Maybe sleep would help. A solid eight hours could do me some good.
I finished up in the shower, then dried off and padded to the spare room. I’d bought a couple throw pillows while we’d been out to liven up the place a bit. But theyou are my sunshinepillow just seemed sad in the room.
And I don’t know what it was about it, or if it really had anything to do with it at all, but I lost it. Completely and totally lost it.
Big, fat tears rolled down my cheeks, a weight settling around my shoulders like a ton of cement blocks. The knot in my chestconstricted so tight that I couldn’t breathe. Wrapped in nothing but a towel, hair dripping wet still, I sunk to the floor, sobs wracking me so thoroughly I thought I might die of the pain. Brandy nudged me, raining kisses on my face, but I ignored them. I appreciated the love, but couldn’t accept it. Not right now.
You see, when you’re seen as all sunshine and wildflowers and everything light and happy, everyone just expects you to be strong and keep your cool in hard situations. And for the most part, I strived to uphold that belief. But sometimes that optimistic, golden girl just couldn’t fight the darkness.
I’d been so worried about taking care of Maverick, of making sure he was okay, that I’d used it as a Band-Aid to not worry about myself.
But seeing that sunshine pillow against a mound of grey and black pillows was the saddest, most accurate depiction of my life right now.
Only problem…I didn’t have many happy thoughts to keep me shining. Okay, that was a bit dramatic, but a girl could feel, right?
I’d woken up yesterday unknowing of just how much my world would be flipped upside down in a day. At least Brandy was okay, at least I still had my truck and Country Road, but now I’d ventured into unknown territory.
A home made of brick and mortar, no wheels to just up and leave. The need to get a job—yet another thing tying me down to this place… Not that Mercenary Ranch wasn’t nice or that I was ungrateful for Maverick, Charlie, Ryder, and Cash’s kindness and hospitality. But it was all so new and foreign and…
Brandy started barking. Barking. Barking.
“Brandy!” I sobbed, but she just kept barking at the door, and I was too much of a mess to stop her.
A knock came a few moments later.
“I’m fine!” I called, biting back a torrent of emotion and tears as I tried to get myself up off the floor. I’d barely stood when the door slowly opened inward, Maverick’s tall frame taking up the entirety of the doorway.
Maverick’s eyes, swirling with worry, landed on me, a silent question lingering there—What happened?
Chapter eighteen
Dig
Maverick
Iwas working inthe garage when I heard the barking. Incessant, insistent barking. The kind meant to get your attention.
Brandy.
Dread coiled in my stomach as I dropped the wrench on the table, not bothering with putting it away.
Was Cheyenne okay? What was wrong? She’d seemed fine when I’d left her in the house a bit ago.
My feet ate up the distance to the house, through the living room, and down the hall. Each step sent my pulse rising, the fluttering in my heart beating faster than damn hummingbird wings. My knuckles rapped on the door to her room.
“I’m fine!” Her voice sounded weak, broken, the words a choked-out sob.
The dread turned tighter in my stomach. She wasn’t fine.
I opened the door gingerly, too worried to wait for an invitation, and found her standing in the middle of the room, clutching a grey bath towel to her chest. Her hair was wet and she smelled like my soap. I know it was indecent of me, but she looked so beautiful and so broken in thatmoment.
My lips pursed as I lingered in the doorway. Brandy whined and spun around, looking between Cheyenne and I. Tears leaked down Cheyenne’s cheeks as she clung to her towel, her eyes deep turquoise pools of emotion.
“I-I’m s-sorry,” she sobbed. “I t-tried to c-calm her d-down.”
I frowned, shaking my head, even as I pulled her into my arms. Did she think I was mad at Brandy? She was a dog. That’s what they did. In fact, she deserved some extra attention for letting me know something was wrong. Cheyenne all but fell into my touch. It’s like she had no more strength in her.
“I-I’m sorry,” she murmured, over and over and over.
