Montana Cowboy Daddy (Wyatt Brothers of Montana #3) - Jane Porter Page 0,77

it, she would, she told herself, hunching her shoulders against yet another blast of cold air, the wind as much a part of Marietta as the famed Copper Mountain peak standing sentry behind the town’s historic courthouse.

Yes, it might mean missing the Marietta Stroll tomorrow night, something she’d never missed before, not even when she was flying with Big Sky Air, as it was her annual tradition with her mom, but Mom was gone, having passed away suddenly in September and Sadie had accepted that things were different. She was different. She’d given up her fantasies and daydreams and had turned over a new leaf. Her goal was to be strong, self-sufficient, and practical. And practical was the most challenging of the three.

Being practical had become her mantra since Rory was hurt, and then came her mom’s death, and being practical took on a whole new meaning. With her mom gone, Sadie realized just how foolish she’d been, chasing impossible dreams all these years, with Rory the biggest dream of all.

Getting over Rory wasn’t proving to be easy. Maybe it was because the last time she saw him was at the hospital in Clovis and he’d been a bear, out of his mind with pain, but at least he was alive.

She’d gone to the hospital to make sure he was breathing. She’d gone to make sure he’d survive.

But looking at his poor, battered body, with all those bandages and tubes and tape, she didn’t feel sorry for him, she felt angry. He was doing this to himself. He wanted out. He didn’t care about living.

That was why she’d wanted to have his baby. It was why she’d shown up at the arenas for over two years. She wasn’t there to watch him ride. She was there to figure out how to ask him to sleep with her. But every time she saw him, her courage deserted her. How did you ask a man like Rory to get you pregnant?

How did you say, “Hey, I’ve loved you since I was thirteen and I’ve spent my life waiting for you, and loving you from afar, and if I can’t have you, maybe I could just have a piece of you…”

Of course, you didn’t say it because it was crazy, and yet it hadn’t stopped Sadie from dreaming and praying.

But then when her mom died, Sadie’s world collapsed, and she’d taken an indefinite leave of absence from the airline while she tried to come to terms with who she was, and where she was at thirty-five, and that was alone, most singularly alone. Sadie also knew she had no one but herself to blame as she’d spent her life waiting for someone, and something, that would never happen.

But that was going to change.

She’d already changed.

She’d given up working for the airline to make a new life for herself in Marietta, a life that was stable, and grounded, a life that meant she was putting herself first and only dating nice, local, emotionally available men. She wouldn’t let herself think of these nice emotionally available men as boring, either. And she most definitely wouldn’t let herself compare them to Rory. It wasn’t fair to them, or her.

But, even more significantly, she was moving forward in her desire to be a mom. She didn’t have to have Rory’s baby to be a mother. The world was filled with men, and fertility clinics, and sperm donors. She didn’t need to be married to be a mom. She didn’t need to wait. She had a home and savings, and she wasn’t getting any younger. If she wanted to have children, she needed to do it now, while she could conceive.

That was why she was working so hard, juggling her online shabby chic business, The Montana Rose, with her job at Marietta Properties, along with the occasional babysitting/dog sitting/housesitting job. The plan was to sock away as much money as she could right now, so she could afford to take some time off when the baby came.

Lights shone in the distance and an old white pickup truck came into view. Sadie watched as the truck slowed and parked next to the curb. The lights turned off, and the driver door swung open. Her heart did a hard, uncomfortable thump as a tall man in a sheepskin coat approached, boots and cane crunching snow, his black felt cowboy hat drawn low on his brow.

Her heart did another hard thump, and she felt a frisson of pleasure followed by a