Page 35 of Forbidden Cowboy

“Beau is okay—he had to have some kind of surgery on his brain to relieve the pressure, but they also managed to stop the bleeding. He took a couple of steps back, and so it’s just about getting his brain activity up again, I suppose. I think he’s going to wake up, I really do, but I’m not sure what’s going to happen then.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Wyatt said. “If I have to build him an accessible apartment in my house, I will do that. If he needs healthcare at home, with nurses, I’ll make it work. I want you to not worry about any of that. If he’s a different person than before the accident, be it mood or ability changes, we will love him. He’s Beau.”

I felt my eyes prickle, but after an emotional two days at the hospital, I wasn’t willing to cry again.

“Thank you,” I said.

“Can I hug you?” Wyatt asked, and I nodded, wrapping my own arms around him as he came over and pulled me in.

Hugging Wyatt was the exact thing I needed. It soothed my soul, just to have some sort of physical contact with him.

While hugging him, I heard the door open and then shut, and I was confused. I thought Anna was going to go swimming in the backyard?

I noticed the rolling of suitcase wheels, and the click of heels on the stone flooring.

“How cute,” came a snide voice.

I pulled away from Wyatt, who whipped towards the entry to the kitchen with a stricken look on his face. A woman stood there, with blonde hair twisted up neatly on her head, wearing a pencil skirt and pinstripe blouse, paired with black heels. She had a small carry-on suitcase with her, and the most piercing blue eyes I had ever seen. I recognized her, even after the years between when I’d last seen her and now. I saw Anna standing several feet behind her, wearing her favorite purple swimsuit and looking incredibly anxious as her eyes met mine.

When Wyatt finally spoke, it was with something akin to venom in his voice.

“Eliana.”

Chapter Twelve

Wyatt

Seeing Sierra again, even after only two days apart, was like a breath of fresh air.

She walked into the kitchen, and I felt the bowling ball that had taken residence in my chest lift off of it with a sigh. I had thought for two days, through meetings and the re-signing of our contract withArchibald’s,about how to approach things with her, but the minute I saw her, everything became achingly clear, and I realized how much I just needed her to be in my life and be okay. I wasn’t going to ask for anything more. Her letting me in enough to share a hug, that was special. I held her, and felt the tension melt out of her.

And then Eliana happened, and whatever beautiful little fantasy bubble I had been living in popped.

She looked worse than she had before. Even at only twenty-five, Eliana had started aging. She bleached her hair so no one could see the greys beginning to grow in her mousy brown locks, and she absolutely slathered makeup over her face so the damage done by years of excessive drinking and party drugs couldn’t be spotted.

I saw it though, in the way her fake smile split her lips across her face like a horrific gash; she wasn’t well. Her eyes had that hollow, sunken look she would get whenever she came back from a bender, and I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that Eliana was about to make everything much more difficult for all of us.

“What are you doing here?” I asked her once the dust of her arrival had settled a little bit.

Sierra had taken Anna out to swim with her in the pool, and I could vaguely hear the happy screaming and splashing noises they were making. I wanted to join them, but knew it wasn’t going to be that easy.

“I can’t just swing by and visit my dear daughter and ex-husband?” She asked, trailing her claw like hands across my face in a grotesque imitation of a caress.

I winced and pulled away from her.

“Don’t touch me, Eliana, and no, you can’t just show up whenever you want. You have mandated times for a reason.”

Her fake smile dropped, and Eliana’s eyes grew dark. She stepped away until the kitchen island was between us, and leaned forward.

“I’m gonna cut to the chase, then,” she said. “I got fired.”

“I’m not surprised,” I said. “Being a flight attendant requires a lot more than the good looks you’re convinced you have.”

“God, have a little faith, why don’t you? Don’t you want to know why I was fired?”

“Were you caught stealing the little liquor bottles?”

“No, actually, they found some powder on me, and—”