like every other man.
The future she hadn’t allowed herself to think about now lay smoldering in a pile of blackened, twisted dreams. She sucked in a breath in an attempt to steady her breaking heart. If she’d thought Brent had hurt her, she’d been wrong. His lies and betrayal were nothing compared with this anguish and pain that pulsed through her. Brent was a self-serving bastard. Josh was not, and it made everything ten times worse.

He wanted her but he didn’t love her. Three months ago that had been enough. Now it didn’t come close. She deserved more but he couldn’t give it, and past experience told her that wasn’t going to alter. Even though they’d reached the end of a very short road and she knew nothing would change his mind, she needed to tell him exactly how she felt. No matter how hard it was going to be or how much it would cost her, it was the only way forward. The only way that gave her some hope of finding a sort of peace in the future.

She wrapped her arms around herself to try and stop her body shaking. “I’m almost thirty, Josh, and I don’t have time to wait or waste. I want a relationship where I’m not on tenterhooks wondering if it’s going to end tomorrow or really start. I want a marriage and I want a baby. I’m done with men using me to make their life more exciting or comfortable, fitting me in around their lives and their wives, at their convenience. If you can’t love me and commit to me now, there’s no point continuing with this conversation.”

—

KATRINA’S
quiet words slammed into Josh, bringing fear and stirring up resentment. He hated ultimatums—Ashley had specialized in them, hurling them at him at every turn, whether it was a dispute over towels left lying on the bathroom floor or full-blown arguments about their future. He’d thought Katrina was different.

“Suddenly you want me to marry you?” The calm he’d been trying to hold on to vaporized and he shot to his feet. “What the hell happened to ‘just using each other for sex’?”

Her head fell forward and she stared at her feet. Slowly, she raised her gaze to his, her face filled with self-loathing. “I fell in love with you.”

Poleaxed, he struggled to speak. “I . . . I had no idea.”

Her beautiful mouth grimaced. “Believe me, I tried my very best not to.”

The quiet and heartfelt words filled with pain made him ache. He didn’t want to hurt her, but that had already happened. “I’m sorry.”

Her eyes closed for a brief moment, and when she opened them, he saw her love for him—raw and wounded. “Not as sorry as I am.”

Her pain hit him at a visceral level, and he flinched, hating himself and angry with her. She wasn’t supposed to have fallen in love with him. Hadn’t he been up front from the very start about what he did and didn’t want? This wasn’t his fault.

Don’t say that.
Say something that helps.
“I really like you, Katrina. I value our friendship—”

“Stop.” She held up her hand, grinding out the words. “Do. Not. Say. Another. Word.” She crossed the room and picked up her purse before opening the door. “Come on, Boy.”

The old dog stood, his tail wagging, and walked over to her.

He rounded the sofa to reach her, torn that she was leaving but knowing he couldn’t give her what she wanted. He’d given Ashley everything and that had ended in disaster, and he wouldn’t be held to ransom. But he despaired at the thought of them not being friends. “Katrina, please don’t leave like this.”

She threw him an incredulous look of such blazing intensity that it halted him in his tracks. “Good-bye, Josh.”

The crashing sound of the door slamming shut stayed with him long after she’d gone.

—

“YOU
did what?” Josh yelled at Millie, not able to believe his ears. “Are you hell-bent on making my life difficult?”

Like every other woman in this town.

Let’s be way more specific here. Like Katrina.

One very long week had passed since Katrina had dropped her bombshell on him. A week filled with what Floyd called manna from health insurance heaven and what Josh called vacation-brain stupidity—tourists injuring themselves in a cornucopia of dumb ways. As a result, he’d been called out every night this week.

Not to be outdone by the tourists, most of the residents of the county had caught the summer flu. He’d put out a general advice session on the breakfast radio show targeting the usually healthy to stay home, sleep, drink plenty of fluids and take some Tylenol. The hope had been that the information would ease the strain on the clinic and leave time for him to see the young, the elderly and those with a chronic illness who truly needed his expertise.

It hadn’t worked. Everyone was coming in.

He was so sleep deprived he could barely see straight. Usually, he was the king of the power nap and able to fall asleep the moment he fell into bed, but not this week. Every time he dozed off, he woke with a start either by hearing the echo of Katrina slamming his door shut or by the coolness of the sheets when he reached for her. He missed her and he missed their conversations—the cottage was quiet and empty without her. Around four in the morning each day as he stared at the ceiling, and ignored the occasional scratching of rodents and sound of the howling wind trying to blow the cottage off its foundations, he reached for his phone to call her. His fingers never made contact with the device. There was no point. She wanted something he couldn’t offer. They were at an impossible impasse. End of story.

She wasn’t supposed to have fallen in love with him and then demand things of him. Things he couldn’t give.

Knowing all of that didn’t make it any easier, though, and fatigue made every nerve jangle, every muscle ache, and he craved some peace and quiet from work and from his thoughts. Now, on top of everything else, the temporary receptionist who’d replaced Amber had up and left.

Millie closed the exam room door and faced him, her curls bouncing and her face stern. “Don’t take your shitty mood out on me, Josh Stanton. I’m the one trying to make your life easier. We both have more than a full patient load and granted, it’s a stopgap solution, but I bet you can’t come up with a better one.”

He ran his hand across the back of his neck. “Does she even know what confidentiality is?”

“Oddly enough, she does. Back in the day, when her rheumatoid arthritis was better controlled and before the problems with her hips, she worked as a medical clerk. It will be okay.”

“Jesus, I must have crossed over from exhausted to delusional if I can be convinced that Bethany is the solution to our problems.”

Millie laughed. “It’s just for a few days. It will be over before you know it.”

He grunted, clicking the mouse on the next patient file. “Promises, promises.”

She paused with her hand on the door handle. “Josh, I’ve just been accepted into medical school, and when I’m a physician, I’m never going to yell or be grumpy at my staff.”

“I’ll remind you of that when you’ve been up thirty-six hours straight,” he muttered before her words fully sank in. He shot to his feet. “You’re going to medical school? That’s fantastic.” Letting workplace propriety fall to the wayside, he engulfed her in a hug. “Why didn’t you tell me you were applying?”

She shrugged. “If I didn’t get in, I didn’t want anyone to know I’d applied and failed, but—” She grinned widely as she gave him a double thumbs-up and wiggled her hips. “I start at WWAMI in September.”

“WAM where now?”

“WWAMI. It’s a program run by the University of Washington and it stands for Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho. I do my first year in Montana and then I move to Seattle for three years.”

“Come work here in the college summers. Please.”

She got a mulish look on her face. “Think Floyd will let me?”

“I’ve got nine months to work on him, and I think he’ll see things my way, especially if we dangle the carrot of a potential new doctor for Bear Paw if he plays nice.”

“Sounds good to me.”

She was going to make a wonderful doctor, and he was genuinely thrilled for her. “We should have a party for you to celebrate. I’ll send out an e-mail and invite all the hospital staff and call Leroy’s to arrange food. Does Friday work?”

She stared at him, utterly silent.

“What?” Had he unwittingly done something to offend her? Never in his life would he understand women.

She laughed. “Josh Stanton, you’ve gone all squishy and community spirited.”

A prickle of sensation gave him goose bumps. “Jeez, it’s just some buffalo wings and beer.”

“Exactly. No wine or cheese or haute cuisine. Bear Paw’s gotten to you.”

Her teasing unsettled him. “I didn’t say I was going to come.”

“Yeah, right. I’ll see you there, Friday at seven, you big softy.”

The intercom sounded behind them and Bethany’s strident voice made him jump. “I’ve got sick people backing up here and coughing all over me. Quit drinking that fancy coffee and get back to work.”

K
atrina galloped across the grassy plains, wishing she could outrun her thoughts and all of her feelings. The intense grief of her mother’s death had collided with her anguish over Josh. Over the last few days, all of it had pressed down on her so hard and heavy that there’d been moments when she wondered how it hadn’t physically pushed her into the ground.

She missed her mother desperately and she missed Josh. She was furious with both of them—with her mother for leaving her too early and with Josh for not being able to give what she needed of him. For the thousandth time she wondered if she’d asked too much of him, but like the other nine hundred ninety-nine times, her answer was a resounding no. She deserved better—not because she was some amazing person but because she’d finally learned that an equal partnership was the foundation of a successful relationship. Without it, they were doomed before they started.

A loud, whooping whistle sounded behind her, startling her, and she wheeled Benji around. Ty was galloping toward her on his beautiful chestnut quarter horse, a plume of dust rising from her hooves.

“Whoa, Perfect.” Ty pulled on the reins and brought the horse to a stop before tugging his neckerchief down from his dusty face. “Hey, Katrina. Great day for a ride.”

She patted Benji’s neck and rolled her eyes. “Apart from the dust and the wind.”

He laughed. “Like I said, great day for a ride in northern Montana. You checking fences?”

Benji threw his head and she reined him in. “Not specifically. More like riding one length of the boundary, soaking it in. I’m going to miss this.”

The bright blue of his eyes dimmed. “You leaving again?”

She wriggled her nose, her thoughts on the subject not entirely clear. “I’m thinking I’ll go to Ecuador like I’d planned before Mom got sick.”

Perfect tried to bite Benji and Ty kicked her into a walk. “Come check the fences with me, Kat.”

Ty hadn’t called her that in years. “Okay.”

“So what does your dad think of Ecuador?”

“I’m gearing myself up to tell him.”

“Do you have to go now? Why not stay awhile longer.”

And see Josh every day when he comes into the diner to buy coffee? I don’t think so.
“It’s complicated.”

He raised his brows. “Maybe you’re making it complicated. It doesn’t have to be.” He kicked his horse into a trot and moved away to study a section of fence that looked to have a definite sag.

She urged Benji forward, and as she closed the gap between them she forced herself to ask, “What do you mean it doesn’t have to be complicated?”

“Exactly that.” He swung off the horse and looped the reins over the fence post. “You either want to live here or you don’t.”

I want to live where I’m loved. “
Life isn’t that cut-and-dried, Ty.”

The cowboy who lived according to the cycle of the seasons gave her a long, assessing look. “I don’t know what you’re looking for, Katrina. I’m not even sure you do. You left here eight years ago for something you couldn’t name, and you arrived back here looking as pale as winter’s snow. Since spring you’ve come back to life.”

He tethered her horse and helped her down. “I know your mama’s death has hit you hard, but what do you think Ecuador will offer you that this place can’t?” Holding on to one of her hands, he swung his other arm out to encompass the vista of tall, yellow, waving grass and the distant majestic mountains before turning back, his expression serious. “Stay. Stay for your dad. He needs you for a while longer.”

He caught her other hand and gently squeezed them both. “Stay for me.”

Stay for me.
Tears stung the backs of her eyes and she tried to speak, but nothing came out.

“Give me time, Kat, to show you I can make you happy.”

He put his arm around her and gently brought her head to rest on his shoulder. The constant battering of her emotions over the last few weeks, exacerbated by what had happened with Josh, had left her as limp and as exhausted as a rag. Ty smelled of soap and sunshine. His heart beat rhythmically against her chest, and he felt solid, safe and blissfully devoid of any dangers to her own heart.

His kindness seeped into her, promising safe harbor and a life lived by the order of the changing seasons—working together as a team, on the ranch like her parents. All of it called to her like the sirens called to the sailors, tempting her to accept her fate—the one she’d fled all those years ago—and be with him.

She heard her father’s voice saying
Give Ty a chance. You might be surprised
, and her mother urging her to spend time with him.

I can make you happy.

The irony of life smashed into her with devastating clarity. She had a man in front of her willing to put her first and treasure her, but she knew that if she accepted his love, he’d be the one to suffer. She loved Ty like a brother, not a lover, and she couldn’t return his love to him the way he would want. She knew exactly what that was like and she couldn’t do it to him.

Lifting her head, she stepped back, glimpsing the moment in his eyes that he knew; the moment they filled with the same pain Josh had put in hers. “Ty, I want to say yes . . .”

He winced, his face tight. “But you can’t.”

She bit her lip, not wishing to hurt him but knowing she already had. “I’m sorry.”
Throw him a bone. “
I can tell you why if that helps any.”

He turned away and pulled a blanket out of his saddlebag and a bottle of champagne. “Seems a pity to let it get hot,” he said with a grimacing smile.

Her heart wobbled at the romantic gesture that she’d gone and spoiled. “You’re such a good man.”

With a vicious twist, he loosened the cork and then using his thumbs shot it out of the bottle, straight up into the blue, blue sky. He took a long swig before wiping the top with his shirt and passing it to her. “Believe me, Kat, I’m not good at all. This guy, the one who’s making you miserable, I want to kill him.”

She sat down on the rug and he joined her. They passed the bottle back and forth. “The guy I love . . . it’s Josh.”

He stared at a square on the rug. “Fuck.”

“Yeah.” She drank some more champagne, welcoming the fizz on her tongue and hoping the bubbles would take the alcohol into her veins fast.

“We have a problem.” A long sigh shuddered out of Ty. “I really like Josh.”

“I love him.” She took another drink and passed the bottle back. “You love me and I love Josh. It’s a total mess.”

He gave her a hangdog look. “We don’t always have a lot of control over who we love.”

She barked out a laugh. “Tell me about it. If you feel as crappy as I do, I’m so very, very sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”

“I know,” he said grimly before taking another long drink. “You love me as a friend.”

The way he’d said the word
friend
made her shudder. “If it’s any consolation, I think I might have some idea how you feel.”

His taut face said she didn’t, and panic built inside her. “We’ve been friends for a long time, Ty. We go way back. Your Beau’s best man and the two ranches share so much. Do things between us have to change?”

“So you and Josh? There’s no chance the two of you will work it out?”

He’d neatly avoided her question, and a piece of her heart quivered. She didn’t want to lose Ty as a friend, but perhaps she didn’t have a choice in that. After all, she’d rejected Josh’s offer of friendship as too hard and a poor substitute for what she wanted.
“I don’t think so.”

“And living in Bear Paw with him here is too hard?”

“It’s not easy.”

For the briefest moment, a spark of bitterness flared in his eyes. “Tell me about it.”

She sucked in her lips and wished things could be different. “I’m sorry, Ty, but you’d only end up resenting me. Eventually, you’d want the love and adoration you give me to be reciprocated. Better I hurt you now than later.”

He didn’t reply so she pushed on. “I think you’re right about me not running from Bear Paw. Dad would never ask me to stay, but he needs me around a little longer yet. I guess if you can live here seeing me often, and I know how hard that is for you, then I have to stop being a princess and suck it up, too.”

He gave a wry smile. “And not get sick.”

“Yeah.” She bumped his shoulder. “There is that.”

He raised the bottle. “To broken hearts.”

Tears splashed her cheeks. “Oh, Ty, I’m so sorry.”

He tilted the bottle to his mouth and drank until there was nothing left.

—

JOSH
had just finished a virtual consultation—an Internet video call—with a woman living out on a ranch forty miles away. She had a husband and three sick kids, and she wasn’t looking too well herself. Fortunately, he’d been able to rule out meningitis and ease her mind that it was the flu and save her an eighty-mile round trip.

The intercom buzzed. “Doctor, there’s a guy waiting and I want to go home so get your keister out here.”

He ground his teeth. From an administration perspective, Bethany had actually managed to run the clinic over the last two days relatively smoothly. She’d successfully uploaded all the test results where he could find them, and the follow-up appointments had all been booked. But she had the personality of sandpaper—abrasive and scratchy.

I
want to go home, too.
Except, if he was honest, he didn’t. Not really. Katrina’s scent still lingered in unexpected places, reminding him of her, and he hated how empty that made him feel. But she’d made her position very clear, and as much as he missed her, he wouldn’t be held to ransom.

He clicked his mouse on the screen to bring up the next patient file, but there was none. This surprised him because Bethany had been on top of that from the start. With a sigh, he pushed back from the desk and walked down the hall to the reception office. “Bethany, I need the patient’s file.”

She raised her crutch and pointed into the almost empty waiting room. A tall man in a tailored suit stood with his back to them.

“Drug company rep?”

“Dunno,” Bethany said, opening a drawer to retrieve her purse. “He was asking to see Katrina and when I said she wasn’t here, he tried to sweet-talk me to tell him where she was.” She crossed her arms and gave off the impression of being a military tank. “Hah! As if I’d fall for that one. He got a bit pissy and asked to speak to my supervisor”—she rolled her eyes as if to say
no one supervises me
—“and as Millie finished half an hour ago, that leaves you.”

A man who wanted to see Katrina? “What’s his name?”

“Wouldn’t say.”

It suddenly occurred to him that this was Bear Paw and if Bethany didn’t know the man, then no one in town would. The guy turned and Josh took in the tailored suit, his salon-cut hair, the silk tie and Italian leather shoes and the massive bouquet of flowers in his hand, the cost of which would have spared no change from a hundred dollars. Surely he wasn’t Brent?

He won’t come this far. It’s the reason I came home
. Katrina’s statement hadn’t reassured him when she’d said it at the rock pool and it didn’t reassure him now. He took a quick glance out the window and saw a red Porsche parked by the curb looking incongruously out of place amid the dusty pickups. Flashy. Arrogant. A surgeon’s car.

His gut tightened as instinct told him this was the married bastard come to Bear Paw. Katrina had underestimated him.

White anger flared at what Brent had done to her, and he wanted to punch him in his very chiseled jaw. Only, he couldn’t do that or he’d lose his medical license, but the need to protect Katrina burned so hot and strong that a trickle of sweat beaded on his forehead. No way in hell was he allowing Brent anywhere near her.

Walking across the waiting room, he extended his hand. “Doctor Josh Stanton. Can I help you?”

“I hope so. I’m a friend of Katrina McCade,” he said with just the right amount of sociability to establish a rapport. “We worked together in Philadelphia and I only just heard the sad news that her mother had passed.” He inclined his head slightly toward the flowers. “As you’ll understand, I wanted to pass on my condolences in person, but I’m having some difficulty getting directions to the ranch.”

“Hah!” A snorting noise came from behind the partition that separated the receptionist from the waiting room. It was followed by the sound of a crutch hitting the metal of a filing cabinet.

This guy was smooth, Josh would give him that, and then he remembered what Katrina had told him.
He’s incredibly good at getting what he wants and he still wants me.

Well, he wasn’t getting her. There was no way in hell he’d allow Brent to use Katrina’s grief over the loss of her well-respected mother to ingratiate himself back into the life of the woman he loved.

His heart flipped as his mouth dried. He loved her.

He truly loved her.

That mass of confused feelings that he’d held for her—feelings that lurched between friendship and frustration, lust and appreciation—was love. He’d loved her for weeks without knowing.

He was a class A idiot. How could he have not recognized that he was head-over-heels in love?