Second Chance at Sunflower Ranch (The Ryan Family #1) by Carolyn Brown

“Until today, if he’d called me and asked me to meet him somewhere, I would have gone,” Mia admitted.

“What changed your mind today?” Jesse asked.

Mia picked at the green grass around her and hesitated so long that Addy thought she was going to ignore the question. The only noise around them was a rangy old bull who had come up to the pasture fence on the other side of the ditch. Every few minutes he snorted loudly as if telling them to get away from his area.

“In that instant when I didn’t know if we were going to live, I realized that Ricky had carved away so much of who I am, that the wrong person was about to die,” Mia finally said. “Does that make sense?”

“More than you’ll ever know,” Jesse answered.

She swiped a tear away with the back of her hand. “I don’t want to be remembered as that girl he created, but as the girl who had a backbone and made her own decisions. I wish I’d never gotten this tattoo, but it will always remind me to never think that I have to…” She wiped another tear. “…to do anything a guy wants me to do to be his girlfriend. I’m just lucky he ran away with that other girl. I hated her at first for taking him from me. Now I feel sorry for her.”

Addy hugged her tightly. “I’d send her a thank-you card if I knew her name.”

“He’d better stay out of Honey Grove for a long time,” Jesse said through clenched teeth.

“I hear a truck coming around the curve.” Mia pointed. “That didn’t take long, and, Jesse, he’s not worth going to jail over. We need to forget him and move on.”

The sound of a big truck filled the air, and then the wrecker came around the slight curve and stopped. A bald man with a full gray beard opened the door and yelled, “Which one you want me to take care of first?”

“The truck, and if we could ride with you back to Honey Grove, that would be great,” Jesse told him.

“No problem. That’s why I’ve got a backseat in this thing,” he said. “By the way, I’m Tommy Forestall. Y’all crawl on up in there. I’ll get this thing hitched up and we’ll be on our way.” He hopped out of the vehicle. “After you get your wife and her sister up in the truck, you could put these up on either side of us to stop the traffic for a few minutes.” He handed Jesse a stack of orange cones. “Don’t want someone to come around that curve and make a mess of my new wrecker. Honey Grove, huh? Do you know Sonny Ryan?” the guy asked.

“That’s my dad,” Jesse answered.

“Good guy. I graduated from Honey Grove High School with him all them years ago. We had us some good times together. Maybe I’ll just run in and say hello to him when we get there,” Tommy said.

“I’m sure he would like that.” Jesse set the cones down and helped Addy and Mia up into the backseat of the wrecker.

“Why didn’t you tell him that I’m not your wife?” Addy whispered.

“Then I’d have to explain that Mia is your daughter, not your sister, and that would just complicate things.” Jesse grinned.

When he’d closed the door, Mia fastened her seat belt and then asked, “Did you ever think about dating Jesse before he went to the Air Force?”

“Like I’ve told you before, we were best friends,” Addy answered. “You don’t ruin something that important with a fling.”

“Too bad,” Mia said. “It might have led to something pretty nice for both of you, but then what do I know? I let Ricky lead me around like a puppy on a leash.”

Addy laid a hand on Mia’s knee. “But now, you’ve broken that leash, and you will never make that mistake again.”

“Other than this damned tattoo, I don’t want anything to ever remind me of him again.” Mia sighed.

Jesse got into the passenger seat. “I heard what you just said. Just forget him, darlin’, and move on with your life. One bad choice doesn’t have to define you.”

“Thanks, Jesse,” Mia said.

“Amen,” Addy added.





Chapter Seventeen



Jesse paced the bunkhouse floor that evening, his nerves strung like a rubber band stretched to the breaking point. All he could think about was that rotten Ricky O’Malley and what he’done to Mia. Jesse was seething when Addy came through the door and crossed the floor, wrapped her arms around him, and held him close.

“I need to feel your arms around me,” she said. “I’m still reeling from everything. I thought that the drama we’d been through was the toughest we would ever see, but I was wrong.”

Jesse wrapped her in his arms and held her so close that he could feel the calming effect of her heart beating in unison with his. “I’ve been in really tough situations, Addy. Some to the point that I wanted to kill whoever had hurt my buddies so badly, but never have I felt such anger as I did today when Mia told us how controlling Ricky had been with her.”

“Me, too, and I needed to be close to you tonight to calm this roller coaster of emotions that’s making me want to cry one minute and hurt a spoiled boy the next,” she whispered.

Jesse slipped one arm under her knees and the other around her shoulders, picked her up, and carried her to the sofa. He sat down, keeping her in his lap. “How on earth did Ricky play at the poker tables anyway? He’s only nineteen, right?”