13. CT
13
ct
“So, you’ve worked on a ranch before?” I ask, holding a measly résumé with about two paragraphs on it handed to me by the teenage boy in front of me. Trent. Why does that name just piss me off? He scratches the side of his head and shrugs. “Is that an answer?”
“I’ve done some things,” he finally says, looking around the barn like he would rather be anywhere else. That makes two of us, buddy.
It’s another hot-as-hell day, and I just finished a lesson with a middle school girl who was horse obsessed and chatted my ear off while I gave the lesson. I was already mentally exhausted.
I finally got someone to come in and interview for the stall help position. Finding people willing to clean horse shit was few and far between anymore.
“Well,” I sigh. I hate this kind of work, picking and choosing who will be around me all the time. And looking at the kid in front of me with the worn-out boots and tight jeans, his white shirt far too clean and nice for barn work like this, I don’t allow my hopes to get too high. “Let me get you set up here and show you where to go.”
Just as I’m handing him a manure fork for cleaning, I hear a truck rumbling near the doors of the barn and know immediately who it is. Dani.
I see her enter and nod at her. She sends me a smile. It’s small, but to me, it feels like a victory.
She heads right for Lady and gets her out, and while I’m dealing with Trent, I keep her in my peripheral vision. She goes through the motions of grooming, then saddling Lady, and I see she’s here to practice.
I’ve kind of taken over the riding of Lady over the last couple of weeks, but Dani also needs to practice.
Trent looks over and lets out a low whistle. “Damn, who is that?”
I turn my gaze to him and glare, waiting for him to look at me, and when he does, his spine straightens. “That,” I start, “is none of your concern. Keep your eyes to yourself and your mouth shut.”
He turns his attention back to the stall, and I sigh, crossing my arms as I instruct him what to do, my own attention drifting to Dani every time I see movement.
I try not to rush through training Trent, knowing he needs me to be very specific about what he needs to do—I’ve dealt with his kind before and know if I don’t tell him exactly what is up, he’ll pretend logic and common sense are a thing of the past.
It’s a shame, really.
About thirty minutes after she heads into the arena, I send Trent out to the manure pile with a loaded wheelbarrow.
I sneak into the arena, keeping near the door as I watch Dani ride. Her blonde hair is tied up in a long ponytail, and as she lopes around the arena, I watch it swing behind her and tuck my thumbs into my front pockets, a smile touching my lips.
I remember the hesitation she first had when we started riding together, it quickly turned to excitement, and then with practice, it turned to confidence and control.
She stops easily in the middle of the arena and starts to walk around, seeming to cool off and an idea springs to mind.
I rush to Milk’s stall—my go-to horse now—and quickly brush him down, throwing the pad and saddle on quickly from muscle memory. I skip his boots since what I have in mind won’t require them.
“Trent, take a break,” I say to him when he wanders back in, sweating and with an empty wheelbarrow.
I take Milk into the arena and pull open the gate, gesturing to the outside. “Wanna cool her off on a trail?”
Dani smiles at me like she can’t help it and nods.
Hope blooms in my chest.
“This is nice,” Dani comments as we make our way up into the hills. The shade is substantial here given that the mountains and trees block the sun. We don’t have cattle on this trail, so I rarely make my way out here, but it’s one of my favorite trails on our property.
I haven’t been out here because it also contains memories. Memories that I haven’t wanted to punish myself with, memories that all revolve around the woman riding to my left.
“It is,” I say, my voice quiet. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to say what I’m feeling or ask how she’s feeling.
After asking her to lunch a few times and getting turned down each time, I had to ask myself if she would ever be open to sharing her heart with me again. But that dance we shared…felt like something .
Was I really fearing rejection right now? Was that truly what it was?
“Lady did great today,” Dani says, continuing the conversation. “I felt good too. I mean…” She rolls her eyes at herself, and I smirk. “I didn’t run her on the flag or anything, but I feel confident otherwise.”
“You looked great.”
She looks over at me and laughs lightly. “Why do I feel like you wouldn’t tell me if I looked bad?”
I duck my head slightly, my eyes catching on my calloused hands as I readjust the reins, giving my hands something to do. She’s not wrong in her assessment. I do feel inclined to compliment her rather than criticize her. I think there is a healthy balance there. One that I achieved when we were younger, and one I’ll have to relearn. I’m more inclined to stay on her good side, but I knew Dani. I knew she would hate it if I wasn’t honest with her.
The sun rises higher in the sky the longer we go. When we finally hit the river, my mind drifts to the meeting I had with Viv, Graham’s friend.
“We renamed the ranch,” I blurt out of nowhere, breaking the silence we were riding in. As we reach the river, we both hop off our horses and let them breathe and get a drink if they want. Milk pulls on me, wanting to head to the grass near the riverbank.
Dani moves toward the river and squats down. Her hair is still tied up high, and her tank top has dried of the small amount of sweat from her morning ride. In a tank, jeans, and boots, her skin sun-kissed and her hair in a disheveled ponytail, she’s the best sight I’ve ever seen, and I find I can’t make myself look away.
“You did? What was wrong with Trevors Ranch?”
I clear my clogged throat and shrug, knowing that same thought had gone through my own head as well. “Viv, uh, the marketing person we hired for the festival,” I say, explaining. “She tells me renaming or…” I pause, thinking of how she put it. It’s all a foreign language to me. “Rebranding, I think, will put the ranch on the map and get more business.”
She stands and sighs, letting Lady lead her away to the grass and letting her graze. “Well, that makes sense.”
I’m glad she thinks so because none of it does to me. But I trust Viv. She does great work and seems like a real genuine person.
Dani cocks her head at me and frowns. “I’ve kind of heard some rumors…”
I stand near her, much to my horse’s delight, so he can also reach the spot he was eyeballing, and tuck my thumbs into my pockets, reins still in one hand. “What kind of rumors?”
“The kind that says you haven’t even been working over the last few years.”
I frown. “That’s not true. I’ve been running cattle this whole time.” A tedious job that really required more help, but I was a glutton for punishment and took it on my own.
“Not that,” she says, letting out a breath. “Riding, lessons, showing, that kind of stuff. You really haven’t been showing all this time?”
Ah. That. I shake my head slowly and glance away from her disappointed gaze. “No, I haven’t.”
She takes a step closer, and I brace myself—for what, I don’t know—but when I see her imploring gaze, I relax. “Cade,” she whispers, and I let her use of my name wash over me. Everyone calls me CT, but when we were alone, when we were dating, she always called me Cade. I’ve noticed since we’ve reconnected that she’s defaulted to the less personal name, and I fucking hate it. “Why haven’t you been doing what you should be? Why did you quit?”
I look down at my feet and shuffle them slightly, kicking at a rock out of frustration. “It was just—” I cut myself off. How do I explain this?
I look down into Dani’s eyes, her attention never straying from me, and decide to just go for the full truth. She deserves that much. “It was too hard. I lost Mom, and it was something she was so supportive of. It was something she got me into, and I couldn’t do it anymore. It brought up too many memories.” Not to mention, showing was something I did with Dani, and I didn’t think I could stomach seeing her at shows and not being there with her.
“CT,” she sighs and reaches out, placing a hand on my forearm and making my skin burn with the contact. I’m not sure she realizes that there’s a buzzing need under my skin to grab her and pull her to me, to taste the lips that once belonged to me, to nuzzle the neck that I know smells like the lotion she always favored. Lemon and honey.
I hold perfectly still, so I don’t do any of those things. “You shouldn’t give up on something you love because you lost someone who loved you. Your mom wouldn’t want that for you. She loved you and Graham more than anything and seeing you fulfill your passions was a highlight for her. She told me herself.”
I snap my eyes back to hers. “She told you that? ”
“Your mom and I had a lot of talks over the years,” she says quietly, a sad look in her eyes. “She was important to my family, to me. Losing her was difficult.”
“Dani,” I start, my voice cracking, knowing that part of her pain from losing my mom was losing me right along with her. “I’m so sorry,” I tell her earnestly. I risk it and reach out, tilting her chin up to look at me. “I’m sorry I hurt you, sorry I pushed you away. I just…didn’t know how to cope.” It’s a lame excuse, but telling her the truth, it’s too raw of an answer, and I don’t want to scare her away.
She takes a deep breath, and her eyes, which were once shiny, blink and a small smile finds her lips. Taking a step back toward the horses, she looks over the river and asks, “So, what’s the new name then?”
I look over the river, the mountains surrounding us, and the summer sun shining down at us, a breeze sweeps through, and I take a deep breath.
A sense of newness settles over me.
“This is now the Three Rivers Trevors Ranch.”
I look over at Dani, the woman who, regardless of how much time passes, will always hold the key to my heart, and she smiles brightly at the name. “It’s perfect.”
And all I can think as I look at this woman beside me is, Yes. Yes, you are.