Rodeo Christmas at Evergreen Ranch (Gold Valley #13)(40)

“I’ll have just a black coffee,” he said, walking up to the counter and making his order a greeting to the sullen-looking girl behind the register. “My wife would like a mocha.”

He could practically see a plume of smoke erupt over Callie’s head.

“We’re newlyweds,” he said, grinning.

“Congratulations,” the girl said, not smiling.

“Thank you,” he said, intentionally using an overly bright tone. “We’re going back to her parents’ place for the holidays.”

“I’m sure that’s very romantic.”

The whole performance would’ve been more fun if he would have had someone at the register who actually cared to make small talk. But still, it was making Callie angry, and as long as that was working, he was enjoying himself.

Why exactly?

He didn’t know. Except that she had kissed him. And it felt like a violation of a great many things. She was acting like she had punched her own face, and blamed him. That was the problem. So really, if he could make her mad, or happy against her will, he would take it. Because he was mad. Pissed off. He had gone years wanting to kiss her, and not doing it. She had blown all that to hell. She had proven the thing that he had never wanted proven, which was that they had chemistry. And if she was a little ruffled by it so be it.

Actually, he would really like it if she was a lot ruffled by it.

When their drinks came out, he turned to her and smiled felicitously. “Here you go, sweetheart.” He handed her the drink and gave her his best grin.

And the way she looked at him wasn’t all that fun. Because her cheeks went pink, and her eyes went wide, and there was nothing like a performance in the few seconds that passed between them then. Instead, he felt something that arced through him like an electrical current that passed through the air and went straight down his spine. And he didn’t the hell like it.

“Let’s go,” he said, taking his own drink and putting his hand on her back, propelling her out of the room.

“Knock it off,” she said when they got outside. She shook away from his hold, and got in the truck.

And they went ahead and embraced that awkward silence from then on until they were out on the highway, driving the long, winding route from Northwestern Oregon to Eastern Oregon. It was a nice drive. He couldn’t complain.

The thick, dense trees were beautiful, and then they slowly changed, growing a little more sparse before the ground became rife with volcanic rock. More and more scrub brush began to appear, large gray mule deer milling about and eating the sage off in the distance. He let Dierks Bentley and Tim McGraw provide a buffer between the two of them, but then some of the songs got a little bit sexy, and he turned the radio off, because that wasn’t helping anything at all.

Then they really did have silence. And it really was uncomfortable.

“When you get up here, take the sign that says John Day Fossil Beds,” she said.

“Okay,” he responded.

They’d left cell service behind a little while ago, the terrain around them wild.

“You ever been to the Painted Hills?”

“No,” he said.

“We need to stop there.”

“Do we?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Well, since you’re speaking to me again...”

“I just feel passionately about where I’m from,” she said. “And think that everybody should experience the natural beauty.”

“Now you just sound like a really angry tour guide.”

“I kind of am.”

He drove on, following her instructions, and the more words they said to each other, the easier it got to just keep talking. And maybe, if they said enough words, they could erase everything that had happened this morning, and the night before. It was wishful thinking on his part, but out there in the middle of nowhere, with the wild closing in around them, it seemed possible at least. And it made him feel a little bit more ready to let go of his irritation. A little bit.

“Turn up here.”

The road moved from pavement to dirt, and the side around them was like an alien planet. Rounded slopes of fine dust that moved in stripes. Red to white with inky black that looked like brushstrokes mixed in between.

“No points for guessing why they call it the Painted Hills.”

“No,” she said.

“Where do we go?”

“Pull over here.”

It was freezing out, but they pulled over and got out, putting their coats on. Callie led the way over a wooden walkway that wove through the scenery. He had never seen anything like it. He didn’t know there was a place like this out here. He’d been to Eastern Oregon plenty of times. To Pendleton for the roundup, and to Sisters for various events. But he hadn’t been out here. Hadn’t seen this strange, cold desert space that looked like an artist had physically painted it.

“Up here’s the viewpoint.”

He followed her up the hill that overlooked a vast expanse of these painted mountains. They were so bright and rich and strange. And he had the weirdest sensation of being small. He had felt jaded for a long damn time. Like the mystery and magic of life had been drained away when he’d lost his parents. And there was something... Gut punching in this moment, to stand there and look on something in his home state that he’d never seen. To feel like he was seeing the world with a fresh set of eyes. It wasn’t anything he’d expected, wasn’t anything he thought was even possible.