LITMIR.BIZ

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responsible for the way that she lived now. He was the reason she had a business. He was the reason she had a house. He was the reason that she had enough money to hire employees and was now indulging in a completely ruined day off.

      It all started with him. Even though her business was completely self-sufficient now, without that injection of cash, she wouldn’t have any of it. And yes, whether it should or not, it mattered that it was from him and not from the insurance company.

      Like the monster had reached out of the closet to offer a piece of candy for everything he’d put her through. She didn’t want that. She didn’t want to be bound to him. Didn’t want to be tied to him completely.

      There was only one option. Only one option that was acceptable to her, anyway.

      She dumped tepid coffee out into what would be flowers, if she ever bothered to plant any. Then she took a deep breath. She was going to get dressed, and then she and Gage West were going to meet on her terms.

      * * *

      GAGE HAD BEEN going over paperwork for hours. The text on the page was starting to wiggle, numbers beginning to reverse themselves. He was not a paperwork guy. He had a brilliant understanding of numbers and how investments worked. It was the reason he had any money to call his own. And he had quite a lot of it.

      But, having a good head for business often meant knowing exactly which tasks you needed to farm out to other people. And that was another area he was expert in.

      He had people to take care of the actual act of investing, people who managed his finances. Meanwhile, he continued to work with his hands whenever he could. Most people who had come into contact with him over the past few years probably imagined that he was destitute. And, he couldn’t really blame them. He tended to live in motels; he traveled from place to place; his truck wasn’t anything to write home about.

      Of course, he’d owned this property on the lake for years. But no one knew that. He bought everything through a shell company and had his attorney handle all of his business. Finding caretakers for the place and everything else. He bought the house about a decade ago but had never actually lived in it.

      It was the kind of place his father would find far beneath West family standards, but to Gage it was much better than the places he’d been staying while on the road.

      It was rustic, but spacious. The property had a couple of outbuildings on it, including a barn that was housing horses for an older couple who weren’t in town half the year. His caretaker had taken care of them while he’d been gone, but he wouldn’t mind a chance to handle horses while he was in town.

      Of all the things he’d done while he’d been wandering the country, rodeo and ranch work had been his favorite. And staying mobile had been a great way to keep ahead of his demons.

      He wasn’t entirely certain what had prompted him to buy a place in Copper Ridge. Only that some part of him wanted to own a piece of it. Wanted to have a foot in it.

      It was a difficult place to let go of, even when you were desperate to do it. But, it was all working out now. In that way that shit shows could work out. Which was definitely what this was.

      He pushed his fingers through his hair and walked over to the kitchen window, looking out at the lake, barely able to glimpse Rebecca Bear’s house where it was nestled in the trees across the water.

      He could totally understand why she felt like she was being stalked. In some ways, he kind of was stalking her. In order to get her to stop being so pigheaded and take the store. He supposed he could sign it over to her, and then there wouldn’t be much she could do about it. Except maybe refuse to sign her part of the deed. And then shoot him in the face.

      His doorbell rang, and he could not for the life of him figure out who it might be. Maybe a neighbor with cookies. A neighbor who had no idea who he was. Because it sure as hell wasn’t a member of his family, or anyone else who had a clue that he was the disgraced Gage West.

      His father had done a damn good job covering up what had happened the night of Rebecca’s accident. Nobody knew that he had been racing some friends on a back road and hit a car carrying a woman and her daughter. But, they did know that he had abandoned his family. They knew that he had left his fragile mother and a father who was endlessly generous to the community.

      Gage West was nobody’s favorite. And he knew it.

      He crossed the kitchen, heading into the entryway, jerking the door open without bothering to look out the window and see who was standing there.

      When he saw his dark-haired, petite visitor, he felt like he’d been kicked in the chest by a bull. “What are you doing here?”

      Rebecca frowned. “I thought you might like to see what it’s like to have somebody show up uninvited at your place.”

      “I’m not nearly as disturbed by it as you were. But, I am curious.”

      “I don’t want to owe you,” she said.

      “Okay.”

      “I see you have a working ranch here.”

      “Nothing major. Just a few horses.”

      “Well, someone has to take care of them. Someone has to ride them. And there are bound to be other things that can be done around the property.”

      “Are you offering to do manual labor in exchange for the multiple thousands of dollars that I gave you?” He was being an ass now, and he knew it. But then, he was often an ass, so he didn’t see why he should change it now.

      “I know, it’s barely going to put a dent in it. But I’m going to do my best to work off my debt to you. And then, I will damn well buy that building from you. But I’m not going to owe you. The way I see it is this—I’m going to work, you’re going to knock some numbers off of the debt. And then, when all is said and done, whatever else I owe you can put into the cost of the building.”

      He rocked back on his heels. “That isn’t quite how I saw it going.”

      “Too bad. I don’t know what you expected to come back and find. I imagine you pictured some broken, fragile girl who was just going to get on her knees and weep at your unexpected charity. But that isn’t me. I’m not a crier. I’m a worker. And my life is my own. So, at the end of the day, I don’t want to owe you a damn thing, Gage West. At the end of this, we part ways, and neither of us owes the other a thing.”

      He stared at her for a moment, his stomach twisting. This angry, strong woman, who was completely different than what he had imagined she might be, was offering him absolution in a way he had never considered.

      Ultimately, he imagined that he was beyond forgiveness. And he stood by that. But she was right. This clean break could mean neither of them would owe anything to the other—it was the only way they could fully extricate themselves from each other’s lives.

      He had never met her before. Not before this week. And yet, Rebecca Bear was the person who had affected his life more than any other. The reason he had made almost every choice he made in the past seventeen years.

      And he could see that he was tied up in hers too.

      So this could be the end. This could be the clean break. He would be a fool not to take it.

      “You’ve got yourself a deal, Rebecca. I’m going to be here for as long as it takes. And in that time you can work on my ranch and assist me with other things that might come up as I organize my father’s assets. Then in the end, we’ll draw up an agreement for the building, and I’ll sell it to you, and we will filter all payments through a bank.”

      He stuck out his hand, and she just looked at it as though it were a snake. He watched as she curled her fingers into fists, but she did not lift her hand. He let his own drop back to his side.

      She tilted her chin up, her dark eyes glittering. “Then, it’s a deal.”

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