Fresh-Start Ranch. Leann Harris

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      Tessa fell silent.

      The waitress appeared with their lunches. Ethan watched as Tessa tasted her food. After she swallowed, she grinned. “Okay, I have to agree with you. These are good.”

      As they ate, Ethan discussed how he’d notify the different ranchers caring for the horses that their organization now had legal custody. “I’ll leave Lady and Hope with you, of course.”

      She nodded. “Okay.”

      He could tell something was on her mind. “Is something wrong?”

      His question snapped her out of her musings. “No.” She wouldn’t meet his eyes.

      He continued to study her. “Are you sure? Were you afraid I’d want to house Lady and Hope somewhere else?”

      “No.”

      “It seems like something—”

      “It’s nothing.” She waved off his concerns.

      That was the worst denial he’d ever heard. “You might as well spit it out.”

      She thought about her question, pursing her lips. “There just seems to be a tension between you and Mary. And with what Kevin blurted out the other day—” Her cheeks flamed.

      Well, he’d asked for it. Why not tell her? Everyone in this part of the country knew of his embarrassment, most people probably witnessed it. “Well—”

      “Don’t worry about it,” she hurriedly added. “It’s not my business.” Her weak smile tried to smooth over her gaffe.

      She’d touched a raw spot. But with Mary back here, the talk would be everywhere and Tessa would hear about what happened sooner or later. He’d rather be the person who told her. “I was engaged to Mary.”

      “People break off engagements every day.”

      “True, but they don’t leave the other person standing at the altar. Mary did.” Well, you certainly softened that, didn’t you?

      “Oh.” She turned a deep shade of red.

      “All the people in this area were in the church that morning and witnessed it.”

      “I didn’t mean to—”

      He shrugged. “It was years ago. We were young and thought we were in love.” He recalled with stunning clarity that humiliating morning, when he stood in the church with all his friends and neighbors gathered, waiting for the bride. After thirty minutes of waiting, her maid of honor showed up. She announced Mary wasn’t going to show and handed him a letter.

      Standing before all the people he knew and had grown up with, he remembered reading those devastating words. Mary had written that she loved him, but not enough to marry him and spend the rest of her life with him. She felt she was too young and didn’t want to get married. Besides, she wanted to go to college and see the world outside their little area of New Mexico.

      Growing up on neighboring ranches, he and Mary were always at the same local events. They began to hang together and slowly became best friends after Mary’s brother ended up face-first in a mud puddle at a local barbecue. They laughed at the same things and shared similar views. Everyone in the community thought they were a couple, and they were comfortable with the label.

      He was a year older than Mary, and when he graduated from high school, he went straight to college. He didn’t know if it was his going away and talking with other girls or that Mary had found someone new, but he noticed distance between them that first Thanksgiving he came home. He thought to solve the problem by proposing to her, which he did at Christmas.

      The wedding had been set for the weekend after her high school graduation. Looking back, he realized Mary’s calling off the wedding was one of the best things that could happen to him. He just wished she’d done it in a less humiliating way.

      “Lot of people thought Mary and I were a perfect couple, but we were so young. I don’t think we really knew what we wanted. Everyone told us we were in love, and we didn’t know any better than to believe them.” Looking back now, he could see that they’d just convinced themselves that they loved each other enough to marry.

      “It must’ve been hard.”

      Something in her voice alerted him. He felt she understood his mortification. “Yeah, I took my share of licks here at home. Luckily in college, no one knew. And on the bright side, it certainly made graduating from college much easier without a wife to care for.”

      “I understand that. A couple of my classmates were married, but they were men. Their wives worked to help them through school. One guy was working and putting himself and his wife through school. He had to drop out for a year because of exhaustion.” She fell silent, but he saw her thinking about something.

      “Did you leave behind any special someone?”

      “No.” She said it with a vengeance.

      “So, what’s the story behind that ‘no’?”

      Her head came up and her shoulders tensed. “What do you mean?”

      He raised his brow and his mouth turned down, letting her know he’d told the truth, now it was her turn.

      She thought about it for a moment, then shrugged. “My senior year in college, I got engaged. We both applied for scholarships. I got one, he didn’t. His solution to that was that I continue with the vet I was working for and support us while he went to law school. When he got his degree, he’d put me through veterinary school.”

      Ethan wanted to laugh, because he could guess what her reaction to that proposal would’ve been. “I assume you didn’t take him up on his offer.”

      Her mouth twitched. “I considered it, but when I saw my fiancé having coffee with another woman, holding her hand and looking like a lovesick schoolboy, I knew what the score was. He was simply looking for someone to fund his law degree. And it wasn’t going to be me.” She toyed with her fork, pushing around her flauta. “It kinda took the bloom off the rose for me. After that, I was too busy in veterinary school to date. With my scholarship, I wanted to keep up my grades. I guess you could say I was single-minded on graduating.”

      He could understand her attitude. At least Mary hadn’t tried to use him.

      “Once the guys in school knew I was there for an MD and not an MRS, I didn’t have problems with them wanting to date. They still wondered if I could cut it, along with my professors, but they watched, observed, then were okay with me.”

      He wondered if she lumped him in with that group of uninformed males.

      The waitress appeared and they paid their checks. He walked her back to her car parked before the court building.

      “Thanks for the help, Dr. Grant.” He flashed a big smile.

      “I think you can call me Tessa.”

      As she drove away, Ethan was surprised by Tessa’s СКАЧАТЬ