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“Well, I can see that. I’m not even your responsibility. I... Why are you doing this?”
“I’m not ever going to get married, Alaina. It’s not in the cards for me. Babies, all of that stuff... But look, I’ve got land, I’ve got this house. I’m not my father.”
“I know you aren’t,” she said softly.
“Right. Well. I might as well, right? I’m not going to leave a kid fatherless, not when I could be one.”
“And what do you get out of it?”
“Snow White. You’re going to clean up my ranch house, right?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Only if I’m in charge of it.”
She hadn’t known she was going to say that until the words came out of her mouth. But if she could be in charge of the household, of all the things in the house, that would be a great deal. That would be something she wanted. A kind of dream, even. “And I want to work at the equestrian facility.”
They were starting equine therapy up on the ranch. And getting all their ducks in a row for it. She had been so fascinated by the whole process, infinitely more interested in it than what was going on with the farm store at Sullivan’s.
“Fine with me.”
“And there’s...” She wasn’t timid. She had never been timid. She was the kind of girl who faced things head-on. Hell, she’d been a virgin, and when she’d decided she was done with that, she’d gotten a guy to deal with it in five minutes in the cab of his truck.
Okay.
She wasn’t quite able to recast that one yet. But she wasworkingon it. Eventually, she would see it as a triumph. Difficult considering the consequences, but she would figure it out.
She would make it a boon.
She was nothing if not resourceful, and she could find a boon anywhere. She could find one here. Shewould.
She was not going to be bashful.
“There’s the matter of sex,” she said.
He looked at her for a full second.
Then, he laughed.
Rich and low, rolling over her like thunder.Like it was funny. Like sex with her wasfunny. “Hard pass, sweetie.”
She sputtered. “I’m sorry, what?”
“That’s not why I’m doing this.”
“Okay then,” she groused, crossing her arms. “You could have said that nicer.”
“Sorry to disappoint you, mite. I am not nice.”
“Oh no, how could I ever have thought that you were nice, Gus? You’re just saving me from a future as an unwed mother. Offering the protection of your name to my child. Why would I think that you were nice?”
“I have honor,” he said, pointing at her. “There’s a difference.”
“All right. So what if somebody else needs your honor? Why me? Why spend it on me?”
He looked at her, long and hard. “I’ve been saving your ass since you were five years old. And you’ve been writing checks that ass couldn’t cash ever since then. You need someone to save you, Alaina, and your family has been shit at it.”
“My sisters arewonderful.”
“Not your sisters. Your parents. They were never there for you the way that they should have been. Somebody had to do it. And you know what...? My father wouldn’t have helped you. He’d have called you everything you call yourself. So having the opportunity to be as different from him as I can... That’s the best thing. That’s what I need.”
