Mac heard the front door slam and looked up from the documents he’d been poring over in the den. One of the ranch hands had found the calf safe and sound a while ago. Since then, Mac had been reviewing all the quotes he’d been given for the various projects he’d been asked to fund. He got up, setting the papers on the large desk, and went out to investigate.
“Kaylee?” he called, but he didn’t see her. Another door slam coming from the direction of her room alerted him she was definitely home.
The front door opened slightly, and Bridget’s face peeked in. “Can I come in?”
“Yeah, what’s going on?” He tried to think of what could have happened and came up blank.
“I’m not sure.” She took two steps into the hall and halted. The questions running through her eyes filled him with dread.
“Did she get sick?”
“I don’t think so,” she said quietly. “I mean, I knew she didn’t want to go to practice when she called me. And I told her I’d pick her up—to at least practice her solo one more time—and she agreed.”
He curled his fingers into his palms. Kaylee hadn’t told him any of that. She’d simply texted him that Bridget was taking her and she’d be home later. He’d assumed Kaylee did her typical about-face as soon as Bridget was involved. Clearly, he’d assumed wrong.
“What. Happened?” His legs were rooted in place.
“She was quiet all the way there. And when she went up front she seemed fine.” Bridget got a faraway look in her eye. “She began to sing, and her voice is so pure, Mac, so beautiful—”
“What. Happened?” His muscles tensed, and he had half a mind to march down the hall to Kaylee’s room and ask her himself.
“She made a choking sound, and then the next thing I know she’s running down the aisle. Crying.”
Crying? Why was Kaylee crying?
“Do you know why?”
“No.” Bridget stared at the ground. “She wouldn’t tell me.”
His frustration reached a boiling point.
“So let me get this straight.” He skewered her with his gaze. “You went behind my back and told Kaylee she had to go to practice after I told her she could stay home? What part of “she had a headache” didn’t you understand?”
Bridget’s chin raised a notch. “I understood she had a headache. I also understood she’s used it as an excuse to avoid uncomfortable situations in the past.”
“Or maybe she just had a headache. Did you think of that?” He was getting too worked up. He hadn’t felt this angry in years.
“No. I didn’t.” Her words were soft, and her gaze never left his. “I still don’t.”
He turned away, putting his fist to his mouth and blowing, before addressing her again. “Kaylee isn’t tough like you, okay? She’s fifteen. A kid. This will probably set her back for months.”
“Fifteen isn’t that young, Mac. And she may not be tough like me—whatever that means—but she can handle more than you think.”
“You’re from New York. You lived on your own. You’re older, more mature. You have no idea what she’s going through.”
“What is she going through?” Her small voice only infuriated him more.
He didn’t know.
He didn’t know what she was going through because she never told him. She seemed to tell Bridget everything, though.
“You tell me.” Mac pointed to her. “She confides in you an awful lot.”
“Not this.”
He’d been wanting to give Kaylee a nice Christmas, and this likely ruined it for her.
“I can’t believe you would be this heartless,” he said coldly. “I’m tired of you pushing Kaylee past her limits. You walked all over both of us today. It won’t happen again.”
This was turning into a nightmare, and it was all her fault.
Mac was right. Bridget had no authority to tell Kaylee to go to practice. She should have minded her own business. What did it matter to her if Kaylee skipped or not?
It mattered.
A lot.
She cared about Kaylee and wanted her teen years to be better than her own.
And Mac had every right to yell at her. She’d grown so close to him and Kaylee that she’d overstepped her bounds.
“You’re right.” Bridget licked her lips, forcing herself to look in his eyes, to let him see the truth in hers. “I was heartless. I never should have pushed Kaylee tonight. I should have been more patient, shouldn’t have overridden you.”
A shift in his eyes told her he was listening. The set of his jaw didn’t bode well, though.
“What you see isn’t what you get when you look at me. I’m not like everyone around here. You said I was tough. I guess I’ve been tough since I was twelve years old. After my father died, my stepmother had custody of me. She didn’t like me. I was immediately taken out of the private school I’d been attending and enrolled in an online school. My stepsister still went to the private academy, though. I basically became a servant. My stepmother was emotionally abusive.”
She forced herself to keep staring into his eyes, even as his look shifted from anger to concern. “When I was sixteen, she kicked me out. I had nothing but a backpack full of clothes and fifty bucks I stole from my stepsister.”
Mac’s jaw dropped, and she took it as a sign to keep going before she lost her nerve.
“I had nowhere to go. No friends. My stepmother flat out told me if I went to child services, they would send me right back to her, and she’d tell them I had anger issues. That’s all it took for me to kill that idea. The first couple of nights on the streets were the worst. I was too afraid to sleep. The money ran out quick.”
He was shaking his head, disgusted.
Why wouldn’t he be? He didn’t even know the worst of it.
She had to tell him everything. Every ugly little thing about her life back then.
“I couldn’t get a job. No high school diploma. For the record, I never earned my diploma. I do have a GED, thanks to Sawyer’s help. I spent my time wandering around the city. I went to food banks, but I knew better than to linger there for long. Too many questions. Too many ways for them to send me back to her. So, I climbed into dumpsters for food.”
He shook his head again.
“I walked a lot at night. Took naps during the day. It was summer. I didn’t sleep much because I had to be on alert all the time.” She swallowed hard, thinking about the two occasions she’d been grabbed by strange men. She’d screamed, fought them with everything she had and managed to escape both times.
“Sawyer was working at a diner, and he saw me in the alley. He gave me some food and told me to come back the next day. So, I did. And every day after that. He told me he could get me a job. I couldn’t tell him I didn’t even have an address to put on an application, but he seemed to know I had no place to go. The next day when I came around, he introduced me to a woman in her early sixties. Said she’d helped him when he was in a bind and she’d help me, too.”
Bridget didn’t even attempt to decipher Mac’s expression.
“I’d been on the streets for almost two months at that point. I was desperate and thankful. I slept on her couch for a while. Worked at the diner, too. Sawyer lived next door to her. When the apartment across from him became available, he helped me with the deposit. I don’t know what would have happened to me if I hadn’t met him.”
Mac closed his eyes as if he was in pain. “Bridget...”
“I’m not done—” she scrunched her nose “—so don’t say anything. I’m sorry for letting you think I’m someone I’m not. The truth is I was homeless, ate food out of garbage cans, didn’t shower for two months, never finished high school and was a fool to ever think I could be someone new here. You’re an amazing guy, Mac, and I’m just...trash.” A tear slid down her cheek. “Please tell Kaylee I’m sorry.”
She turned to go, but Mac stopped her. “Wait, you can’t leave after telling me all that.”
“There’s nothing more to say.” She flicked the tears away.
“Nothing more to say?” he bellowed. “I don’t understand why you didn’t tell me. We’ve spent a lot of time together. Shared a lot, Bridget. Didn’t you think you could trust me?”
“It wasn’t about trust.”
“Then what was it about?”
“I fell in love with you, Mac. I love you, and I’m not the right woman for you. I never was.” She couldn’t stand here another minute. She opened the door, and Mac caught it. “Please, Mac, just let me go.”
He blinked as if in pain, and she slipped outside, pulling her coat tightly around her body as she made her way to the SUV.
Hadn’t she known all along a relationship with him would never work?
She slid the key into the ignition and glanced at the porch. He stood in the doorway, the Christmas lights all around him, and didn’t move. She put the SUV in Reverse and headed out of there.
So much for keeping a low profile, avoiding romance with one of the town’s single ranchers.
She’d put her future at risk, and the worst thing was that she didn’t even care. If she lost the coffee shop, she’d survive. But losing Mac? Losing Kaylee?
Bridget didn’t know how to face a future without them.