I stiffened at his remark. “Housetrained? I don’t think I follow you.”
“You know, one of those guys who sit at home every night with their woman and never have much of a life. I need some excitement and am starting to feel like I’m being cornered.”
Disbelief washed over me, and I blinked rapidly. “I don’t really know what to say to that. I thought you were okay with the way things were going between us. You seemed to be.”
“Well, I’m not.” Though I tried to stop it, I had no doubt the devastation showed on my face. Cowboy frowned, then turned away. “Look, I’m sorry I wasted your time.”
“Wasted my—” I paused, not believing what I heard. No way was he getting off that easy. “Are you serious? That was supposed to be your heartfelt apology?”
Cowboy turned back to me and sighed. “I know we’re going to run into each other from time to time, with you being Bobbie Jo’s friend and all, so I think we should try to at least remain friends.”
“Y-you’re giving me the friend card after all we’ve…” My voice warbled and tears formed in my eyes. “Do you not even care how much you’re hurting me right now?”
His fingers gripped the corner of the desk until his knuckles turned white. “Damn it, I’m trying to give you a polite rejection, but you keep pushing. Anna, I’m not responsible for your feelings. We just got wrapped up in this and…” He squeezed his eyes shut, as if it pained him to continue. But that didn’t stop him from doing so. “I’m starting to get bored, okay?”
My hand slapped across his face so hard, his head turned. Probably harder than I even intended, but the bastard deserved it. And I wasn’t going to apologize. Not to him. Not after what he’d done to me. “You know, I guess you were right about one thing from the beginning, Cowboy. You are a piece of shit.” Then I turned and marched out of the office, slamming the door behind me.
I held my tears at bay until I pulled out of the fire station parking lot. Then I couldn’t stop them. Clenching the steering wheel tightly, I navigated the roads through misty eyes as I replayed Cowboy’s words in my head. My heart burst all over again.
He hadn’t felt anything for me the whole time. Only pretended long enough to get me into bed. Now that his mission had been accomplished, he was looking for a fun new toy to play with. Which kept me wondering if he hadn’t really snuck off to see Mandy the night of the fire, after all. Bastard.
The vague, pathetic excuses had left me unsatisfied until I pushed him into telling me the real reason he’d dumped me. The novelty of our relationship had worn off. Relationship. What a joke. Meaningless sex was hardly referred to as a relationship. But it hadn’t been meaningless. Not for me. Because I was in love with— Oh God! I was in love with…a selfish, arrogant prick!
Apparently, I had been for years. Only difference now was that I actually knew it. And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. Especially since I wasn’t even sure what had gone wrong. Maybe I’d come across too needy. Or maybe I…
No! This isn’t my fault. This is on him.
He had betrayed my trust, not the other way around. He had used me for sex and then calmly walked all over me like a doormat. Well, never again. Never again would I give my heart to a man…especially since I’d left all the broken pieces of mine at Cowboy’s feet.
Chapter Twenty-One
Several days later, I was sitting in my kitchen dishing out lemon cookies and Gatorade to my two unexpected guests when someone tapped on my front door. I excused myself momentarily and opened it to find Bobbie Jo on my front porch.
Her worried expression sent a jolt of panic through my system. “Bobbie Jo, is everything all right?”
“That’s what I was about to ask you,” she replied. “Since you left the hospital, I’ve tried to call you several times, but you haven’t answered. I guess I was just afraid you might have—”
“Left town?” I grinned at her, but shook my head. “Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere. I’ve decided to stick around permanently.”
“What about Cowboy?”
Just hearing his name sent rage sloshing through my veins. Even though I walked out on him, he hadn’t bothered to try and contact me. And since he wasn’t willing to fight for me, I could only assume he was satisfied with letting me go.
“What about him? I don’t need his permission to stay where I have friends. I know we’re going to run into each other from time to time, and it will most definitely be awkward, but that’s just too damn bad. If he doesn’t like it, then he can avoid me.”
He said he wasn’t responsible for my feelings. Fine. Then I was sure as hell not responsible for his comfort level. The jerk.
“What about your father?”
“Oh, he’s still in town. My dad rented an apartment with the money he saved by working in the prison on kitchen detail. As an ex-convict, he was having a hard time finding a job, but Junior hired him as a line cook.”
“Are things…okay between you?”
“We’ve been talking and working through all of it. It’s a lot to take in, especially after believing something that wasn’t true for the last twenty-two years. But I think we’re heading in the right direction. And we’ve even started proceedings to get my father’s name cleared.”
A clang from the kitchen had both of us leaning inside to see what was going on. Joe and Clay Barlow sat there, tiny teacups in their giant hands, looking rather sheepish. “Sorry, Miss Anna,” Joe said. “We were fighting over the last cookie and this dipshit…um, I mean my brother…broke one of your plates. Don’t worry. We’ll clean it up.”
“Thank you. I’d appreciate that,” I replied, offering them both a sweet smile.
Bobbie Jo blinked as if she’d entered a different realm of existence. “The Barlow boys…in your kitchen…drinking herbal tea and…eating cookies?” Her brows raised a little higher with each pause.
“They’re taking a break.”
Bobbie Jo peeked inside again and the two hulking guys holding a broom and a dustpan gave her a quick wave. She shook her head and frowned. “A break from what…terrorizing you?”
“They didn’t terrorize me. I only thought they did. The moment I got home from the hospital, the two of them came over and apologized for not only what their sister had done, but how they’d behaved as well. They had no clue Mandy sent me threatening notes, much less that she misspelled them on purpose to frame her own brothers. She hadn’t known they were in jail when she kidnapped me, and I think they realize how lucky they were. It’s changed them.”
“What’s going to happen to her? Is she going to prison?”
“No. She failed her psychological evaluation. Mandy Barlow will spend her years locked away in a mental institution. It’s a fate worse than prison.”
“More memories coming back?”
“They all sort of rushed back at once. My mother lived in a dream world and had brainwashed me into believing I lived there as well. She kept me away from my father because she was afraid of losing me, which is why I think I blocked out all of the bad memories of her. I was afraid of losing her too.”
“Miss Anna, we’re going to get back to work now,” Clay said, lifting a large box from the living room floor and carrying it out the door past us. I smiled at them as Joe grabbed another and followed his brother out.
“Thanks, fellas. You’re a big help.”
Bobbie Jo grimaced. “So if you’re staying, what’s up with the boxes?”
“Oh, I’m donating all my books to the library,” I said, motioning to the piles of cardboard boxes cluttering the walkway. “The boys are helping me with the heavy lifting and loading them into my car for me.”