My Only Sunshine by Rowan McAllister

Author:Rowan McAllister [McAllister, Rowan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781627982894
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

TANNER was a little slow to get started the next morning. After Mason had left so suddenly, he’d paced the confines of his room, listening anxiously for the sound of sirens or Mason’s truck leaving. When neither of those things happened, he was relieved, of course, but it still took forever for him to relax enough to fall asleep. There were too many conflicting emotions in his head—joy, guilt, anxiety, frustration. After 1:00 a.m., he’d finally given up and downed the rest of the bottle of wine, hoping it would be enough to knock him out.

It worked, but he had a hell of a hangover when the sound of a car arriving woke him before dawn the next morning. When he’d stumbled out of bed and peeked out the window, he’d seen Mason’s sister heading for the house, and he’d had to look at his clock a couple of times before it registered that she was there much earlier than usual. He felt his stomach roil, and it wasn’t only because of the wine, but all he could do was stay hidden in the bunkhouse and hope everything was okay.

A couple of hours later, he saw Diana and Mason help their daddy into her car, like always, so he guessed whatever it was couldn’t have been too bad. As Diana drove off, Mason headed back toward the house, and even though Tanner wanted to follow, he was afraid Ed or one of the others would see him and start asking questions, so he poured himself the last of the coffee in the pot and headed out to the barn to wait.

As he strolled down the stalls and said good morning to each of the horses, Tanner was ashamed to admit the fear of getting caught wasn’t the only thing that kept him from going after Mason. He was tired and that meant his insecurities were back. He knew that. He knew that day was no different than the one before it and the one before that. Nothing had changed. But that didn’t stop the ugly little voice in his head from whispering maybe Mason wouldn’t want him nosing about in his family’s business. That if he pushed too hard or overstepped his bounds, Mason would decide he wasn’t worth the trouble. He wasn’t all that smart. He didn’t have a penny to his name. And he wasn’t even good-looking anymore, so why would Mason want him around? What could Tanner possibly offer?

That voice got so loud it drowned out any rational arguments he might’ve had. He hated it, hated how pathetic he sounded, even in his own mind. But fighting it took so much energy, and he was just so tired. It didn’t help matters any that Tanner could pinpoint the exact moment when the voice broke free of the box he’d put it in and started to grow again. Something Mason had said the night before, while they were making love, had started a tiny niggle of doubt.

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