Chapter 10 Dreams and Doubts #2
The stubborn gelding looked almost heroic in several drawings.
I snorted softly.
Oliver had somehow managed to turn one of the grumpiest horses on the ranch into a noble work of art.
The horse would be insufferable if he knew.
A smile tugged at my mouth.
Then I reached the next section.
And the smile disappeared.
Because suddenly the subject changed.
Me.
Page after page.
Sketch after sketch.
Ryder fixing fences.
Ryder working cattle.
Ryder riding through pastures.
Ryder standing beneath sunsets.
Ryder talking to ranch hands.
Ryder laughing.
God.
I hadn't even realized he'd seen some of these moments.
One sketch showed me sitting alone on the porch late at night.
The image stopped me cold.
I remembered that evening.
I'd thought I was alone.
Apparently I wasn't.
The drawing captured something I rarely allowed people to see.
Loneliness.
The realization settled heavily in my chest.
I slowly sat down beneath the tree.
The sketchbook rested open across my lap.
A strange feeling had begun growing inside me.
Not pride.
Not exactly.
Something deeper.
Every page revealed another moment.
Another memory.
Another version of myself seen through Oliver's eyes.
The thing that unsettled me most wasn't the skill.
Though the skill was remarkable.
It was the affection.
The quiet tenderness hidden in every line.
The kid hadn't just drawn me.
He'd paid attention to me.
Really paid attention.
More attention than anyone had in years.
Maybe ever.
I turned another page.
Then stopped breathing for a second.
A sketch of Midnight.
Not from a photograph.
Not from real life.
From my description.
Oliver had listened carefully enough to recreate the horse from memory.
The powerful shoulders.
The proud posture.
The intelligence in the eyes.
Something tightened painfully inside my chest.
Most people forgot details.
Oliver collected them.
Protected them.
Turned them into something lasting.
I stared at the drawing for a long time.
Long enough that the evening grew darker around me.
Long enough that the first stars appeared overhead.
Then I found the pages that truly ruined me.
Future pages.
Dream pages.
The kind never meant for anyone else to see.
The ranch house.
The porch.
Two figures sitting together beneath the stars.
A sketch of someone painting near the horse paddocks while another person repaired a fence nearby.
A life.
A future.
Not explicitly.
Not obviously.
Yet the meaning sat right there.
Between the lines.
Between the drawings.
Oliver wasn't just sketching Blackthorn.
He was imagining a place for himself here.
The realization hit harder than any rodeo injury ever had.
Because for the first time, I understood exactly how much this ranch meant to him.
How much I meant to him.
And God help me, that knowledge felt wonderful.
Right up until it felt terrible.
The shift happened quickly.
Like a storm rolling across open land.
One moment I was smiling.
The next I was staring at the pages with a growing sense of dread.
Because dreams were easy.
Reality wasn't.
I looked down at a sketch of myself standing beside Whiskey.
The version on paper looked stronger than I felt.
More certain.
Less damaged.
The truth was considerably messier.
I was thirty-eight years old.
My body still ached from injuries that never healed properly.
My rodeo career was a collection of memories.
My marriage had failed.
Most of the people I'd loved had eventually walked away.
Those facts didn't disappear because a talented artist drew pretty pictures.
The sketchbook suddenly felt heavy.
Too heavy.
Oliver deserved possibilities.
Adventure.
Choices.
A future that stretched beyond the boundaries of Blackthorn Ranch.
He deserved someone who could give him those things.
Someone younger.
Someone without scars.
Someone who wasn't carrying enough regrets to fill an entire lifetime.
The thoughts arrived one after another.
Relentless.
Cruel.
Impossible to ignore.
I hated them.
Mostly because they sounded reasonable.
That was the worst part.
If I truly cared about Oliver, shouldn't I want more for him?
Shouldn't I want him to have opportunities?
Experiences?
A life bigger than this ranch?
The questions dug deeper than I wanted.
The answer remained stubbornly out of reach.
Because another truth existed too.
I loved having him here.
Loved seeing him every morning.
Loved hearing him laugh.
Loved watching him sketch horses and argue with Whiskey and turn ordinary moments into something special.
The selfish part of me wanted to keep him.
The better part wasn't sure I should.
I closed the sketchbook slowly.
The night air felt cooler now.
The stars stretched endlessly overhead.
For several minutes, I sat there alone with my thoughts.
Neither side won.
Neither side surrendered.
The battle simply continued.
Eventually, footsteps sounded somewhere across the field.
Fast footsteps.
Hurried.
Panic-driven.
I didn't need to look up to know who it was.
Oliver.
Searching for the sketchbook.
Searching for his heart.
Searching for every secret he'd accidentally left behind.
A faint smile appeared despite everything.
The kid was about to be mortified.
Unfortunately, that wasn't what worried me anymore.
Because sitting beneath that tree with his sketchbook in my hands, I'd finally admitted something I'd been avoiding for weeks.
I was falling in love with Oliver Hayes.
Deeply.
Completely.
Dangerously.
And that realization came with a second one.
A much darker one.
The more I loved him, the more convinced I became that he deserved better than me.
The thought settled quietly into my chest.
A seed planted in fertile ground.
Small.
Painful.
Growing.
And even as I heard Oliver getting closer, I couldn't shake the feeling that sooner or later, that belief was going to break both our hearts.
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