Chapter 21 #2
Wyatt didn’t hesitate, always willing to be of use to his father, even if the man never loved him.
He loved him for what Wyatt did—but not for who he was.
He fetched the glass of water from the bedside table and placed the soft plastic straw against his father’s lips.
He noted the sheen of lip balm coating his lips, preventing them from cracking.
He watched his father’s throat work as he drew in the water and sighed, settling back down into his pillows, already spent from that slight movement. Wyatt carefully placed the water back and glanced back to see a pair of bright blue eyes looking back at him.
“Dad,” Wyatt said with a nod.
“You’re here,” he rasped.
Wyatt was unsure if it was surprise or indifference in his tone.
“Yes, sir, I am.”
His father’s stare impaled him on the spot, making him feel like a kid all over again. But he wasn’t a kid anymore.
“Why are you here?” his father asked.
“I think it’s pretty obvious,” Wyatt replied, glancing at the oxygen tank.
“You don’t need to be here,” he said sharply. “I don’t need… you… with this.”
Wyatt exhaled. His father never needed him, and his mother didn’t want him. He was invisible to them both. His father only saw him as another ranch hand who ate at his table and cleaned out shit from the stalls.
Maybe it had been a mistake coming here.
“I’m sorry you feel that way,” Wyatt said slowly. “I’m sorry if I was ever a burden to you. I didn’t mean to be. I think the only thing we have in common is our stubbornness and love of horses,” he choked, clearing his throat. “I… I can bring a horse around, if you want?”
His father’s gaze wavered. “I can’t ride anymore.”
Wyatt nodded, “Can you walk?”
“No.”
Wyatt glanced down at the hospice bed, frowning, wondering if it was anything like a hospital gurney and if he could roll it out.
“I got a wheelchair,” his father grumbled. “Nancy knows where it is.”
“Okay,” he turned on his heel, and his father’s voice stopped him.
“You don’t—you don’t have to do this.”
Wyatt read his father’s face and knew in that instant, he did.
“Yes, I do.”
Wyatt strode down the hall to find Nancy, Carol, and John in the kitchen, drinking iced tea and sitting around the table.
“Could I get his wheelchair?” Wyatt asked Nancy.
She jumped up, head nodding. “Yeah, but we were told he shouldn’t leave the bed without a nurse…”
“Well, good thing your nephew is a doctor, then,” John said, also getting to his feet, his steady warm eyes holding his.
“I’m gonna bring a horse around,” Wyatt informed them. “We’ll lift him out of the bed when we get back.”
Nancy and Carol stayed, and John followed him out the door.
Wyatt blindly followed the trail behind the estate to the massive working horse stable.
He heard the birds chirp, felt the heat of the sun on his face, and yet his heart ached.
It ached for the parents who couldn’t give him the love he deserved.
Ached for the father who wanted to see a horse more than his damned son.
“You okay?” John asked.
“Not really,” Wyatt muttered. “He doesn’t want me here.”
“I think we all would like to believe that some of us soften under the eyes of death. But sometimes, the fighters insist on going down swinging.”
“You mean the assholes.”
“Well, I was trying to be…”
“Nice about it,” Wyatt finished, the tension in his back shifting a little. “Because that’s what you do. You see the kindness in everyone.”
“Don’t you?” John asked with a soft challenge in his gaze.
Wyatt shook his head, “Not today.”
The two men walked silently into the barn, the scent of animal, hay, and leather filling his nostrils. He finally released the breath his soul seemed to be holding since he arrived.
Wyatt strode through the barn, hoping to recognize one of the horses but knowing it may be unlikely due to the years he’d been gone. His boots stopped at the second-to-last stall. It was Roxanne’s best friend, Charity. He grinned, reaching for her snout, stroking up and down her thick brown fur.
“Hey, you…” He drawled. “Damn, it’s good to see you.”
“Who’s this?” John asked, petting her affectionately.
“Charity. She was best friends with… Roxeanne. The horse that…”
Mateo’s horse.
His horse.
John grasped his shoulder and nodded in mute understanding. He glanced back at Charity, trying to bring understanding and compassion to the darkness that had settled around Wyatt ever since they arrived. A darkness John held with light.
Because that was who he was.
“Hello, girl,” John cooed, a genuine smile dancing on his lips, drawing up the crinkles around his eyes. “You’re a looker, aren’t ya? Aw, I see some gray. Looks better on you than me.”
He gave him a sheepish, bashful smile, and Wyatt blinked.
“I love you.”
John’s hand stilled on Charity and he turned, dark blue eyes suspending him.
Wyatt had already told him how he felt that day at the hospital and neither of them had brought it up again. But he felt it so powerfully in this moment, the undeniable truth that blazed through his soul like a torch piercing the black.
“I love you so goddamned much that I can’t breathe,” Wyatt admitted, voice cracking.
“I wasted my entire life wishing my dad would just love me. That’s all I ever wanted.
My mom left me behind and started another family.
I never had a parent who loved me the way I needed to be loved.
And it took coming back here to realize that I don’t need that anymore.
I need you. I need you to come to me on bad days and on good days.
I need you on my good days and my bad days.
Because I’m fuckin’ terrified that I don’t matter to anyone. Fuck, I need you to love me, John…”
Tears flooded him and he stepped away, digging his palms into his eyes and breaking apart at the seams.
Fuck.
He knew this would happen. He knew that coming here would hurt.
John’s arms were around him, bringing him to his chest, and Wyatt collapsed against him, sobbing into his shoulder and breathing in his scent, embracing him like a life raft, desperate and gasping.
“I want everything from you, John,” Wyatt confessed.
“And if I can’t have that, leave me here.
Leave me in this fuckin’ place and let me die like that old man, because you're my soulmate. I felt it the first time I kissed you. I think that’s why I couldn’t let you go.
I can’t let you go…” He continued to cry, shaking.
John pulled back, tears wetting his cheeks. He kissed him hard and dropped his temple to his. “You matter, Wyatt, don’t you ever, ever doubt that. You matter so much to me,” he rasped, voice threaded with emotion.
“I was too scared to say it, and I should’ve,” John continued.
“I fell in love with you on that first damned night. I was so scared because I didn’t know it was supposed to be that easy.
So, I tried to make it hard, thinking it couldn’t be real—that you couldn’t be real.
And you wouldn’t stop giving me reasons to love you,” John praised, kissing him tenderly.
“You were relentless and thank God for that. And when I saw you hurt, it broke me. I ran because it hurt to love you and lose you. I’m so, so sorry for that.
I understand now that I can never, ever do that to you again.
And I won’t. I won’t, baby,” he said firmly, kissing the tears off his cheek. “I love you.”
Wyatt hugged him hard against his body, so hard he could feel his heart beating against his own.
“I need you in my bed, my home, my life. I need you so fucking much.” John continued, both men's tears turning into joy. “I think I might even beat my parents' record…” He drew back, capturing Wyatt’s hand and tracing his ring finger. Wyatt’s heart stopped and his breath sped up.
“'Cause I don’t think I can wait a year to make you mine forever.”
Oh God.
Wyatt roughly grabbed him, pushing him against Charity’s stall. John let out a whoosh of breath from the impact as Wyatt devoured him, heart dancing in his chest.
“My answer is yes,” he whispered against John’s wet lips.
John let out a sigh, and more tears filled his eyes. Wyatt was obsessed with his vulnerability, his sensitivity—knowing he felt everything so deeply, so passionately—and that heart belonged to him now.
“But first, we’ll live together,” Wyatt said, unable to stop the smile spreading across his face and knowing he probably looked like a fool in love, but it didn’t matter because John was looking back at him the same way. “Make sure it works.”
“It will,” John replied firmly, kissing him.
“It will.”
He thought briefly of seducing John in the barn, of feeling their love in the most sensual way possible, with the smell of leather, hay, and animals filtering through his bloodstream, becoming a bit animalistic himself.
Because he could do that here. This barn was the only place growing up where he felt truly free.
He had lost his virginity to Mateo here on a stormy, hot night, caught up in the turbulence of the storm and each other.
Working with the horses here also made it the first place he had understood the value of giving without wanting anything in return.
He had found himself here, became the person he is today because of this scared place.
And damn, did he want to drop to his knees right now and give in to the temptation.
But he had unfinished business with his father. Until things felt settled and he could breathe easier here again, all those deliciously naughty things he wanted to do to John would have to wait.