Tough Luck Hero

He realized how true it was the moment he said it. He really was fine. Pissed, sure. Sierra was right. Leaving someone at the altar was a low move. There were any number of ways Natalie could have gone about ending things with him, and not ending them until the entire town had watched him get stood up was about the worst way to do it.

He was angry. Completely, justifiably so. But otherwise he really was fine.

“Right. That’s why you flew to Vegas for one night.” Maddy was looking at him skeptically.

He gritted his teeth. He had to do this. There was no other option. And right then and there, he knew he had to lie to his sisters too. He didn’t like it, but there really wasn’t another way to play it. He didn’t need them opposing him when it came to dealing with their mother. And, since his youngest sister was married to the town bartender, who was the commander of the town gossip hub, he had to be even more careful than he might have been otherwise.

“Well, I didn’t just go to Vegas overnight for no reason. I went to Vegas to get married.”

“You’re having a psychotic episode, aren’t you?” Maddy’s face contorted. “Please don’t tell me that you married a stripper. If some Las Vegas stripper ends up with a portion of our inheritance because you married her without a prenup...”

“I did not marry a stripper. I went to Vegas with Lydia Carpenter.”

“You did what?” Sierra’s voice had risen several octaves.

“I’m kind of surprised you didn’t hear about it already.” He watched their faces closely, using their responses as a primer for what it would look like to confess all of this to his mother. Not to mention his father.

Though he didn’t really care about his father’s response. His father’s sins were part of why he was in this mess. He had a feeling the scandal had influenced Natalie’s behavior. More than that, it was one of the biggest reasons he couldn’t afford to disappoint his mother.

“Why would we have heard about it? Did you print an announcement in the paper?” Maddy asked.

“Lydia may have...sent some texts.” He cleared his throat. “And I might have sent one or two myself.”

Maddy arched a brow. “And you didn’t text your sisters. You got married in Las Vegas to someone that we barely know and texted a bunch of random people to tell them?”

“Texting decisions were made. They were not made entirely sober.”

“So, you got drunk and you got married in Las Vegas,” Maddy said, her gaze pointed.

“It doesn’t matter if I was drunk or not. I’m married.”

“Wow,” Sierra said. “I really didn’t expect you...”

He looked down at her rounded belly pointedly. “I’m not sure you’re in a position to judge about drunken actions.”

Sierra’s pregnancy hadn’t exactly been planned. But then, her entire relationship with Ace Thompson had been more or less unplanned. And though Colton would never have thought his sister, the town’s rodeo princess, would have worked with the flannel-wearing once-confirmed bachelor, he had to admit that they did.

“I’m in love,” Sierra said, flipping her hair.

“And I stand by my decision,” he said.

He wasn’t going to go throwing around the word love. He hadn’t done so even when he’d been engaged to Natalie; he was hardly going to do so now.

Maddy noticed. “So, you marrying the woman running against Natalie’s father has nothing to do with...I don’t know, revenge?”

Lost somewhere in the murky mists of time was the reasoning behind his decision to marry Lydia. Maybe it had been about revenge. He had a feeling when they’d started taking shots together in Ace’s that it had absolutely been about revenge.

But after that? He couldn’t remember a damn thing.

So he could pretty much give her whatever answer he wanted to and it wouldn’t really be a lie. As long as it sounded reasonable.

“No. I’ve known Lydia for a long time. It’s just that I was involved with Natalie and...”

“And you were going to marry another woman anyway? But then Natalie just so happened to leave you at the altar?” Maddy asked.

“I was committed to Natalie. But then she didn’t show up for the wedding. And Lydia and I...”

“You were overcome?” Maddy pressed.

“Yes,” he said, turning his cup in a circle. “I was overcome.”

Colton had never been overcome by anything in his entire life, but if that was what Maddy needed to hear to accept the situation, then that was what he was going to tell her.

He was not going to tell her this was only temporary. He was not going to tell her that he had never felt much of anything but irritation for Lydia, and for some reason a little alcohol added to that mix had resulted in the two of them ending up in bed together.

Maybe he had been overcome. But not by emotion. And he wasn’t about to explain that to either of his sisters.

Even with Sierra visibly pregnant, and married, he preferred to pretend that neither of them would have any idea of what he was talking about.

He didn’t really have any idea of what he was talking about. Because he still couldn’t remember.

“Anyway, obviously I’m going to have to have a talk with Mom,” he continued.

“Obviously. And maybe a therapist.”

“Thank you, Madison. Would you kindly refer me to yours?” he asked, a little bit of bite in his tone.

“My therapist quit and retired to the Bahamas with all of the money I paid him. He said it was really nice that working with me was so financially successful for him, but unfortunately he was going to have to use a good portion of that money to pay for his own therapy,” his sister said drily.

“Maybe it’s just as well. Lydia is going to be moving into my house today. So I’ll be a little busy.”

“This is borderline scandalous behavior,” Maddy said, her lips curling up into a smile. “How nice of you to join the rest of us in disgrace.”

“You know, you could work a little harder to look concerned for my well-being.”

“I’m just saying,” she said, lifting her shoulder, “it is a bit daunting to be the sister of Saint Colton West. And more than a little satisfying to see your halo get tarnished.”

He looked at Sierra. “Sorry,” she said, not sounding apologetic at all. “It is kind of nice to know that you can make impulsive decisions.”

“Impulsive, maybe. But I stand by it,” he reiterated.

“You’re too stubborn to do anything else,” Sierra said.

It was easy for Sierra and Madison to sit there and give him side eye. Yes, Madison knew what it was like to be the center of a scandal. And the town, their parents and the dressage riding community had all been unkind to her when she had been caught in an affair with an older man when she was seventeen.

Colton had wanted nothing more than to break the other man’s jaw. Before he killed him. Slowly. But far too many people had held his underage sister responsible for the whole thing.

Madison made a practice of laughing it off now, but Colton knew that she didn’t really find it all that funny.