Cassidy Harte and the Comeback Kid Read Free Page B

arms of her brother’s wife.
    Seeing him all the time, working for him, was bound to undermine that confidence. She couldn’t do it. Not even for Jean.
    â€œI’m sorry,” she said again.
    Jean shrugged and managed a weathered smile. “We’ll just have to make the best of a bad situation.That’s all we can do. Now, it’s been a heck of a day. Why don’t you go back to your cabin and I’ll finish up here?”
    â€œNo. I’m almost done. You get some rest.”
    Jean touched her shoulder again. “Good night, then,” she said, then hobbled from the kitchen.
    After her boss left, Cassie quickly finished her prep work for breakfast, then turned the lights off and walked out of the kitchen toward her own cabin next to the creek.
    She considered her little place the very best perk of working for the ranch. It was small, only three rooms—tiny bedroom, bathroom and a combined kitchen and living room—but all three rooms belonged to her.
    For another few days, anyway.
    The cabin was more than just a place to sleep. It represented independence, a chance to stand on her own without her two older brothers hovering in the wings to watch over her, as they had been doing for most of her life.
    She was twenty-eight years old and this was the first time she had ever lived away from home. How pathetic was that? She had never known the giddy excitement of moving into a college dorm and meeting her roommates for the first time or the rush of being carried across the threshold of a new house by a loving husband or repainting a guest bedroom for a nursery.
    She didn’t like the bitter direction her thoughts had taken. Still, she couldn’t help thinking that if it hadn’t been for Zack Slater, her life might have turned out vastly different.
    She had just graduated high school when he blew into her life. She had been young and naive and passionately in love with the gorgeous ranch hand withthe stunning gold-flecked eyes and the shadows in his smile.
    To her amazement he had seemed as smitten as she. The fierce joy in his face whenever he saw her had been heady stuff for a girl who had never even had a serious boyfriend before.
    Right from the beginning they had talked of marriage. He had wanted her to finish college before they married, but she couldn’t stand the idea of being away from him for four long years. She had worked for weeks to persuade him that she could still attend college after they were married, that he could work while she went to school since she had a scholarship. After she graduated, she would work to put him through.
    Finally she had worn down his resistance. She flushed now, remembering. Maybe if she hadn’t been in such a rush, had given him time to adjust to the idea of settling down, he wouldn’t have felt the need to bolt.
    But he did, taking her dreams—and her brother’s wife—with him, and leaving Matt a single father of a tiny baby.
    What else could she have done but stay and try to repair the damage she had brought down on her family? If she had the choice to do all over again, she honestly didn’t think she would change anything she had done after he left.
    She sighed and let herself into the cabin, comforted by the familiar furnishings—the plump couch, the rocker of her mother’s, the braided rug in front of the little fireplace. She had made the cabin warm and cozy and she loved it here.
    Functioning more on autopilot than through any conscious decision, she walked into the small bathroom and turned on the water in the old-fashioned clawfoottub, as hot as she could stand. When the tub was filled almost to overflowing, she took off her clothes and slipped into the water, desperate to escape the unbelievable shock of seeing the only man she had ever loved, after all these years.
    Taking a bath was a huge mistake.
    She realized that almost as soon as she slid down into the peach-scented bubbles. Now that