Free Always Conall (Bitterroot #2) by Sibylla Matilde Page A

imaginary conversation, “thanks for hanging out with me tonight.”
    “Do you want to play more ponies?” she asked me hopefully.
    “I think it’s about your bedtime, and I have to go make sure the critters on the ranch are set for the night.”
    She set down her ponies and sloughed over to me, curling her little arm around my leg to give me a little-kid one-arm hug. “Can you take me out there?” Her wide blue eyes earnestly begged for me to agree.
    “Um, sometime, yeah,” I smiled down at her and ruffled her hair, “that would be awesome.”
    “Tomorrow?” she smiled.
    “Not sure when, but we will soon. I promise.”
    I looked over at Sage who walked into the room with us. She lifted Mattie into her arms, and I watched my daughter’s sleepy little body relax against her mom.
    Everything about me wanted to stay.
    But I nodded a quick goodbye and headed out the door.

Chapter 6 ~ Paper Weight
     
     
    Sage
    The next couple days crept by. Long and arduous shifts at the hospital, time dragging so slowly. I didn’t hear from Conall, which, considering that we’d left things a little off-kilter the other night, this was not surprising.
    I didn’t hear from Jeff, but this wasn’t unusual either. Despite what I’d tried to convince Conall of, it was a total fuck buddy situation. He did make me feel beautiful, but that was simply because he wanted to sleep with me. He sure as hell didn’t like me for my mind. We barely even spoke. And I went with it because he was safe. Our relationship, or lack thereof, made things easier for me because I didn’t have to worry about a future. I didn’t have to put anything too real into whatever we had. He wasn’t interested in more, which worked well for me.
    So no word from Conall, no word from Jeff. A few shifts, and then came my day off, and I was going stir crazy at home. Any form of housework was driving me bonkers, and, to be truthful, with just Mattie and I, there wasn’t a lot to clean. I couldn’t sit still to read. After staring blankly at kiddo TV programs for entirely too long, I had to get us out of there. Out of town.
    Some of the nurses had been talking about a huckleberry patch down the canyon just outside the city limits. Apparently, the berries were at their peak, so I bundled up Mattie along with a little picnic lunch, bug spray, bear spray, sunscreen, and a couple pails, and we went off to pick huckleberries.
    As the hot July sun crossed the smoky sky, we filled our bowls. Mattie chased butterflies and splashed in the stream looking for frogs. Then she lost her ever loving mind when she saw a crawdad in the water and refused to go anywhere near it after that. Eventually, she began to get sorta cranky, so we loaded our huckleberry haul into the car and started home.
    In a matter of minutes, my girl had conked out in the backseat, softly snoring with her mouth gaping. As we got closer to home, I glanced back to see her foot on the verge of knocking over one of the pails of berries, so I pulled to the side of the road to save them. Unfortunately, as I climbed back into the driver seat and shifted the car back into drive, I heard a loud thunk… and my car didn’t move. I stepped on the gas and nothing. I returned it to park, then put it in gear again, and… nothing. I tried shifting to first and second gears. Nothing. Reverse… nothing.
    For a few minutes, I just sat there wondering why the hell I had talked Kian out of taking a look at my car. Apparently, he’d sensed an issue when he drove it, but, oh no, I felt like I was too dependent on others as it was.
    And now, I was miles from home with a sleeping four-year-old and a big ol’ Ford Taurus paperweight.
    Fuck .
    Feeling like shit for doing it, I tried calling Brynn, but her phone went straight to voicemail, as it often did when she was working. Then I tried Kian, his rang a few times, but then went to voicemail, too, which was often the case when he was teaching a class.
    Looking down my short