Page 129 of Risking it for the Cowboy

“If there’s any part of you that loves him, you should make it your business.”

She silenced at Tyler’s low-key scolding through the phone.

“Charity was with a guy like Jason. She called Thaddeus years ago, panicked. Without a penny to his name, he drove all the way across the country to help her pack and leave with him, except her ex, her agent, came home and flew off the handle. So Thad protected her.”

“T. Rex was homeless, Charlie,” Heart said. “He slept in his truck most nights, busked for gas money in each city just so he could get to her—”

“And put his fist through the bastard’s jaw,” Ty interrupted Heart. “Then collected his sis and started driving her home. He was arrested before he crossed the state line on assault charges.”

The conviction had nothing to do with a girlfriend or partner?

He defended his sister. Like he defended me…

“Couldn’t you help him?” Charlie croaked.

“Ty isn’t licensed to practice in New York,” Heart said. “Only in Massachusetts where his alma mater is.”

“I couldn’t represent him. Thaddeus got a public defender who did fuck all for him and pleaded him out instead. He served all his months. Couldn’t get a job after that. That conviction followed him everywhere. Got fired repeatedly when he lied to get on a payroll and the employers eventually found out. He’d never lower himself to ask me for help. Thought he was using me. But he finally begged me for a job.”

“Between that and his parents kicking him out because they didn’t realize he had a learning disability, he didn’t have anything left to live for,” Heart said.

Silence except for the occasional sounds of the precinct in the background. My God, to be in such despair to have lost the desire to live … she sucked in, but the ragged sound shimmied in her throat.

Tyler was the first to speak, his voice thick. “Our gramps left my farm in a bad way. But since hiring T.R. as foreman, he’s helped me turn it around. His parents threw him out. I took him in. He’d take no handout. Said he’d swing a hammer, do grunt labor, anything, to earn his keep.”

“And yet, you’d sell it to a stranger?” Charlie’s plea blurted out.

“Naw, Charlie, I’ve been workin’ on a plan to do his punk ass one better but …” Something guttural cracked in his voice but he cleared it. “The only two times I’ve seen my cousin lose control, has been when someone he loves is threatened. You gotta know, Jason bothered him from the beginning. He talked to me about it. Didn’t want you and Daisy alone.

“Now, about tonight,” Tyler continued, lowering his voice, a rustling sound indicating he was moving away from the precinct noise and shifting through some paper. “Don’t forget the real problem here. Nothing woulda happened had Jason not hurt you. You and I got some stuff to talk about once I get Thaddeus outta this mess. I won’t try to sway you about him. But don’t give up on him if you love him. He deserves to be happy, and you and Daisy do that. And off the record?” He paused, his next words a growl. “I’d have done the same thing if it had been Heart. Wouldn’t have batted an eye.”

She watched Heart twist her ring around her finger, a soft edge to her spunky demeanor that Tyler had clearly put there. Nose stuffy, that Thad had put his record on the line and to hell with the consequences for her, Charlie nodded.

“You’re gonna help him, right?” Charlie chewed her lip, wishing Trouble was here to pluck it free.

“Of course.” Spoken with confidence, his next words dark and determined. “This ain’t New York.”

*

He hung up, leaving her chest cut into pieces.

“He thinks we’re over now,” Charlie whispered, her heart breaking, an insatiable need to tell him she was in his corner.

“Why? Your brain says leave. Your heart says stay. But what does your gut say?” Heart asked softly.

Something buzzed like a text message in the distance as the breeze kicked up, rustling the leaves.

She glanced toward the sound. His shop door? It was open, and a feeble light was glowing.

That was right! He’d come outside to tinker. Had he left his phone out there? She hopped down the steps, across the earth, and sure enough, his phone and his keys lay on his drafting table, next to an incredible architectural rendering and a drafting triangle shoved across the desk.

It couldn’t be the chicken coop, that one was done…

The name Daisy caught her eye.

She pulled it forward and angled it to the light. Her eyes roved over the plans.

It was his … cabin? The name Daisy was written in block caps, for clarity. Within the parameters of … a plan for an addition? An extra bedroom and bathroom. Built in bookshelves—he was certain he was going to turn Daisy into a reader; she smiled despite the moment—drawings of a bed and table and play area. In fine details. Sketches of a horse pattern tiny and intricate on the bedspread. It wasn’t just an architectural plan. It was an imagined space. And only a dad who loved his little girl would pour himself into making her dreams come true.