Tough Luck Hero (25 page)

“Maybe that's why my brother never comes back.”

She knew him well enough to know that he didn't mean to hurt her with that comparison, but all things considered, it kind of stung. “Maybe. You don't know what happened with him?”

“I just assume that he left because he didn't want to fall in line with my dad. Which I imagine didn't go over very well. You don't oppose my father unless you don't want him in your life.”

“But you don't know why?” she asked, pressing gently. “I mean, not for sure.”

“Now you're making this about me.”

“Full circle,” she said. “It started about you.”

“But you... I'm sorry. We should be talking about you.”

“I don't particularly want to talk about me. There's a reason that you haven't heard that story before. There's a reason it doesn't make it into campaign speeches. I'm not interested in a pity vote. I'm not interested in using my sister's life or death to enhance my life in any way.” That was only part of the truth, but it was good enough.

“Regardless, you told me.” He cleared his throat. “I feel like...I guess, that we should discuss it.”

“Why?” she asked, feeling almost like she had found some of her composure again. “So that I can cry? Get it all out? It's been fifteen years.”

“It still hurts,” he said, and she knew that he was talking about his loss too. The abandonment of an older brother that he didn't even want to come home.

“Nobody tells you that emptiness is so heavy,” she said. “But it is. Losing somebody carves this hole out inside of you, and it's so useless. This void that lets you know something is missing, always, but somehow adds weight to your every step. But, while it never goes away, you do get used to it. You get strong enough to walk with the extra burden.”

He didn't say anything. He tightened his hold on her and pushed the swing slightly with his foot. She didn't need him to say anything, anyway. It was just nice to have someone understand for a second. At least, she would pretend that he understood. She knew he didn't understand all of it. That part that he perceived as abandonment. But he was still there. Still sitting with her. So she supposed that he didn't find her completely reprehensible.

“It's amazing how much the lack of someone can change things. How someone being gone can make you see just how much they did when they were here.” Colton's voice was soft, low in her ear. “I don't think I ever felt my brother as much as when he wasn't there.”

Lydia took a deep breath, trying to banish the tenderness in her chest. She felt like she had been opened up, and that something of Colton had gotten inside. It was exhilarating and terrifying. She wasn't sure she liked it. Feeling close to someone. Feeling like someone knew. Like someone had an insight into who she was.

Not just
anyone
.
Colton
.

She didn't particularly want to be vulnerable in front of anyone, but only a few short weeks ago she would have said he was probably the last person on earth she wanted to show any weakness in front of. And here she was, presenting herself to him without barriers in place.

It was an extension of the madness from last night, she knew. But knowing that didn't mean there was anything she could do to stop it. She was bleeding out emotionally and she had no idea what to do to stop it.

She wanted to make it stop. Wanted to make it so she was somewhere else. Or so she was at least thinking a little bit less.

She angled her head and reached up, running her fingertips along his jawline. His dark gaze met hers, and she saw the same thing there. The desire to pull back. Regret, because he had said more than he wanted to. Because they had both revealed more than they normally would have.

She rescued them both. She closed the distance between them, kissing him. She intended to blot out the emotion with physical desire, but there was something different about this kiss. She waited for the fierce current of need to sweep them both under. It was there. There was no chance it wouldn't be. But it simply swirled around them, didn't drag them under. She was firmly in the present, caught up in the need that he made her feel, but far too aware.

Aware of who she was. Aware of who he was.

She closed her eyes tight, deepened the kiss. She lost herself in the sensation, determined to drown in it. The velvet slide of his tongue and the masculine scent of him. The sweet ache of desire that built down low inside of her. Drowning out some of the pain in her heart. Stripping an edge from it, leaving it dull, rather than lethally sharp. But it was still there. Radiating outward, competing with her desire now.

“I think we had better take this inside, don't you?” he asked after a few moments.

“I think you're right.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

W
HEN
HIS
SISTER
'
S
frantic texts called him off the job site the next day, Colton was less than amused. Still, he got in his truck and drove down to the Chamber of Commerce, as directed by an overenthusiastic Sierra.

When he got there, the two of them were already in the parking lot. Sierra was carrying a binder that was large enough to obscure her baby bump, and Madison was simply standing there, looking as placid and unreadable as ever. Which meant that something shocking was likely to come out of her mouth. Although, with Madison, that was usually the case.

“What exactly are the two of you doing here? And why did you need me?”

“Planning your wife's party!” Sierra said.

For once, it didn't seem strange at all to have Lydia's image in his mind when someone said the word
wife
. He didn't think of Natalie much at all.

“I see. And does my wife know that you're coming?”

Maddy waved her hand. “No. But since the West family is so generously allowing her the use of our property, I don't suppose she can be too bent out of shape over planning it on our time.”

“My dearest lady of leisure,” Colton said, “not all of us spend a very small amount of time teaching riding lessons and the rest of our time polishing our nails. Some of us have work that's a little more demanding.”

“Bite me, Colton,” Madison said, flashing him a brilliant smile. “I work more than forty hours a week, you degrading jackass. Anyway, your sister could go into labor anytime over the next couple of weeks, so we have to plan it around her and her cankles.”

Sierra scowled and looked down. “I do not have cankles. They're a little bit swollen. But there is still a calf and an ankle. But Maddy has a point. I've been having a lot of Braxton Hicks. And given the things that they say induce labor, I have a feeling I'm going to go early.”

“What things?” he asked.

Sierra arched a brow. “Things you don't want to hear about, dearest brother. Things concerning my husband and the fact that he doesn't mind my cankles.”

“Okay, you're right, I don't need to know. Now, let's go ambush my wife with your binder.” Colton followed his sisters across the parking lot and toward the building. “So you have a plan now?”

“Yes,” Maddy said. “Dad is paying for everything. It's his contribution.”

“I see. And why hasn't he called me about any of this?”

“Have you been pestering him? Because I have.”

“No,” he said, “I haven't talked to him at all.”

They had one hell of a weird family—there was no denying that. His father depended on him to do his bidding, and yet, rarely made contact. His mother, on the other hand, was in frequent contact, and it was unusual for him to go more than a week without talking to his sisters.

And then there was the half brother.

Yeah, he didn't really want to think about his family right now.

When they walked in, Marlene was sitting at the front desk, as she had been the last time he had come into the Chamber. “Hi, Marlene,” he said.

The older woman smiled, then blushed. “Well, hello, Mr. West.”

“Colton. And these are my sisters, Sierra and Maddy.”

Marlene made all the requisite comments about Sierra being ready to have the baby any day now, asking for the gender and the due date, and all of the things that people seemed unable to hold back in the presence of a pregnant woman. Sierra, for her part, was long-suffering and friendly.

The extricated themselves as quickly as possible and went down the hall, toward Lydia's office.

“You've obviously been here before,” Maddy said, treating him to an assessing look.

“Yes, I have been to my wife's office before.” He knew that his sister was still a little suspicious about the circumstances of his marriage. He would love to be defensive about that, but in this case, the suspicions were correct, so there really was no ground for him to stand on.

“Very supportive.”

“I am supportive, Madison. As you should well know.”

Madison made a jerk off motion with her hand. And then turned and knocked on the door to Lydia's office.

“Come in.” At the sound of Lydia's voice, his stomach twisted tight. He wanted her, that easily, that simply. He wished that he was not with Sierra and Madison, because he wished that they could be alone. He wished that he could fulfill that fantasy he had had about taking her over her desk.

Madison was eyeing his face speculatively, and that killed his fantasy a little bit.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she said, twisting the doorknob and pushing the door open. “Hi.” Her voice turned instantly cheery. “We thought it might be a good time to come and plan your election night party.”

Lydia tilted her head to the side. “Okay. I mean, it is, but usually I have appointments...”

“I called ahead,” Madison said. “Not you, but the woman who works at the front desk, Marlene? She said you were free.”

Maddy took her seat in front of the desk, and Sierra took the other available chair. Colton leaned up against the back wall, only shrugging his shoulders when Lydia looked up at him with about a thousand questions in her dark eyes.

“I brought some ideas for setting. And theme,” Sierra said. His sister was making a little bit of a name for herself with interior design, after having done her husband's new brewery. Obviously she was now extending this skill to planning family events.

“That's very... That's very nice of you,” Lydia said, looking more scared than excited.

“You're family. And of course we want to support your campaign.”

Maddy tapped her fingers on the desk. “Of course.”

“Thank you,” Lydia said, shooting him another look. He treated her to another shrug.

They started going through guest lists, and practicalities regarding setting up screens so that they could watch as the news of the election results was announced.

“Oh,” Sierra said. “Do you have any family from out of town you want to invite? We'll make sure we give them a table of honor.”

Lydia's expression went stony. “No.”

Sierra frowned. “No one?”

“She said no,” Colton said, pushing away from the wall and walking toward the desk, his chest tightening. “Just leave it.”

Lydia shot him an irritated look. “It's fine,” she said to Colton. “Thank you for thinking of everything.” She directed that comment to Sierra.

Truly, he did not feel like she was grateful enough for his intervention.

“Well,” Sierra said, her tone conciliatory, “you will have family there. Because we'll be there. You're part of our family now.” His sister sounded like she was getting choked up, which was kind of par for the course with her hormones at the moment.

Lydia reached across the desk, patting Sierra on the hand. “Thank you. That's...very sweet.”

“I think that covers everything important,” Madison said, standing, and encouraging Sierra to do the same.

“I'll call you if I have any more questions but I would like to make it so that I handle as much as possible. I don't want to make this any more work for you,” Sierra said.

Lydia eyed Sierra's stomach. “I'm pretty sure I'm more worried about your workload.”

“I'm ready to pinch-hit should she go into labor before the party,” Maddy said.

“I'm not worried about the party. I'm worried about exhausting a pregnant woman.”

Sierra waved a hand. “I'm young.”

Maddy nodded. “Obnoxiously so.”

“If it gets to be too much for you...”

“I've got it,” Maddy said. “Everything will be fine. This won't make more work for you.”

“I don't mean to sound ungrateful at all. I just... Why are you doing all of this for me?”

“Because you're family. Because this matters to Colton if it matters to you, and that makes it matter to us,” Sierra supplied.

“I hated that bitch Natalie,” Maddy added.

Lydia's eyebrows shot upward. “Okay then. I accept either way. Thank you both.”

“Goodbye to you both,” Colton added.

“Eager to get rid of us?” Sierra asked.

“Very,” he said, looking at Lydia, and that wasn't even part of the show. It was just the truth. He wanted to grab her and pull her into his arms and give her a kiss. He wanted to do more than that, but he wouldn't, because she would probably get mad at him if he interrupted her workday further.

“Bye,” Maddy said, grabbing hold of Sierra and leading her out of the office.

Once they left, Lydia let out a hard breath and grabbed hold of her temples. “I feel like such a jerk.”

“Why?”

“They think I'm family.”

“Mostly, it's the thing about how much they hated Natalie.”

“Whatever. I don't really like tricking your sisters.”

“I don't, either. I mean, obviously I'm not perturbed enough by it to not do it.”

She huffed out a laugh. “Eli and Sadie know.”

“Eli knows?”

“Well, I had to tell Sadie, because there's no way she would believe that I just ran off and married you in a fit of passion, since I don't do fits of passion.”

“I beg to differ, but go on.”

She quirked her mouth to the side and treated him to an unamused look. “Anyway. I had to tell her, and she said she tells Eli everything, so I can only assume he knows. But he was also sworn to secrecy.”

“I'm lying to my sisters,” he said. “And you apparently have a whole posse of people who know what's going on with us.”

“But you're the only person who knows much of anything about me.”

Those words hit him in a strange place, somewhere in the center of his chest. Made him feel like he'd suffered a crack in the retaining wall around his heart.

Her cheeks turned pink, and he could tell that she regretted the moment of sincerity. He wasn't sure if he did or not.

He decided not to say anything. Instead, he decided to give in to what he'd been wanting to do since he first walked into the room. He moved to her desk, reaching out and taking her hand, drawing her up and pressing a kiss to her lips. “Hi,” he said.

“You greeted me already,” she said, her voice breathless. He didn't think he had ever made Natalie breathless. Or anyone else, for that matter. It did something to him. She did something to him.

“Yeah, but not properly.”

“Now I forgot what we were talking about.”

“For the best, probably.”

She laughed. “I can't argue with that. So, I guess there's going to be a party at your parents' house.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I guess so. That will be interesting.”

“You don't talk to your dad very often, do you?”

Her words echoed his earlier thoughts. “Not really. Unless he's issuing edicts or laying out complaints, Nathan West doesn't have much to say to his kids. I suppose this party for you is his approval. Or it's just revenge because he's still angry about Natalie humiliating the family.”

“You got left at the altar and he never even called to check on you?”

It was Colton's turn to laugh. “Why would he do that? That would imply that he was concerned my feelings might be hurt. Or that I had emotions wrapped up in this in any way at all. He wouldn't get why I wasted any time feeling bad about a woman.”

“That seems...”

“Cold? Unfeeling? You have to remember, this is the man who had a secret affair years ago that resulted in a child. And that same man kept it a secret from his wife, from his whole family for more than thirty years. My father is not a man terribly in touch with his emotions.”

“Unlike you?”

“Next to him I look like a damn Care Bear.”

She pressed her hand to his stomach and pushed against his abs. “Aren't you supposed to have some kind of rainbow light that shoots out of you or something?”

“I regret my choice of simile. Stop pressing on my stomach.”

“It pretty much doesn't press. Your abs are crazy.”

“Dusty enough for you?”

She pushed him. “That isn't fair. I don't make any jokes about the other women you've slept with.”

“I know. Because you're way too nice.”

“I am not nice.”

“Nice as peaches.”

She scowled. “Peaches aren't nice. They're gross.”

“Yours taste pretty sweet.”

He really was just a few seconds away from pushing her over that desk and having his way with her. He'd had her twice last night. It had done nothing to take the edge off his need. Here it was the middle of the day, he should be at work, and yet, all he could think about was her. It was like he was having some kind of delayed adolescence. The one he had never really been able to afford to have, because he had been too busy trying to be the shining example next to Gage's tarnished one.

“That's filthy,” she said.

“You like it.”

She looked away from him. “A little bit.” She took a breath, and met his gaze again. “So, I assume that you're going to talk to your father at my dinner.”

“About the weather?”

“More than that. I thought you might talk to him about...about your ranch.”

He frowned, extricating himself from her hold. “Why would I do that?”

“Because it's important to you. I understood that the first moment you showed me your barn and your horses, but yesterday...yesterday I really understood. That place is your dream, Colton. That's where you see your life headed. Kids on that swing. That property. It isn't at your parents' ranch, and you know that.”

“I've spent more than thirty years not discussing any of those things with him. I don't know why I would start now.”

“Because you were just talking yesterday about how—”