Sweet Home Wyoming Read online

  Sweet Home Wyoming

  Holiday Heartthrob Book 3

  Holly Hathaway

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2020 by Holly Hathaway

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  A Gift For You

  Afterword

  Also by Holly Hathaway

  Let‘s Stay Connected!

  Chapter One

  Allie

  My body is on my parents’ ranch in Wyoming, but my heart is still on its way back from Europe. And how could it not be after spending the summer traveling with my best friends and

  falling in love with the man of my dreams? I have spent the last week sitting on our porch, gazing off into the distance, dreaming of Ben giving up everything to be out here with me.

  My heart was floating in the clouds for the entire summer when I was in Europe. It was the kind of vacation you see in films. I took off with my two best friends from college, Kate and Mindy, and we spent three months traveling from country to country. It was the ultimate girls trip, until I met Ben on the very first day and never looked back. He captivated me with his strength and charm, and I have no doubt in my mind that he is the love of my life. He also happens to be a wealthy investor, and we met on his stunning yacht in Ibiza. I was utterly enchanted with him, and we made love the very next day after the most romantic dinner of my life. It was my first time, and I loved every second of it. We were smitten with each other. So much so, he flew me to Dubai to join him on a business trip.

  In Dubai, he confessed his love for me. It was a big step, a huge leap forward that we were hardly ready for, but something about it felt right. And when we weren't together, he texted me every hour of every day. He made me feel like we were made for each other.

  And now he's back home in England, and he hasn't been messaging me as much. I spend entire days waiting on his texts, but sometimes they don't come. In Dubai, he promised that he would make arrangements to visit me at home in Wyoming. But I'm beginning to wonder if he’ll follow through. I'm starting to feel like Mindy was right. Was it just a summer fling that had to end? This thought makes me feel heartbroken.

  Mindy and Kate have since gotten jobs out of state and are preparing to move. I know I should be helping them pack and saying goodbye, but I can't muster the energy to do much of anything. My mother called me 'mopey' the other day. She keeps attempting to get me to help her with the horses, but heart isn't in it. I can only use jetlag as an excuse for so long…

  Kate is moving to New York City, and Mindy is headed to Miami. And I’m still living in my parents’ house hung up on a guy who lives an ocean away. I pat Tractor on the head, my large black gentle giant of a dog. He slobbers all over my lap, but it's comforting. I missed him while I was gone, and I think he missed me, too.

  I've applied for a dozen jobs now, and I've also had a few phone interviews, but I haven't heard anything back. I'm pretty discouraged, although my dad keeps assuring me that it will take some time before I hear anything and that I shouldn't worry.

  I wipe the lenses of my glasses on my shirt, which I know I'm not supposed to do. The summer disappeared so quickly and gave way to brisk air and yellow, crispy leaves. I see signs of autumn in the trees. Wyoming grows cold early in the year, and it feels fitting for the state of my heart.

  Is Ben going to break things off?

  "Allie, let's go ride," my brother, Eric, says as he comes up onto the porch, his cowboy boots stomping on the floorboards, starting me out of my daydreams.

  I swing back and forth on the porch swing.

  “Come on, Allie. You can’t sit there all day.”

  "Sure I can." I glance down at my phone, but I'm not looking at anything in particular. He marches up to me and swipes it out of my hands.

  "Hey!"

  “Al. You’re not yourself. You need to forget about this guy. He’s breaking your heart.”

  I look up at Eric, the only person who can ever get away with calling me Al. It’s so hard for me to be mad at him. I can't be, even if I try.

  “I’m sorry, Eric. I just don't really feel like it today. Maybe tomorrow?"

  “It’s going to be cold tomorrow.”

  “I’ll wear a jacket.”

  He looks down and then out into the horizon, disappointment written all over his face. "Here's your phone back, sis," he says as he hands it back to me, frowning. He's five years younger than me, but he acts like he's older by always trying to look out for me and be protective. And sometimes, he likes to tell me what to do.

  He turns to leave but looks back over his shoulder.

  "Just move on, Al. He's no good, and you deserve better."

  Chapter Two

  Ben

  “What are you doing brooding around the house, Ben? It's like you're a sullen teenager all over again." My father sits across from me, a coffee table between us and a fireplace crackling in the corner of the living room. It's already after midnight, and I try to tune him out as I wrap up a few work emails.

  I take a deep breath, hold it, and let it slowly release. I finish the message and press send. It’s to a client, though. Not Allie. I’ve typed out a hundred messages to Allie and then deleted them, never summoning the courage to hit the send button. I'm never sure if what I have to tell her is going to be helpful or hurtful. It's hard to communicate when there's this distance between us, both physical and emotional.

  "Come on. Talk to me," he prods. "I'm a lonely old bastard with nothing to do." He takes a sip of scotch. "And my other son is a moron. Tell me, how's business?"

  "It's going well, I guess." I shrug, still staring down at my phone.

  "Son, what's really on your mind?" His voice is loud and echoes throughout the house. I know he's not going to let it go unless I open up, or go to bed.

  “Nothing.”

  “Is it that girl?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “You don’t want to talk about anything.”

  "I just have a lot on my mind. There's a big deal I'm closing at work this week" I glance up at my dad. Ever since my mum left him and he moved into my house, he's become something of a homebody and a drunk.

  "If you have a lot on your mind, then you must have a lot to talk about. I know it's more than just work," he says.

  I let the grandfather clock tick away the seconds and fill the silence for one, two, three, four… “I don’t know about Allie, anymore. I haven’t been talking to her.”

  He gives me a stern look. I never know when he's going to launch into an in-depth conversation about love and life or when he'll make jokes and laugh all of our problems away. I didn't start growing closer to him until Mum was out of the picture. “I know I don’t always talk about women in the brightest of lights," he says. “I’ve slandered your mother once or twice for running off with a sleazy car salesman from Lancashire.”

  “Dad…”

  “But you were happier than I’ve ever seen you when you came home this fall. And I know it’s because of
that American girl. So what’s wrong? Why won’t you talk to her?”

  "Because. It's complicated."

  “You’re not twelve. You can’t just say because.”

  "The summer went by so quickly. Everything is moving too fast. We fell in love too fast."

  “And then what happened?”

  My life has become his soap opera. I can tell he's loving the drama right now, soaking it in. "If you must know, I just don't know if I can force her to choose between being my wife and following her dreams. I feel I would just complicate her life. I don't want her to resent me forever."

  He pours himself another glass of scotch. “Don’t look at me like that, son. My liver is fine. Why would she have to compromise her dreams in order to be with you?”

  “Because she's young and she wants to stay in America and ride horses and save the grizzly bears. And I'm so busy, I can never stay in one place. We have such different lifestyles, I believe I would be a drain on her.”

  “It sounds like a tough decision." He gazes down at the floor, as if musing over all of the mistakes in love and life that he made over the course of his life. “You're a brilliant man with a lot of resources. I'm sure you'll figure something out."

  My father is right. I have a way of always figuring something out. I can make a win-win situation out of just about anything. In fact, I think I know just what I could do.

  Just when I’m about to send Allie a message, I receive one from her.

  Hey, Ben, we need to talk. I feel like you're not feeling this anymore, and I need to move on.

  Chapter Three

  Allie

  Heart pounding, I type out the message to Ben and then shove my phone into my underwear drawer, where I won't hear it vibrate, and it will be out of sight. Out of sight, out of mind. I don't want to look at that thing until tomorrow.

  Or maybe I’ll just get a new phone with a new number and forget all about Ben. Waiting for him to call me and text me is torture, and Eric is right. I’m not myself right now, and I need to carry on with my life. I take a deep breath and head downstairs. I hear my dad singing along to the radio as he is cleaning up the dishes, and spot my mom on the couch, engrossed in her new book club novel.

  “Hey, sweetie,” my dad says with a genuine smile, noticing my entrance. I know he’s been trying to give me some space since I’ve been back. “Good to finally see you out of your room.”

  “Where’s Eric?” I ask.

  “I think he’s outside on the porch.”

  I step outside. The night is chilly, but the sky is breathtaking and speckled with stars. That's one of the many things I missed the most when I was in Europe. I was always in a brightly lit city where you couldn't see the stars. Here on the ranch, they gleam bright and brilliant, and I could stare at their silvery-white beauty for hours.

  “Al?” says a voice from the porch swing in the shadows. “You look cold. Come here.”

  I sit down beside him and he gives me his jacket. I wrap it around my body and rock back and forth on the creaking swing.

  “I did it,” I say.

  “You did what?”

  “I gave him an out.”

  “What do you mean?”

  But he looks at me like he already knows what I’m going to say. Unlike his big sister, he went through half a dozen relationships in high school. I tell him about the message I sent Ben.

  “I think you made a good choice, Al.”

  We rock back and forth on the swing, just like we’ve done night after night since we were just kids. Tractor sits near our feet, panting. His ears prick at the wild animals making noises in the forest. He barks. A horse neighs from the barn.

  Soon enough, I'll get myself a job and move out of this house. Not too far, I hope. But it's time for me to grow up and be a woman out on my own.

  In the morning, I wake to the smell of omelets frying downstairs. I don't know what time it is because my phone is still hidden away in my underwear drawer. I'll have to retrieve it eventually, but for now, I'm too nervous to see Ben's response.

  If Ben responded. It will hurt too much to know this early in the morning.

  I head downstairs and see that Eric has already prepared my favorite turkey and cheese omelet. He drops the plate down in front of me and pours me a fresh cup of coffee.

  "I remember you tried coffee in Europe, and you liked it, so I thought I'd make you some this morning.”

  I smell it. “Kind of reminds me of Ben.”

  He swipes it away and dumps it down the sink. “No coffee for you.”

  "Eric! I still would have liked it."

  “Not now. It’s already gone.”

  My mom comes in from outside. She stomps her boots on the mat in the entryway and hangs her coat on a hook. The fresh smell of hay follows her into the house.

  “Well,” she says. “The horses are fed. And there’s a black SUV coming up the driveway. I don’t know who it is.”

  “Probably somebody who got lost," Dad says as he gets up from the couch and makes his way toward the door with a slight limp. “Let me handle this.”

  It's not very often that anyone comes up our driveway, but I don't give it much thought. I'm sure it isn't anything important. I just want to dig into this omelet and forget about the British hunk who broke my heart.

  Chapter Four

  Ben

  "Can I help you?"

  “My name is Benjamin Smith, and I'm here to see your daughter, Allie." I look him square in the eye and hold out my hand for him to shake. The air is dry and smells strongly of pine and horses. There's also the kind of silence that is a constant reminder that I am no longer in the city.

  “What do you want with her?” He shakes my hand and looks at me like he already knows exactly who I am.

  Before I can answer, a young man comes out of the house. He stomps down the porch towards us, his boots crunching gravel with every step.

  “Who is this guy?”

  “Says his name is Ben,” says Allie’s father, who keeps his eye on me. “I’m Greg. This is my son, Eric.” They stand beside each other with their arms crossed. I can tell they’re Allie’s relation, especially Eric. “Those shoes are gonna get muddy,” says Greg, pointing down at my feet.

  “It's no bother."

  Eric does not shake my hand. He stands there with his arms crossed and his eyes glaring at me. “Allie doesn’t want to see you,” he says.

  “I know. That’s why I had to come in person.” I fold my hands in front of me. "I've come a long way. May I see her please?"

  “Nice Cadillac,” says Greg, completely disregarding my request.

  Greg is not what I was expecting. He has a very calm demeanor and seems unsurprised that I'm here. Almost as if he was expecting me. I can't read him. At this point, I don’t know if he’s going to throw me off his property or if he’s going to invite me in and serve me breakfast. Eric, on the other hand, looks like he wants to strap me to a rocket and blast me off into outer space.

  “It’s a rental,” I respond, avoiding Eric's eyes. They look exactly like Allie's only much angrier.

  "Would you like to come inside?"

  “Dad,” the boy growls.

  “A cup of coffee won’t hurt,” says Greg.

  "We finished the last of the pot."

  “We’ll make more,” Greg says to me with a wink, but I don’t know what it means. I don’t know if he’s being charming or making some subtle threat using a very obscure coffee metaphor that I will never decode.

  "Why didn't you just call her?" Eric steps closer to me, and I now see that he’s just a teenager, a boy, and one who's clearly very protective of his sister.

  "I'd like to tell her that in person. I have some matters to discuss with her, and I'd just like to see her."

  “And what if we just ask you to leave?” Eric steps closer to me once again. If not for his father standing there, I might think he would attack me. He doesn’t seem to know how much smaller than me he is, and I doubt he would stand a
chance.

  "Then I'll leave quietly. I can't force you to let me in. But could you at least let her know that I am here?"

  "She deserves the right to know," says Greg with a shrug. “Calm down, Eric, you’re not in a Clint Eastwood movie.”

  Chapter Five

  Allie

  “Al. There’s someone here to see you.”

  "Someone to see me?" I ask through a mouthful of turkey and egg.

  I turn to see Eric standing in the doorway with the same look in his eye that he used to have right before we tried to beat each other up when we were kids. I don’t even need to ask who it is.

  “It’s Ben,” he says.

  "Allie, you can do whatever you want," says my dad from outside. "You can go talk to him. Or you can stay here, and we'll send his ass away. It’s up to you. But I think he means well.”

  I take a deep breath, no longer hungry for the second half of my omelet.