Parker (12 page)

Parker shook his head. “Nope. And I can’t say
that I ever will.”

Callie smiled. “Well, she has great
followings on Twitter and Facebook, and she’s growing her base on
Google+. Her blog is the most fantastic thing ever though—she has
hundreds of thousands of followers. She e-mailed a few things to me
this morning, and I’m working up her blog post and then will be
sharing it around.”

Parker listened to his sister rattle on while
he pulled a skillet from the cabinet and retrieved bacon and eggs
from the refrigerator. There was still a half pot of coffee left,
so he poured himself a cup while the skillet was heating up. He
struggled with the plastic bacon package. “Why does Reba do all of
this twittering and posting and stuff?”

There. The zipper on the package opened. He
pulled out four slices of bacon and arranged them in the pan.
Callie still hadn’t answered.

He turned. “Callie?”

She was typing, staring at her computer
screen, where all kinds of messages were flying by.

Parker stepped forward. “What the hell is
that?”

“Twitter.” She glanced up. “Or rather, it’s
my twitter management system. I can manage several clients’
accounts with a quick glance.”

The rows kept spinning by.

“I don’t get this.”

She grinned. “I know. You just stick with
cows. It’s better that way.”

“Agreed.” He went back to the bacon, now
beginning to sizzle. “You didn’t answer me. Why does Reba do all of
this? What is her job?”

Silence.

He turned. “Callie, are you avoiding me?”

Another pause. Finally, she said, “Yes. I’m
avoiding answering that question.”

Parker turned the heat off under the skillet,
walked to the table, and sat down. “Why?”

“Because, well…” She bit her lip.

“Spill it, Callie.” Her hesitancy was
starting to get to him. Was there something she didn’t want to tell
him?”

“You like her, don’t you?”

He cocked his head. Where was this going?
“I’ll give you the short answer. Yes. I like her. A lot.”

“How much do you know about her, Parker?”

How much did he know? She was pretty and
spunky. She was tough when she needed to be and it took a lot for
her to cry, but when she did, watch out. She could handle him when
he got out of line. And, she was soft in all of the right places
and firm in the others. He glared at Callie. “I know enough.”

“There is a lot you don’t know though,
Parker. Do you want to know? Because maybe Reba has her reasons for
not telling you yet—”

“Then let Reba worry about telling me. It’s
not your place.”

“But you are my brother, and I don’t want you
to get hurt and—”

“Whoa. How am I going to get hurt?” His gut
was beginning to ache.
What the hell.

Callie closed her eyes and exhaled. Long.
“All right. Here is the deal. Reba and I…we decided to keep this
all hush-hush with the family the other day, until time comes. We
don’t want any leaks.”

“Leaks?”

Callie turned in her chair to face him.
“Parker, Reba is famous.”

Famous?
“What?”

“Yeah. She’s famous. I’m sure you never heard
of her because you don’t do blogs and stuff, but she’s real famous.
She has this fantastic food blog called
Bekah’s Cottage
where she does all kinds of homey food and craft and decorating
ideas. She makes her own soaps and natural make-up products too,
and she prides herself on using found and natural ingredients for
things—well, not for cooking—but she likes to use whole foods and
unprocessed and organic when it’s practical. See, she’s all about
the practical and then throw in a little bit of frugality, and
she’s…well, like I said, famous.”

“
Bekah’s Cottage
?”

“Yes. And there is a book deal, and her agent
is talking negotiations with a cable network for a TV show.”

Parker sat back. Dumfounded. “Why didn’t she
ever tell me any of this?”

“Did you ever ask?”

He shook his head. No, he hadn’t. Had he?
He’d been too busy avoiding and pushing her away in the beginning,
and then when the jealousy bug had bitten him, he’d jumped right
into her bed. Had he stopped to even inquire what Reba was all
about? What was important to her?

Had she done the same with him?

No. They really didn’t know each other, did
they?

“Penny for your thoughts.”

Parker shook himself out of a slight trance.
“Not worth a penny,” he said and rose from the table. He glanced at
the bacon in the pan and put the eggs back in the refrigerator.
Then he headed for the door.

“Where are you going?”

“Not hungry. Something I need to do.”

“Parker, wait. There is one more thing I want
you to know. I think it’s important.”

He turned, still dazed. What else?

“Did you know that Reba was married once
before?”

He blinked. “Yes. Yes I knew that, but I
don’t know what happened.” One more thing he didn’t know about the
woman he was falling in love with.

Callie took a deep breath and then let it out
slowly. She held his gaze. “He died, Parker. Six months ago. He had
cancer, and she cared for him until the end. She never let her fans
know, and she kept it all inside. Now, she’s getting ready to make
some things public because of the book deal and the potential TV
show contract. It’s what she wants to do, but it’s going to be a
difficult time for her, I think.”

Parker’s brain was spinning. How could Reba
have kept all of this information from him? Why didn’t he know
this? He would never have taken her to bed if he’d known….

Would he?

Maybe she didn’t want you to know.

“Parker?”

He turned for the door. “Stay as long as you
like, Callie. There’s something I have to do.”

Something I should have done days
ago
.

****

Reba was in the midst of juggling a hot
cookie sheet of Old-Fashioned Honey Oatmeal Cookies with her good
hand while poking at her cell phone ringing on the counter with the
forefinger of her bad hand when the pounding came at her front
door.

She glanced to the phone. Callie.

“I’ll call you back,” she said to the phone,
not answering.

The cookie sheet landed on the stovetop with
a bit of a clatter—she wasn’t used to this one-handed approach to
baking yet. Then she looked down the hallway toward her door. Who
in the hell had ventured up to her cabin?

Wiping her hands on her apron, she went to
the door, peeked out the sidelight, and saw him.

She opened the door. “Parker. Hi!” She
smiled.

Her barreled past her, not smiling.

Well, hello there,
Mr. Personable
.

She followed him into the kitchen where he
halted by the island, hands on hips, glancing from the cookies on
the stove, to her laptop on the kitchen table, to the pile of
paperwork beside it.

“What’s your job, Reba?”

She approached him from the side. “What are
you asking me, Parker? Really.”

He turned, leaned his backside into the
island, and crossed his arms over his chest.

“I didn’t know you were famous.”

Ah. The reason for Callie’s call. “I’m only
famous in the foodie world. It’s nothing to get excited about.” She
went back to the cookies, found a spatula, and began removing them
from the cookie sheet to the clean counter to cool.

“But you didn’t tell me.”

“You didn’t ask.”

“Did you ask me about my job?”

She looked up. “Parker. Your job is obvious.
You live on a ranch. You’re a rancher.”

“And yours isn’t so obvious, so why didn’t
you tell me?”

She shrugged. “What does it matter?”

“It matters.”

Suddenly Reba was confused. “Why?”

“Because I want you to share things like that
with me.”

Reba picked up the cookie sheet and took it
to the sink, running water over it and scraping off the crusty
parts. Her brain was trying to work over the puzzle of his words,
and she needed a minute. What was he truly saying?

She turned. Parker was behind her. Almost too
close. “There were reasons why I hadn’t mentioned it to you yet.
It’s all tied up in a big circle with some other things that I’m
still working through, and it was just too much to talk about. I
really didn’t think it would be a big deal.”

He studied her, arms still crossed. “Are some
of those other things about your husband and his recent death?”

Pain sliced through her heart. She broke away
and stumbled toward the window, away from him. “Callie should not
have told you.”

“She’s my sister. She thought I should
know.”

Reba spun back. “I was going to tell you
that. I just wanted to find the right way and time. I wasn’t ready
for you to know. That was a very difficult time for me.”

He stepped closer and reached for her elbow.
Reba instinctively jerked back and saw the sudden hurt in his
eyes.

He paused, stopping whatever words were about
to exit his mouth. For several heartbeats, they stared at each
other. Finally, he said, “I understand it was a difficult time.
What I don’t understand is why you let me make love to you the
other night, without me knowing that you are probably still
grieving the loss of your husband. Reba, this is awful soon for
you.”

She turned away, walking back toward the
island, and then whirled back to face him. “I’ll decide when it’s
right for me to share things about my late husband and whether I
have grieved long enough and whether I want to sleep with someone.
That is my business, Parker, not yours. I decide.”

He dropped his gaze, staring at the floor.
“Of course it is. But if I fall in love with you because of our
making love and you decide later that it’s too soon for you, then
it’s my business.” He paused, stepped closer, and peered down into
her eyes. “Reba, I shouldn’t have made love to you. I’m sorry.
You’re not ready. I’m not ready to deal with everything you have
going on around you. I’m not ready to have a relationship because
of everything going on around me. It’s too much for either of us to
expect we can start to build a relationship until some things calm
down.”

Reba swallowed. Hard. And lifted her chin.
She didn’t want to hurt Parker. Had never wanted to hurt Parker.
She did care for him. A lot. He was all she’d thought about for the
past day and a half. But…

“Parker, I just wanted sex the other night. I
wanted to feel a man’s body next to mine. I wanted the pleasure and
the closeness. It had been a long time. I don’t want a relationship
or a commitment. You’re right. I’m not ready for that. And it
sounds like you are not ready either. So no worries.”

She hoped that set his mind at ease.

But the range of emotion that flashed over
his face then said otherwise. “So, it was just sex. Just casual.
Just another roll in the hay. For you.”

It almost pained her to say the next word,
but she did. “Yes.”

Parker stepped back, raked his hands through
his hair, and looked away. He stood there for a moment, staring
off, his lips tightly pursed. Then his gaze lifted, caught hers,
and he stared at her for a length of time.

Reba swore his eyes were misty.

“All right,” he said. “I get it. Good-bye,
Reba.” Then he strode past her and out the door.

Out of her life.

****

For the ten minutes it took him to get to the
main road, Parker fought the stinging emotion behind his eyelids.
During the five minutes’ drive to his ranch entrance, he swallowed
back the sting, but it was stuck in his throat.

By the time he reached the barn, he figured
he could talk, so he parked and dialed Murphy’s number.

Murphy answered on the second ring.

“Yeah, boss.”

“Just listen. I don’t want to see anyone, and
I don’t want to talk to anyone until tomorrow. I’m heading up to my
cabin for the rest of the day and night. You know my cell phone
won’t work up there. If anyone asks where I am, just tell them I
need some time. And by God, do not let anyone come after me. There
is a bottle of whiskey with my name on it up there, and I plan to
consume every drop. If she asks, tell Liz I’ll meet her at Tom’s at
two o’clock tomorrow afternoon. You can handle anything that needs
handling between now and then. Got it?”

“Got it. Let me know if you need anything
else.”

“I will but I doubt it. Thanks, Murphy.”

He cut off the call, drove through the back
gate and up into the foothills.

Chapter
Thirteen

Late that night, Reba lay in her bed, staring
at the beams in the ceiling. The time was way past midnight, and
she had been up since six o’clock that morning, testing out recipes
for the potential show and the cookbook.

She was dead tired, but her brain wouldn’t
shut down.

She spent two hours on the phone with her
agent after Parker stormed out, and she was certain she had not
retained a single thing they discussed. She hoped Elayne would
recap in e-mail for her tomorrow, as she usually did.

She didn’t call Callie back, although
Parker’s sister had tried to reach her two more times that
afternoon. She just wasn’t in the mood to talk anymore.

Or think.

That’s why she went to bed. Of course, now
she was wide-awake, with no chance at sleep anytime soon because
her brain kept tripping over the scene in her kitchen with Parker,
trying to make some sense of it all.

She’d been way too blunt. He was only trying
to understand. He was actually trying to show her he was interested
in her and for reasons beyond sex.

She had totally turned the tables and pretty
much told him she was a slut. That she wasn’t interested in
anything beyond sex, and good sex, thank you very much.

She’d blown it. She’d been too focused on her
dreams, her goals, and just doing something to please herself. For
once. She hadn’t considered his feelings or his needs, at all.