The Cowboy's Last Goodbye (Grass Valley Cowboys Book 6) Read online

  Excited, General wiggled beside her, eyeing the ranch dogs as they nipped at heels and chased cows who tried to turn back and make an escape.

  Once they were all in the pen, Ben rode by her and winked.

  Although she’d seen him on a horse several times and even ridden with him on a few occasions, watching him ride made her morph into some starry-eyed girl.

  Prepared to give herself a lecture about the silliness of it all, she stopped. There wasn’t a single, reasonable female who wouldn’t experience the same feelings watching Ben in his dusty cowboy hat, worn chinks, and jacket that stretched across his broad shoulders. Enthralled, she kept focused on his every move.

  Skilled at their work, the cowboys began sorting out the cattle they wanted to cull and ran them into an adjoining pen.

  Harper started to climb up on the fence, but General gave her a look that said, “you’re gonna leave me here by myself?” Instead, she found an empty five-gallon bucket by the barn and turned it over, sitting on it next to the dog.

  Together, they watched the cutting horses go through their paces. Dust floated in a cloud the color of creamed coffee as the cows milled around the pen, mooing indignantly at their captivity.

  By lunchtime, Ben and his crew had sorted out a truckload of cattle and released the rest back into the pasture.

  He rode over to the fence and Harper climbed up on it. When he leaned over and planted an involved kiss to her lips, the men whistled and hollered.

  With a fire still burning in his dark eyes, Ben melded his gaze to hers. “Ignore them, Tink. They’re just jealous I’ve got the sweetest, prettiest, cinnamon-cookie baking girl in the county cheering me on with her trusty sidekick.”

  Harper grinned. “Who have you got out here besides General and me?”

  Ben kissed her nose. “With you two, why would I need anyone else?” He reined the horse away from the fence. “Go on up to the house for lunch. We’ll load the truck after we eat.”

  “As you wish, my captain,” Harper said, jumping off the fence and whistling to General. The dog fell into step beside her but glanced back at Ben, as though asking for permission to stay with him.

  Ben shook his head and the dog continued plodding along with Harper.

  Mike seemed in better spirits at lunch as Harper drew him into the conversation, asking him questions about things he remembered from Halloween when he was a boy. The holiday was only a few days away and Harper wondered if Ben had any special plans.

  The Morgan family had already provided the wagon and horses to take the church youth group on a hayride the previous week. The Thompson family was working on final details for a party for Cass and her classmates. One afternoon, she’d caught Travis and Brice plotting ways to scare the women, mentioning something about resurrecting a scarecrow costume.

  Uncle Cletus had helped her carve some pumpkins to set outside even though Harper doubted any trick-or-treaters would venture all the way out to their house.

  After lunch, Harper helped Michele with the dishes while Ben met with a fertilizer salesman who’d shown up unexpectedly. They’d just finished drying the last dish, when Ben entered the kitchen and asked if Harper wanted to watch as they loaded the cattle onto the truck.

  She grabbed her coat and followed him outside to the loading chute where he’d backed their semi-truck and cattle trailer.

  “Wow! You are a man of many talents. I didn’t know you could drive a semi on top of everything else.”

  “You grow up on a ranch, you learn to do a little bit of everything,” Ben said, kissing Harper’s cheek as he hurried by her and helped load the truck.

  Once the trailer rattled with the sound of impatient cattle, Ben reappeared at her side. “Do you want to go with me to the sale? I don’t know how long I’ll be there, but it might be late.”

  “I think I’ll pass. I have some things I need to do at home. Give me a call when you get back.”

  “I’ll do that,” Ben said, walking her to her pickup. General sat on his foot, waiting for the attention he always received. With an indulgent look, Ben dug a bacon-flavored treat out of his pocket and gave it to the dog, rubbing his head.

  “You’ve completely spoiled him rotten,” Harper said, motioning for General to get into her pickup. Eager to eat his snack, the dog jumped inside and settled onto his blanket on the backseat.

  “Nah. General and I just get each other, that’s all.” Ben wrapped his arms around Harper and held her close for a long moment. When he relaxed his hold, she pushed the brim of his hat back with her finger and pulled his head down toward hers.

  For several long moments, Ben delivered impassioned kisses to her willing lips. General barked, letting them know they’d used up his patience for waiting.

  Ben smiled against her mouth and gave her one more teasing kiss before he let her go. “I’ll talk to you later, my dazzling, darling pixie.”

  “I’ll count on it, Captain.” Harper hugged him one last time. Before she lost her courage, she spoke the words she’d wanted to say for weeks. “I love you so much, Ben. I’m so, so happy to have you in my life.”

  Afraid to give him a chance to reply, she jumped in the pickup and left.

  Ben watched her go, hating that the time had finally come to tell her goodbye.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Goodbye always makes my throat hurt.

  Charlie Brown

  “Someone’s here to see you, girlie,” Uncle Cletus said, grinning at Harper from the kitchen doorway.

  A glance at the clock confirmed it wasn’t yet eight in the morning. Something awful had happened. Otherwise, no one would come to the house that early in the day.

  After tossing down the dishtowel she had in her hands, she hurried into the living room where Ben hunkered down petting General.

  “Ben? What’s going on?” she asked, stepping next to him.

  Affectionately giving the dog one more scratch on his belly, he stood. Dread snaked down her spine and left her chilled at the look Ben cast her direction.

  Briskly rubbing her arms with her palms, she stared at him, afraid something had happened to his father.

  “Is your dad okay? Is it Tess?”

  Ben smiled, although it failed to reach his eyes. “Dad and Tess are both fine. I didn’t mean to frighten you, but I need to talk to you about something important.”

  Uncle Cletus rubbed his hands together, as though some exciting development was about to take place right before his eyes.

  “Why don’t we go outside and take a walk?” Harper snatched her coat off a hook by the door and stepped outside as Ben and General followed.

  The dog loped across the yard and headed along the driveway. He stopped next to Ben’s pickup, fully anticipating going for a ride.

  When Ben and Harper turned and walked in the direction of the barn, General barked once then raced ahead of them.

  “What do you want to discuss?” Harper asked. Part of her hoped Ben was there to propose. If he did, she’d say yes in a heartbeat. The love she felt for him trumped her fears and anxieties about getting married and making a lifetime commitment.

  “Us. You.” Ben stopped and stared at Harper. With great tenderness, he trailed his thumb over her cheek and across her chin. “You are so beautiful, Harper. You make me laugh, and challenge my mind. You’re a sweet, caring woman, full of fire and feistiness. I’ve never met anyone like you and I doubt I will again, but what you said yesterday changes everything.”

  “That I love you?” she asked. Excited that her dream of becoming his wife might be about to come true, her eyes shone with emotion as she gazed at him.

  Ben nodded and continued walking.

  She grabbed his arm and pulled until he stopped and faced her. “You don’t feel the same way, is that it?” Tears glistened in her eyes and her bottom lip trembled.

  “Aw, Harper, this is gonna be so hard.” Ben enfolded her in his arms and held her close. He inhaled the fragrance that always brought to mind exotic locales
and sunny beaches. He’d memorized everything about her. The sound of her happy sigh when he held her hand, the way her nose wrinkled when she giggled, the oceans of depth and wonder in her blue eyes.

  Slowly he tipped her chin up and kissed her, one last time.

  One kiss to last a lifetime.

  In spite of how carefully he’d guarded his heart, Harper had infiltrated his defenses and left him hopelessly in love with her.

  He poured all that love and emotion into the kiss, but he couldn’t keep from conveying his sorrow, too.

  As he raised his head, he noticed the tears on her cheeks and brushed them away. The fact that it was the last time he’d touch her silky smooth cheek or inhale her intoxicating scent made him want to wrap her in his arms and never let go.

  Unfortunately, determination ruled over the desires of his heart.

  “It’s not that I don’t love you, Harper. I do.” Ben sighed and slowly moved away from her. “I love you more than I thought I’d ever love anyone and that’s why this has to be goodbye.”

  Dumbfounded, Harper glared at him. “So what Tess said is true? As soon as a woman starts to touch your heart, you dump her and move on. Is that what this about? Your fear of commitment?”

  “Tess talks too much. To clarify, no one has ever touched my heart. Not even close to the way you do.” Ben paced back and forth then looked at Harper. “The thing is, I’ve been married before and it ended badly. I refuse to put myself through that kind of pain again. Not ever.”

  “You’ve what?” Harper asked. Her legs gave out beneath her as she sank down on the grass, heedless to the frosty moisture seeping through her jeans.

  Ben sat beside her and released another long breath. “The only thing I wanted to do when I graduated from high school was leave this little community. I wanted to experience everything the big world had to offer. By the time I was nineteen, I’d moved to Portland and had a part-time job while I went to school. I met a girl on campus, Melissa, and fell into what I thought was love. She was gorgeous, the kind of girl all the guys notice. Fresh off the farm, with no clue about anything, I believed all her lies. Her particular talent was in telling me everything I wanted to hear as she stroked my ego and wormed her way into my world.”

  General ran over and plopped down next to Ben, resting his head on his thigh. Absently, Ben scratched behind the dog’s ears as he continued his story.

  “We’d known each other three weeks when she suggested we run off and get married. I hadn’t even mentioned her to my parents at that point. She wasn’t the type of girl my mother would have welcomed with open arms. Despite the voice in my head telling me to run for the hills, we applied for a marriage license and got married at the courthouse.”

  Harper couldn’t take her eyes from Ben’s face as he seemed lost in his memories. Pain and regret etched deep grooves across his forehead, making her want to smooth them away. “What happened?”

  “The first week of marriage was fun. After all, I was nineteen and she was the first… Well, anyway, by the end of the second week, she’d started asking me for things, gifts. She wanted money for shopping, to get her nails done. When I told her I barely made enough to pay rent and cover my classes, she threw a fit, ranting about marrying a rich rancher’s son. My family has always done okay, but we’re far from well off. I certainly didn’t have access to the kind of money she seemed to think I did. We’d been married almost a month when I came home after class to change before work. I found her in bed with some guy she’d met that morning at the coffee shop. She didn’t even know his name.”

  Ben relived all the feelings of being a foolish idiot as he told Harper about his past. Now that he’d started his confession, he had to finish. He owed her that much.

  “I told her to get out then stormed off to work. When my shift ended, I came home to an empty apartment. Literally empty. She’d taken everything. Every fork, every towel, even my cowboy boots and hat. She’d found my bank account information and cleaned me out. The only thing I had left was my dad’s old pickup that he’d given me to drive when I moved to Portland. Rather than share my stupidity with my family, I never said a word to them. To this day, you are the only person that knows about my month-long marriage.”

  Overwhelmed by emotions she couldn’t begin to process, Harper didn’t know what to say. After a long silence, she blurted the first question that popped into her head. “What did you do?”

  “I talked a friend into letting me move into his apartment and I took a second job. I slept on his couch and got up every morning at three to deliver papers for more than a year. Eventually, I replaced everything she’d stolen and saved enough to start over. She disappeared without a trace, so for years, I was married with no idea what had happened to my wife.”

  Harper’s mouth dropped open. “That’s why you run from relationships, because you’re still married?”

  Ben shook his head. “For eight years that was the reason. After multiple attempts to locate her, I hired a private investigator to track her down. He found her doing time in a prison in New Mexico for fraud, among other things. Come to find out, she wasn’t a college student when we met, but a thirty-year-old con artist. Her real name wasn’t even Melissa, it was Amber. After much headache and expense, I finally closed that chapter of my life. Although I’m still not certain if we were ever legally married because she used a false name, I have divorce papers all the same. The day she turned my world upside down, I promised myself I’d never again go through something like that.”

  “But, Ben, you know me. You know I would never do anything like that.” Harper brushed at the tears spilling down her cheeks in frustration.

  “Yeah, but I thought I knew her and could trust her. Look where that got me. That was a hard-learned lesson I’m not ever going to repeat.” Ben started to reach out to her then thought better of it. “I didn’t plan on falling in love with you, but this has to be goodbye. I can’t do this. It’s unfair to you since I can’t promise you anything more than what we’ve had the last few months. I’m so sorry, Harper, but you deserve to fall in love with someone who can love you back with their whole heart. A part of me will never be able to love you like that. In the back of my mind, I’ll always be waiting for you to walk out on me, to betray my trust.”

  Harper jumped to her feet, furious, wounded, and wracked with grief as her dreams crashed around her. “That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in my life, Ben Morgan. You’re afraid to open your heart and conveniently use one idiotic decision based on your teenage hormones running rampant as an excuse to hide from your emotions. How dare you even hint that I’d do something like that to you! You aren’t worth my time and you certainly aren’t worthy of my love!”

  She started to stalk back to the house, turned around, and slapped him across the face. “Consider this my official goodbye.”

  With that, she spun around and ran to the house. The slamming of the door echoed loudly in the morning silence.

  General lifted his head and whined before licking Ben’s hand.

  Ben swallowed around the egg-sized lump in his throat. “I know, boy. I hate goodbyes, too.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Goodbye may seem forever.

  Farewell is like the end,

  but in my heart is the memory

  and there you will always be.

  Anonymous

  “I don’t want you to leave, girlie, but you do what you need to,” Cletus said, watching as she set her suitcase in the back of her pickup.

  “I’ll let you know what I decide, Uncle Cletus. Thank you again for letting me stay with you.” Harper hugged the dear old man who’d always been more like a father to her than her own.

  “It’s me who should be thanking you, honey. You took good care of me when I needed it most. Now that I’m back to normal, I can’t force you stay when you need to go.”

  Harper sniffled and hugged him again. “I don’t want to go, but it’s too hard to be here with…” Her voice caught a
nd Cletus frowned.

  “I don’t understand why you don’t let me drive over to the Running M and thump some sense into that boy’s thick head. I heard he’s as crotchety as a bear with a briar stuck to his backside. His poor mother is nearly beside herself trying to work at the bank and referee Ben and Mike.”

  Harper had heard through the Thompson girls that they’d never seen Ben so miserable. A tiny little vengeful part of her was glad he was suffering because it was all his own doing. If he wasn’t so stubborn, they could have made a wonderful life together.

  Instead, Harper was leaving her beloved uncle to return to her life in Boise. Ready to put her time in Grass Valley far behind her, the memories would haunt her for the rest of her life.

  No matter how angry she was with Ben, how much she wanted to hate him, she couldn’t. Not when she still loved him so much and always would.

  “If you change your mind, I’ve always got a place for you here, honey.” Cletus grinned at General. “You and that mutt of yours.”

  Harper smiled. “Don’t call him a mutt. You’ll hurt his feelings.” After the dog jumped inside her pickup, she slid behind the wheel. “I’ll be back for Thanksgiving, Uncle Cletus, so don’t go thinking you’ve gotten rid of me for good.”

  “You could come back this afternoon and I wouldn’t mind at all. Now drive safe and remember to call me when you get there.”

  “I will, Uncle Cletus. I love you.”

  He leaned in the open window of her pickup and kissed her cheek. “I love you, too, Harper. Be a good girl and stay out of trouble.”

  A tear slipped down her cheek and she nodded her head. Cletus had always said the same thing to her every time she came to visit.

  Before she broke down into sobs, she rolled up the window and headed down the driveway.

  She managed to keep her tears in check until she reached the freeway. For the next hour, no matter how hard she tried to stop them, tears dripped down her cheeks. General whimpered from the backseat, so Harper finally got her emotions under control for the dog’s sake.