Return to Homecoming Ranch (Pine River) by Julia London

Author:Julia London [London, Julia]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Published: 2014-07-22T04:00:00+00:00

SIXTEEN

There was a definitive change in the air; Sam could feel it weighing down on his temples and his throat. The sky was turning an icy blue, the color before a snow.

But it was too early for snow. It felt as if the earth were turning upside down and back onto itself—snowy autumns, fiery summers, dry springs. It was the same way Sam was feeling inside—twisted up and around, pulled in the wrong directions, the wrong things happening at the wrong times.

He took a hand off the wheel of his truck and tore the hat from his head, tossing it aside. He pushed his fingers through his hair, a nervous habit, and looked out the window at the gold meadows rolling by.

What he’d done in the Kendrick bathroom—kissing Libby, putting his hands on her body—reminded him of something he would have done when he was drinking. Something dumb, something indefensible. But then again, it was far different from a drunken grope, because unlike when he’d been drinking, Sam had known exactly what he was doing at the Kendricks’.

He couldn’t figure out what was in his head. It wasn’t as if he were going to sleep with Libby for the sake of sleeping with her—he wasn’t that kind of guy. And he wasn’t going to pursue any sort of relationship with her, either, for all the reasons that were so obvious to him. The woman has issues, he told himself for the hundredth time. Big issues. Bring-the-dogs-in-lock-the-door kind of issues.

If there was one thing he knew about himself, one definitive thing, it was that when he got involved with a woman who had big issues, everything went to hell.

It annoyed him to no end that he couldn’t seem to get Libby off his mind, what with all her don’t check on me and happy medium. But that smile and those blue eyes were stuck in his brain. Her earnestness had always appealed to him—no one could claim that she wasn’t dedicated to a cause. Her sense of humor, too—she had one, in spite of her troubles.

Still, having feelings about Libby didn’t mean Sam needed to act on it, for Chrissake’s. It wasn’t a mandate, it wasn’t a siren call. And it didn’t change anything.

He just needed to handle this the way he handled his life—keep his hands busy, his thoughts on benign things. Keep to himself, mind his horses, mind his life. Sam hated feeling unsettled. It made him want to settle himself, and in the past, the go-to for settling had been alcohol. He’d known for a long time that he was best all alone, best making birdhouses and checking on society’s rejections, like Millie Bagley. The moment a woman entered his picture was the moment the wheels always began to fall off his sturdy little applecart.

The worst of it was that Sam had put Tony up at the ranch, which meant he couldn’t exactly avoid Libby forever. Moreover, Tony had called him a couple of times since he’d been up there, feeling low.

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