Cowboy Read online

  Years ago, when I had just moved to the city, I’d discovered that I really enjoyed sex with no strings attached. I got an almost electric thrill from being desired by men and women. I had spent so many years as a tomboy and in Lee’s shadow that I felt sexually powerful for the first time when I moved away and discovered the joy of simply slutting around.

  People often though women who were sexually liberated must have Daddy issues, or were abused by men at some time...neither was true with me, I just happened to thrive on the attention.

  It also helped that the only time my mind wasn’t filled with thoughts of Ryder was when I was flirting with other men or writhing under their sweaty bodies.

  I had a full and amazing life back then, I had finished an MBA in record time from an excellent school and fast tracked myself into the world of investment banking. I was young, competent and had been at the top of my game when I met Andrew Tucker.

  Andrew was a junior partner at the firm, and dating a co-worker went against everything I believed in professionally, but he pursued me for weeks before I finally gave in just after the annual Christmas party.

  We went out a few times, fooled around a little, but I wasn’t that attracted to him. He had classic good looks, blonde hair, blue eyes, was a prep school trust fund kid with a body sculpted by hours spent at the gym, but there was something missing between us, there was no spark.

  That was until we’d started talking about sex. Andrew had opened me to a world of polyamory, the idea that human beings weren’t meant to be faithful to one partner, that I could love him, but be free to explore with others.

  I had taken to this concept like a fish to water, and we had moved in together a few short weeks later. Our lives had become a series of work weeks dotted with wild parties in between. Both of us enjoyed fooling around with other people quite often, but always as a couple.

  I had to admit, I blossomed in this environment. I could love Andrew, and live with him, but never be in danger of breaking his heart. Our rules were mutual and well laid out and very clear.

  I honestly thought I would finally be able to forget about Ryder and leave my small town life in the past. It didn’t work though, as much as I’d enjoyed it, Ryder had been there haunting me the entire time. He was a ghost in my head and in my heart, and tricking myself into believing in sharing Andrew had simply been the only way I could reconcile the fact that I’d never love anyone other than my tall, handsome cowboy.

  Andrew and I had never been conventional about our relationship, but there had been an underlying unspoken rule about playing solo: it was off limits.

  I myself knew for certain that I always wanted to include Andrew in my sexual explorations, and had assumed the same about him.

  About a month ago I had come home early to find Andrew and a girl named Sylvie fully naked and exploring each other’s bodies without me, in our bed.

  We knew Sylvie from the firm and I was crushed that the two of them were hooking up on the sly. The revelation shook me to the core and made me question everything I thought I had built with Andrew.

  It also made me question everything I had been doing to erase my small town past and my love for Ryder. I started to feel dirty and used then. Every time Andrew tried to kiss me after that I felt sick. Sylvie tried to talk to me about everything at one point, but I couldn’t even look at her. The two of them filled me with disgust over their betrayal.

  “Alex, darling, Earth to Alex.” Mom’s voice interrupted my reverie.

  “Oh yeah, hey mom, what’s up?” I replied, snapping out of it. There was no point going over it anyways, in that case the past was much better left in the past.

  “What are your plans today? Will you start looking for work here in town, or do you think you’ll take a few days to get used to being back home?” Mom asked.

  “I’m not sure, I hadn’t really thought about it. I’m sorry. I do have some money in my savings account for something like this, so if you need anything I could help out.”

  “Oh no, dear, that’s not what I was asking. I just wouldn’t want you to get bored. You should keep busy, especially at a time like this,” Mom replied and stood up to clear the breakfast dishes.

  “I was thinking it might be nice to take Rio out for a ride if that’s okay with you and Dad,” I said, looking at him hopefully.

  “Of course sweetie, she’s still your horse after all,” he told me without looking up from the local paper.

  I got up from the table and put my mug in the sink and helped Mom clear the rest of the dishes. She still looked overly concerned and told me to leave the plates for her to wash.

  “Aren’t you going to eat something though, Alex? I worry about how skinny you’re getting,” Mom said with her brows furrowed.

  “Oh Rita, leave the poor girl alone, she’s been through enough,” Dad jumped in with a wink. “Now why don’t you go feed and water the horses for me so I don’t have to do it before I go to work.”

  I was grateful for the excuse to get outside, away from Mom’s prying concern. “No problem Dad, I’ll see you later!”

  Rio stuck her head over the pasture gate as soon as I got close to the barn. Rio was a gorgeous horse, shiny and energetic. She was a dark bay, chocolate brown with a black mane and tail, and four white socks. She was a Quarter Horse from some of the best bloodlines in the US, and it showed. Even though she was in her mid-teens and hadn’t been worked in years, she was in fantastic condition.

  When I had been barrel racing in high school, Dad spared no expense to get his little girl the best. I appreciated it though, I wasn’t ungrateful or spoiled.

  And I’d never loved anyone or anything as much as I’d loved Rio and being away from her all these years had been so difficult.

  Well, other than Ryder of course, and that had been difficult too.

  Having a bond with a horse was impossible to explain to those who haven’t had it. I felt completely free and alive when I was out on the trail, all of my problems used to disappear when I was riding. The horse became my world and everything else melted away.

  I threw some hay to the horses, checked the automatic waterers and left them to munch their breakfast while I went to explore the old barn, checking if Dad had changed anything while I’d been away.

  I stopped in the doorway of the tack room and inhaled deeply. I loved the smell of oiled leather; I stepped inside, closed the door, sat on a bale of hay and breathed in the comforting smell of the tack.

  Alone at last, I began to think about the scene I’d walked in on back at home, Andrew and Sylvie. Andrew’s muscled back glistening with sweat from the effort of taking Sylvie from behind had startled me at first, but for a moment I had watched the two of them together, listening to the wet slap, grunts and moans of good sex.

  The most bizarre thing about the entire scene had been my absolute lack of jealousy. I’d felt hurt and betrayed, but not possessive of Andrew at all. I’d pondered it briefly, examining it as if it were a foreign concept, jealousy.

  I’d cleared my throat and brought the coupling to a frantic, stuttered, apologetic end. I realized immediately that they weren’t sorry for their deed, they were only sorry that I’d uncovered it.

  Upon interrogation, I’d discovered the deception went deeper than I had originally assumed. Andrew admitted that he had been meeting Sylvie several times a week for the past few months. I was devastated and humiliated by their lies but only in an abstract sense.

  I’d quickly realized that I’d never been in love with Andrew, but only in love with the lifestyle he’d offered. I could be free with him and be myself with him, only because he ultimately didn’t matter.

  We tried to limp our relationship along for a week or two after that, but I couldn’t stand the idea of hanging onto something I hadn’t really wanted in the first place.

  Things at work got weird too. Although Sylvie worked for the firm, she didn’t have any position of authority over me. But it turned out her father was one of the senior pa
rtners and founders of the company.

  So it was no surprise when I was called into my manager’s office and given my walking papers. I now understood how smart I’d been to have a ‘no sex with coworkers’ policy in my younger days. Not that it made much difference now; that was in the past and I was back in town and kind of happy to be here.

  I sighed heavily as I looked back at the series of mistakes I’d made leading up to this. If only I could have turned down Andrew in the first place. Or if I’d realized he was growing tired of being with me, that he wanted to explore sexually on his own. If only I’d crept back out of the apartment and pretended I’d never seen what I had.

  If only I hadn’t left town in the first place, and if only I hadn’t broken Ryder’s heart.

  I’d heard about him from my parents from time to time. Mom would offer up some nugget of information during their yearly visits to the city, looking sideways at me, gauging my reaction. I had always played it cool, but had to admit that I felt a sharp, unexpected stab of jealousy when I’d heard about his marriage. The jealousy that had been absent with Andrew.

  The worst was that it was a marriage to Brittany Adams of all people, that bitch. My rival on the rodeo circuit and for Ryder’s attention in high school. Brittany had never gotten it through her head that Ryder was with me, she was the kind of girl who had flirted outrageously with him, even when I was standing right next to him. I had always warned Ryder about her, that she was gunning for him, but he never saw Brittany’s dark side. It was one of his greatest strengths and apparently one of his biggest weaknesses; he always focused on the good in people.

  Our biggest argument had been about Brittany. It was when I was seventeen, the year before graduation. I had beaten Brittany in the barrels once again at the local summer rodeo, this time by less than half a second. Brittany’s family had money and had gone overboard buying Brittany a horse worth ten times the price of Rio.

  It hadn’t worked; it just made me try even harder to show them that Rio and I could beat anyone at any time. After the event, Brittany complained to the judges and claimed that I crossed the line before the bell was sounded, which would have disqualified my run and let Brittany take the prize. Her complaints weren’t valid though, and I remained the winner but no matter how hard I tried to show Ryder Brittany’s maliciousness, he refused to see it.

  “She’s just doing what she thinks she needs to do, she wants to win as much as you do Alexandria,” Ryder had said.

  This just angered me more. I hated it when he used my full name to talk down to me. “Are you kidding me? You don’t see how much that slut hates me! You never do!”

  He’d pulled back and looked at me, puzzled. “I don’t see it because I don’t think she’s that bad. She’s had a rough life and hasn’t had the support of her parents like you have.”

  “Oh my god, stop defending her! I’m your girlfriend, why aren’t you on my side? And her parents buy her anything she wants! What are you talking about?”

  “Her dad is a bastard, Alex. I just think you should cut her a little slack.”

  “Maybe he’s a bastard because his daughter is such an embarrassment!” I spit back at him, so pissed off that I was shaking and on the verge of angry tears.

  “Alex, darlin’, that kind of anger is beneath you. You need to let it go and let Brittany have her feelings too. I love you, and only you so there’s no reason to feel jealous of her.” Ryder had pulled me close then and covered my mouth with his.

  That was all it took for me to melt away and forget about silly Brittany and her stupid rivalry. I did learn later from Lee that Brittany had even gone as far as to sleep with one of the judges. At the time I had to admit that made me sad for Brittany to hear it, but also a little smug. Brittany had proven that she was exactly what I thought she was, even if Ryder didn’t see it.

  And Ryder had gone and married her. The bitch.

  Brittany must have felt so triumphant when Ryder asked her, finally winning something of mine after all.

  I had managed to keep my face expressionless when Mom told me the news, but later that night, alone in the bath, I let tears of anger and sadness flow down my face.

  I’d finally felt as if I’d had lost him then, and didn’t know how to mourn something I’d walked away from. I’d never thought Ryder would be the kind to divorce, but Lee’s recent news had changed everything, he was single again and I was sure I would see him soon.

  I heard the front door slam, an engine revved and Dad’s truck left the yard. I got up to check on the horses and saw that Rio was done, so I grabbed a line and clipped it to her halter.

  I was nervous at first but everything came back to me and within minutes I was grooming Rio as if no time had passed at all.

  I wondered for a moment what Ryder was doing right then, but quickly shook my head and concentrated on the horse. I didn’t want to end up worrying myself into a wreck, daydreaming and obsessing over Ryder.

  For all I knew, he already had a new girlfriend or would still be so angry with me that he would refuse to talk to me. I did pause to allow myself a brief image of Ryder’s throbbing cock probing me and pushing deep inside me.

  I sighed heavily and realized I was already obsessed again; I wanted him again so badly I ached for him. I just hoped this newfound vulnerability wouldn’t leave me broken in the end.

  “Well girl, let’s take my mind off all these crazy ideas,” I said to my horse, suddenly feeling foolish for allowing myself to get so dreamy in my parents’ barn. “I’m such an idiot, I’m glad you still seem to love me at least,” I said and patted Rio’s neck. I grabbed the horn, put my foot in the stirrup and swung up into the saddle for the first time in years.

  After a moment or two of adjustment, I settled perfectly into the curve of the seat and slipped the reins through my fingers. I waited a second or two, gauging Rio’s mood, she was relaxed and listening to me so I clicked my tongue and urged her forward out into the brilliant morning.

  I paused for a moment and pulled Rio to a full stop. I had been out riding for at least a couple of hours but it felt like no time had passed at all. It was such an uplifting feeling to be back with my horse. We had walked along familiar trails, me daydreaming and reliving rides I’d taken over the years and simply enjoying the solitude and quiet.

  Rio pricked her ears up as if hearing something, so I stilled my breathing and listened to the sounds of the forest around me. I heard something unexpected, the sound of somebody talking in a low voice.

  With a start I realized where I was, I had subconsciously directed my horse to the western most boundary of Ryder’s family ranch. I looked around to see that nothing much had changed.

  The sunlight shone through the trees and created a dappled pattern on the forest floor, small wildflowers bloomed randomly against the dark trunks of the trees and birds flitted from branch to branch, cheerfully calling to one another.

  I could remember meeting Ryder here a few times, tying our horses up, and exploring each other’s bodies in the hot summer sun. It felt like it had happened yesterday, and a sudden sense of sadness washed over me. All that time I had wasted away from town seeking something I hadn’t even wanted. All that time I could have been right here building a future with the only man I’d ever loved.

  I’d been so god damned foolish, and my only saving grace would be Ryder forgiving me and picking up where we’d stopped off.

  I gently urged Rio forward and did my best not to make a sound. I listened again to pinpoint the source of the voice and followed it directly in front of me.

  I urged Rio ahead a few more steps and stopped just inside the edge of the tree line where I could remain hidden.

  Ryder’s family had fenced almost all of their thousands of acres, and I knew exactly where this hayfield ended. I didn’t want to get out into the open in case I happened to run into Ryder like this, messy, sweaty and smelling of horse.

  A movement to the left of me caught my eye and I saw a figure crouched dow
n about fifty feet along the fence line from where I sat on Rio. He appeared to be concentrating hard on tightening the barbed wire along the bottom strand and wasn’t paying attention to the world around him.

  I could barely breathe, if that was Ryder so close to me, what would I do?

  I caught a bit of a song now and then on the breeze as the man worked and finally after what seemed like hours, he stood up, stretched, and adjusted his hat.

  It was Ryder in all his glory.

  I exhaled appreciatively and licked my lips as I narrowed my eyes to get a better look.

  I hadn’t known what to expect, I didn’t think he’d ever get fat or go bald or anything, but I hadn’t realized how much better looking he would get. He was shirtless and gleaming with sweat, he looked like an ancient god come to life.

  He still possessed a quiet confidence, but his body had filled out even more, his muscles rippled and flexed as he stretched again, taking a long draw from his canteen.

  He took his hat off and ran his hand through his hair. It was still thick and black, his face was tanned and his jawline had become chiseled with age.

  I didn’t know what to do; he still hadn’t noticed me and I knew now there was no way I could possibly talk to him like this. I needed a chance to calm down and gain my composure so I wouldn’t be stuttering like a fool or fainting at his feet.

  I backed Rio up quietly and turned to leave. I couldn’t resist though, I stopped, turned around, and took in one last long look.

  Ryder was crouched back down on another strand of fence. He had the wire stretcher in his hands and his arms bulged with the effort of pulling it tight. His face was fully concentrated on his task, but I couldn’t help but notice he had sadness in his eyes.

  Somebody had hurt him badly, but I wasn’t sure if it was me or Brittany.

  I did know that I had to find out.

  By the time I got home Mom had a fresh batch of baked goods ready. As Mom loved say, “Eat the tears away.” I should have known I hadn’t fooled Mom; she must have picked up on some of the whirlwind emotions racing through me since I got back yesterday.