“At all?”
“At all. Look. When I first entered the rodeo scene, I partied as much as the next cowboy, but once I lost Aaron, I lost my moral compass completely. I floundered, not only in my private life, but out in the arena. Alcohol was a way to dull my senses.”
“I’m going to be forthright with you. After everything I heard about you, I half expected you to show up drunk today at the auction.”
He frowned. “I won’t ever do that to you. I promise I’m dry and will do everything in my power to remain that way. But I think it’s only fair to tell you it’s only been three days since my last drink. At this point I’m still going through physical withdrawal, not to mention emotional issues. It’s not easy, but I’m detemined.”
She pinched her lips. “I see.”
She didn’t understand the struggles he was facing. Not really. She’d never even tasted alcohol, much less been tipsy, nor had she ever spent any time around an alcoholic before, so she had nothing to gauge what Cash was pledging to her.
Could he really stop drinking cold turkey, and all on his own, as Martin had insisted?
“Is that a deal breaker?” He tilted his head and met her gaze. Like her, he didn’t couch his question in sweet terms.
She considered his words for a moment, chewing the corner of her lip. After a long pause, she shook her head.
“No. Not necessarily. But know this. If you show up drunk on the job one time, I will kick you out the door faster than any bareback bronc ever did. You have exactly one opportunity to prove yourself. Do we understand each other?”
She knew she was being tough on him, and her demands wouldn’t be easy for him to follow, but she wasn’t about to start pulling punches now. She had her store to think of, before anything else, even her own emotions.
She understood herself well enough to know that if she worked with him, she would become entangled in his battle. She didn’t have the strength, nor the good sense, to hold him at arm’s length, especially if she saw him struggling. So the rules were as much for her as they were for him.
“Understood.” His voice sounded like gravel, as if his throat was lined with sandpaper. “What else?”
She paused, opening and closing her mouth twice, about to speak and then stopping herself.
He tensed, and his gaze narrowed.
“Spit it out. Let’s get everything out in the open now. Like you said. No surprises.”
There was one other thing, but it was a touchy issue, perhaps even more so than his drinking. And Alyssa suspected Cash already knew what she was about to say.
“I heard there was a woman.”
He exhaled and dropped his gaze to his hands, no longer willing or able to meet her eyes.
“Yes. I figured you would have heard about Sharee. She was all over the news with her smear campaign.”
“Is that what it was?”
Alyssa thought she wanted the truth from him. But did she really want to hear it?
What if what Sharee had said was true? What if he had “knocked her up”—Sharee’s words, not hers, and a phrase Alyssa found especially repugnant—and then refused to acknowledge his baby?
“A smear campaign?” He shrugged. “Yes and no.”
“Cash?” she said, when he didn’t continue.
“Yes, she is pregnant with my child. I willingly admit that I’m the father, and I take full responsibility for my actions, both then and now. But not one word of anything else she has blurted to the press is true.
“She’s cast me in a very bad light, making it appear that I abandoned her when she told me I was going to be a father. The truth is, she didn’t even bother to inform me she was pregnant. I had to hear that from the evening news.”
He picked off his hat and tunneled his fingers through his thick black hair.
“Yeah, I’ve made a lot of mistakes, Alyssa. But I didn’t walk out on her, because we never had a relationship. She was a buckle bunny and I was a rodeo cowboy too big for his britches. Which I guess makes me a jerk, so maybe she has that right. She pursued me, not the other way around. Not that I’m making excuses.
“We connected one time, and I was so drunk I barely remember.”
She was trying not to judge Cash. But what kind of man got a girl pregnant like that?
Alyssa felt for the woman, buckle bunny or not. That Cash had a one-night stand with her only made the situation worse.
“And?” she pressed. “What now?”
“Are you asking me about my intentions?”
“I am.”
He could tell her it was none of her business and he would probably be right. But if he did, she would send him on his way, auction or no auction.
“Believe me, I’ve tried to do right by her,” he said, his voice cracking. “And my baby. As soon as I heard she was pregnant, I contacted her. There is no question in my mind that I’m going to pay child support, but it’s more than that. I don’t want my child to grow up without a father. I know I’m a mess right now and not the kind of man who would be a positive influence on a child. But I’d like to share custody after I get my life back together. Being a father is a huge motivation. Except Sharee has made it crystal clear she wants nothing to do with me, nor does she want me to have any part of our child’s life.”
His gaze dropped. “And who can blame her? Look at me. I’m hardly in any position to be a father, to take care of a baby. I’m a wreck.
“I have every intention of doing all I can for my baby—giving my financial support, at least, even if Sharee won’t let me into my child’s life in any other way.” He groaned. “If I can’t really be a father to him or her in the ways that really matter.”
“But if it is your baby—”
“It is. I can’t prove it right now, but I feel it in my gut, and the timing is right.”
“Yes, but then don’t you think...”
“Believe me, that’s all I’ve been thinking about,” he cut in. “I need to be a better man. Not just for the rodeo’s sake, although there is that, since that’s the only way I know how to provide for my baby. But the adjustments I intend to make in the way I live? In a few months my baby will be born. Talk about life changing. Suddenly it isn’t all about me. My baby will be born soon.”
His mouth curved up and a spark fired in his eyes at the mention of his baby’s upcoming birth, but then he frowned and shook his head. “I only saw the ultrasound of the little bean because Sharee shared it on the news. She announced that she had just finished her first—trimester. Is that the right word? Trimester? I don’t know much about pregnancy, and Sharee won’t tell me anything.”
Alyssa didn’t much like the way this woman was treating Cash. Maybe he deserved it for how he’d treated her, but now there was a baby involved. They needed to put aside both their agendas for the child’s sake.
It sounded like Cash wanted to do what was right, but if what Cash said about Sharee was true, she was using her baby for her own gain. It made Alyssa sick just to think about it.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured.
“Don’t be. It’s all my own doing. I dug this hole, and now it’s up to me to crawl out of it. I’m not anywhere close to being ready to be a father, but it’s up to me now to become a good daddy. I know what I have to do now—and that starts with cutting out the whiskey.”
“And