Page 76 of The One Who Saw Her: Boone

Boone braced both palms on the back of a chair, leaning into it like he needed the furniture to hold him upright. When he spoke, his voice was low and measured—not a man venting, but a man trying to be precise.

"I don't want to be angry at her. She was trying to help. She always is and I know that. But if she hadn't been so—her—about it, so loud and enthusiastic and determined to put her mark on every corner of this place, the inspector wouldn't have heard a word about the expansion. If he wouldn't have walked his clipboard-toting ass, we wouldn't be standing in this hole."

Silence settled thick and heavy, and something close to regret slithered down his spine.

"If I hadn't been so much, you wouldn't be in this mess?" Vivi's voice came from behind him.

Boone closed his eyes with regret. Had he known she was there he would have said—what? What exactly would he have said that was any different? His words were honest and correct and—well, shit. They were harsh and personal, and aimed at someone who hadn't deserved to hear them from across a room. If he said them to anyone, it should have been to her first and not bitching like the kitchen was a playground.

He turned around.

She had her feet planted like the floor was the only thing keeping her upright. Her eyes were wide, practically swallowing her face. And that lower lip—the one he'd kissed more times than he could count—had a slight quiver she was doing everything she could to hide.

"My spontaneity is endearing when it benefits you?" Her voice was remarkably steady for someone whose eyes weren't. "But not when it doesn't fit your agenda?"

"The structural engineer from the county inspected the foundation and the electrical. Both failed and put the project on hold."

Her eyes went impossibly wider, filling with something he recognized immediately—not defensiveness, not pride. Just pure, unguarded remorse. "I am so sorry."

"He heard about it from people in town. All the talk about the barn raising."

She pressed a hand over her mouth and shook her head slowly. "I had no idea this would cause a problem. None." He watched her throat bob as she forced a swallow. "You have every right to be angry."

"I'm not angry," he said, and meant it. "Just frustrated. I never wanted to do this in the first place but I got talked into it."

"I know." She lifted her chin slightly, something resolute moving through her expression despite the brightness in her eyes. "I will fix this."

The confidence in her tone was so strong that he believed her—and that was the problem. He believed she'd throw herself at the way she threw herself at everything—fully and completely and purely on emotion.

And he was about to cut that off before she could complicate this further.

"You've helped enough," he said, keeping his voice soft. "I'll take it from here."

She gave a shaky nod. "Of course. Of course." She turned toward the door, and he caught it—just a flash, just a second—the moisture at the corners of her eyes before she walked out.

He listened to her footsteps down the hall and the bedroom door close with barely a sound, but it felt like a door slamming on something that had just begun.

Rea looked at him with the patient, steel-spined expression of a woman who had outlasted every storm this family had ever produced. "You know those things needed to be fixed sooner or later."

"I was counting on later," Boone said. "When we had the money."

"How were you going to redo the electrical after sheetrock?" Colter asked and Boone didn’t have an answer. But it proved his point that they’d jumped into this without a thorough plan.

“Was it worth making her cry?" Eli asked. "She already felt terrible. Did you have to go that far?"

"What did I say?" Boone asked, frowning.

"There's no middle ground with you," Eli said. "Either everything's fine or you burn it down. No safe territory. It's like Dad."

"At least he dedicated his life to keeping this place going," Boone said. "To honoring Granddad's memory."

"Because he felt he had to," Eli said. "And it made him one stressed out and lonely man. I don't want to be that. And I don't think you do either—not anymore."

"Save the ranch or don't," Colter said, leaning back with a grin that was equal parts affection and exasperation. "But do it because you want to, not because you feel like you have to. And if you want our help, just ask. Stop carrying it alone and then resenting the weight."

Boone opened his mouth to push back but couldn't. Because that's exactly what he'd been doing. The passive, grinding resentment that turned inward and then outward at whoever was closest. Just like his father. It had twisted things when he was a kid, and apparently it was still twisting things now.

He'd just aimed it at the one person in this house who had never once been anything but on his side.