Chapter 19
COLTON
We both ended up staying over at Miranda’s last night.
The two of us on her tiny-ass couch was a pain, but it gave me an excuse to keep him in a bear hold for most of the night.
After hanging out for a bit, chatting, and him filling her in on the anonymous texter, we both headed back toward the ranch.
Once I pull up, I get off my bike, placing my helmet on the fence post. Glancing over, I see Cash standing by his truck, his back to us, shielding a woman.
As Rhett crosses over to me, I call out, “Cash, who’s the flavor of the week you got hiding over there?”
Cash turns, his face a little surprised to see us both here, but he masks it as fast as he can as Halle’s face comes into view.
“Hal–Halle?” The puzzled look on my face causes Cash to turn the same shade of red as his hair.
Something flashes in Halle’s face before she’s composed again. “Thank God! I was so worried. I’ve been waiting for you.” She holds her phone up. “I’ve been watching your location all day!”
Cash snorts, but the way her eyes cut to him causes him to immediately go quiet again, making me raise an eyebrow. Before I can question more, though, Rhett cuts in.
“Thanks for the warning, guys. Rowdy Randy, was not what I expected her to be all.”
Cash and Halle both break out into laughter as Halle walks over, wrapping her arms around me in a warm embrace.
She whispers to me, “I’ll explain later, but I just had to. It was so worth it, and Cash jumped right in. Honestly, it made it even better.”
I shake my head, chuckling, and filing that away to ask Rhett about later, before pulling away from her. As soon as she’s out of my arms, she smiles before heading for her car and saying goodbye to us all.
Cash lingers for a moment, watching her car disappear, then makes some shit excuse as to why he’s making himself scarce. Darting off as the last bit of daylight shines over the fields.
I look over to Rhett who’s just standing there, watching my face. “You’re staring.” I say it without looking at him, but I’m smiling and he can probably tell.
“I know.” He doesn’t stop.
“The Randy thing. Explain.”
“They thought they were hilarious, I guess. Told me all about your ex, Rowdy Randy. I was seeing red until I saw her. That was fucked up.” He extends his hand to me, jerking his head to his truck. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”
I follow him to the truck and we climb in. He doesn’t say where we’re going, and I don’t ask. The engine turns over, pulls off the gravel and into the fields, and I watch his hands on the wheel, thinking about those same hands on me last night, and have to look out the window.
The land opens up the further we go. Fence posts thin out. The cattle disappear behind us. The grass gets taller, the quiet gets heavier, and Rhett drives like he knows exactly where he’s going, which, I suppose, he does. He’s known this land his whole life—every acre of it.
After a few minutes, he eases the truck to a stop in the middle of a field where the grass has grown high, rising halfway up the doors, brushing softly against the sides of the truck.
When the engine finally cuts, the silence settles in around us. Rhett climbs out, putting the tailgate down and hops up to sit on it. I follow, sitting next to him, and look at the expansive land around us.
“I had no clue that the ranch spans this far out,” I say quietly.
“It didn’t, at first. Grandpa Ben has been expanding for years—graduation gifts, birthdays, milestones, or anything else one of us had worth celebrating. Instead of money, we got land. This plot is mine.” He gestures widely to the tall grass stretching out as far as the eye can see around us.
“All yours?” I ask skeptically.
“Could be ours,” he says so softly, a stark contrast to the determination in his eyes.
How the fuck do I even respond to that?
I look out at the grass—try to picture it. A house sitting here instead, a porch catching the evening light, someone’s boots on the steps.
The first image that comes is wrong—a woman I don’t know, kids that aren’t mine. Rhett standing in the doorway of a life that got built the way everyone expected it to, and me somewhere else entirely, which is where I’ve always been headed anyway.
I sit with that image for a second longer than I should.
Then I look at him.
He’s not looking at the field anymore. He’s looking at me.
He’s watching me with that steady, certain expression, the one I’ve spent all summer trying to crack.
My stomach flips.
“I don’t want this because you think you’re supposed to give it to me. If we do this—any of this—it has to be because it’s actually ours. Something we build together. Not because it fits some picture you’ve had in your head your whole life.”
“I know that.” Rhett holds my eyes. “That’s why I brought you here and not anyone else.”
“Even if I have to leave for school? I won’t give up on my dreams either.” I push again.
Rhett huffs out a quiet breath. “I’d tell you you’re being stupid if you tried to stay. I want you to chase your dreams, but I want to build more with you—a whole life with you, even if it means waiting a couple years. I told you I love you and I meant it.”
“Jesus,” I mutter, running my fingers through my hair.
“Colt, I’m going to be here when you come back,” he adds, softer now. “And if you told me today that this”—he gestures to the field—“isn’t for us, then we’ll build something different that makes you happy too.”
“What about you? What about your happiness?” I ask.
Rhett leans back on his hands, looking out over the land like it’s already written. “I’ve spent twenty-three years building something I could barely see the shape of.” He looks out at the field, then back at me. “I can see it now. It’s you. That’s what changed.”
My chest tightens, something sharp and unfamiliar twisting under my ribs.. “Are you really okay with that? You’ll be happy with me?” I ask, quieter than I mean to.
He doesn’t even hesitate. “As long as you come back. I told you how I felt, Colt Dawson. You’re mine. I’m not going anywhere.”
That does it.
His eyes meet mine and I close the distance between us, angling his mouth just the way I want him so that I can devour him. I want to show him, without words, what he means to me.
Breaking the kiss, I lean my forehead against his. “I love you, Rhett, and if you want a house on this patch of land then that’s what we will do. You, with your sexy cowboy hat, Dandee, and me. We can make this ours.”
Everything else fades out around us as the last bit of sun fades away, the stars and moon replacing it and turning the landscape into a dream.
Looking up, I point to the unfiltered sky above us, stars twinkling, and chuckle. “My first house demand is a skylight so that I can kiss you under these stars in our bed.”
He chuckles with me. “I’ll start a list of your demands. I’m sure you’ll have more as we go.”
“Count on it,” I say.