“Don’t worry,” she told him in an equally hard tone, “I won’t make the mistake of trying to help you again, either. If you want to wither away in your grief and let it eat up your entire life and your future, go right ahead. I thought you were worth helping, that maybe there was a real human being—a man with a beating heart—beneath all the fury and nastiness. But now you’ve helped me see that you aren’t worth anything at all.”
She turned to walk out on him, but before she could leave him to stew in his own misery until kingdom come, he said, “Instead of pestering me with your questions, you should be asking yourself what the hell you’re doing hiding on my farm. Because we both know this isn’t where you belong, Naughty.”
God, it hurt to hear him say that, and then to fling the family nickname at her, one she now knew she never should have shared with him, as if every last part of her was tainted. Unlovable.
Because if she didn’t belong here with the animals and the land and the bright blue sky—and if she no longer belonged in the dance world—then where did she belong?
Lori knew she just needed to keep putting one foot in front of the other, to keep on walking out of the barn and out of his life. But even as she tried to get away, he kept coming at her with more words aimed where they could do as much damage as possible.
“How would you like it if I turned my focus to fixing you, because it was easier than fixing myself?”
His accusation stopped her cold, even when she knew she should be running from him as fast as she could, before he could do deeper damage than he’d already done. He’d already hurt her with his complete dismissal of her feelings in the cottage during the storm. Badly. And he’d made her doubt her own feelings, made her ask herself if she was really nothing more than the self-absorbed person he’d made her out to be.
“Do you know what I saw that day when you drove into my fence and sent my chickens running down the road?” He didn’t wait for her to answer, didn’t stop to notice that she was crumbling apart one word at a time. Or if he did see it, he clearly didn’t care just how badly he was hurting her. “I saw a scared little girl who’s had everything she ever wanted, everything she’s ever needed, handed to her on a platter. And then, when she hit one little bump in the road, she was so spoiled that the only option she saw was to give up.” He put his hands on her shoulders and spun her around to face him. “If you’re a dancer, then you should be dancing, damn it.”
She couldn’t stop the tears from falling down her cheeks, and not just because he was gripping he shoulders nearly hard enough to leave bruises. “I’m not a dancer anymore.”
He stared at her for a long moment, the sparks of heat and anger and a still undeniable connection going off between them, before he dropped his hands from her shoulders. “No, you obviously never were a real dancer if you’re able to give up this easily.”
She didn’t have to stay here and listen to his insults. She could go work on someone else’s farm. She could clean someone else’s toilets until they sparkled and keep their chickens and pigs fed and weed their rows of vegetables. Not, of course, that she needed the money, considering she had plenty socked away from some of her higher-profile gigs. It was just that she couldn’t imagine not having something to do, being left with her thoughts all day long. Even cleaning a stranger’s bathrooms would be better than that.
Without saying another word, she made a beeline for the farmhouse, kicking her dirty shoes off on the porch before going inside. Just because she wouldn’t be cleaning Grayson’s house anymore didn’t mean she needed to make it harder for the poor person he tricked into replacing her.
Only, just as she walked into her bedroom and yanked her suitcase out from under the bed, she heard a sound that had her chest clenching tight. She ran out to the living room, where Sweetpea was coughing and shivering on top of her blanket.
No, not now. She couldn’t deal with this, too, not when her heart was already torn to pieces.
Lori scooped the cat up into her arms, pressing her lips to the soft, hairless spot between its ears. “Poor baby,” she said as she rocked it in her arms. “Poor, poor baby. You feel rotten, don’t you?” She kissed it again. “It’s been that kind of day for me, too.”
Grayson walked in, but she was so concerned about the cat who had been her one true friend for the past week, that his presence barely registered. While Grayson had been God-knew-where avoiding her the past few days, Lori had spent many hours with Sweetpea sleeping warm and purring on her lap, stroking the cat’s bony back as she tried to get her to eat the food and drink the milk she brought her every few hours. She’d been about to leave to save what was left of her heart, but now she knew that, no matter how much it hurt to be near Grayson, she needed to stay for the one true friend she’d made on his farm.
“Don’t worry, Sweetpea,” she told her furry friend. “I’m not going to leave. Not as long as you need me.”
* * *
When Grayson stepped into the house and saw Lori with his cat in her arms and heard her make the promise to stay no matter what, the relief that flooded him was so strong it nearly buckled his knees.
Before the storm, before they’d ended up in the cabin, he’d wanted her. But now that he’d touched her, tasted her, he realized that earlier wanting amounted to little more than the buzzing of a fly around his ears. He’d known that he’d pay for those moments of weakness in the cabin, and boy, was he. Because how could he possibly ever regret knowing how soft, how sweet Lori had felt in his arms, how shockingly sweet the sound of her moans, her gasps of pleasure, had been as she came?
And how could he ever forgive himself for the way he’d just lashed out at her, when he knew all she was trying to do was help him? Especially when she’d told him that she’d come to his farm to take a break not only from dancing, but also from men.
He knew he couldn’t be what she needed, but he shouldn’t have to hurt her to prove that.
“Lori,” he said in a low voice as he approached her, “I promised I wouldn’t do that to you again. I broke my promise.” He felt like he was swallowing fire as he said, “I’m sorry.”
God, he would have given up every one of his thousand acres just to see her smile up at him, just to hear her say, “You’re forgiven,” again like she had the day he’d lost it over the pigs and had offered to take her to buy cowboy boots.