Chapter Eighteen
Marina
It’s good to be back in Wyoming. I felt like I could breathe easier the minute the plane touched down.
I don’t have much to unpack.
Two trunks. That’s it.
A few changes of clothes for me and Ryder. His boots. Some pajamas. A handful of books. A few of his favorite toys.
Shelby sits cross-legged on the floor beside one trunk, folding Ryder’s shirts and stacking them on the bed, while Evelyn sorts through the other. Sunlight spills through the bedroom windows, making the whole place feel warm and golden.
I didn’t want to drag our old life into this one. Not the furniture. Not the decorations. Not the memories attached to every room of that condo.
I even told the realtor to sell it fully furnished.
Blaze had picked out everything in there anyway.
We’d bought that condo together after my last world championship win. At the time, it felt like a symbol of everything we’d built. The money. The success. The life we were supposed to have.
After he left, he signed it over to me.
Apparently, he thought that was sufficient compensation for the years we had spent together.
For all the broken promises.
I bite the inside of my cheek and place another pair of Ryder’s jeans on top of the pile.
Hopefully, the condo sells quickly. If it does, I can pay off what debts I have left, get myself a car that can handle Wyoming winters, and put whatever is left into an account for Ryder’s future.
Because I don’t foresee Blaze helping with any of that.
“I’m still trying to understand it,” Shelby says.
I glance over at her.
She’s sitting on her heels now, holding one of Ryder’s little flannel shirts in her hands.
“Understand what?”
“How he could just … walk away like that.” Her brow furrows as she folds the shirt carefully. “I can’t understand a man not wanting his child.” She looks at me. “Especially one like Ryder. That kid idolizes everything rodeo. He seems like exactly the kind of kid any cowboy would want.”
“In theory, yes,” I say. “But Blaze is selfish.”
The words come easily now. They used to hurt to say.
Now they just feel like facts.
“What he realized was that you can’t be a parent and be selfish.
” I place a set of my pajamas in the dresser and close the drawer.
“Because it isn’t about you anymore. Everything changes when you have a kid.
Your wants become secondary. Your plans have to bend.
Sometimes, you have to give things up.” I glance toward the hallway, where Ryder is currently entertaining himself with a toy truck. “He didn’t want that.”
Shelby’s expression softens.
“He wants the spotlight. He wants the wins. He wants a gorgeous woman on his arm and a life that looks good from the outside.” I shrug, though there’s nothing casual about the words. “He doesn’t want anything tying him down or getting in his way.”
“And Ryder would have done that?” she asks.
“In his eyes?” I meet her gaze. “Yes.”
I lean back against the dresser, folding my arms. “Kids grow up. They get sick. They need rides to school and help with homework. They have their own dreams and fears and problems. They need you when you’re tired, when you’re busy, when you’d rather be doing something else.
” I shake my head. “They require time. Attention. Sacrifice.”
My gaze drifts toward the hallway. “Especially mine.”
The words come out quieter. “Blaze didn’t like that. He didn’t like that Ryder became the center of my world. That my choices started revolving around him. That I couldn’t just pack a bag and chase the next win anymore.”
I look back at Shelby. “He wanted a life where nothing came before him. And the second he realized being Ryder’s father meant he couldn’t have that, he decided being a father wasn’t for him.”
Shelby studies me for a long moment. Then she asks quietly, “Do you still love him?”
The question catches me off guard.
I look down at the little shirt she’s holding. “I don’t think I ever did.”
Her eyebrows rise.
“I loved the idea of him,” I admit. “Of what we could be. I was riding the high with him. The wins. The travel. The adrenaline. We were young and successful, and everybody knew our names.”
A smile touches my mouth, but there isn’t much happiness in it.
“I loved the life I thought we were building.” I swallow. “But then Ryder came along.” My gaze drifts toward the doorway. “I’ll never forget the first time they laid him in my arms. He was so tiny.” My voice softens. “And everything shifted for me in an instant.”
I can still feel the weight of him. The warmth of his tiny body against my chest. The way his little fingers curled around mine, impossibly small and trusting.
And his smell.
That sweet, unmistakable newborn scent when I buried my nose against the soft folds of his neck and breathed him in.
“I knew right then that there wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do for him. Nothing I wouldn’t give up. Nothing I wouldn’t change.”
Shelby nods slowly.
“Blaze was just as mesmerized as I was at first.” I shake my head. “But after a while, the shine wore off, and he didn’t like the limits having a family put on him.”
Shelby lets out a breath and shakes her head. “Waylon was the opposite.”
I look at her.
“The minute he found out about Ruby, he shucked off all that bullshit pride of his and came home.” Her smile is small but full of affection. “He made amends with his father because he knew Ruby would have a better life here.”
I smile.
“And in the end, it was apparently a better life for him too. Because he found you,” I say.
From the other side of the room, Evelyn makes a soft humming sound as she hangs one of my dresses in the closet.
“Funny how that works,” she says.
We both look at her.
“When you lean into the right things—the hard things—God has a way of blessing you with more than you hoped for.”
Something about the certainty in her voice settles over me.
I look around the room. At the few belongings we brought with us. At Ryder’s little boots beside the dresser.
At the new life waiting just outside the door.
And I think maybe she’s right.
Maybe we landed here for a reason.