The Holiday Gift. RaeAnne Thayne

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СКАЧАТЬ briefly furrowed in confusion. “Oh. I almost forgot about that. Look, the situation has changed. If you’d rather stay home with Addie, I completely understand. I can tag along with Wade and Caroline Dalton or Justin and Ashley Hartford. Or, again, I can always just skip it.”

      Was she looking for excuses not to go with him? He didn’t want to believe that. “I asked you out. I want to go, as long as Mary doesn’t mind one more at your place.”

      “Addie’s never any trouble. I’m sure Mary will be fine with it. I’ll talk to her,” she promised. “If she can’t do it, I’m sure all the kids could hang out with Hope or Celeste for the evening.”

      Her sisters and their husbands lived close to the Star N and often helped with Barrett and Louisa, just as Faith helped out with their respective children.

      “I’ll be in touch later in the week to work out the details.”

      “Sounds good.” She glanced at her watch. “I really do need to go. Thanks again for your help with the horse.”

      “You’re welcome.”

      As she climbed into the Star N king-cab pickup, he was struck by how small and delicate she looked compared to the big truck.

      Physically, she might be slight—barely five-four and slender—but she was tough as nails. Over the last two and a half years, she had worked tirelessly to drag the ranch from the brink. He had tried to take some of the burden from her but there was only so much she would let him do.

      He stepped forward so she couldn’t close the door yet.

      “One last thing.”

      “What’s that?”

      Heart pounding, he leaned in to face her. He wanted her to see his expression. He wanted no ambiguity about his intentions.

      “You need to be clear on one thing before Friday. I said it earlier but in all the confusion with Addie showing up, I’m not sure it registered completely. As far as I’m concerned, this is a date.”

      “Sure. We’re going together. What else would it be?”

      “I mean a date-date. I want to go out with you where we’re not only good friends hanging out on a Friday night or two neighboring ranchers carpooling to the same event. I want you to be my date, with everything that goes along with that.”

      There. She couldn’t mistake that.

      He saw a host of emotions quickly cross her features—shock, uncertainty and a wild flare of panic. “Chase, I—”

      He could see she wasn’t even going to give him a chance. She was ready to throw up barriers to the idea before he even had a chance. Frustration coiled through him, sharp as barbed wire fencing.

      “It’s been two and a half years since Travis died.”

      Her hands clamped tight onto the steering wheel as if it were a bull rider’s strap and she had to hang on or she would fall off and be trampled. “Yes. I believe I’m fully aware of that.”

      “You’re going to have to enter the dating scene at some point. You’ve already got cowboys clamoring to ask you out. McKinley is just the first one to step up, but he won’t be the last. Why not ease into it by going out with somebody you already know?”

      “You.”

      “Why not?”

      Instead of answering, she turned the tables on him. “You and Cindy have been divorced for years. Why are you suddenly interested in dating again?”

      “Maybe I’m tired of being alone.” That, at least, was the truth, just not the whole truth.

      “So this would be like a...trial run for both of us? A way to dip our toes into the water without jumping in headfirst?”

      No. He had jumped in a long, long time ago and had just been treading water, waiting for her.

      He couldn’t tell her that. Not yet.

      “Sure, if you want to look at it that way,” he said instead.

      He knew her well enough that he could almost watch her brain whir as she tried to think through all the ramifications. She overthought everything. It was by turns endearing and endlessly frustrating.

      Finally she seemed to have sifted through the possibilities and come up with a scenario she could live with. “You’re such a good friend, Chase. You’ve always got my back. You want to help make this easier for me, just like you helped me buy the horse for Louisa. Thank you.”

      He opened his mouth to say that wasn’t at all his intention but he could see by the stubborn set of her jaw that she wasn’t ready to hear that yet.

      “I’ll talk to Aunt Mary about keeping an eye on the kids on Friday. We can work out the details later. I really do have to go. Thanks again.”

      Her tone was clearly dismissive. Left with no real choice, he stepped back so she could close the vehicle door.

      She was deliberately misunderstanding him and he didn’t know how to argue with her. After all these years of being her friend and so carefully hiding his feelings, how did he convince her he wanted to be more than that?

      He had no idea. He only knew he had to try.

      * * *

      Faith refused to let herself panic.

      I want you to be my date, with everything that goes along with that.

      Despite her best efforts, fear seemed to curl around her insides, coating everything with a thin layer of ice.

      She couldn’t let things change. End of story. Chase had been her rock for two years, her best friend, the one constant in her crazy, tumultuous life. He had been the first one she had called when she had gone looking for Travis after he didn’t answer his cell and found him unconscious and near death, with severe internal injuries and a shattered spine, next to his overturned ATV.

      Chase had been there within five minutes and had taken charge of the scene, had called the medics and the helicopter, had been there at the hospital and had held her after the doctors came out with their solemn faces and their sad eyes.

      While she had been numb and broken, Chase had stepped in, organizing all the neighbors to bring in the fall harvest. He had helped her clean up and streamline the Star N operation and sell off all the unnecessary stock to keep their head above water those first few months.

      Now the ranch was in the black again—thanks in large part to the crash course in smart ranch practices Chase had given her. She knew perfectly well that without him, there wouldn’t be a Star N right now or The Christmas Ranch. She and her sisters would have had to sell off the land, the cattle, everything to pay their debts.

      Travis hadn’t been a very good businessman. At his death, she’d found the ranch was seriously overextended with creditors and had been operating under a system of gross inefficiencies for years.

      She winced with the guilt the disloyal thought always stirred in her, but it was nothing less СКАЧАТЬ