Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
GRAHAM
I couldn’t stop watching Rose.
We’d been riding for hours, and she’d barely spoken to me beyond clipped instructions and the occasional “watch your spacing” aimed at the whole line. Ranch owner in charge. Not my friend. Not my anything.
Then the wind shifted.
Most people missed it. My team were too busy being impressed by Colorado, joking over their shoulders, laughing at Jamie’s running commentary about how “this view is illegal.” Brutus’s ears twitched, though, and Cassiopeia lifted her head. Horses always knew before people did.
Rose noticed.
Her whole body went from tour guide to commander. Like she’d flipped an internal switch that didn’t allow discussion.
“We’re turning back,” she called.
There were groans behind us.
“What? It’s just clouds,” Olivia argued.
“We’re turning back,” Rose repeated, calm and final. “Now.”
Kaya’s voice carried from the end. “She’s right. That’s moving in quickly.”
Rose didn’t spare a second. “Keep up and stay tight. If you fall behind, call out and Kaya will help you.”
The tone was what did it. Not angry. Just final.
No one argued again.
Dex reinforced it with one quick sweep of his eyes down the line. Do not make her repeat herself. Jamie discreetly pulled out her phone to capture the dramatic shift from postcard morning to apocalypse ride.
Scotland had taught me storms could come fast and mean it. Colorado, apparently, had the same way of reminding people they weren’t in charge.
Brutus drifted up beside Cassiopeia again.
The light went flat. Wind cut through the aspens hard enough to make the leaves shiver silver-side out.
A cold drop hit my cheek.
Another.
Then the rain committed.
Not a polite drizzle. Not a cinematic mist. Fucking needles. Cold and sharp, driven sideways, turning the trail into slick clay in the space of a minute. Everyone behind us went quiet one by one, their laughter dying as the weather stopped being pretty and started being real.
Rose lifted her voice again, steady and clean over the rain.
“Hands soft. Let your horses move. No one passes. Call out if you can’t see the rider behind you.”
Thunder rolled over the ridge, low and deep.
Olivia swore under her breath.
“Welcome to the mountains,” Kaya called from the back.
I glanced over at Rose despite myself.
She was soaked already, hair coming loose at the edges, water darkening the shoulders of her shirt. But she rode like she and Cassiopeia were made of the same material. Totally unshaken.
Fucking hot. No other way to put it.
Brutus’s stride stayed even, matching Cassiopeia. I kept my hands low, letting him choose his footing as the trail turned treacherous.
This wasn’t the time to be a hero. This was the time to be smart.
We rounded a bend and the stream crossing came into view.
Earlier in the day it had been a gentle ribbon of water you could step over without thinking. Now it was swollen and brown, moving fast, dragging branches and foam.
Rose slowed Cassiopeia to a halt and assessed it in one sweep. Then she turned in the saddle and lifted a hand.
“One at a time,” she called. “Wait for my signal. Straight line. Do not rush them.”
No one questioned her now. Not with thunder rolling and rain flattening their hair to their heads. Fear had done what Rose’s authority had already tried to do: made them listen.
Rose went first. Cassiopeia stepped into the water like it was nothing, hooves finding rock with the confidence of a mare who’d crossed much worse. Rose didn’t pull. Didn’t clamp. She let the horse do her job, and Cassiopeia rewarded her by being exactly what everyone else needed: a calm example.
Rose reached the far bank, turned Cassiopeia in the stream, and lifted her hand again.
“Dex. You’re next.”
Dex went without hesitation, his horse following Cassiopeia’s line. Then Olivia, and then Jamie.
Rose watched each crossing. When her eyes landed on me, it was quick.
“Bring him straight,” she said, meaning Brutus. “Don’t let him angle.”
“Aye,” I answered, and guided Brutus in.
The water hit his legs and he tensed. Not frightened, annoyed. He picked his way forward, thinking. Almost across, a rock shifted under his front hoof and his shoulder dipped.
It was the kind of slip that became a fall if you handled it wrong.
My whole body reacted on instinct. Lean with him, give him room, stay centered. Don’t fight the horse. Don’t punish the mistake.
Rose moved at the same time.
Cassiopeia stepped in close, and Rose leaned out and grabbed Brutus’s bridle strap to steady him. I reached down too, smoothing my hand along his wet neck, speaking low.
“Easy, boy. Find it.”
For a second, our hands met. Fingers brushing through wet leather and rain.
The contact went through me like a current. Brief and sharp and completely disproportionate to what it actually was, which was two people grabbing the same horse.
Rose’s eyes snapped to mine.
She felt it. I could see her hating that she had.
Then she looked away. “Good,” she murmured to the horses. “That’s it. Move.”
Brutus found his footing and climbed out onto the far bank. Cassiopeia followed, Rose already watching down the line again.
The stream crossing finished without anyone getting hurt.
The storm had transformed the final path back into something out of a disaster film, rain coming in sheets. Lightning cracked so close the horses flinched. Jamie gasped.
Rose lifted her voice, calm and sharp. “Breathe. Talk to your horses. Keep them moving.”
We finally reached the ranch in a rush of wet bodies and snorting horses. Hank appeared at the barn door, raincoat on, ready.
Rose didn’t waste a breath.
“Inside,” she ordered, voice carrying clean over the rain. “Towels are by the entry. Boots off. Hot drinks in the kitchen. No one goes wandering.”
She pointed once, decisive. “Kaya. You’ve got them.”
Kaya gave a crisp little salute. “Aye, boss.”
Rose didn’t smile. Not even close.
She turned to Hank. “Check the generator and the backup water lines. Storm this heavy, we might lose power.”
Hank nodded and headed off without a word.
Then Rose turned back to the horses.
I should’ve followed the others inside. That would’ve been sensible. That would’ve been what she wanted, me nowhere near her after yesterday.
But the barn was full of nervous animals, and Rose was only one person.
I followed her down the barn aisle.
She glanced over her shoulder once. The look was sharp enough to cut rope, half warning, half the smallest crack of reluctant acceptance.
“Stay out of my way,” she said.
“I will. But I can help.”
Her gaze held mine a fraction longer than it needed to, considering how hard she’d worked all day to pretend I didn’t exist.
Then she gave one curt nod. “Fine.”
She turned toward the first stall, and I made the mistake of actually looking at her.
Rose was soaked. Completely, thoroughly drenched. Her shirt clung to her in a way that made her body impossible to ignore. Her hair had gone dark with rain, plastered against her neck and collarbone, and water ran down her throat in a path my eyes followed before my brain could intervene.
She was so goddamn beautiful it physically hurt.
And she had no idea. She was already moving, already working, completely focused on the horses, oblivious to the fact that my brain had stopped functioning.
Focus. Horses. Storm.
“Saddles off,” Rose commanded, cutting through the noise in my head. “Loosen girths. Don’t yank anything. If you spook them, I’ll feed you to Brutus.”
It was almost a joke. The fact she could find humor right now, looking like that, adrenaline buzzing through the barn, made me want to say something I’d regret.
I kept my mouth shut and worked.
We moved fast. Saddles slid free. Pads peeled away heavy with rain. Leather slapped against racks. Buckles clicked. Buckets got topped off, hay nets rehung.
I kept my eyes on the work. Mostly. Every now and then they’d drift back to Rose, the way her wet clothes moved with her, the glimpse of skin at her collarbone, the efficiency in every motion, and I’d force myself to look away before she caught me staring.
Most of the horses settled the second the tack came off. They shook, snorted, lowered their heads to hay like the storm was already last week.
The bay in the far stall wasn’t most horses.
He was big, with a white blaze and eyes showing white at the edges. His head was high like he could see lightning coming through walls. The storm didn’t just scare him. It rewired him.
Rose reached his stall. And in the space of one step, she changed.
The command voice stayed, but the edges softened. “Hey,” she murmured, the sound meant for the horse alone. “Hey, Ricky. I’ve got you.”
Another crack of thunder hit and his body surged, not aggressive, just desperate. His shoulder bumped her hard enough that she rocked back a step.
I didn’t think. I just moved.
I stepped into the stall at an angle, giving Ricky space while making sure he didn’t slam into the wall. Hands low, palms open, voice steady. Something I’d learned a long time ago. You couldn’t outmuscle panic. You could only outlast it.
“Easy,” I said. “Look at me. That’s it.”
Rose’s head snapped toward me. “Don’t crowd him.”
“I’m not. I’m giving him an anchor.”
Ricky’s gaze flicked to mine, wild and searching. He hesitated, caught between instinct and the calm I was offering.
I breathed slowly on purpose, exaggerated the rise and fall of my chest like a metronome. Not magic. Just physics. Just a body telling another body: you’re safe enough to breathe.
Rose saw it.
And instead of fighting me, instead of snapping me out of her space, she matched it.
Her inhale. Mine.
Her exhale. Mine.
For a moment, it wasn’t about yesterday or secrets or boundaries. It was just the three of us in that stall. Ricky shaking like the storm lived in his bones. Rose steady as a post. Me watching the way she held him with her voice like it was the only thing keeping him here.
Ricky’s pacing slowed.
His head lowered inch by inch.