Grant (Riding Hard) - Jennifer Ashley Page 0,15
around. “Where’d you hear that?”
“Mrs. Ward told me.” Ray settled his head back on the seat. “Yesterday, I think. They made her an offer on her restaurant. She said no, and they were seriously p.o.’d. She said they acted like she was a dumb hick for turning it down. Dickheads.”
Christina stared at him for a moment or two before she pulled away from the stop sign and drove on toward the highway. She hadn’t heard anything about offers for Mrs. Ward’s store, but she’d been focused on the wedding, and on avoiding Grant.
Interesting. She’d have to ask her uncle, Sam Farrell, who owned the bar. Sam knew everything going on in town that was worth knowing.
The Malory ranch was on a fairly flat piece of land north of town. The house had been there for about a hundred years, the Malory family about fifty.
A barn lay beyond the house, surrounded by huge fenced pastures. While Kyle and Ray were most known for their bull-riding skills, they also trained cutting horses for both the rodeo circuit and for cattle work on the big ranches.
The house was dark with Kyle, Grace, and Lucy still at the reception. Ray had gone back to sleep by the time Christina parked in the driveway, and she had to dig into Ray’s pants’ pocket for his keys.
She took him in through the back—only company used the front door. Ray was hanging on her, half awake and stumbling as Christina got him up the stairs of the two-story house.
Christina knew which one was Ray’s bedroom, and she took him there now, arranging him on one side of his big bed.
He was out. Christina put her hands on her hips, studying him.
Ray was a big man, strong, but right now he was completely limp, one arm hanging over the side of the bed. He hadn’t been part of the wedding party, so he was in a regular suit, the coat bunched up his back.
Christina sighed. She wouldn’t feel right leaving him alone like this. She still cared about Ray—they’d always been friends. She’d stay to make sure he was okay, at least until Kyle or the girls got home.
She pulled off Ray’s boots, loosened and slid off his tie, and eased his coat from him, then his pants. She pulled a blanket over his bare legs, folded the clothes neatly on the dresser, and looked at him again.
Ray snored softly, his mouth slack, dark hair rumpled. He really was handsome, even sound asleep.
Standing in the darkened room, Christina made the decision to let him go. It gave her pain to do it, because she’d never know if she and Ray could have had something together.
But it wasn’t fair to Ray that Christina’s breath left her every time Grant walked into a room, that she was aware of every move Grant made even when she didn’t look at him, that she felt sad whenever he walked out again.
Ray deserved to be with a woman who was entirely into him. He deserved to fall madly in love, get married, and have half a dozen kids. The kids would love horses like he did, and maybe grow up to be champion bull riders.
Christina would tell him tomorrow, once he got over his hangover, that their current coolness wasn’t a temporary fight. They could never be together, not while Grant was there in her heart.
She sighed again. She was tired, she needed to rest, and there was no chair in Ray’s bedroom. Plenty of room on the bed, though. Two days ago, she would have climbed up without a second thought. Now, though … She’d step across the hall to Grace’s room, and then go home when Kyle or the sisters turned up.
Ray moaned in his sleep. He was drunker than usual, and she wondered if he’d imbibed more because of his anger at her. Another moan, then the poor guy started to get sick.
Christina hurried into the bathroom, grabbed a towel, and managed to get his head over the edge of the bed, the towel to his mouth. He retched up some spit, then settled down again. Christina folded the towel over and put it into the laundry chute in the hall, then went back to the bedroom.
She worried about leaving him alone in here, even as close as Grace’s room was. If he choked…
She could at least take care of him one last night.
Christina wouldn’t be able to lie down comfortably in the gown. She reached around to unzip it,