“I’d love it. But, Billy, I wish you’d stop flinching every time I touch you. It’s starting to give me a complex.”
What was he supposed to say? Christ. Right now, he wanted to lick that little bit of syrup off the corner of her mouth, and run his hands over the smooth skin on her legs—her ridiculously long legs that he could see every bit of, because of her impossibly short pajama bottoms.
“Billy, did you hear me?”
“Yeah. You wanna to ride or not?”
“I told you I did. Why are you acting so weird?”
“Just go get dressed,” he barked at her.
“Keep talking to me like that, and you’re gonna be cleaning the kitchen by yourself, cowboy. You might be finished by next weekend.”
“I won’t be here next weekend,” he growled.
Renie threw her napkin down on the counter and stood. She put her dishes in the sink and went downstairs.
Great. Now he made her mad.
Less than two minutes later she was back upstairs, dressed, and had her bag with her.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going home, Billy. Everything I say or do makes you mad. Sorry about leaving you to clean up the kitchen, but it’s best if I go.”
Oh no, no. This wasn’t what he wanted to happen. He paced around the kitchen and ran his hand through his hair.
“Jesus, Renie. I’m sorry. Look, we do need to talk. I just don’t know where to start, but I sure as hell don’t want you to leave.”
She dropped her bag on the floor. Was she crying? Renie almost never cried. He kept making things worse.
“Come on,” he said, pulling her by the hand. “Let’s ride.”
She brought Pooh out of her stall while he figured out which horse to ride. She was quiet, and that wasn’t like her. If things were normal between them, she’d be giving him hell for the way he was acting.
“Come here,” he said, but walked to her and pulled her into a hug. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s goin’ on. Everything’s off kilter this weekend. I can’t explain it.”
She rested her head on his shoulder. “I hate this. We’re never like this. Why are we like this?”
“No idea,” he answered, but he was lying again.
They followed the heavily-treed trail until they reached the top of the short incline, in another few feet they’d come to a large meadow. Renie coaxed Pooh into a gallop.
He stayed a few paces back, watching her ride. It was a beautiful thing. Her long, blonde hair blew in the wind, and it was cold enough today that he could see her breath. There was a mist hovering over the trees that made up the Black Forest.
“Let’s go see your mom,” she shouted out before she took off in that direction.
The best view of his parents’ house was from this meadow. The house wasn’t as modern as Liv’s—his house now. It had been built in the traditional Colorado-style, with log siding and a tin roof. Each of the three levels had decks off the main rooms, with forest-green railings.
In the summer, his mom hung baskets filled with colorful flowers off the decks. Smoke streamed from the stone chimney that shot up on the kitchen side of the house. Another stone chimney mirrored on the side of the house opposite the one billowing smoke.
Renie climbed off Pooh and had opened the gate to the pasture by the time he rode up to the barn.
“Meet you inside,” she shouted, running in the direction of the back door.
His heart ran right along with her. Why had it taken him so long to realize she took it with her wherever she went?
Renie went inside, pulled her gloves off, and hung her jacket on the hook by the back door.