Chapter 3
Colton
‘What about this one?’ my brother signs before tapping the white hat on the rack in front of us. He’s wearing his processor over the back of his ear, but I sign back without asking whether or not it’s on.
I don’t mind ASL over voice one bit, and Remi prefers the former.
‘I’m not sure,’ I tell him. ‘I think I like brown better.’
I’m also fairly certain Noah wears a white hat, and there’s no way I want to match him, on purpose or incidentally.
Remi pulls one of the brown hats off the rack with a question in his eye. Now that one I like just fine. He passes it over, and I weigh it in my hands before trying it on.
‘What happened to your other hat?’ Remi asks, his motions loose and distracted as he eyes a few baseball caps nearby.
I groan, really not wanting to answer that.
Remi looks back at me with a raised brow.
‘Heather,’ I finally spell.
‘The girl you…’
He doesn’t finish his sentence, but he bounces his eyebrows in an obvious manner.
‘The girl I used to,’ I correct. ‘This was just a…slip.’
Heather and I dated briefly last year. We cut things off before it got too serious, a mutual decision. Guess I was just feeling a little lonely the other night when I ran into her at The Barrel, our town’s one and only bar. Unfortunately for me, unless I want to go back to Heather’s, my hat will remain forever lost.
Remi snorts. ‘Get the brown one. Looks good.’
I nod, plucking the hat off my head.
‘Your hair’s getting long,’ my brother adds idly. ‘Want me to cut it?’
I consider that, fingers drifting through the strands curling now at my nape and around my ears, before I shake my head. ‘I’ll keep it for now.’
He lifts his hands to say something else when a figure comes around the corner, bumping into me and sending me bumping into Remi. I help my brother catch his balance before turning to face…
Of course.
Noah fucking King.
“Oh, sorry. I—” The man cuts off abruptly, his eyes meeting mine before his teeth shut with an audible click.
“The fuck is your problem?” I say, my heart pounding fast, one hand still on Remi’s shoulder to hold him steady or—I don’t know—keep him away from Noah. My adrenaline is so high I barely even register Noah signing, ‘Sorry,’ to my brother.
“Didn’t see you,” he adds gruffly in voice, making to step past.
“What deal did you cut with the Brookes?” I ask before he can walk away, the words practically gritted out. I haven’t been able to stop wondering since I got Henrietta’s call.
Noah stops, looking back at me, his hulking presence enough to ensure my adrenaline doesn’t fade. The guy is big. Taller than me by an inch or so but bulkier by a good bit. The edgy cut to his dark brown hair—shaved at the sides but long on top—furthers the tough guy persona. As do the tattoos snaking out from under the collar of his shirt.
His eyes, a much lighter shade than his hair, narrow. “Why would I tell you?”
“’Cause I wanna know.”
“Colt,” my brother says softly, his hand on my arm squeezing once as he looks from Noah’s lips to me.
“Listen to your brother, little Colt,” Noah says with a sneer. “You won’t like what I do if you don’t let me go.”
It’s then I realize I have his arm in my grip. I drop him like a hot potato, and Noah huffs before walking off.
“Little Colt,” I repeat to myself, practically shaking.
God, I hate him. I hate him so fucking much.
‘Be right back,’ I sign to Remi.
His voice follows me, “Colton” spoken with as much pleading as resignation, but I keep on. I catch up to Noah in the next aisle over, near the farrier supplies. The box of horseshoe nails in his hand lowers to his side as he turns to face me, his stupidly full lips set into a hard line.
“Don’t,” is all he says.
I get in his face, poking his chest with my finger. “What is your problem?”
“Me?” he asks, incredulous. “What’s yours?”
“You,” I answer. “Is that not obvious?”
“You couldn’t make it any clearer,” he says flatly, pushing my hand away. “Back. Up.”
“Why?” I goad. “Feel like hitting me?”
His face runs through a myriad of emotions as my pulse beats a swift staccato in my ears. “Back up, Colton.”
I don’t know why I do it. I really don’t.
“Make me,” I spit out, shoving his chest.
The next second, there’s a forearm pressing me into the shelves of neatly boxed nails at my back, Noah’s presence looming over me and damn near suffocating.
“Jesus,” I mutter, sucking in a breath as his eyes ping between my own, the copper-colored gaze hard and unflinching.
He gives me another small shove before letting go, some of the boxes behind me rattling. Without a word, Noah King turns away, shaking his head as he walks off down the aisle.
Fuck .
My feet feel unsteady as I rejoin my brother. Remi’s eyes sweep over me quickly, concern in his gaze. His hands move swiftly in question, the motions choppy and agitated. ‘What the hell was that? You have a death wish all of a sudden?’
My head shake is slow. ‘Can’t stand the guy.’
He rolls his eyes in a no shit manner. ‘Doesn’t explain why you went after him.’
“I don’t know,” I grumble aloud, hand rubbing down my face.
Remi flicks my shoulder before tapping his chin, a perplexed frown on his face as he asks me what I said. And because I love my brother, I’ll never, ever deny repeating anything he didn’t catch the first time regardless of whether or not the words are ones I want to repeat.
‘I don’t know. I don’t know what that was, okay? He…’
My hands wave around absently as I search for words before I let them fall at my sides with a groan. Remi pats my shoulder, as if he gets it.
I’m not even sure I get it.
Yes, Noah has always been a burr under my heel, but I’m not in the habit of purposefully antagonizing the man. I’ve never once tried to get him to—what? Snap right in front of me?
I shake out my arms, certain I don’t want to find out what Noah might do to me under properly provoked circumstances. The guy is…not scary, exactly. But there’s a threat there. One I should do my best to steer clear of.
‘I don’t know,’ I sign again, shaking my head because I truly don’t have an answer. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
Remi nods, handing over the hat I’d dropped in my haste to chase after Noah. I tug the tag off after paying and plop the hat on my head, the wide brim doing its job of keeping the sun off my face as we head outside. Even so, I blink up at the sky for just a moment, the compulsion like pressing a bruise you know is going to ache.
Shaking my head once more, I face forward and put Noah fucking King firmly out of my mind.
I try. I really do.
On Monday, I head to the Morenos’ farm for their horses’ routine shoeings. Most of my work is exactly that: routine. A horse’s hoof grows the same way as human fingernails. The horseshoe prevents it from wearing down naturally as it would in the wild. That’s where the farrier comes in, among a good many other duties. We trim down the excess hoof, both the sole and the outer walls, and reaffix the metal shoe that strengthens and protects the workhorse’s hooves. They’d wear far too quickly without it, causing more harm than good for the horse.
It’s a painless process, assuming the horse has no hoof injuries that need tending to. The horseshoe can help with that, too.
What’s not painless?
The fact that, no matter how hard I try, I can not get Noah King off my mind.
On Tuesday, I’m a county over, hitting a handful of single-horse clients in the area. As I pull shoes free, use my loop knife to scrape away overgrown frog on the underside of hooves, hammer in nails, crimp and rasp off the excess metal, and smooth down the surface of over a dozen hoof walls, Noah King is on my mind. As my back gets nibbled on by curious horses and the muscles in my arms and legs ache, I hope Noah King is aching just as badly. More . The man deserves it.
On Wednesday, when I’m pounding a new set of shoes into shape, sweat trickling down my temple, I wonder where Noah King even came from. The man just popped up in town fifteen years ago, a chip on his shoulder and hate in his eyes that seemed directed at me more than anyone. Where was he before? How did he learn to shoe? Was he self-taught, or did he go to school for farrier science, learn equine anatomy and physiology as I did, maybe even train in welding?
I don’t know. And I shouldn’t care.
On Thursday, I’m back at the ranch. Or, rather, I stay on the ranch. I wake up at my leisure, the sun drifting in through the window letting me know I succeeded in my plan to sleep in. I’m slow to get out of bed for no other reason than I can be.
I like that hazy morning feeling, where the sheets are warm and rumpled and it’s oh so easy to drift in the space between asleep and awake. I laze there now, my hand sinking down my abdomen toward my crotch. Until Noah fucking King’s face pops into my head.
With a scowl, I throw back my covers and swing out of bed. By the time I get downstairs, the ranchers are in the dining room, eating their eleven o’clock lunch. I pass Ash in the doorway, tossing him an upnod and a mumbled “Morning” he looks amused by.
The scraping of utensils against nearly two dozen plates and the many conversations floating down the exceptionally long dining table are part of every mealtime here at the Darling Ranch. Most of my family is present, apart from Lawson, who’s at the school, teaching. Jackson is sitting across from an empty space that Ash likely vacated. Remi is having a conversation with Ira, one of the longtime ranch hands, Remi’s head angled in Ira’s direction and his eyes on the other man’s lips to help catch his words amidst the various sounds in the room. Even my mom and dad are here, seemingly bickering over one thing or another, as they always do.
I plop down in an empty seat and grab a fancy-looking ham sandwich.
“Morning, Colton,” my mom says lightly, her voice as amused as the look Ash threw me a minute ago.
I glance down at myself, checking that I’m dressed. I am.
“Morning,” I reply, snagging a serving bowl that still has some pasta salad inside. I load a heaping spoonful on my plate as I chew my bite of sandwich. Ash is a damn good cook—I’ll give him that.
“Late night?” my dad asks, his glasses perched down at the end of his nose.
I shrug. “Not really. Just needed the sleep.”
Someone down the table snickers, and I look around.
“What?” I ask. “What is it?”
“Colton dear,” my mom says, her brown eyes twinkling in a way I know means trouble. “You’ve got a little something…”
She taps her cheek in demonstration, and I scoot my chair hastily back, heading in the direction of the hallway bathroom. As soon as I see my reflection in the mirror, my eyes shoot wide.
“It wasn’t like that!” I shout to a chorus of returned laughter, all good-natured enough I can’t be upset by it. I wet a washcloth and scrub furiously at my cheek. Specifically, at the bright red imprint of lips. “It wasn’t .”
“No shame in the game,” my dad calls back.
Jesus Christ .
“It was Evelyn Jacobs,” I yell.
There’s more laughter at that, and someone wheezes.
“We didn’t…”
I let my voice peter out, giving up on an explanation and shaking my head. Evelyn Jacobs is in her eighties, a terrifying woman on Darling’s event planning committee. She caught me in town on my way home yesterday, verbally strong-arming me into attending this year’s Blossom Bash—Darling’s official springtime festival—with a demonstration on farriery. After procuring my resigned yes , she smacked a floral-scented kiss on my cheek and went on her way.
“It’s cute,” Remi says from the doorway, clearly battling his own laughter. “You two would make a fine couple.”
“Get over here,” I gripe, making a grab for him.
Remi deftly evades me, dancing away on lithe feet and disappearing up the stairs. I give up on trying to wipe away the red smudge and rejoin the lunch crowd. The food is good, even as my thoughts flit from Evelyn Jacobs—who I most certainly did not get with—to Heather and even the women I was with before her.
Every relationship I’ve been in—casual or not—has been fine. They’ve all been fine , but nothing much beyond that.
Is there a woman out there I’ll want to spend my hazy mornings with? Someone who’ll be more than fine . Maybe even someone capable of creating those fireworks I’ve heard other folks talking about?
If there is, I wish I knew where to find her.