Return to the Black Hills (18 page)

“You do know he could be halfway to Aruba by now, right?” She chose a mat of her own and sat, legs crossed.

“He’s not.”

He copied her pose across from her.

“Let’s start with a complete breath.”

She described the method of breathing she’d learned so many years before—in the hospital. An enlightened, progressive nurse had helped Jessie deal with the pain using her mind and focused breathing instead of drugs—some of the time. “Draw a full breath from deep in the diaphragm. Fill your lungs from the bottom up. Let your belly relax and expand like a balloon. Hold the air in, shifting the muscles in your abdomen like a belly dancer. Up and down, then exhale, forcing the air out completely.”

She wasn’t a formally trained yoga instructor, but she’d been studying the practice for many years. Some classes she’d attended were highly structured. Her approach was not. She liked to move from pose to pose as her subconscious suggested, spending as much time as necessary on whatever muscle group needed attention.

This time, she consciously selected poses she thought her student—and her damaged ankle—could handle, changing positions with a slow and deliberate pace.

“Wow. This is harder than it looks,” Cade said, struggling to keep his balance in the extended leg-stretch pose.

Jessie got up and walked to his mat to help position his body to take advantage of his center of gravity. “Sink back on your haunches, keeping your upper body as straight as possible. Use your core muscles to maintain your balance.”

He wobbled a bit, but she lined him up by bracing her hands on his shoulders. His muscles were thickly roped from his very physical job. She could picture him shirtless, fixing a fence in the hot sun. Sweaty. Tanned. Gorgeous.

She swallowed hard. “Focus,” she said, her voice huskier than she would have liked.

She returned to her mat, but the image of Cade’s chiseled derriere in yoga pants would not leave her brain. How was she supposed to lead a yoga class when her mind was stuck in Hot-for-Cade overdrive?

Bad Jessie. Lust was not one of the principals of yoga.

“Let’s come into standing,” she said, out of habit shifting to her left leg to allow her right foot to swing out and down. Her full weight was only on her left foot for a few seconds, but that was long enough to send a nasty reminder through her body. Damn. Her ankle was better and getting stronger every day. She needed to keep her mind on her goal and not get distracted by hunky cowboys.

“Lower yourself to the mat, bottom first.”

Normally, she’d move through the squat gracefully. Not this time. She plopped backward, landing hard. There was no disguising her muffled, “Uff.”

“Are you okay?” Cade asked.

“Fine. Obviously out of shape, but I’m getting there. I’m actually surprised by you. Most men aren’t this limber.”

“I have a good teacher.” The look he gave her was complimentary, but there was a hint of teasing, too. And sexy. She was reminded that although they had something serious going on, the fact remained that they were alone for the weekend. If no stalker showed up, they could spend the entire time in bed.

A good idea, except for one thing. She wanted it a hair too much. Nothing had been resolved between them, formalized, recognizing for sure that Cade accepted the inevitable. Her life was not in the Black Hills—not long-term. “Since
prana
—another word for
breath
—is key to life
and
yoga, let’s work on fire breath and fire wash. These are both good for stress,” she said pointedly.

She heard Cade give a soft chuckle but she didn’t acknowledge him.

“Place your hands on your knees and lean forward. Now, we’re going turn our belly into a billows. Breathe in and out through your nose in short, staccato breaths. Like this.”

She demonstrated, exaggerating her form so her student could get the idea. Cade watched but obviously wasn’t trying to copy her. She realized he was looking at her much the same way she’d been looking at him a few minutes earlier.

She felt flustered and overly warm and completely out of sync—not at all the way she normally felt when she was doing yoga. Damn. The man was quite possibly even more dangerous than Zane. Her former friend might have managed to turn Jessie’s life upside down, but Cade somehow turned her emotions inside out.

And he was pretty sure the end goal of yoga did not include being turned on. Unfortunately, he was also pretty sure that baking cookies in church would probably be a turn-on for him if Jessie was leading the demonstration.

He liked her. He was totally, utterly infatuated. Did guys get infatuated? He didn’t know. What he did know was he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

He copied her inhalation and let out his deep gulp of air with a huge sigh. She told him he was supposed to keep his mind empty—turn away any and all outside thoughts. An impossible task, he decided. Images kept popping into his mind. Shiloh waving as his sister and her family pulled out of the driveway. Jessie looking grim and perplexed as she watched the video her sister had shot. Her surprise and pleasure at seeing his father’s old barn converted to a yoga studio of sorts.

People didn’t do enough for her, he decided. She was the doer. The one who took care of others. This was his chance to show her that it was okay to let down her guard. Hand that task to someone who cared, who wouldn’t let her down.

“Ohm,” she hummed on her final exhale.

Cade couldn’t bring himself to try that. He was too self-conscious. Tugging on a pair of his brother-in-law’s workout shorts was strange enough. Chanting was definitely out.

She turned to look at him. “Not bad for a first time.”

Their first time was burned in his memory for good. He was ready for a second time. And a third.

“Ah. You’re there, my friend. You’ve arrived.”

Buck shook his head. “What? Where?”

“Your happy place.”

Buck laughed out loud. “You weren’t listening, Matthew. I’m not happy. I’m a miserable, self-serving screwup and there’s a good chance I’m screwing up again simply by being here.”

Matthew took a step closer, his smile unchanged. He pressed his hand flat against Buck’s chest, directly above his heart. “I meant the inner you has arrived,” he explained. “When you came here, you were outwardly calm and composed, albeit somewhat sad and serious. You were looking for answers from outside, but the real answers you sought were tucked deep inside. And now you’ve found them.”

Buck pulled back, horrified. “The answer is I’m a self-serving screwup?”

Matthew shook his head, his smile even bigger. “No. Your answer is you care about your family so much you’d leave this place of safety and dive into their lives to try to help. Does that sound self-serving, Buck?”

No. He had to admit it didn’t.

“Wait, my friend. Sleep on it. Your family is learning to navigate without you. We both know that is a reality that will face them someday. Just as you’ve been teaching yourself how to live without them, without their worries, their needs and demands on your energy. We all learn in different ways, Buck. But time is by far the best teacher.”

Buck took a deep breath. He felt calmer now. Almost as if a veil of grace had fallen over him. Matthew was right. Buck wasn’t there, yet. He needed to stay until he truly understood that his happy place would be a part of him forever.

“It’s boring. And it depends on someone else acting first. I hate to wait. I can’t simply sit around waiting for Zane to show up and try to kill me, Cade. That’s not my style.”

“Well, then, what do you suggest as a Plan B?”

“What if we call him out, so to speak, on a couple of the social-networking sites? We both agree the man is ego personified. I could put the clip of the video Remy took and tell everyone that the person who tried to hurt me failed.”

“Do you really think he’s spending a lot of time online at the moment? I’m not knocking your idea—trust me, I’m not wild about feeling trapped in my own home—but I think he’s smart enough not to burst in here because his feelings are bruised. The guy might be obsessive, but he’s not dumb, right?”

She drummed her fingers on the countertop. “Not by a long shot. Which is partly why I’m so confused. I mean, until he messed with Yota, which made everybody realize my car could have reacted exactly like my rollover, he’d basically gotten away with trying to kill me. Why? We don’t know. But everybody called it an accident and most people were happy to blame my driving ability. The whole thing would have gone away—even if I’d been killed. With the climbing tower, he still could have talked his way out of any charge if he’d stuck around. But now everybody is looking at him as a suspect. If he somehow manages to outsmart us, I might get hurt or be killed, but he’s going down, too. How could he possibly expect to get away with this?”

Cade shook his head. “I don’t think he cares anymore. Sometimes you reach a point where you have to win—at any cost.”

“By win, do you mean successfully kill me?”

He threw out his hands. “If that’s his goal. Maybe he planned to disable Yota so he could snatch you. He might even have settled for Remy if Mac hadn’t stopped to help her.”

Jessie pushed her plate away. “This was good. Thank you, but I’ve suddenly lost my appetite.”

He rose to carry their plates to the sink. She needed to pace. That’s how she worked out things that were troubling her, but the yoga had been taxing enough on her ankle. She’d had to ice it again before dinner.

She took a sip of wine. The light fruity taste was refreshing. “What if I died? Very publicly? Very theatrically.”

The plate in his hand clattered to the counter. “I beg your pardon?”

“It was Remy’s idea. She told me she had a dream last night that I was on fire.” She spotted the look of abject horror on his face and quickly added, “It’s okay. I was fine. She said she knew it was a stunt. There was a crew around me to put out the flames. I pretended to limp. I fell and it looked as though I died, but, of course, I didn’t.”

He shook his head. “I don’t get it.”

“I think I should leave. Fly home. I have friends in the business. People who would help me create this stunt and release the clip and—” She stopped. “Bad idea, huh?”

“Yeah. And the answer is no. If he sees you leave, he’ll follow. I don’t want to see what this guy will do if he decides to improvise.”

She gave him that point, but Remy’s dream had bothered her on several levels. Fire was not her friend and she didn’t want to think what might happen if Zane decided to smoke them out—literally. “I couldn’t live with the guilt if you lost this beautiful home because of me.”

He wiped his hands on a towel, then walked to her chair. “Jessie, you don’t have to prove to me how brave you are by facing your worst fear. I’d let him set fire to every freaking building on this ranch before I’d put you through that.”

“I’m not afraid.”

“But I am.” He took her hand. “I’m afraid of losing you…”

The words held an import Jessie was terrified to examine too closely. She pulled her hand free. “Well, then, what do you suggest?”

“I think we should go to the movies.”

Her mouth dropped open. “What?”

He picked up a newspaper that she’d seen lying on the counter. “What do you prefer? Chick flick or action adventure?” He gave her a wry look. “No-brainer, huh?”

“We can’t just—”

He lowered the paper. “Live our lives? Why not? The guy is a cowardly opportunist. You’re his obsession. You, Jessie. Nobody else. He’s not going to blow up a crowded theater just because you’re inside it.”

She had to admit he had a point. So far, all of the bad things that had happened were focused entirely on her. She was the only one who got hurt. Even when he booby trapped Yota, he’d admitted that he’d gotten the wrong twin by mistake. “Does this mean you’re asking me on a date?”

“Yeah. I guess it does.”

Jessie snatched the paper out of his hands. “
Chick flick?
Please. I’m an animated-kids’-movie kind of girl. Don’t you know anything?”

He was too startled by her quicksilver change of heart to laugh but his own heart did that funny leaping thing he was beginning to associate strictly with her. That’s when it hit him.

I love her.

He swallowed hard. The rational part of his brain was shouting, “Too soon.” But a far more fatalistic side—maybe the young boy who would cradle baby Kat in his arms when the fighting and hollering got too much—knew love didn’t ask permission or make logical, time-sensitive choices. Love happened.

He hadn’t expected to love Kat—the child his father seemed to adore above his other three children—but he did. He hadn’t expected to love and marry Faith, but once she flashed that Look out, cowboy, here I am smile his way, he was a goner. And now he was in love with Jessie.

He’d told his father he was head over heels a few days earlier. How odd, he thought, sharing that private thought with a man he didn’t trust when he hadn’t even admitted the truth to himself.

“Damn,” he muttered.

She looked at him. “I’m teasing. I’m actually not that picky. I like most movies. It doesn’t even have to be great. Just keep me entertained for a hundred and twenty minutes and I’m a happy camper. But animated movies are my favorite. And there’s a new one playing that I’ve been dying to see.” She snickered. “No pun intended.”

She flattened the paper and nudged the Entertainment section closer to Cade, pointing to a familiar logo with her finger. “And it’s even playing in Spearfish. Here are the times.”

She looked so hopeful. So real.

“Let’s go. I’ll set the alarm and let the boys in the gatehouse know when we’re coming back so they don’t shoot first and ask questions later.”