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How could Chase forget? The conversation he had with Brody two months ago had haunted him every day since. His jaw muscles worked as he lifted his beer to his mouth. He took a long swig, reminding himself when Brody gave him that very same look.
The crisp night brushed across Chase’s face as Brody slammed him against the side of the two-story brick house that Brody shared with Harper. “Fuck, no!” Brody spat, nose-to-nose with Chase. His hands fisted Chase’s T-shirt. “Absolutely not. Stay the fuck away from Harper.”
Chase stayed still, not giving Brody a reason to start throwing punches. “Let me go, Brody,” he eventually said, steady and calm.
Ten seconds passed, then twenty, then forty, before Brody finally released his fingers. Chase stepped away from the wall he’d been slammed into and moved the couple feet needed to take a seat on the porch steps, giving Brody some space. He had dropped a bombshell on his friend, and yet, he also could not ignore his interest in Harper anymore.
When Brody finally sat in next to him, Chase told it to him straight: “I know you feel like you can stop this, Brody, but I told you out of respect for our friendship. I’m not asking your permission to date Harper. And we both know you wouldn’t want me asking permission either.” Because that’s not the type of man Brody would want for her.
Brody shut his eyes, blew out a deep breath, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’ve known for a month now that something was happening between you two. I hoped it would fade away.”
Chase snorted. “If this thing had a chance of fading, I wouldn’t be here.”
Another loud and deep breath passed through Brody’s mouth. “You know I trust you,” he said, glancing at Chase with a hard look. “Christ, I even know you’d do right by her.” Brody hesitated, studying him for a long moment before addressing him again. “You say you’re not asking for my permission, but clearly you want my approval, or you wouldn’t be here.”
“You’re my longest and closest friend, Brody,” Chase said gently, cupping his Brody’s shoulder. “Your friendship matters, but what I feel for Harper matters too.”
Brody stared down at his laced hands. “Are you in love with her?”
“That’s what I want to find out.” Chase paused to collect his thoughts, knowing he had to get this right. “It’s been a month that I’ve been fighting against what I’m feeling for her. A month that I’ve been telling myself to stay away from her.” He admitted a truth that he could not run from anymore. “I can’t fight against this anymore.”
Brody ran his hands over his face. When he dropped his hands, his expression was troubled. “You’re as close as a brother to me. Because of that, I’m going to ask you to do something before you go ahead with this.” He hesitated. Then, “Wait.” Another pause before he added, “Give Harper time to decide what she wants to do with her life.” His voice turned sad, eyes equally despondent. “When our parents died, she had to grow up so fast. Too fast. She didn’t get the teenage life that most teenagers got. She had to pull out of that show, and I saw how that ruined her for a long time. She lost everything when they died. It took her years to start cooking again. Years, Chase. It took me even longer to finally convince her to go to culinary school.” His voice blistered. “She lost what made her happy for a long time. She’s finally got that spark back, and I won’t let anyone fuck with that. Because out of anyone, she is good and sweet and didn’t deserve any of the pain that she was handed.”
“I want to make her happy, not hurt her,” Chase stated.
“I have no doubt you do,” Brody countered. “But Harper has dreams. Big dreams. Before she left for Denver, she showed me her plans for opening her restaurant in Las Vegas. She’s got all these ideas that had gone away for a really long time and now are back. If she falls in love with you, she won’t go to Vegas. She’ll stay here in River Rock for you.”
She’ll stay here in River Rock for you. Chase felt the weight of those words press against him.
“If you’re truly the friend you say you are to me,” Brody added, voice soft, so untypical of him, as was the depth of the conversation, “and if you truly care about Harper, you will wait for her to decide what life she wants first. If she gives up on this dream in Vegas on her own, deciding to open a restaurant here in River Rock, I won’t stand in your way. Christ, I’ll stand beside you as you marry her, if that’s where you two end up.” Brody leaned forward, his eyes glinting and promising violence. “If you don’t wait, our friendship is done, and I will fight like hell to make sure
she stays far away from you. The last thing I want for Harper is for her to end up being with someone who can’t love her right.”
“Chase.”
He blinked out of the memory, reminded that he had not yet answered Brody. “Yeah, I remember our conversation,” he said.
“Two months ago, you did the right thing and let her carve out her own way in this world. Now she’s done that. She’s made her choice.” Brody hesitated. Then his eyes glinted with something hard and dark. “You will not stand in the way of her dreams.”
Chase’s gaze fell to Harper again, staring into the sweet warmth of the smile that she aimed at someone else. He felt as drawn to her as he did the day she returned. Every day that had passed had been a slow torture, forcing him to endure a punishment he did not know what he did to deserve. Every smile. Every look she gave to him. A year ago, he thought his biggest challenge was opening Blackshaw Construction, after saving his earnings from working at Blackshaw Cattle. Now that he had done that, and had been working his first job, he realized he had been wrong. His greatest challenge over the last couple months had been keeping his promise to Brody. “Of course, I won’t stop her from chasing her dreams,” Chase confirmed.
“That’s not good enough,” Brody stated with a tight voice. “Promise me you won’t give her a reason to stay.”
Chase downed the remainder of his beer, fighting against his swimming thoughts. “Her dreams matter to me as much as they do to you,” he told Brody harshly. Needing to get fresh air desperately, he rose from the stool, feeling like the world had suddenly gotten very unsteady. “She’s made her choice. I will live with it.”
* * *
The digital clock read four minutes after ten o’clock, and Chase was nowhere in sight. Harper supposed that should not have come as much of a surprise, considering her cheek was pressed against the cool wooden floor, while a coarse strand of rope burned around her wrist. Sometimes she wondered how the poor little calves felt when the cowboys slid off their horses, wrangled them up, then hogtied them.
Now, she knew it was very unpleasant.
“Ouch,” she growled at the guy standing over her. The cowboy with the thick, black beard had her leg bent, hastily attaching the rope from around her cowboy boot to her wrist.
Too focused on the task of winning, or maybe not hearing her due to the roar of the crowd, the cowboy continued pulling the rope tighter. She gritted her teeth, staring at the round ball of dust floating across the stage. Eight more days of this, then she would be done being part of Kinky Spurs’ Rope ’Em Up games.
A game that all began when Gerald Kinky sold the place to Megan once he retired. She had not only given the bar a fresh modern makeover, she’d taken inspiration from his name, and every night at ten o’clock she entertained the crowd with roping games between the customers to win a free dinner.
Nine months ago, when Harper started working at the bar since the place looked fun and she needed to figure out her next steps, she had loved the games. Then Chase entered, and everything changed after that. For the first three months after she came home, her life had mirrored the one she had before school in Denver. The three months that followed had brought Chase and Harper closer. For the last three months, after she’d gotten the nerve up to ask him to be her taste tester—all to spend more time with him—she only wanted Chase touching her. No one else. And somehow letting other men touch her, even in this way, felt like a betrayal to him. Though as she lay here, her cheek still pressed against the floor, she knew the time had come. She had to leave her hometown behind. In River Rock, all she did was wait. For happiness. For love. For her dreams to become realities.
