Free Sacrifice of Passion (Deadly Legends) by Melissa Bourbon Ramirez Page A

enough.”
    “It’s not the same.”
    She smiled and cupped his face. “It is to me.” The delicate silver chain held a horseshoe pendant as the focal point. For my rodeo champ, he’d said when he gave it to her. She hadn’t taken it off since.
    “You’re all packed?” he asked.
    “For weeks now. I just have to get through dinner with the family and some neighbors tonight and then we can ride off into the sunset. Or sunrise, I guess.”
    “I’m no prince, Laney.” He looked at her solemnly.
    She put her finger to his lips before he could start lecturing her about why they should wait to get married. “I know exactly what I want. That’s never going to change.”
    He brought her wrist up and brushed his lips over the heel of her hand. Her smile erased the furrow of concern on his face. “You better go now.”
    He kissed her before she got out of his truck. “See you at three forty-five.”
    She blew him a kiss as she walked down the road to her house, believing that soon she’d be Mrs. Vicente Vargas.
    But because he’d decided to ask her parents proper, he hadn’t gone to meet her in the wee hours. He knew that if he had, she’d have done everything in her power to change his mind. He wouldn’t have been able to resist her pleas. So he’d stayed away. After all, what difference could a couple of hours make?
    A lot, as it turned out. He still regretted that decision.
    But things were very different now. Delaney West wasn’t a girl madly in love with him. Probably never had been. Instead of waiting for him, or at least coming to him and talking about it, she’d left him. Just like that, with no looking back. She’d broken his heart years ago, and all bets were off.
    He took a step toward her now, his gaze holding hers, refocusing on getting her out of his system once and for all. He reached out and rubbed the ends of an auburn curl between his fingers. “You give any more thought to my deal?”
    She scoffed, flipping her hair aside. “You had your chance. Twelve years ago.”
    He smiled ironically. “And me thinking you wanted to wait until you were married. My bad.”
    She stared at him. “Excuse me?”
    He went for the jugular, as much to get under her skin as to keep himself in check. “I was just thinking about how some other lucky man was your first.” When it should have been him.
    She went pale, but her chin rose. “Yeah, some other lucky man.”
    “Who was it, Delaney?”
    “Vic, so help me God—”
    He dropped the smile and advanced on her. “You used to say you loved me. That you were meant for me and no one else. I guess those were just lies.” He felt his anger rise to his throat, heard it come out in his voice. “So who’d you give yourself to instead of me?”
    She shoved past him, stalking off toward her Jeep.
    He was right on her heels. Hell, no. She was not getting off that easy. He caught her arm and swung her around. “Why did you leave?”
    She gaped. “Are you kidding?”
    “Dead serious. One minute we’re getting married, and the next you’re on a bus for Austin.”
    She shook her head. Laughed humorlessly. Then she glanced at his truck. Pointed surreptitiously at Zach. “That’s why I took off.” She stared him down. “Come on, Vic. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out exactly when he was conceived. You didn’t miss me for very long.” She smacked her forehead with the heel of her hand. “Oh, right. You didn’t miss me at all. You were too busy with Miss—”
    “You left!” he bellowed as he slammed his hand against the side of the Jeep. “Without a word to me, but apparently plenty to your parents. I was pressuring you?” His words spilled out, too fast to stop. “Your folks spread that little nugget all over town. And yet I distinctly remember you were the one with your hand down my pants that night.” He loomed over her, and despite the old anger spewing from him, suddenly all he could see were her scared eyes, like a deer’s doe-eyes,