Always Conall (Bitterroot #2) (12 page)

“I don’t really want to talk about it, Sage,” Conall growled with frustration.

“Fine,” I spat, tossing a gauze pad on the tray. I doused the wound with saline and wiped a little more vigorously with a fresh four-by-four.

“Jesus, woman,” he hissed, jerking back in an attempt to get away from my reach.

“Knock it off, you big baby,” I berated him as I moved closer, although I did ease up some. In doing so, I noted a small shard of glass that had likely been causing a great deal of discomfort. Pausing to remove it, I flushed the wound again with saline and carefully examined it for more glass. Confident that I’d removed the last little bits of the foreign material, I began to dispose of the gauze and reorganize the supplies.

“I’ll go grab Dr. Barsky who’s on staff tonight. You’ll probably need stitches. That’s a pretty deep cut.”

“Thanks,” Conall sighed.

“I’m just doing my job, Conall,” I stated flatly, narrowing my gaze back at him. I knew I was being a royal bitch, but for some reason, I couldn’t seem to help it. I was just so fucking pissed at him.

Finding Dr. Barsky, I followed him back to the exam area, standing back to be of assistance when needed, but doing my best to just keep my seething to myself.

“Yes, sir,” Dr. Barsky stated, “you, my boy, are going to need stitches.” Looking back at me, the genial older doctor gave me an odd questioning look for a moment before he spoke. “Sage, would you grab a suture kit?”

With a nod, I escaped through the curtain, taking a moment to regroup before I returned.

“Let me know if you feel much discomfort,” Dr. Barsky gently told Conall as he began to place the stitches.

“Can’t hurt more than washing it out did,” Conall grumbled back, and Dr. Barsky’s hands halted. I could feel his gaze studying me intently for a moment.

“There was little glass in there that I didn’t see at first,” I murmured in response, guiltily looking at back at him with a
sidelong glance. Dr. Barsky lifted an eyebrow skeptically, but remained silent and quickly stitched up the wound.

“That should do it,” he said at last. Giving me a hard look, he then turned back to Conall. “I’ll leave you in Sage’s
capable hands
to finish you up. When was your last tetanus shot?”

“I don’t remember, actually,” Conall answered.

The doctor turned back to me. “Better update that.”

I nodded without a word, and left to get the injection. When I returned, Dr. Barsky had left, and it was only Conall and I again.

“So, it would appear that you’re really making stellar strides in figuring your shit out, huh?” I snidely muttered as I prepared the syringe.

Conall didn’t say a word. So I baited him a little more. I couldn
’t help it. I was just so pissed.

“Fighting in the bar.
That’s awesome. All responsible father shit. Taking after your dad.”

Still nothing.
Silent with a clenched jaw. Which irritated me even more. I couldn’t tell if he was mad at what I was saying or mad about the hoochie he’d been defending. And that was infuriating.

“So which barstool bunny were you fighting over, anyway?”

Finally a response. “Just forget about it, Sage.”

A little harsher than I probably should have, I jabbed the needle into his deltoid muscle, and felt a smidge of satisfaction at his visible recoil.

“Fuck,” he growled. “Easy, honey.”

“You know, I
’ve asked you to quit calling me that. A couple times.” I huffed at him, applying a little pressure with a cotton ball before I placed a small bandage over the injection site. It wasn’t bleeding bad, but I didn’t want it to get on his shirt. Then I realized that his shirt was trashed and bloody as it was because of the gash to his abs. A small spot of blood on his upper arm was the least of his worries, yet I still felt a twinge of guilt in my gut for my less-than-compassionate treatment.

“Would you just settle the fuck down?” he shot back, and just like that I was pissed all over again.

“You’re done,” I nodded to the waiting room. “Let’s go.”

As we headed back to the waiting room where Brynn and Kian sat, I sighed and handed him an informational sheet and began to recite the usual aftercare instructions. “Okay,” I breathed out heavily, “
keep it clean to avoid infection and stop back here or at the walk-in clinic in seven to ten days to have the stitches removed.” Because my mouth couldn’t seem to stop there, I had to get in one last little dig. “You should be back to fighting over slutty bar bitches in no time,” I spat.

“Awesome,” Conall replied coldly, then turned on his heel and abruptly headed out the door.

“Sage…” Brynn’s voice was low, but Kian cut her off.

“Stay out of it, Brynn,” he said quietly.

“She should know,” she shot back before looking towards me. “He was fighting over you,” she quickly said before Kian could stop her.

I looked over at Kian in question. His scowl was all for Brynn, but he glanced at me and nodded slightly in affirmation. I could only stare dumfounded as they turned and left the ER.

Sage

I turned down the dusty dirt road towards old Jacob Anderson’s ranch. I’d been out here quite a few times with Matt and Conall, but that was years ago, so it surprised me how easy it was to find. Also, how familiar it all seemed.

Jacob’s ranch lay just a few miles out of town, just shy of where the timberline met the valley floor. The foothills rolled back into the pine trees, and the main ranch house sat back in
a small clearing surrounded by a stand of quaking aspens. Black angus cattle lazed in the hot afternoon sun near the creek bed along the lengthy driveway, and a barrage of chickens scattered as I pulled up in front of the house.

Part of me wished I’d brought Mattie. She’d love this place.

The other part of me wanted to turn and run with my tail between my legs. I was here to find Conall… to apologize.

After he’d left the hospital, my shift had gone slowly. A long night of nothing, really, and the hours had crawled by at a snail’s pace. I had a great deal of time to reflect on my behavior.
The chivalry of his actions. And the guilt ate at me because I had been a real bitch. I’d completely assumed the worst.

Finally, it was time to get my kid and head home. I dozed on the couch for a bit while Mattie played. I showered and changed into a halter maxi dress to get a little relief from the horrid city heat. Mattie and I watered our little patio garden.

And, still… the guilt gnawed at my gut.

Finally, it was time for Mattie’s karate class with Kian. Brynn was waiting at the bottom of the stairs to their apartment above the gym. By the look on her face, I had an idea of why.

“Yes,” I began, trying to ward off the spiel I knew was coming. “I feel like shit for how I treated him last night, okay? You don’t have to lecture me.”

“So, you should talk to him, then.”

“I know.”

“You don’t work tonight, right?” she asked.

“No, but Mattie—”

“I’ll watch her after class. Take as long as you need. Go talk to him.”

“I could just try calling.”
Okay, so I was being a complete chicken.
“Or I’ll just see him at our next mediation meeting.”

Brynn
totally knew I was wimping out. “Sage, you guys need to get this shit straight.”

“I’m the one with the issues, Brynn. It
’s like I just can’t get over it. I can’t be that shell of a person again, that empty, lonely person he left behind.”

“Sage, you should have seen him last night. The minute fucking Doug started in—”

“God, it was Doug? He’s such a dick. No wonder Conall wanted to kick his ass.”

“Yeah, Doug is a dick. But it was what he said about you that got Conall fired up.” She lifted a brow as she looked at me sternly. “There’s something there. But you two just can’t seem to get on the same page. You’re mad, now he’s mad. You just keep trading places. Yet you are both trying to give each other everything you have. So, go. Talk to him. Take all night if you have to. Mattie can
stay here. I think we’ve even got some of her clothes here from the last time.”

So as I drove out to the ranch, I thought back to every interaction we had since he had returned. The more I dwelled on each one of them, the worse I felt.

I was coming to realize just how angry I was at Conall for leaving. I’d used that as a shield to hide behind. I didn’t want to be a pitiful victim, so, to deal with the grief of suddenly being so alone, I’d braced myself with animosity. With poisonous resentment. That anger gave me power. And even though he was back and doing and saying all the right things, he was causing my tenuous foundation to crumble. And that terrified me. That had been my only strength in the years he’d been gone.

In an effort to protect myself from feeling that way again, I
’d told myself he didn’t care, that he never really had. I’d been a total bitch to him. Over and over.

I still didn’t understand what he was thinking, but I wanted to. I need
ed some clear sense of how he felt about me. Not diluted with the shock of finding out he had a kid like that first day. Or the guilt of Matt’s death all those years ago. Or the influence of booze in Hyper that night shit went down with Jeff. Or with Robyn’s guarded confusion over our weird relationship. I needed to just know what he was thinking.

I pulled up to the main ranch house and climbed out of the Subaru. A nearby sound caught my attention, and I saw Jacob down near the barn, pitching hay over the
corral fence for a little sorrel mare and her spindly legged young foal. I headed over towards him and watched for a minute as he scratched the mare behind the ears and crooned to her with a relaxed, gentle resonance.

“Mr. Anderson?” I finally called out.

“Well, hello there, young lady,” he said looking over towards me with a welcoming smile. “Is there something I can do for ya’?” His expression revealed a trace of familiarity in his eyes, although there was also curiosity, too, as though he recognized my face but couldn’t quite place me.

“Um, I’m Sage Nichols. My brother Matt used to work for you. I’m not sure if you remember me, but I was out here a couple times with him.”

A wide smile crossed his face as the connection clicked to him. “Well sure I do, darlin’. You’ve gone and grown up, haven’t ya’.”

“I guess,” I murmured. Suddenly I felt a little awkward in the maxi dress. It was a bit different from the t-shirt and jeans he’d always seen me in before. “I’m looking for Matt
’s friend, Conall. He’s living in a cabin out here on your ranch, right?”

“Sure is. I was surprised to see him after all this time.
Nice to have him around again. I’m not quite as spry as I once was, ya’ know.” He pushed his weathered straw hat back on his forehead and pointed back down the driveway. “Head back down the drive about a quarter mile or so, and you’ll see another road that dips off to the west. It heads back into the gulch, and Conall’s cabin is back there. You can’t miss it,” he said with a friendly wink.

“Thank you,” I smiled, then climbed back into my car and pulled out of the driveway.

Shit
… now I knew where Conall lived. Now I had no excuse not to go see him. I was already here. As I neared the road Jacob had told me about, I felt the sudden urge to keep going straight. To just pretend I’d never been out here. My heart was beating a mile a minute, pounding in my chest at a furious pace. I could barely breathe as I slowed. And I stopped.

I just couldn’t bring myself to turn.

As luck would have it, I didn’t have to. Because coming down the road towards me was Conall’s pickup. As he pulled closer, his eyebrows knit with recognition. Across from me, through the windshield, I could see him clench his jaw. Then he turned down his own driveway, and I followed behind.

As he pulled to a stop before the cabin and climbed out, I could tell he was pissed that I was here. I began to doubt my wisdom for coming, thinking I should have maybe just called. But it was too late now.

“I don’t want to fight with you, Sage,” he grumbled as he climbed out of his pickup and walked up the steps to the front door.

“I’m not here to fight,” I said.

“I thought you didn’t want to talk until we were done with this mediation.” He stared at me for a long moment, and I sort of squirmed uncomfortably under his gaze. I had said that, more or less. Finally, probably just out of sheer annoyance, he opened the door and held it ajar. Taking a deep breath, he blew it out before he gave me a hard look and spoke again. “Well then, by all means, come in.”

My throat went dry at his bitter, sarcastic tone, but I managed to squeak out a response. “Um, okay.”

He nodded towards the open door, and the motion jerked me into action. I quickly mounted the steps and walked inside, taken aback at just how nice and modern the cabin was. Way more than I would have figured for an old rancher to have just sitting empty.

“Wow,” I breathed. “This is a pretty sweet little place.”

“Jacob’s son put a lot of time and money into it,” Conall shrugged. “Then his wife said it was her or the ranch. He picked her.” He took off the ball cap he wore and tossed it on the dining table, then leaned up against the butcher block island in the kitchen and folded his arms over his chest. “The things men will do for pussy, right?”

Oh yeah, he was still pissed.
And I suddenly had something in common with Jacob’s city slicker daughter-in-law. I wanted to get the fuck out of here, too.

“What are you doing here, Sage?” Conall finally sighed following an extraordinarily uncomfortable silence.

For a second, my voice caught in my throat as I bit my lip and forced the words out. “I’m here to apologize.”

His eyes narrowed, and he looked at me suspiciously. But, despite the quavering in my voice, I continued on.

“I was a real bitch to you last night at the hospital.”

“Oh, I’m sure I deserved it,” he mocked as he shook his head and looked away from me.

“You didn’t. I jumped to conclusions, made assumptions about what happened.” I swallowed hard. “I think I’m so use to wallowing in my self-pity that I forget sometimes… you are going through some pretty heavy shit yourself. You were way back when, too. It’s just easy to blame you sometimes for leaving, for everything that seems difficult in my life. And I never was really fair to you when you left.”

“You were a kid.”

Ouch. Yeah… that hurt.
Just like it did the last time he said it.

“So were you.”

“So,” he caustically said, “now that we’re grown up, it’s all better then?” He took a step closer to me. I had a hard time reading his mood. His words seemed…
cold
. “Am I forgiven? Just like that?”

“I’m not sure what there even is to forgive. You didn
’t really do anything wrong. Everything has just been so off-kilter since you came back.”

He took another step closer to me. Too close. My throat went dry as I tried to move back slightly, only to find I had the back of the couch pressing against my ass, impeding my escape. His scent of fresh air and light sandalwood surrounded me. His dark eyes caught mine and held them, hypnotizing me.

“So,” he murmured, staring at my lips, “kiss and make up, then?”

“Why are you acting like this?” I asked breathlessly.

“Like what?” he shot back. “You got pissed that night in Hyper because I was with whatever-her-fucking-name-was.”

I pursed my lips. “Angela
.”

“Ahh, that’s right. Angela.” He smiled coolly, his eyes still lit with a dangerous glint. “And then, last night, you abused me in the hospital because you thought I was fighting over some other chick. I’m getting the feeling you don’t like it when I hit on other girls. Maybe you just want me hitting on you.”

“You know, I’m genuinely trying to apologize… about how I’ve been acting. That isn’t like me. And this isn’t like you.”

“How do you know, Sage? How do you know what I’m like anymore, huh? Half the time, you treat me like a stranger. The other half, I’m the love of your life. Frankly, it’s kind of hard to keep up.”

His lips had dipped dangerously close to mine, and my mind flipped back to that night in the bar. That night he kissed me and how heated it all got in the restroom. My breathing turned shallow and fast. Conall’s hands came to rest on the couch near my hips and he leaned down just a hair more. I felt my eyes drift almost closed and I subconsciously yearned for him to kiss me again. Or not to. My head spun with the warring emotions that thrummed through my body.

“I’m trying to figure out what the fuck you want from me,” he whispered, his words tickling my lips and shredding my heart. “One minute, you don’t want a thing from me. Not even money. And now… do you want me to stay? Be Mattie’s dad and live happily ever after in a little house with a white picket fence? ‘Cause life isn’t a fucking fairy tale, Sage.”

“I never said it was.”

“Your brother dying was just the beginning of some of the shit I’ve lived through. I just wanted to escape the ghosts of this fucking town. To erase the guilt I felt every waking minute. But no matter where I went or what I did, I couldn’t… I couldn’t get away from the mistakes I made.”

“And I was one of those mistakes.” A small sob crept from my chest.

I felt his body tense. His eyes opened, so close to mine that I could see myself in the deep brown depths, swimming in his agonizing regret.

“I never should have touched you.” The rasp of his obvious self-condemnation sliced through me, leaving a gaping, ugly wound. I tried to pull back, trapped between him and the heavy overstuffed couch behind me. “I never wanted this,” Conall harshly ground out at me as he lifted a hand to cup my jaw. “I don’t know what I do want. But I know what I don’t want. I don’t want to feel this way about you.” A single tear spilled over and ran down my cheek. His thumb brushed it against my cheekbone, and his fingers tangled in my hair.

Holding me steady, he tenderly kissed the wet trail down my face to the corner of my mouth, slowly and cautiously. His entire body pulsed with resistance, and my hands rose to his chest as my mind went dizzy with his feathery touch. And then his lips were on mine, and he crushed me against him. My arms slipped up his chest, across his broad shoulders, and I pulled myself closer. It was physically impossible for me to not respond to this man. I’d loved him my entire life.
As long as I could remember.