Page 97 of Roped

“Why not?”

He simply squeezes my waist in response.

“Okay, fine. You don’t want to leave me alone,” I concede. “Although, I will say why not because if this place is so secure, with cameras and everything, you going into town for an hour or two shouldn’t be an issue.”

His response is another flex of his arm around me and a growl.

I roll my eyes. “Have you ever heard of online shopping?” I chew on my lip then. “Actually, I don’t think that’s an option, because if this place is so super remote, I don’t think Amazon would deliver here. Ugh.” I poke his ribs with my elbow. “Radisson? Are you asleep?”

“Yeah,” he rumbles.

I sigh sharply. “No, you’re not.”

“Only ’cause you won’t stop gabbin’.”

Another poke of my elbow. “You could gab with me.”

He hums and if I didn’t know better, I’d think he’s seriously considering giving my suggestion a thought. But I do know him better, and he proves me right by what he says next: “Given how you ask all the questions and then turn around and answer them yourself, I don’t think you need anyone to gab with you.”

“Whatever,” I mutter, poking him again, and I swear I hear him smile. “I just don’t really get why you bought this place when you won’t even furnish it. Also, why is this place so far away from Rawhide when all your family is there?”

“’Cause this used to be my daddy’s place, where he grew up,” he says, and my heart jumps like it does every time he shares little pieces of information with me. “He wanted to move here one day. After Rawhide.” He lets a few moments pass in silence before adding, “He loved Rawhide, loved workin’ with Mars and everyone else. My ma loved takin’ care of her sister’s children too. But they never understood or agreed with the Grayson–Turner rivalry. My father supported Mars in his endeavors, but it wasn’t where his heart was, fightin’ for land. He was a worker, a nurturer, a cowboy. So his dream was to leave one day, when the time was right, go back to his own land.”

I hear him swallow behind me and my eyes sting. He told me about his family moving in with the Graysons after their parents died, which is how he came to be so close to them. But I didn’t know his family wanted nothing to do with the rivalry. Something, unfortunately, that comes with being involved with either a Grayson or a Turner.

“He couldn’t, of course. They were… gone long before that. Gone because of the very thing they wanted no part of. So I saved up my own money and bought it. Patched it up over the years. Stayed in this barn while doin’ it. Started to furnish it, but…” Another flex of his arm, telling me he couldn’t do it. “The best I could do was hire help to keep an eye on the place after all the repairs and take care of Tulip. While I tried to visit every few months. That’s all.”

So that’s why he lives here, in the barn. Because he can’t bear to live in a house he probably thought his family was going to live in. My heart twists in my chest as I ask quietly, “Do you want to live here someday?”

He squeezes my body again, this time tightly, tighter than usual, telling me yes.

“Is that your dream?” I ask, my voice even quieter than before.

“Don’t got dreams.”

I swallow thickly. Of course he doesn’t. Why would he, after everything he’s lost and has been through? How could I even expect him to? But I do. I want him to have dreams. I want him to have hopes and wishes. I want him to be happy. I want him to be excited about life, about waking up in the morning, facing another day. Wasn’t that why I wanted him to kill my father before I found out that was the point of contention between him and his sister?

But maybe that’s not the answer. Maybe the answer is being here. At his dad’s ranch. Because he’s different here than he was at Rawhide. Back there, he had tension in his body, his gait. He was dark and dangerous. He is all those things here, too, but there’s a calmness about him that I’ve only ever noticed when he’s sleeping. He smiles more or does whatever it is that passes for a smile with him. He talks more, too, though I still have to make him, but still. Maybe with time, his smiles will become wider and he’ll talk without prompting. The fact that I may not be here to see those things is something I’m choosing to ignore.

“I know,” I say, my voice as quiet as ever. “But if you did. Would you… would you live here forever? Bring your… that girl here? To live with you?”

The one he talked about the other day. The one that I am. But only for a little bit.

I’m not sure what I wanted him to say, but his next set of answers knocks the breath out of me. They make me feel both elated and devastated at the same time. “Yeah. But as isolated and secure as this place this, it still wouldn’t be enough to put my mind at ease.”

“So what would?”

His arm tightens around my body as he says, in a low voice, “Probably put my ring on her finger and marry her.” As if that wasn’t astonishing enough, he adds, “And then, maybe plant my baby in her belly as soon as I could so she’s tied to me more. So much so she wouldn’t even think about runnin’.”

I’m staring at the wall wide-eyed as I blurt out, “She wouldn’t. She’d never run from you.” He goes still behind me, frozen. Almost as much as me and I breathe out, “Radisson? Are you—”

My words vanish when he rolls me onto my back and hovers over me, his eyes dark, his face mean. “As much as I fuckin’ love your voice, I ain’t in the mood to gab. Not about this. So you’ve got two options: Find somethin’ else to do with your mouth on your own, or I will. Either way, in about three seconds, I’m gonna put your lips to better use, but I’ll leave it up you as to how.”

He has a habit of doing that, shutting me down when we’re about to talk about something serious. Surprisingly, he’s gotten comfortable talking about his past, but it’s his future that he refuses to dive into. He won’t even share with me if he’s found out anything about the people who’re supposed to be hunting me, us. And I’ve tried asking multiple times. All he says is that he’s taking care of it and I don’t need to worry. That he and the Graysons plus my brother have got it. And maybe I should push. But I don’t want him shutting down completely, and really, when has he ever done what I’ve asked him to?

“One,” he begins counting in his typical way.

Despite everything, a current of arousal thrums under my skin.