Chapter 41
Forty-One
I’VE GOT TO PLAY HIS GAME OR PAY THE PRICE.
KINSLEY
"Something's wrong," Brook murmurs beside me, following my gaze to the corner where Wyatt and Senator Martinez stand too close, their voices too low beneath the country band's slow ballad.
"I can see that." My voice comes out steady, controlled.
We step through the wooden doors into the evening air, where string lights crisscross overhead and a small cluster of guests watches the confrontation from a careful distance, champagne glasses frozen halfway to lips.
Across the venue, Cash and his band continue to play, oblivious to the tension unfolding at the edge of the dance floor.
Blood dots the senator's lower lip. Fresh. Red.
By the time we reach them, crossing the polished concrete that reflects the amber glow of overhead lights, I've stuffed every emotion I have into a tin box inside my heart where they will stay until the end of time.
Martinez dabs his mouth with a handkerchief, his eyes never leaving Wyatt's face. I get the feeling that he is putting on a show for me and making sure I know that Wyatt hit him. I don’t care if he is trying to manipulate me into taking his side.
I’m here to do a job and that means playing nice with this man that I want to grind under my boot.
"Gentlemen," I say, stepping into their orbit with the same calm I've used to defuse a hundred political standoffs.
Inside, I'm calculating damage control—one bloody senator, dozens of witnesses, and a client relationship hanging by a thread.
This is familiar ground, even as my personal life collapses.
"I hope everything's all right over here. "
Martinez's smile spreads across his face like oil on water. "Miss Rose. Always the professional, aren't you?"
"I take my job very seriously, Senator." The words taste like ash, but muscle memory kicks in and I deliver them with a practiced confidence I do not feel. I feel nothing, actually, there’s a great whole of emptiness where feelings should be inside of me.
Wyatt's eyes flicker with a plea, an apology, a warning. But I can't afford to look into his eyes right now. I can’t afford to show him sympathy or even acknowledge he’s standing there, or I’ll crack open.
Everything we’ve worked for hangs in the balance. We need the senator’s commitment to our cause tonight.
"Beautiful event," Martinez continues, gesturing toward the crowd with his bloodied handkerchief in an effort to get me to notice it. "Though I have to say, the entertainment tonight has been... unexpected."
Blood on a senator's face. At my event. With two hundred possible witnesses and heaven knows how many cell phone cameras. I’ve got to play his game or pay the price. "Senator, are you hurt?"
"I'm fine." His tongue darts out to test his split lip. "There's no problem here, is there, Wyatt?"
Wyatt's jaw works, muscles jumping beneath sun-weathered skin, but he doesn't speak.
"Good. Good." Martinez folds his handkerchief with deliberate precision, every movement calculated. "I think it's time I gather my family. Good night, Miss Rose." He turns to Wyatt with the satisfied smile of a man who's just closed a profitable deal. "I'll be in touch about our discussion."
He walks away, leaving us standing in the wreckage of whatever just happened.
"Wyatt," I start, but a few guests glance our way—curious looks, raised eyebrows.
They sense drama but can't quite place it.
Thankfully not everyone saw what just happened.
The band plays on, couples still swaying on the dance floor.
Life moving forward while something fundamental just shifted beneath our feet.
"What did he say to you?" Brook asks her brother. She puts her hand on my arm in a show of support.
Every line of Wyatt's body screams barely controlled rage.
His shoulders bunch beneath his suit jacket, knuckles still red from the impact.
The muscle in his jaw works overtime, clenching and unclenching like he's biting back words that would only make things worse.
When he finally looks at me, his eyes hold the kind of wild edge that comes from being backed in a corner—the same look I've seen in the seconds before he nods for the chute to open, when there's no way out but through.
"Nothing."
"Don't," I rasp. “We both know that's not true—you don't split a senator's lip over nothing." I'm shaking and I'm scared, but I need to know what's happening. "Don't lie to me. Not tonight."
Wyatt exhales but doesn't say a word. He's not about to tell me or Brook anything.
The anger hits me like a flash flood—sudden, overwhelming, and safer than the alternative. Anger I can handle.
"You’ve ruined everything." My voice stays level, controlled, but each word carries the edge of someone who's truly furious. "I'm trying to save the ranch and you're punching the man who could save your future."
His eyebrows come together, and he looks at me, hard. "You mean—our future."
"Do you have any idea what you've done?" My mind catalogs the damage like an autopsy report—Martinez's influence with federal agencies, the guests who might have seen something, the potential media nightmare if this gets out. "He could destroy your family."
Brook sucks in.
"And you hit him." I shake my head. "I'm not sure how I'm going to fix this."
Wyatt senses that I'm not just talking about the land. He grabs my arms, his grip firm but gentle. "I love you."
Three words. Simple. Desperate. True.
I stare at him in shock, my breath catching painfully in my chest. The party fades around us as my skin burns where he touches me. My mother's voice echoes in my head: Men say what they need to when they're cornered.
But this is Wyatt.
He loves me, I can’t be that wrong, can I? The image of his hand on Brittney's stomach flashes before my eyes, a stark contradiction to his declaration.
Something cracks inside me—the last of my defenses, maybe, or just the final fracture in my already broken heart. My throat tightens as I swallow down all the things I want to scream. How dare he say those words now, after everything that's happened? After I've seen the truth with my own eyes?
"It doesn't matter," I blurt, my voice barely steady.
"Excuse me. I need to …" Brook walks away. I don't blame her. I don't want to be here either.
His face goes white. "What do you mean it doesn't matter?"
"She's having your baby, Wyatt." Each word is tar. "Do you have any idea what it's like to grow up wondering why your father chose someone else over you? To spend your whole childhood believing you weren't worth staying for?"
"You think I'd abandon my own child?" His voice is raw with horror and heartbreak.
The question knocks the wind from me. Of course he wouldn't abandon his child. That's what makes this impossible. That's what makes Wyatt different from my father and every other man my mother warned me about.
This isn't about choices or him picking sides. This is about reality crashing into the fairy tale I'd barely let myself believe in.
He has a baby coming. A family to build with someone else. And I have to do damage control.
"No. Which is why you can't love me." I turn away before he can see the truth in my eyes—that part of me wants to believe him desperately, wants to find a way through this impossible tangle.
But wanting isn't enough. Not with a child in the balance.
My heels click against the concrete as I move away, each step costing more than the last. The band shifts to a slower melody as I weave between clusters of guests.
"Kinsley!"
His voice cracks behind me, anguished and reaching, but I don't stop. Can't stop. If I stop, I'll break.
Inside, I'm mourning a future I barely let myself imagine—quiet mornings on the ranch, Wyatt's hands gentle in my hair, the possibility of belonging somewhere, to someone, for keeps.
Our own baby—or babies. I wanted two. Preferably, little girls, so I didn't have to watch my babies ride bulls, but I would have done it for him—for them—because I would have loved them that much.
I love him that much.
I look up and pray the tears won't fall. My eyes sting, and my heart hurts worse. I reach for that empty feeling and shove everything into the void.
Love ends.
Dreams shatter.
But work—work is always there, demanding nothing but competence and giving back exactly what you put into it. And if there’s a chance I can salvage anything out of this night, I’ve got to try.
On the dance floor, couples sway under a string of lights to Cash’s ballad about a second chance at love while I catalog the evening's wreckage. Martinez's split lip. The possible media nightmare waiting to explode. The ranch that still needs saving, somehow, without the senator's support.
I've got hours to come up with a new strategy to salvage this situation or accept what I've always known—that some places aren't meant to be home, no matter how badly you wish they were.