Read Online In a Cowboy's Arms (Hitting Rocks Cowboys) by Rebecca Winters - Free Book Online Page B

She ran into those arms that had always been outstretched to her. They hugged for a long time.
    “You saw Jarod.”
    Sadie nodded and eased away. “I don’t think it was by accident.”
    “No. He knew you were going to visit Ralph.”
    “He followed me to the truck. We talked about that ghastly night eight years ago. He said he couldn’t come to the meadow until after dark because Ned had been stalking him in White Lodge. That’s why he was so late.”
    “That doesn’t surprise me one bit. Ned was always up to no good.”
    “But it was a revelation to me! When he thought it was safe, he started for the mountains but got broadsided by a truck.” She told Millie everything they’d talked about.
    “Don’t tell me you didn’t believe him—” The tenderness in her brown eyes defeated Sadie.
    “Of course I believed him,” she half protested. “But back then I was dying inside. Now it is eight years too late. Millie—” She scrunched her fists in anger. “All these years I’ve wanted to hate him for not trying to get in touch with me.”
    Millie’s voice was gentle. “You didn’t reach out to him, either. It’s a tragedy you both lost out on eight years of loving. Ah, honey...you were so young, struggling with too many abandonment issues. When he didn’t come for you in California, the pain was too much for you.”
    “You should have heard him, Millie. He...he thought I left Montana because I didn’t want to marry a part Indian. Did you know his parents got married on the reservation? But no one knew about it, certainly not Ned.
    “I didn’t realize Jarod suffered so much from Ned’s taunting. He had to know none of that mattered to me. Can you imagine him believing I thought less of him because of his heritage?”
    The housekeeper gave her a sad smile. “Yes. Jarod is a proud man like his uncle Charlo. But at twenty-one, everything was on the line for him. Don’t forget your father’s hatred of the Bannocks, let alone his hatred of anyone who wasn’t of pure English stock.
    “Wanting to marry you was a daring dream for any man, but as we both know, Jarod was always his own person. In his fearless way he loved you and reached out for you. But when you left Montana before he got out of the hospital, all those demons planted in his mind by your father and Ned caused his common sense to desert him for a while.”
    “I see that now,” Sadie whispered, grief stricken. “But I was afraid my father would kill him.”
    “Don’t you know about the great wounded warrior inside him? He needed you to believe in him, to believe he would protect you.”
    “You’re right.”
    “Did you tell him tonight that you’d wanted to marry him more than anything in the world?”
    Sadie wiped her eyes with the palms of her hands. “Yes, but he didn’t listen. Do you know what he said? In that stoic way of his he wished me a safe journey back to California.”
    Millie studied her for a moment. “Perhaps he thinks you and Zane are romantically involved. Have you forgotten that fierce Apsáalooke pride so quickly? According to my daughter, Zane Lawson is the most attractive man she’s seen around these parts in years.”
    “No, Millie. I cleared that up with Avery the other day when she asked about Zane. She’s close to Jarod and would have told him.” But Ned had been brazen enough to ask her about Zane.
    Millie shrugged. “Maybe Jarod thinks you’re involved with a man in San Francisco and are looking forward to getting back to him.”
    “It never happened.”
    “All I can say is, if you’re going to be neighbors with the Bannocks again, it wouldn’t hurt to mend a fence that doesn’t need to stay broken. Don’t you agree? After all, Jarod’s involved with another woman right now.”
    Pain pierced her. “I know. Apparently it’s more serious than his other relationships.”
    “That doesn’t surprise me. He’s not a monk and he is getting to the age where a man wants to put down roots with a