“Am I? Or do you have feelings for her, and she just sees you as a friend? You must really hate that, seeing her with other guys when you’re the one who wants to be with her.”
Logan waited to see the rise in Colt’s anger. But all he got was another laugh. “You don’t know me. Or, for that matter, Des. Maybe you should spend time getting to know more about her. She’s loyal and faithful, especially to the people she cares about. But if you screw with her, she’ll cut you out of her life completely like you never existed.”
“And you think that matters to me.”
Colt laid his empty beer on the table. “I don’t know if it does or not. I hope it does, because she matters to me, but not in the way you think.”
Colt walked toward the house, leaving Logan standing there contemplating what Colt had just said. Whatever the hell Colt had said.
He ran his fingers through his sweat-soaked hair, trying to figure out what was wrong with his attitude today. Maybe it was walking in the house and finding Des leaning against Colt, laughing with him, seeing the ease the two of them had together.
He didn’t believe there was nothing going on between them. There had to be something, and Logan didn’t like being in the middle of that.
Then again, he and Des had made no promises to each other. They weren’t exclusive. If she wanted to screw ten other guys, she could, couldn’t she?
Though the thought of it stabbed him in the gut, and he didn’t like feeling that way, didn’t like the hold she already had on him.
But was that hold in his mind? She’d never put a claim on him, never asked him for any kind of guarantees. She’d never asked for . . . anything.
And why was that? Most women, if he was with them more than a couple of times, started hinting about relationships and promises and wanting to take things a step further.
Not Des. She’d just showed up and they’d been having fun and then she disappeared just as fast.
Maybe, just maybe, Colt might be right, and he should find out a little bit more about the woman who kept him lying awake at night.
AFTER SAYING GOOD-BYE to Martha, Colt and Des climbed into the SUV to head back to the set.
It had been an exhausting day, but Des had had a good time. She wished she could have spent more time with Logan, but she knew he’d been busy. He had a ranch to run, plus getting things ready for tomorrow had kept him doubly occupied.
“How was your time with Logan?” she asked as Colt drove along the gravel road leading them back to the set.
“Oh . . . fine,” Colt said, his expression revealing nothing.
Sometimes it was a pain in the ass to be friends with actors. They could mask their emotions so easily if they wanted to.
“Colt. Really. Did something happen?”
“Oh, you could say something happened.”
But he didn’t say anything, and she refused to press him like an emotionally needy woman. Because she wasn’t. Emotional or needy, that was, especially as it related to Logan.
They returned to the set and headed back to their trailers. Des stopped at Colt’s.
“Are you going to talk to me?”
Colt turned to her and grinned. “He really does like you, Des. A lot.”
Her heart drummed up a fast rhythm. “How can you tell?”
“Because he thinks there’s something going on between you and me, and he’s really pissed about it.”
“He does? He is? Why? Did he say something to you?” She hated even asking these questions, but she couldn’t help herself.
“He did, and yes, he is, and yes, he most definitely said something to me. I thought for a minute there he was going to knock me on my ass.”
She climbed up the stairs so she could be eye level with Colt. “You aren’t serious.”
“I’m deadly serious. I could feel the testosterone radiating off him. If I didn’t already have the love of my life, I would have been swooning. Hell, I was swooning. On your behalf, of course.”
She laughed. “Stop it. What did he say exactly?”
“First he asked if the two of us had something going on, then he intimated that I was pining away for you because you saw me as just a friend.”
She crossed her arms. “He did not say that to you.”
“Yeah, he did.”
She leaned against the railing and contemplated for a few seconds, before looking at Colt. “What a dick.”
Colt laughed. “Nah, just guy talk.”
“Yeah, guy talk about me. He thinks I’d use you that way? Seriously, what a douchebag. What kind of a bitch does he think I am?”
Colt held up his hands. “Whoa. Calm down, Des. I think he meant to insult me, not you.”
“I don’t care. I’m insulted. I would never hurt you that way.”
“Honey, if I was straight and we were friends and I had the hots for you, but you didn’t feel the same way, the conversation Logan and I had today would have been an honest one. Because you don’t feel that way about me, do you?”
“Well, no. But I would be honest with you and tell you that. I’d never string you along or make you my sidekick. Jesus, what do you men think we women do?”
“Be honest. Some women do that to guys.”
She blew out a frustrated breath. “I guess.”
“So don’t be too hard on Logan. He doesn’t know the truth about me.”
“And he won’t be hearing it from me, so don’t worry.”
He gave her a short kiss. “I know that. Listen, I’m going to go make a phone call. All this talk about romance and relationships has made me miss my guy. And I want to find out when his plane lands.”
“When do Tony and the others fly in?”
“Late tonight.”
“Are you going to the airport to pick them up?”
“No, I’ve arranged for a car service. Less likely for the paps to pick up on them arriving, or to connect Tony and me together.”
“Good idea. You have fun with your reunion. Give Tony my love, and say hi to Sarah and Callie for me.”
“Thanks, honey. I’ll see you in the morning?”
“Yes.” She kissed his cheek and moved on to her own trailer, where she spent the next hour pacing. It was still early in the evening, and she didn’t feel like reading or watching TV. What she felt like doing was giving Logan a piece of her mind. Which she wouldn’t do, of course. Not tonight, anyway.
He had a lot of nerve giving Colt a hard time. If he wanted to know something, why didn’t he come to her and ask her?
She already knew the answer to that. Because he was the most stubborn, uncommunicative man she’d ever met. And he made assumptions. Lots of assumptions based on—absolutely nothing.
Maybe if he actually had a conversation with her, he’d know she was just friends with Colt and had been forever. No, wait. She’d already told him that. Apparently he didn’t believe her, which meant he’d indirectly called her a liar.
She dragged her fingers through her hair while simultaneously wearing out the rug in the trailer.
This was getting her nowhere. She needed an outlet for her frustration, and she wasn’t going to find it here. She changed into her running clothes, put on her tennis shoes, then stretched before heading out of the trailer to take a run. Maybe a few miles in this oppressive heat would burn out some of her irritation.
She breathed in and out, even though it was like breathing fire, digging her feet in and pushing off as she got a head of speed going. She couldn’t run like she normally would if it wasn’t so hot, but she cleared her head and ran along the dirt path, concentrating on enjoying the scenery.
She often ran along the hills in L.A., though out there she couldn’t be alone. Not like here, where all she could see were hills and valleys and ponds. The landscape of trees was breathtaking, too, and she even glimpsed cattle as she came up over the rise on her third mile.
And that’s when she saw Logan’s truck, parked at the far end of the road. He was out there leaning against his truck drinking a beer and watching the sun go down.
Her first thought was to turn around and head back to the set. She’d gotten most of the mad out of her system on her run, and the last thing she wanted was to get riled up again. But she wasn’t a coward, either, so she slowed to a walk to catch her breath and stopped at his truck.
“A little late for you to be out, isn’t it?” he asked.
Still breathing a bit heavily, she said, “Last time I looked, I was an adult and capable of making my own decisions. And, as far as I know, I’m not on a curfew.”
“You seem a little mad.”
“Do I?”
“Yeah.”
He went around to the door and grabbed a bottle of water, unscrewed the top and handed it to her.
“Thanks.” She nearly inhaled half the contents of the bottle, which helped.
“You want to talk about it?”
“You went after Colt and questioned my relationship with him.”
“He told you about that, huh?”
“Yes, he did.”
“I’m not very reasonable when it comes to you, Des. And I don’t understand it myself, so I don’t think I can give you a good explanation for why I talked to him the way I did. But I’m sorry, and I’ll apologize to Colt tomorrow.”
Well, shit. Logan’s apology instantly burst her giant bubble of anger. And his explanation made it seem as if he felt something for her.
“Thanks. And what do you mean you’re not reasonable when it comes to me?”
He pushed off the truck and came toward her, swiping her sweat-soaked hair from her eyes. “Don’t ask me to define it when it confuses the hell out of me. You confuse the hell out of me. You make me feel things.”
She lifted her gaze to his, saw that confusion on his gorgeous face. It was almost as if he was angry with her. But within that anger, she also saw passion rise up, as it always did when they were together.
“Are you sure you’re not confusing sex with some other feeling?”
He wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her close. “I like ha**g s*x with you. There’s no doubt about that.”
“But when it comes down to having an actual relationship with a woman, my guess is that’s where you bow out?”
She gave him credit for not backing away. “Yeah. That’s where I bow out.”
“Why? What scares you about that?”
“Nothing scares me.”
Now she pulled away. “Bullshit. Be honest with yourself, at least, Logan. It’s your parents’ relationship, the way your mom reacted to living on the ranch that makes you hesitate with women, isn’t it?”
“So now you’re the expert on me, Des?”
“No. But it doesn’t take an expert to figure out that’s why you don’t do anything permanent with women. I can’t really blame you, either. Who’d want to take the risk of repeating the past?”
She saw him visibly relax. But she wasn’t going to let him off the hook so easily.
“But you have to realize that not every woman you meet is going to be like your mom, right?”
“I know that. Doesn’t mean I’m ready to settle down yet. Or that I’ll ever be ready to take that chance.” He turned and looked out over the valley. “It’s a tough life out here. It’s a lot to ask of a woman who isn’t born into it, who doesn’t have a natural love of the land.”
She walked over to stand next to him. “You want someone to love this as much as you do.”
“Yes.”
“Understandable. And I guess you haven’t found that woman yet.”
“I don’t think that woman exists. No one will be able to understand what it’s like to work the land as if you’re part of it, to live and die according to the whims of nature and the cattle market.” He glanced over at her. “Would you understand that? Could you feel a part of that?”
“Today? No. But a woman who loves you could learn to love the land and your work the same way you do.”
He shook his head. “My father thought that when he married my mom. He was wrong, and it made him miserable.”
Both his father’s and his mother’s choices had made Logan miserable, and the one thing Des understood was suffering the consequences of someone else’s choices. She wrapped her hands around his arm, always surprised and excited by the strength she felt there.
“Logan, you can’t damn yourself and your future because of your father’s choices or your mother’s sins. You have to allow yourself to fall in love, to find someone you care about and ask them to become a part of your life out here. It’s an amazing life and one that’s worth sharing. You have to start making your own choices instead of living with the consequences of someone else’s.”
“What would you know about that?”
She leaned against the truck. “I hated that my father was army, that whenever I’d get settled in one spot and make friends or get my bedroom decorated just perfectly, my dad would get new orders and we’d have to pull up stakes and move again. We were like nomads, and I never once in my life felt settled.
“My mom always accepted this, and of course she had married into the army, so she knew that was what life was going to be like. But I hated it, and I vowed that some day I’d have a permanent house in one location and lots of friends and I’d never move again.”
Logan laughed. “And then you became an actress, and now you travel all over the country and the world. So what does that mean?”
Her lips lifted. “That life very rarely turns out like you expect it to. I had planned to get married, raise a bunch of kids, and settle in one place. I was never going to move them around like I was moved constantly when I was a kid. But that didn’t happen for me. I told you the acting bug bit when I was in high school. I never in a million years thought I’d become a success. I did move out to Hollywood when I turned eighteen, figuring I’d give it a try for a year or two, just to see what would happen.”
Logan waited to see the rise in Colt’s anger. But all he got was another laugh. “You don’t know me. Or, for that matter, Des. Maybe you should spend time getting to know more about her. She’s loyal and faithful, especially to the people she cares about. But if you screw with her, she’ll cut you out of her life completely like you never existed.”
“And you think that matters to me.”
Colt laid his empty beer on the table. “I don’t know if it does or not. I hope it does, because she matters to me, but not in the way you think.”
Colt walked toward the house, leaving Logan standing there contemplating what Colt had just said. Whatever the hell Colt had said.
He ran his fingers through his sweat-soaked hair, trying to figure out what was wrong with his attitude today. Maybe it was walking in the house and finding Des leaning against Colt, laughing with him, seeing the ease the two of them had together.
He didn’t believe there was nothing going on between them. There had to be something, and Logan didn’t like being in the middle of that.
Then again, he and Des had made no promises to each other. They weren’t exclusive. If she wanted to screw ten other guys, she could, couldn’t she?
Though the thought of it stabbed him in the gut, and he didn’t like feeling that way, didn’t like the hold she already had on him.
But was that hold in his mind? She’d never put a claim on him, never asked him for any kind of guarantees. She’d never asked for . . . anything.
And why was that? Most women, if he was with them more than a couple of times, started hinting about relationships and promises and wanting to take things a step further.
Not Des. She’d just showed up and they’d been having fun and then she disappeared just as fast.
Maybe, just maybe, Colt might be right, and he should find out a little bit more about the woman who kept him lying awake at night.
AFTER SAYING GOOD-BYE to Martha, Colt and Des climbed into the SUV to head back to the set.
It had been an exhausting day, but Des had had a good time. She wished she could have spent more time with Logan, but she knew he’d been busy. He had a ranch to run, plus getting things ready for tomorrow had kept him doubly occupied.
“How was your time with Logan?” she asked as Colt drove along the gravel road leading them back to the set.
“Oh . . . fine,” Colt said, his expression revealing nothing.
Sometimes it was a pain in the ass to be friends with actors. They could mask their emotions so easily if they wanted to.
“Colt. Really. Did something happen?”
“Oh, you could say something happened.”
But he didn’t say anything, and she refused to press him like an emotionally needy woman. Because she wasn’t. Emotional or needy, that was, especially as it related to Logan.
They returned to the set and headed back to their trailers. Des stopped at Colt’s.
“Are you going to talk to me?”
Colt turned to her and grinned. “He really does like you, Des. A lot.”
Her heart drummed up a fast rhythm. “How can you tell?”
“Because he thinks there’s something going on between you and me, and he’s really pissed about it.”
“He does? He is? Why? Did he say something to you?” She hated even asking these questions, but she couldn’t help herself.
“He did, and yes, he is, and yes, he most definitely said something to me. I thought for a minute there he was going to knock me on my ass.”
She climbed up the stairs so she could be eye level with Colt. “You aren’t serious.”
“I’m deadly serious. I could feel the testosterone radiating off him. If I didn’t already have the love of my life, I would have been swooning. Hell, I was swooning. On your behalf, of course.”
She laughed. “Stop it. What did he say exactly?”
“First he asked if the two of us had something going on, then he intimated that I was pining away for you because you saw me as just a friend.”
She crossed her arms. “He did not say that to you.”
“Yeah, he did.”
She leaned against the railing and contemplated for a few seconds, before looking at Colt. “What a dick.”
Colt laughed. “Nah, just guy talk.”
“Yeah, guy talk about me. He thinks I’d use you that way? Seriously, what a douchebag. What kind of a bitch does he think I am?”
Colt held up his hands. “Whoa. Calm down, Des. I think he meant to insult me, not you.”
“I don’t care. I’m insulted. I would never hurt you that way.”
“Honey, if I was straight and we were friends and I had the hots for you, but you didn’t feel the same way, the conversation Logan and I had today would have been an honest one. Because you don’t feel that way about me, do you?”
“Well, no. But I would be honest with you and tell you that. I’d never string you along or make you my sidekick. Jesus, what do you men think we women do?”
“Be honest. Some women do that to guys.”
She blew out a frustrated breath. “I guess.”
“So don’t be too hard on Logan. He doesn’t know the truth about me.”
“And he won’t be hearing it from me, so don’t worry.”
He gave her a short kiss. “I know that. Listen, I’m going to go make a phone call. All this talk about romance and relationships has made me miss my guy. And I want to find out when his plane lands.”
“When do Tony and the others fly in?”
“Late tonight.”
“Are you going to the airport to pick them up?”
“No, I’ve arranged for a car service. Less likely for the paps to pick up on them arriving, or to connect Tony and me together.”
“Good idea. You have fun with your reunion. Give Tony my love, and say hi to Sarah and Callie for me.”
“Thanks, honey. I’ll see you in the morning?”
“Yes.” She kissed his cheek and moved on to her own trailer, where she spent the next hour pacing. It was still early in the evening, and she didn’t feel like reading or watching TV. What she felt like doing was giving Logan a piece of her mind. Which she wouldn’t do, of course. Not tonight, anyway.
He had a lot of nerve giving Colt a hard time. If he wanted to know something, why didn’t he come to her and ask her?
She already knew the answer to that. Because he was the most stubborn, uncommunicative man she’d ever met. And he made assumptions. Lots of assumptions based on—absolutely nothing.
Maybe if he actually had a conversation with her, he’d know she was just friends with Colt and had been forever. No, wait. She’d already told him that. Apparently he didn’t believe her, which meant he’d indirectly called her a liar.
She dragged her fingers through her hair while simultaneously wearing out the rug in the trailer.
This was getting her nowhere. She needed an outlet for her frustration, and she wasn’t going to find it here. She changed into her running clothes, put on her tennis shoes, then stretched before heading out of the trailer to take a run. Maybe a few miles in this oppressive heat would burn out some of her irritation.
She breathed in and out, even though it was like breathing fire, digging her feet in and pushing off as she got a head of speed going. She couldn’t run like she normally would if it wasn’t so hot, but she cleared her head and ran along the dirt path, concentrating on enjoying the scenery.
She often ran along the hills in L.A., though out there she couldn’t be alone. Not like here, where all she could see were hills and valleys and ponds. The landscape of trees was breathtaking, too, and she even glimpsed cattle as she came up over the rise on her third mile.
And that’s when she saw Logan’s truck, parked at the far end of the road. He was out there leaning against his truck drinking a beer and watching the sun go down.
Her first thought was to turn around and head back to the set. She’d gotten most of the mad out of her system on her run, and the last thing she wanted was to get riled up again. But she wasn’t a coward, either, so she slowed to a walk to catch her breath and stopped at his truck.
“A little late for you to be out, isn’t it?” he asked.
Still breathing a bit heavily, she said, “Last time I looked, I was an adult and capable of making my own decisions. And, as far as I know, I’m not on a curfew.”
“You seem a little mad.”
“Do I?”
“Yeah.”
He went around to the door and grabbed a bottle of water, unscrewed the top and handed it to her.
“Thanks.” She nearly inhaled half the contents of the bottle, which helped.
“You want to talk about it?”
“You went after Colt and questioned my relationship with him.”
“He told you about that, huh?”
“Yes, he did.”
“I’m not very reasonable when it comes to you, Des. And I don’t understand it myself, so I don’t think I can give you a good explanation for why I talked to him the way I did. But I’m sorry, and I’ll apologize to Colt tomorrow.”
Well, shit. Logan’s apology instantly burst her giant bubble of anger. And his explanation made it seem as if he felt something for her.
“Thanks. And what do you mean you’re not reasonable when it comes to me?”
He pushed off the truck and came toward her, swiping her sweat-soaked hair from her eyes. “Don’t ask me to define it when it confuses the hell out of me. You confuse the hell out of me. You make me feel things.”
She lifted her gaze to his, saw that confusion on his gorgeous face. It was almost as if he was angry with her. But within that anger, she also saw passion rise up, as it always did when they were together.
“Are you sure you’re not confusing sex with some other feeling?”
He wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her close. “I like ha**g s*x with you. There’s no doubt about that.”
“But when it comes down to having an actual relationship with a woman, my guess is that’s where you bow out?”
She gave him credit for not backing away. “Yeah. That’s where I bow out.”
“Why? What scares you about that?”
“Nothing scares me.”
Now she pulled away. “Bullshit. Be honest with yourself, at least, Logan. It’s your parents’ relationship, the way your mom reacted to living on the ranch that makes you hesitate with women, isn’t it?”
“So now you’re the expert on me, Des?”
“No. But it doesn’t take an expert to figure out that’s why you don’t do anything permanent with women. I can’t really blame you, either. Who’d want to take the risk of repeating the past?”
She saw him visibly relax. But she wasn’t going to let him off the hook so easily.
“But you have to realize that not every woman you meet is going to be like your mom, right?”
“I know that. Doesn’t mean I’m ready to settle down yet. Or that I’ll ever be ready to take that chance.” He turned and looked out over the valley. “It’s a tough life out here. It’s a lot to ask of a woman who isn’t born into it, who doesn’t have a natural love of the land.”
She walked over to stand next to him. “You want someone to love this as much as you do.”
“Yes.”
“Understandable. And I guess you haven’t found that woman yet.”
“I don’t think that woman exists. No one will be able to understand what it’s like to work the land as if you’re part of it, to live and die according to the whims of nature and the cattle market.” He glanced over at her. “Would you understand that? Could you feel a part of that?”
“Today? No. But a woman who loves you could learn to love the land and your work the same way you do.”
He shook his head. “My father thought that when he married my mom. He was wrong, and it made him miserable.”
Both his father’s and his mother’s choices had made Logan miserable, and the one thing Des understood was suffering the consequences of someone else’s choices. She wrapped her hands around his arm, always surprised and excited by the strength she felt there.
“Logan, you can’t damn yourself and your future because of your father’s choices or your mother’s sins. You have to allow yourself to fall in love, to find someone you care about and ask them to become a part of your life out here. It’s an amazing life and one that’s worth sharing. You have to start making your own choices instead of living with the consequences of someone else’s.”
“What would you know about that?”
She leaned against the truck. “I hated that my father was army, that whenever I’d get settled in one spot and make friends or get my bedroom decorated just perfectly, my dad would get new orders and we’d have to pull up stakes and move again. We were like nomads, and I never once in my life felt settled.
“My mom always accepted this, and of course she had married into the army, so she knew that was what life was going to be like. But I hated it, and I vowed that some day I’d have a permanent house in one location and lots of friends and I’d never move again.”
Logan laughed. “And then you became an actress, and now you travel all over the country and the world. So what does that mean?”
Her lips lifted. “That life very rarely turns out like you expect it to. I had planned to get married, raise a bunch of kids, and settle in one place. I was never going to move them around like I was moved constantly when I was a kid. But that didn’t happen for me. I told you the acting bug bit when I was in high school. I never in a million years thought I’d become a success. I did move out to Hollywood when I turned eighteen, figuring I’d give it a try for a year or two, just to see what would happen.”
