Besides, he had bigger things to deal with, like Alex cutting him off. He didn’t want this to end... “You sure this is what you want to do, Lex?”
Alex lifted her shoulders, dropped them and released a long-suffering sigh. “I’m tired of the lectures, the disapproving looks from Gus. I’m tired of sneaking around. I need more sleep and I have a couple of personal decisions I need to make. You’re a...complication.”
A complication, huh? “It’s just sex, Alex.”
Was that reminder directed at her or himself?
Annoyance glimmered in Lexi’s gorgeous blue eyes. “Of course it is, but since it’s sapping my time and energy, it needs to stop.” She looked away from him, shrugged before dragging her eyes back to his. “Maybe once the auction is over, after the holidays, if I’m around, we could maybe pick things up again.”
So many maybes, Daniel thought, pulling on his boot. Wait, what did she say? “You said, if you’re around? Are you thinking of leaving?”
Another thought to cool his head. He definitely wasn’t getting enough sleep!
“I’ve had a job offer that might take me back to Houston,” Alex said. “I’ve stayed in Royal longer than I thought I would. My plan was always to return there.”
“What’s the offer?” Daniel asked, standing up and tucking his shirt into his jeans.
“Managing partner in a social media strategy firm. It’s a good offer. I’ve always wanted to be my own boss.”
He quirked a brow. “Isn’t that what you are here on the ranch?”
“Gus is still the boss, Dan,” she reminded him. “And while I can run the finances, I’m not a rancher. In Royal, everything has a memory associated with it. My parents, Sarah...”
He heard her unsaid you and could almost taste the emotion in her voice. They’d both had hard childhoods, had been knocked around by life, but he knew that losing her parents as a little girl had rocked her world. And then to lose Sarah, on top of all that, had truly devastated her. “I am sorry, Lex. Sorry for you, for Gus.”
Alex managed a wobbly smile. “Thanks, I appreciate it.” Standing up, she placed her hand on his chest, and Daniel felt his heart rate kick up, his throat tightening. Alex just had to touch him and the thoughts of stripping their clothes off and taking her again were front and center. He forcibly held himself still as Alex stood up on her pretty painted toes to kiss the side of his mouth. “Thanks for this, Dan. It was fun. And maybe it exorcised some ghosts.”
Yeah, but maybe it also, Daniel couldn’t help thinking, created a whole bunch more.
* * *
She’d said goodbye to him as a teenager but watching him walk away as an adult was surprisingly a great deal harder than she’d imagined it would be. She’d been madly in love with him then, but she wasn’t in love with him now, so... Why on earth was she so upset?
You have to let him go. There is no other option. This is not a situation where you can have the cowboy and ride him, as well.
But she still couldn’t keep her eyes off him as he strode toward his dirt bike. Sighing appreciatively, she watched as he threw a long, muscular leg over the saddle and gripped the handlebars, dark curls shining in the early-morning light. Man, he was gorgeous, a perfect combination of Anglo and Hispanic. Olive skin, black hair, those smoldering brown eyes and that lean, powerful physique.
Alex leaned her forearms on the railing of the deck and watched her lover—no, her ex-lover—ride away, ignoring her wildly beating heart. There was no denying that this man had the ability to liquefy her insides, to shut down her thought processes, to invade her thoughts. But he’d also broken her heart, and she’d never give him the power to do that again.
She’d noticed that Daniel was starting to sneak under her skin, that her thoughts went to him at inopportune times—like every ten seconds—and this morning, while making coffee, she’d thought about asking him whether he wanted to attend a country music concert in Joplin with her the following week. They could stay in a bed-and-breakfast, try out that new restaurant she’d heard was fabulous...