Shared By the Cowboys by Cassie Cole
28
Rebecca
We scrambled to put fresh clothes on and then went downstairs, where the guys were unloading grocery bags from the truck.
“Y’all aren’t workin’?” Cody asked with a curious look on his face. “If I didn’t know any better…”
“One of the calves got in the river,” Blake said. “Got swept away in the current.”
Mason slammed the truck door angrily. “I told you we needed the fence built quickly.”
Blake recoiled. “The fuck you trying to say to me?”
Mason dropped his groceries and jabbed a finger into Blake’s chest, making the man wince in pain. “If you’d been working harder since you got here, instead of sleeping on the job, the river fence would’ve been finished by now!”
Blake knocked aside his finger. “Fuck you.”
“Hey, wait!” I shouted.
“I knew it was only a matter of time before your bullshit bit us in the ass,” Mason growled. “If you don’t want to be here, then go. We’ll replace you with someone who puts in a full day’s work.”
Blake shoved his brother in the chest, knocking him back against the truck. Mason snarled and stepped forward to throw a punch, but Blake sidestepped him and the older brother’s fist swung through open air.
“STOP IT!” I shouted, jumping between them.
They both froze, then lowered their fists.
“The calf was nobody’s fault,” I said, patting the air to calm them down. “It’s back with the herd now. Everything is fine. Blake came as soon as I called him on the radio. He jumped in the river to rescue the animal, and has the scars to prove it.”
That surprised Mason. He blinked and said, “You jumped in?”
“I wasn’t gonna let it drown,” Blake replied simply. “Stupid animal didn’t know any better.”
Mason studied him, glanced at me, then looked back at his brother. “You get tore up in the process?”
Blake raised his shirt to show the bandages underneath. “He fucked me up real good.”
Cody whistled. “No one can ever accuse you of not having balls, brother.”
Blake reached down and adjusted himself through his pants. “Took a couple of kicks there, too.”
Everyone laughed softly, and the tension slowly faded away. Blake picked up the grocery bags from the ground and sighed.
“I do want to be here,” he said. “It’s just taking me some time to work through some shit.” He glanced at me, then nodded as if convincing himself of the fact.
“Sorry for what I said,” Mason replied. “It was a dick thing to say.”
“Yeah, you’re good at being an asshole,” Blake replied.
Mason aimed a finger at him. “Watch it.” But he said it with a smile, with none of the heat from the earlier argument.
“Okay, hug it out everyone!” Cody said. “No? We’re not gonna hug? All right, all right, just checkin’…”
We helped unload the groceries then went about our daily tasks. Cody and I led Wildfire into the training pen and spent half an hour working with him. Feeding him carrots and letting him get used to us some more. By the time we were done, we were confident we could get a saddle on him within the next week.
Cody made meatloaf and buttered rolls for dinner. Blake recounted the incident with the calf, and how he thought he was going to drown until I jumped in and pulled the calf the last few feet to the riverbank.
“He did all the hard work,” I said while gathering plates from the table. “My part was easy.”
“Like when Blake can’t open a pickle jar!” Cody said. “Then I pop that sucker open real easy, and Blake claims it’s only because he loosened it for me.”
“Something like that.” I took the plates into the kitchen, then grabbed a half-gallon of ice cream from the freezer and four bowls and spoons.
When I returned to the dining table, everyone was staring at me. And not because I had ice cream.
“You two…” Mason’s finger swung between me and Blake. “You and Blake had sex?”
“Yes,” I said quietly. It still felt like a confession, one which made my stomach twist. I had slept with Mason and Cody, and now I was confessing to them that I had slept with Blake.
But Mason and Cody both reacted happily at the news.
“Hot damn!” Cody said. “I knew you’d melt his frozen heart.”
“Hey,” Blake said with offense. “Ain’t nothing wrong with my heart.”
“I don’t know about that…”
Mason watched the back-and-forth between his brothers while smiling softly.
I put the ice cream and bowls on the table. “I’ll be honest. It’s kind of weird talking about it openly like this. I still feel like I’m doing something wrong.”
Blake grabbed my arm and pulled me into his lap. “If this is wrong, then who the hell wants to be right?” He pulled me into a kiss.
“There’s the Blake we’ve missed,” Cody said. “Like he never left at all.”
“Everything’s out in the open,” Mason said simply. “We all know where we stand. Nothing wrong with that.”
“You two were right, by the way,” Blake said. “She’s good people. Didn’t know what I was missing.”
As I climbed off his lap, he gave me a loud smack on the butt.
“On behalf of the Cassidy family,” Mason said, “I apologize for my brother’s lack of table manners.”
I gave my ass a little shake and said, “I don’t mind being manhandled at the table.”
I sat down and opened the ice cream lid, then began scooping it out into the bowls.
“Does this mean you’re considering what we talked about?” Mason asked.
“Consider it?” I asked. “We’re doing it. You wanted to share me, and, well, that’s what’s happening.”
“I meant the extended stay. Remaining on the ranch after your three-month contract.”
“Oh.” I slid a bowl toward Blake and said, “Maybe so. It’s still early. I might be bored of you three by the time my contract ends.”
The joke succeeded in changing the subject. Cody leaned across the table and said, “I’ll promise you right now, Becca: that ain’t gonna happen.”
“We’ll find ways to keep you happy,” Mason agreed.
Blake kicked his feet up on the table and dug into his ice cream. “Fuckin’ right.”
They laughed and teased me with hints about what they had planned, but I had to force myself to smile back at them.
What happens when three months is up? I thought. What am I going to do?
