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  “How many bedrooms does this place have?” she asked him curiously, trying not to sound too interested in the answer.

  “Five, and we have a fairly large guest house that’s unoccupied” Ashton answered. “Would you like to stay here?”

  Becca widened her eyes at him. “I’ll have to think about it—YES. Would you be offended though if I chose the guest house? I absolutely love it here, but we’re just starting out again and I think it’d be best to take things slow.”

  He laughed. “I’ll let Alexa know you said yes. She kind of thought that you would. Do you want to go horseback riding with me? When’s the last time…?”

  “Oh wow, not since I was about sixteen,” she replied honestly. “Yes, I would love to.”

  He led her out to the field next to his ranch-style mansion and took his time introducing her to his horses. Becca decided that she liked the white horse with gray spots the most, so Ashton had the horse saddled up nicely for her along with the one he’d chosen and they carefully climbed aboard their steeds.

  “Now, I don’t recommend going out past the fence,” he explained to her. “The ground is less level and the horse might get spooked and throw you.”

  She held on tightly to the reigns and they rode along together. She felt the thrill of bouncing along atop a strong and strong-willed creature. “You spoil me,” she said to Ashton. “What did I ever do to deserve any of this?”

  He shrugged a little bit, smiling at her. “You stuck by me even when I treated you poorly. You saved my dog. And most of all, you gave me a second chance instead of tossing me out like the miserable jerk I was.”

  Becca laughed softly, unable to keep from smiling at him as they bobbed along side-by-side through his rolling property. There were cows out there in the grass and dirt as well, but they paid them no mind. “So what you’re saying is that it was a wise decision not to move on?”

  Ashton thought about it and nodded his head. “Maybe not in all cases, but in this case, yes.”

  They rode their horses for a while longer, until he received word from Alexa that Becca’s things were taken out of the tiny apartment and they were on their way to his ranch. She was amazed that after all of that drama and heartache, she was going to be right next to Ashton. She was determined not to leech off of him for too much longer, though. What she really needed to do was find herself a good job as a vet somewhere. The trouble was that none of the animal hospitals in the city seemed to be hiring, and she couldn’t exactly open a practice of her own.

  Ashton didn’t pressure her into looking for employment, but that was likely because he still pictured himself as her knight in shining armor. Becca appreciated that sentiment, but she’d spent too long taking care of herself to be fully okay with that. A little pampering was fine, but she didn’t think she deserved to just sit around and do nothing all day.

  Her things arrived at his guest house and Becca was happy to choose claim it as her own for the time being. She now had space for the furniture she’d brought along so it didn’t have to waste away in storage.

  “Now it feels just a little bit more like home,” she told him with a smile. “Just don’t forget to start charging me rent as soon as I can pay it.”

  It wasn’t very likely that Ashton was going to charge her rent, but at least she’d offered to pay. The good thing was that the house and property was so big, she wouldn’t exactly be giving up her independence. She wouldn’t even have to see Ashton there if she didn’t want to, but of course she did.

  She didn’t know what life in New York had in store for her, but if she was going to be living with him at his ranch, then she knew she would be feeling more at home in no time.

  Epilogue

  It turned out that it didn’t take Becca too long to find a job. The trouble had been that none of the animal hospitals in the city were hiring, but it just so happened that the veterinarian that took care of Ashton’s horses was getting ready to retire and was in need of someone to take over his clinic. “I’d be happy to do it,” she told him. “I studied farm animal medicine in college.”

  They made a deal and shook hands on it for added effect. The old vet would keep the business but she would be the veterinarian there. He would assist by paying the building’s bills and mortgage. Becca was thrilled simply to be working again. She finally felt like an adult again after so many weeks of feeling the regression settling in.

  Every chance she got, she went out horseback riding with Ashton. Now that she was his veterinarian, she got to know his horses quite well and she made sure that they were always healthy and well taken care of. Ashton was quite happy to have her as his horse’ vet. He knew that they were in capable hands.

  As she continued to adjust to city life, he took her to more restaurants and tourist spots like the Empire State Building and the Museum of Natural History. He even took her to a Broadway show, which she enjoyed but she didn’t think it was as captivating as Ellen’s Stardust Diner.

  “Remember when I told you that I loved you?” she said to him one evening as they sat together on his front porch. “I told you that I never stopped loving you and you didn’t say anything back.”

  She pouted at him a little bit.

  “I love you too,” he said with a smile. “I’ve always loved you. That’s why I couldn’t come back here unless I brought you along with me. You’re the only piece of Meridian that I can’t live without.”

  Becca rested her head on his shoulder. That was a good enough answer for her.

  When Christmastime came around, rather than being in the city to witness the pomp and circumstance that went into a New York Christmas – and all of the extra tourists that came with it – Ashton decided that they should go home to Meridian and spend the holiday with their families. After all, he had promised that he would visit again, and it had been almost a year now.

  He hoped that Skipper was okay. When they arrived at his parents’ house, one of the first things Ashton did was go check on his old dog. Skipper wagged his tail at him and gave his chin a lick, then he cuddled with Becca too.

  “It looks like New York City has been treating you well,” his mother remarked. “You’ll probably be staying away from here a lot now too, right?”

  Becca smiled and shook her head a little bit. “It’s not really the city that interests me so much as it’s Upstate New York. The city is so loud and frantic, but I spend most of my time taking care of the horses on Ash’s ranch.”

  They had a wonderful time catching up over dinner and when it was time to go, Ashton invited them to come visit him once the warmer months of Spring arrived.

  Becca couldn’t stop in Meridian without taking time to visit with her friends. They were overjoyed to see her again and they kept commenting on how happy she looked.

  “You don’t really look like a city-slicker at all,” Erin said with a surprised laugh. “You look like you’ve been enjoying sunshine and fresh air.”

  “That’s because I have,” she told her friends. “I’ve being really enjoying working outdoors on Ashton’s big ranch with the horses and cows. And being able to spend time with Ash as much as I do, make it all the more special.”

  “Wow,” Jaz said, whistling. “It sounds like you’ve got the best of both worlds now.”

  It wasn’t difficult to leave the small Colorado town, but it was hard for Becca to say goodbye to her best friends again. Several months felt like several years when she’d spent so much time with them over the years. It was a big adjustment, not seeing them every day, but she was glad to be able to pester them in texts and emails back and forth.

  When it was time to fly back to New York, Ashton was grateful to have Becca as his flying partner now. He didn’t have to go anywhere without her, as long as she wanted to come along. They made plans to visit Denver again as soon as it was springtime and the weather would be more hospitable. They made plans to visit Europe too, for a change of pace and for somewhere that Ashton hadn’t been to yet either. Alexa was more tha
n happy to help them make plans, as long as he was smart about it and planned things so he wouldn’t have so many meetings for her to attend in his absence.

  Becca had never thought that she could be as happy as she was now. She never thought that she’d get the chance to see so much of the world. Instead, she always sort of assumed that she’d live the rest of her life in Meridian. That wasn’t such a bad prospect, but now that she was together with Ashton again, she could see with clearer eyes that the world was a lot of fun to explore. She just needed the right person to explore it with.

  She knew that her friends had always sort of scoffed at her for being so devoted to that boy who’d run off on her all those years ago. She knew now that there was nothing wrong with being faithful, as long as that faith was placed in the right person. Luckily for her, Ashton was exactly the right person for her all along.

  Preview Of The Cowboy’s Match

  Pretendr Dating App Series

  Chapter One

  Dallas, Texas

  “Ready,” Trent proclaimed, lowering the front hood of his bright tomato red truck before jumping back into the front seat. He revved the engine and peeled out.

  “Woo hoo!” his friend Austin trilled, racing alongside him in his own truck – a black beauty with flames painted on.

  “Don’t get excited,” Wes shouted over all of the engine noise. “Y’all know I’m going to beat you.”

  The three friends had been drag racing each other in their trucks practically ever since they learned how to drive. Trent couldn’t pinpoint exactly how it had all started, but he figured that it belonged in the broad ‘boys will be boys’ category.

  Sure enough, Wes reached the makeshift finish line before him, with Austin trailing in third place. Their races pretty much always ended this way, but they still always found it fun. It was a certain form of comradery that their parents in particular would never understand. “Wanna go get some burgers?” Wes asked, grinning triumphantly.

  “You know I can never say no to a proposition like that,” Trent said with a grin back at his friend. It may have bothered him that Wes always found a way to beat him at drag racing, but at least Wes also always invited him and Austin out for burgers afterward.

  After hanging out with his friends, eating tasty burgers for a few hours, Trent headed back home to the ranch where he lived with his parents. He looked at the time on the dashboard. “Aw, heck, they’re going to be annoyed about this. I had no idea how late it’d gotten.”

  He often lost track of time when he was out having fun with his friends. Such a thing might have been okay when he was in high school, but he was in his early thirties now; he didn’t think his mom thought it was cute anymore. So he did what he thought any sensible person would do in his situation. He floored it.

  The flashing red and blue lights appeared in his rear-view mirror almost instantaneously.

  “Man,” Trent complained under his breath, dutifully pulling over to the side of the road.

  A police officer got out of the parked patrol car and came strolling up to Trent’s window. Trent rolled it down so they could chat. “License and registration, please.”

  He gave the officer the requested documents and then the officer looked over them, making sure to match them with Trent’s face and the model of his car.

  “Were you aware of how fast you were going back there?” the officer asked in a calm but authoritative tone.

  Trent nodded. “Yes, sir. I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry I wasn’t more careful, officer.”

  He didn’t think that sweet-talking was really going to get him out of trouble, but he figured that it was worth a try. The policeman took the paperwork back to his patrol car so he could look Trent up in the system. This was normally the part where he would get let off with a warning, but he had a feeling that this time, that might not happen. He had quite a stack of offenses at this point. He wasn’t going to be let off so easily every time, as much as he wanted to believe that. He’d been raised to understand that he was fortunate but that didn’t mean that he was entitled.

  He hung his head a bit while he waited an uncomfortably long amount of time for the officer to look over everything. Trent knew that he didn’t have anything outstanding, but he had been caught speeding with his buddies more than a few times, and he also knew that his parking record wasn’t impeccable.

  Finally, the officer returned to the open window of his car. He handed the license and registration back to Trent. “Looks like this wasn’t your first joyride,” the officer stated. “I’m afraid I’m gonna have to ticket you for this one.” He wrote something down on his pad of paper and then tore off the ticket, handing it over to Trent.

  Looking down at the slip of paper in his hand, Trent did his best to not audibly gulp. $226.10?! His parents were going to kill him. He wasn’t going to ask them to pay it off, of course, but still. They kept tabs on him, since he worked and lived on their ranch. They weren’t going to be pleased about this.

  He was polite to the police officer and he made his way back along the road towards home, making sure to drive slower both because of the speed limit and also because he wasn’t looking forward to confronting his parents. He had no idea what he was going to say to them. He couldn’t keep something like this a secret. He already knew that he wasn’t the most well-behaved son, so lying would only make his case worse.

  As soon as he got to the ranch and parked his truck in the garage, Trent walked inside the house as quietly and as calmly as he could. The goal is to move into my own house on this land, but I can’t exactly build that if I’m spending all of my money on speeding tickets and new tires all the time. He knew that it wasn’t all that odd for a guy his age to be living at home with his parents – especially a guy who lived on his parents’ ranch – but he still felt quite deflated. He’d had such a grand time with his friends. It didn’t seem fair that his great day had to end this way.

  They’re just going to lecture me like they always do, he thought, collapsing onto the couch in the living room. They seem to forget that I’m not a kid anymore. I can pack up and leave any time I want to.

  But he didn’t know where he would go or what he would do. It was just an empty threat.

  “Oh, there you are,” his mother said as she strolled into the room and found him sitting there. She had an expression on her face that was difficult to read. His father was close behind, looking tired as usual.

  “We were wondering where you’d gone,” Trent’s father said. “We need to discuss some things with you.”

  That was an alarming sentence. Trent knew that his parents were planning things behind his back – things that concerned him – and he’d been nervous about it. They didn’t used to be so secretive. Now they kind of kept away from him. He’d assumed for some time that it was simply because he was an adult now and they were giving him his space… But now he wondered if he’d been wrong to read into it. “Sure thing, Pop,” he said as calmly as he could, sitting up straight on the couch so there was plenty of room for his parents to join him there.

  “It probably won’t come as a surprise to you that we’ve been thinking about retiring,” Trent’s mother said once she and his father were seated. “We’ve owned and operated this ranch for nearly forty years now. We’re ready to relax and have someone else take it over…”

  Trent perked up in his chair a bit. Is this the moment? Are they going to give me the reins to the ranch?? He tried his best to not look too excited, but it was difficult. This was the kind of thing he’d been looking forward to – a purpose for him, something for him to focus on instead of being so wild all of the time. He knew that his parents were tired of him goofing off. He craved the responsibility.

  His father sighed softly, entwining his fingers thoughtfully. “We wanted nothing more than to pass on the ranch to you, Son. But we’re concerned that you aren’t responsible enough. Your heart doesn’t seem to be in it. And all of this… drag racing that you’re doing with your friends… We ca
n’t have that. If you were to take over the ranch, you’d need to be fully committed and present. And not just physically, but mentally as well. You’d need to put the ranch first. It doesn’t seem like that’s something you want. We know that you care about things here, but do you care enough?”

  This was more words than Trent had ever heard from his father. The senior Mr. Reed was not a man of many words, but he was a hard-working man of action. Trent’s face went a bit red. He had expected a lecture about his drag racing, but he’d never thought that they’d been considering passing him over for the ownership of the ranch.

  “I do care,” he countered, keeping his voice gentle. He didn’t need to start a shouting match over this. He was sure it was just a misunderstanding. Meanwhile, the speeding ticket practically burned in the pocket of his jeans. He was going to have to deal with that without even mentioning it to his parents. How could he prove he was responsible in one breath while telling them about that in another breath?

  “You’ve got a funny way of showing it,” his mother said. “You’re always gallivanting around with your friends when you could help out more around here. Our new intern Willie – who’s fourteen, mind you – has been doing so much already and he only just got here.”

  “Just because I don’t follow you around like a dog doesn’t mean I don’t care about this place,” Trent said stiffly. Then, a beat later, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I just… Please tell me what you want me to do to improve things, and I’ll do it. I can’t stand the thought of someone taking over this ranch. It’s like your baby.”

  He might have been imagining it, but he thought he saw his mom’s chin quiver at that.