Chapter 25 Teague
Teague
Ash Dunne spent eleven hours today doing ranch work and not once did anyone have to tell him what came next.
He was in the barn by six, mucking stalls before I'd finished my first coffee, his hair tied back with one of my bandanas because it's gotten long enough to fall in his eyes when he bends over.
He mucked all eight stalls, watered the horses, groomed Mabel without being bitten, hauled feed bags from the truck to the storage room, helped Cass re-string wire along the south fence, and spent an hour with a yearling who won't take a halter.
The yearling took the halter on the third try.
It took Cass two weeks with that horse and he's still talking about it.
I can’t imagine a moment without Ash on our ranch, even if I know that realistically he’s avoiding a conversation we’re all desperately trying to have. Dad not only said not to push it, he said hands off.
He mentioned it at breakfast with his coffee raised and his eyes making the rounds, the universal Boone signal that the matter is closed before it's been opened. Ash needs a day. His body needs rest and his head needs quiet after cracking apart in a shed yesterday.
I've respected the boundary. Mostly. I brushed past him in the hallway around noon and let my hand trail across his lower back, which I maintain does not count. He leaned into it for half a second before catching himself, his cheeks going pink, and then he was past me heading out to the pasture.
Now it's after dinner and the kitchen is empty except for the three of us.
Ledger is at the table with a notepad, writing in that precise, small handwriting that looks like it belongs on an architectural plan.
Cass is leaning against the counter with his arms crossed, his split knuckles wrapped in tape that Ash applied this morning, standing on his toes to reach while Cass held still with an expression that could only be described as devastated tenderness.
"The lease is month to month," I say, pointing at the notepad where Ledger has mapped out the logistics. "Ash can break it with thirty days' notice. The furniture is mostly Marcus'. We're grabbing clothes, personal items, anything that belongs to Ash."
"When," Cass says.
"Tomorrow. I thought we could head into town and then just keep going."
"If Marcus is there?"
"Then he gets to watch us pack." I take a sip of coffee. "If he puts his hands on anyone, that's his problem."
Ledger taps the pen twice against the notepad. The list is organized into categories: clothing, toiletries, documents. There's a line item that just says blue mug with an asterisk beside it.
The screen door creaks. Ash appears in the doorway in one of my flannels and a pair of Ledger's sweats rolled three times at the waist. His hair is still damp from the shower, curling behind his ears. He's barefoot, holding an empty glass, scanning the counter.
"Is there any fruit left?"
"Apples in the bin," I say. "I ate the last of the peaches."
"Of course you did." He crosses to the counter, opens the bin, and picks through the apples.
His eyes drift to the notepad. He reads the column headers, apartment, boxes, truck, and the apple stops halfway to his mouth.
He sets the glass down, picks up the notepad, scans the list, reads the blue mug line twice.
"You're getting my stuff."
"Tomorrow, yeah."
He sets the notepad down carefully, his fingers lingering on the edge. He picks up the apple and takes a bite, chewing slowly, his gaze slightly unfocused. I can see him picturing it, three of us walking through Marcus' door with empty boxes. The corner of his mouth twitches.
"I want to come."
"Ash—"
"It's my apartment. My stuff. I should be there."
Cass and I exchange a look. Ledger doesn't look up from the notepad but his pen has stopped moving, which is his version of exchanging a look.
The logistics of bringing Ash into Marcus' space are complicated in ways that have nothing to do with box counts.
But the set of his jaw tells me this isn't a request he's going to let go of easily.
"We'll figure it out," I say, which isn't a yes but isn't the no he's bracing for.
He accepts it with a nod and takes another bite, his color rising as Cass shifts against the counter. Cass' eyes are tracking the way Ash's flannel has slipped off one shoulder, exposing the layered bruises along his collarbone.
"You know," Cass says, "I was telling Teague earlier about the fence today. The way you bent through those rails."
His face twists up in confusion. We haven’t explicitly mentioned that there are cameras across the property and one of many reasons why we knew where Ash had run off to.
Ledger found him like a fucking hound dog but I just flipped through the app on my phone to see Ash folding himself nearly in half. It was glorious.
"I fit through the rails because I'm small, Cass."
"That's what I said. Teague had a different interpretation."
"Teague has a different interpretation of everything." Another bite, his flush deepening, fully aware of where this is heading. "What exactly did Teague interpret?"
"The practical applications of your flexibility," I say, because I was put on this earth to steer conversations into dangerous water. "Which got me thinking about something we haven't done. Not the midnight game. Something with more room to run."
Everyone straightens up, the flush on Ash’s face deepening.
"Forty acres of woods out back," I say. "Creek, plenty of cover, a man who moves through fencing like a deer. What if we gave you a head start? Five minutes. In the dark. Whoever catches you gets you."
Ash sets the apple down. His lips are parted, his pupils wide, the pulse in his throat hammering hard enough that I can see it from across the kitchen. His thighs pressed together when I said whoever catches you and he hasn't stopped looking at me since.
"Right now?"
"Unless you'd rather play the goodnight game again," Cass grins, already pushing off the counter. "We haven't played that in a while."
"Because one of you is usually fucking me to sleep."
The kitchen goes still. Ash's hand flies to his mouth, his eyes blowing wide, the blush reaching a shade I didn't think skin could produce. Eleven days ago this man couldn't ask for a kiss. Now he's standing in our kitchen telling us we fuck him to sleep like it's a complaint.
"Run, Sunshine."
He looks at me. Looks at Cass. Looks at Ledger closing the notepad with a finality that means the list is done and something else is starting.
Ash runs.
The screen door bangs behind him, bare feet on the porch, then gravel, then grass, getting fainter. Cass takes a step toward the door and I put my hand on his chest.
"Five minutes."
"That's a big head start."
"He's barefoot in the dark in forty acres, Cass. He needs it."
Cass exhales through his nose, Ledger already pulling on his boots. I start working through the logistics and which direction into the woods I’ll take first. I’m going to be the first and the last. We’re going to ruin that beautiful man.
The back door opens. My father walks in from the porch, a beer in hand, and takes in the scene with a single sweep. Three sons, one pulling on boots, one being physically restrained from the door, the screen still rattling.
"Where's Ash going?"
"The woods," I say. "Five-minute head start. Also, we're going to the apartment tomorrow to get his things. Ledger made a list."
Boone glances at the notepad on the table. He picks it up, reads it, and sets it back down. "The arena is tomorrow."
"Fuck, yeah, we’ll just go after."
Dad huffs out a laugh. "The three of you look like men who forgot they have jobs. Team roping at noon. Cass has the open ride at two. The apartment happens after, not instead of."
"We know, Dad."
"Good." He sets his beer on the counter and crosses his arms, the posture that means what follows is law.
"I also need all three of you to hear me clearly before you go running after that man.
Ash cracked yesterday. He sat in a shed and cried for an hour because the weight of everything we've given him got too heavy to carry.
He's stronger today but he's not invincible.
His colors work the same in those woods as they do in this house.
So does Meridian. If he says yellow, you slow down.
If he says the word, you stop. Everything stops.
You wrap him up and you bring him home."
"We know," Cass says, quieter this time.
"I know you know. I'm saying it anyway because one of my sons drove onto this property yesterday and got within thirty feet of that man, and the fact that Ash is running through those woods right now instead of folded into a corner tells me he trusts you with something I need you to be worthy of."
We stay silent, all of us realizing just how much Ash has given us. It’s not just his body or his love or an open door into his life. He’s given us everything.
"Go take care of him," Dad says. "And somebody put boots on him before he steps on something."
I almost ask how Dad knows Ash is barefoot but nix the question. Ash is almost always barefoot. Cass is out the door in the next second. Ledger follows at his own pace, pulling the screen shut without a sound. I stand in the kitchen with my father, listening to the night swallow my brothers.
"I hate reality," I tell him. "Jobs, arena, schedules. All of it." The thickness in my own throat catches me off guard. "I'm just hoping at the end of two weeks, it includes Ash."
Dad doesn’t say anything, watching me as I grab a pair of boots for Ash, pull my own on and then head out the back.