Rough, Raw and Ready (10 page)

When Edgard didn’t elaborate, Trevor demanded, “You gonna explain that comment? Or you gonna sit there with that smug-ass look and make me guess?”

“Trying to explain it when you’re in a piss-poor mood would be a waste of breath.”

Edgard gave Trevor a cool once-over. “And for the record, I’m not acting smug. I’m just as screwed up about all this with Chassie as you are.”

“Right. I’m sure you’re happy as shit.”

Seething, Edgard snapped, “You never had the balls to tell me how you felt when we were together every goddamn day, so don’t you
ever
fucking presume to tell me anything about the way I feel now when you haven’t seen me for three and a half fucking years.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“Yeah, you did, so just drop it. Jesus.”

“Fine.”

“Fine,” he retorted.

Meridian grunted and her tail slapped the wall again.

www.samhainpublishing.com 73

Rough, Raw, and Ready

Time dragged on, yet there was no place Edgard would rather be than right there, even if they both were angry, frustrated and not speaking. Hell, it was practically normal for them.

Casually, Trevor remarked, “You’re playin’ with your hair again.”

Edgard lowered his hand. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. Long as we’re bein’ honest and chattin’, all friendly like, I wanna know if you stabled a corral full of young studs durin’ the last few years? Or did you just pick one stallion to ride?”

For claiming to be a plainspoken man, sometimes Trevor’s verbiage confounded him. “A few one-nighters here and there. Guy named Reynaldo stuck around longer than most.”

“How long?”

Edgard shrugged. “Less than a year. I wasn’t sorry it ended, just the way it did.”

Rey’s outburst, “
I won’t spend my life in the middle of a fuckin’ jungle with a dirt-covered rancher”
, and Edgard had been glad to see the ass end of him.

“Bad break up with Reynaldo send you scurryin’ back to the States?”

Trevor’s tone smacked of conceit and Edgard sought to shatter his cool. “No. Rey was a great fuck. Nothin’ that boy wouldn’t do in bed. He wanted a sugar daddy, a citified
papi
with deep pockets. When Rey realized it wasn’t gonna be a free ride, he bailed to richer pastures. He never was worth a shit with the livestock.”

“But I’ll bet he was a pretty boy, huh?”

“Yep. Thought I’d try since that type ain’t ever been my taste.”

Trevor grimaced. “And yet, somehow I’m offended by that statement when I got no right to be.”

“Sorry to burst your bubble, Trev, but you ain’t been pretty a day in your life. You’re hot as shit in that, don’t-fuck-with-me-I’m-totally-hetero way, but definitely not pretty.”

“This conversation is deteriorating.”

“You brought it up.”

“Yeah, I did.”

74

www.samhainpublishing.com

Lorelei James

“Turnabout is fair play. How many bunnies hopped on you in that same time frame?”

“Way too many. I could lie and say I was such a fucktard because I’d been drinkin’, but mostly I was stone cold sober after the first six months after you left.” Trevor picked at a chunk of wood in the gate top. “I was miserable drunk and miserable sober.”

Edgard lived that existence too. “Damn good thing I barged my way back into your life and livened things up, eh?”

Trevor laughed. “Asshole. You always could make me laugh. Especially at shit that ain’t funny.”

How pathetic did it make him that Edgard lived for those moments of Trevor’s unrestrained laughter?

“We had some good times, Ed. Easy to forget we were friends first. Even when we were nailin’ each other at every chance, we were still friends.”

“Sometimes I miss that constant companionship more than the sex.”

Trevor appeared to be weighing his response—probably disbelief.

“What?”

“Speakin’ of missin’ companionship…she ain’t been gone an hour and I already miss her. We haven’t spent a single night apart since I moved in.”

Be petty to point out after Trevor and Edgard became lovers they hadn’t spent many nights apart either.

“Think that’s sappy? Think I’m pussy-whipped?”

“No. I’m jealous as hell. But if you get too lonely, remember, you can always crawl in bed with me. I’ll warm the
cock
-les of your heart.”

“Goddammit, you’re offerin’ to polish my pole after all that ‘I ain’t touchin’ you’

line of bullshit…” Trevor’s voice trailed off when he noticed Edgard’s big grin. “Real funny. You’re a fuckin’ riot, Mancuso.”

“Just trying to lighten things up. I know this is serious stuff, but I’m tired of standing around doing nothin’. Don’t you have fence post holes to dig or some menial, backbreaking, punishing shit work?”

www.samhainpublishing.com 75

Rough, Raw, and Ready

Trevor rolled his eyes. “What part of livin’ in the tundra is confusin’ to you, jungle boy? The ground is frozen solid.”

“There’s gotta be other chores that need done.”

“Trust me, there’s plenty to do around here, especially with Chass gone.”

Meridian neighed loudly and flopped to the ground.

“Shit.” Trevor opened the door to the stall. “This’s been goin’ on for days. I have no idea what’s wrong.”

“Do you want me to call the vet?”

Trevor tossed off, “Can’t afford it. You’re way better with horses. You wanna give me a hand? Maybe between the two of us we can figure something out.”

For the next few hours they worked side by side. Without sexual tension. Without covert looks. Without accidental touches. Just two ranchers doing a job that’d been a normal part of their lives, separately, but never together.

And for Edgard, it was enough. For now.

76

www.samhainpublishing.com

Lorelei James

Chassie was such a basket case that she drove around for over an hour without remembering her destination.

Wheatland. For her friend Zoey’s bridal shower.

Right. Like Chassie had any business passing out marital advice.

But she couldn’t go home, not after she’d made such a point about needing time to sort things out. She could check into a motel. Hole up in misery and anonymity. Or she could drive to Denver and pour her heart out to her cousin Keely.

Damn humbling to realize she didn’t have any place to go and few people in her life she could really talk to. Even if she claimed a dozen close girlfriends, the my-husband-is-in-love-with-another-man scenario smacked of an episode of
Jerry Springer
and wasn’t a topic she felt comfortable discussing with anyone. She suspected whoever she told would tell someone else—in complete confidence of course—and that person would tell another person, and so on. The gossip, which Trevor and Edgard had managed to avoid for years, would run rampant.

Not to mention people would gape at her with pity. She’d grown up being the brunt of those soft-eyed expressions. First because she was mixed race, unclaimed by her mother’s tribe and shunned by most of her father’s relatives. Didn’t help that Chassie’s family history included her father, who’d built a reputation as a real asshole, her mother’s status as a doormat, and the rumors about Dag before and after his tragic death. Chassie was the little half-breed with the weird name who’d worked herself damn near to death to keep a ranch her lazy father had never wanted.

Yeah, this situation would be the real kicker.

Gossip had run amok when Trevor Glanzer married her. Now that Chassie really thought about it, why had Trevor pursued her with such zeal? Because he couldn’t be www.samhainpublishing.com 77

Rough, Raw, and Ready

with Edgard? So he’d settled for her? Or because Trevor broke ties with his family and wanted a ranch to call his own? What would be an easier way to get quick land ownership than to charm the plain, simple daughter of a drunken fool? A lonely young woman who was set to inherit a ranch? A rundown ranch, to be sure, but it’d be a perfect place to start.

That possibility filled her with such nausea that she pulled along the side of the road and dry heaved. Chassie left the truck running and pressed her forehead into the steering wheel. Wouldn’t solve anything to bang her head against the molded plastic as she repeated
dumb,
dumb, dumb
to the empty cab but she wanted to do it anyway.

“I love you. I’ve never said that to another person. Think on that.”

Maybe that’s what hurt the most. Chassie believed Trevor really did love her. She’d hoped for once in her life she alone would be enough to make someone happy.

But even on the best days, didn’t you sense that pocket of emptiness inside Trevor?

Chassie had chalked up those niggling doubts to them living in an isolated location away from his friends and Trevor’s estrangement from his family. She’d never imagined he’d be pining for a lover. A lover he’d convinced himself he could not have.

A semi whizzed past, rocking her truck with a whoosh of cold air. She lifted her head and stared at the snow lining the ditches. Dread sat in her chest like a lump of coal as the drive to Wheatland loomed. She felt too raw to face party games, shiny new pans and the shiny new hope in Zoey’s eyes.

Chassie dialed Zoey’s number, apologizing about missing the bridal shower as she spontaneously concocted a lie about Trevor being sick. It put her back to square one.

Nowhere to go and still wanting to talk to someone she could trust.

It hit her. Trevor said Colby knew the truth. She could talk to him. Dammit, he owed her after keeping this secret.

The line rang several times before Colby’s wife Channing picked up with a breathless, “Hello?”

“Channing, it’s Chassie.”

78

www.samhainpublishing.com

Lorelei James

“Hey. No, honey, I’m not going anywhere. Dang it, hang on a second.” A cry, then the scratchy noise of a receiver being shifted. “Sorry. Gib is cranky and insists I hold him all the time. So what’s up?”

“Is Colby around?”

“No. He won’t be back until later tonight. He went to an equipment auction with Cord and Colt and his dad. What did you need?”

“Just to talk to him.”

“You could try him on his cell.”

Chassie fought the urge to cry. “No, that’s okay.”

“Chassie? Is something wrong?”

A sob was all she could get out through the tight feeling in her throat.

“Did something happen to Trevor?”

“Yes.”

“Oh dear Lord, what?”

Don’t cry. Be strong.

She cleared her throat. “Edgard came back.”

Silence.

“Why didn’t you tell me about them?”

Gib started to cry. Channing said, “Why don’t you come over and we’ll talk about it?”

“I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

Not nearly enough time to formulate all the questions she had, but it was a start.

Channing and Colby McKay’s log house was as enchanting and homey and perfect as a cabin from a fairy tale. A fire burned in the slate fireplace. The scent of sugar cookies and coffee wafted from the kitchen. Toys—trucks and horses mostly—littered the living room.

www.samhainpublishing.com 79

Rough, Raw, and Ready

Chassie sank into the oversized chenille loveseat. Western art decorated the log walls, as well as a few pieces she recognized as her cousin Carter McKay’s artwork.

Hand knitted blankets in earth tones hung off the arms of the couch and the antique rocking chair. Children’s books were stacked on the sturdy pine coffee table next to a box of crayons, a pad of paper, a plate of smashed up animal crackers and a half-eaten banana.

Channing came around the corner and paused. “More coffee?”

“No. I’m fine.”

“Be right back.” A minute later Channing plopped on the couch directly across from Chassie and adjusted her shirt over her pregnant belly. She propped her feet up on the coffee table with a big sigh. “Much better.”

Chassie had spent time around Channing at various family events over the last few years. Her cousin’s wife was sweet, thoughtful and almost too nice to be true. Colby worshipped her. So Chassie was struggling with how this woman would view the situation between her, Trevor and Edgard.

“Let’s get right to it. Tell me what happened after Edgard showed up.”

While Chassie talked, and talked some more, Channing refilled her coffee cup.

Twice. Chassie realized Channing’s up and down movement wasn’t because the subject matter bothered her; rather it was as close as she could get to pacing without actually pacing.

After Chassie finished speaking, Channing handed her a tissue. “Thanks. I didn’t mean to cry.”

“I’d think it was odd if you weren’t crying.”

Chassie looked up. “Why didn’t anyone warn me about Trevor’s past with Edgard?”

“Anyone meaning Colby or I?”

She nodded.

“Because, sweetie, and this may be hard to hear, but the details about that past relationship isn’t our right to share with you.”

“How did you find out?” Chassie demanded.

80

www.samhainpublishing.com

Lorelei James

Channing met her angry glare head on. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know on two conditions.”

“Which are?”

“You promise that what we discuss is never repeated outside this room. And you keep an open mind about what you hear and don’t pass judgment on anyone involved until you’ve had time to think about it. Thoroughly.”

Chassie figured that’d be the most difficult promise to keep. But she wanted to know so badly…no, she wanted to
understand
so badly that she agreed.

“You asked how I found out about Trevor and Edgard? I walked in on them having sex.” Channing appeared to wait for Chassie’s gasp of outrage, and when she didn’t hear it she continued. “Long story short: Four years ago this summer, I wanted a wild Western adventure with a real cowboy. Colby said I could travel the circuit with them for ten days if I agreed to be their personal buckle bunny for all three men. Sometimes at the same time.”

Chassie’s jaw dropped. “You…and…Trevor…did it?”

“Yep. And me and Trevor and Colby. And me and Trevor and Edgard. And me and Trevor alone. And me and Colby alone. Obviously I clicked with Colby from the start.”